5 Murder by Syllabub (21 page)

“Soap.” Aunt Mary walked over to the crock, lifted the lid and looked in. “You make your own soap?”

“Well, just for the things in here, and for what we do in the classes. I have a small kitchen in the new part of the house. I’ve got a bathroom, electric lights and a TV, too.” She laughed a little self-consciously.

I thought it
was the smartest statement Hattie had made all day. It was wonderful to know how our ancestors lived, and I thought it important for everyone to know how our country came into being. I’d always enjoyed the few history classes I’d taken, and the little I’d seen of Colonial Williamsburg had left me wanting to see more. However, reading about history—or even visiting reenactments of history—was one thing. No shower and no hot water crossed my limit line. I picked up my purse and followed them out into the garden.

“T
hat was the best spinach salad I’ve ever eaten.” Noah pushed his chair back a little and smiled. His mother looked at him. “Next to yours, Mom, of course.”

Mildred started to shake her head but stopped. She put her hand up to the large white bandage that covered the left side of her head instead. “Mary’s is better. You’ll tell me how to make it?”

“It couldn’t be easier. However, it’s politically incorrect. I make the dressing with hot bacon fat.”

“No wonder he liked it.”

“Umhm. Very good.” Elizabeth sounded as if she wasn’t quite sure what she was claiming was good and the two bites missing from her plate didn’t do much to validate her opinion. “I wonder where Cora Lee is? She didn’t say in her message, did she?” Elizabeth knew she hadn’t. She’d listened to it twice. “What’s she doing in Richmond? I didn’t know she had friends there.”

Noah shifted in his chair. He opened his mouth as if to speak but closed it again. He glanced at Mildred, who stared down at her barely touched piece of chicken. Finally, he seemed to make up his mind. “She’s got an attorney in Richmond.”

Elizabeth almost dropped her fork. “An attorney. Is she finally going to divorce C.J.? I thought they had that all worked out.”

“I don’t think she’s seeing a divorce attorney.”

“Oh.” This time the fork dropped and Elizabeth’s hand flew up to her mouth. “It’s about the will, isn’t?” She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I guess I can’t blame her. After all, Smithwood should, by all rights, be hers.”

“I don’t know,” Noah said. “I don’t know why she’s seeing him.”

Aunt Mary laid down her fork. “You know, I’m a little tired of you people speaking in code. Elizabeth, you asked me out here to help you, but so far I haven’t been much help, largely because I have no idea what’s going on.” She turned to Noah. “Who is Cora Lee seeing and how do you know?” To Elizabeth, she said, “Whose will? What are you talking about?”

Noah pushed his plate away and glanced again at his mother. Her eyes didn’t meet his. Noah sighed. “I guess we’ve been a little remiss.”

“You might say that.” Aunt Mary picked up her wineglass and settled back in her chair, as if waiting to hear a good story.

“One of our officers
—a good friend of mine—was over in Richmond this afternoon, giving a deposition. He came into the station as I was leaving. He told me.” Noah spoke slowly, as if his words were a minefield he was trying to pick his way through. “He knows Cora Lee. He knows her story. So, when he saw her going into Alan Baedeker’s office, he asked me what was going on.”

Aunt Mary said,
“I don’t know her story. I don’t know who Alan Baedeker is or why Cora Lee would go to see him.” Her tone left no room for discussion. Someone needed to enlighten her, now.

“Cora Lee’s father disinherited her when she was nineteen or so.” Elizabeth stabbed at her chicken with her fork as if it had personally insulted her.

I watched for a moment, waiting for her to go on, but she didn’t. “All right,” I said. “Why?”

“She got married, that’s why.” Mildred put her fork down and reached over to cover Elizabeth’s hand with hers. “Elizabeth, you had nothing to do with it. Nobody knew you then. You weren’t the one who threw Cora Lee out and you weren’t the one who got her pregnant. So, quit feeling guilty.”

I didn’t know why I was so shocked. The scenario described by Mildred had played out many times, in many families, over the centuries. “I gather she married C.J.?”

Mildred nodded. “The old man hated C.J. and when he found out Cora Lee was not only pregnant, but married to him, he threw her out. Then he drew up a new will saying she could never inherit nor could any of her issue. Issue. That meant his grandchildren.”

Some things were coming clear. Elizabeth’s tolerance of Cora Lee and all her little barbs, for instance.

Aunt Mary looked from Mildred to Elizabeth.
“I wondered why you hadn’t told her to take a hike long ago. Guilt makes us do strange things. Mildred’s right, though. You shouldn’t feel any. What was so awful about this C.J., anyway?”

Mildred
sighed and shook her head at Elizabeth, who appeared suddenly tongue-tied. “I’ll tell them.” She turned to face Aunt Mary and me. “Charles John Wittingham’s family didn’t come from Virginia. They came from New England originally and settled in Atlanta after the war. The important war, the one that counted. They were carpetbaggers. As far as Mr. Smithwood was concerned, they still were and always would be.”

I made a face.
“Are you telling me the only thing he had against that boy was he wasn’t from Virginia?” I’d heard about this kind of thing, had read books where family was everything. Wasn’t
Romeo and Juliet
the same story? The Hatfields and the McCoys? But the Civil War had been over for a hundred and fifty years or more. As for the Revolutionary War, well, there’d been even more time for families to shift and change. “Family history doesn’t seem enough to count someone as worthless.”

“Hattie doesn’t think so,
” Mildred continued, “but there was something else that old Mr. Smithwood could never forgive.” She sighed again, reached up to touch the bandage on her head and winced. Dark circles had begun to form under her eyes and her mouth looked pinched and tired, but I needed her to finish.

I didn’t think we’d get much out of Elizabeth. “Go on.”

“C.J. got rich. Very rich. It seems he had the Midas touch. Started out making a fortune in pork bellies, or something like that, and didn’t look back. Mr. Smithwood never forgave him.” She gave Elizabeth a sad little smile. “I think he wanted Cora Lee to come crawling back broke, begging for her father’s forgiveness. It didn’t work out that way.”

“And now?”
Clearly, somewhere along the line the marriage had fallen apart. What happened wasn’t any of our business, unless Cora Lee had it in mind to get her share of Smithwood back.

Elizabeth lifted her head, her eyes troubled. “She has two children, both grown, of course, and five grandchildren. One of her granddaughters is going to graduate from Stanford next month. Her kids have never been here. Neither have her grandkids. I’m not sure they care, but she does. She loves this place, and I know she thinks they got cheated.”

“Old Mr. Smithwood is dead. So is Mrs. Smithwood. Why didn’t William just change the will or give her part of the estate?” It seemed an obvious solution to a not very difficult problem.

“Mr. Smithwood held a deep grudge.” Mildred kept patting Elizabeth’s hand in a gesture I thought was meant to be comforting, but the bitterness in her voice wasn’t. William’s father hadn’t treated Mildred and her family any better and Elizabeth hadn’t followed through on changing that situation. At least, not yet. “He had the will sewed up tighter than a tick clinging to a dog in summer.” Mildred’s face got tight and she squeezed Elizabeth’s hand,
making her flinch. “He wasn’t a forgiving man. Neither is Cora Lee. C.J. started to cheat on her just as soon as his first million was in the bank. She would have left him flat, but she refused to give her father the satisfaction. The day he died she came back and started to help her mother. When William needed someone to manage the plantation while he taught, she jumped at the chance.”

“You think she’s seeing the attorney because now that William’s also dead, she thinks Smithwood should be hers
?” I asked. I couldn’t believe it. Cora Lee had an acid tongue and a wicked sense of humor—if you could call her little barbs humor—but I thought she was genuinely fond of Elizabeth. Maybe she was fonder of Smithwood. Only, to go to an attorney behind Elizabeth’s back to get the will set aside didn’t make sense. “She’d have to get two wills set aside, wouldn’t she?”

Elizabeth seemed confused. “Two wills?”

“Think about it. If her father cut her off and William got everything, and he left it all to you, she’d have to get both of them changed.”

Noah had been silent. Now he sat up and shook his head. “I don’t think so. If she could prove she had been wrongly cut out of her share by Smithwood, then William would have only his share to leave to Elizabeth.”

“Would Cora Lee know that?”

“Oh, yes. Marriage to C.J. taught her a lot of things.”

Mildred looked up for the first time. She put her hand up to her head again and touched the white bandage covering the stitches in her scalp, which also covered the hair that had been cut away. It was a different pain that bothered her. “Elizabeth.”

Elizabeth turned to her expectantly.

“Have you made a will?”

Elizabeth
was stunned. The implication was only too clear. “No.”

“If something happens to you, what happens to Smithwood?”

There was probably more than one reason Mildred asked that question, but one stood out. If the Longos’ house wasn’t deeded over to them, they could be out on the street. I’d never been in a room this quiet, with people waiting for an answer they all knew already.

“I don’t know.” Elizabeth
appeared to shrink in front of our eyes. “One more thing to ask Aaron Glass.” She pushed her plate away as if the very sight of it made her sick. “The lawyer Cora Lee went to see, does he do divorce?”

Noah watched Elizabeth, as if he expected her to break down. She wouldn’t, even if her straws collapsed. I was sure of that. “No
,” Noah said. “He specializes in estate law. Wills, deeds, that kind of thing.”

The silence descended once again, settling down around us like a fog.

Aunt Mary broke it. “She could very well be setting up her own will. She’s at the age where you need to think about that kind of thing. Cora Lee will have plenty to leave. Maybe it’s as simple as that.”

Noah brightened, looked around the table at each of them, almost imploring them to believe that theory.

Still, no one spoke. We all sat, lost in thought, not one of us wanting to believe the possible implications.

Finally Aunt Mary
said, “Even if she is looking into her father’s will, that doesn’t mean she wants to contest it. It certainly doesn’t mean she murdered someone. Besides, she wasn’t the one who attacked Mildred.” What was left unsaid was that Cora Lee had opportunity for everything else that had happened.

All eyes dropped back to the table. No one said a word.

T
he front door opened.

“Anybody here?” A female voice echoed down the hallway.

Both dogs were on their feet, barking at the top of their lungs, running toward the doorway.

A slim brown woman in hospital scrubs, hair cropped short, brown eyes rimmed with fatigue, walked into the room. Noah was on his feet in an instan
t, gathering her in his arms, planting a soft kiss on her cheek. The dogs both danced around her, demanding her attention. She kissed Noah and bent down to rub Max’s ears. She tried to do the same for Petal, but the little dog kept jumping away, barking and whining. “You’ll have to stop that if you want a scratch, you silly thing.”

Petal didn’t take the hint. She kept on jumping and barking. Elizabeth got up and caught
the little dog. “You’re an idiot. Now stop that.” Petal immediately settled down. Felicity, for it could be no one else, reached toward her and rubbed her ears. Petal whimpered with pleasure and licked the woman’s hand.

Felicity grinned. “I’m sorry I’m so late. There was a wreck on the Colonial Parkway and they needed another nurse in the ER. Did you get my message?”

“We did.” Mildred pushed her chair back and started to her feet. “We saved you dinner. Balsamic Chicken, mashed potatoes and spinach salad, courtesy of Mary. Sit down, child. You look done in.”

“Oh, good. I’m starved. Never did get time for lunch.” She walked over to the sink to wash her hands. “Where’s Cora Lee?”

Aunt Mary was taking Felicity’s foil-wrapped dinner plate out of the warming oven but stopped, her back to the room. How much of this did Felicity know? Rather, how much had Noah told her?

“She’s in Richmond.” Noah didn’t elaborate.

Felicity turned away from the sink, the dishtowel still in her hands. “What’s she doing in Richmond?”

“Seeing an attorney.” Mildred’s voice was flat, almost devoid of interest. Almost.

“What attorney?” Felicity hung the dishtowel back on the hook and walked toward the table. Petal followed, but Felicity ignored her. She stopped in front of Noah, her eyes demanding an answer.

“Alan Baedeker.”

Felicity didn’t say anything, but her eyes widened and she shook her head. She grabbed the top of the chair next to Noah, pulled it back and lowered herself into it. “Damn. I’m exhausted.”

“You know him?” Elizabeth seemed surprised and not a little displeased at the thought.

Felicity nodded. “He does wills, estates, probate, that kind of thing. My folks used him for theirs, and I’ve run into him a couple of times at the hospital. I had to witness a will one time. Why did she go to see him?”

“That’s what we’re wondering.” There was something in Elizabeth’s voice that made Aunt Mary pause before she slipped the food she’d been keeping warm in front of Felicity. Wariness? Disappointment? Certainly discouragement.
It wasn’t surprising.

It had been a terrible few months and things weren’t getting any better. William’s death, someone prowling the upstairs hallway, a crate pushed over
, almost hitting her, then Monty murdered.
Now Cora Lee, who she thought she could trust, might be trying to get Smithwood from her. Or, had she suspected that for some time? She’d told Aunt Mary she needed someone she could trust. Cora Lee might want Smithwood, but she wouldn’t get it by maiming, or killing, Elizabeth. Neither would Noah or Mildred. They all had a vested interest in keeping Elizabeth alive and well. Who would? Calvin Campbell? No. He had a motive for killing Monty. Revenge. That didn’t include Elizabeth. However, he kept showing up at odd moments. He’d worked here for years and probably knew every inch of the property. He could know how to get in and out of the house. Calvin bore looking into.

I pushed my plate away. The thought that any one of these people could have done such a thing ruined my appetite. Someone had, though. The questions was, who? Why?

“This is wonderful,” Felicity effectively ended that train of thought. “Noah, do you think I could have a glass of that wine? Bring the bottle. There are some empty glasses here.”

Noah jumped up to get the wine.

“I think Mildred needs to go home. She’s looking tired and her head must be pounding.” Aunt Mary held her glass out for him to pour a little in it also. “Why don’t you and Felicity take her just as soon as she finishes?”

Felicity nodded and cut a slice off her chicken breast. Noah set a full glass in front of her. She smiled her thanks. “Are you sure Cora Lee went to see the lawyer? Robert Tucker is in that building. He’s one of the best orthopedic surgeons in the state. I’d think she’d want a second opinion before she commits to anything. Of course, she could be updating her will before she goes into surgery. Although, a hip replacement doesn’t—why are you all staring at me like that? Oh, oh. She hasn’t told you.”

“Hip replacement?” That got Elizabeth’s attention. Her head jerked up and she stared at Felicity. “She hasn’t said anything about a hip replacement.”

Felicity sighed and laid her fork down on her plate. “I shouldn’t have said anything, but I thought you all knew. You only have to watch her walk to tell she’s in pain.”

“I thought the cane was an affectation. A part of her statement. She’s good at that kind of thing.” Elizabeth’s voice was faint.

That had been my assumption, too
. Thinking back, the little winces, the leaning on the cane to take the weight off one side—how could I have missed it?

“We have to help her.”

“Cora Lee doesn’t want help. She doesn’t even want us to know. She’s a proud and stubborn woman.” Aunt Mary was right.

But Elizabeth had suspected Cora Lee of doing something that would hurt her deeply. Now, in a fit of guilt, she’d try to make it up in an excess of sympathy. That wouldn’t work.

Mildred nodded. “Cora Lee equates sympathy with pity and help with weakness. Felicity, why did she tell you?”

Felicity gave an embarrassed little laugh. “She didn’t. I took a patient to X-ray a few weeks ago and there was a chart with her name on it. I picked it up and read it. I didn’t realize she hadn’t told any of you. I should have, though. She’s so blasted proud. I’m really sorry.” She pushed her plate away and leaned forward. “If you’re going to start feeling sorry for Cora Lee, think again. This is a hip replacement. People have them all the time. She’ll be fine. This is Cora Lee we’re talking about. She looks fragile as glass, but she’s as tough as a steel bayonet, and just as sharp. Quit worrying. She’ll tell you when she’s good and ready, probably the day before the surgery.”

Elizabeth smiled broadly and leaned back. “I knew it all the time. Cora Lee wouldn’t ever go behind my back.”

Aunt Mary smiled also.

I didn’t think she was nearly as convinced as Elizabeth, who had jumped to conclusions again. Cora Lee might be having surgery for her hip, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t trying to take back what she considered rightly hers. Cora Lee had gone into the attorney’s
office
, not just the building. She might have intended to get her will in order, but perhaps not. I’d give a lot to know why Cora Lee really went to see that attorney.

Noah drained the last of his wine and pushed back his chair. “I’m sorry about Cora Lee, but Mom’s fading fast.”

Mildred looked as if she couldn’t take much more. Her eyes were closing and the pain around them was evident.

Felicity took another look at her and nodded. “We probably shouldn’t have brought her over. Although, it would have been a shame if she hadn’t had some of this wonderful dinner.” She took another quick bite, reached over, picked up Mildred’s wrist and took her pulse. “Yep. It’s time you went home. Noah, did they give her any pain pills?”

He nodded. “A few. Doc wrote out a prescription as well. He said not to give her anything but what he prescribed.”

“Head wounds can be tricky.” Felicity helped Mildred to her feet and looked around for her coat
, which was draped over the rocking chair. Felicity thrust one of Mildred’s arms in a sleeve then, carefully avoiding the bandage on Mildred’s head, put the other in and pulled the coat up over her shoulders. “Your concussion was mild. That doesn’t mean you don’t need to rest.” She gave Mildred a peck on the cheek. “You need sleep more than anything right now.” She turned so she faced Noah and gently pushed her into his arms. “I’ll be down directly. Noah, can you help her get into bed?”

“I don’t need help.” Mildred lifted her chin and glared at all of them. Or, she tried to. Pain and exhaustion made it a failed attempt. “It’ll be a bad day when I can’t get into my own nightgown.”
Starting for the door, she staggered and caught herself just in time.

“We’re on our way.” Noah had his hand under his mother’s arm, ignoring her protests. “Thanks for dinner, and Flice, we’ll see you soon?”

“Just let me finish this last bite and I’ll be right behind you.”

No one sat back down until the front door closed.

Then Felicity dropped into her chair and leaned her elbows on the table. “Okay. Just what’s going on around here?”

“I wish to hell I knew.” Elizabeth’s jaw was set. She was angry and scared and had no problem
showing it. “Mildred’s getting attacked was the last straw.”

“Did she say anything?” Felicity seemed as angry as Elizabeth. “
She has fourteen stitches in her head and bruises on her shoulder and back. Whatever she was hit with wasn’t too heavy, but whoever swung it whacked her pretty good.”

“I think it was that shovel in the barn
,” I said. “I saw it lying just inside the door when they turned on the lights.”

“I remember you talking about the shovel,” Elizabeth said slowly. “Did the police take it?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. McMann knew about it. There was blood on it, probably Mildred’s. They should be testing it for fingerprints.”

“Fingerprints.”

“Yes, Felicity. Fingerprints. I thought you might want to mention that to Noah, in case he doesn’t know about it.”

“You thought I might, huh
?” Though still tense with anger, Felicity managed a smile. “Is there anything else I should mention to Noah?”

“As a matter of fact, there is
,” I persisted.

“There is? What?” No smile now. Felicity
was on full alert.

“I heard a car engine while we were running toward the barn.”

“A car engine. Where? Down by our house?”

“No. It sounded as if it was behind the barn someplace.”

“Ellen’s right,” Elizabeth said. “I was so upset about Mildred, I didn’t notice. Only, there aren’t any roads there.”

“There’s that old farm road, but it doesn’t go anywhere.
”

Elizabeth
blinked. “What old farm road?”

“The one close to the river. Noah took me down it once, oh, ages ago. It’s not much more than a track. They used it when the tobacco barges were running. There was a pier down there and an auction shed. Wagons loaded with bales of cured tobacco from several of the plantations would come, so would the buyers from the tobacco companies. Sometimes the buyers had already made a deal with the planters. Sometimes they had an auction. Then they loaded it on the barges and headed out. The pier’s gone. So are the Smithwood drying sheds. The road’s still there, barely. It doesn’t go anywhere.”

Elizabeth leaned forward. “That’s right. This used to be an old tobacco plantation. William told me, but that was all gone before I came. We went down by the river once, but I didn’t see any road. If one’s there, that has to be how this person is getting on and off the property.”

“One’s there, all right. Probably overgrown by now, and it never did go up by the barns or the houses. Just ran from the highway down that hillside where the crops used to grow and stopped at the river. I remember the last auction.” Felicity’s smile was soft, dreamy. “My grandpa was an old tobacco man. He brought me out for that one. Said I needed to see a tobacco auction before they were gone. That’s where I met Noah. Louis, Noah’s dad, managed the sale for Smithwood. That was the only time I ever saw him, and Noah and I got in trouble for trying to climb on the tobacco bales. We were pretty little.”

She paused but the smile still lingered.

It faded and her tone was brisk. “I think you’re right, Elizabeth. That road has to be how this person is getting on the property. Noah will know and he’d better go take a look. I don’t think he knows you heard a car.”

Aunt Mary nodded. “What it doesn’t tell us is who was driving.”

I nodded. “Or how he’s
been getting in and out of the house.”

We were all quiet
for a moment.

“Well,” Felicity sighed. “It’s a start.” She pushed her chair back, picked up her empty plate and walked over to the sink. “I want to check on Mildred before she goes to sleep and I have a whole lot to tell Noah.” She rinsed her plate and slipped it into the dishwasher.
Picking up her purse from the floor beside her chair, she added, “Elizabeth, don’t you worry about Cora Lee. She loves Smithwood. She loved William and she loves you, too. She wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. Or Mildred.” She turned toward Aunt Mary and smiled. “Thank you for dinner. It was great. If I could cook, I’d ask you for the recipe.”