Morning Glory Circle (20 page)

“Or they share a molten passion that threatens to drown them both in a tidal wave of desire,” Maggie said.

“That’s just gross,” Hannah said.

Bonnie interrupted them and said, “We need to get going or we’ll miss the second service.”

Maggie walked down to Sacred Heart with her mother, who was fussing about the new keys.

“I went over this morning and checked but nothing was taken,” she said. “Sonny dropped off more keys and gave me a lecture about not handing them out to just anyone. I told him, ‘if I can’t trust my family who can I trust?’”

Maggie thought it wisest to keep her mouth shut.

Ed and Tommy had multiple helpings of pancakes, bacon, and sausage. Several people asked where Mandy was, and Tommy kept telling them, “She’s working at the bakery today.”

Many of these people winked at Ed, but he pretended not to notice.

Patrick took a break and plunked down next to Ed, telling Tommy, “Why don’t you run down to the bakery and see if there’s anything you can do to help your mom out.”

Tommy obediently jumped up and went. Ed found himself resenting Patrick bossing Tommy around, but restrained himself. Tommy was not his son, and Patrick had enjoyed a closer relationship to the boy for a longer period of time.

“So how’s it going?” Patrick asked Ed.

Ed could feel himself blush and hated himself for it.

“Fine,” he said. “Just fine.”

“That’s what I hear,” Patrick said. “Let’s be sure it stays that way.”

“What do you mean?” Ed asked him.

“Well let’s just say that Mandy and Tommy are part of our family, and I would hate to see them get hurt.”

“Are you threatening me?”

“Astute observation. I can see why you work in the news biz.”

“Patrick,” Ed said. “I would never do anything to hurt Mandy or Tommy. You know that.”

“Good. Then there will be no need for me to break both of your legs if you do.”

“You aren’t serious.”

“As a heart attack,” Patrick said, and stood to leave.

“C’mon, Patrick,” Ed said. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Glad we could have this talk,” Patrick said, and slapped Ed pretty hard on the back before he walked away.

Sean sat down in the seat his brother had just vacated.

“Patrick putting the strong arm on you?” he asked.

“Yes,” Ed said. “I can’t believe he’s serious.”

“He’s pretty fond of Mandy. Maggie says if it weren’t for Ava, Patrick and Mandy would probably be married by now.”

“Well, that explains a lot. Thanks for telling me.”

“I’ve only been back a couple days,” Sean said. “But I gotta tell ya, it’s like a soap opera around here.”

“Don’t I know it,” Ed said. “It’s good to see you, though.”

“Thanks,” Sean said. “Listen, we think Brian might be sniffing around town, behind the scenes.”

“That’s just what Ava and the kids don’t need right now,” Ed said.

“If you see him, will you let me know? Before Patrick, I mean.”

“Sure thing.”

Scott looked over the lists he had been making in connection with Margie’s murder investigation. After canvassing the town without Sarah in tow, he and Deputies Frank and Skip had found many people who were willing to share their negative experiences with Margie. Scott figured for every one person willing to tell a tale there were two more that had worse to tell but chose not to. Just like the investigation into Theo Eldridge’s death, Scott now faced a town full of suspects, many of whom may have hated Margie enough to want her dead.

From interviews made about her last known movements on Monday night Scott knew she had an altercation with Sue Fischer outside their house on Lotus Avenue, and then Maggie saw her mailing some letters at the post office. Margie then insulted Maggie, and as she walked away, Maggie overheard Margie getting into it with Matt Delvecchio at the IGA. After that no one had anything to report except her mother Enid, who said she heard Margie come in late that night but couldn’t remember what time, and didn’t hear her leave again.

Scott walked down to the IGA and found Matt Delvecchio stacking large bags of dog food on a pallet by the front windows. When he asked about what Margie said to him Matt shook his head.

“Margie was a lonely, bitter person,” Matt said. “I never took anything she said seriously. On Monday night she hinted my wife was having an affair with my brother Sonny because she goes to the hardware store a lot. Sonny’s wife just left him and my wife is working there to help out, so Margie was right about the visits but didn’t have all her facts straight. Not having the facts never stopped ole Margie from spreading a rumor.”

“Any idea who might have hated her enough to kill her?”

“I’ve been hearing some really awful stuff about her now that’s she’s dead, and if half of what they say is true, there could be dozens of people, really. It’s all just gossip, though. You know how people are.”

“What have you been hearing?”

“You understand this is just what’s going around?”

“I understand.”

“Well, my wife heard that Margie was blackmailing some people over things she found in their mail, and things she saw going on when she walked around town at night.”

“Any names attached to these stories?”

“I wouldn’t like to say. It’s just gossip.”

“Would your wife tell me?”

“Probably.”

Scott thanked Matt and headed up Pine Mountain Road to Lilac Avenue, where Matt and his wife Rita lived in a brick foursquare with a porch covered in what looked like twenty years worth of lawnmower and bicycle parts. Rita answered the door in her bathrobe, smoking a cigarette. She invited Scott in, and led him to the kitchen in the back of the house through a dark hallway lined on each side by towering stacks of newspapers, magazines, catalogues, and books. Scott had never been in their house before, but quickly recognized the signs of a hoarder living there. In the kitchen there was a narrow path to each appliance, plus room for two people to sit at an old chrome dinette table. Every other inch of available space was piled with flattened food packaging, egg cartons, and milk jugs, all in neat, orderly piles tied with twine and stacked as high as Scott was tall. It gave the kitchen an almost labyrinth quality.

“Excuse the mess,” Rita said, and Scott almost laughed out loud.

Rita was a fortyish woman of medium height with a gaunt frame and frizzy dark hair. She had a habit of crossing one arm across her body in order to grasp the elbow of the other arm, which held a cigarette in its hand. This cigarette was never farther than six inches away from her face, with an ash so long it was mesmerizing to watch how it didn’t fall off. As soon as each cigarette was smoked a new one was lit. The house was permeated with the smell, and Scott knew he couldn’t stay long. He declined coffee and got right to it, asking her about the rumors.

“That Margie was a piece of work,” Rita said, and then inhaled deeply on her cigarette before blowing the smoke out in an upwards direction by extending her bottom lip. “She’s got my mother-in-law tied up in a knot over some letter she sent claiming Tony’s a big pansy. Listen, everybody in the family knows about Tony, but we don’t really care. He’s a good guy, and he keeps that part of his life out of town, where it belongs. His mother just doesn’t want to know, ya know?”

“Did Margie ask your mother-in-law for money to keep it quiet?”

“No, she just wanted to punish Tony for not writing her an insurance policy on the old lady. She had to make good on some of her threats or no one would take her seriously, ya see what I mean?”

“Do you know of anyone she has blackmailed?”

Rita looked at Scott speculatively, and finally knocked an inch long ash off her cigarette onto a saucer on the table. Scott could feel a tiny headache start, right behind the sinuses between his eyebrows. The cigarette smoke was starting to make him feel sick at his stomach.

“I’m not going to do all your work for you, but I will give you some names to get you started,” Rita said. “You go talk to Trick Rodefeffer and Mandy Wilson. Ask those two what Margie had on them.”

Trick’s name didn’t surprise Scott, but Mandy’s did.

Scott walked up to Morning Glory Avenue, where Trick and his wife Sandy lived in a faux Tudor mini-mansion. Trick was still in bed when Scott rang the bell, and eventually answered the door in his pajama bottoms and a sweat shirt. He also invited Scott back to the kitchen, but unlike Rita’s and Matt’s house, the Rodefeffer house was spotless, and the kitchen was a showplace of marble and stainless steel. Trick filled a coffee filter and started the coffee maker, but only put one mug on the table, in front of Scott.

Trick was the same age as Scott, but looked ten years older. He had big bags under his pale blue eyes, and his thinning blonde hair was cut in a style made popular twenty years ago, when Trick wore a puka shell necklace and drove a black Trans Am with a gold eagle painted on the hood. He got himself a beer out of the massive refrigerator, removed the cap with a practiced thumb flick, and plopped down on a stool across the wide kitchen island from Scott.

“What can I do ya for?” he asked.

“I guess you heard about Margie.”

“Oh yeah, awful thing, just awful. Horrible, horrible thing. I hated the bitch, but still, stabbed in the heart and thrown over the hill like a sack of garbage. That’s brutal.”

“I understand you’re handling the sale of her mother’s house.”

“I am, I am indeed. Mountain View owns it, so technically I am representing their interests.”

“Did you have any trouble with Margie over the sale?”

“Trouble was Margie Estep’s middle name, Scott, as you well know. That sour little minx had her nose in everyone’s business, and mine was no exception.”

“What did she do?”

“She intercepted a very private letter sent to me by a dear, close personal friend of mine of whom my wife has no knowledge. She threatened to show it to Sandy. Very cold, very calculating, almost evil, some might say.”

“What did she want?”

“My percentage of the sale of her mother’s house.”

“What did you do?”

“I love my wife, Scott, and five percent of that shack is not that many pesos, but money’s money, am I right? I knew if I gave in once she’d be back for more. Pesky business, blackmail. It’s a deep pit, just terribly deep. I told her I’d tell Sandy myself, save her the trouble. She almost swallowed her tongue she was so mad.”

“Did she show Sandy the letter?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Did you tell Sandy?”

“My wife’s a terrific gal, Scott. She hears things, she sees things, and when she comes to me, I explain to her how appearances can be deceiving, facts can be twisted, and completely innocent conduct can be misconstrued by jealous busybodies. She may be mad for awhile, but she always comes around. It may take a piece of jewelry or a nice vacation to smooth her ruffled feathers, but we have a good life and she likes being Mrs. Rodefeffer. I didn’t want to upset her by sharing what Margie had done, and as far as I know, Margie never carried out her evil plot. All’s well that ends well.”

“Except for Margie.”

“Nothing to do with me or mine, I can assure you. I couldn’t kill anybody. I’m a natural born coward and everybody knows it. I can’t hunt or fish, hell, I can’t even boil a live lobster; makes me sick at my stomach just thinking about it. Besides, the missus and I just got back from a trip to the Keys; we left last Friday and just returned yesterday evening. I think that puts me out of the Margie-specific time frame, doesn’t it?”

“Has Sandy opened the mail that accumulated while you were gone?”

“Not that I know of, why?”

Enlightenment paled Trick’s face under his Florida tan and he jumped up and ran to the front hallway, where a basket of mail sat on a side table. Scott followed at a slower pace, and when he caught up to Trick, the man was frantically rifling through a pile of envelopes and periodicals. When he came to a plain white envelope with his wife’s name and their address typewritten on the front with no return address, he looked at Scott with wide eyes.

“You may have just saved my life, compadre.”

Scott held his hand out and Trick reluctantly parted with the letter.

Mandy was working at the bakery, and Scott led her out into the alley behind it for their talk.

“What’s up?” Mandy asked, her big green eyes wide.

“Did Margie Estep try to blackmail you?”

Mandy’s face flushed and her eyes opened even wider.

“Oh, Scott,” she said. “You don’t think I done kilt that rotten egg.”

“No, I don’t,” Scott said. “I’m just following up on everyone she tried to get money out of, and your name came up.”

Mandy’s eyes teared up and Scott felt awful.

“Oh my Lord,” Mandy said as the tears started falling. “You think I coulda done somethin’ like that.”