Hanging Hannah (4 page)

“Nicholas!” Jane cried.

She ran across the grass toward the source of his scream, the other adults close behind her. She realized now that the children had been in the woods, presumably gathering items for their scavenger hunt. Jane could see neither Ginny nor any of the children through the trees, but as Jane neared them, she could hear children crying.

She was the first to enter the woods, by means of a path that bored into the shadows between two wide oak trunks. She had walked only a few feet when she nearly collided with Ginny, who stood on the path with her back toward Jane and was calling desperately to the children, whom Jane could see just beyond her.

“Kids, quickly! Come out, follow me!” Ginny, oblivious of Jane and the others behind her, moved quickly among the children, roughly shepherding them toward the path that led out of the woods. Jane spotted Nick. His face was sickly white and tears ran down his cheeks. Ginny grabbed his shoulder and pushed him after the other children. At that moment Nick saw Jane and ran to her, hugging her hard.

Jane felt someone bump her from behind and turned her head. It was Ernie, who was looking past her with a look of alarm.

“Ginny, what on earth is going on?” he demanded.

Ginny, having gotten all of the children headed out of the woods, spun around to look at him. Jane had never seen her like this. Her face was white, almost green, and she looked as if she was trying hard not to pass out. She said nothing, instead pointing with her eyes to something deeper in the woods.

“Oh, good Lord . . .” Doris whispered.

They could see only feet, grimy feet in sandals, dangling about a foot and a half off the ground. Foliage obstructed the rest, and Jane, followed by the others, moved slowly around.

Jane's hands flew to her face. “My God.” It was a young woman, thin, in a simple pale blue cotton dress sprinkled with tiny white flowers. She hung by the neck from a noose at the end of a rope that had been thrown over a heavy branch; from the branch the rope extended straight and tight at a downward angle to where it was tied to the base of another tree's trunk.

“Who is she?” Penny said softly.

Jane studied the woman. She didn't think it was anyone she knew but it was impossible to know for sure because even in the dappled shade of the trees it was clear that the woman's face was covered with garish makeup, almost like a clown: a red circle of blush, like old-fashioned rouge, on each cheek; scarlet lipstick applied so sloppily that it extended well past her lips to create a weird oval red mouth; deep blue eye shadow on her eyelids, which were, mercifully, closed. Her hair was an ordinary brown and shoulder length; it hung straight and limp—as if, it occurred to Jane, she'd had a bad haircut. Jane squinted, studying the woman's face harder. Could she be faintly smiling? It seemed so, but this, too, was impossible to say for sure because of the lipstick. If not for the unnatural angle of her head, she might have been peacefully asleep, so relaxed was her face, so gently closed were her eyes. But that was how death often looked, Jane told herself. That was what death was—a kind of sleep.

The wind rose, rustling the leaves on the trees, playing with the girl's hair. Goose bumps rose on Jane's arms, and she shivered.

“Does anybody know her?” Ernie asked softly, and Jane jumped at the sound of his voice.

No one answered.

“Come on, let's get away from her,” Louise said, taking control, and like automatons everyone turned and started back along the path.

Nick held Jane's hand tightly. She realized now that she should have shepherded him out of the woods with the other children, that she'd allowed him to study the poor hanging woman along with the grown-ups.

“Mom?” Nick was crying. “Who is she?”

“I don't know, darling,” was all Jane could say, wrapping her arm tightly around his shoulder. “I don't know.”

They emerged into the bright sunshine. Ginny had the children on the patio in a cluster. A few feet from Jane and Nick, Louise was speaking softly to Ernie. “Nothing like this has ever happened at Hydrangea House,” Jane heard her say, an oddly accusatory note in her voice. Then, “I'll call the police,” Louise said, and ran toward the inn.

Jane led Nick to the patio. Ginny was gone, Penny overseeing the children in her place. Jane gave her an inquiring look.

“Ginny's calling their parents,” Penny explained.

Jane nodded.

“You should take Nick home,” Doris said. She was only now arriving at the edge of the patio from the woods. “Apparently he discovered her.”

Jane looked down at Nick in horror. He was no longer crying, but he was deathly white and very still, staring into nothingness, as if seeing an image of the hanging woman that was imprinted on his eyes.

“Yes, come on, Nick, we're going home now.” She took his hand again and started for the inn.

Daniel and Laura stood together near the door. Daniel's face was set in a frown she seldom saw, a frown that signified he was deeply upset. Beside him, Laura dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief.

“We're leaving,” Jane told them.

They nodded.

Rhoda approached Jane, gently touched her shoulder, and leaned over to whisper in Jane's ear. “Jane, if Nick found her, the police may want to ask him some questions.”

Jane hadn't thought of that. She felt a sudden surge of fierce protectiveness. She shook her head firmly. “No. He's been through enough already.” She felt anger, though at whom she couldn't say. And then she realized she was angry at the dead girl herself, for killing herself that way, for being so selfish, for letting innocent children find her like that, children who should never see such things. But I'm not being rational, she told herself.

She and Nick entered the inn's cool back servants' pantry. Louise emerged from the kitchen. “The police are coming.”

And at that moment they heard a siren. It grew louder and abruptly stopped with a yelp.

Jane wanted to speak with Louise. “Nick, darling, just wait here for a second. Mommy needs to speak to Mrs. Zabriskie for a minute.”

Hearing this, Louise followed Jane into the kitchen.

“Louise,” Jane said softly, “I don't want the police questioning Nick and upsetting him. Don't tell them he found the girl.”

Louise's jaw dropped; her eyes widened. “How awful. I didn't know. I thought Ginny found her.”

“No,” Jane said, already back in the pantry and grabbing Nick's hand. “Come on, honey, this way.”

She hurried with him to the end of the pantry and out into the hallway that led to the foyer. Louise had no doubt told the police a dead woman had been found in the woods behind the inn. The police would park and walk around the inn. Jane would hurry Nick out the front to her car, which she'd parked on the gravel drive, and they would slip away before anyone could find Nick and upset him.

Reaching the end of the hallway, she could see straight across the foyer and through the windows to the front, where two police cars were parked.

“Let's go,” she said softly to Nick, and pulled him briskly across the foyer as the dark outlines of three men loomed up against the shirred ivory-lace curtain on Louise's front door, on which one of the men now knocked firmly.

Louise appeared from behind Jane, looking distraught. She started toward the door to open it, then stopped and looked helplessly at Jane. Thinking quickly, Jane pulled Nick back toward the hallway. She glanced over her shoulder at Louise, who was clearly waiting to answer the door. But to Jane's horror, the doorknob turned and the door swung open before Louise had even reached it.

Jane froze, still holding Nick's hand. One of the men, the one in front who had knocked, looked familiar to Jane. He wore plain clothes, a blue blazer over gray slacks, and was of medium height, with exceptionally broad shoulders. He had dark brown eyes and fine, straight sandy hair combed in a neat line across his forehead. Behind him stood two uniformed officers.

They strode into the foyer, the officers keeping respectfully back, the man in plain clothes approaching Louise. “Take me to her, please.”

Louise turned to lead him through the inn to the back. The man started to follow her, then noticed Jane and stopped. His lips curved in the tiniest, most professional of smiles.

“Mrs. Stuart,” he said, his tone respectful. “You probably don't remember me.”

So she was right that he looked familiar. He was with the police, obviously, but when had she met him?

As if reading her thoughts, he said, “We met when you were looking for your nanny last fall. Greenberg,” he said, pointing to himself, “Detective Stanley Greenberg.”

She realized she'd blocked him out with as many of the other memories of that episode as she'd been able to block out. But she remembered him as having been kind to her, respectful and deferential, the way he was acting toward her now.

“Yes, of course,” she said, forcing a little smile of her own. “I'm sorry.”

“Not a problem. You're leaving?”

“Yes . . . . My son is very upset. You'll see—” She glanced at Louise, who stood nearby, silently waiting.

“All right,” Greenberg said to Jane. “I'll call you if I have any questions. First I'd better have a look.” He gazed down at Nick and gave him a kind, almost sympathetic smile, though of course he couldn't have known Nick had more reason than the others to be upset.

Jane walked with Nick between the two officers and out the front door. They hurried across the porch, down the steps, and across the drive to Jane's car.

“Mommy,” Nick said, strangely calm, as Jane drove through the gate onto Plunkett Lane, “who
was
that woman in the woods?”

“I—I don't know.”

“Why was she there?” Tears crept into his voice. Jane found herself starting to cry, too.

“I don't know, honey,” she said. “I just don't know.”

And then, though of course she'd known it all along, she remembered that the reason they had been at Hydrangea House in the first place, the reason for the party, was that today was Nick's birthday. If only she could turn back time, make it that he hadn't seen that horror in the woods. But of course she couldn't. He'd seen it, couldn't unsee it, and it occurred to her that the image of that poor girl hanging in the woods was no doubt one that would remain with him for the rest of his life.

Florence had weekends off, though she often remained at home with Jane and Nick. Now that spring had arrived, she spent the occasional weekend with a friend, a fellow nanny in Randolph, where she had worked before coming to Jane last fall. Jane hadn't expected Florence back until that night, but when Jane pulled into the driveway, Florence stood on the front steps of the dark chalet-style house, terror on her dark pretty face.

Jane and Nick got out of the car and walked up the path.

“Missus!” Florence cried. “Who was it, do they know?”

Jane stared at her. “How did you hear about it?”

“My friend Noni, the girl I told you about from Saint Kitts—she called me.”

Noni was also a Shady Hills nanny. “But Noni lives at the north end of town,” Jane said. “How did
she
know?”

“From Yolanda, her friend who works as a chambermaid at Hydrangea House. Yolanda told Noni the girl was dressed up like a clown!” Florence looked horrified as she contemplated this picture.

“Not in front of Nick,” Jane murmured to Florence as she passed into the house.

“Right,” Florence said.

Nick, looking on the verge of tears, walked quickly past her through the foyer and into the family room, where he switched on the TV and sat on the floor, legs crossed.

“Winky!” he called, and the small tortoiseshell cat appeared instantly, climbed into his lap, and curled into a ball. He slowly stroked her fur, staring at the TV screen but as if not seeing it. “Oh, Wink . . .” he said softly.

Jane turned to Florence and tilted her head toward the kitchen. Jane led the way in, and they both sat at the table.

“He's very upset,” Florence observed.

“He found her,” Jane said.

Florence's hands flew to her face and tears appeared instantly in her large dark eyes. “The poor boy.”

“The kids were having a scavenger hunt. They went into the woods to find some of the things on their lists. And there she was, hanging from a tree.”

“But who is she?”

Jane shook her head. “No one recognized her. And she wasn't dressed like a clown, by the way; she was wearing heavy makeup, very garish, like a clown.”

“Ah.” Florence frowned. “But why?”

“No idea.”

“And whoever she was, why did she hang herself there?” Florence asked.

“Excellent question. The obvious answer is that she had something to do with Hydrangea House.”

“You mean someone who worked there, like Yolanda?” Florence shook her head. “No, Mr. and Mrs. Zabriskie would have recognized her.”

“True, but she could have been connected to the inn in some other way. Perhaps she knew someone staying there, or had been staying there herself.”

“But Mr. and Mrs. Zabriskie—”

“Would have recognized her?” Jane pondered this. “I wonder. How well can they know all the people who come and go at the inn? I believe it could have been a guest. Louise said they've been busy lately.”

Florence rose. “Would you like some tea?”

Jane had to laugh. “You're off today, Florence. I'd love some tea, but I'll make it. May I make you some?”

“Yes, you are very kind,” Florence said, and sat down again while Jane worked at the counter.

“You know . . .” Florence said, and her tone was different, deeply thoughtful, so that Jane turned to look at her. “I remember now that Wednesday night I was talking to Noni, and she said Yolanda had talked about seeing someone walking in the woods behind the inn.”

A cold shiver passed through Jane. “So did Louise.”

“Yolanda told Noni it was a young woman, thin. Yolanda watched from the window of her bedroom on the third floor.”

Jane recalled that a number of Louise and Ernie's employees lived on the inn's third floor, especially in the summer, when young college students came to Shady Hills for jobs.

Florence went on, “Yolanda watched her for quite some time. The girl never left the woods, but she kept right to the edge . . .” She stopped, closed her eyes as if remembering. “ ‘Like a stranger looking in,' was how Yolanda put it. How very odd. . . .”

“Odd indeed,” Jane said, pouring tea into two cups and taking them to the table. “Well, whoever she was, whatever she was there for, I think it's a safe bet that she's our hanging woman.”

“But
who
is she?”

“I know very little about such things, but I'm sure the police have ways of identifying people in cases like this. Sending out bulletins, trying to match the dead person's description with that of any missing persons . . .”

“Yes, I am sure you're right.”

Nick walked into the room, Winky at his heels, and the two women put on smiles simultaneously as they turned to him.

“I never got any birthday cake,” Nick said in a deadpan voice.

Jane pulled him over and squeezed him tight. “You poor thing,” she said, though she was glad he'd gotten over the trauma of his discovery enough to realize he'd missed a piece of cake.

Winky jumped onto the table with her combination purr-and-rumble that said, “Pay attention to me!” Florence, happy to oblige, began stroking the cat's soft orange-and-black fur.

“I tell you what we'll do!” Florence said, her face brightly animated. “I will make you one of my special vanilla cakes from a recipe straight from my mother in Trinidad! You will love it—it is full of raisins and almonds. How about tonight? I will run down to the Village Shop for the ingredients. And I will get ice cream, too.”

Nick considered this for a moment, looking at Florence with something close to suspicion. “Well . . . okay!”

“Yes,” Jane said, “that will be wonderful, Florence. Thank you.” She gave Florence a wink.

Florence responded with a tiny nod and looked at her watch. “My goodness, it's past three. I'd better get going. This cake needs time!” She jumped up and went to the sink, where she ran her hands under the faucet. “Soon this cat will have more fur on me than on her!” Shaking her head, she dried her hands on a dish towel, then took a dab of hand cream from a jar near the sink and smoothed it over her hands.

“Now,” she said briskly, “who wants to come with Florence?”

“Me!” Nick cried.

Florence threw back her head and released a big rich laugh. “I had a feeling. Is your homework done?”

He thought for a moment. “Yup—except for my spelling words.”

Florence looked at Jane.

“I think it's okay for him to work on his words while you're baking. In fact,” Jane said, turning to Nick, “if you ask Florence nicely, maybe she'll take you to the inn to pick up your presents. We left them there in all the confusion.”

“I think that is very possible,” Florence said with a smile.

“Yes!” Nick bent down and scooped Winky into his arms. “You can have a piece of my birthday cake, too, Wink!
And
you can play with my presents.” He started toward Florence as if he intended to take the cat along.

“Well, let go of her, then!” Florence said, throwing her hands out toward Winky.

Suddenly, with a loud yowl, Winky sprang from Nick's arms to the floor. For an instant she stood still, the fur on her back standing up, her tail bristling like a brush; then she bolted across the kitchen so fast her paws slid on the tiles. When she reached the back hall, she abruptly turned around, shot back through the kitchen, raced across the family room, and disappeared into the foyer. They heard her thumping madly up the stairs.

“I swear that cat understands English,” Jane said.

“No, missus,” Florence said, looking perplexed. “She has been acting like this for several days. I have been meaning to tell you. She just—goes bananas! Racing around the house, up and down the stairs! A crazy cat! What do you think it is? Maybe spring fever? I've told you I thought you should let her go outside.”

Jane shook her head firmly. “I don't know what's making her act like that, but I've told you, Florence, you're wrong about her going outside. She's an indoor cat.”

“But she has her claws,” Florence argued.

“True, but so did all the other cats that wandered into the woods and lost fights with dogs and foxes and possums and raccoons . . .”

“No way is she going outside!” Nick put in. “Who cares if she acts crazy? That's just Winky. Come on, Florence.” He went out the back door into the garage.

“My orders,” Florence said with an indulgent smile.

“Florence—” Jane put a hand on the other woman's shoulder. “Thank you.”

“No problem!” Florence said. “It's what the poor thing needs.” She started to turn, then stopped, her expression darkening. “I just can't stop thinking about that poor girl. Why would she do that to herself?”

“Why does anyone commit suicide?” Jane asked rhetorically.

“Who said it was suicide?”

Both women turned in surprise. Nick, who had apparently been listening on the small landing just outside the door to the garage, had poked his head back into the hall.

“What do you mean?” Florence asked him.

He shrugged. “How do you think she killed herself?”

“Well, it's obvious,” Jane said, though not really wanting to talk about this. “She tied a rope around a tree trunk, threw it over a branch, made a noose, put it around her neck, and . . .”

“Yes?” he said.

“Well, she could have either jumped from another branch or stood on something and kicked it away.”

But Nick shook his head. “Mom, you're always telling me that things are rarely as they seem and that I should look for things other people don't see.”

Jane didn't remember telling him that, but she decided to play along. “And?”

“Well, I looked at everything very carefully, because I knew I'd never get to see it again. There were no branches she could have jumped from—the tree just wasn't shaped that way. And as for standing on something—there was nothing there!”

“A rock?” Florence hazarded. “A fallen log? Don't forget, she would have kicked it away. So it wouldn't have been right under her.”

“I know that.” Nick looked at Florence as if to ask, Do you think I'm an idiot? “So I looked
all
around her feet. There was nothing. No rock, no log, no stump, no nothing.”

Jane was becoming upset. “But then—”

“Then either of two things could have happened. One, she did stand on something and kick it away, but afterward someone came along and took it away.”

Jane gaped at him. “But why would anyone do that? It doesn't make sense.”

“No, it doesn't, does it?” he agreed solemnly. “So I'm leaning more toward theory two.”

“Which is?”

“Someone strung her up! She was murdered!” His face was positively fiendish. “And I found her!”

“Nicholas Stuart!” Jane was horrified. He had gone from being traumatized to actually enjoying this. “How awful to find it fun that someone has died, and like that! Besides, who would have wanted to kill her? And why?”

“I don't know, Mom. Why do you think
People
magazine called you North Jersey's Miss Marple?” He wiggled his eyebrows the way Kenneth used to when he was at his most devilish. “You're the detective!
You
figure it out. And while you're at it, figure out why whoever killed her smeared that makeup all over her face.” And he vanished back into the garage.

“Oh, missus,” Florence said ominously, looking at Jane in a whole new way, and she turned and followed Nick outside.

Jane stood in the middle of the kitchen, thinking about what Nick had just said. He was absolutely right. Why hadn't she seen it?

Someone had killed that poor girl, strung her up right there among the trees not six feet from the backyard of Hydrangea House.

Someone who, quite possibly, lived right here in Shady Hills.