Catch As Cat Can

10

Why does everything happen to me?” Tally grumbled as she watched her guests struggle with the situation.

Then again, what does a hostess do when someone dies at her party? Dispose of the corpse after the festivities? Haul him out and dump him on the lawn so no one has to look at him? Comfort the family members? But years of cotillion plus years of running Crozet before stepping aside for her niece had given Tally a sure touch.

She listened as the ambulance wailed about a mile away. In the quiet of the country sounds carried.

“Ladies and gentlemen, if you would all repair to the garden, please.” She nodded to Ned Tucker, who shepherded them out the opened French doors. Then she walked over to Sean, leaning against the chair in which Roger had been sitting before Little Mim yanked him off of it. Sean's mouth hung slack. “Sean, come over here and sit with me.” The nonagenarian led the tall, lean man into the formal living room. Big Mim helped her as they gently sat him on the peach-colored satin Hepplewhite sofa.

“Aunt Tally, I'll get the door.”

“Thank you, dear.”

But Cynthia Cooper reached it first, opening it for Diana Robb and her Crozet Rescue Squad assistants, Dick and Susan Montjoy. Big Mim joined them as they walked over to the body.

Diana said under her breath to Cynthia and Big Mim, “I knew the coke would kill him sooner or later.”

“I had no idea,” Big Mim whispered, surprised since she thought she knew everything about everybody.

Cooper shrugged. “People use the better part of their intelligence hiding their habits. I see it every day.”

“Yes, I guess you do,” a troubled Mim replied. “Sean's in a state of shock. I wonder if he knew.”

As Diana and Dick carefully lifted Roger into the body bag and then onto the gurney, Big Mim quietly walked into the formal room.

“Sean.” Aunt Tally patted his hand. “Sean, honey, they're taking Roger away.”

Big Mim leaned over. “I know this is difficult. Is there a funeral home you—”

He jerked his head up. “Hill and Woods.”

“Yes. I'll go tell them.” She paused a moment longer. “For the sake of your health, Sean, you might want to request an autopsy.”

He dropped his head into his hands. “No. I don't want anyone cutting my brother.”

Tally and Big Mim exchanged glances and then Big Mim returned to Diana Robb and the Montjoys. “Hill and Woods. Tell them Sean's in no condition to make decisions at this moment.”

“Okay.” Diana rolled out the gurney as Susan opened the door.

When the door shut, Big Mim folded her hands together, her seven-carat emerald ring shining like green fire. “I wish he'd order an autopsy. When young people die like that you want to know. It could run in the family.”

“Yes, but when young people do drugs, especially cocaine, it wreaks havoc on the body,” Cooper said.

“The only thing I ever saw Roger do was drink beer and bourbon, a bit too much of it.” The older, perfectly groomed woman stared out the front window, watching as Diana shut the ambulance door.

“That's just it. You don't see people do these things. Albemarle County is a wealthy, wealthy county, Mrs. Sanburne. You can buy anything here and there's a group that does drugs. They know one another and they protect one another,” the deputy whispered.

“But surely we'd have some sign, Cynthia. A deterioration of behavior. A sudden drop in weight or the reverse. He seemed so normal. Not the most brilliant man but well—normal.”

“He was.” She sighed. “Now, I can't prove he took cocaine, but we have Diana's word on it and she's rarely wrong.” She thought a moment. “Some people can take a line or two of cocaine and enjoy it just like some people can take a drink or two. One of the reasons the anti-drug campaign doesn't work is it really doesn't tell people the truth. It just demonizes drugs instead of explaining that different people have different chemistries. One person can drink and not become an alcoholic and another is lost with one drink. There's so much we don't know and it would appear we don't want to know.”

“Are you condoning drugs?” Mim was incredulous.

“No. But aren't we hypocritical? One drug, alcohol, is legal. Either legalize them all or ban them all. That's how I see it, and it would make my job a great deal easier.”

“I'll have to think about that. In the meantime I'd better find someone to take Sean home. And I'd better release the guests from the garden. This will put a crimp in my dance tonight.” She said this without rancor but more in the spirit of how life throws curveballs to everyone from time to time.

“I'll tote Sean home,” Cynthia offered.

“Thank you.”

As Big Mim headed for the garden, Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, and Tucker emerged, breaking their silence.

Pewter crossly complained, “You didn't wake me up in time. Lottie Pearson's shrieking woke me up. You saw the whole thing!” Mrs. Murphy had told her what happened.

Mrs. Murphy padded over, not focusing on the spilt raw sugar, a small amount, that had fallen into the cracks on the floor. “How was I to know he'd just died? I didn't know until he flopped on the floor. As it was I did come get you two.”

Tucker blinked. “He just keeled over?”

“Here today, gone tomorrow.” Pewter giggled.

“Diana thinks the cocaine did him in. Humans lower their voices but it's so easy for us to hear.” Mrs. Murphy ignored Pewter's merriment. “I never smelled cocaine on Roger, though.”

“Easy to determine. Bitter. They sweat it out.” Tucker wrinkled her nose.

“Pope Rat would know.” Pewter mentioned the rat in Roger's shop. “He lived with Roger . . . not that Roger knew.”

“It really doesn't matter.” Tucker watched Sean being helped to his feet by Fair Haristeen and Reverend Jones. “He's done for and that's the end of it.”

But it wasn't, of course.