The Christening Day Murder (19 page)

“God, she was something. She got hormones flowing I didn’t even know I had. I was thirteen or fourteen and she had to be ten years older, but I was willing to do anything to make it work. But I had a lot of competition from the other guys in my class. Everyone was in love with her. She was really cute. And a good teacher, by the way.”

“Any competition from adult males?”

“Yeah, there was that, too.”

“You remember seeing her with anyone special?”

“You looking for a scandal? Could be. She was parked
one night with Mayor Larkin. I really didn’t get it. He must’ve been forty, and he didn’t have half my personality.”

I could believe it. “You saw them together in a car?” I hoped I didn’t sound as elated as I felt.

“Yeah. His car. Down by the athletic field one night when there wasn’t any game on.”

“Were they … I mean …?”

“Necking? Not when I saw them. They were just talking, planning her life without me. Boy, did I have the hots for her.”

“You sound like a very honest man, Mr. Mulholland. Did you tell your parents about it?”

“Nah. I was nuts about her. I didn’t want to get her in trouble. I was with a couple of friends that night. We decided to keep it to ourselves. Call me Jerry, OK?”

“Was that the only time it happened?”

“Other guys saw her with him other times. It was always in his car. She had this old VW he probably couldn’t fit in.”

“Any possibility that someone in your parents’ generation saw them together?”

“Every possibility. It was a small town. Anywhere you went, someone could drive by or walk by with his dog. One of my friends saw them once at the top of the hill. Not where the farm was, the other side of town. Near those people—what the hell was their name? Funny name, German-sounding.”

“Could it have been Degenkamp?”

“Degenkamp, right. My friend lived near the Degenkamps. He saw them drive by.”

“You’ve really been very helpful, Jerry.”

“Call any time. You want to tell me why you’re asking? Amy didn’t say.”

I had a pang of guilt. Even after so long, he wouldn’t take my message with equanimity, and I hated to be the one to tell him. “Can I pass until I’m sure?”

“If you promise to call.”

“I will.” It wouldn’t be the best day of my life.

* * *

Fred Larkin wasn’t waiting at the door for me this time. In fact, he wasn’t at home, but his wife was. She recognized me and invited me in. Her husband had gone into town a little while ago and should be back soon, she told me. In the meantime, how would I like a cup of coffee? I said I’d like that very much.

We sat in her large kitchen outfitted with handsome cabinets and good-looking appliances. I remarked that she must enjoy cooking, and she said she did. As if to prove her skills, she brought out some home-baked cookies and put them on the table.

“I was going to ask you about Studsburg,” I said after complimenting her on the cookies, “but I realized just this morning that you hadn’t lived there.”

She studied me before answering. She was an extremely attractive woman, even younger than I had first judged. She was quite tall and graceful, her hands well manicured, her hair thick and cut short, falling in place naturally. I didn’t think she spent much time at the hairdresser, and probably looked better than most of the women who did. At home in her own kitchen, she was wearing a suede vest over a silk blouse, and dark brown wool pants over glossy brown boots.

“I met Fred after his first wife died in a tragic accident,” she said.

“What happened?”

“She lost control of her car one night. When the police found the car, she was already dead. Fred was devastated. They’d known each other since they were children.”

I was about to say something when the front door opened and Fred Larkin called a cheery hello to his wife.

“In the kitchen, dear. We have company.”

He would know that, of course. My car was parked outside. In the country you can’t hide by parking around the corner.

“Well, Miss Bennett. What brings you here?”

“A couple of questions. I won’t trouble you for long. I have to be getting back.”

“Where is it you get back to?”

“I live near New York.”

“Long trip to ask a few questions.”

“I had some other business in the area.” I got up from the table and thanked his wife for the coffee.

“I’m kind of busy myself, so let’s see if we can make it pretty quick.” His expansive charm of last Thursday had been replaced with a petulance I found intimidating. He walked into the family room with its trophies and photos, and I followed.

“I wonder if you would tell me about Candida Phillips,” I said.

He was smart enough not to dodge. On Thursday he had spun a fable for me, a pretty story told by an all-knowing adult to a wide-eyed child. It had had all the elements of a fairy tale: good people grew up together and lived happy lives; everyone was friendly, and the rich helped the poor; men and women met as children, grew up, and married each other, living happily ever after; the mayor attended baptisms and weddings and gave presents on all occasions, and
they kept Mr. Dietrich on even though the classes shrank down to almost nothing
. But the name Candida Phillips told him I hadn’t bought it, and what was worse, someone may have cracked and told me things that had been buried for thirty years.

He gave me a tight little smile. “Now, that’s a name I haven’t heard since I left Studsburg. Yes, there was a Miss Phillips that last year. She taught in the school. Came from nowhere, and went back to nowhere.”

“I believe you interviewed her for the job.”

He knit his heavy white eyebrows together. Was he wondering if Henry Degenkamp was the source? “I suppose I did. As mayor, I had a lot of diverse duties. It fell to me to notify a family when a mishap occurred to their son and to administer punishment when a Halloween prank got out of
hand. Yes, I interviewed Miss Phillips, as I interviewed the janitor who came in and cleaned the school twice a week.”

“Do you know where she went at the end of the school year?”

“I suppose to another school somewhere. She was a teacher, after all. Teachers teach in schools.” His voice had gotten a hard edge, a derisive nastiness that good people like the Stiflers and Mulhollands had surely never heard.

“If you interviewed her, you must have written her a reference.” I had seen it in the file along with one written by Scofield.

“I might have. These aren’t the things I can pull out of my memory. What I remember is the town, how it felt, how people treated each other.” He glanced at the aerial photograph, the proof that heaven had once existed on earth.

“I’m a little surprised you didn’t remember her when we spoke a couple of days ago. She spent a whole year in Studsburg, and a number of people saw you with her. In the evening,” I added.

He kept himself in check, but I sensed the anger below the good-old-boy surface. “You are now getting personal and you are putting me in the awkward position of having to say things about someone who is not here to defend herself. Miss Phillips was a new, young teacher—Studsburg may have been her first assignment, I don’t recall—and young people in every profession need guidance. That was another task that fell to me that year, helping out a young teacher.”

“Can you tell me what her problem was, Mr. Larkin?”

“It isn’t any of your business, Miss Bennett, but young women sometimes become involved with the wrong men. Whether it’s their fault or not makes no difference. Families are sacred. Studsburg was an old-fashioned, family-centered town. I saw to it that it remained that way right to the end.”

It was interesting that he had glided from professional assistance to family guidance. “Do you always give guidance to young women in your car?”

“Young woman, you are very close to being thrown out
of this house. I shouldn’t honor that snide question with an answer, but I’ll tell you this much: My office was in my home. I had something personal and delicate to discuss with Miss Phillips, and I considered it better to meet her where no one would be aware that she was being chastised. If someone saw us together and chose to draw a foolish conclusion, well, I can’t be responsible for people’s stupidity or malicious intentions. I had her best interests at heart, you may believe me.”

“Did you ever see Candy Phillips after the last day of school?” I asked.

He looked me in the eye. “I never did,” he said. “And now I think it’s time for you to go.”

I went out to my car feeling high as a kite. He had never once asked why I was interested in Candy Phillips. He didn’t have to. He knew.

It was still reasonably early when I saw the towers of Cornell rising above Cayuga Lake. It’s all uphill to the campus and the little villages adjacent to it. I needed only one stop to inquire for directions to reach the Degenkamps’ house. This time a man opened the front door. He was Eric Degenkamp, a middle-aged version of his father, dressed in dark corduroy pants, a sporty shirt, and a sweater that may have been cashmere.

“What’s going on here?” he asked when I told him who I was.

“I don’t know what you mean. I want to talk to your father and mother.”

“My father isn’t here and—”

“Who’s there, Eric?” Ellie Degenkamp called from inside in a shrill voice. “Is your dad back yet?”

“Not yet, Mom.”

“Did he get a phone call?” I asked.

“About an hour ago. Did you call him?”

“No, but I think I know who did.”

Ellie was standing behind her son, looking frightened to death. “You,” she said accusingly. “You better tell me what’s going on and where Henry is.”

“I left Fred Larkin an hour ago, Mrs. Degenkamp. I was talking to him about Candy Phillips. That’s all I know.”

“Candy Phillips,” she said angrily. “Can’t you leave well enough alone?”

“Maybe you can tell me about her,” I said gently.

“Tell you what? She was a little slut that they brought in to teach the last year of Studsburg. God knows what damage she did to those children.”

“The children loved her.”

“You’ve talked to the children?”

“Some of them.”

“What do twelve-year-olds know?”

“I think they’re a pretty good judge of character.”

“She didn’t have any character to judge.” Ellie was angry and forthright, the superficial sweetness that she normally turned on the world dissolved in anger and worry and a touch of bitterness. “What did Fred tell you?”

“That she taught in Studsburg one year. That she came from nowhere and went to nowhere. Not much else.”

“Well, you won’t get anything out of me, because there isn’t anything else. But I want to know where Henry is. It looks like snow out there and he shouldn’t be driving.”

“Why don’t you call Fred Larkin?” I said.

We had all been standing just inside the front door. Now
Ellie went into the kitchen to make her phone call while Eric and I went to the living room.

A few minutes later she joined us, flopping into a chair, her short white hair lifting and falling as she sat. Her son went and knelt beside her. “Dad isn’t there,” she said, her voice cracking. “Fred called just after Miss Bennett left. He didn’t ask him to come, he just said Miss Bennett might be on her way.”

“Maybe he didn’t want to talk to her, Mom,” Eric said. “Maybe he just went out to have a cup of coffee.”

“That’s not like Henry.” She shook her head. Then she looked up at me. “Why are you doing this?” she wailed.

“Mrs. Degenkamp, were Fred Larkin and Candy Phillips lovers that year?”

“I don’t know,” she said weakly. “I don’t know anything anymore. He said they weren’t.”

“Did you believe him?”

She thought about it. “I thought he and … he and his wife were happy.”

“Why did you call her a slut?”

“Please go away,” she said. “Eric, go and look for him. Maybe he’s reading the papers at the library. Or having coffee at that new place.”

Eric patted her shoulder and got up to go. I wrote my name and phone number on a slip of paper and gave it to her.

“I’ll be at this number tonight. Will you call me and let me know what happened to him?”

She nodded. I followed Eric to the door. Ellie’s forecast had been accurate. Huge snowflakes were falling. Although the street was clear, the lawns were turning white. I wondered if this would be the end of the drought, if Studsburg was about to sink into a lake of oblivion again. I had a desperate urge to know the truth before Candy Phillips’s grave was underwater for the second time.

Outside the house, Eric zipped up a heavy jacket and pulled a knitted cap on his head. The snow was coming down furiously.

“Would you like to tell me what’s going on?” he said.

“A woman was murdered in Studsburg, probably on the Fourth of July thirty years ago, the last day of the town’s existence. Were you there that day?”

“No. And I wasn’t there any part of that year.”

“I’m trying to find out who she was and why she was killed.”

“That sounds like a police matter to me. Why don’t you leave it to them?”

“Has anyone from the sheriff’s office been here to question your parents?”

“No one.”

“That’s why I can’t leave it to them. They’re not trying very hard. When the body was found, there was a media circus for a day or two. Now that the cameras are gone, no one really cares very much.”

“I can assure you my parents had nothing to do with anyone’s death.”

“I agree with you.” I wasn’t all that sure, but I decided it was better to sound sure if there was any chance he might cooperate with me. “But they know something they don’t want to talk about. I’m sure you see that. And your father was obviously very disturbed when Fred Larkin called. Someone’s going to tell me eventually.”

“I’ll talk to my mother when I get back. Maybe she’s protecting someone.”

“Thank you. I hope you find your father.”

“I’m sure I will.” But he didn’t look sure. He looked very worried.

   It was one of those snows that had dedicated itself to a small geographical area. Before I reached Binghamton I was out of it, and although the sky never cleared, I made it home without trouble.