“This is the best place to be because Santa stops here at the end to pass out candy,” Cassie said. “Yo u 'll be able to get some good pictures here for the paper.”
Our staff bounced up and down, screaming, “Candy. Yay!”
Downtown was beautiful, from the white lights in the bare branches of the trees to the red and white plastic candy canes hanging from the streetlights.
“It's like fairyland,” one of our papergirls said.
Someone behind me grumbled, “Nothing says Christmas like colored lights.”
Cassie no longer seemed upset with me, and I was glad for that. For one moment, I considered asking her if I could come to her coven meeting tonight, but in the back of my mind I kept hearing Weezie's voice repeating “baby blood” over and over, and I just couldn't bring myself to do it. We chatted amiably about nothing of importance and thanked several people who came up to us to tell us today's edition of the paper was the “best one yet.”
“I wonder why a paper full of tragedy is so popular?” I asked.
Cassie shrugged. “After years of looking at our ‘grip and grin’ photographs and reading hot tips from the extension office about the latest developments in cattle food, they probably find it exciting to have something interesting to read about.”
The sound of a band approaching on a side street caught the crowd's attention, and everyone pushed forward. I worried about my kids losing their places, but they all held their own quite nicely. The high school band came around the corner and was greeted with a rousing cheer. Their instruments were decorated with red ribbons and sprigs of mistletoe.
“They just won the district band competition,” Cassie shouted over the din. “This week everybody loves the director.”
I snapped several pictures.
“Don't use up too much film at the beginning,” Cassie warned. “The best floats come at the end.”
Behind the band came a yellow school bus with a Nativity scene on top. Screaming children hung out of the windows and tossed Hershey Kisses to the spectators. I was proud to see my staff got most of them. This was followed by a troop of Brownies dressed as Christmas trees, carrying flashlights that they flicked on and off to represent stars.
A group of middle-aged women, preceded by a banner that said they were the Silver-Haired Twirlers Association, marched in front of the junior high school band in little white tasseled boots and skirts that were much too short for them.
I heard a strange noise come from Cassie. She sounded like a strangling horse, and I couldn't look at her for I knew if I did I'd have the giggles for the rest of the day.
When the bus from the Sigafoos Home for the Aged went by, I saw the woman who reminded me of my mother sitting in the front seat wearing a Santa Claus hat. I waved at her and she returned my greeting with a Queen Elizabeth-style finger wiggle and a vague smile that really did look like my mother's. I suddenly realized I needed to visit the Willows.
The man who'd played the bagpipes at Eddie Douglas's funeral passed in front of me playing an explosive version of “Scotland the Brave.” I noticed Buchanan Mc-Cleary, the borough solicitor, standing on the other side of the street beside Luscious, who looked quite official and almost handsome in his blue uniform.
I waved at Buchanan, who smiled back.
“I want to talk to you,” I mouthed.
He tilted his head and moved his lips. I interpreted it as “What did you say?”
I cut through a troop of marching Boy Scouts to get across the street.
Buchanan greeted me with an enthusiastic hug. He and I had developed a kinship based on our both being outsiders in the small town and both being romantically involved with members of the Gochenauer family.
A Maryland high school band stopped in front of us to play a medley of Dixieland jazz. “What's up?” Buchanan asked loudly.
I didn't want my questions to be overheard by everyone nearby, so I stood on tiptoe and yelled in his ear, “I want to ask you about Stanley Roadcap.”
“Like what?”
“Like what did Stanley have to gain by Bernice's death?” As I finished shouting out my question, I realized the band had stopped playing and everyone around us either heard me or was stone-deaf. I winced with embarrassment.
Buchanan laughed at my expression. Luscious turned bright red, moved away a few inches, and pretended he didn't know me.
Taking my arm, Buchanan led me through the crowd to the semiprivacy of the covered entrance to the Sweete Toothe Candy Shoppe.
“I'm so embarrassed,” I said miserably.
He shrugged. “If that's the worst thing you ever do, consider yourself lucky.”
“I like your philosophy.” I lowered my voice and made sure nobody was listening before I asked, “Is there anything you can tell me about the Roadcaps? I met Stanley yesterday, under rather strange circumstances, and he tried to convince me that he and Bernice were getting back together. I just wondered if this was true. Or if Stanley was trying to convince me that he didn't have any reason to want her dead. Do you know if he stood to gain a lot from her will?”
“I was Bernice's lawyer,” Buchanan said. “So I do know quite a bit about their affairs. And since the settling of her estate is a matter of public record, I won't be breaking any confidentiality by telling you this. Bernice inherited her personal fortune from her father in a trust. The beneficiary of the trust is Stanley and Bernice's son. Stanley won't get anything-a fact that he was well aware of. And he doesn't need it. Stanley is fairly well-to-do.”
“A son? Where is he?” I asked, thinking I had just acquired a new suspect.
“In the army, stationed in the Middle East. He's flying home right now for the funeral.”
There went my suspect. I was vaguely disappointed. The idea of the killer being someone I didn't know was far more preferable to the alternative. I was also aware that the terms of the trust meant Bernice was more valuable to Stanley alive than dead. And for the same reason, it would have been to Stanley's advantage to keep his marriage going. How much of Stanley's patience with Bernice's history of rehab romances was due to his love for her, and how much was due to her wealth?
“At least no man's going to marry me for my money,” I thought out loud. “I don't have any.”
Buchanan looked seriously at me. “I'm not so sure about that,” he said cryptically. “Sometimes I think you act like a rich kid slumming it.”
“Where did you get that idea?” I asked, startled by his comment. “I'm no different from anybody else.”
He smiled. “What about that preppy accent, the five or six languages you speak, the casual way you drop exotic places into your conversations, the way you assume everything will go your way?”
“It's my background,” I protested. “In the foreign service, we tend to live ‘rich’ even when we're not. My father is a career diplomat who worked his way up, not one of those millionaires who bought his ambassadorship. And that accent you referred to comes as a result of my having lived in a dozen foreign countries when I was growing up.”
Buchanan said, “Okay, Tori, you've convinced me. I didn't mean to stir up a tempest in your teapot.”
The high school steel band drummed out my retort. He planted a kiss on the top of my head and moved on with a cheery good-bye.
“If you ask me,” said a woman's voice behind me, “he and that galfriend of his done it.”
I spun around to face Weezie Clopper, who was standing in the open doorway of the candy shop. How long she'd been there, I didn't know, but apparently she'd heard most of our conversation.
“Hello, Mrs. Clopper. How nice to see you again,” I said, forcing a smile.
“I thought about calling you after you left,” she said. “About that Gochenauer woman. She thinks she's so much better than everybody else because her family's been here forever.”
As the poison dripped from her lips, I thought how untrue were her remarks about Greta. Garnet's sister was a true original, an aging flower child, who lived to help everybody and everything in the world.
“What is it you are trying to tell me, Mrs. Clopper?” I asked. My smile was gone now, and I was striving for cool and intimidating.
“You know how she and that-that black man”-she spoke with a sneer in her voice-“have been yacking about
