Quilter's Knot

He took a long look at her before he spoke. “Yeah, sure. I guess. If it will help you fix things for Lauren.” He said it in a flat voice. Harriet found his enthusiasm underwhelming.

'The other night I saw you with an armload of files. Did they come from Selestina's office?'

He looked at her.

'So what if they did?'

'Hey, relax. I'm on your team.'

'I doubt that.'

'What did you find in the files?'

'A big bunch of nothing. It was shipping records. Angel Harbor has an arrangement with a couple of Folk Art Schools back east. They all give the same certification for their programs, and to be sure they stay calibrated they ship samples of student work to each other and they all evaluate it and see if they all come up with the same assessment.

'There were a couple of slips for shipments to England, but the descriptions weren't detailed enough to know what quilts they were talking about. And there was nothing that told why they were going. Other than that, there was a file of staff insurance forms. I tried to tell Lauren Selestina didn't keep much in that office.'

'As janitor you can go into all the offices, right?'

'I have access to the whole school. Mostly, I work in the fiber arts building and its outbuildings.'

'What about Tom Bainbridge's office?'

'Yeah, his office is in the ceramic arts building. I work there when we wax the floors or when Brett is on vacation.'

'What can you tell me about him?'

'What do you want to know?'

Harriet wanted to smack him. If she were a detective, she'd have been the worst kind. She could see you had to be blessed with a lot of patience, something she didn't possess.

She took a deep breath. “The first day we were here, I saw Tom with some guys who looked like they were surveying the meadow. Is he selling some of the property?'

'I don't know if he's really planning on trying to sell it out from under his mother, but he's been talking to a couple of realtors.” He paused. “I guess things are probably different now.'

'Is it possible he was just getting the property valued for tax purposes?'

Les set his bucket at his feet and looked her in the eye. “Anything's possible.'

'Tell me about the vehicles here. Who has access to the Ford Explorers?'

'Senior staff, Tom. Selestina, of course, although she didn't really drive much. Nancy in the office.'

'Did they have assigned vehicles?'

'Not exactly assigned, but people had their favorites.'

'But could anyone drive any of the cars? Were the keys kept in a public place?'

'They didn't need to bother. All the keys are the same. You got one, you've got them all.'

Harriet clenched her fists at her side. “You must know something that can help me prove your sister didn't kill Selestina,” she said. “Come on, throw me a bone.'

Les rubbed the fine blond stubble on his chin as he thought.

'I don't know about the murder, but if you're trying to find her missing quilt, I'd check Tom's office and the workshop. He's the one that actually boxes and mails the stuff back and forth.'

'Is the workshop in the center of the fiber arts building?'

'No, anyone can get into those rooms. There are some utility buildings in the woods, sort of hidden at the back of the property on the far side of the meadow. I think they were the original barn and outbuildings before they built the school. Selestina has her personal studio there. And Tom does the packing there.'

'So, what am I going to find?'

Les spread his hands wide. “I don't know,” he said and when Harriet didn't say anything, he continued, “Really. It's the one place I don't have a key for. Selestina wanted her privacy when she was working on her own stuff. It's strictly off-limits.'

'Are you sure you don't know anything else?'

'Look, don't you think if I had overheard someone talking about killing Selestina or even about setting Lauren up or stealing her work-don't you think I'd say something?'

'I suppose so. Thanks, anyway. And if you think of anything, let me know.'

'You'll be the first,” he said in a tone that told Harriet the opposite would be the truth.

Chapter Nineteen

Harriet went back to the Tree House and picked up her bag of tools and fabric. It was hard to think about her half-rectangle project when thoughts of Tom's office kept creeping into her mind.

None of the Loose Threads was in the Tree House, so she went into the kitchenette and helped herself to three chocolate chip cookies; Darcy had picked them up the day before at a little bakery when she was in town. Harriet knew none of the Threads would begrudge her the dose of chocolate, but she also knew Aunt Beth would grill them about her cookie consumption and none of them would stand up well to the pressure. She wiped her face and hands with a damp paper towel to insure she wasn't wearing any evidence and set off for the fiber arts pavilion.

She reached the fork in the path that led to the fiber building, and with thoughts of Robin and Aiden's warning ringing in her head, she went on past it and toward the ceramics pavilion and Tom Bainbridge's office.

When she reached the porch, she stashed her bag under a rattan bench then looked carefully each way before pulling open the large carved-wood door. She strode briskly toward the exhibition area, the one legitimate destination for a person outside the ceramics program. She wandered past a display of mugs without seeing anything; she could hear the grinding of potters’ wheels coming from behind her, and a voice delivering a lecture off to her left.

Suddenly, she heard Tom Bainbridge's voice approaching. She stepped into the women's restroom, keeping the door cracked open so she could observe him when he walked past.

His companion turned out to be a cell phone, one with a strong signal, she guessed, given how poor the service was here. He was telling someone he would “be right there.” Good, she thought. Wherever there was, it should give her enough time to see if Lauren's quilt was in his office. If it wasn't, perhaps there would be some useful shipping information.

She counted to sixty after the door closed behind him-she wanted to be sure he wouldn't come back for forgotten keys or a jacket or anything that would cause him to discover her rifling through his stuff. She went to seventy-five just for good measure then stepped out of the restroom, hurried down the hall and ducked into the room she'd attempted to hide in a few nights earlier.

The octagonal shape of the pavilion made for some unusual interior room shapes, especially since an attempt had been made to create rectangular classrooms wherever possible. Tom's office was one of the rooms that had absorbed a number of oddly angled walls. His desk sat diagonally across a narrow point where two walls came together. The table he'd been sitting at on her previous visit was in the middle of the room. Several sheets of paper were laid out side-by-side on its surface.

Harriet went to the table and picked up two of the papers. They appeared to be real estate documents. She quickly scanned them. They were competing offers for a piece of property that had to be the meadow.

'Find what you were looking for?'

She dropped the documents and turned to the door. Tom stood just behind a handsome gray-haired man carrying a black briefcase.

'If you'll excuse us, Miss Truman?” Tom said, and held the door open.

Harriet felt her cheeks burning. There was nothing she could say. She started out the door, but he grabbed her arm in a none-too-gentle grip.

'I've got a meeting that can't wait, but we aren't through. I will call for you…” He looked at the stainless steel Rolex on his wrist. “…in one and a half hours at the Tree House. Do not disappoint me.'

He released her, and she left, not stopping or taking her gaze from the floor until she was back out on the