more enjoyable. For five minutes she screamed incoherently about how this news affected her stress, which apparently had reached its zenith over the weekend. I didn’t bother to point out that had her stress indeed reached its zenith (her words), then my news could not have possibly added to it. She then proclaimed that had I joined her for New Year’s Eve “none of this would have happened” and asked if I had “even the slightest idea” of what this was doing to her blood pressure. It was on the tip of my tongue to ask how my presence at a hot tub party could have prevented a murder, but I restrained myself. As for her query about her stress and blood pressure, I refrained from calling them my old friends, having heard them mentioned with consideration for twenty years at least. She wouldn’t have caught the reference anyway and I saw no reason to waste a perfectly good line.
The only call I enjoyed was the one to my boss, Cheryl. As I had anticipated, she ranted and raved once she understood that I would be out of the office for the next several days. She demanded to know who was in charge of the case and I happily obliged her by giving her Detective Stewart’s direct line. I hoped she would call him; they deserved each other.
By midafternoon, Aunt Winnie and I had packed the food for Lauren and Polly and were on our way to their house, with the car radio blasting. When Aunt Winnie is stressed she likes to listen to country music. She says the songs are so depressing that they make her feel better in comparison. So as we drove along in her light blue ’68 Mercedes, I stared out the window, trying to ignore both the blaring music and her horrible attempts to sing along. Finally, it was too much for me and I reached over and turned the volume down. “What are you doing?” she asked.
“Do you know what happens when you play country music backward?” I replied conversationally. Without waiting for her to answer, I continued. “You get your job back, your wife comes home, your dog comes back to life, you sober up …”
“You know, some people consider country music an art form,” she countered.
“Some people feel the same way about body piercing.”
“Are you saying you prefer body piercing to country music?”
I pretended to consider the question. “Would you be singing the country music?”
She laughed. “Oh, never mind. We’re here.” Before us was a massive colonial situated a couple of hundred yards from the beach. Dusk was starting to settle by the time we pulled into the driveway, and the trees out front blazed with thousands upon thousands of tiny white lights. It was beautiful, to be sure, but in all honesty, I preferred the simple charm of Longbourn.
A somber-looking woman of indeterminate age answered the door. She briskly introduced herself as Mrs. Jenkins. She had an intelligent face, fine brown hair pulled back into a tidy bun, and neat, serviceable clothes. This, combined with her aura of cool efficiency, made her subsequent announcement that she was the Ramseys’ housekeeper superfluous. In fact, so perfectly did she fit that part I wondered briefly if she was from central casting. I didn’t think people like Mrs. Jenkins existed outside of Agatha Christie novels.
Explaining that Lauren was on the phone, Mrs. Jenkins graciously took our wicker baskets of food and led us to wait in the sitting room. I was curious to see what an actual sitting room looked like, having only read about them in books that boasted characters like Mrs. Jenkins. Sadly, the room held only standard doors, not the French- window variety that Agatha Christie’s characters were forever popping in and out of. I felt cheated.
The room was a curious blend of both Gerald’s and Lauren’s personalities. The formal atmosphere, with its brocade fabrics in red and cream and Queen Anne furniture, was clearly Gerald’s choosing. The collection of ceramic pug dogs with giant faux-sapphire eyes, however, was just as obviously Lauren’s contribution.
The rest of my inventory was cut short by the discovery that Aunt Winnie and I were not alone. At the far end of the room stood Daniel and Polly, their heads bent close together. Upon seeing us, they pulled apart with startled expressions. Daniel recovered first and crossed the room to Aunt Winnie and me.
“We’re sorry to interrupt,” began Aunt Winnie. “We were just bringing some food over for Lauren and Polly.”
“That’s very kind of you,” said Daniel. “But please, don’t apologize. It’s always a pleasure to see you, Ms. Reynolds, and of course you, too, Elizabeth.”
The wink that accompanied this aside to me happened so fast I wondered if I had imagined it. By now Polly had joined us. Her hair was pulled back with her signature tortoiseshell headband and she wore another shapeless dress, this one of dark blue corduroy. She looked terrible. Her face was pale and drawn, and there were dark circles under her eyes. “Lauren is on the phone,” she said, “but I’m sure she’ll be off any minute. I know she’ll want to thank you.”
“How is she doing?” I asked.
Polly shrugged and glanced at Daniel before answering. “She’s doing all right, I guess,” she said, “as well as can be expected. With Lauren you never really know.”
Daniel opened his mouth as if he was about to say something, but Aunt Winnie spoke first.
“And how about you, dear?” she asked kindly. “How are you doing?”
Polly’s lower lip twitched and she took a steadying breath before answering. Daniel watched her intently.
“I’m okay,” she said, giving us a humorless smile. “I’m not going to pretend that my father and I got along particularly well, or that I was overly fond of him. But … he was my father.”
I wasn’t sure what to make of Polly’s answer. Granted, I had found Gerald Ramsey to be a singularly disagreeable man, but he wasn’t my father. It was another thing altogether for his own daughter to react this coolly to his death. But then again, she was his daughter. Maybe she was more like him than anyone realized. That said, the line “sharper than a serpent’s tooth” still sprang to mind.
Aunt Winnie tilted her head to one side and said quietly, “I think that with all things considered, you’re holding up just fine, dear.”
Something unspoken passed between them and Polly’s eyes welled with unshed tears. The door suddenly swung open, breaking the mood. Mrs. Jenkins entered. Beyond her right shoulder was a bright red hat covered in tiny white flowers that bobbed furiously up and down. Mrs. Jenkins’s announcement was unnecessary. Miss Jackie Tanner had arrived.
She instantly swooped down on Polly. “Oh, you poor, poor child!” she gushed as she enveloped Polly in a tight hug. Polly’s startled face hovered above the mass of white flowers before she deftly removed herself from Jackie’s grip. Jackie appeared not to notice the maneuver.
“What an awful thing for you to go through,” Jackie said in a tone that belied her words. Having a close relative murdered not ten feet from her was probably Jackie’s idea of high drama. “If there is anything I can do to help,” she continued, “just let me know. And don’t you worry. I know that the police will find out who did this terrible, terrible thing. Tell me, dear, have they given you any idea as to which one of us they think killed your father?”
Jackie’s words hit like a bucket of cold water. There was a startled pause, a lot of rapid blinking, and, for some reason, slightly better posture. Only Jackie seemed unaffected. She gazed expectantly at Polly, calmly waiting for a response.
Polly gaped at Jackie before glancing at the rest of us for help. None came, and I realized that while we all might abhor Jackie’s tactics, we nevertheless were eager to hear what they produced.
However, if Polly knew anything, she wasn’t telling. She merely shook her head and said, “I don’t know any more than you do. Detective Stewart has asked Lauren and me to stay in town for a few more days, but other than that, he hasn’t told me anything.”
“I heard that there’s no chance it was a mistake,” said Jackie.
“What do you mean?” asked Daniel, his voice hard-edged.
Jackie turned to him, her eyes big with excitement. “Well, from what I understand, the police found reflective tape on Gerald. They think the killer must have put it on him sometime during the evening, to be sure the bullet found its mark.”
Polly let out a little gasp. This had gone too far for me. “Ms. Tanner!” I said firmly. At the same moment Aunt Winnie snapped, “Jackie! Really!”
I continued, “I don’t think this is an appropriate conversation to be having right now.”
Jackie’s brow furrowed underneath the shadowy brim of her hat. “Why?” she asked, with the simplicity of a small child.
My mind went blank. She was too unbelievable for words. I tried without success to explain why I thought a
