Waiting for Armando (Kate Lawrence Mysteries) (20 page)

I wasn’t sure myself what my reaction was. Margo’s eyebrows had climbed halfway up her forehead, and
Strutter’s
jaw was unattractively slack. I cleared my throat. “I see. And the other women from BGB who attend your classes?”

Esme
looked thoughtful, considering. “From time to time, Harold has invited colleagues from the firm, both men and women, to attend a reading. They most often seem to be members of his gardening club, although there have been others. I channel one evening each month, and anyone is welcome to attend.”
Welcome for a fee,
I amended silently and was startled when
Esme
added, “We charge a nominal fee to cover the costs of printing our brochures, maintaining our website and so on. From that introduction I have gained a number of students who study with me in small classes that I hold throughout the week right here in this room.”

Strutter
glanced around uncomfortably.

Margo spoke up. “These friends of Harold’s, ma’am. It’s quite a coincidence that two of them were also involved in relationships with Alain
Girouard
, don’t you think?” She smiled again to soften the sharpness of her question.

Esme
remained
unrattled
. “Coincidence? No. There are no coincidences, you know, just paths human beings are destined to travel that bring them together, if that helps them to learn the lessons they are meant to learn in this lifetime.”

“Ah,” said Margo, “lessons.”

Esme
looked amused. “Harold has always been an avid gardener,” she continued. “That’s one of the reasons he enjoys living here. He is the one responsible for my beautiful gardens, and he presides over an active horticultural society at the firm. As I have said, most of the people he brings here share that passion, with the notable exception of Alain
Girouard
.”

I was startled at the mention of Alain’s name and must have shown it.

“Oh, yes, Alain was one of my students years ago. He and Harold were students at Boston University. It was Alain who was largely responsible for Harold being hired by BGB.”

Esme
paused before continuing wryly, “Unfortunately, I soon realized that Alain’s interests lay more in the realm of the physical than the metaphysical.”

“I don’t understand,” I said, shaking my head in confusion.
Strutter
and Margo looked equally befuddled.

Esme
clarified her little joke. “I quickly realized that Alain used my sessions as a place to meet women. Many of them first come to me during a crisis in their lives and are extremely vulnerable to the attentions of an attractive, successful man, even one who is married. When I realized that he was here under false pretenses, I asked him to leave and not return.

“As for the two women you mentioned,” she smiled and shrugged, “Alain has had many lovers. It’s not really so surprising that among all those women, two of them should share other interests, is it?”

I looked at Margo, who lifted a shoulder and let it fall.
Strutter
turned her hands palm up in an I-don’t-know gesture.

“Well,” I said, “thank you so much for your straightforward answers. I’m sure the information you’ve given us will be very helpful.” I pulled a small notepad and pen from my purse and scribbled my name and cell phone number on a sheet of paper, which I handed to
Esme
. “If you have any other, uh, thoughts about this situation, I would very much appreciate hearing them. You can reach me at this number almost any time.” I got to my feet, and Margo and
Strutter
followed my lead.
Esme
ushered us into the living room.

“Would you care to see the gardens?” she asked. “Harold takes such pride in them, and they really are quite beautiful. I know he would be very disappointed to learn that you were here, and I failed to give you the tour.”

I looked at Margo with alarm. Of course,
Esme
would tell her tenant that we had been here and what we had asked her. Too late now. We might as well see everything
Esme
was willing to show us. “If you can spare us a few more minutes, we’d love to see the gardens, thank you,” I managed. We followed
Esme
through a typical suburban kitchen and out the back door onto an equally typical suburban patio furnished with comfortable-looking chairs and tables.

For perhaps ten minutes
Esme
ushered us along the perimeter of the gardens that bordered the large back yard. Some were heavily shaded by the same pines that cooled the room in which we had talked, and some enjoyed full sunlight. All were lush with plantings of a dizzying variety. The smaller plants were backed by shrubs of every size, shape and shade of green. Some bloomed with dazzling color. We
oohed
and
aahed
spontaneously at the beauty of the combined display until
Esme
began putting names to the plants we were admiring. Among the usual azaleas, rhododendrons and mountain laurel, she pointed out lily of the valley, jimsonweed, foxglove, oleander, and hemlock. We fell silent.

At the end of the border we hurriedly thanked our guide once again for her time and made our way down the driveway to the front of the house, where we had parked on the street in the welcome shade of one of the old oaks. I hadn’t put up the windows, so the car was relatively comfortable as we climbed in.

“I don’t know why I always have to sit in the back seat,”
Strutter
grumbled.

“Because riding in the back makes me sick,” Margo retorted. “Well, what do you make of that? We already knew that Karp and
Girouard
went to school together, but now we know that Karp apparently set
Girouard
up with a limitless supply of needy, vulnerable women, as well. Well, lord knows there are plenty of them around.” She buckled her seatbelt thoughtfully.

“I don’t know roses from ragweed,” said
Strutter
, “but weren’t some of those names
Esme
mentioned also on that toxicology report Diaz read off to you and Ingrid?”

My mind churned through the information
Esme
had provided. “Not just some of them, all of them. Our Harold has what amounts to a poison factory right there in his own back yard. Now what do you suppose he planned to do with all of those toxic little beauties?”

“You mean, besides distribute them for the beautification of BGB?”
Strutter
snorted. “It looks like Karp just moved up to the top of our suspect list, but how can we figure it out without making him more suspicious of us than he probably already is?”

“Karp is away for the weekend. We have to take advantage of this opportunity,” I said.

“An opportunity to do what, Sugar?” asked Margo.

“Search Karp’s office,” I said. “Find out whatever we can to try to make sense of his involvement in Alain’s murder.”

“How do you plan to get into his office?” Margo wanted to know. “He keeps it locked when he’s away.”

“Oh, I know where he keeps his spare keys,”
Strutter
said cheerfully. “I filled in for his secretary once. He keeps them on a bent paper clip and hangs the clip inside a mug filled with pens and pencils on the top of the file cabinet outside his office. Probably everybody in the office knows where he keeps them. It’s just that nobody ever cared before this.”

That settled, we continued on our way, crossing the Putnam Bridge in silence and proceeding across the Silas Deane Highway to Prospect Street. I stopped at a traffic light, prohibited from turning by a “No Turn on Red” sign. As so often happens, the driver behind me took exception to having to wait and honked his horn. When I didn’t move, he leaned on it angrily.

“Damn, that’s annoying!”
Strutter
slapped the seatback in exasperation and reached for the door handle. “I think it’s time Mr. Loves-His-Little-Horn and I had a conversation,” and before either Margo or I could react, she was out of the car.

Circling around to the driver’s window,
Strutter
tapped on the glass, smiling pleasantly at the heavily pierced Neanderthal behind the wheel of a Firebird. “Excuse me, sir,” she said loudly. “Excuse me!”

Too surprised to do otherwise, King Kong lowered his window.
Strutter
extended her hand and introduced herself.

“I couldn’t help but notice that you were honking repeatedly at my friend,” she said conversationally, waving at Margo, who
stared
, aghast, into the rearview mirror. “Perhaps you didn’t notice that sign there.”

Strutter
pointed to the “No Turn on Red” notice on a six-foot post at the corner. The traffic light changed from red to green, and the cars behind the Firebird started honking, which
Strutter
ignored.

“No turn on red,” she read aloud slowly and clearly, then smiled engagingly at the driver once again. “That means it’s illegal to make a right turn when the traffic light is red. So my friend didn’t turn, because that would have been breaking the law. You wouldn’t want us to do that, would you?”

At least six angry drivers leaned steadily on their horns, but
Strutter
appeared to be oblivious. Margo and I held our breath, sure that Pontiac Man would take a Saturday night special from beneath his seat and blow
Strutter’s
head off at any moment. The light changed back to red.

“
Aww
, c’mon, Lady, what is your problem?” yelled a driver in the stalled queue.

“
Uhhh
,” stammered the brute, clearly wanting only to escape. “Sure. I mean, no, I wouldn’t want you to do that.” He glanced frantically at his rearview mirror, then at the light, which would change to green any second, provoking a new cacophony of horns.

“Good! I knew you’d understand, if somebody just explained it to you,” said
Strutter
, straightening from her crouch beside the window and giving the Firebird’s door a satisfied pat. “Maybe next time, you’ll give it just another moment’s thought before you start honking at somebody. They just might have a very good reason for doing what they’re doing, you know?”

The light changed to green, and once more the chorus of horns rang out, this time accompanied by yelled curses and much arm waving from the vehicles behind.

“You have a lovely day now.” And ever so deliberately,
Strutter
walked her walk back to the Chrysler, opened the rear door, and slid into the passenger seat just as the traffic light turned amber.

“Hit it!” she hissed at me, and I obeyed, screeching through a hard right turn just before the signal again turned red, neatly trapping the Pontiac and its tail of steaming drivers once again.

We sailed through the next intersection and sped another half-mile before I loosened my death grip on the wheel and glared at
Strutter
in the mirror.

“You idiot!” I sputtered. “You could have gotten yourself killed. We might all have been hauled in …”

“And the cops might have decided to search us for drugs while they were questioning us,” Margo picked up the thread. “That would not have been good, Sugar. I keep a little weed in my purse for medicinal purposes, don’t you know.”

Strutter
remained impassive as we ranted, crossing those curvy legs and gazing out the window as if enjoying the view. Then she looked directly into my mirror and crossed her eyes. I couldn’t help it. I fell apart laughing.

“What’s she doing?” Margo demanded crossly, craning around to look. “Oh, for God’s sake! We’re planning a break-in, and you’re giving lessons in traffic etiquette to a three-hundred-pound goon,” she lectured
Strutter
, refusing to react to the crossed eyes.

Strutter
stuck out her tongue and slowly slid it up to touch the end of her own nose.

For a count of five, Margo maintained an impressive deadpan. Then she crossed her own eyes, stuck her front teeth out over her lower jaw, and did an outstanding imitation of a deranged beaver.
Strutter
broke up. Margo faced front, satisfied.