"Eat something. Then we can talk about Andr‚. That is, if you want to."
I stared at the crackers and cheese. "I had to identify the body."
"I heard. I'm sorry, Goldy. Honestly, I am." He leaned over and squeezed my hand. "And I'm sorry I sprang the kitchen stuff on you before you were ready. It's just that I have to get started."
"It's okay." I bit carefully into a crisp cracker topped with the creamy cheese. The sherry was like fire in my chest. Fire... I said, "Tom, there's something that's been bothering me all day. Andr‚ had burn marks on his hands."
"Burn marks? What kind of burn marks?"
"He wouldn't have done that to himself," I rushed on.
"Plus, he went out to the cabin an hour early to do extra food prep, and that's not like him, especially when the kitchen there is so small... and for him to die right after Gerald Eliot, and Cameron's arrest... I mean, it's all pretty weird...."
Tom's eyes searched mine, which had again filled without warning. "Start over," he told me solemnly. He scooted his chair over so he could rub my back.
The comfort of his warm, accepting presence made talk possible. I told him about the call from Sheila O'Connor, about going to the morgue, having the conversation with the cabdriver, who said Andre had gone to the cabin early. I told him about visiting Blue Spruce, dealing with the intrusions from Bobby Whitaker the Realtor and Craig Litchfield the caterer. I told him about poor Pru. Thinking about what Andr‚'s death had done to Pru's world, a sob closed my throat.
Tom nodded. "So Sheila's thinking heart attack?"
I exhaled; "Can they find out exactly when he had the heart attack?" I asked. "And how he burned himself?" My voice sounded suddenly shrill.
"I'm sure the department will check it out," Tom said quietly. Outside, the rain started up again. Mist rolled into our yard and pressed against the dining room windows. Raindrops pattered on the plastic sheeting Tom had put up. "You know the drill," he went on. "They secure the scene, sweep it to determine what happened.
There'll be an autopsy, toxicology, to see what actually caused his death, whether it was a heart attack or what." I closed my eyes. "If Sheila said I could call her about it, I will."
I said, "You can ask around, can't you? Please?" It was part statement, part plea.
"Of course." His voice was a murmur, like the rain. "I just need to go easy. And so do you, Miss G. You know, if this had happened to someone I didn't know, I'd say you need a victim advocate. You're not the victim, but you were close to Andr‚, and it was an unexpected death."
"You can be my advocate."
He smiled at me. "Can't. I'm your new kitchen contractor."
"Don't joke."
"I'm not."
Julian and Arch banged in before he could reply, laden with three bags of carry-out Italian food: ziti with marinara, fettucine alfredo, pizza bianca. I looked at my watch: incredibly, almost half an hour had gone by. The few crackers with cheese had filled me up. But I ached to be with people.
Arch gave me a brief hug and whispered that I was a good mom, his standard assurance in rough times that things would turn out fine. His cheek was like sandpaper. Although he had no beard yet and his voice only occasionally cracked, he had begun to shave with great hopefulness on his fourteenth birthday. The razor had been a gift from Tom; I would never have thought of it.
"Andr‚ was old, wasn't he?" My son's voice was anxious, even though he had only met Andr‚ a few times during my stint at the restaurant. Still, he wanted to put a spin on sudden death. "I mean, he had retired and everything, right?"
"Yes, hon."
Julian dressed a green salad with balsamic vinaigrette, heated some breadsticks I'd made the previous week, and set out all the food. When we said grace, I offered a silent prayer for Pru. Despite the problems besetting our family, at least I had companionship and comfort. Except for her nurse, Pru now had no one, and my heart ached for her.
As Julian expertly twined fettucine onto a fork, he again brought up the following day's tasting party. "Thought we could do that fantastic grilled fish, with grilled polenta and a fruit salsa. What do you think, Goldy? I called your meat and seafood supplier, and she had fresh escolar. I had her deliver five pounds of it while you were out at Andr‚'s place. She said she'd put it on your bill. I hope that's okay." He paused, eager but embarrassed. "I mean, does this sound good to you? We do sort of need to discuss stuff."
I struggled to remember the menu we'd finally decided on for the postponed tasting party. Oh, yes: I had been planning to roast a pork tenderloin and serve it with Cumberland sauce. Pork is plentiful and inexpensive in the fall, and people enjoy its heartiness when the weather turns colder. But the escolar would be good for dieters, or at least for people who think eating fish entitles them to dessert. "I don't know about grilling fish at the Homestead," I told Julian uncertainly. "But it might work. Maybe with an exotic slaw to complement the salsa and polenta."
Tom smiled and I knew what he was thinking: At least we weren't talking about death or remodeling.
"You can grill at the museum," Julian said authoritatively. "I know because I went over in the van once your supplier brought the escolar. I had a chat with the curator lady, Sylvia. Took her some truffles left from lunch."
"The Soir‚e committee might see that as cheating," I pointed out gently.
"No, it isn't," Julian protested. "Besides, Sylvia's not even one of the people who decides." He looked at me innocently. "Is she?"
"No, but she'll probably be there and influence the decision-makers, who are Marla, Weezie Harrington, and Edna Hardcastle."
"Oh, brother," said Julian.
"Do we have to talk about this?" Arch piped up. "Can't we have some of the truffles, too?"
"Absolutely," Julian replied. He retrieved a foil-covered platter, and uncovered his special dark truffles dipped in white chocolate.
"You are too good," I said to Julian as I bit into the exquisitely smooth, densely creamy ganache.
"Sylvia Bevans loved them. Had a couple while she told me her problems." He measured out coffee for espresso. He pulled the shots, then dumped them over glasses half-filled with ice and whole milk. "Oh, by the way, she said they found one of the missing cookbooks."
"What?" I demanded. "When? Which one?"
"A piece of evidence was returned?" Tom asked sharply. "The department found it at the site, or Sylvia had it all along?"
"That Watkins Cookbook she kept complaining had been swiped, remember?" He handed the iced coffees to Tom and me, fixed one for himself and dosed it with sugar, then sank into a chair. "The cops told her they found it in the back of Mr. Burr's truck. But they finished their search of the house and guest house, and I never found the last one. They told her it's probably gone for good, tossed out in the road or something."
"Thrown out of the truck?" I asked, incredulous.
"Gosh, Goldy, I'm sorry. Mrs. Bevans doesn't believe someone could have tossed her beloved copy of The Practical Cook Book out on the road, but if the killer was that stupid, she said to ask Tom if he could search for it. She wants everything back the way it was. The woman was a wreck. Remember all that complaining she was doing to Andr‚? Since the cops think the museum theft was just an attempt to cover up the murder, they're sticking with their the-last-cookbook-got-chucked-away theory. Sylvia doesn't care about their theory. She says she has to have The Practical Cook Book, because some old handwriting of Charlie Smith is scrawled across one of the recipes. Who s Charlie Smith?"
"Smythe. Grandfather of Leah Smythe and Weezie Smythe Harrington," I supplied. "He built the Merciful Migrations cabin." Where Andr‚ died.
"Oh," said Julian. "According to Sylvia, Charlie Smythe's handwriting could make the cookbook real valuable, like a collector's item, at least in Aspen Meadow. And here's something else: Sylvia said Andr‚ called her up this past weekend, after we catered together at the homestead? He said he was interested in some recipes."
"Some recipes?" I echoed.
"Yep. Andr‚ asked if Sylvia had photocopies of their historic cookbooks in the museum files, and if so, could he have his own photocopy of The Practical Cook Book."
"You're kidding. A copy of the entire cookbook?"
"Nope, I'm not kidding, and yep, the whole cookbook. Sylvia told him sure, she'd make a copy for him. But he never showed up to get it." He gave me a wideeyed look. "I'm really sorry I brought this up. You probably don't want to be reminded of your teacher right now."
"Why would Andr‚ want a photocopy of The Practical Cook Book?" I asked, but of course none of them had a clue. Nor did I, since I knew that Andr‚ never gave two turkey drumsticks about American cooking. Plus he prided himself on being a chef of great stature. I could not imagine why he would want photocopied recipes for dishes he would have scoffed at: white bread, brown sauce, yellow cake. "This doesn't make sense," I said to Tom.
"It's strange," he agreed. "Four cookbooks are stolen. Eliot is killed. All but one cookbook are retrieved. A chef who asks for a photocopy of the last missing cookbook - which is almost a hundred years old - turns up dead before he can get it."
Tom dialed the sheriff's department. I used my business line to try to track down Sylvia Bevans.
13
While we were on the phone, Julian insisted on doing the dishes. I tapped the counter impatiently. Sylvia now claims The Practical Cook Book is a collector's item... and Andr‚ wanted a photocopy of it.... Could! Andre really have cared about early twentieth-century American cookery? An answering machine picked up at the Homestead Museum. I hung up and dialed Sylvia's home. The phone rang and rang. The curator, apparently, did not embrace telecommunications technology.
Charlie Smythe's handwriting across one of the recipes makes it valuable... so what? To the best of my knowledge, I Andre had never been in the Homestead before Friday. He'd never seen the cookbook, or any recipes therein, had he? Who would know about this? Someone in the Furman County Historical Society? Marla. But I got her machine, too. Was the IRS holding her hostage? I stared glumly at the hole in our back wall as I listened to my friend's bright voice on tape. Of course, there was Cameron Burr... I wondered if his lawyer had told him yet about the incriminating evidence retrieved from his pickup. There was no way Cameron would have staged the museum burglary and then left the old cookbook in his truck. So where was the fourth cookbook? And who on earth had reason to steal it? I left a message on Marla's machine asking her to call, and hung up.
Arch announced he and Julian were taking Jake on an evening walk. Did I want to go? The rain had vanished, leaving the air cool and moist. I declined, anxious to hear what Tom was learning from the department. Realistically, what could they tell him? So they found an- other of the stolen cookbooks? So what? I fidgeted with my iced coffee glass.
"Okay, there's not much but here it is," Tom said after twenty minutes of conversation with his depart- mental cohorts. "Fuller's guys did find the Watkins Cook- book. No sign of the other cookbook, although they have the photocopies of all four from the Homestead files, and this is the first they've heard about the cookbook possibly being a collector's item. As far as they know, it's worth less than a hundred bucks. But here's something more interesting: The department got the tip about Eliot's body being at Burr's house just a little more than three hours after my team answered Sylvia's call about the robbery at the Homestead. So in Fuller's mind, the whole thing looked.like a homicide-masquerading-as-burglary pretty quickly. See what I'm saying?"
"Yes, I think so... that once he decided it was a homicide, you couldn't think of it as anything else?"
Tom nodded and poured us two cognacs. Well, why not? We'd already splurged on the last of the shrimp, carry-out food, and a loan for a new kitchen. We might as well finish off the Courvoisier. Tom placed a crystal liqueur glass in front of me and continued: "Andy Fuller ordered Burr arrested without taking the time to hear his story, and without a lot of evidence. Burr didn't have any alibi for that night beyond being drunk. He had brawled with Eliot earlier in the evening, and Eliot's body was found on Burr's property. Q.E.D., according to Fuller, who claimed Burr knew when Eliot would be working at the museum, killed him there, then faked the burglary as an inebriated afterthought."
I sipped the cognac: It was sweet, smoky, and soothing. "Didn't they ever investigate it as a robbery? Especially with what Sylvia is saying now about the last cookbook being a potentially valuable collector's item?"
"They don't put much stock in Sylvia, Miss G." Tom shook his head. "Fuller had his homicide-not-burglary theory. The department had already recovered the first two cookbooks, and those weren't very valuable. I mean, we're not talking the Gutenberg Bible or anything, right? Plus, Sylvia's original report didn't even mention all the stolen cookbooks, so they're reluctant to change their theory now."
