The Devil's Puzzle (20 page)

“Ed Bryant was the man who got into a fight with my uncle,” Molly said. “Jesse told me.”

“He did? Jesse sure is being generous with information,” I said. Far more generous than he often was with me. I turned back to Natalie. “Does Mary have money?”

“She must. She’s never worked as far as I know. I don’t know what her husband did. Or maybe Glad supports her.”

“Any kids?”

“None. She does have cats, though. Lots of them. At least that’s what I’ve heard. And she’s supposed to be a witch.”

I rolled my eyes. “A Wiccan witch, or a broom-and-pointy-hat witch?”

“Broom and pointy hat, I guess. Kids are afraid of her.”

“Jesse says she’s strange,” I said, as I pulled into the driveway of a drab and uncared-for brown house. Weeds had taken over the front of the house, and what had once been a colorful garden gnome was broken in pieces and trapped by a bush. “And so far, I’m pretty sure I agree with him.”

“How charming to have young visitors.” Mary Shipman opened the door to her small house with a cat in one arm and what looked like a beer in the other. Her long, graying hair was loosely tied in a ponytail, and she was wearing a lime green T-shirt paired with a long, flowing skirt of the same green but with bright pink and orange flowers on it. She had flat sandals on, showing off red toenails. But what caught my eye was a large, ornately carved silver bracelet dangling from her left arm.

“That’s beautiful,” I said.

“Thank you. It was a gift.”

She waved us inside and what I saw was in stark contrast to the outside of her home. The place was funky, but it was beautifully decorated and alive with color. All around her living room were items from faraway places—Asian art next to pieces clearly from Africa, hanging above sculptures from India.

“Did you get these yourself?” I asked.

“Yes. Years ago. My late husband and I were quite the world travelers. And for a time I went solo. But that’s all behind me now.”

“Why is that?”

“You don’t know? I thought everyone knew,” she said. “I’m the crazy woman in the ugly house. I never go out.”

“Never?” Molly asked.

She smiled. “Only in the dead of night, and then only to lure strangers to my home so I can use their bones in my spells.” She looked at Natalie. “Are you fat or pregnant?”

“Pregnant.”

“Well, then I won’t offer you a beer. How about you?” she pointed at me.

“Water,” I said. “We’ll all have water.”

She shrugged and left us alone except for a cat here and there that wandered into the room.

“A beer? It’s nine in the morning,” Natalie whispered.

“I’m not sure she cares about the time.”

When she came back, she had three large glasses of water as well as a platter of grapes, strawberries, and cut-up pineapple. Natalie and I sat on a large cream sofa, Molly sat across from us on its exact match, and Mary sat next to her. And she stared. Out of nervousness, both Natalie and I immediately went for the fruit.

“You’ll have to forgive my manners,” Mary said. “So few people come to see me. Just my sister, and of course, Ed.”

“Ed Bryant?”

“Yes. He’s a dear friend.” She looked at me, amused. “You’re not terribly well-informed about the gossip in this town, are you dear?”

“I guess not,” I said. “Why don’t you fill me in?”

CHAPTER 31

M
ary Shipman sipped her beer and stared at me. “Where would you like me to start?”

I considered it for a moment. I couldn’t quite determine why, but I felt that she had the answers to all my questions. Maybe it was the amused way she looked at three women she didn’t know who had arrived at her door unannounced. Or it could have been the clear, constant gaze directly into my eyes. If she was a witch, she probably was casting a spell on me as I sat there.

“How do you know Ed?” I asked.

“I’ve lived in this town my entire life, as has Ed. He taught at the high school when I was a student there. Not my teacher. I didn’t care for science. But even so, it would be a strange thing if we didn’t know each other.”

“Why does he visit you?”

“Do you know Ed?”

“Yes,” I said.

“And do you like him?”

“He’s very nice.”

“I feel the same way.” She looked from me to Natalie and Molly. “Is that why you came, or is there something else you would like to know?”

“There was a skeleton found in my grandmother’s backyard,” I said, hoping to start the conversation slowly and build up to love affairs and the other long-buried secrets of Archers Rest.

“Your grandmother is Eleanor Cassidy?” She laughed. “Should have known. She’s always jumping in to help, whether she’s asked to or not. How’s Oliver? Has she agreed to marry him yet?”

Natalie coughed out a piece of pineapple. “You know?” she stammered.

“I hear things.”

“From who?” I asked. “You said your only visitors are Ed and Glad, and neither of them is aware of any possible engagement.”

“Maybe I just read it in the stars.”

I matched her stare with my own and made a guess. “Maggie?”

The corners of her mouth curled up. “She might have mentioned it.”

“When did she come to see you?”

“She brought me a cat. A stray had popped up on her doorstep and she knew that I would care for it. One of Maggie’s grandchildren is allergic, so she couldn’t keep the little thing herself.”

“And how did the conversation turn to Eleanor?”

“How does any conversation turn anywhere? We began to talk about our mutual friends. I could see that Maggie was troubled about something, and she confided.”

“What was her concern?”

She smiled. “That would be a question for her, Nell.”

I sat up straight. “You know my name?”

“You said you were Eleanor’s granddaughter. I assume the one that’s living with her and dating the police chief. That makes you Nell.” She sipped her beer. “And this is Natalie. She’s Susanne’s daughter and works at the shop.” She looked at Molly. “I don’t know who you are, I’m afraid.”

“I’m Winston Roemer’s grandniece.”

“I can see a slight resemblance. More to Grace than to her son. Which is a good thing. Winston was an attractive man, in a stern sort of way, but you’d hardly want to take after a man so unhappy with the world.”

“Was he unhappy?” Molly asked. “Why?”

“I don’t know, dear. He didn’t confide in me,” Mary said, then turned back to me.

“How is Jesse, Nell? Is he as scared about marriage as it appears? Or is that just you?”

“We’re not talking about getting married.”

“Other people are talking about your marriage, pushing you toward it. I would suggest, if you’re looking for advice, that you put the idea on the back burner for now. You need to be the individual you are first.”

“Thanks for the advice. What’s your source?”

“It’s gossip, not witchcraft, despite what you may have heard.”

“Fair enough,” I said. “What gossip do you know about Winston Roemer? Aside from the fact that he was unhappy.”

“None, but I do have firsthand information,” she said. She rested her hand on Molly’s. “I don’t mean to bring up sad memories of your uncle. You should know that he was a lovely dancer and he had a wonderful laugh. Deep, throaty. He also spoke several languages: Spanish, French, and Latin, if I remember correctly. He was the one who got me interested in world travel. He told me once I had the potential to be anything I wanted to be and I shouldn’t let small-town gossips get in my way. I had quite the crush on him.”

“Did that make Ed jealous?” I asked.

She laughed. “Wouldn’t that have been something? No, dear. Ed and I became involved with each other many years later, after my husband’s death, and only for a short time. I knew Winston when I was a girl of only nineteen.”

“Did you have an affair with him?” Natalie leaned forward as far as her belly would allow.

“No. Sadly, no. Winston was not available.”

“Meaning,” I said, “he was already involved with someone.”

“Meaning exactly that.”

Natalie and I glanced toward each other. “Who?”

Mary smiled. “One of Archers Rest’s finest citizens. Can I get any of you more water?” she asked as she got up.

“Yes, please,” I said. I was afraid if I said no, it would be my cue to leave, and there was no way I was leaving yet.

“Who do you think she means?” Molly asked once Mary had left the room.

“I don’t even know if she was being sarcastic,” I answered. “But if she meant it, then Glad pops to mind.”

“But she wasn’t prominent then. She was a teenager.”

“Assuming she meant 1975, and assuming she wasn’t just amusing herself at our expense.”

“I’m not sure we’re going to get a straight answer out of her,” Molly said.

“Well, we’re going to try.” I got up and went looking for Mary.

I found her in the kitchen. As I walked in, she was hanging up the phone. She blushed when she saw me.

“Do you know who might have killed Winston?” I asked. No reason not to get right to the point.

“No, I don’t.”

“Lots of people in town didn’t like him.”

“Lots of people in town don’t like me. People don’t like different. It’s scary when someone insists on being who they are regardless of what people think.” She smiled a little. “I imagine you struggle with that.”

I took a step back. “Why would I . . .”

“The town’s own Sherlock Holmes—isn’t that your reputation?”

“I don’t know if anyone calls me that.”

“They do. But you have an instinct about people, if what I hear is right. You help others. You shouldn’t run away from that or be embarrassed about it.”

Now I was blushing. “I’m concerned about my grandmother,” I said.

“Don’t be. That will work out the way it was meant to. Focus yourself elsewhere.”

“The quilt show or the murder?”

“I know my sister. If you don’t pull off the quilt show to her satisfaction, there will be a murder.”

“Was she the one? The person Winston was involved with?”

“No, but he would have been her type. She was dating a local boy. Someone her own age. He was cute. He played high school football and ran track. Drove my father crazy because he was, how should I say it, not a member of the country club.”

“What happened to him?”

“He became the mayor.”

CHAPTER 32

“I
don’t think that means anything,” Jesse said as we ate lunch two hours later. “They dated in high school, more than thirty years ago.”

“It’s just interesting. They don’t seem to like each other now.”

“What’s hard to imagine is that they liked each other then. Glad dating a local gardener working his way through college? Hardly seems like the type of guy to get her attention.”

“You mean she would go for sophisticated, worldly men,” I said.

“No, I mean she would go for rich men.”

“Like Winston?”

He tilted his head and stared at me. “He was more than twice her age.”

“So what?”

He shrugged. “I guess it’s a possibility, but I doubt Glad will tell us if it’s true.”

“Speaking of Glad, did you ask her about last night?”

“Not yet.”

“Why not? Did you look at what she did to Archer’s grave?”

“What
someone
did,” he said. “It was red paint, nearly a whole gallon of it. You were right about that. It must have been the person you saw running into the cemetery, which may or may not have been Glad.”

“Whoever it was, I didn’t see a paint can in her hand.”

“I checked with the hardware store and the art store. No one sold that color paint recently. So either someone already had it, or went out of town to get it.”

“She didn’t want it traced back to her.”

“I have a hard time believing it was Glad,” he said. “No matter who you saw drive off.”

“Why do you say that?”

“She was the one who raised the money for a new headstone. She personally suggested the epitaph. Besides, she’s practically a John Archer groupie. Why would she want to vandalize his grave? Much more likely it was her sister. She is strange, isn’t she?”

I thought about it for a minute. “No, she’s not,” I said. “I actually liked her. She’s very . . . she’s comfortable with herself.”

“She’s odd.”

“What’s wrong with being odd? I’m a little odd.”

He smiled. “You’re good odd.”

“What, exactly, makes Mary the suspect in everything that goes on in town?”

Jesse looked around as if he were embarrassed to be overheard. “When I was about ten, she was arrested for threatening to blow up city hall, while the entire city council was inside.”

“I heard something about that. Do you know why she made the threat?”

“What do you mean, ‘why?’ Is there a good reason for trying to do something like that?”