Death Takes Priority (2 page)

Other than Wendell being height-challenged for a male, I couldn't help but notice that the former quarterback hadn't lost his physical appeal. Light brown hair with a hint of red, combed back from a high forehead and full eyebrows and lashes that many women envied. A square jaw and muscular physique. Not that I remembered very well.

“Phone books come yet?” Wendell had asked during that one awkward business visit. I doubted his mind was on our crepe-papered gym-turned-ballroom.

I'd barely gotten out a “Not yet” before he broke in.

“I'll check with the main office. You should have them before the end of the month,” he'd muttered, and plodded out.

Linda's voice interrupted my thoughts of Wendell Graham, the old and the new. “Anyway, it's worth considering that the whole stealing-the-directories thing was a prank by Wendell, who's still hung up on how you ditched him.”

“I didn't ditch him.”

“Did he stay in your hometown after you left for college?”

“So what?”

“That's a ‘yes.' Did you keep in touch?”

“He had a lot of friends who stayed in town, and—”

“That's a ‘no.' You ditched him.”

“If this was a prank, a better theory would be that it's harassment from some grown-ups here who think I should have stayed in Boston.”

“Like me,” Linda said.
Uh-oh
. Since I'd started the thread, I let her go on for a while. “You didn't hear it from me, but your so-called replacement is a ditz,” she continued, a rant I'd heard before. “The files you so carefully organized are already a mess. Everyone misses you. I miss you. Steve goes around as if he's lost his best friend. Speaking of which—”

“I'd better go,” I said. I didn't want to hear about Steve or any other of my former employees and coworkers. I was afraid I'd agree with Linda and beat it back to Boston. I could be there in time for a late dinner on the wharf. Fresh grilled food, the lights across the water . . . But I needed to make my own decisions about this new venture, without the aid of a sentimental pull or well-meaning but strong-minded friends like Linda. “I have to unlock the front doors and start the retail day,” I said.

“Oh, the throngs,” Linda said, chuckling.

When we hung up, I was no smarter about the missing phone books, and no less homesick for my old city life. But neither was I ready to declare my North Ashcot experiment a failure.

I
'd sifted out the usual amount of problem mail—forwards, postage due, and pieces marked “not at this address,” among other items needing special handling. I wondered how long it would be before I'd stop looking for a certain letter addressed to me. I pictured it. To: Cassie Miller. From: Adam Robinson.

I imagined a note of apology, admitting to his stupidity in letting me get away. In my fantasy, Adam would have seen the light, wanting us to be partners, a working couple with a family, as I thought we'd agreed on. In real life, he'd been diverted by a career path that meant whirlwind international travel as a corporate attorney for him and a clear role for me: hanging on his arm, hosting important parties.

It was about time I marked that fantasy letter “return to sender.” Besides, Adam had dumped me not with an
eloquent “Dear John” letter, but by way of four text messages, beginning with:

I'm sure u agree. Time 2 call it.

Coward
, I labeled him now.
Immature.
And once again resolved not to think about him.

I threw back my sagging shoulders, cleared my dreamy mind, and gave my attention to the counter, where customers had lined up. I was ready for whoever might need stamps, shipping service, prepaid envelopes, or change of address cards. My morning began as usual, except for the fact that at least a dozen people asked when the phone books would be available. It was all I could do not to glance over my shoulder at the empty spot where they should be. Eventually, I'd have to call Ben for advice on the protocol for missing directories, but it would have to wait until I closed shop for lunch. The long line of customers came first.

I peered across my counter and surveyed the Monday crowd, noticing many regulars I looked forward to seeing. Carolyn and George Raley, both with fluffy gray hair, both retired from the school district, sat on the lobby bench, waiting for a break in the line. Each held a small animal, wrapped in a knit blanket. Last summer, before I returned to North Ashcot, I wouldn't have been able to identify the tiny catlike African genet on Carolyn's lap, or the larger, white-nosed coatimundi, a member of the raccoon family, nestled against George's chest. I felt smart, zoologically speaking. I'd have to tell Linda: North Ashcot had broadened me in some ways.

The Raleys were volunteer trainers of exotic animals that would eventually reside in a zoo or become teaching animals in a program for schools or public educators. Their job was to raise the newborns and socialize them, getting them used to riding in cars and being handled by humans before they'd be exposed to children and the general public. I admired the people who did this, and I was happy to offer the use of the largest scale in town, but I didn't want to know the details of potty training a coatimundi.

Carolyn and George had been turned away by my predecessor, citing postal regulations that prohibited all except service animals from entering the building. When they approached me soon after my arrival, carrying a sweet little African fawn, I couldn't resist.

“Would you say this is a service animal?” I asked.

George started to shake his head no, but Carolyn nudged him. “Of course she is,” Carolyn said. “Bella and all our animals
serve
children in classrooms and park programs across the country.”

“Good enough for me,” I said, as the three of us smiled.

That led to the weigh-in today and nearly every Monday.

“Here you go, Snappy, onto the most accurate scale the U.S. Congress can approve,” gray-haired George said to the pointy-snouted animal. “Stay still for Cassie while she weighs you.”

The coatimundi and I were used to each other by now, so I no longer cringed and worried about Snappy snapping. For the minute that it took me to arrange his long striped tail properly and give Carolyn the scale reading for her notebook, Snappy was well behaved.

“Two pounds, one ounce,” I declared, and repeated the
process with the small spotted genet. “One pound, four ounces for little Ama,” I said.

George and Carolyn put on gloomy faces. “Only a few more ounces and it will be time to turn them both over,” Carolyn said, her voice sad. “So, if you want to feed them and say good-bye before we take them to the Center, you'd better come by the house this week.”

I promised I would, and looked forward to the next set of four-legged post office customers.

The second Monday ritual, one I was not happy about, involved Sally Aldritch. Here she was carrying a large package she'd labeled “media mail.” No surprise, the box, recycled from an online shopping site, was addressed to her son in Montana. It had taken me a while to figure out what just about everyone in town knew, that Sally sent her boy, a bachelor in his thirties, staples every week—cereal, snacks, toothpaste, underwear. Everything but books, CDs, or anything else that could be legitimately classified as eligible for media mail.

I thought I'd give her another chance to obey the law. “Is there anything in here besides printed or recorded material, Sally?”

She shook her head soundlessly. As if by not saying the word
no
out loud, she was not technically lying.

“Shake it,” said a voice from behind Sally.

“Smell it,” said another, laughing.

“Drill a hole in it,” said still another, laughing harder.

My post office was a fun spot today.

But mail fraud was serious business, and I'd obviously failed to convince Sally and the rest of my customers of the fact. I ignored all their hands-on amateur investigative
advice, but resolved that the next time this happened I'd give Sally a gentle reminder that media mail was subject to inspection, that I could open the box at will in front of all of her gawking neighbors. If she called my bluff, her spoiled offspring would receive the package via priority mail, with postage due, and maybe be shamed into persuading his mother to follow the rules.

For now, I stamped the box—I wasn't one hundred percent sure that it contained more than media mail, after all—and let it go, mostly because I saw Monday ritual number three in the background. Scott James, arguably the most eligible bachelor in North Ashcot, and certainly the best looking—in a shuffling, Jimmy Stewart kind of way, Aunt Tess would have said—stood at the back of the line.

The assistant manager of a small antiques store in town, Scott came by regularly with his assortment of flyers, invoices, and other routine mailing. I noticed how he made himself useful while he waited, straightening the various forms in my racks. He'd lined up the edges of customs, special delivery, vacation hold, and registered mail slips; retrieved pens from the floor; and neatened the Land of the Free Boxes display, a fond reference to the slots containing flat-rate envelopes and boxes. A neat freak. I liked that in a guy.

Scott was becoming a friend, probably because we hadn't gone to high school together. He'd had no opportunity to develop a long-standing grudge against me. I didn't know much about him, except that he seemed trustworthy. I'd trusted him with Aunt Tess's old furniture and silk hankies, hadn't I? He was relatively new in town, having arrived
little more than a year ago. So what if he wasn't very forthcoming about his former life. Neither was I. In any case, I liked Scott, and on days when I was in a hoping mood, I hoped to get to know him better. Linda's special therapy, which she named “Recovering from Ex-ism,” and delivered direct from Boston, seemed to be working as images of Adam faded in the presence of Scott James.

Scott approached the counter, his turn at last. He set his small tub of mail close to the scale, then removed an envelope from his jacket pocket. I liked his casual, fleece-lined look, the polar opposite of Adam's sharp, custom-made Italian suits.

“Hey,” Scott said, waving the envelope in front of me. “Okay to do a little personal negotiation during your work hours?”

I pointed to the large clock on the wall, its second hand chugging toward twelve. “It's almost noon,” I said, smiling, and plucked the envelope from his hand. “A check, I presume?”

He nodded. “We sold both of your aunt's dressers.”

“Wow. Good news. Bought by someone on the tour bus that came through from Albany on Saturday?”

Another nod. “One of the last buses of the season, but they spent a lot, all starry-eyed over genuine forties and fifties furniture.”

I'd given Scott two of Aunt Tess's dressers on consignment. They were beautiful, solid oak period pieces, but much too bulky for my taste. And one of them was built for someone about a foot shorter than I was, making the drawers too low while the mirror cut me off at the neck. Aunt
Tess had also been a tall woman, leaving me to wonder which short member of our family, most likely on my mother's side, had bought the piece in the first place.

I tucked the envelope in the pocket of my regulation blue sweater, and gave it a pat. “Thanks,” I said, moving along to take care of Scott's mailings. He paid me with cash and took a turn checking out the clock on the wall, almost an antique itself. I followed his gaze. Five minutes after noon.

“Hungry?” Scott asked.

The missing phone books floated through my mind. “Sort of, but I have a little problem to take care of during lunch.”

“Can it wait? I was hoping you might join me for a bite.”

My heart gave an unfamiliar, ever so slight lurch. The phone books weren't going anywhere, I reasoned. Not that I could be sure of that, since they'd already migrated from my back room to parts unknown. I weighed my options. Lunch with Scott, which might even count as my first North Ashcot date, or a conversation with ornery old Ben to confess that I'd lost control of inventory and needed his help.

“You have to eat something. Somewhere,” Scott said.

“Can you give me a minute to lock up?”

*   *   *

There weren't too many lunch options in North Ashcot. Townsfolk joked that there were two: Betty's diner and the diner run by Betty. Which was why I always kept a fallback peanut butter sandwich in the little fridge in my building. And why I was surprised when Scott drove his shiny, silver four-wheel drive past Betty's to the edge of town.

“Do we really want all our customers to see us having lunch together at Betty's?” he asked, his eyebrows raised.

“Only if it wins a big headline in
The Weekly Register
and a feature on the local news.”

“I can see the article now. Right under the one about the male peacock found in the Monroes' yard.” He put his fist to his mouth, microphone style. “Anyone lose a peacock?”

Scott pulled his new-looking Red Sox cap down even farther until it reached the top of his sunglasses. I liked his playfulness and saw it in his face, but was there a touch of furtiveness also? Was it really that awful to be seen with me? Maybe this wasn't a date, but a business meeting after all. I imagined Scott's boss dispatching him to soften me up with a BLT, then having him make a special request like home pickup or delivery, or a further discount on postage. I'd been worried that I was presenting a big-city image, but maybe instead I came across as an easy mark.

“It can be hard to maintain privacy in a town the size of ours,” I said, keeping us on the personal track.

“I'm beginning to realize that,” he said, still serious.

We drove along quiet roads surrounded by maples and birches in the last vestiges of their red, orange, and yellow dress, across a small bridge, and eventually across abandoned rail tracks into a crowded parking lot. I guessed we were about ten miles from the center of North Ashcot, still in beautiful Berkshire County. We stopped and parked at the end of a gravel road, where an old cottage stood, now a combination tea shop, antiques emporium, and vintage clothing store. The venue was fitting for an antiques dealer, if not for the tall, muscular man Scott also happened to be.

“Charming,” I said, reaching to unhook my seatbelt.

The usual press-and-yank movement to unbuckle myself didn't work, so I twisted in my seat to check the mechanism.
Something was caught in the metal, something that presented no problem going in, but was offering resistance now as I tried to take the buckle out of its slot. I gave it another tug and it came loose.

A piece of plastic. I looked closer. Ugly green plastic. My breath caught. The same kind that the phonebooks had been wrapped in? How could that be? Scott . . . ? No, surely the phone company couldn't be the only one that used this product for shipping. I wouldn't be surprised if Scott had his own bulk rolls of the stuff.

I pulled the plastic fragment free and undid my buckle as Scott came around to the passenger side.

“Problem?” he asked.

For reasons unknown to me, I curled my fingers around the plastic scrap and stuck it in my jacket pocket. “Everything's fine,” I said.

*   *   *

Our waitress could have been from another era, posing for an ad for a turn-of-the-(last)-century tea shop. Tammy, the young woman who welcomed us to our table, seemed lost in a heavy black dress that was much too big for her slim body. Her thin neck moved chickenlike within the circle of a white Peter Pan collar. But it was the deckle-edged headdress that made the outfit. A stiff black-and-white fabric crown rested low on her freckled forehead, just above her eyebrows. I tried to avert my eyes, which had focused on the ruffled trim on the crown, but I was too late to prevent stifled laughs from both Tammy and me. I guessed I wasn't the first customer to react to the uniform, and Tammy seemed pleased to join in the fun.

She set down a lovely china three-tiered serving piece with delicate blue and yellow flowers around the edges. Neat arrangements filled the tiers: creamy scones; crustless bread spread with mixtures of olives, cucumbers, and cream cheese; small fruit tarts; and chocolate nibbles. My first lunch date in North Ashcot was going well, except for the baffling scrap of green plastic in my pocket.