Sticks & Scones Read online

  “Aren’t you going to take notes?”

  “If I need to remember something.”

  Connie shrugged. She kept her mouth closed for a long time, and I feared she’d changed her mind about talking to me. Finally she said, “Her name was Sara Beth O’Malley. She was with a MASH unit in a valley. It was right before the end of the war. Her unit was overrun and she died….”

  I said, “I’m sorry.”

  Connie looked at me, then returned her gaze to the playground. I knew I hadn’t sounded sincere, so I waited a few moments before continuing.

  “Did you all get together for … the funeral service when they shipped Miss O’Malley’s body back? To commemorate her belonging to your class?”

  Connie Oliver tugged her coat tightly around her and shook her head. “The Army wasn’t able to retrieve her body. We didn’t have a memorial service.”

  I mm-mmed sympathetically, and again waited. “Is there anyone who would know whether there was a ceremony for Sara Beth O’Malley? Family in the area, something like that?” Somebody who might be hiding her now? I added mentally.

  “Nah. Sara Beth didn’t have a lot of family. Her parents were fairly old when she studied to become a nurse, so they must have passed away by now.” Connie Oliver wrinkled her forehead, remembering something. “She was engaged, though. The guy was younger. I think he might still have been in high school when she finished nursing school.” I held my breath. She squinted at me. “His name was Tom. Schwartz or Shoemaker or something like that. He adored her. Much later, I heard through the Fox Meadows D.A.R.E. officer that Sara Beth’s fiancé had become a cop. I guess you could see if you could find him through the sheriff’s department.”

  “Okay, thanks.” I paused, almost overwhelmed by so many words from her strung together at once. I had to ask another question. “Did you ever hear anything about Sara Beth coming back from Vietnam? Like she wasn’t really dead after all?”

  “No!” She paused, shaking her head, clearly annoyed. “The things you journalists come up with, I swear.” A bell rang and she stood up. “I have to go in. You want to know more about Sara Beth, you need to go talk to Tom Schlosser or whoever he was.”

  “Okay. Thanks. You don’t happen to know any more about him?”

  She gestured to a boy who was limping toward her. “What is it, George?”

  “Mike kicked me. I’m crippled. I think I’m going to have to go home.”

  Connie’s voice turned indulgent. “Let me have a look.”

  As George scooted onto the bench, I said, “I promise I’ll get out of your hair if you can just finish what you were telling me about Sara Beth’s fiancé. Did he grieve over her death?”

  “That I don’t know,” Connie said as she carefully folded down George’s sock. I winced at the swelling bruise. No question about it, life on the playground was still pretty darn rough. Connie’s voice was quick and dismissive. “All I remember, Miss Chastain, is that even though Tom was younger than Sara Beth, he was terribly protective of her, always calling to see how she was holding up during exams, seeing if she wanted to go out to eat. That kind of thing. He was crazy about her. Some girls have all the luck.”

  “Thanks again,” I repeated forlornly, before sneaking George my last emergency truffle. He gave me a wide smile. I winked at him and left.

  On my way to Golden, I called the castle. To my astonishment, Tom answered.

  “Hello, husband,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t hear the tremor in my voice. “I’m just phoning to check in. How are you feeling?”

  “Great, for a one-armed guy. Where the heck are you?”

  “Doing errands.” It was sort of the truth. “I’ll be home in no time.”

  “Julian keeps stuffing everyone around here with food. Nobody’s going to be hungry until midnight.”

  “Incorrect!” Julian yelled from the background.

  “Okay,” Tom said, laughing. “Alicia hasn’t arrived yet. But the Hydes talked to Julian about tonight’s dinner. They have a leg of lamb and won’t let him go get one. It’s thawing now. They’re excited you all are fixing dinner, and want to have it in the Great Hall.”

  I told him that would be no problem, signed off, and parked on the steeply sloping street that boasted the residence of Troy McIntire, auction agent. It was a mixed area of run-down houses, I noticed, as I cut and pasted from The Stamp Fox catalog. Some older dwellings were made of stone, while others were cheaply faced with vinyl siding or false brick. My assembling mission complete, I walked up to a one-story brick house with peeling white trim.

  “I’m Francesca Chastain,” I told the short, stooped, sandy-haired man who opened the door. I judged him to be in his mid-sixties. “We have an appoint—”

  “Yeah, yeah. McIntire,” he snapped brusquely as he offered a gnarled hand and closed the door behind him. “What exactly are you looking for?”

  So, we were going to stand on his porch to conduct business? Oh-kay. I remembered Lambert’s words that the types of stamps stolen had never been reported in the newspaper. I handed McIntire the cut-and-pasted page I’d made from The Stamp Fox catalog. On it I’d slapped five pictures of the most valuable Queen Victoria stamps. Troy McIntire held the sheet up to his face and perused it, then quirked a thin eyebrow.

  “Okay, yeah, I have one of these.” A crooked finger pointed to a picture on my sheet. “A man was going through his great-grandmother’s stuff and found it. There might be more, but he has to go through a ton of stuff. You wanna buy it?”

  “How much?”

  He squinted at me, rheumy bloodshot eyes in a pale face. “It’s in mint condition. Two hundred twenty-five thousand.”

  “Actually,” I said tartly, “I’m an investigator working with the police.”

  “Go away.” He dropped the sheet and turned toward his door.

  “I’m going to need to see that stamp,” I said, my voice firm.

  “The heck you say.”

  “Please turn around and look at me.”

  He slowly turned back and shot me a baleful look. “You’re not coming in without a warrant. And let’s see some ID.”

  “It’s in the car.”

  “You ain’t no investigator!”

  I sighed. “You’re right. I’m a collector. Part of my collection was stolen when I gave a party. It’s driving me nuts.”

  “You ain’t the first to have stamps stolen.”

  “I know. I’ve already been over to that place at the mall.”

  McIntire snorted contemptuously. “That guy’s a piker.”

  “Could you please help me? Could you just tell me who sold you those stamps?”

  “It was just some guy. I don’t remember his name.” He quickly whirled, pulled on the knob, and slid through his door.

  “Please wait.” I planted my elbow on the door. McIntire groaned. With my legs braced and my right elbow forcing his door open, I used my right hand to grasp my wallet and my free left hand to rummage around for my wad of photographs. I thrust the packet across the threshold. “Recognize any of these people?”

  He looked down at the first one: the cuddle of saccharine-smiling Chardé and Buddy and family. “These are the people who were at your party?”

  “Have you seen either one of them?”

  “Nope.” He shuffled past snapshots of Sukie and Eliot and one of Arch in his fencing gear, being corrected by Michaela on his lunge. Then he stopped dead.

  “What is it?” I demanded.

  “Nothing.” He tried to hand me back the photos, but they fell on the ground. Avoiding my eyes, he swiftly wrenched the door away and slammed it shut.

  “Can’t you tell me anything?” I pleaded. “Did you recognize anybody?”

  “Scram!”

  “Thanks for nothing!” I snarled, suddenly deeply exhausted, frustrated, and extremely angry. I dropped to my knees and started to scoop up the fallen photos.

  Chardé and Buddy. Sukie and Eliot. Michaela and Arch.

  I gasped and m
y blood ran to ice. The final photo was the one I’d shown Sukie and Eliot. The Jerk. In his scrubs.

  “Hey! Was your mystery seller a slender, good-looking guy?” I hollered at the closed door. “Blond hair, drives a gold Mercedes? Real pale, like he’d just gotten out of prison?”

  Inside, all was silence.

  CHAPTER 19

  I hopped into the van, revved it, and made a hasty U-turn. I glanced back at the house, knowing McIntire was watching my departure through a crack in the curtains. But maybe I was imagining it, the way I was everything else. I punched in Sergeant Boyd’s number on the cellular and told him of my interview with the auction agent. After I described the interchange about the stamps and McIntire’s reaction to my photos, I took a deep breath. Then I said:

  “I suspect that the person who sold McIntire the stamp was my ex-con ex-husband, John Richard Korman.”

  “Goldy, that is such a long shot.”

  “Listen, Sergeant Boyd. John Richard knew Ray Wolff in jail, and now he’s deeply involved with Viv Martini, Wolff’s ex-girlfriend. John Richard just bought a car from Buddy Lauderdale that he can’t possibly afford, not to mention a condo he can’t even begin to afford. He must be getting that money from somewhere. Maybe he cut a deal with Buddy. Not only that, but John Richard treated Sukie Hyde for cancer, and she never mentioned it to me—”

  “Take it easy, Goldy,” Boyd interrupted, obviously determined to put an end to my speculations. “First, we have to question McIntire. Then if we strongly suspect the man received stolen goods connected to a robbery, we’ll try to get a search warrant for his house. If we can arrest him and he agrees to identify Korman from a lineup, we’ll have something to go on. But, all this stuff about Buddy Lauderdale?” He hesitated. “I don’t know, Goldy. It’s beginning to look like you’ve got something against the guy.”

  “Maybe he sold the stamp to McIntire,” I said quickly. “It’s so obvious. You can see The Stamp Fox from his showroom, I was just there—”

  “Goldy, stop.”

  “I want to know who shot Tom.”

  “So do we all. But you’re reaching. For example, do you really think Sukie Hyde would give you the details of her cancer treatment? Especially since it was your ex-husband who treated her? Come on.”

  I exhaled. “You think I’m losing it.”

  “I think you’re reading bizarre stuff into the way some people act. And I think you need to be cautious.”

  “A driver’s been killed. A robber’s been killed and dumped in a creek. My husband’s been shot. Our house has been vandalized and burgled. And you’re saying my problem is I can’t deal with some people, and I need to be cautious?”

  “Just trying to help out,” Boyd replied. “We think we might have a line on your computers, by the way. An older guy matching the description you gave offered to sell a couple that sounded like yours to an undercover cop this morning.”

  “Where?”

  “In a bar.”

  “Morris Hart brought our computers to a bar? And tried to sell them there? And one of your guys just happened to be tying one on, first thing in the morning?”

  “Hey, our undercover guys go to bars when they open. It’s their job. Where do you think crooks go in the morning? To the office?”

  “Can you visit McIntire soon? Please?” Okay, I was wheedling, but I really needed his help. He agreed and signed off.

  It was three o’clock. Either Julian or I needed to pick up Arch from fencing practice at five. At the castle, I had a lot of cooking to do and labyrinth research to review. I shook my head and pressed the accelerator.

  Approaching the Hogback, a sudden cold wind rolled out of the foothills and rocked the van. Was I deluded? Or did I truly believe that Buddy or Chardé or Viv—all of whom either did have or might have the security codes for the castle—or Eliot, or Sukie, or even Michaela, who also had access to everything and seemed awfully angry about something, was guilty of grand-scale theft? Could any one of them commit murder? Or was the killer some compatriot of Ray Wolff’s, such as the man who stole our computers?

  Fast-moving dark clouds raced from north to south as I headed west, up into the canyon that led to Aspen Meadow. It was true that Andy had been found in the creek, not far from the place where Tom was later shot … and both spots were within spitting distance of the fence surrounding the Hyde Castle estate. Somebody was up to something, but whether it was John Richard, Viv Martini, Chardé Lauderdale, or her smarmy sharpshooting husband Buddy Lauderdale, I did not know. What worried me more was having Arch, Tom, and Julian in such close proximity to the Hydes and their friends. Yes, we could arm our doors at night, but what about during the day? If someone brandished a gun like the one that killed Andy Balachek, a butcher knife wasn’t going to be much defense.

  Boyd’s warning had been, You need to be cautious. I even imagined what he would say to me, if I presented him with my worry about susceptibility. Boyd would insist that our family had already been at the castle one night, enough for a determined killer to have a go at us. So if the killer was in the castle, why hadn’t he or she made a move?

  Tom will know what to do, I thought as I swung through the castle gates. Snowflakes swirled down. I slowed the van, as the icy patches of the long drive were treacherous in the white blur. Concentrating on not slipping, I reflected that being completely honest with Tom was not something I’d been very good at lately. Covert ops and frustration had intruded—in the form of Sara Beth O’Malley. My mind spun back to the question tormenting me for the last two days: What secret is Tom keeping from me? For my part, I was definitely shielding my investigation of Nurse O’Malley from him.

  He was crazy about her, Connie Oliver had said of Tom and Sara Beth. He was terribly protective of her. Maybe he didn’t love her anymore, as he’d claimed to me. But could he be protecting her? From what? How would I find out without asking him? As I strode into the castle, I realized that while I had many questions, I didn’t have a single answer. It was time to bite the bullet.

  I was surprised to see Tom in the kitchen, groping through one of the glass-fronted cabinets. With his right shoulder bandaged and his arm immobilized by the sling, he was moving with a slowness that made me cringe. In contrast, Julian bounced back and forth from the counter—where an enticing array of miniature finger-shaped sandwiches was arranged—and the kitchen table. Tom shuffled to a stop and gave me a baleful look.

  “Miss G.” His voice was an attempt at joviality, but his eyes betrayed his physical pain. “I’ve been worried about you.”

  “Tom,” I scolded, “you shouldn’t be up.”

  “Please. I couldn’t lie there another minute. Looking at all that old English furniture gave me the heebie-jeebies. So I thought Julian and I could make tea—”

  Julian interjected, “Make that he tells me what he wants for a Brit-style tea, and I make all the sandwiches and cakes. Hungry?”

  The Italian ice cream was a distant memory. I grinned and nodded. Tom loved to cook and to direct cooking. Before relaxing, though, I had to check the dinner ingredients. On the counter beside the refrigerator, the Hydes’ lamb roast was happily defrosting. I washed my hands and stuck the meat with a thermometer probe so that room temperature for the interior wouldn’t be a matter of guesswork. Now all I had to find was some mint jelly to go with the lamb. If you were going to be English, you had to go all the way, right?

  “Well, boss,” Julian remarked, “In one department, our tea won’t be authentic.” His smile was impish. “No smoked salmon. So I made cucumber sandwiches. And I’m about to spread cream cheese on that sweet bread you made. Eat your heart out, Weight Watchers.”

  Tom awkwardly stretched his free hand to unlock a high cabinet. “If this isn’t where Sukie stores her tea, strainer, and teapot, I’m going to have words with that woman.” He fumbled about on the shelf and ultimately drew out a box of English Breakfast tea leaves, a silver strainer, and Eliot’s ceramic teapot shaped like an English butler. Tom pulled
the key from the cupboard. “And before you ask, Goldy, Sukie gave me the keys and told me to get out anything we needed. The trick is just to find which key goes with which hole.” He surveyed the kitchen table. “What else do we need?”

  “Scones!” Julian and I said in unison.

  Julian offered to put together butter, jams, and thick whipped cream if I would bake the treats. I was happy for scone duty, since I had a recipe that I’d been tinkering with back in Ye Olde Home Kitchen, the same one I’d tried—unsuccessfully—to make for the cops. Eliot had mentioned that he eventually wanted to serve Victorian-style tea to conference clients, and I was eager to offer irresistible samples of my wares. My laptop booted while I rummaged through my boxes for a package of currants. I inserted the disk with British-fare recipes. Eventually the scone recipe flashed on the screen.

  I preheated the oven and poured boiling water over the currants. While the currants were plumping up, I measured dry ingredients into the Hydes’ food processor. Chunks of cold unsalted butter went in next, followed by a quick binding with egg, milk, and cream. I patted out and cut the resulting rich dough, then slid scone triangles into the oven. While Tom merrily squabbled with Julian over the taste merits of meat-based over vegetarian chili, Julian searched through the kitchen jam cabinet for lemon marmalade.

  “See if you can nab some mint jelly,” I begged him. After a few minutes of clattering, Julian brought out small crystal jars of blackberry jelly, orange and lemon marmalades, and raspberry jam.

  “No mint jelly,” he said, discouraged. After a moment, he brightened. “Hold on, I think I remember seeing some mint jelly in Eliot’s other jam cabinet.” He grabbed the keys, disappeared into the buttery/dining room, and cursed colorfully. Then more sounds of clanking glass reached the kitchen. After a moment, Julian marched back into the kitchen, clutching jars of mint and sherry jelly.

  While the baking scones filled the kitchen with a homey scent, we sipped Tom’s dark, hot, perfectly brewed English Breakfast tea and ate the delectable cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches. Julian remembered that Michaela had called to say she was bringing Arch home. When I expressed guilt that we weren’t including our hosts, Julian said the Hydes would be out until the evening meal. Eliot, Julian went on, had signed up to attend a late-afternoon seminar on running a home-based business. Sukie, vowing that she was the only Hyde who had any business running anything, had insisted on accompanying him. Julian had packed them a snack of gourmet vegetarian wraps. They’d said they’d be back at seven for dinner in the Great Hall, where Eliot had already set up the Elizabethan games he wanted us to try. Great, I thought. Cook, eat, and play a rousing game or two of indoor badminton and horseshoes. Excuse me—shuttlecock and penny prick. Why did Elizabethan games sound like naughty sex? Would the Elk Park parents call after Friday’s banquet and complain?