'Wunnerful.' Doreen hung up the slicker, tied her apron around her waist, and sat down at the butcher block. 'Got time for coffee,' she suggested. 'Only one room is still occupied. Baumer.'
'Everybody left yesterday?' said Quill.
'Pret' near. It was the ambl'ance cornin' and goin' that done it, I think. When it come for that one' - she pointed an accusing finger at Meg - 'lady in one-o-six said if they were tryin' to kill the cook now, it was time to leave.'
Quill braced herself. For the past four days, Meg had met prophecies of financial disaster with the sunny confidence of a high-caliber chef cooking for the most influential of captive audiences: the food critic from L'Aperitif.
'John will think of something,' said Meg. 'If not, we can always purchase Harvey Bozzel's rewrite of 'Rock Around the Park' and depend on advertising to bring the customers back.'
'That's 'clock,' ' said Doreen loftily.
'No, it's not,' said Meg. 'It's sung by the Chili Stompers on the Three Bean label. Quill sang it to me in the hospital. I told her I'd heard it before.'
'Sass,' grumbled Doreen.
'Wait a second,' said Quill. 'What about our four-star review in L'Aperitif?'
'Now that you know who Edward Lancashire really is,' said Meg airily, 'I don't have to keep up the charade anymore.'
'You thought Edward was the food critic from the very beginning!' said Quill. 'You cooked your brains out for that guy!'
'You've got to be kidding.' Meg scowled. 'I knew the second meal I created that he wasn't any gourmet critic. The man's a peasant. I was just keeping your spirits up by going along with your delusion.'
'Admit it, Meg. He had you going.'
There was a suspicious tinge of pink in Meg's cheek, but she said obstinately, 'I knew all the time.'
'You did not!'
'I did, too!'
'Good to be home,' said John Raintree as he came through he dining room doors. Myles was with him. Both men were soaked. 'Not as quiet as your jail though, Myles.'
'Has it ever been?' Myles shook the water from his raincoat and hung it on the peg near the back door. He came up to Quill and stood close.
She looked up at him and touched his cheek. 'You're soaked. Meg's got coffee on. You both should have something hot.' Myles settled into the rocker, declined the expresso with a grimace, and accepted a cup of the Melitta drip.
John sat on the stool next to Doreen. 'Quill, I'm not much good at thanks...'
'Neither is she,' Meg said briskly. 'What we want to know s how all this came down while I was getting my stomach pumped.'
'Marge and Doreen,' said Myles.
'Marge?' said Quill. 'Doreen?'
He shot her an amused look. 'What I'm about to tell you s not true. It's a guess. If it were true, I'd have to make a few arrests, for illegal hacking, unlawful entry into private data, and violation of several interstate banking laws.' He stretched his long legs in front of him. 'I gather that after your visit to the diner, something clicked in Marge's brain.'
'It did?' said Quill. 'I told her Mavis always referred to herself as a modern-day Scarlett O'Hara. Marge got this funny look in her eye.'
'It would have helped Eddie a lot to know about Scarlett O'Hara,' said Myles. 'Even her son didn't know where Mrs. Hallenbeck hid her money, although he guessed that Mavis was concealing it for her. After you left, Marge hared off to solve the mystery of the missing three hundred thousand. She walked over to Mark Anthony Jefferson's bank. The two of them got on to the phone and into the computer, and they tracked down information that turned most of Eddie's guesses into evidence. Mavis Collinwood, as Scarlett O'Hara and with a fictitious social security number, had close to four hundred thousand dollars in a checking account in Atlanta. The only authorized signatory to the account was Amelia Hallenbeck. Incidentally, six payments averaging twenty thousand dollars each had been paid into the account by various hotel and motel insurance companies over the past eight months. This cross- checks with the information Eddie had from the Insurance Index about fraudulent claims the women had been making.'
'So he knew Mrs. Hallenbeck was guilty!' said Quill. 'He never said a word to me.'
'He was pretty certain she was behind the tainted-meat scandal,' said Myles. 'And Quill, Eddie wasn't here to solve the murders. He worked for the son. His job was to stop the trafficking in the meat. And I don't blame him for keeping undercover. Confidentiality is the core of his business. Without it, he wouldn't get another assignment.'
'Confidentiality,' Meg said sarcastically. 'Try deceit. Try ripping people off. Try bogus!'
'I knew you thought he was from L'Aperitif;' said Quill.
'Ha!'
Myles rapped the arm of the rocker for silence. 'May I continue? Then Marge and Mark turned the computer on to Keith Baumer. They called the American Express Travelers Cheque operations center in Salt Lake. Mark, in his capacity as bank vice-president, convinced the Fraud Unit there of the urgency of the situation. The Fraud Unit gave them Baumer's address, and the name of the bank where he'd bought his cheques. Marge thought there was a strong likelihood the cheques would have been purchased at the bank where he ' had a checking and savings
