Beth Keever and I exchanged glances that were a little more cynical.
“Okay,” she said briskly, pushing back her dark brown bangs. “Back to business. Are we all agreed the new judges need the session on dress and conduct?”
Another ten minutes finished our meeting. The others called for their checks and left to enjoy the pleasures of this beach resort before the meeting of chief district court judges began the next afternoon.
I still hadn’t ordered and a line had formed at the reception stand. I was about to move to a smaller table when Martha Fitzhume waved from the line and, in a voice meant as much for the six or eight people ahead of her as for me, called, “Oh Deborah! Good. You did get my message to hold us a table.”
She was trailed by Fitz, Chelsea Ann, Rosemary, and Rosemary’s husband, Dave Emerson. Except for dear, clueless Fitz, who kissed my cheek and murmured “Thanks, Deborah,” before taking a chair beside me, the others knew good and well that Martha hadn’t called and left me a message.
An attractive, college-age waitress with henna-red hair and flawless skin hurried over to hand us menus and bus the table. Like the rest of the waitstaff, she wore a coral jacket that matched the beach umbrellas beyond the outer plate-glass wall. Her smile brightened upon recognizing Martha. “Oh, hey there, ma’am! Nice to see you again.”
“It’s Jenna, right?” said Martha.
The waitress beamed. “Yes, ma’am, it sure is. Now what can I get y’all to drink?” she asked when she’d finished wiping down the table.
Martha ordered a glass of Chardonnay, the rest of us opted for iced tea or soft drinks.
“Be right back,” the waitress promised as she left with a huge tray of dirty dishes.
“What happened to you?” I asked Chelsea Ann. “I thought you were going to come swim.”
“I got sidetracked,” she said. “Phone calls and then I stopped to watch the news about Pete Jeffreys’s murder. My car made it on camera, but we didn’t.”
Dave Emerson looked up from the menu he was sharing with Rosemary. He really was a handsome man whose smile could almost fool you into thinking you were someone special when he turned it on you. Easy to understand Rosemary’s kitten-in-cream glow, a glow that probably accounted for Chelsea Ann’s sour expression. “Did they say if the police are close to making an arrest?” he asked.
“Nope. Just requesting anyone who saw anything to come forward.”
“That police detective—Edwards? He asked us when we last saw Jeffreys,” said Martha. “Any of y’all notice him much after nine-thirty?”
The others shook their heads, as did I.
“He wasn’t around when Fitz and I left so we gave Cynthia Blankenthorpe a lift back here. She couldn’t find him. Or said she couldn’t anyhow. I don’t know how hard she looked.”
My head came up on that. “They have a fight or something?”
“Who knows? Why?”
“Well, she rode over with him and he was introducing her all around, but she didn’t sound very upset about his death when I spoke to her in the party room last night.”
Martha shrugged. “I think she was annoyed that he was treating her like a babe in the woods or somebody who wasn’t smart enough to figure out the ropes herself. That’s probably the real reason she hitched a ride with us.”
“What time was that?” I asked.
“A little after ten.”
“So nobody saw him after, say, nine-thirty?” I mused.
“He got to the restroom about the time I was leaving it,” said Fitz. “And now that I think about it, he did seem a little brusque.”
“Brusque?” Martha asked.
“Well, you know how when you meet somebody face-to-face and you’re trying to get out of each other’s way but you don’t? Most times, you just laugh and the other one’ll stand still so you can get around him? Jeffreys didn’t laugh. In fact, he almost knocked me down. ’Course now, he just might’ve been in a hurry to get to the nearest urinal.”
“Was anyone else in the bathroom?” I asked. “Or coming in as you were leaving?”
“Nobody I knew, but—ah, thank you my dear, but I believe I ordered ginger ale,” he said as our red-haired waitress set a glass of tea in front of him.
“Oops! Sorry,” she said, and gave the tea to me.
“No, mine’s the diet Coke,” I said.
She did remember that Martha had ordered white wine and the rest of us eventually got our right glasses.
“Y’all ready to order?” she chirped, readying her pad.
“Jenna’s studying law enforcement at the community college here,” said Martha, who had naturally gotten the young woman’s history at breakfast that morning. “She wants to join the SBI.”
“Like ever since I was a little girl, I’ve been, like, just
“Then you need to talk to my husband,” said Rosemary, patting Dave’s hand with a proprietary air. “Judge Emerson’s had a lot of experience with the Bureau, haven’t you, darling?”
