Bowled Over

Chapter Twenty-Four

Saint Just opened the car door and slid onto the front seat, feeling very much the conspirator. "She wants to talk to you," he said without preamble as he reached over to turn up the heat, as he'd been standing at the windy corner for more than ten minutes, and had begun to feel the chill. "Now."

"Who wants to talk to me now? Lisa? Lisa wants to talk to me?" Maggie's eyes were wide. "She hates me. She never talked to me in school. She didn't even know who I was until the day I unstuffed her, for crying out loud. Why on earth would she want to talk to me?"

"She didn't confide that information to me, but I think you should see her, Maggie. She's one of the ghosts from your past, isn't she?"

"Ghosts? Like I'm haunted or something? Don't go all Doctor Bob on me now, Alex."

"Lisa Butts is a very unhappy woman, Maggie. And, I believe, a considerably frightened woman."

"Lisa? She ruled the world, Alex. Well, our world."

"Time moves on, and the world changes. When I first arrived, introduced myself, she seemed wary, unwilling to talk. But I'd had the happy coincidence of arriving in the midst of a small meeting for refreshments—Lisa called it a coffee klatch? At any event, two of the women there were on our list of W.B.B. members, although the third was not. Still, the topic of conversation was, as one would expect, the murder of Walter Bodkin."

"Hold it. Back up a minute, okay? How did you introduce yourself? You never told me how you were going to get through the door."

Saint Just smiled. "Why sweetings, I took a page from our books, you might say. I told them I was an author friend of yours in town with you for the holidays, and planning on writing a recap of the murder for my next true crime anthology."

"You're kidding. You have got to be kidding. You and Henry, both using variations on a theme? And they swallowed that?"

"I have no idea if any of them even know the definition of anthology. I have found, much as you dislike hearing such things, that once I've bowed over a woman's hand and complimented her eyes, there is nothing all that difficult about having myself invited in from the cold for tea and biscuits."

"It's a damn good thing you're no Ted Bundy."

"And now I have no idea what you mean. However, if I might return to what I've learned?"

"My irresistible perfect hero. I should give you a wart on the end of your nose in your next book, and maybe it will show up on your face here and—no, forget that. That would mean I'd have to look at the wart, wouldn't I? I'm not a masochist. Who were the other two women?"

"Jeanette Bradley and Brenda Kelso. As I said, both on the list of W.B.B. members. Not that anyone volunteered that particular snippet of information. They both seem fairly innocuous women with uninspiring husbands, and I believe we can cross them off our list. In any event, we chatted about the murder for some minutes, Mrs. Butts lending very little to the conversation, as she seemed fully occupied in shredding her paper napkin and keeping her eyes downcast. It was only when the others left that she asked about you, asked me to bring you to her."

"And you said yes," Maggie said on a sigh. "Why? Do you think she knows something? Because of the way she was acting?"

"I do, yes. I know the good Left –tenant Wendell would remind me that feelings are not evidence, but as Steve is not here with us, I think we can go with my powers of observation and the conclusions I draw from those observations. At least for the nonce. Now, are you willing to face your ghost?"

"I really wish you'd stop saying that," Maggie told him as she put the car in gear and executed a very neat U-turn, heading back down Second Street to the gray two-story house sadly in need of fresh paint. "And, before we go in, I've got some information for you. Well, not exactly information, but something Carol said started me thinking that maybe we've missed something."

"Indeed," Saint Just said, looking at her in some interest. "How depressing to believe we are not infallible."

"I'm not writing this story, Alex, so get used to it—it's not like we're following some outline I've already gotten the bugs out of, plugged up all the plot flaws so you can look good."

"Ah, then it's not me that's no longer infallible, but you. Just so that we're clear on that."

"Bite me," Maggie said, turning off the car's motor. "Carol said, wondered, who Dad's enemy is. Not Bodkin's enemy—Dad's."

Saint Just reached inside his topcoat and extracted the grosgrain ribbon that held his quizzing glass, began swinging it idly back-and-forth at chest level as he considered Carol's question from every angle he could muster. "Hmm, an interesting twist on the thing, isn't it?"

"Right," Maggie said, unbuckling her seat belt and turning toward him on the seat. "The murderer could have set up anybody, well, nearly anybody, if we stick to our theory that the killer is married or was married to a W.B.B. member. Or he—the murderer—could have just bopped Bodkin with a hammer or a tree branch, or any number of weapons, and not tried to frame Daddy or anyone else at all. Right? But he didn't. He went out of his way to break into Dad's car, steal his bowling ball, use it as the murder weapon. So why, Alex? Why did the murderer do that? And why Dad, just about the last person in the world anyone would think capable of murder?"

Saint Just lifted the quizzing glass and began tapping its edge against his chin, cudgeling his brains for an answer to that question as he looked toward the vast ocean, the water gray and cold with winter. "We had thought it could be because of that contretemps your father and Bodkin partook of in the parking lot outside of the bowling establishment a few weeks ago. There were witnesses, correct?"

"Yeah, I thought about that one. And I ran into Henry—not literally, not this time—and he talked to Mae Petersen this morning, and he said that what she told him about was seeing the fight. There probably isn't anyone in town who doesn't know about the fight."

"If I were to murder someone," Saint Just said, still tapping the quizzing glass against his chin, stopping only when he realized what he was doing, and how Maggie had written that affectation into their books, "I might consider it prudent to find a way to cast suspicion on someone else and away from me. Prudent, and plausible. Indeed, I might even first discover that idea after observing the man I wanted dead and another man rolling about a parking lot, beating on each other for all to see. But that would only be a theory, one not easy to prove."

"So you think Dad didn't have any enemy, that Bodkin's murder wasn't a two-for-one shot—kill one, convict the other and send him up the river and, bam, two enemies gone with one blow? I'm finding that scenario pretty hard to believe, myself. So, bottom line here, you think that the fight with Bodkin just gave the murderer the idea to try to pin the blame on Daddy?"

Saint Just considered this for a full minute. "Yes, the latter theory seems more logical," he said at last.

"But you aren't buying it, are you? Not one hundred percent."

"No, I don't think I am. At least not completely. The more I learn, the more I realize—we realize—that the late Walter Bodkin's amorous adventures may have been the worst-kept secret in this relatively speaking small town. There was no real reason to go to the trouble to select your father from so many possible suspects, so many cuckolded husbands. Indeed, if the police would only let go their grip on their conviction that your father is their slam dunk, they would probably have at least two-score names to put on their suspects list."

Maggie sank back against the seat. "So Daddy does have an enemy. That's what you're saying, isn't it?"

"I'm saying, Maggie, that we cannot discount the notion that your father could have been the real target, and Bodkin tossed in as the victim as a sort of two-for-the-price-of-one, thus getting rid of the local lothario at the same time. Even if I can think of only one other person of my acquaintances I would consider less likely to ever cultivate an enemy than your father."

"Sterling," Maggie said, smiling slightly. "You know, I think I must have unconsciously patterned Sterling a little on my dad. Minus the being browbeaten, I mean."

"I would say that we should curtail their excursions about town, except that as long as your father remains the primary suspect, he's probably safe. If the charges against him were to be dropped, however, and he truly does have an enemy who is also already a murderer, we'll have to rethink the situation. In the meantime, I believe we've kept Mrs. Butts waiting long enough."

"Oh, right," Maggie said, reaching over to pull down the sun visor in front of Saint Just and checking her makeup, pushing at her hair. "How do I look?"

"No longer seventeen and vulnerable," Saint Just told her, taking her chin in his hand. "But let's do something about that mouth, shall we?"

Maggie tried to look in the mirror again, even as he held her chin steady. "My mouth? What's wrong with my mouth?"

"I don't think it has been kissed in at least two hours," Saint Just said as he leaned closer, took her mouth with his own. He sucked lightly on her bottom lip, then slanted his mouth as he ran his tongue around the sensitive skin behind her upper lip, smiling against her as she moaned low in her throat and pulled him even closer.

When he moved away from her, it was to see her with her eyes still closed, her mouth soft, moist, and faintly bee-stung. "There. Perfect."

Maggie opened her eyes. "Well, that was interesting," she said, and then sighed.

"Hmm, yes, although you might wish to explain why you taste, delightfully, of sugar," Saint Just told her, taking his handkerchief from his pocket and brushing at the bits of white powder and small particles of sugar littering the front of her coat. "And then tell me why you seem to be decorated with it as well."

"Henry. He gave me donuts when I saw him. I didn't want them, but he forced them on me."

"Held you down and shoved them into your mouth, did he? The unmitigated cad! Do you think I should call him out? Go-carts at ten paces?"

"Aren't you a riot? I'm hunting a killer with a guy auditioning to be a stand-up comic." Maggie pushed his hand away and opened the car door. "We're keeping Lisa waiting, remember?"

Saint Just smiled as he walked around the car to extract the walker from the backseat, and then bowed slightly as he unfolded it and presented it to Maggie, who seemed to feel it was time she checked to be sure that the bicycle horn Bernie had given her still worked.

Oooga-oooga.

"Move it, Romeo. I want to get this over with and get home to Dad, ask him a few more questions."

"Such as?" Saint Just asked her as he followed her up the short brick walkway to the Buttses' domicile.

"I don't know yet. But I'll think of something. In fact, maybe we should take Dad over to Mom's, and sit them both down, ask them both some questions."

"Put them together in the same room? My, aren't you the brave one today. Or is what I'm seeing an example of what I've heard termed a sugar high?"

"You're like a dog with a bone, aren't you, Alex? Yes, I ate two donuts. No, I'm not sorry. Yes, I know I told you I'm still trying to lose those last three pounds I gained when I quit smoking. Okay, four pounds." She stood back as he reached past her to bang the knocker three times, smiling down at her as he did so. "All right, all right, five pounds. I still have to lose five pounds. Happy now?"

"I don't recall ever putting forth the notion that I am unhappy, sweetings. You're soft to the touch, and I like that." He leaned closer, his mouth a mere inch from hers. "I like that very much."

The door opened just as Maggie's lips parted slightly.

"Alex, you're—oh. Maggie? Maggie Kelly? Wow, you've really changed, haven't you?"

Maggie had pulled herself erect on the walker and was now smiling at Lisa Butts. "Well, I got my hair cut, put in a few highlights, you know, and—um ... you haven't changed a bit, Lisa," she said, her smile so bright Saint Just knew that the poor girl was positively cringing inside at what had to be a blatant lie.

After all, Saint Just considered himself to be a connoisseur of the feminine sex, and if Maggie and Lisa Butts were of nearly the same age, had graduated high school in the same year, then something had gone wonderfully right in Maggie's life in the intervening years, while something had gone depressingly wrong in the life of the former chief cheerleader.

Lisa Butts had lines around her eyes, lines that only seemed to accentuate the dark circles beneath those eyes. Her lips, although wide and full, pulled down at the corners, as if they had forgotten how to smile. Her brown hair hung rather limply to just above her shoulders, her body was clothed in a too-large gray sweatshirt and black knit pants that bagged badly at the knees. Her bare feet were pushed into frayed satin slippers that may once, long ago, have been white.

It did not, as Maggie would have said, take a rocket scientist to determine that the years had not been kind to Lisa Meadwick Butts.

The photograph he had seen on the fireplace mantel during his first visit to the house, that of a much younger, immeasurably happier Lisa Butts executing a truly impressive leap into the air while thrusting her arms and some large pom-pom type things high in the air, could also be considered a clue to Lisa's unhappy state.

But Saint Just preferred to think he would have known all of this without also seeing the photograph.

"You want to come in?" Lisa asked, turning away from the door she left open behind her. "I've got fresh coffee on. Just go in there, to the living room, and I'll bring it right in, okay? How'd you break your ankle, Maggie?"

"Foot," Maggie called after her as she maneuvered the walker toward the living room. "I fell out of a tree in Yosemite National Park while photographing a white-breasted nuthatch and ..." she turned on Saint Just as Lisa disappeared down the hallway, whispering, "Holy cripes, Alex. What happened to her?"

"Life happens to people, sweetings. And life, I would deduce, has not been kind to Lisa Butts."

Maggie turned the walker and backed up until her calves were against an overstuffed chair covered in an unfortunate choice of imitation orange leather, and then sat down with a thump, sinking even lower as the sound of air being hissed out of the cushion was the only sound in the small room. "But she was head cheerleader. She married the captain of the football team. She had a charmed life ..."

"Here we go," Lisa said, reentering the room, this time carrying a tarnished silver tray holding the glass pot from a coffeemaker and three thick earthenware mugs. "I hope you take it black, Maggie. I'm out of milk and I can't go to the store until Barry—well, I can't go until later."

Saint Just neatly divested her of the tray and placed it on the table in front of the couch as Lisa smiled up at him, blushing, and sat down.

"Thank you, Alex," she said, resting her elbows on her knees as she leaned forward, spoke to Maggie. "I can't tell you how sorry I was to hear about your father. But I'm sure he's innocent. I heard you hired some hotshot woman lawyer. She'll get him off, won't she? Because I'm sure he didn't—well, I suppose you're sure, too, huh?"

"Thanks, Lisa," Maggie said, pouring herself a cup of coffee, and then lifting the pot and looking at Saint Just, who shook his head, declining her offer to pour a cup for him as well. "I think you're the first person we've talked to who believes Daddy didn't do it."

"I am?" She sat back quickly, almost as if she'd been slapped. Or said too much? If so, she wasn't done speaking. "Maybe that's because I remember your father from the Laundromat where I work on weekends. It's right next to Barry's shop, so it works out fine for us. He's so sweet, your dad, coming in with his laundry the last two months or so. He had absolutely no idea how to work the washers. In fact, he tried to put his clothes in one of the extractors we use for the really big loads, if you can believe that. Thought it was a washing machine. Anyway, I'm sure the police will realize they made a mistake and let Evan go."

Lisa had just called him Evan? Maggie blinked. A woman her own age had just referred to her father as Evan, not Mr. Kelly? Said it just as though they were friends? Wow.

"He's not in jail, Lisa," Maggie corrected. "He's free on bail."

"Oh. Well, good. That's good, isn't it? He's out on bail, and soon they'll drop the charges. They have to."

"Again, thank you, that's really sweet of you. Lisa—what the hell happened?"

Saint Just shot a look at Maggie, gave her a slight, warning shake of the head, not that he expected Maggie to be anything more than Maggie—inquisitive, caring, and sadly lacking in finesse.

Lisa laughed, but it wasn't a happy sound. "You always said what was on your mind, didn't you, Maggie? What the hell happened? I don't know. But it sure did happen, didn't it? To both of us. I'm the dreary housewife, and you're the famous author. I always envied you, you know, back in high school."

"Me?" Maggie said, sipping her coffee. "I didn't think you even knew who I was. Well, not until the day that I—that was stupid of me, Lisa. Juvenile. I'm sorry I did it."

"I wasn't. I stayed out of a lot of backseats in those days, so that no guy would find out what I was doing. The stuffing, you know? False advertising? Oh, sure, some kids laughed at me when they found out, but that didn't last long. I was the head cheerleader, lead choir soloist, vice president of the senior class, and all sorts of other stuff, after all. And, hey," she said, shrugging, "I finally made it to the backseat and let a guy get to second base, found out what I'd been missing—sorry, Alex. Are we embarrassing you?"

"The word mortified comes to mind, yes," he told her with a smile. "But carry on, please. I am nothing if not adaptable, and I understand the modern American woman is often frank in discussions of such things."

"And he watches television, Lisa," Maggie said, holding her cup to her lips. "Even cable movies. Don't you, Alex?"

"Yes, thank you for sharing that, Maggie," Saint Just said, taking up his place at the mantel, lifting down the photograph of a large and smiling and happily filthy young man dressed in a football uniform, the number five on the muddied jersey, his helmet tucked under his forearm. "I noticed this photograph beside yours, earlier. And this would be Mr. Butts? Mr. Barry Butts?"

"Yeah, that's Barry, right after we won the state title our senior year. That was his big moment. The high point of his life."

Saint Just replaced the photograph. "Surely not," he said, looking at Lisa. "After all, his wedding day must have ranked much higher."

"See any pictures of the happy couple sitting around in here, Alex?" Lisa said, her voice bitter. "I know I don't."

Maggie and Saint Just exchanged looks, and he could see the pain in her eyes. This time he didn't bother to try to warn her off as, still looking at him, she asked Lisa, "When did you and Barry get married, anyway? I guess I'd already left for the city, huh?"

"Yes, you left town. You left, and you didn't come back, did you? That's why I envy you, Maggie. You did it. You got out. You had a dream, to be a writer, and you went after it. That's the one thing I could never do—write. Sing, dance, yell loud, but not write. Not the way you did, for the high school newspaper and yearbook. You were really good."

"I ... um, well, I—you had a dream, Lisa?"

Lisa pushed her hair out of her eyes, smiled. "Sure, didn't all of us have dreams? I was going to be on Broadway. Singing, dancing. But Barry came first, you know? Just like Brenda's Frankie came first, and Jeanette's Bruce came first, and—marriage seemed so much ... so much safer, you know? Easier?"

Saint Just stepped away from the mantel. "And is it, Lisa?" he asked her. "Easier, that is."