Cat With a Clue Read online

  “This one?” Mr. Goodwin’s age-spotted hand rested on Eddie’s back. Eddie started purring immediately. “What’s the harm in letting him roam? Pity about the bookmobile this morning,” he added. “Makes you wonder what’s next. And that Andrea Wiley.” He sighed. “I don’t like it when young people die. Such a waste. She had too many years taken away from her. And I’m so very sorry that you had to be the one to find her, dear Minnie.”

  That was not something I wished to revisit. “Thanks. Did you know her?”

  He began to pet Eddie, eliciting even louder purrs. “My wife was a good friend of her mother’s, so I heard about her until my Mary went away.”

  Two years ago, Mrs. Goodwin had gone to the emergency room because she was having trouble breathing. They’d diagnosed a serious heart condition and admitted her immediately for emergency surgery, but she hadn’t survived. It had taken Mr. Goodwin more than a year to come back to being anything close to his former self, and only recently had he been able to speak her name without his voice breaking. I could only guess the depth of his grief, and still hadn’t decided if I wanted to love someone that much. Not that we got the choice. Or did we? Something to wonder about tonight.

  “The last time I saw Andrea,” Mr. Goodwin said, “must have been when the library was in the old building.”

  I blinked at him. “What?”

  “Now, don’t go trying to confuse an old man,” he said, smiling. “I may not be able to remember what I had for breakfast this morning, but I can remember some things.”

  I laughed. “You have a better memory than ninety-nine percent of the population, and that includes me. Better eyesight, too. And probably better hearing. Don’t you go running down one of my favorite library patrons.”

  Mr. Goodwin arched his eyebrows. “Should librarians have favorites? Shouldn’t they be like parents and claim to love all their children equally?”

  Probably, but there was no way I was going to like Mrs. Suggs, who checked out nothing except books on how to improve other people, as much as I liked Reva Shomin, who had small children whose favorite thing in the world was to curl up in the big chair in the children’s section and have their mommy read aloud to them.

  “Then you saw Andrea about four years ago?” I asked. “I’d heard that she’d never come back to Chilson after she lit out of town right after high school.”

  Mr. Goodwin scratched Eddie’s chin. Whenever I tried to do that, he turned his head away, but here he was, allowing Mr. Goodwin to scratch away and, even worse, purring as if that’s what he wanted all along.

  “Metaphorically speaking,” Mr. Goodwin said, “I suppose that’s true. After that trouble with her high school boyfriend, she didn’t come north for years. But eventually she came back for Thanksgiving, Christmas, that kind of thing. Her parents’ fiftieth wedding anniversary. And”—he ran his hand over the length of Eddie’s long body—“her great-aunt Talia’s funeral.”

  All of which kind of put paid to my half-formed notion that Andrea had been killed because it was the first time she’d returned to Chilson in more than twenty years. That was too bad, because I’d already come up with half a dozen scenarios that would have worked, ranging from an unrequited high school love that turned deadly to a long-dormant posttraumatic stress disorder triggered by Andrea’s return. Why her return might have reawakened a trauma, I hadn’t yet determined, but I figured all I needed to do was watch a little more television and something would occur to me.

  “Were they close?” I asked.

  “Talia and Andrea?” Mr. Goodwin picked up the end of Eddie’s tail and waved it around. Eddie purred. “Not to my knowledge, but that’s not to say they weren’t. My Mary would have known.” He held on to Eddie’s tail a little too long, and Eddie turned around to look at him.

  “Mrr,” he said quietly.

  Mr. Goodwin smiled. “Apologies, Mr. Edward. I wasn’t taking proper care of you, was I?” He chuckled and patted the top of the furry head. “From what I recall, Andrea was a squarish peg in a round hole. Ambitious in a family of folks who were accustomed to taking what was given them. Full of curiosity when those around her didn’t question a thing. It must have been difficult for her, and moving away was probably the best thing.”

  Except that coming back had ended in her death. “Do you have any idea,” I asked, “why she might have been in the library after hours?”

  Mr. Goodwin was silent for a moment. “No, I don’t,” he finally said. “I have nothing to offer, and I’ve considered that question thoroughly.” He frowned. “Beyond the appalling tragedy of Andrea’s death, the entire event is extremely puzzling. I’m sure your Deputy Wolverson agrees, yes?” Mr. Goodwin’s white and bushy eyebrows quirked up at me.

  I smiled. “He doesn’t talk to me about active investigations, but he has to find it weird.”

  And that’s what I kept coming back to. The whole thing was beyond weird. Why had Andrea been in the library? It probably wouldn’t have been that difficult to hide from Gareth for a few hours, but why on earth would she? Had she unlocked a door to let her killer inside? If so, why? She wouldn’t have unlocked the door for someone who was about to kill her, but who would she have unlocked it for? Or could it have been the other way around, that the killer had been hiding in the library and let Andrea inside? Since we didn’t have security-camera video, I wasn’t sure we’d ever know.

  “Mrr,” Eddie said.

  I looked down to find both Eddie and Mr. Goodwin looking at me with concern. “Did you go somewhere?” Mr. Goodwin asked. “You had an odd look on your face.”

  “Just thinking,” I said. “Makes my face twist up sometimes.”

  Mr. Goodwin laughed. “And I suppose you want to take your feline friend back to your office, yes?” He tried to arrange Eddie into a pickup position, but Eddie knew what was coming and wasn’t having any of it. He went flat, dangling his legs and drooping his head.

  “Nice try, pal,” I said, scooping him up from Mr. Goodwin’s bony lap. “Better luck next time.”

  “Good-bye, Eddie,” Mr. Goodwin said, waving. “Come back again.”

  I held up one of Eddie’s front paws and waved back, then walked out of the room, muttering to my cat. “Come back again? Not in this lifetime. You may be a bookmobile cat, but you’re not a library cat. I’d be a wreck worrying about you.”

  “Mrr.”

  “Yeah, well, just so you know, some people worry a lot more than I do. I’m a very low-grade worrier, in the general scheme of things.”

  “Mrr.”

  We were nearing the front desk, and since there was no way to sneak around it, I’d have to barrel through with Eddie in my arms and hope no one took much notice of what I was carrying. “Compare me to some others,” I murmured, trying to keep Eddie’s attention on my voice so he wouldn’t be frightened by all the new things around him. “Do you really think Aunt Frances would let you climb onto the houseboat’s roof? No, she would not. And do you think Julia would be okay with you wandering all over the marina most of the summer? I don’t think so. And—”

  “Mrrrrr.”

  I slowed my brisk walk. That hadn’t been Eddie’s normal sound. It sounded like a howl, but not really that, either. What it had sounded like was the noise he made just before—

  “And the front desk,” boomed a stentorian voice, “is another highlight of our library. We paid a high price for the design and installation, but we think it was worth every penny.”

  I stopped stock-still in the middle of the hallway. In front of me was Otis Rahn, president of the library board, along with two other board members, and a sleek woman I didn’t recognize. The small group hadn’t noticed me and, if I was very lucky, they wouldn’t.

  Silently, I walked backward and was about to turn and beat a fast retreat to the reading room when Eddie let out a hideous and mournful howl.

  “Mrroooooorr
rrooo!”

  He squirreled out of my arms, started to run, reached the ankles of the group of four, then stopped and arched his back.

  I ran forward, reaching out, and just as my fingers touched my cat’s fur, he hurled up all the beef jerky he’d eaten and half his breakfast. Then he took three backward steps, bumped into the ankles of the woman I didn’t know, turned her way, and hurled up the other half of his breakfast onto the toes of her very expensive-looking shoes.

  Still crouching, I looked up.

  “And this,” Otis said grimly, “is Minnie Hamilton, our interim library director. Minnie, I’d like you to meet Jennifer Walker, our first interviewee for the library director position.”

  * * *

  Kristen’s laughter echoed off the walls of her tiny office and bounced back into my ears over and over.

  “It was not funny,” I said, slumping in my chair.

  “Seriously?” she managed to ask. “Eddie puking on the shoes of the person who might be your next boss?” She went off into more gales of laughter. “How could it get more funny?”

  I eyed her coldly. “You could have a little more sympathy for my situation.”

  “And you need dessert.” She picked up the phone and dialed the kitchen. “Harvey? No, not the crème brûlée, not tonight. What she needs is a piece of the new thing. You know. Thanks.” She replaced the receiver and leaned back in her chair. “Just think: If this Jennifer person turns into the new director, you have nowhere to go but up.”

  She had a point, but it was even more likely that Ms. Jennifer Walker would want a new assistant director to replace the one named Minnie, whom she’d fired her first day on the job.

  “What did everyone else think about her?” Kristen asked.

  I slid down a little farther. “They’re begging me to give the board my application.”

  The board had toured Ms. Walker through the building and then taken her upstairs to the boardroom for the interview. The staff had immediately congregated in the break room to discuss the potential boss, and their knee-jerk reactions had been overwhelmingly negative.

  “Did you see her face?” Kelsey had asked. “All screwed up tight?”

  “Well,” I’d said, “Eddie had just heaved his stomach contents onto her Italian shoes.” Which I’d only known were Italian because she’d told me so when I’d tried to help clean them. “That’s not likely to bring out the best in anyone.”

  “She could have asked how Eddie was,” Donna had said. “All she cared about was her stupid shoes. Who wears shoes like that in Chilson, anyway?”

  My point that anyone would have expected their shoes to be safe in a public library was ignored.

  “It was like she’d never seen a cat before,” Josh had added. “Lots of libraries have cats. She looked at Eddie like he should never have been born.”

  The thought had chilled me. If Eddie had never been born, my life would be the lesser for it. He brought me comfort and companionship, and if Ms. Walker became the new Stephen, would she want to ban Eddie from the bookmobile? I’d bit my lip and tried not to worry. She was only the first candidate, after all.

  “Minnie,” Holly had said sternly, “you have to apply for the job. Just think if that . . . that witch is our new boss. She’s just like Stephen.”

  Heads around the room had nodded, mine included, because from the little I’d seen of her, she might be even more strict and have even less of a sense of humor than Stephen.

  “Then it’s settled,” Holly said, dusting off her hands. “Minnie’s going to apply. They’ll have to interview them all, just to say they did, but they’ll hire Minnie in the end.” She’d sent me a brilliant smile.

  “But—”

  I’d wanted them to know that all I’d been nodding about was that Ms. Walker was Stephen-like, not that I’d apply for the job, but my explanation was lost in the shuffle as everyone left the room, satisfied that life would be good from here on out.

  Kristen thumped her long legs up onto her desk. “And are you going to? Apply, I mean?”

  “Do you have a date for Trock yet?”

  She gave me a look, knowing that I was trying to change the subject, and decided to let me. “Yes. Tuesday.”

  “The second Tuesday in July, you mean?”

  Kristen’s restaurant was scheduled to appear on an episode of Trock’s Troubles, a nationally syndicated television show hosted by Trock Farrand, who owned a nearby summer home. Trock also had an adult son, Scruffy Gronkowski, who was currently dating Kristen.

  Three Seasons had been short-listed for the show before she’d met Scruffy, but it had taken a lot of Trock’s convincing her that the other restaurateurs in the area wouldn’t hate her for being on the show of her boyfriend’s father. “They will love you for it,” he’d said. “After the show, people will come to this adorably quaint town for a weekend, and since they won’t be able to eat at Three Seasons three times a day, they will eat elsewhere, yes? Yes.”

  My friend leaned back and yawned. “No, I mean next Tuesday.”

  “What?” I squeaked. “Like the Tuesday that’s”—I made a quick count on my fingers—“five days from now?”

  “Just like.” She put her hands behind her head, trying to act all nonchalant, but failed completely, since a huge grin was lighting her face from ear to ear.

  “When did the date get changed?” Last I’d known, the taping had been scheduled for mid-July, with an October air date. That was unfortunate for two reasons; one, July was the busiest month of the year in Chilson, and tripping over a television crew wasn’t going to help get dinners served any faster, and two, an October air date was worse than useless, because Kristen closed the place down around Halloween.

  “Just yesterday,” Kristen said. “A restaurant that was set to be on the show burned to the ground the other night, so they bumped me up.” Her smile faded. “Horrible thing, to have your place burn. I hope they get back on their feet soon.”

  Knowing Kristen, she’d start a social-media campaign to support them in their time of need and send a hefty check. “And when will you be on TV?”

  Her grin reappeared. “That’s getting moved up, too. Scruffy says he’ll rush the production and get it on the air the second week of August.”

  “Hmm.” I squinted at her. “I’m trying to think of better timing, but I can’t think what it could be. What did you do to deserve all this good fortune, anyway?”

  “Not a thing,” she said promptly. “Except this.” She nodded behind me, and Harvey bustled into the room, carrying a tray and a tray stand. Smoothly, he set up the stand, settled the tray down, tidied the small arrangement of flowers, straightened the silverware and napkins, and pulled off the silver domes that covered the plates.

  “Your desserts, madams,” he said in a suave, butlerlike tone that wasn’t anything like his usual voice, and retreated.

  I gaped while Kristen pulled her chair around the desk to sit opposite the tray from me. Four adorable little crepes the size of my palm were stacked with alternate layers of sliced strawberries and whipped cream. A massive chocolate-dipped strawberry topped the creation, and an artistic chocolate drizzle decorated the entire plate. It was almost too pretty to eat, but Kristen would have my head if I didn’t put a fork into it, so I did. If possible, it tasted better than it looked. “You’re a genius,” I said solemnly.

  Kristen nodded. “I know.”

  I took another bite, then asked, “Say, who should I talk to about the DeKeysers?” Kristen and Rafe, being Chilson born and bred, were my sources for insider knowledge. If they didn’t know the dirt on someone, there was a roughly 99.9 percent chance they’d know someone who did. And since I was convincing myself that Andrea’s death was somehow linked to Talia DeKeyser’s passing, getting background on the DeKeysers was a good starting place.

  My friend stared at me. “Does this have to
do with Andrea Vennard’s murder? Don’t you dare tell me you’re getting mixed up in that. Remember what happened last time.”

  “Yeah, I ruined my cell.” The water resistance of cell phones clearly needed to be improved. Sure, I’d accidentally immersed the thing for nearly twenty minutes, but still.

  “And you were almost killed,” Kristen said accusingly.

  “Like the man said, the report of my death was an exaggeration.”

  “Is that Shakespeare?”

  “Mark Twain,” I said, sighing and shaking my head. “See what a PhD in biochemistry got you? An unrounded education.” I finished the last bite of dessert and laid my fork across the plate. “Can I come and watch the filming?”

  “Not a chance.”

  “Please? I promise I won’t make faces at you.”

  She snorted. “Now, that’s a promise that you can’t possibly keep. See? You’re making a face right now.”

  I flattened my expression, which felt really strange. Something else I needed to work on. Next week, maybe. “So, who should I talk to about the DeKeysers?”

  “No one,” she muttered.

  “You might as well tell me. Otherwise I’ll ask Rafe, and he’ll tell me without any lectures.”

  Kristen forked in another bite. She swallowed, then said, “Well, if you insist on being stupid about this—”

  “I do.”

  “—you should talk to Dana Coburn.”

  I’d never heard the name. “Is that a female Dana or a male Dana?”

  Kristen grinned, her good humor suddenly restored. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

  Since Kristen wasn’t being helpful, on the way home I stopped at Rafe’s house to get more information. He was in his dining room, up on a six-foot stepladder and installing crown molding.

  “Looks nice,” I said, hitching myself up onto a battered wooden stool.

  “You think?” He eyed the length of trim he’d just attached. “I wasn’t sure about the proportions. Maybe half an inch more height would be better.”