Judith asked.
“Walt.” Meg smiled thinly. “It was in your driveway.
He picked it up on a . . . whim, I guess. I tried to use it
this morning, but before I could make it turn right,
some fat old bag came to the door.”
Judith had another query for Meg. “Why did you hit
Winifred Best and start the fire?”
Meg’s jaw jutted. “I thought she had my book. She
said she didn’t—Bruno had it. But that didn’t make
sense. Bruno was dead, so where did it go? She swore
she didn’t know. That’s when I hit her. Then I went all
through her room, but I couldn’t find the book. I got
mad.” Her eyes grew cold as marble. “I struck a match
and set fire to the bedclothes. That woman may not
have had my book on her, but she’s had Bruno all these
years.
Judith tried not to gape. Could Meg still love Bruno
in spite of everything he’d done? Sometimes love and
hate were so hard to distinguish. Maybe it was obsession. Yet Bruno Zepf had inspired love in several
women, perhaps including Winifred Best.
“And there was this,” Meg added, releasing the grip
on her purse. She fumbled a bit before she held out a
black rubber spider. “I came to leave this. Sort of a . . .
what do you call it? A calling card, maybe.”
“An epitaph,” Judith murmured. “Why did you put
the other spiders in our freezer?”
“Walt did that,” Meg said, looking askance. “Don’t
ask why Walt does things. Sometimes I think he’s a
little tetched. Losing his pa’s farm, you know.”
Judith suddenly recalled another seemingly inexplicable incident. “And the truffles that were sent here?”
“Truffles?” Meg scowled. “I don’t know what a
truffle looks like.”
“They’re kind of . . . disgusting,” Judith explained,
“but they taste wonderful.”
Meg continued scowling, then suddenly let out a
sharp yip of laughter. “I sent Bruno a cowpie, straight
off the farm.”
“Oh!” Gertrude had been right to flush the parcel’s
contents down the toilet. “I see.”
Meg toyed with the spider for a moment, then
pushed it across the table to Judith. “Here, you keep it
as a souvenir. What are you going to do now, call the
cops?”
Judith gazed at the gray, gaunt face. Meg Izard was
already condemned to death.
“I have to,” she finally said.
Meg reached into her purse. “Okay,” she said. “But
not yet.” In her hand was a .45 revolver. No doubt it had
