Poisoned Pins

6

“Debbie Anne,” I said, clutching the edge of the counter to prevent myself from toppling off the stool to shatter like a cheap vase, “where are you?”

“I can’t tell you. I was just calling to ask you to let my mama know I’m all right. They might have her line tapped so they can trace calls. It’s long-distance, but I swear I’ll pay you back when all this is oven Every last penny of it.”

“I’ll make the call for you, but you must tell me where you are, Debbie Anne, so that I can come pick you up. You’re in trouble, and hiding out is not going to help the situation.”

“Golly, Mrs. Malloy, you think I don’t know I’m in trouble? I should have stayed home and maybe gone to the junior college like my friends, but my mama insisted I go to school in Farberville, and look where it’s got me!”

“Where?” I said cleverly.

“In a passel of trouble, that’s where. Please won’t you call my mama for me? If the police call her first, she’ll most likely have a heart attack right there in the middle of the kitchen.” She rattled off a telephone number, waited until I regained a semblance of consciousness and found a pencil, repeated it, and added, “Don’t worry about me, Mrs. Malloy. She’ll never find me, and even if she figures it out, she’ll be too scared to come here. Once she’s been arrested, I’ll come right to your store and pay you back for the call.”

“Who is this ‘she’ you keep mentioning, Debbie Anne?”

“I’d like to tell you, but I promised I wouldn’t. If I did, I’d be in worse trouble than I already am. Why, they could arrest me, you know, and lock me up tighter’n bark on a tree-especially if she lies about it and they believe her. In the end everybody’ll know it was her idea, but I don’t aim to sit in jail until she admits it.”

I closed my eyes and sought inspiration, but nothing was forthcoming (except an embryonic headache). However, I was a wily and well-seasoned inquisitor, and she was but a freshman in more ways than one. I took a wild guess. “I don’t think Winkle would want to see you in jail. She’ll admit it.”

“Huh? I’m talking about Jean Hall, Mrs. Malloy. Somebody just drove up, so I’ve got to go. Have a nice day.”

After I’d grown bored listening to the dial tone, I replaced the receiver and tried to make sense of the conversation. Unless Debbie Anne was terrified by the possibility of being haunted by a diaphanous, chain-rattling law student, she wasn’t aware that Jean was dead. On the contrary, she was worried about being locked up “tighter’n bark on a tree” (the quaint phrase did not refer, presumably, to a birch tree) because of something Jean might accuse her of doing, or of having done, or of planning to do in the future. Whatever it was would result in incarceration until Jean admitted her guilt, at which time Debbie Anne would be vindicated.

I knew Debbie Anne’s parents had been contacted by the police, but I’d promised to call them and I was a bit curious about their reaction. No one answered, nor did a mechanized voice suggest I leave a message at the sound of the beep. Resolving to remember to try later, I tucked the piece of paper with the number into my pocket.

The police were not usually brought in on cases in which the perpetrator shared the secret whistle with someone outside the sisterhood. Surely Debbie Anne knew that, I told myself as I dialed Peters office number. He was out, I was informed by a woman with a chilly voice, who subsequently declined to share the details of his destination or his estimated time of return. I left a message for him to call, waited the rest of the afternoon for him to do so, periodically tried Debbie Anne’s home number with no success, and locked the store at seven.

I hesitated under the portico that had once protected ladies with bustles from rain when they’d debarked from the train and waited for their carriages. These days the ladies tended to wear jeans and T-shirts, and rarely bustled. Nor, frankly, did I, even during prosperous times when I could afford such behavior

The beer garden was too rowdy for my taste on Saturday evenings, and my apartment was apt to be occupied by a teenaged tragedienne who’d had all afternoon to drape the living room in black crepe and polish her performance for the final act. Unwilling to be subjected to it, I walked up the hill to Luanne’s store to see if I could interest her in fajitas, cheese dip, and speculation.

The “closed” sign hung on the inside of the door, and the windows of her apartment above the store were dark. I couldn’t remember if Luanne had mentioned plans for the evening, but it didn’t much matter As I stood on the sidewalk, hands on my hips, frowning at my undeniably comely reflection while I debated what to do, I felt a twinge of sympathy for Debbie Anne Wray. How many nights had she been in the mood for food and chatter, only to be rebuffed by her so-called sisters? She had no place else to go, no one else on whom to rely.

I had my apartment, but I would be forced to listen to Caron’s insufferable whines. The Book Depot was bleak and inhospitable after dark, inclined to creak as if trains of bygone days were racing by to the next abandoned station. If Peter were home, we could cuddle on the sofa and watch inane movies, but he might be occupied until all hours. It occurred to me that I’d insulated myself too well, and my insistence on self-reliance would reduce me to a half order of fajitas.

“Ho, Mrs. Malloy,” called a familiar voice as a bicycle sailed down the sidewalk on what I felt was a collision course.

I shrank into the doorway and fluttered my fingers at my science fiction hippie. In honor of the weekend, he’d combed the crumbs out of his wispy beard and tied his ponytail with a relatively clean shoelace. His blue workshirt was unsoiled, if also unironed. He braked in front of me and put a foot down to steady himself.

“You ever find that copy of Bimbos?” he asked. Behind the smudged lenses of his glasses, his eyes sparkled, either from friendliness or from the recent inhalation of an illicit substance.

“No, but I ordered one for you, and it should be here next week. Would you like to join me for fajitas and beer? My treat, naturally.”

“Is this like a date?”

“This is like a dinner” I said firmly, although inwardly

I was quivering like an adolescent at a junior high dance.

I was on the verge of withdrawing my offer and scurrying away when he nodded, and shortly thereafter I was perched on the back of his bike and we were zooming down the sidewalk.

Several hours later I emerged from the restaurant, satiated not only with food and beer but also with a heady conversation about the manuscript he was writing, well over a thousand pages already and still in the germinal stages of its plot. It was an alternative history that concerned the impact on our modern culture had Napoleon refused to us (as in U.S.) the eight-hundred-odd-thousand square miles known as the Louisiana Territory.

I was pondering the convolutions of Nebras qué as I approached the Kappa Theta Eta house. It looked innocent, as if the tragedy of the previous evening had never taken place. Lights were on in the front room, and in Winkie’s suite. With Debbie Anne still in hiding, only three occupants were left: Winkie, Pippa, and Rebecca. Pippa was threatening to leave for the summer, which meant Eleanor Vanderson might decide to close the house. For her, a coup d’autorité, for me, a coup d’éclat.

I may have been smiling complacently when I saw a tiny light in a third-floor window. It blinked out, but after a moment, it appeared in another window, illuminating a construction-paper cat on the wall for a brief moment, and then again blinked out. I tried to convince myself I’d had one fajita too many, but when I spotted the light in yet a third room, I dismissed the heresy.

Someone was prowling on the third floor, moving through the rooms at the front of the house, apparently unimpeded by locks. And doing so stealthily, in that a person with a legitimate presence would find it more expedient to switch on the ceiling light fixture rather than risk stubbed toes and bruised shins.

I had no idea what to do. I was barely able to prevent myself from clasping my hands together and fluttering my eyelashes in the timeless tradition of gothic heroines. I had options, but racing upstairs to confront the prowler was not high on the list. There were three people living in the house; one of them might have been doing some sort of ritualistic room check, as required by National. Or Debbie Anne might have been hiding up there since the previous night, I told myself slowly. The police had been told no one currently lived on the second or third floor, and therefore might have searched in a perfunctory manner, ascertaining only that lights were off and doors were locked. If she’d hidden until they left, she could be staying in her old bedroom and using the communal pay telephone in the hall. And creeping from room to room in search of clean towels or pink paper cats.

As I congratulated myself on the theory, a face appeared in a window. It was not Debbie Anne Wray, unless she’d shaved her head and put wadded cotton in her cheeks. I wasn’t completely sure, but the man bore a remarkable resemblance to the one who’d driven up to the house the previous evening, parked for a minute, and left. He jerked away from the window so abruptly that I assumed he’d seen me staring at him from the sidewalk.

I forced myself to shrug and stroll toward my apartment, seemingly unconcerned by his presence on the third floor I was unable to whistle, but I made every effort to look as if I might at any moment. Only when I was in the foyer of my duplex did I go storming up the stairs, gasping in a most unattractive fashion. I pounded on the front door and yelled, “Caron! It’s an emergency! Hurry up!”

I’d dumped the contents of my purse on the floor and was pawing through the litter for my key when the door opened. “Mother,” Caron said, her lip curled in distaste, “what on earth are you doing?”

I told her to pick up everything, hurried around her, and dialed the fateful three-digit number “There’s a prowler in the Kappa Theta Eta house!” I said. “It’s on Campus Boulevard near the corner of-”

“You’ll have to call campus security, ma’am. It’s in their jurisdiction.”

“I don’t have time to-” I stopped, lowered my brow, and growled, “Give me the number.”

After I’d reported the problem to the campus police, I banged down the receiver and nearly knocked Caron down on my way to my bedroom window, where I did my best to watch the front and side yards for any sign of the prowler

“Are you having a hot flash?” Caron asked from the doorway. “Most women don’t have them until after the age of fifty, but it’s not totally unheard of in medical circles. You can look forward to osteoporosis, urinary incontinence, and my favorite, genital atrophy.”

“Will you shut up!” I said without turning.

“Irritability is another symptom, you know. Watch out if the doctor puts you on a combination of estrogen and androgen. You may feel great, but side effects include hirsutism and acne. You might turn into a spotty troglodyte.”

This time I tried a bit more vigorously to knock her down as I went past her, through the living room, and downstairs to my porch to await the campus police. My two old chums pulled up within minutes, and I trotted across the yard and caught up with them as they headed for the Kappa house.

“Another prowler, Mrs. Malloy?” said Officer Terrance. “I saw a man in that room.” I pointed at the pertinent window, which was black and blank, and then explained the progression of the flashlight and tried to describe the face I’d seen in the window. All I could do was hope it sounded less preposterous to them than it did to me.

He and Officer Michaels exchanged skeptical looks, but continued across the porch to the door. I followed them, praying that the delay hadn’t resulted in mass murder in the lounge, and was relieved when Winkie opened the door with a puzzled frown rather than a bloody gurgle.

“Your neighbor here reported another prowler,” said Terrance. “This time, according to her, he’s up on the third floor, carrying a flashlight and-”

“Men are not allowed on the third floor,” Winkie said automatically, then put her hand to her mouth and stepped back. “Don’t just stand there-go find him and bring him down here!”

She looked so small and frightened that I edged past the policemen and put my arm around her “You need to give them the keys to all the bedrooms and storage rooms, Winkie,” I said. “Until we’re sure he’s not hiding up there, you’re not safe. Where are the girls?”

“They went out together to see a movie.” She glanced at the dark staircase. “How could someone be up there? I made quite sure the back door was locked, and I’ve had my door open all evening, waiting for Pippa and Rebecca to return just to reassure myself that they were safe. No one came through the front door”

“The keys, ma’am?” Terrence said impatiently.

“Yes, of course, but I’ll have to accompany you. Even with no girls in residence, I cannot…“ She went into her suite and returned with the key ring. The keys clinked and her voice was thin and uneven as she said, ‘Well, then, shall we go upstairs, gentlemen?”

I trailed along, telling myself I was doing so to give moral support to Winkie. She switched on the lights as we came to the third-floor hall, then began unlocking doors and waiting as the officers searched each room. The storerooms that were used for luggage were empty, as were the pink-tiled bathrooms and the shower stalls. The bedrooms were incredibly small, some jammed with as many as three or four bunk beds, all with built-in furniture, well-worn textbooks, electronics equipment, oddments that had been overlooked during frenzied departures, a plethora of construction-paper cats, and the aura of a shabby hotel that had seen way too many better days.

After the final room had been searched, we repeated the process on the second floor, found nothing more intriguing than a solitary mouse, and returned to the first floor.

“We’d better check the basement,” I said.

Winkie stiffened. “This is the door that leads to the basement,” she said as she gestured at a door that had been painted pink and was almost invisible. “There is only one key, and it is in my possession at all times. Furthermore, I have a clear view of the door from the rocking chair in my living room. I promise you that no one can go down there without my knowledge.”

Officer Terrance glanced at me, then said, “If there was a prowler, he’s gone now. Everything’s okay, but I would like to say it’s not wise to allow the girls to leave things in their rooms all summer You’re asking for trouble.”

“Normally, we don’t allow it, but since the house is occupied this summer, I didn’t insist they remove all their belongings. I didn’t realize how many of the girls have computers these days. When I was in school, we shared a portable typewriter”

“We’ve had a lot of thefts on the campus this month,” he said. “Not just in the dorms and houses, but in the departments, classrooms, maintenance sheds, you name it.”

“Better get your exterior locks re-keyed,” added Michaels.

“I did exactly that three days ago, after Debbie Anne and our house corps president were attacked outside the house. There’s no way this man could have a key unless..

“Unless he has Debbie Anne’s,” I finished for her

“Oh, my goodness,” she gasped. “Then we’re not safe here! This man could murder us in our beds! My God, Claire, I’m responsible for the welfare of the girls.”

The look they exchanged this time was weary, leaving me to be skeptical as Terrance said, “We’ll patrol the house every hour If there was a man on the third floor, he knows he was seen and he’s long gone. Besides, you have Ms. Malloy here to keep a surveillance on your house, night and day.”

They left, but Winkie seemed so distraught that I offered to stay with her until Pippa and Rebecca returned. I was leery of accepting her invitation for tea in her suite, but she assured me that Katie was curled up on her little bed. I called my apartment to let Caron know what I was doing, but the line was busy and I doubted she’d be overcome with worry about someone who insisted on wearing an inappropriate palette.

“Debbie Anne called me early this afternoon,” I said when we were settled with tea in her suite. “She wanted me to call her mother”

“She called you? Are you and her mother acquainted in some way?”

“Debbie Anne’s afraid her mother’s telephone line has been tapped by the authorities and they could trace her call.”

‘Where is she?”

“She wouldn’t tell me. The odd thing is that she spoke as if she were unaware of Jean’s death.” I could have added more, but I wanted to assess Winkie’s reaction to each tidbit.

“But how could she not be? It was her car, and she must have been driving. Rebecca borrows Pippa’s car on occasion, and I’ve let Jean use mine when hers was in the shop, but I can hardly imagine anyone wanting to borrow Debbie Anne’s old clunker. Last fall some of the girls signed a petition to forbid her from parking it in front of the house. They felt that it made the house look disreputable, as if we were on the verge of putting rusty pickup trucks on concrete blocks, scattering broken appliances in the yard, and raising farm animals. Even though I ordered them to forget such foolish snobbery, Debbie Anne cried for days.”

“Unless she’s a skillful actress, she doesn’t know what happened,” I said. “When I first saw the flashlight on the third floor, I wondered if she was hiding up there. But it was a man, the same one who parked briefly in front of the house last night while the police were here. He’s short and plump, with a round white face and a basically bald head. Does he sound like anyone you know?”

“And he was on the third floor tonight?” Without waiting for an answer Winkie went into her kitchen, opened and closed the refrigerator, and returned with the decanter and two wineglasses. “This has been too much- all the excitement, the police, the ambulance, prowlers in every nook and cranny. Will you join me?”

“Yes, thank you,” I said as I watched her slosh wine into the glasses. She’d withdrawn her emotions and was the epitome of indecipherable blandness, but it was clear she had a good idea of the identity of the man I’d described. And wasn’t going to tell me. “Even if this mysterious man”-I gave the phrase a bit of emphasis-”had access to Debbie Anne’s house key, he couldn’t have used it to open bedroom doors, could he? They’re all keyed differently.”

She handed me a glass and sat down in the rocking chair “Yes, they are. Each girl has two keys-one for the exterior locks and one for her bedroom. It doesn’t make any sense, and I’m beginning to wonder if you might have seen a reflection in the window, perhaps from a car driving through the campus. As for this face, it was nothing more than the man in the moon shining back at you. You did say you’d been drinking beer, dear.”

I took a deep swallow of wine, and when I could trust myself said, “So I did, and in any case, it wasn’t Debbie Anne. Do you have any idea where she could be hiding? Does she have any friends from her hometown who’re going to summer school? Is there a professor she might have gone to?”

“The police asked me those questions last night, and all I could say was that we have sixty-seven girls in the house, and I cannot keep track of their friends and confidantes. On the rare weekends when there were no pledge activities, Debbie Anne went home. The pledges are strongly encouraged to involve themselves in Kappa projects in order to strengthen the bonds of sisterhood in anticipation of initiation. Jean was the pledge trainer last year, and she did a marvelous job. She organized picnics, treasure hunts, outings to rest homes and child-care centers, parties with fraternity pledge classes, all sorts of things. I can’t remember when a pledge class has been so busy.”

It sounded more like isolation to me, an attempt to erase or at least minimalize their individual personalities and mold them into genuine Kappa material. All that enforced togetherness would have driven me into the nearest built-in closet. I’d endured two years in a dormitory, but I’d done so at a civilized distance, eschewing floor meetings and popcorn parties, and moved into an apartment as soon as it was permitted by the in Iota parent’s policy of the college.

The squeaks of the rocker were barely perceptible as Winkie gazed at the wall above my head. Her eyes darted not from flock to flock, but from thought to thought, as if she were filling in a crossword puzzle in her mind.

As tempting as it was, I reminded myself I could not shake her until she relented and told me what she suspected. “Debbie Anne said something else that troubles me,” I said conversationally. “Not only was she unaware of Jean’s death, she seemed frightened by the idea that Jean might accuse her of something that would end in arrest.”

“Jean? I find that impossible to believe. Jean was one of the few girls who never came home drunk, never failed to sign out for the weekend, never was late for our Monday-night dinners, never skipped a chapter meeting or a house meeting. She was so very responsible, unlike Debbie Anne, who more often than not claimed she’d lost track of the time or had a flat tire or some silly excuse.” She finished her wine, refilled her glass, and sat back to regard me with the smile of a used-car salesman who’d just closed a deal. “Jean Hall was a girl of impeccable character and breeding. No one ever so much as breathed a word against her.”

But someone did run her down in the alley, I considered mentioning, but kept it to myself. Winkie was not going to offer me anything that might explain Debbie Anne’s slightly incoherent avowal that Jean had coerced her into something illegal. Girls of impeccable character and breeding didn’t do that sort of thing; they simply became Kappa Theta Etas.

The doorbell rang. Winkie patted my shoulder as she went past me and out to the foyer to open the door. “Why, Eleanor,” she said, “whatever brings you here at this hour?”

“I’m so worried about all this, and about you and the girls, and even little Katie. I was at a charity bridge party all afternoon, and this evening at a dreary reception for a faculty candidate. I wanted to stop by and find out if the police have made any progress.”

Winkie remained in the doorway, smiling politely at her guest but managing to shoot a quick-and noticeably panicked-look in my direction. I grabbed the decanter and glasses and took them into the kitchen, and was relaxed on the sofa by the time Winkie and Eleanor came into the suite.

“Claire,” Eleanor murmured with a gracious nod. “How nice of you to keep Winkie company.”

“She seemed nervous,” I said with an equally gracious nod, “and Pippa and Rebecca are out.”

Eleanor accepted a cup of tea from Winkie. “Has Debbie Anne come back? I heard on the morning news that the car is registered to her parents and that she’d obtained a campus parking permit. It pains me to say it, but the evidence is certainly mounting up against her. I wish I knew how to help her, but we don’t even know where she is or how to assure her that…, we want to get this settled as soon as possible. How terrible for her to be alone at this time, no doubt terrified of what will happen to her”

I waited for Winkie to mention the call I’d had, but all she said was, “I was just telling Claire what a wonderful girl Jean was, how enthusiastic and energetic. Some of the pledges must have wondered if she was a drill sergeant, considering how busy she kept them.”

“Yes, indeed,” Eleanor said in a strained voice.

“And she herself was always so busy,” Winkie continued. ‘With her zealous dedication to classes and to house activities, it was a miracle that she found time for a social life. I spoke to her about it, suggesting that she relax and try to enjoy her senior year, but she assured me that she was enjoying it very much.”

“I hope as much as you’ve enjoyed the year, dear Winkie. All your responsibilities must exhaust you.”

I felt as if I were watching them toss a hand grenade back and forth. Either the room was oppressively warm or they were filling it with inarticulated anger along with their sugary words and thin, meaningless smiles.

Eleanor unexpectedly lobbed the grenade to me. “Winkie’s on call day and night, and as the housemother, she must have a reputation and demeanor above reproach. I’m afraid I myself would find it a relentless burden. Don’t you agree?”

“Oh, yes,” I said, fingering the metaphorical pin and discovering it was loose. “I’d hate to face life without an occasional scotch or a lovely Sunday morning in my shabbiest bathrobe and bare feet.”

I thought I’d passed it to Winkie, but it ended up in Eleanor’s manicured fingers. “I understand you have a relationship with that handsome police lieutenant who was here last night. Rosen, isn’t it?” She laughed as I opened my mouth to protest. “Farberville’s a small town, Claire, and you’ve gained some notoriety with your involvement in those mysterious cases.” To Winkie, she added, “Our neighbor is a renowned amateur sleuth, which explains why she was so quick and clever when that awful man was prowling in the yard. She knew just what to do.”

It struck me as an opportune moment to mention the most recent prowler, but Winkie again ignored the obvious. “So quick and clever,” she murmured. “So quick and clever.”

I didn’t feel quick or clever, and I was tired of the grenade game. If I’d heard anything worthy of my analytical attention, I had no idea what it was. Smothering a yawn, I bade them good night and left, not caring which of them was blown to smithereens, metaphorically or otherwise.