Dead Man's Bones (18 page)

I smiled as I saw that. The director and most of the cast (I doubted that Max was aware of what was happening) had obviously taken revenge on the old lady for imposing her script, her conditions, and her casting on them. Marian and Jean were going to hear about this—but, of course, it was too late. Jane Obermann was stuck with her bargain. Anyway, she was the one who had insisted on casting Max in the role of her father. Poetic justice, it seemed to me.

But there wasn’t time to think about that now. While the audience was leaving the theater, Sheila and I were already on the stage, behind the curtain, setting up the tables for the buffet supper. As Party Thyme’s catered events go, this wasn’t a major production—especially since somebody else had volunteered to handle the drinks and another person had brought a CD player and a stack of CDs. It didn’t take long to unload our boxes and trays and put out the food, and by the time the actors were out of costume and the curtain was raised on an empty house, we were ready to party. People began to migrate to the drinks table, then filled their plates, all the while talking about the play.

“—muffed his lines, but she came right on back. What a trooper, that Ruby!”

“—so then he picked up the wrong prop and put it down in the wrong place, halfway across the stage from where I was standing, and I had to—”

“We’d better get the electrician to look at that second light bar. Couldn’t bring it up, no matter what I—”

“Gotta hand it to Jean. She took a bad play and made it pretty damn good.”

“—the look on old lady Oberwhozit’s face? Worth a mint, just to see that scowl.”

“—magnificent, Ruby, absolutely, utterly—”

“Duane? Dunno, didn’t see him. Was he here?”

I stepped forward, took a cigarette lighter out of my pocket, and relit the Sterno under the dish of meatballs. The success of a cast party always depends on the success of the play, and tonight’s party was obviously already a smashing success.

Even Max was having a good time. Face flushed, eyes twinkling behind his gold glasses, he came up to me. “Well, Ms. Bayles?” he asked. “How did you like it?” He was formally polite, as always—a formality that strikes me as odd, when you consider that this man, before he retired from his dental career, had had both hands in my mouth.

“I thought it was great,” I enthused. “Your performance was perfect, Max. Couldn’t have been better.” I spoke truthfully, albeit with an ironic twist.

Max looked pleased. “I thought I captured old Merrill G. quite well,” he said, in his gruff voice. “I didn’t know him personally, you understand. He died while I was away at college, before I came back to Pecan Springs to start my practice. But my father was acquainted with both him and his wife, and I know his daughters, in a professional way, of course. I’m glad to have had this opportunity to—”

“I’m terribly sorry,” I said, “but I’m afraid I have to see Ruby about something.”

Impolite or not, I made my escape. Once Max gets started, he’s a little difficult to stop.

Cassandra caught me as I went around the table. “My compliments to the caterers,” she said, her round face crinkling into a wide smile. Cass has a strong sense of style, and she doesn’t believe in trying to camouflage her size, which I like. “Got it, flaunt it,” I’ve heard her say. Tonight, she was flaunting it, in a red-and-purple draped dress that flowed with her movements. She’s heavy and rounded, but she carries herself with a grace that seems to be an expression of spirit, as much as a mannered way of moving. “You’ve done a terrific job on this party,” she added, tilting her head. Her eyes sparkled. “Any chance a girl could get a job with you?”

“Are you serious?” I asked, startled.

“Oh, heck, yes,” she replied, without hesitation. “I’m tired of pushing paper and dealing with the food service bureaucracy. I want to cook again. Would you like me to bring my résumé by the shop?”

“As a matter of fact,” I said, thinking of Janet’s arthritis, “I would. Of course, I have to talk to Ruby, but—”

“I already did,” Cassandra put in. “She said she had to talk to you.” She hesitated, her face becoming sober. “But to tell the truth, I’m looking for more than just a job. I have a proposal I want to make to you. I’ve been thinking of opening my own business as a personal chef and—” She raised her hand to wave at Marian, who was giving her a high sign. “But let’s talk about this later, when we have more time. How about Monday afternoon? I can be at the shop by four-thirty.”

“That’ll work,” I agreed, wondering what “more than just a job” might mean.

Ruby was standing with Colin, and Marian had just joined them when I came up. “You were terrific, Ruby,” Marian said excitedly. “Great, incredible—”

“Let’s not overdo it,” Colin said, straight-faced. “She’s already about nine feet off the ground. Another compliment or two, and she’ll be in the stratosphere.”

Ruby gave him a playful push, then turned to survey the table. “Gosh, China, you and Sheila did a great job with the food. Thanks for taking over tonight.” She turned to me. “How’d my eye look?” she whispered. “Could you see it from where you were sitting?”

“It wasn’t noticeable at all,” I said truthfully. “Anyway, you were larger and brighter than life. Nobody could possibly spot a little shiner.”

Colin laughed and put his arm around her shoulders. “She was wonderful, wasn’t she?” he said, and looked down at her fondly. “She was the star, no doubt about it.”

“Oh, please,” Ruby said. She lowered her voice under the party chatter. “Max will hear you, Colin. I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”

“Hurt his feelings?” Colin asked, opening his dark eyes wide. “Why? Max was super. It’s no fun to play a little tin god, especially when your leading lady has all the great lines.”

I raised my eyebrows at Ruby. She gave me back a smirky little smile, and I knew that Colin was playing straight man. “Hey,” I said, sotto voce, “Cassandra wants to talk to us. About some sort of proposal she has in mind. Monday at four-thirty. Okay?”

“Fantastic,” Ruby said. “I’m hoping that—” Whatever she was about to say was drowned out by a burst of raucous laughter from the group behind us.

Sheila came up to us. “Where’s Duane Redmond?” she asked over the hubbub. “Didn’t he come tonight?” She paused. “Or maybe he didn’t want to watch Max trying to fill his shoes.”

“So you know about that?” I asked.

“You’re surprised?” Sheila countered. “The chief of police is supposed to know what’s going on in her own town, isn’t she? Sure, I heard that Miss Obermann fired him.”

“Chief of police?” Colin asked. He had turned to her when she came up. Was I mistaken to think that he was taken aback by the sight of her? Now, I noticed, he was eyeing her, quite appreciatively, I thought.

Ruby grinned. “Chief Sheila Dawson, meet Colin Fowler, owner of Good Earth Goods, on the square.”

“You’re kidding,” Colin said with an almost exaggerated disbelief. Deliberately, he dropped his glance to Sheila’s silk shirt and faux pearls, then back up to her eyes. “You’re a cop? Pardon me all to hell, ma’am, but that’s kinda hard to believe.”

Ruby, busy with a cracker on her plate, had missed the glance. “Don’t you read the newspapers?” she asked Colin. “Sheila makes the headlines at least twice a month.” She put down her plate, held up an invisible newspaper, and pretended to read. “‘Courageous Chief Collars Parking Meter Thief.’ ‘Awesome Dawson Does it Again.’”

“Ruby, you’re a scream.” There was a perceptible tension in Sheila’s voice, and her eyes were on Colin. This time, it was her glance that I intercepted. It held surprised recognition and something like a covert signal, not quite a head shake, but clearly a warning. There was something taut and still about both of them, and just for an instant, all the sound and motion in the room seemed to stop, as if somebody had hit a freeze-action switch, to allow the two of them to exchange silent, secret messages that the rest of us couldn’t hear.

But then it started up again, both motion and sound. Glasses clinked. Somebody laughed. Colin bent to whisper in Ruby’s ear, then took her glass and his own and went in the direction of the bar, stopping to exchange a complimentary word with Max Baumeister.

As Colin moved away through the crowd, my eyes went back to Sheila. I was suddenly, apprehensively, convinced that she and Colin knew one another. And that neither one of them was anxious to let Ruby in on the secret.

But I knew it. Where did that leave me? And eventually, Ruby would have to know it, too. Where would that leave her?

Jean and Cassandra came up with plates of food. “I think Duane must be sitting this one out,” Jean said to Marian, and I suddenly realized that I wasn’t the only one who might have seen the exchange between Sheila and Colin. “Poor guy. I don’t think he’d ever been fired before. It must really have hurt his feelings—otherwise he’d be here.”

Cassandra turned to Ruby, her round face animated, her eyes sparkling. “Ruby, you were brilliant! You did it. You saved the play.”

“It was all of us,” Ruby said earnestly. “Not just me.” She looked troubled. “Jane was not thrilled, though. I saw her marching out while we were still taking our bows.”

“Miss Obermann must not have seen the whole production ahead of time,” I remarked to Jean. “Otherwise, you’d never have gotten away with it.”

“She saw it all,” Jean said, chewing appreciatively on a meatball, “but not all at once, just in bits and pieces. And she said she didn’t want to come to dress rehearsal, since it would mean being up late two nights in a row.”

“Thank God for old ladies’ bedtimes,” Marian said in an aside, popping a stuffed mushroom into her mouth. “Hey, guys, this food is terrific. You can cater my parties any day.”

“Thanks,” I said, and grinned. “We’ll phone you about a date. We’re definitely looking for work.” I couldn’t help glancing at Sheila. Her head was half-tilted, and she was watching Colin, who was returning from the bar with a glass of wine in each hand. Fierce, undisguised feeling was written on her face. Whatever their relationship had been, it had obviously not been merely a flavor of the month. It had meant something to her.

Ruby had gone back to the subject. “And when Jane was here, we tried to distract her with trivial mechanical problems, so she’d concern herself more with the renovations to the theater and less with the play.”

“And we kept asking her opinion about Max’s scenes,” Jean added, “to make sure that he was playing her father exactly the way she wanted him played. I even took notes about what she said, so we’d be sure to get it right.”

“And to cover your asses,” Colin suggested helpfully, handing Ruby her drink.

Jean’s grin was mischievous. “I didn’t want her to come back later and accuse us of making her father look like a dodo bird on its way to extinction.”

“But that’s exactly the quality that Jane caught—quite unconsciously—in her play,” Marian said. “And the only way it could actually be staged, without the risk of boring the audience to death, was to remake the Cynthia character.”

“Where Cynthia was concerned,” Jean said, “we only had to tweak the actual script a little—it was mostly in the way Ruby played her. Of course it’s hard to say for sure, but she was apparently quite eccentric. Manic-depressive, we’d probably say today. She killed herself, you know. Dove headfirst off the roof of her house. Broke her neck.”

“Her husband probably drove her to it,” Colin said. Sheila carefully did not look at him. “Or maybe her daughters.”

“It’s not known for sure that she jumped,” Jean objected. “She didn’t leave a note. And the family insisted that she fell.”

Ruby took the wineglass from Colin. “Oh, right,” she said, heavily sarcastic. “Cynthia just happened to fall off the roof of her house at three-thirty in the morning. And how do we know she didn’t leave a note? If she did, neither Jane nor her father would voluntarily hand it over to the police.”

“Well, if you ask me,” I said, “it’s a very good thing that the Obermann sisters can’t take back their theater. If they could—”

“What was that?” Sheila held up her hand.

“What was what?” Marian asked.

“It sounded like a shot,” Colin said. His mouth had gone tight, his eyes alert, his muscles tensed. I remembered the look I had seen the other day, the look of a man watching his back.

“A car?” Jean hazarded. “A door slam?”

“Maybe. But—” Sheila shook her head. “Sorry. What were you saying, China?”

I was watching Colin. His head was turned, as if he were still listening. Listening and assessing his next move.

“Only that it’s a good thing the Obermann sisters can’t take back their play and their theater,” I repeated. “If they could—”

There was a commotion in the theater lobby. “Chief!” The uniformed security guard—the one who had been hired to make sure that none of the faux gems were filched—came running down the central aisle. “Chief Dawson,” he yelled. “You’d better get out here. There’s been a shooting.”

Conversations stopped. People turned and blinked and sucked in their breaths. Sheila put her plate on the table and turned, peering down the dark aisle. “Lonnie? Is that you? What’s going on?”

Lonnie vaulted onto the stage. “I was in the parking lot, getting ready to leave.” He was breathless. “I heard a gunshot, then another one, right close together. And then a woman screaming. It came from the Obermann mansion.”

Marian pulled in her breath with an audible gasp. Jean let hers out with a dismayed puff. Marian put down her glass, her face suddenly white.

“Oh, my God,” she breathed. “It’s finally happened! Somebody has murdered that wicked old woman!”

My thought, exactly.