“Yes, there is,' Mel said from the doorway. 'When did Ms. Palmer get this note?”
Lisa was wringing her hands. 'A week ago? No, longer than that. Let me think for a minute. It was a week ago Monday, I guess. I'm so sorry. I should have told you right away.'
“What did Ms. Palmer think about the note?' Mel asked.
“She laughed it off. Almost. She handed it to me and said that somebody was playing childish games. She was sort of irritated, I think, but not really upset.'
“And you were?'
“Well, of course. I don't remember exactly what it said, but it looked to me like a vague threat.'
“Are we talking about the same note?' Mel asked her, unfolding a photocopy of the note and putting it on the table.
Lisa studied the copy. 'Yes, I think so. It was just a line or two like this.'
“Did she say who she thought wrote it?' Mel asked.
Lisa shook her head.
“Did you have an opinion?”
She looked at him. 'Do I have to answer that? I had a guess, but it was just a guess.”
Mel let her reply go. 'Are you aware that this was typed on the machine in Ms. Palmer's office?'
“No, of course not. Are you sure?'
“Quite sure. Who had access to that machine?”
Lisa shrugged. 'Practically anyone, I suppose. Regina only locked her office at night, and I don't think she always did that. Except for the typewriter and answering machine and such, there wasn't anything valuable. Valuable to anyone else, I mean. And she kept her door open during the day unless she was having a private conversation.'
“Even when she was out of the office?”
“I–I think so. I never especially noticed. Sharlene would know better than I do.'
“So Ms. Palmer handed you the note?' Mel said, shifting gears abruptly.
“Yes.' She looked at him questioningly and then the light dawned. 'Oh, fingerprints. Yes, mine are probably all over it.'
“And you handed it back?”
Lisa thought for a minute, obviously having trouble concentrating. 'I guess I must have. Or maybe I just put it down on her desk. I have no idea. Oh, I feel so bad and stupid about this. Would it have helped if I'd told you about it sooner? I can't imagine how I could have forgotten it, except that so much else has happened—”
Mel refolded the photocopy and put it back in his inside jacket pocket. 'No, I don't think it would have changed anything. Did you notice anything different about her after she got this note? Like locking up her office or taking any special care for her safety?'
“No, not really. But then, it was the week that the Pea Festival started. Everybody's frantically busy then. If she did anything differently, I'm not sure I would even have noticed.' Her eyes filled with tears again and she said, 'I should have paid more attention. She was my best friend. I should have looked out for her better.”
Jane handed her a napkin from the stack beside the coffeemaker. 'Lisa, we can't always look after ourselves as well as we might, let alone other people. You can't hold yourself responsible.'
“I know — but still—'
“Jane, I have a few more questions to ask Ms. Quigley,' Mel said.
“And you want me to get lost. Okay. I need a break anyway,' Jane said.
Fifteen
Proud of her day's work and prevented from going back to the computer because Mel was using the boardroom, Jane went home early. It was an unusually cool, dark afternoon with rain clouds threatening. Remembering that trash day was tomorrow, Jane decided she might as well break down and clean out her station wagon, which was in its usual state of looking like a motorized wastebasket. She went indoors to try to recruit 'kid help,' but found three notes on the kitchen bulletin board.
She rounded up her car-cleaning supplies, invited the cats to come help, went back out to the driveway, and started removing everything that looked useful or important. She stacked things on the cement by ownership: some of Katie's notebooks that had been in there since the last day of school nearly three months earlier; Todd's emergency backup supply of Legos in a clear plastic box; some cassette tapes of Mike's that had been kicking around gathering dust since he got his own vehicle. She decided the movie section of the paper that was a month old was trash, as were a truly disgusting number of fast-food bags and cups.
Jane discovered a number of perplexing things in the car. A long-overdue library book titled
To her embarrassment, she also found the telephone bill that had caused such a hassle. The phone company had threatened to cut her off for nonpayment and, in high dudgeon, she'd indignantly insisted that she'd never received it. They'd sent another, which included a late-payment charge that Jane had fought with a high-minded arrogance that even Shelley had admired. Jane quickly tore up the bill and stuffed the bits into the trash bag, fearing that even as she was doing so, some official of the telephone company was watching through binoculars and saying into a walkie-talkie, 'Yup, she had it all along, just like we thought.”
There were treasures, too. Shelley had convinced her a couple of weeks earlier that she needed a bird feeder and there it was, still in its box, waiting to be filled with the special seed mix Shelley had recommended. Unfortunately, there was a hole in the bag of seeds that looked suspiciously chewed. Did she have a critter living in the car? She opened all the doors, giving any resident wildlife the opportunity to escape, and walked around the outside of the house looking for the best place for the bird feeder. She decided on a spot in front of the window the kitchen table sat next to and felt terribly smug that she was able to find a screwdriver and get the bracket in place without any trouble.
She was just filling the feeder when Shelley pulled into her driveway, which adjoined Jane's. 'It looks like your car exploded — all the doors standing open that way,' Shelley said. 'And there are the wildcats picking over the remains.”
Max was sniffing at the glove box and Meow was sitting on the top of a headrest, a golden ball of fur surveying a new kingdom. 'Wonder what they'd think of Heidi.'
“Who's that?' Shelley asked.
“Mr. Snellen's stuffed cat,' Jane said. 'I wonder if they'd let me borrow it for a night, just to see if Max and Meow recognize that it was once a cat.'
“You've grown attached to that dead cat, haven't you?' Shelley said. 'There's no accounting for taste or lack of it.'
“But it has such a nice story. It's sort of like that picture Sharlene has of Mr. Snellen himself. Except that Heidi's three-dimensional.'
“And hairy,' Shelley said. 'And probably infested with God knows what.'
“Then Max and Meow would be sure to like it. They adore infestations.'
“Jane, what did you think about that note Sharlene found?' Shelley said, putting down her purse and helping Jane get the spilled birdseed into the feeder.
Jane went to retrieve a plastic bucket from the garage to put the birdseed bag into and said, over her shoulder, 'I've been trying not to think of it, to tell the truth.'
