illegitimacy and such — or much more often she'd prove they sprang from very common stock. Of course, almost all of us do, but lots of famous people don't like hearing that. Only politicians bother to pretend they like being common. Everybody else secretly wants to be able to brag that they are a cousin of Queen Elizabeth or Albert Einstein.'
Jane's mind was clicking along. 'Lucky, I hate to ask this, but I must. If she had found out something horrible about someone—'
Mel put his hand on her knee warningly.
'Blackmail!' Shelley breathed.
'I was trying to come up with a more tactful term,' Jane chided her.
Mel was shaking his head as if to say,
Lucky was also shaking his head. 'Absolutely not! Not in a million years. The few people who were insulted or angry about her information, and said so, devastated her. She had no judgment about what would offend people, but she positively bristled with moral fiber. She would have been shocked to the core at the very thought of blackmail.'
'You're quite certain?' Jane asked.
'I'd literally stake my life on it. God knows Doris had a lot of flaws, but greed for money wasn't one of them. Greed for attention, or for professional recognition, yes. But not for money. In fact, the more rich and famous a client was, the less she'd charge for her work. It was the connection to celebrity that really intoxicated her.'
'Speaking of intoxication, would anybody else like a drink?' Mel asked.
Chapter 18
When the band finally took a break, lowering the noise level, Jane turned to Shelley and asked, 'Do you think we can believe him? Lucky, I mean.'
Lucky's wife had collected him a few minutes before.
'I think we have to,' Shelley said with regret.
'But blackmail would be a nice way of explaining Doris's death.'
'I know, but he was so adamant and he knew her very well for years and years. And it's not as if he exactly minded finding fault with her. I think if blackmail was even the most remote possibility, he'd have said so.'
'I'm afraid I agree,' Jane said reluctantly. 'Phooey.'
'Besides, it wouldn't connect with Bill Smith's death, even if it were the case.'
Jane nodded. 'There's Tenny. She's looking for somebody.'
Tenny glanced toward them and waved.
'Us, apparently,' Shelley said. 'I wish she didn't feel like she had to go out of her way to be friendly to us at such a hard time in her own life.'
Tenny was weaving her way through the crowd toward them and sat down heavily in the chair Lucky had vacated when she finally reached them. 'What a mob!' she said.
'It's a nice turnout,' Shelley said. 'How are you and your aunt getting along?'
'Fine. Really. Just fine. I'm starting to think Uncle Bill had the right idea. If you force yourself to pretend someone isn't really gone, pretty soon you start believing it. This is about the best crowd we've had for a dance all winter,' she added, glancing toward the lines at the cash bars in a professional manner and no doubt doing a little mental calculation of profits. 'We might have to try having a second dance night in the middle of the week, too. We used to have bingo games on Wednesday and they were very popular, but the law came down on us.'
'Why?' Shelley asked.
'Oh, the gambling laws in Colorado are strict. Of course, we were pretty stupid about it and had no idea anybody really considered bingo as gambling, so we blithely went along for two years with the games until somebody complained.'
'But there's a state lottery,' Shelley said. 'I saw the tickets for sale at the airport.'
'Yes, a state lottery, and some nonprofit organizations can play bingo to raise funds. Churches and fraternal organizations and things like that. But we didn't qualify. It's a shame. There could be gigantic profits on real gambling if it was allowed. People who normally wouldn't even buy a lottery ticket at home will throw away all kinds of money when they're on vacation. Anyway, I just wanted to say hello and see how you're all getting along.'
'Wonderfully well,' Shelley said. 'But you mustn't worry about us. Is there anything we can do for you?'
'No, not really. We're doing fine. At least Aunt Joanna and I are. Pete's in a terrible snit, though.'
'Why is that?' Jane asked bluntly.
'Because, as it turns out, I'm cotrustee with Aunt Joanna of Bill's estate. I was surprised, but Pete was horrified. He's gone off in a huff someplace.'
'I don't mean to be grim, but are you sure he went off willingly?' Shelley said, tactfully skimming the fact that Tenny had originally thought her uncle Bill had departed of his own volition.
'Yes, I saw him drive off. In fact, he was yelling out the window at me as he went that he was going to find his own lawyer and get me replaced. Don't worry. I shouldn't have mentioned it. He'll cool off and come back. And if he does follow through and succeed in getting rid of me, which he can't, I'd be relieved.'
'I talked to my husband very briefly,' Shelley said, 'and shared your concern about selling with a provision that your aunt could stay here, and he said it would be a breeze. In fact—'
Jane excused herself, feeling that this was a business discussion that wasn't any of her business. She was also wondering what had become of Mel. The last she'd seen of him, he'd volunteered to look for Katie and Denise in the crowd, just to make sure they were still safe and sound. She found him with two very attractive young women who had him more or less pinned in a corner. To give him credit, he didn't look too happy with the arrangement.
'Mel, did you find the girls?' Jane asked.
'Oh, no!' the blond girl with the magnificently cantilevered bosom said. 'I bet you're his wife and I bet we're not the girls you're talking about, huh?!'
Jane started to deny it, but Mel quickly said with dreadful heartiness, 'She sure is, and I'm in trouble now. Come on, honey, let's look for the kids!'
'What an extraordinary thing to do,' Jane said when he'd briskly steered her across the room and out the door into the hallway.
'My God! They were so aggressive it even scared me. You would have been shocked to hear what they suggested the three of us do. Them and me, that is.'
'I'd really rather not know,' Jane said.
'By the way, the girls are drinking ginger ale with a bunch of kids up next to the bandstand. I even contrived to 'accidentally' take a sip of Katie's to make real sure it was ginger ale.'
'I'll bet you were very subtle about it,' Jane said wryly.
'I don't think they noticed,' Mel said, aggrieved.
Jane laughed. 'Mel, teenage girls are super-finely attuned to any infringement on their imagined adulthood. They can find evidence and take offense at being checked up on even when it's not happening at all. But when it is, you might as well be wearing a sandwich board. Still, it was a nice thought.'
He shrugged. 'Well, I tried.'
Jane slipped her arm around his waist and leaned against him. 'It's nice and cool and quiet out here. Let's check on the boys and find some place to sit down for a while. I left Shelley talking business with Tenny. By the way, Tenny said she's cotrustee with her aunt and Pete has gone berserk about it— apparently to the point that he's threatening to get a lawyer to harass her.'
'Not good,' Mel said.
'Tenny's not too worried. And from the sound of it, I think the sale of the resort will probably go through anyway and Tenny will be relieved of the responsibility for running things.' She explained to him about Tenny's pottery and her desire to get on with her own life. She was tempted to speculate on Pete's reaction, whereabouts, and the significance of both on his role as a suspect. But she'd promised herself to enjoy the evening without thinking about the whole thing and firmly put it out of her mind.
'You know, I was so interested in the main courses at dinner that I completely forgot to think about dessert,' she said. 'I must be sliding right into senility!'
'Then I think we better remedy that,' Mel said.
