Murder in Merino Page 6

“So what did Danny say?” Nell asked.

  “Nothing, really. Just that she was interested in mysteries and the fact that he’d been an investigative reporter.”

  “Fiddlesticks,” Birdie said. “That’s a conversation you have at a party or when meeting Danny in the bookstore. You don’t invite a handsome young man to have drinks with you to discuss it. Especially one who is involved with another woman.”

  Izzy picked up her pace and Nell and Birdie huffed to catch up. “I was upset when she told me, but the more I think about it, I think Jules is oblivious to the fact that Cass might not like her hanging out with Danny. And I don’t think she’s really flirting, either. Jules doesn’t strike me that way. She was in the shop yesterday, talking to everyone, asking a million questions about Sea Harbor, why people lived there, who lived where, who was who. How great the food was. How friendly the people. You’d think she was writing a history of the town or an article for a travel magazine instead of just visiting. She sat with Esther Gibson for a long time in the shop, knitting away, and Esther was in heaven—she loved having someone interested in all her old stories.

  “Customers liked her, too. Even Mae likes her, and she’s a pretty good judge of character. She likes that Jules seems unaware of her looks, as if it’s totally irrelevant to anything important. She’s almost careless about herself.”

  Nell had noticed that, too. Unlike many beautiful women, Jules didn’t try to bring attention to herself. She was who she was—that was the message she gave out, and whether people liked her or not didn’t seem to be anything she worried much about.

  But there was something else about Jules Ainsley. Something just beneath the surface. A kind of determination that Nell couldn’t quite put her finger on. She was friendly, but directed, and Nell suspected she wouldn’t take kindly to people getting in her way.

  “Do you know if she’s been married?” Birdie asked.

  “No husband, now or ever. Mae came right out and asked her.”

  Nell laughed. “Mae Anderson is the perfect shop manager for you, Iz. She probably knows the complete history of every deliveryman who steps into the shop. No unsavory characters allowed.”

  “Was Jules offended?”

  “Not at all. She laughed, in fact, and told Mae that she’d had a couple of relationships but none that ended in permanency. She said she probably wasn’t cut out for that kind of commitment.”

  A familiar voice traveled across the sand beach and stilled the conversation. They all turned toward the sound.

  “Hi, guys,” Jules Ainsley called out from the water’s edge. She waved a baseball cap in the air.

  A bright red tank top was plastered to her damp tan skin. Green sneakers kicked up sand as she jogged along the beach, her shoes just touching the tide. A headband was only partially successful in holding her hair in place.

  They waved back, but Jules had already passed them and soon was just a moving dot in the distance.

  Jules’s appearance caused an end to the conversation. The feeling that somehow they’d been gossiping hovered uncomfortably as they kept up with the fat wheels of the stroller moving along the sand. For a while they walked in silence, the breeze off the water blowing away remnants of the uncomfortable conversation and energizing them with the smells of the sea. When the beach narrowed to a sliver, they turned their backs on the beach and headed toward the road.

  “Is your house on the market yet?” Birdie asked, looking down the road to the hilly neighborhood that Izzy had lived in before her marriage to Sam. The cottage was at the top of a gentle rise in the land on the quiet Ridge Road cul-de-sac. Trees, brambles, and bushes crowded the low hill that led up to the homes.

  Izzy laughed. “Supposed to be. But no. We thought it’d be ready to show sooner, but Abby put her chubby little foot down. It’s amazing how a person as sweet and tiny and wonderful as Abigail Kathleen can determine our days with such indomitable force. With a tweak of her finger she pushes everything else in our lives to the backseat.”

  “As it should be. And you love it, Isabel,” Birdie said.

  Izzy nodded happily. She looked back at the hill. The potting shed and back porch were just visible above the trees. “As for the house, Sam did some minor fix-ups last night. We didn’t get around to the potting shed as we’d planned—it’s still a mess from the last tenant. Gloves and tools all over the place. But Stella thinks that’s okay since, as she so sweetly put it, we’re selling a house, not a place to pot plants. She’s having an open house Friday. She even bought a new dress for it. Can you believe it? She’s so excited.”

  Watching Stella Palazola, a young Sea Harbor resident they’d known nearly her whole life, setting out on a new career was nice to see.

  Izzy turned Abby’s stroller down the beach road and toward a shortcut that would take them back to Nell’s house, where scones and iced tea were waiting.

  Birdie paused for a minute, looking back toward the hill leading up to the Ridge Road neighborhood. She pushed her sunglasses into her short white hair and squinted. “Isn’t that Jules down there?”

  Izzy and Nell stopped and looked back down the road toward the hill.

  Jules Ainsley stood at the edge of the road, her profile visible as she stared up the hill. For a moment she appeared to be frozen, her body unnaturally immobile. Then one hand lifted to her mouth, as if suppressing a cry.

  Birdie started to move in that direction, to call out, but she stopped before the words were formed, instinctively knowing it was a moment that defied interruption.

  An eerie moment.

  Jules’s head was held back as if tethered in place. Her eyes were focused on something in the trees and bushes that covered the hill like a briar patch, as if seeing something visible only to her. It was a look of awe, they agreed later. A look of disbelief.

  A look that was seeing a mirage, or a miracle in motion, or something else entirely.

  A look that was aimed directly at the hill leading up to the Perrys’ cottage.

  Chapter 7

  Ben said they were all overreacting. “You’re forgetting that she’s a tourist. That’s what tourists do—look at things.” He put the morning paper aside and took off his glasses.

  “Stare,” Izzy corrected around a mouthful of scone. “Definitely a stare.” She checked her watch.

  “It was a bit unusual,” Birdie agreed. “And not to disparage Izzy’s old house, but that hill behind it isn’t very pretty. Jules could have found many more beautiful spots to admire if she was out seeing the sights.”

  “You’re absolutely right,” Izzy agreed. “That back area is a mess. Sam kept thinking he’d do something about it—a person could die in that tangle of weeds and bushes and never be found. But in the end we decided to lower the price and leave the yard work for the next guy. That land is actually owned by the city, so it’s always iffy who should take care of it.”

  She knelt down beside the stroller, her long legs bending like a ballet dancer’s. She touched Abby’s cheek, then looked up. “I need to get home, shower, and get to the shop. You’re sure you don’t mind keeping Abby today, Aunt Nell? The class I’m teaching should be over around four.”

  Nell simply smiled. Mind? What a silly question. Mind watching this beautiful baby who had brought such joy into their lives? Her day with Abby, written on the calendar with a bright red marker, was the highlight of her week.

  The day was planned. She’d take Birdie home, run errands, and then lunch with Ben at the yacht club, where they would show off Abby’s smile to the hostess, Liz, to the bartenders, the diners. Later she and Abby would head to the Sea Harbor Historical Museum for a short meeting in which Abby would be welcomed by the board members as warmly as an unexpected donation to fix the roof. Amazing the power babies had.

  Izzy planted one last kiss on Abby’s plump cheek and was out the door, followed in minutes by Ben, off to a meeting
at City Hall.

  “It doesn’t happen often, but he’s wrong, you know.” Birdie looked at Ben’s departing back. She gathered up her sweater and backpack and headed toward the door.

  Nell picked up the infant seat with its precious cargo and followed her to the car without answering. Birdie was absolutely right, of course.

  Tourist or not, Julia Ainsley couldn’t possibly have been in awe of the tangled jungle that had once been the hill in Izzy’s backyard. Something else had stilled the lovely runner into that silent stare. In whatever form it had come—a sudden memory, a dream, a thought—Julia Ainsley had seen a ghost.

  A ghost on Ridge Road.

  It was nearly two in the afternoon when Nell and baby Abby finished their errands and parked near the museum. With both Beatrice Scaglia and Karen Hanson on the museum board, it was certain the premeeting chatter wouldn’t be about politics. Laura Danvers, chairwoman, ran a tight ship and avoided confrontations. A relief to Nell. Beatrice was everywhere these days, and the tension caused by a heated campaign was difficult to avoid in such a small town.

  She carried the car seat with a sleepy Abby into the redbrick building that housed Sea Harbor’s past in glass cases and exhibits. Its viewing rooms were filled with models of fishing boats, photos of early settlers, maps, and exhibits of the once thriving granite industry. It never failed to make her proud of the place she and Ben had chosen to live after leaving busy corporate lives in Boston.

  Laura Danvers was waiting at the door of the meeting room for a peek at baby Abby. “I just came from the yarn shop and Izzy mentioned Abby was joining us. I need my baby fix,” she said, bending down to meet Abby at eye level.

  “The meeting will be short, I promise you, sweet Abby,” she whispered, then rose and, with a smile, promised Nell the same.

  Nell slipped inside and took a chair close to the door, settling the car seat on the floor at her feet and nodding a greeting to other board members. Rachel Wooten sat down next to her. She leaned toward Nell. “Don mentioned you ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time the other day and were forced to hear an argument. He was so sorry. Those things can be messy.”

  “It was nothing, really. Not even messy. Business dealings can be tense—it’s the nature of the beast.”

  “‘Beast’ is a good word for it.”

  “My bet is that whatever it was, it’s settled by now.”

  Rachel smiled. “You’re probably right. Don says business arguments are easy to handle. It’s the personal ones he has trouble with.”

  “Personal problems? Are you talking about Jeffrey?”

  Rachel nodded. “He didn’t show up for work yesterday. I’ve known Jeffrey since I was a kid—it’s not the way he is. Don was worried enough about it that he stopped by his house.”

  “Was Jeffrey okay?”

  “He wasn’t there. Then today he missed a meeting with the accountants, but at least he called and made some excuse. So I presume he’s fine, though it’s odd. He loves the Ocean’s Edge. He’s never delinquent, never misses a meeting.”

  “Maybe he was sick. There’s a stomach bug going around.”

  Rachel agreed. “Or maybe he just needed a day off. Who doesn’t want to miss work now and then? That’s one of the reasons I’m on this board. It’s a fine board, but also a good reason to get out of the courthouse legal offices every few weeks.”

  “Definitely true,” Nell agreed. Everyone needed a break. Even Jeffrey Meara, who never took one.

  • • •

  But later that afternoon, while pushing Abby’s stroller down Harbor Road, Nell wondered whether both she and Rachel had been too quick to fabricate excuses for Jeffrey Meara.

  She had stopped on the harbor bridge to watch several stately sailboats making their way to inland waters. Leaning over the railing, she spotted Jeffrey sitting on a stone bench, hunched over, his elbows on his knees. The bench was below the bridge near the concrete pilings, not easily visible to people walking by.

  Next to him, also leaning forward, was Stan Hanson. The two men were huddled together as if planning the next play in a tie Patriots game. Stan’s face was in profile, his chin set, his brows pulled together tightly.

  Nell stood there a minute watching the muted conversation. The two men’s body language spoke of a somber conversation, with Jeffrey Meara doing most of the talking. Stan Hanson’s expression seemed to shift with Jeffrey’s words: surprise, dismay, a touch of anger. Sadness. Every now and then he’d take a deep breath, sit back on the bench in silence, and look out over the water. Then, when Jeffrey began to talk again, he’d resume his listening posture.

  Nell pulled herself away. Even though she couldn’t hear a word they were saying, she felt like an eavesdropper. Abby’s soft gurgles were a welcome relief. Quickly she turned and pushed the stroller away from the bridge and down Harbor Road, toward friendly faces and conversations she was meant to be a part of.

  “Nell, you’re just the person I want to see.” Mae Anderson rushed from behind the checkout counter as Nell pushed the stroller into Izzy’s yarn shop.

  “You don’t fool me for a minute. It’s Abigail Kathleen you want. I am simply the means to your end.”

  Mae laughed and leaned her needle-thin body down to peer into the stroller. Abby was fast asleep, but that didn’t stop Mae from carrying on a sweet and intimate conversation with the baby.

  “Well, you truly are the person I want to see.” Beatrice Scaglia appeared from behind a display of merino yarn. The soft skeins were piled high in all the colors of autumn—burnished gold, honey maple, sage green, rich reds and oranges, several of which Beatrice held in her hand. Although Beatrice was rarely seen knitting, she was a devoted customer and often attended Izzy’s classes, disguising her true intent with a pile of yarn, bamboo knitting needles, and a stack of pattern books at her side while she listened to every conversation spinning around her.

  “It helps her to know what people are saying and thinking about the town,” Izzy explained with a shrug.

  Nell looked at the skeins of yarn in Beatrice’s hands. “Those are beautiful, Beatrice. You have good taste.”

  “No, it’s Izzy with the taste,” Beatrice said. She motioned for Nell to follow her to the side of the room, out of traffic. “I tried to talk with you at the museum earlier today, but sometimes it’s hard to talk privately with Karen Hanson around.”

  When she noticed Nell’s frown, her words came more quickly. “I’m sorry if I sound disrespectful, but for all her smiles, she has somehow managed to push me off the speaking platforms of nearly every social group in town by pulling her first-lady card and suggesting that she do it herself. I suppose growing up in the lap of luxury gives one that feeling of power. And somehow—though it seems inappropriate—being the mayor’s wife holds more weight than being a hardworking councilwoman.” Her voice trailed off.

  “Beatrice, campaigns are difficult for sure. But Karen has done a lot of good in Sea Harbor during Stan’s tenure as mayor.”

  “All calculated,” was Beatrice’s retort.

  Nell looked around for an escape.

  “I know I shouldn’t be venting to you, Nell,” Beatrice said, her voice softer, and one hand resting on Nell’s arm. “It’s not what I really wanted to talk to you about anyway. I want to help with your anniversary party.”

  Nell sighed. Before long, the planning committee would include the whole town.

  “I will give a toast, of course, but I could also serve as an unofficial emcee? Welcome people, make everyone feel comfortable. And my nephew has a band I will contact—he’s playing at all my political gatherings.”

  Nell could imagine the scene—an American flag hanging in the background, Beatrice in a colorful suit at the microphone commanding attention, a band playing somewhere in the distance. A political rally in disguise. “Beatrice, you’re generous,” she said. “But w
e don’t need a thing. It’s going to be a casual gathering of friends and family. Hopefully something like lobster rolls and beer.”

  Beatrice frowned and took a step back. “I heard that Mary Pisano is helping organize things.”

  Of course, Nell thought. And she probably knew that Karen was helping Mary. Nothing escaped Beatrice.

  But this time Beatrice focused on a new target. “Mary told me the woman staying in her inn is offering suggestions. Surely you don’t want a stranger involved.”

  This time Nell laughed. “Jules used to cater parties. Mary is simply asking her for ideas.”

  But Beatrice wasn’t listening. “The woman is pleasant enough—but she seems a bit inappropriate, don’t you think? I’ve seen her jogging through town in those skimpy shorts. Asking questions, nosing around. I even saw her over at City Hall this afternoon.”

  “Oh?”

  “In the records library. How many tourists do you see in the records office?”

  Beatrice let her words hang in the air between them, casting them in an ominous light.

  “I think she makes the most of places she visits, absorbing the town’s spirit and history, getting to know people. It’s a good idea, don’t you think?”

  It was a thought that developed as she said it aloud, and hearing her own words, Nell decided there was probably truth in what she was saying—even though her intent was to keep Beatrice from imagining nefarious scenarios.

  Beatrice didn’t answer, but her lack of a reply, brief good-bye, and quick exit told Nell what she thought of her opinion. And of Jules Ainsley. And definitely of Karen Hanson.

  Nell watched her walk away. The councilwoman was unique, and in spite of her idiosyncrasies and sometimes irritating manner, Nell admired her. She’d undergone a tragedy in her own life when her then husband was found guilty of a murder in an attempt to cover up an affair. Somehow she had come out on top of it all, holding her head high and resuming her place in Sea Harbor’s political scene. Beatrice Scaglia was a survivor and Nell liked that about her.