See Also Deception (26 page)

I eased out of Calla's office reluctantly. “Goodbye,” I whispered. I knew the room would never be the same again, and it was highly possible that I would never have the privilege, or opportunity, to enter the librarian's private domain again.

It was still unsettling that the library was noisier and busier than I had ever experienced it, but that also made it easy to lose myself in the crowd that had assembled to mourn Calla. I was dressed in Lida Knudsen's best funeral dress. Everyone, it seemed, was dressed in black. Now I
was
a sagebrush moth, easily camouflaged and grateful for it.

I caught a glimpse of Delia Finch still holding court at the counter as I stepped out of the double doors. I hoped beyond hope again that she would only be a temporary replacement. Nothing she had done since our first meeting had endeared her to me at all. Just the opposite. I knew though, that no one could ever replace Calla Eltmore. Not even the sweetest, wisest librarian in the world—which Delia Finch was not—would have a chance with me. Had I known Delia before Calla had been killed, I would have put her at the top of my suspect list. As it was, I wasn't sure that Delia and Calla had ever met. She had no reason to kill Calla that I knew of. It was a silly thing to consider. Especially with Herbert in jail.

The weather had changed since I'd been inside the library. The air was cool and moist, the sky gray and growing grayer. A front of distant clouds looked like they could transition into black at any second, so they too would be in in mourning with the rest of us. But I knew better. The clouds were full of rain. I could see the steady sheets dropping to the earth from where I stood, in that crucial spot where Nina Tutweiler had launched her fall from. I should have been happy—the farmer's wife, rejoicing—because the autumn season had been so dry. Worryingly so. Nearly a drought. No amount of index money would ever get me through that catastrophe. Besides, I could only do so many indexes. It wasn't something one could speed through in a day and send out a bill for services rendered. A good index took weeks to create, sometimes months, and ultimately, the publisher never seemed in a hurry to pay the bill. A check could take three or four months to arrive, after the fact.

It looked like the rain was about ten minutes west of town, which gave me plenty of time to hurry the two blocks to where I had parked the Studebaker without getting soaked. The wind was as riled as the sky, pushing hard at my back, hurrying me along as I went.

I ignored the cars and trucks and the people coming and going from the library. Honestly, I was glad that I hadn't run into anyone that I knew. Taking the time to stop by the Tutweilers only put more distance and time between Hank and I. Olga had assured me that I had plenty of time before Doc Huddleston signed the release papers, and I knew if I showed up too early I would only add to Hank's discomfort and fidgeting. He would be upset that he was keeping me from something that I needed to get done. He'd always hated being a burden.

The Tutweilers' house was easy to find. It sat a block and a half from the entrance to the college, just off of 7th Street West. Professor Tutweiler could most likely walk to class on a nice day, or come home for lunch if he so chose. The in-town options of life were foreign to me, of course, but I had to admit that I was envious at times of the ease of access to life and living. Like now. I felt so disconnected and far away from my normal life. It would be nice to have the ability to run home, open the door, breathe my own air, and check on Shep. But that was not to be. I was miles away from the comfort of my own home and the worried dog that waited there for my return.

The Tutweilers lived in a lovely little two-story, clapboard house, a dark maroon instead of the normal white. The front door was arched, as were the windows. The front yard was well-tended—the bushes trimmed and shaped, and all of the leaves carefully raked so not one blade of dormant grass was out of place. A rare single-stall attached garage sat off to the right of the front door, and I assumed there was an entry inside it as well. Most houses had a garage in the back, accessible by the alley, or no garage at all—one of the downsides to town living. Most folks had heaters they plugged into the engine blocks of their cars and trucks in the winter, so they would start in subzero temperatures, but I always felt sorry for those houses that only had the option to park along the street.

The Tutweilers' house looked warm and inviting, even as rain started to pelt the windshield of the Studebaker. More to the point, it looked like the perfect English professor's house—pulled straight out of a fairy tale and placed gingerly on a perfect small-town street.

I could have lived in that house, it was that cute.

I sat in the truck, not anxious in any way to jump out into the rain. I lacked an umbrella, but I was glad to see an overhang above the front door that would help protect me, partially, from the persistence of the coming storm. The wind pushed the rain sideways, but that was nothing out of the ordinary. Gray skies had turned to black, and the rain I had seen from the library had arrived in full force on 7th Street. I had nothing in me that would allow for a celebration of life.

There was a part of me that didn't know what I was doing here. My arrival was less out of politeness, having accepted an invitation, and more out of curiosity. But beyond that, I was afraid. What if Nina Tutweiler had killed Calla? What if I had been right to put her on my suspect list? I had no way to protect myself. The shotgun was in the wardrobe at home where it belonged, and I'd left the .22 with Pastor. There'd been no need to bring the gun to the funeral or ask Jaeger to put it in the truck after he'd repaired the tires.

Could Nina have been the one to have slashed the tires in an attempt to keep me from the funeral? I couldn't make the connection, find a motive. Besides—and this was still a thorn in my side—Shep would have heard her and barked. He hadn't. I still couldn't figure out why that was.

I closed my eyes and listened to the rain pound the top of the truck, waiting for a reprieve from the downpour. Nothing I could think of really led me to believe that Nina had killed Calla. Just the opposite, if she had written the letter. There had been no anger there, no hate. Just longing. I'd understood that as soon as I read it.

It didn't take long for the rain to slow and offer me a chance to hurry to the front door. There was not enough power in the clouds to encourage a day's worth of rain like we needed, but it did promise to come and go for a good while. It was go to the Tutweilers' now, or go to the hospital.

To die, to sleep—To sleep, perchance to dream—ay, there's the rub, For in this sleep of death what dreams may come . . .
 The line from
Hamlet
that Nina had quoted outside of the funeral home crossed my mind before I could make another move, and I wondered for the first time if she had been trying to tell me something instead of challenging Claude. Or both.

CHAPTER 43

Just as I started to push out of the truck, something brushed my ankle and made me stop. I reached down and touched the musk thistle I had placed there and completely forgotten about. Lightning plant, or thistle in general, had special protection powers gifted by Thor, the Norse God of Thunder, according to the book I was trying to finish the index for. Which was not late to the publisher, thank you very much. But it seemed I couldn't get far from that book, or Norse mythology, for that matter. But since Norwegian is the root population of the majority of folks around here, it shouldn't be a surprise that I'd run into Thor on occasion. I suppose we all could use some protection, but I didn't really need the reminders.

I scooted the plant back under the seat just as a clap of thunder rumbled in the distance. I shivered, opened the truck's door, and hurried to the Tutweilers' stoop, clutching my purse with the purloined letter safely inside of it. I pressed the doorbell right away, then waited as patiently as I could. No one answered the door immediately, nor did I hear anyone coming. Rain pushed at my uncovered hair, and no amount of Aqua Net could have held it in place.

If I stood at the front door too long, I would be soaked to the bone. I pressed the doorbell again, listened to it buzz, and continued to wait.
Perhaps I had misunderstood the invitation.
I tapped my foot to the beat of the rain.

Somewhere inside the house a radio or television set played soft, comfortable music. The tune was instrumental, orchestral. No voices, no singing, much like we had heard earlier at the funeral home, except the music wasn't hymns of praise or salvation, just something that seemed to set the proper mood for company.

There was no other sign of anyone at home. I had expected Nina and Claude, still dressed to the nines, not a hair out of place, like their yard, like their house, sitting in wait to mourn Calla over tea and cookies. But that didn't seem to be the case.

I was tempted to leave, not ring the buzzer again, but I gave it another try, held the button next to the door a little longer than I had before. I had, after all, overcome all of my suspicions to face them both.

With that thought in mind, I peered in the side glass hesitantly, uncomfortably, before I hurried back to the truck. There could have been a million reasons why either of the Tutweilers had failed to come to the door.

What I saw didn't make sense. At least not at first.

A dining room chair was tumbled over on its side. My mind immediately recognized the sight of something that shouldn't be there, a broken pattern. Everything with the Tutweilers had been in place. Everything except what I was seeing as I peered inside. That
and
the damage to their Cadillac. It was a mar on something perfect in every other way. I had misplaced the memory if it or deemed it unimportant, I wasn't sure which. The windshield had been shattered, and the driver's side fender had been dented in. I'd assumed the damage had been caused by a normal everyday fender bender. But maybe I had been wrong. A new pattern was starting to take form, precipitated by a chair on its side.

I opened the screen door and knocked on the front door a little more heavily than I normally would have. “Is everything all right? Hello, is anyone home?”

I was answered by a gust of wind and a clap of thunder that sounded like it erupted over the library. Close, but not overhead. Still, my whole body vibrated and my purse slipped down my arm and fell to the ground. I reached down to grab it and stood up slowly, eyeing the inside of the house from a lower perspective. There, just above the chair, barely in view, was a pair of shoes dangling motionless in midair. There was no doubt in my mind that they were a woman's shoes. I had admired them earlier in the day.

I couldn't process what I was seeing or what I was thinking. My entire body felt like it had been shocked. I bolted straight up, yanked on the screen door again, and pounded on the door. This time it eased open, like it had been unlocked all along.

I knew enough not to touch Nina Tutweiler any more than I had to determine that she was dead. Her hand was cool, not cold, and her finger still had flexibility in it. Rigor hadn't set in yet, so her death seemed recent.

Nina Tutweiler hung from a rafter in the dining room by a makeshift noose that was nothing more than a double-wound orange, heavy-duty extension cord. It must have come from the garage. She was still dressed in her funeral clothes. Her head was cocked to the side, her neck snapped, and her tongue, fading pink, hung out of the corner of her mouth.

There was nothing that I could do to save Nina. I rushed to the phone to call the police, to call for an ambulance, without giving a single thought to Claude Tutweiler's presence or my own state of being or welfare. Why would I?

Words burbled out of my mouth once a human being came on the line. I was relieved not to be alone.

I gave the address to the operator and told her what I saw: “The lady of the house has hanged herself.”

It was so easy to think that was true when you were looking right at it.

CHAPTER 44