A Sticky Situation (9 page)

“Got it. Any idea where I should start?”

“Why don't you go talk to Karen Brewer, the former town clerk? After all, the money went missing from inside her desk drawer at the town hall. And maybe some of the people who were questioned at the time. Like Jim Parnell and Cliff Thompson. Maybe they'll be willing to share more now than when the incident happened in the first place.”

Grampa, Loden, and I were up at the crack of dawn checking on the trees and the lines and the status of the evaporator. I may have agreed to help Tansey but the sap wasn't about to wait while I ran around asking people thirty-year-old questions. Sap can go bad if not properly handled, just like any other food product. If too much time elapses between collecting it and boiling it down it spoils and has to be thrown out.

I can't think of too many things that feel more wasteful to me than that. We try our best not to waste a drop. With so much sap needed to produce a single gallon of finished syrup we don't have a drop to waste.

As I hustled through the woods I thought of Mindy Collins and her new sugaring business. Even with all the help from the family, sugaring is a big job requiring
a lot of effort, made easier by so many willing hands and by using modern practices.

Mindy's husband, Russ, might not be working on the opera house because of the investigation but I'd be willing to bet the chance for an early spring that he wasn't pitching in with the syrup making at their place instead. I was even more grateful than usual for my family and the feeling of teamwork sugaring season always brought out in us.

Most of us, that is. The night before when I had finished talking with Lowell I dragged myself up to my room where I was not surprised in the least to see Jade flung across the spare bed, the contents of her overnight bag spread across everything else. I had to remove the bag itself from my own bed in order to crawl under the covers. Jade had not been in a talkative mood and had kept her eyes squeezed shut when my alarm went off well before the birds were chirping.

Hazel hadn't been up to lend a hand either and unless she had changed since her last visit I didn't expect she would help with anything involving syrup except the sampling of it. Hazel's idea of heavy lifting involves raising a full jug of syrup from the table to pour some onto a stack of pancakes someone else made.

By noon I felt I had earned my lunch and also a break. I was going to use it to track down Cliff Thompson and Karen Brewer like Lowell had suggested.

*   *   *

“Worst job I ever had,” Cliff said when I asked him about being a library trustee. I had caught up with him at the fire station. The department, like so many others in New Hampshire, was staffed by volunteers. Cliff had served as chief for at least the last twenty years. Since his retirement he had taken to spending most of his waking hours in the station yakking with the other firefighters and playing solitaire on the computer. Which is handy since not only is he the chief, he is also the only full-time EMT in town.

“Because of the theft?” I asked.

“The theft made a tough situation even more complicated. The library was the real problem.” I hadn't heard about this but that wasn't really a surprise. Gossip and troubles of all sorts flared up and died down all the time in Sugar Grove. Alliances got made, broken, and remade with every election cycle or new project that came into view. A thirty-year-old drama would have been pruned from the grapevine so many years ago most people wouldn't have remembered it had ever existed.

“What could have gone wrong at the library? It's a beautiful place.”

“It ought to be with what it cost.” Cliff's face took on a purplish hue and I wondered if he was going to need to practice some of his medical training on himself.

“I would have thought as a library trustee you would be proud of the place.”

“That's just where you'd be wrong, missy. I became a trustee to help curb the outrageous spending in town. I was on the budget committee and when a vacancy came up on the library board partway through the term I got myself appointed.”

“So what exactly happened?”

“Some folks in town got a bee in their bonnets about building a separate library building. They weren't satisfied with using a room in the town hall as a library and they wanted to put up a bond to build the one we have now.”

“But you didn't want to?”

“Of course I didn't. The tax rates were already sky-high and that would only have made things worse. With a bit of renovation we could have continued to use that library indefinitely.” New Hampshire has no broad-based tax and the property taxes are consequently a frequent point of contention.

“Did the other trustees want to build a new library?”

“Priscilla did. I didn't. Lisette Gifford was on the fence.” Lisette is the pastor's wife. She tends to keep a lot of her opinions to herself, which seems to be a wise move considering her family's position in town. Being trapped between warring opinions from Priscilla and Cliff must have been rough for her to deal with.

“So how did you work it out?”

“I finally managed to convince Lisette that the families who were barely making ends meet needed to feed their kids more than they needed a new library. We approached the festival committee about donating the
funds that year to the library renovation fund. They agreed and Priscilla got outvoted.”

“Was Priscilla gracious about the defeat?”

“Nope. She's barely managed to look at me, let alone speak to me, ever since.”

“Even though in the end the new library got built?”

“I don't think that helped any. There were some nasty words exchanged on both sides when the money went missing. It got so bad I prayed for a fire call before every trustees' meeting so I could avoid it.”

“You didn't seek another term as a trustee?”

“It was too much aggravation. Before the end of the term I served I was popping antacids like peanuts. I'd still rather run into a burning building than tangle with Priscilla about anything again.”

“Sounds like the money going missing really impacted your life.”

“I didn't kill Spooner but I'd love to shake the hand of the guy who did.” Cliff shook his head. “That man came into town all smiles and goodwill and ended up nothing but a thief and a womanizer.”

“From what I've heard everyone liked Spooner.”

“All the ladies liked Spooner. Even more than the men in town hated his guts.” Cliff scowled at me.

“What do you mean?” Cliff was a devoted gossip who needed only the slightest encouragement to spill his secrets. The smallest push wrenched open the taps and all he knew gurgled out like water from the discharge end of a sump pump.

“Spooner roved his eyes over all the women in Sugar
Grove. He didn't even seem to have any preferences. From middle-aged married women to girls still in high school, he turned his charms on all of them.” As aggravated as Cliff said he was, I heard a note of admiration in his voice. “If I had had a daughter instead of sons I would have locked her up until Spooner cleared out.”

“That bad, was it?”

“Worse. That wretched man's disappearance was the best thing that could have happened to a whole lot of marriages in town.”

“Anyone in particular's marriage?”

“Preston and Karen Brewer's, for one. Theresa and Gary Reynolds's, for another. Although, in the strictest sense they weren't married at the time, just engaged.”

My heart sank. There was no way I wanted to poke my nose into the Reynoldses' private business. After all, I had finally managed to get their son, Mitch, to stop peppering me with citations. Maybe I could get all I needed to know from Cliff if I just kept asking the right questions.

“Was Theresa the high school kid you were talking about?”

“No, Pastor Gifford's daughter was the high schooler. Theresa had already graduated and was a contestant in the Miss Maple pageant.”

“Spooner ran after the pastor's daughter?”

“I told you, he latched on to anything in a skirt. He sweet-talked Tansey into letting him live at her place, then was caught backstage at the opera house with his paws all over young Sarah Gifford on the Saturday of the festival.”

“Did the pastor know?” I asked.

“Know about it? He gave the fieriest sermon I'd ever heard from the pulpit the next morning.”

“He mentioned it publicly?”

“He certainly did. Service ran over by at least an hour by the time he'd gone into all the types of eternal damnation that awaited the men that betrayed trust and defiled innocents. Lust in the heart, that sort of thing. He was practically foaming at the mouth.”

“Was Spooner there to hear the sermon?”

“No he was not. And a good thing, too. As worked up as he was just preaching to the choir, I hate to think how much worse things would have gotten if Spooner had been within the confines of the church.”

“Did he manage to calm down at all?”

“If anything, venting his spleen seemed to make him more agitated. In fact, the deacon had to stand up and whisper something in his ear before he wrapped it up.”

“Do you remember who was the deacon at the time?”

“Of course I do. It was your grandfather. Even he didn't manage to calm the pastor down. He just got him to finally sit so we could all get home to our Sunday dinners. I was grateful my wife had taken to using a slow cooker or else we would have had a cremated chicken that day.” Cliff had given me a lot to think about. The pastor may have been a man of God but he was also a father. How far would he have gone to protect his little girl?

Karen lived and worked out of a tiny lakefront cottage. Lots of cottages on the lake are year-round homes but many more are summer places only. Realtors like Jim Parnell call them three-season properties but most homeowners would confess they are lucky to get fourteen weeks a year use out of the places. Between mud in the spring and depressingly damp and frigid temperatures in the late fall it wasn't a place I'd want to be.

I chewed on a sandwich and an apple I'd packed while I bumped along the rutted track leading to Karen's. Most of the places looked devoid of life. Windows were boarded over on some houses to discourage partying kids or other sorts of critters while the owners were out of town. A lot of the summer people were from
Massachusetts or Connecticut and didn't come up to the lake outside of the summer season.

I passed only one house that looked occupied after I turned onto the private road that Karen lived on. It felt a little like one of those postapocalyptic movies where all the buildings are still standing but the people have vanished. I was glad to pull up and see Karen's car in the drive. I had called ahead to ask if we could meet but I was still happy that she hadn't been snatched away by some monstrous force.

“You're all by your lonesome out here at this time of year, aren't you?” I asked after she had taken my coat and offered me coffee.

“Yes I am, thank God. The racket all over the lake in the summer is enough to drive you nuts. Not that I mind the money, it's just the people I can't stand.” Karen ran a property management business on the lake and disgruntled customers were part and parcel of things.

“I imagine some folks are hard to please.”

“You wouldn't believe it. You know which ones are the worst? The people who feel guilty about owning a property they can't be bothered to use.”

“I thought the lake was really popular in the summer.” Lakes in New Hampshire tend to be full of people making merry on the water and along the shore when the weather was just right. If there was room to squeeze in a tent, or build even the tiniest structure someone would have done so.

“Oh, it is. But after a few years of ownership families
change. People divorce, kids get on with their own lives. It can be a real mess.”

“That's too bad.”

“Most folks aren't like your family with generations all wanting to keep the property in the family. The worst case is when old folks die and leave the property jointly to their heirs. Invariably a whole lot of ugly comes floating to the surface when some want to sell and some want to keep the place in the family. I can't tell you how much I hate my job.”

Karen gulped a long swallow of coffee and thumped her cup on the Formica table. The whole place was decorated with a duck and boat theme. Everywhere my eye landed, crudely finished wooden signs said things like
LIFE IS BETTER AT THE LAKE
and
FLOAT YOUR CARES AWAY
. Karen didn't seem to be taking any of the sentiments to heart.

“Do you ever wish you were still the town clerk instead?”

“Every damned day.” Karen leaned toward me, her eyes glowing like she had a fever. “That was the best job I ever had.”

“You still miss it after all this time?” I had never considered how attached someone might be to a town clerk position but apparently I had been shortsighted.

“Health care, vacation days, clear and enforceable policies, an employee handbook. Of course I still miss it.” Karen shook her head at me. “You know what I got now?”

“I almost hate to ask.”

“Phone calls and angry people banging on my door at all hours. People who aren't happy with the size of their rental cottage. People who want to know why there isn't Internet access in the middle of the lake. People who want me to call an exterminator if a chipmunk crawls onto the porch.”

“No wonder you miss the town hall.”

“What I wouldn't have given to have kept that job. I hope you haven't bought yourself a property down here that you want me to manage. I only work for out-of-staters. I couldn't stand seeing a client at the Mountain View Food Mart in the middle of the winter.”

“Nope. It's nothing like that. I actually wanted to ask you about your time as the town clerk.”

“Why would you drive all the way out here to ask me about that?”

“Had you heard that Spooner Duffy's remains were found in the basement of the town hall?” I watched her face closely for twitching, lip biting, or other signs of discomfort. Karen just leaned in closer and let out a low whistle.

“I've been in bed for two days with a bout of stomach trouble and then I've been playing catch-up with returning phone calls and all that stuff that goes with running a business. I hadn't heard a thing.”

“It looks like instead of running off with the money from the festival, Spooner never left Sugar Grove.”

“Where'd they find him?” Karen asked. I told her about Russ and the coal pile and the spoons next to the
skeleton. I didn't mention Tansey. “So what's any of this got to do with you?”

“My grandparents were distressed at how the renovations on the opera house have ground to a standstill because of Spooner's body. I thought if we could hurry up and get to the bottom of how he happened to be there we could get the job completed.”

“Was the money with him?”

“Not as far as anyone can tell.”

“Basements tend to be wet. I suppose the money could have rotted.”

“I don't know about that. The opera house is set up rather high and everything seemed pretty dry. His clothes were in decent shape.”

“But paper would probably take less time to decay than cloth.”

“Maybe.” It was a good point. I would be sure to ask Lowell if they had any way to analyze the body or the soil around it for decomposed currency. The paper for printing money was sure to be unique and it wouldn't surprise me if there were lab tests that could shed some light on Karen's question.

“Or, he could have taken the money and stashed it somewhere before he wound up dead. The guy had to be afraid for his life what with all his goings-on.”

“What do you mean?” I pricked up my ears. Tansey, my family, and the doc had indicated Spooner was well liked. This didn't fit with what Cliff and Karen were saying about him.

“I mean he had an eye for the ladies. He didn't keep
his hands strictly on those spoons of his, if you know what I mean.” Karen gazed off into space and crossed her arms over her chest.

“Doc MacIntyre did mention he was popular with the ladies.”

“He was. But not so much with their husbands.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“I guess you could start with my ex.” Karen shrugged.

“I didn't know you were divorced.”

“The marriage didn't last long. Being married to a policeman is never easy.”

“Which policeman?”

“The old chief, Preston Byrnes.”

“Sounds like a royal mess.”

“Oh, it was. Jim Parnell came by the town office first thing to pick up the bank bag full of the festival earnings. The plan was for him to have left it locked in my office drawer the night before for safekeeping. He said that's what he did. When we got to my desk, it wasn't locked and the bag was gone.”

“So who called the police?”

“I did. I rang up Preston at the station and Myra put me right through. Preston got to the town hall in under three minutes. My marriage was over almost that fast, too.”

“Why's that?”

“Because as soon as Preston got there Jim said he knew it was Spooner who stole the money. When Preston asked him why, he said that I probably had mentioned
to him that the cash was going to be in my drawer during some passionate pillow talk. Preston hit the roof and as far as I know never looked at another suspect.”

“Wow. That must have been a bad day all around.”

“It was. But you know what I never could understand? Why did Jim have to do that to me? He could have pointed the finger at Spooner without bringing me into it. After all, everyone knew Spooner had a key to the town hall.”

“How did he even know about the affair to be able to tell your husband?”

“He saw us canoodling in the town hall when he came to pick up the key to my desk drawer. I guess I should have known better than to bring my private life into the office.” That was probably what cost Karen the election. No one wants the town spaces being used for things that are best done at home. It probably put people off their suppers just imagining the goings-on.

“And you're sure the police never investigated anyone else for the theft?” Perhaps there was more hope for poor Spooner and for Tansey's image of him than I had thought at first.

“Preston and I didn't talk all that much about his work or anything else after that day so I can't swear to it. But, as far as I could tell, the entire investigation was focused on Spooner. Preston was obsessed.”

“Did you two try to reconcile?”

“Preston wanted to after he had calmed down but I wasn't willing.”

“Why not?”

“The way he acted when he found out about my affair really scared me. He got pretty violent.”

“Did he hurt you?”

“No, but he did a number on the house. You know, throwing dishes, punching holes in the walls. I worried it wouldn't stop there so I left him.”

“It sounds like you made the right decision,” I said. As I drove away from Karen's place I had to ask myself if there was any way that the police had found Spooner all those years ago and if the chief had managed to make sure he wasn't ever found again. While it wasn't exactly what Lowell had authorized, I decided the next person I had to talk to was Preston Byrnes.