More of the flowering shrubs and shredded bark lined the full length of the drive. It wasn’t a short one, either, leading a good hundred yards up a hill. Someone-and I wagered it was Adam Fairfield himself-had put in a tremendous amount of back-breaking labor. And a tremendous amount of money, as well. And all in an attempt to get his wife back, I supposed. If he’d done all this when she’d begged for it… But that was exactly like Adam, applying bandages after the patient had bled to death.
Adam’s white Chevy pickup truck stood in front of the garage, probably where John Goulding left it last night. My gaze moved on to the house, and I slowed to a stop, impressed. It had received a new coat of paint, bright yellow with white trim. Raised brick planting beds surrounded the foundations, as yet unplanted. New shrubs lined a recently added brick walkway, though as yet no flowers filled the empty areas. That would probably wait until spring-or until Lucy returned to tend that herself. I hoped she would. So much effort deserved some reward. And I hated to see couples who’d been together for so long break up. You had to give Adam credit for trying. I hoped Lucy would.
I climbed out and walked toward the door, which opened as I neared it. Nancy Fairfield looked out, her dark, curling hair-natural, no need for a perm, here-framing her pale face and delicate features. A bulky fisherman knit sweater topped a long corduroy skirt that hugged her slender hips, and she wore sheepskin-lined boots that added an inch to her five foot four. With her eyes rimmed with red, as if she’d been crying, she looked frail and fragile.
“You should be lying down!” I blurted out. Not the most encouraging greeting, perhaps, but she really looked drained. She had started her senior year at Stanford, only to develop pneumonia two weeks into classes. She’d spent almost three weeks in the hospital before being sent home to recuperate. From the looks of her, she might not be able to resume her studies in January, as Gerda had said she’d planned.
“Just got up from the sofa.” She managed a wan smile. “I’m doing better.” She stepped back and waved for me to enter the hall.
The renovations hadn’t reached the interior yet, which remained comfortably cluttered and shabby. I looked around, trying to remember the last time I’d visited here. More than a year ago, long before Lucy had packed up and moved out. It still felt like her, warm and friendly.
A loud thud sounded from somewhere above us, and we both glanced up. “He’s getting the pot out of the attic,” Nancy explained needlessly.
“Your dad’s been doing a lot of work.” I sat in the large, padded chair she indicated. To my relief, she sat down in another.
“Everything Mom always wanted,” she agreed. Her lower lip trembled. “A bit late, though.”
“She might appreciate the gesture,” I suggested. “It’s a rather impressive one.”
“God, I hope not!” Tears started in her eyes. “They just weren’t meant to be together. Not like-” She broke off.
“Not like you and…” I racked my memory. What was the name of that guy Gerda had told me Nancy was seeing? Someone her father hated- Lowell, that was it. “You and Simon Lowell?” I finished.
Nancy blinked rapidly, then dabbed with a handkerchief at the moisture that slipped down her cheeks. “And Dad just can’t see it!” she cried with the voice of youth throughout the ages. “Just because Simon’s a little unconventional.”
Unconventional was putting it mildly, according to Gerda. Everything from his appearance to his politics seemed to upset most of the town. But I didn’t voice that comment. I’d never actually met Simon Lowell, after all. “Probably because he isn’t a third-generation Upper River Gulcher,” I said with an attempt at diplomacy.
Nancy sniffed. “He inherited his place, you know. From a great uncle. Only three years ago,” she added, grudgingly.
“That puts him in the category of summer visitor,” I said.
She didn’t smile. Just goes to show how deep in her misery she was. Normally jokes about newcomers-those who’d lived here for less than twenty years-were met with more jokes.
“I don’t see why he can’t try to get to know Simon,” she declared. “He-”
Steps sounded on the stairs, accompanied by bumps and mutters. Nancy fell silent. Another thud followed, then a minute later Adam Fairfield strode into the room. He looked as if he’d thrown on an old sweater and jeans at random onto his tall, wiry frame. He certainly hadn’t combed his sandy hair. His eyes, normally a mundane shade of brown, were so bloodshot I didn’t see how he could be standing, let alone moving coffeepots. He clutched his head and groaned.
“Hangover?” I asked, more matter-of-fact than sympathetic. It never seemed to me that the pain a person was trying to forget could possibly be worse than the one he inflicted on himself. Adam wasn’t an alcoholic. He drank by choice, not compulsion. And he seemed living-if you could call it that-proof that he’d made a very bad choice.
He nodded, then winced and sank onto an old floral pattern couch. “Your pot’s in the kitchen. You’re welcome to keep it.”
“Meaning you don’t want to haul it back to the attic?”
He grinned, then winced again. “Yeah. Hey, that’s tough about your finding Brody. Rotten thing to happen to you.”
“To him, too,” I pointed out. “How’d you hear?”
“Dave Hatter.”
“Dave…?”
“Night watchman at the Still. Thought you knew him.”
“I do. But how’d he hear? And why’d he call you?”
“Woke me up.” Adam leaned back with a groan, massaging his temples. Could his drinking be self-punishment, maybe, for driving away his wife? “Wanted to share what he thought was good news.”
“Dad’s swing-shift manager, now,” Nancy stuck in with a touch of pride. “Dave reports just about everything to him, even when Dad’s got a night off, like last night. Then Tony called, too.”
That would be Tony Carerras, one-time-or I gathered frequent-time-resident of juvenile hall, now Peggy’s prize protege. She’d picked him up at the homeless shelter where she donated hours of work, and got Gerda to help her convince the Still’s owner, Hugh Cartwright, to hire the guy as a janitor and general grunt laborer down in shipping and receiving to give him another chance. And one chance he never missed was to pass on any tidbits of gossip, the more gruesome the better.
It wouldn’t be quite accurate to call the Still-that’s Brandywine Distillery-a grapevine. They don’t crush grapes there so much as apricots, cherries, and other varieties of fruit-and a lot of rumors and hearsay. And come to think of it, they don’t really crush them. They ferment them, add flavor, and distribute them.
“Neither one of them knew very much,” Adam opined, “only what Peggy told Tony, which was that you’d been the lucky one to find him. So, give with the gory details. Who done him in?”
“No idea. But I think the new sheriff is eyeing Aunt Gerda.”
“Gerda?” Adam sat up too fast, groaned, and sank his head back against the couch. “I’d laugh, but it’d hurt too much.”
“Peggy’s running a close second.”
That brought a deep chuckle and another groan from him. “God, if old Tom were here-” He broke off. “Sorry,” he muttered.
“Oh, I agree,” I said as brightly as I could.
The sound of an engine approaching saved us from embarrassment. A moment later it cut off, and a car door slammed. Correction, a Jeep door. I could just make out the uniformed figure of our new sheriff as he headed toward the brick walkway.
Adam peered out the window. “I’m not home,” he told Nancy.
The girl closed her eyes, then gripped the arms of her chair to leverage herself up.
“I’ll get it.” I pushed her gently back against the cushions, hurried into the hall, reached the door as the first knock landed, and swung it wide.
Sheriff Sarkisian blinked at me, then frowned. “What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded.
“Good morning to you, too.” I bowed him in with a sweeping gesture. “Is that the way you normally say hello?”
He studied me for a long moment, but his gaze gave nothing away of his thoughts. “Just dropped in for a visit, did you?”
