Antiques Fate (4 page)

“That's math, Mother. Don't make me do math.”

“Go on, dear. It's not that difficult.”

“Well . . . there should have been at least fifteen pills left in that bottle, right?”

Mother nodded sagely.

“So,” I said, “Millie must have been double-dosing on more than one occasion. Out of forgetfulness, perhaps.”

Mother stroked Sushi on her lap. “Or so someone wanted it to appear. It's all too easy to trot out how absentminded or even pre-Alzheimer's an older person can be.”

We had arrived at our local home-away-from-home, where I found a spot in front. We got out and I noticed the outside sign had been restored to W
ELCOME TO THE
H
ORSE AND
G
ROOM
I
NN
.

Inside, Celia, in her outdated pastel pink suit, was behind the check-in counter. With a practiced smile, she asked, “And how did the Bornes like the New Vic?”

“Really a charming venue,” Mother replied. “On the other hand, Millicent Marlowe is dead.”

Standing behind Mother, I tried pinching her through her Spanx, with no luck. While she could be tactless, particularly on the subject of death—she was fatalistic to a fault—I was well aware that she would now be viewing every resident of Old York as a suspect.

Celia stared, agape. “Did I hear you correctly, Mrs. Borne?”

I stepped around Mother. “I'm afraid Millie suffered a fatal heart attack. One moment she was smiling, the next . . . well, I'm afraid she's gone.”

“Oh, that's just terrible,” Celia said, one hand to her chest. “Such a terrible loss to our community.”

I nodded sympathetically. Mother was studying the woman rather coldly, looking for reactions.

Celia said, with a shrug that indicated she had a streak of fatalism, too, “Well, I can't say I'm surprised, really. She had a heart attack before. Will you excuse me?”

The innkeeper turned abruptly and disappeared into her office, where in New (not Old) York fashion she could start spreadin' the news.

Mother eyed me with a smile I can only describe as devilish. “Quite a cold reaction, don't you think?”

From the office came a faint but distinct: “Yes, a
heart
attack! . . . Yes, yes . . . I
know. . . .
”

I set Sushi down and turned to face Mother. Sushi looked up at her, too. “Vivian Borne, what is
wrong
with you?”

Since no one else was around, I thought this was as good a time as any to get into it with her.

Mother's eyebrows went up and over her glasses and her expression was one of angelic innocence. “Why, whatever do you mean, dear?”

“You call
her
cold? How about how insensitively you're behaving? The blunt way you told Chad about Millie, and now Mrs. Falwell!”

Her chin came up. “I was merely stating the truth. Anyway, darling, you know I'm fishing for suspicious reactions.”

“Can't you go fishing without such tactless bait on your line? Try a little compassion on your hook, why don't you?”

She cocked her head, like Sushi trying to understand a new word. “Dear . . . don't take this wrong . . . but have you been taking your Prozac as prescribed?”

“How about you? Taking your lithium? As prescribed?”

About once a month we were reduced to this.

Mother lowered her voice. “Dear, I have a wealth of compassion in this situation.”

“Do you?”

“Yes. And it all goes to my good friend Millie.”

“Your good friend Millie? You
just
met her.”

“We were fellow thespians. Sisters of the stage. You should be used to my methods by now. The reactions I'm gathering will help us catch her killer.”

“
If
she was killed,” I reminded her. “We don't know that for sure.”

Sushi, having enough of this, barked.

I sighed. “Baby wants her supper.”

Mother bestowed a smile upon me. “Then why don't we table this matter, dear, until our evening meal?”

I agreed. We knew we needed a breather from each other, and returned to our respective rooms.

An hour later, Mother and I were seated in the dining room at a table for two beneath a framed print of ferocious hounds chasing a frightened fox, the picture's once vibrant colors having faded from sunlight.

A few other customers were dining, as well—a portly couple in the dessert phase (bread pudding), and an elderly man reading a
Des Moines Register
over coffee.

Seabert, wearing a too-tight three-piece suit even more out of style than his wife's attire, came over with a wine list, which we declined.

Unhappy with our decision, he snatched up our wineglasses so they wouldn't get sullied.

“We've got shepherd's pie or bangers and mash,” our host declared with an offhand finality that said there were no other options. He really was John Cleese without the comic timing.

Mother had the pie; I took the bangers.

After Seabert left—and rather than reopen the wound of her insensitivity—I shared with Mother the conversation I'd had with Chad in the vending machine hallway, just before she'd arrived with the dire news about Millie.

Mother's magnified eyes behind the large glasses narrowed to near normal size. “So the young man was opposed to how his grandmother was running the New Vic.”

“Yes, and he was
especially
opposed to the way she was using her own money to keep it afloat.”

Mother nodded. “The poor boy had to just sit there and watch his inheritance fritter-flutter away. I would call that a good murder motive.”

I leaned across and whispered, “
Must
you see mayhem everywhere you look?”

Mother's eyebrows crawled above the rims of her glasses like caterpillars chasing a leaf. “The way you talk, one would think I
enjoy
solving murders.”

Since I wasn't at that moment drinking from my water glass, I denied the few other diners that age-old theatrical fave, the spit-take. Mother, across the table from me, was spared that refreshing spray, as well.

She put a splayed hand to her chest. “Dear, it distresses me that you think so poorly of me. Surely you must know that beneath my hard, cold mask, I am suffering from the tragedy that befell poor Millicent. . . . Oh, goodie, here comes our food!” She leaned in with a conspiratorial smile and said, “I hope the pie is as good as
my
recipe, although frankly I can't
imagine
it could be.”

 

 

1 tbl. olive oil
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 onion, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
1 can cut green beans
1 lb. lamb, minced
1 beef cube stock
1 lb. tomatoes, chopped
3 tbl. tomato puree
1 tbl. corn flour
2 lb. potatoes
¼ lb. butter (1 stick)
pinch of salt and pepper

 

Heat olive oil in a skillet, add the onion, garlic, and carrot and cook until soft. Add minced lamb and stock cube, then cook until brown and crumbly. Stir in the canned green beans, tomatoes, and tomato puree, then add the corn flour. Let simmer, stirring occasionally, for about fifteen minutes or until thickened. Meanwhile, peel and chop the potatoes and boil until soft, then mash with the butter, add salt and pepper to taste. Put the meat filling into a deep oven dish, top with the mashed potatoes, and put under broiler until the top is brown and crisp.

 

Mother had once made this recipe for little Brandy who refused to eat it because of the lamb. (PBS had been showing the old
Shari Lewis Show
, with the talented ventriloquist and her cute puppet, Lamb Chop.) Hamburger can be substituted for the lamb, as Mother did for me from that point on, but then what you're eating is Cottage Pie.

We were finishing our hearty meals—no complaints from either of us—when Celia swooshed over. Our hostess's big smile said she was bearing up well under the news of Millie's death.

“I'm going to be gone for about an hour,” she told us, a hand on the back of my chair. “Should you need anything, Seabert will tend to it. Ask him twice if necessary.”

Mother said innocently, “I would imagine you're off to a meeting of the trustees.”

Celia's smile faded. “Why . . . yes. How in heaven's name could you guess, much less know, that?”

Mother dabbed her mouth daintily with the napkin. “It just stands to reason, after Millie's sudden death.”

Good lord!
Was Mother actually going to come right out and say that the votes for incorporation, and bringing progress to Old York, now swung three for and two against?

But instead Mother said, “I wonder if the board might not like to have someone present a brief eulogy before my performance Saturday night?”

“Ah . . . that does sound appropriate,” Celia said, somewhat blindsided. “That is,
if
there's a play at all.”

Mother was quick to rise from her chair, a testament to the high quality of her double hip replacement.

Chin high, swathed in indignation, she said, “Madam! If that is
indeed
an issue, shouldn't
I
be included in this meeting? And my daughter, as well, the other half of the Borne troupe. After all, we've come quite a distance.”

Sixty miles.

“And might I point out,” Mother added imperiously, “we gave up another engagement to take this one!”

Not really.

Celia, frowning, shaking her head, the friendly hand off the back of my chair now, said, “I'm sorry, Mrs. Borne—only trustees are allowed at our meetings.”

“I see,” Mother replied. “Then I guess they wouldn't be interested in hearing Millicent Marlowe's last words.”

Celia's eyes widened. “Well,
I
am. What were they?”

Yes, what? Mother hadn't mentioned anything about this to me.

“I'm so sorry, Mrs. Falwell,” Mother said sweetly. “I'm afraid Millie's final thoughts were intended for
all
of the trustees to hear.”

Our hostess stood frowning in thought. Then, with obvious reluctance, she said, “All right—you may attend.”

“My daughter, too.”

“Yes, yes, yes.” She checked her wristwatch. “Come to the Community Center in ten minutes—it's just across the village green, on Brighton. I'll go on ahead and inform the others that you'll be dropping by.”

She hurried off.

After signing the meals to our rooms, Mother and I stepped out into a brisk autumn night air that made me wish I'd brought along a jacket. The sky was nearly cloudless and the moon was full and glowing. Speaking of the moon, our unknown prankster had struck the standing sign again: W
ELCOME
—D
ARN
H
ORSE ON THE
M
OON
.

As Mother and I cut across the lush, ivory-washed grass, I asked, “What
were
Millie's final words?”

She gave me a sideways glance. “I've been mulling that. Haven't settled on anything just yet. What do
you
think they should be?”

I stopped short, but she kept on going.

“Mother, you didn't. . . .”

“Actually, Millie didn't.”

“Oh, Mother.”

As I caught back up with her, she shrugged and impishly grinned. “Got us into the meeting, didn't it?”

The Community Center was on the first floor of a Tudor-style building sandwiched between a tearoom and an apothecary. After entering through an etched-glass door into a long, narrow room with a low ceiling crisscrossed by wooden beams, we moved through a sitting area where several mismatched couches and overstuffed chairs huddled around a scarred coffee table. Beyond this was an area used for meetings with banquet-style tables, both rectangular and round, set with metal folding chairs, off of which a kitchenette was home to an old refrigerator that hummed and a coffeemaker that gurgled.

Mother and I approached a round table where what I assumed to be the remaining five trustees were seated.

Celia stood, her expression pleasant. “Everyone . . . this is Vivian Borne and her daughter, Brandy. As you know, these girls were supposed to put on a play at the New Vic Saturday night.”

At the words “supposed to,” Mother flinched, but held her tongue. I did the same on the word “girls.”

The innkeeper introduced the trustees, gesturing to each one as she went clockwise around the table.

“This is Digby Lancaster, Old York's resident land developer.”

Around sixty, heavyset, Lancaster had bulldog features and a belly that strained the middle of his blue button-down shirt.

“And this is Father Cumberbatch, priest at the Episcopalian Church.”

Perhaps thirty-five, Cumberbatch was slender, his sandy hair unruly, his eyes a light blue. He wore the traditional dark suit with white collar.

“This is Barclay Starkadder, manager of the local museum, a favorite tourist stop of ours.”

Pushing sixty, distinguished-looking in a three-piece suit, Starkadder sported carefully groomed silver hair and a neatly trimmed beard; he had the general appearance of a matinee idol gone long in the tooth.

“And, finally,” Celia said, “this is Flora Payton. She owns our floral shop.”

I wondered if somebody named Fawna ran the local pet shop.

Flora, about forty, was a beauty with flowing red hair, green eyes, slightly freckled translucent skin, and lips stained a startling red. She wore a fuzzy black sweater with a low neckline better suited for clubbing.