typewriter.” Popping the cartridge out, I wished I’d thought of it before we’d paid Poodle Guy the forty dollars.
“Two bucks.”
Handing her a fiver, I turned to look for Tav, waving the cartridge triumphantly.
Tav and the poodle guy were inspecting a display of framed movie posters, some of which looked like they were from the 1940s and 1950s, and I started toward them, tucking the cartridge and my shoes into my purse. Before I had taken two steps, though, I caught sight of a tall, skeletally thin man clad in a trench coat skulking at the edge of the property, half-hidden by a spiky-leafed hedge. Hamish MacLeod! What was he doing here? On impulse, I headed toward him, pretending to glance at the tables of knickknacks and pieces of furniture on the way. When I got to within hailing distance, I looked up-artistically, I thought-and pretended to spot him for the first time.
“Why, aren’t you Hamish MacLeod?” I said, heading toward him with a big smile. “I saw you at the will reading. You were husband number four, right? I work with Maurice, who was husband two.” I beamed at him.
He shrank back, practically wedging himself into the hedge, and his eyes darted from side to side. I got the distinct impression he wasn’t happy to see me. Too bad. “It’s sad, isn’t it,” I babbled on, gesturing to the crowds of people trampling the grass and making off with Corinne’s treasures. “Sad to see it all go.”
“It’s sacrilegious,” he muttered, his Scottish accent blurring the words. If I’d closed my eyes, I could have been listening to Scotty from
I didn’t quite see the parallels: Corinne was no saint, and this wasn’t her resting place.
“These ghouls don’t appreciate who Corinne was,” he said, a bit louder. He inched out of the hedge with a rattle of branches and glared down his beaky nose at me. He must have been sweltering in the trench coat, because sweat beaded his forehead and slid down his temple.
“Were you here to get a memento?” I asked.
“Why would you ask that?” he shot at me, one hand sliding into his coat pocket. Only then did I notice the way the pockets bulged.
“They have no right! That vase there.” He pointed to a huge cut-crystal vase a heavyset woman was carrying in both hands. “That held the first offering of tulips I ever made to my gorgeous Corinne. It was the night after we met. She had told me tulips were her favorite flower, and I rounded up every one I could find in the city and gave them to her in that vase.” He turned away, as if the sight of the vase being sold was too much for him.
“Very romantic.” Clearly, the man had been gaga over Corinne. Completely unbalanced about the woman, in my humble opinion. If he had felt slighted by her, if she’d told him she was going to write something that dissed their relationship, how would he have reacted? Of course, I reminded myself, she’d divorced him and married twice more, and slights didn’t get much more “in your face” than that. The divorce hadn’t prompted him to harm her, so why would he poison her now? He hadn’t had the opportunity, either, as far as I knew.
“When did you last see Corinne?” I asked.
“I went to every competition and exhibition she participated in.” He straightened and threw his shoulders back, clearly waiting for me to applaud his devotion.
He frowned at me. “I’m retired from the ministry. My time is my own.” I imagined he used that exact voice in the pulpit when he wished to emphasize a scriptural point. The effect was diminished somewhat when a small, faceted perfume bottle tumbled from beneath his coat and landed in the grass. We both ignored it.
“I guess you spend time with Randolph, too.”
He froze momentarily, then leaned toward me. Hunched over like that, with his long, skinny neck and beaky nose, he reminded me way too much of a vulture. “Why would you say that?”
“I was chatting with Randolph this weekend and someone mentioned you’d stopped by,” I said, forcing myself not to back away. What could he do to me on this grassy lawn with hundreds of bargain hunters nearby?
Some emotion flitted across his eyes; it looked like fear. “What I do and where I go is no business of yours, young lady.”
“I’m just trying to keep Maurice from being convicted of Corinne’s murder.”
“Whoever killed my beloved Corinne should be burned at the stake. It was an evil thing to do. Evil!”
He said it with an intensity that made me wonder whether he had all his marbles. “I think you have an ulterior motive for being here today,” I said, stooping to retrieve the perfume bottle. I held it on the flat of my palm, the way you feed a horse so you don’t get bitten, and he snatched it.
“As do you, young lady!”
His accusation startled me, and I gripped my purse tighter. Could he know about the typewriter cartridge? Was he here for more than the odd memento? Was he looking to retrieve the manuscript, too?
His next words dispelled that fear. “You’re here, like they are”-he gestured to the crowd-“out of vulgar curiosity. You’re here to feed on the beauty, the gentleness, the incandescent light that was Corinne. Scavengers, all of you! Ghouls!” He threw one arm up dramatically, and a foot-tall bronze figure of a dancer
Tav broke away from his conversation, joining me with a grin. I grabbed his arm and pointed to Hamish MacLeod as he disappeared down the driveway. “That’s Hamish MacLeod,” I said, “Corinne’s fourth husband.” I relayed our conversation and my conviction that the man was stealing easily portable items.
Tav looked after Hamish with interest. “Corinne certainly had eclectic taste in husbands,” he said.
I hadn’t expected him to go tearing after MacLeod and accuse him of theft, but his comment seemed anticlimactic. “Why do you suppose he was visiting Randolph at Hopeful Morning?”
Shrugging, he looked down at me quizzically. “Probably not for any nefarious reason. Perhaps you are so caught up in keeping Maurice out of prison that you are seeing suspicious behavior in very ordinary activities?”
His words stung a bit. “Well, I don’t call thieving ‘ordinary’ activity,” I said huffily.
We had reached the driveway by this time, and I stopped to put my shoes back on, using a hand on Tav’s shoulder to balance myself. I tried to slip him forty dollars, but he shook his head. “I want credit for doing my part in keeping Maurice out of jail. I only hope this cartridge contains something useful after all the hassle we went through to get it.”
The sun highlighted yellow flecks in his brown eyes as I smiled up at him. “You and me both.”
Since Tav was late for a meeting, I dropped him off at the Metro station before returning to the studio. Vitaly and I taught an international standard class at Wednesday lunchtime, and I had to hustle to get back for it. We introduced the Viennese waltz-harder than the regular waltz-to applause and groans.
“I don’t know how you manage to look like you’re floating, Stacy,” one woman said. “I feel like I’m wearing cement shoes.”
“Practice,” I said with a smile. “It’s all about practice. You can float, too; I promise.”
The class wrapped up at twelve thirty, and Vitaly stayed in the ballroom to coach an amateur-amateur pair who were excited about entering their first competition. I descended to my kitchen and called Maurice, leaving a message to let him know we’d finally acquired the typewriter cartridge. My hand was still on the phone when it rang, startling me.
“Stacy, I’ve got the CD with your proofs on it,” Sarah Lewis said when I answered. “I’m going to be at Tate Slade’s Fine Arts this afternoon, taking photos for a brochure for their new exhibition, and I can drop it by afterward, if you like.”
“How ’bout I meet you at the art gallery,” I said, feeling restless. “It’s on Royal, right, near the Episcopal church?”
I mopped the kitchen floor and then changed into white cotton slacks with a thin red stripe and a red peasant blouse before scooting upstairs to tell Vitaly I was leaving and to ask him to lock up when he finished. Walking the few blocks to the art gallery, I felt myself relaxing, sinking into the moment. I deliberately put aside thoughts of
