Poisoned Pins

7

“I hear you went out with another man last night,” Peter said as he came into the Book Depot. During the school year, it was closed on Sunday afternoons, but I was too desperate to risk missing a single sale, and at that particular moment I was considering the possibility of adding a section of Greek-related items. Not virgin olive oil and ouzo, but cutesy coffee mugs, visors, clipboards, and pastel stationery, all with appropriate letterheads. Other stores in town carried that sort of thing, but I was the closest to the campus and might do well. Then again, it would be challenging to put on makeup every morning if I were unable to look at myself in the mirror.

“I’m impressed with the breadth of your surveillance,” I said evenly. “Where have you been? I was beginning to suspect you and Jorgeson were sharing romantic moments at the cabin. The mere thought of such treachery is what drove me to the arms of another man-that, and the need to avoid my daughter until she regains her grip on fiscal reality.”

“That could take years.” Peter propped his elbows on the counter. He wore a cotton sweater rather than a suit, but his cheeks were smooth and I caught a whiff of the after-shave I’d given him for his birthday. After a moment, I realized I’d given him the sweater for Christmas. The rest of his clothing was of his own doing; a lady never proffers trousers or underwear, and the cost of his shoes was comparable to my rent.

“Jorgeson’s not bad,” he continued, “but his ankles are bony and he sweats. So who’s this guy?”

“Merely one of those potential millionaires one meets on the street every day. As soon as his book hits the best-seller list, he’s going to whisk me away to some swanky resort with an employee whose sole duty is to swat mosquitoes.”

“I also heard you called 911 last night, and then the campus police, who responded promptly to your latest claim to have seen a prowler at that blasted sorority house. You might as well move in and save yourself the bother of dashing over there every hour.”

I told him about the man I’d seen in the window, adding that I was convinced he was the same man who had stopped in the street the night Jean Hall was killed. “And when I described him to Winkie, she reacted as if she knew him,” I concluded, doing my best to hide my frustration.

“But refused to share the name with you?” He flashed his perfect white teeth at me. “How uncooperative of her. I’ll go by tomorrow and see if she’ll be more forthright with an officer of the law. Is there anything else you’ve discovered and failed to share with us?”

I thought about attempting to strike a bargain with him, but I had a feeling he might interpret my offer as blackmail rather than a display of camaraderie. I related the gist of Debbie Anne’s call, and said, “She sounded genuinely worried about something Jean was going to do to her, and I doubt she was bluffing. However, I keep characterizing her as a soggy-nosed ninny, but she did graduate from high school and was accepted at Farber College, so she can’t be totally devoid of wits. Those who know her better than I seem to think she’s devious and deceitful, and capable of manipulation. For all I know, she could be a contemporary Mata Han with a secret agenda that forebodes ill for the future Kappa Theta Eta alumnae pool. Maybe she hired this prowler and staged her encounter with him to fool us, gave him her keys, and sent him to the house last night to…”

“Plant bombs? Bug the bedrooms? Kill the cat?”

“I don’t know,” I muttered, unamused by his condescending attitude. There I was, willing to share my ideas and pass along information, and in return, I was rewarded with smirky intonations, delicately arched eyebrows, and those damn teeth. It was time for a new game plan. “What progress have you made? Did you identify any fingerprints in the car?”

“With the exception of some unremarkable smudges, they belong to the person who reputedly occupied Debbie Anne Wray’s bedroom at the sorority house, used her toothbrush, and placed the photograph of her parents on the desk. The blood on the bumper, hood, and tires matches that of the victim. A shard of glass from the broken headlight was taken from the body. The prosecuting attorney won’t file charges until we have her in custody and can finalize our report, but even if it was an accident, he’ll probably opt for negligent homicide and leaving the scene of a personal injury-both felonies. No one admits to having any idea where she is, so we’re just waiting for her to get tired of hiding. I suppose we could put a tap on your telephone.”

“Not without a court order signed by Sandra Day O’Connor. If Debbie Anne calls again, I’ll persuade her to tell me where she is and you’ll be the first to know. But I am not going to allow you to eavesdrop on my calls or monitor my private life as if I were a criminal. How did you know that I had dinner with a man last night?”

“One of the desk sergeants was at the restaurant and said something about it,” Peter said. He had the decency to look somewhat embarrassed to be caught gossiping, which gave me a measure of satisfaction. “I was teasing, Claire. You’re perfectly free to see anyone you want, or date other men, or spend the weekend with them. It’s increasingly clear that our relationship isn’t going in the direction I’d hoped it might. Maybe seeing other people would help both of us figure out what’s for the best.”

“Maybe it would,” I said without inflection, inwardly appalled at the thought of even a second dinner with my science fiction hippie, who was harmless (when not discoursing on his manuscript) but hardly as stimulating as Peter. Rather than allow the conversation to lapse into something more suitable for a romance novel, I told him I had work to do and he huffed away.

I did not burst into tears, but I admit I sniffled just a bit as I dusted the self-help racks with more than usual vigor. My predicament was of my own making, which made it all the more irritating, and by the time Caron and Inez came into the bookstore, I’d dusted every book, swept the floor, cleaned out the drawer beneath the cash register, and rearranged the racks in order to determine if I could add sorority and fraternity paraphernalia.

“Menopause,” Caron explained to Inez. “Her face is red and she’s drenched in sweat. Furthermore, she’s been behaving very erratically lately, and-”

“Help me move this table,” I interrupted in a glacial voice, struggling not to imagine the warm satisfaction I would receive if I throttled her on the spot.

Inez blinked soberly at me. “My mother started having hot flashes in her mid-forties, Mrs. Malloy. She said she felt as if she were wrapped in an electric blanket set as high as it would go. Sometimes she’d start crying for no reason, but the doctor gave her estrogen and it really worked.”

The intensity of my scowl provoked them into mutely helping me drag a heavy oak table across the room and situate it in front of the window. “I am not having hot flashes,” I said, panting. “Peter and I had a disagreement, and I was perturbed. I’m not even forty yet, for pity’s sake, and I do not care for all this unsolicited advice from teenage girls whose knowledge of medical matters is gleaned from soap operas. Do you understand?”

“Whatever.” Caron wandered toward the office. “You had a call earlier this afternoon, by the way. Some man, but he didn’t leave his name or number.” As the door squeaked, she added with ill-disguised relish, “He said you’d better mind your own business or you’d be sorry.”

“What?” I gasped. “Tell me exactly what he said.”

“I just did, Mother. A rather poor choice of clichés, if you ask me, but the whole thing was probably a wrong number I mean, why would some man call you? Do you have any diet sodas stashed in here? I’m about to Die of Thirst after all that work.”

Inez had edged behind the travel guides, as if she feared my purported hot flashes might escalate into an incendiary eruption. “We don’t have much time,” she called to Caron. “You have an appointment in less than an hour and it’ll take us a while to walk over there, especially if we go by the Kappa house to get the kit.”

“Who’s the victim?” I asked her.

“Mrs. Verbena, the art teacher at the high school. I don’t think she was all that enthusiastic, but she finally said Caron could come by and explain it.”

“She’s an Elegant,” Caron said as she returned empty-handed. “Of course, I won’t tell her until she agrees to pay me. My Beautiful Self consultants have to watch out for sneaky people who try to weasel free advice.” Her eyes narrowed as she regarded my jeans and black T-shirt. “Some of us certainly could use some, free or otherwise. Come on, Inez, we have to go all the way to the Kappa house, and then turn around and go all the way back to Mrs. Verbena’s house. If I had my own kit, we wouldn’t have to walk the extra six blocks, but no one would lend me the money for one crummy week so I could get it. That’s why we have to go all the way to the-”

“So Pippa didn’t leave?” I asked before we reheard the entirety of the itinerary, which in her mind seemed to require miles of walking barefooted on glowing coals.

“If she’d left, I wouldn’t be able to borrow her kit, would I?” She jabbed Inez. “I need to go home and change clothes. This forest green is good, but my royal-blue blouse really demonstrates how effective the analysis is. If you’d stop being selfish about your new earrings, I could probably do an accessory awareness, too. Come on, it’s going to take at least half an hour to get the kit and find Mrs. Verbena’s house. If we’re seconds late, she’ll make up an excuse to leave and we’ll have hiked All Over Town for nothing.”

Inez trudged after her, but turned around and came back to put her hand on my arm. ‘Why don’t you call my mother, Mrs. Malloy? I’m sure she’ll be happy to give you the name of her doctor”

“I’ll think about it,” I said through clenched teeth. Once they were gone, I sat on the table and stared at the cobwebs on the rafters, wishing I’d stayed in bed with the Sunday newspaper and countless pots of tea-or with the blanket pulled over my head. First Peter, then the girls, and to top off the afternoon, an anonymous threatening call.

After another bout of sniffling, I bestirred myself and dialed the number Debbie Anne had given me. This time a woman answered, and I told her who I was and why I was calling.

“I am worried sick about this,” Imogene Wray said, having identified herself as such in a twangy drawl identical to her daughter’s. “The police calling, and then Brodie-he’s the deputy sheriff-coming by to make sure Debbie Anne wasn’t under the bed or out in the barn. My husband’s ulcer flared up so bad he finally went over to the drugstore to buy another bottle of that gooey pink medicine. I can’t imagine what’s gotten into Debbie Anne. She’s always been so sweet and respectful, never ever in any kind of trouble. You can ask any of her teachers at the school, and they’ll tell you the same thing.”

“I want to help her, but I don’t know where she is or how to find her. Has she ever mentioned any friends who live in Farberville and might let her stay with them?”

“I don’t reckon she has any friends outside the sorority,” Imogene said promptly. “That’s all she ever talks about, how they had a party or played cards or went to the picture show together. They seem to keep her awful busy when she’s not studying, but I guess the reason for joining a group like that is to have girlfriends who are as close as sisters.”

I told Mrs. Wray that I’d let her know if I found Debbie Anne and replaced the receiver It appeared that Debbie Anne had failed to communicate the true nature of her relationship with her sorority sisters, but that was understandable and by no means proof that she was generally mendacious.

What I needed was not estrogen therapy, but a clear idea of Debbie Anne’s personality. And of Jean Hall’s, I added as I wrote each name on a discarded envelope. Presumably, they were opposites, but I had no idea which personified good, which evil. Winkie and Eleanor had made their position known, and Rebecca and Pippa were likely to concur Imogene Wray dissented, but she was biased. Peter didn’t care. I seemed to be the only person willing to defend Debbie Anne, although I wasn’t going to do it until I had more evidence about her.

Unable to rally the energy to play devil’s advocate, I tried a scenario in which she was nothing more complex than a soggy-nosed ninny. If this persona accidentally hit Jean in the alley, she would have leaped out of the car and dashed inside to call an ambulance. She might have been distressed to the point of hysteria, but if she’d panicked, she would have gone no farther than my apartment to sob on my shoulder (if I let her, and since it was my scenario, I instead made her sit at the kitchen table) and whine about her troubles.

Her telephone call added to my confusion. If she had been telling the truth, she hadn’t been driving her car, and had gone into hiding for another reason-one that had to do with illegal activity instigated by that lovely girl Jean, who was in no condition to be questioned.

The anonymous call was equally bewildering. Arnie? The man-in-the-moon prowler? Some unknown figure who lacked the imagination to come up with an innovative threat? After all, I was minding my own business, or at least what business there was on a Sunday afternoon in June; it was hardly my fault that prowlers kept popping out of the Kappa shrubbery like possessed prairie dogs.

A growing sense of petulance provoked me into closing the bookstore several hours earlier than I’d intended. I took the long route home in order to avoid passing the sorority house, although I couldn’t prevent myself from glancing at it as I approached my porch. Rebecca and Pippa sat on the top step, surrounded by unopened textbooks, notebooks, bags of chips, and cans of soda, clearly more interested in painting their fingernails than in the quest for knowledge.

I veered across the lawn and said, “Have you heard from Debbie Anne?”

Rebecca shook her head. “I’m not sitting here waiting for her to walk up the sidewalk so I can give her a welcoming hug. After what she did to Jean, she’d better have taken the first bus home to her little redneck enclave amid the pigsties and chicken coops.” Her lovely blue eyes brimmed with tears, and her lovely voice with bitterness. “Jean and I were best friends since our first semester, and we shared a room until last year when we both moved into private rooms. It was going just great- until that pious little bitch pledged Kappa Theta Eta and ruined everything!”

“Pious?” I echoed.

“She didn’t approve of anything, not even some of the boring public relations stuff the pledge class has to do every year. Apparently in her hometown, nobody ever smoked a cigarette or drank a glass of decent French wine, much less partied past midnight. Right before spring break, Jean bribed one of the Betas to take Debbie Anne out and get her good and drunk, but she drank half a martini, gagged on the olive, and threw up all over his front seat. What’s that supposed to do for our reputation?”

I had no answer for that. “Debbie Anne did tell me that she was pressured to do things she felt were wrong.”

“Such as?” Rebecca said with a faint sneer that reminded me of Jean.

“She said she couldn’t tell me because I wasn’t in the sorority. Her faced turned red, however, and she implied they were things that would upset her preacher”

Pippa giggled. “She was probably thinking of the Bedroom Olympics weekend. What a prude!”

“You have to consider her background,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound prudish. “But you’re convinced she was driving her car when Jean was struck?”

Rebecca leaned back and regarded me coolly. “Winkie tried to convince us it was an accident, as did Mrs. Vanderson, but I won’t buy it. There’s light in the alley, and it’s too narrow for someone to be driving very fast. It’s obvious that Debbie Anne did it on purpose. She murdered Jean out of jealousy.”

Trying to mask my surprise, I said, “I would have said it was more a case of wistfulness than of jealousy.”

“Everybody in the house knew how jealous she was. She stole silk blouses from Jean on at least two occasions, and she pretended to be overcome with astonishment when Jean’s tennis bracelet just happened to turn up in her desk drawer Maybe in the beginning she just wanted to be like Jean, but became so obsessed that eventually she had to be Jean. When she realized she couldn’t, she slandered her and finally killed her.”

I certainly had no need to probe delicately to ascertain her opinion of Debbie Anne. I shifted my attention to Pippa, who was not dimpling.

“It might have been an accident,” she said in response to my implicit question, “but Debbie Anne’s awfully moody and reserved. She never contributed to the conversation or told jokes, and it was like a total waste of time trying to teach her to play bridge. One night I found her hunkered in the shower as if she were in a catatonic stupor. A real spook, if you ask me.”

“A real bitch,” growled Rebecca.

“And neither of you has any idea where she might be?” I asked with faint optimism.

Pippa gave me a facetiously sad look. “And neither of us cares. Mrs. Malloy, I don’t know if Caron’s said anything to you, but you really shouldn’t wear black. It tends to emphasize all those wrinkles around your nose and chin, and it makes your complexion look ashy.”

“How nice of you to notice,” I said as my fingernails dug into my palms. “Caron mentioned that you were thinking about dropping out of school for the remainder of the summer I presume you’ve changed your mind?”

“You what?” Rebecca turned on her so abruptly that fingernail polish splattered on her knee and dribbled onto the porch like viscous pink blood. “You’re damn well not going to split for the summer, honey! We’re both going to stay right here at the Kappa Theta Eta house for the duration, especially after what happened to Jean.” She caught my bright-eyed look and forced a melancholy smile. “I lost one of my best friends, and I cannot bear to lose another so soon.”

It sounded like a line from Tennessee Williams, and the setting was appropriate: decaying mansion, dusty summer afternoon, sisterhood gone awry, tumultuous emotions poorly disguised. All we needed was a surly male in a stained undershirt and a clattering streetcar.

I hesitated, but Rebecca was wiping the polish off her knee with a tissue and Pippa was shriveling into the woodwork. To the latter, I said, “It was kind of you to lend Caron your color analysis kit.”

“Oh, it was nothing, and I feel sorry for her. I know what kind of psychological damage can be caused by feelings of economic deprivation, and it’s important to feel a part of one’s peer group at such a vulnerable age. I just hope she can make enough money this summer to buy a car and successfully integrate herself into her self-perceived community.”

I repressed the urge to point out that Caron was neither economically deprived nor noticeably vulnerable, despite her incessant complaining to the contrary. Her relationship with the infamous Rhonda Maguire was the root of all evil, and I was disinclined to listen to a spate of psychobabble from someone who dimpled- sympathetically, no less.

“Please let me know if Debbie Anne comes back,” I said and headed for my apartment. I was halfway through the downstairs door when a cacophony of rumbles, rattles, wheezes, and clanks caught my attention. The green truck pulled to the curb, and visible through the bug-splattered windshield was none other than Arnie Riggles. He lurched across the passenger’s seat and disappeared, but after a moment the window on that side began to descend in tiny jerks.

I had several questions for him, and it seemed an auspicious moment to pose them. Before I could rally sufficient enthusiasm, however, Rebecca hurried down the sidewalk and began to converse through the window. She spoke rapidly and urgently, pausing for what had to be responses from the pit of the passenger’s seat, and then reacting with increased urgency. Stunned, I could only watch as she stepped back and Arnie resurfaced behind the steering wheel and drove past my house and around the corner. I looked back in time to see Rebecca and Pippa entering the sorority house. What on earth could strikingly beautiful, perfectly packaged Rebecca have to discuss with someone as vile and oily as Arnie?

This was the second time he’d slipped away before I could inquire into the parameters of his involvement, and I decided it was high time to have a little talk with him. The mere thought was enough to make my skin itch as if I’d rolled in poison ivy and the pustules were emerging. Rather than retreat to the bathtub, I reminded myself that I was the only person with any desire to help Debbie Anne, whether or not she deserved it.

Arnie was not listed in the telephone directory. The last time I’d been unfortunate enough to encounter him, he’d been living in a storage room at the city animal shelter He’d subsequently been fired-for just cause-and I had no idea where he currently lived. I could have spent the remainder of the afternoon turning over rocks in the woods or crawling under bridges in hopes of finding him, but even I had limits (although Peter Rosen would be the last to acknowledge it).

I made a pot of tea and sat down on the sofa to rely on deductive prowess rather than physical exertion, being a fan of the armchair-detective genre. Reading about the women private eyes with brass bras and testosterone for brains had always left my fingers gritty and my eyes dazed with images of violence. Tea and intuition were… my cup of tea.

Arnie was employed by a remodeling contractor, more specifically a painter whose name I’d heard and dismissed as unworthy of notice. If I asked Winkie for his name, Rebecca might hear about it and realize I’d seen her talking to him; I wanted to confront him before he could be waned. Under no circumstances would I ask a certain cop to track down Arnie’s address.

In the middle of the second pot of tea, it occurred to me that Eleanor Vanderson would know the painter’s name, if not the details of Arnie’s squalid personal life. There was only one Vanderson in the directory, and she herself answered on the third ring.

“This is Claire Malloy,” I said, “and I was hoping-”

“Did Debbie Anne call you again? Do you know where she’s hiding?”

“Sony, but no. This has nothing to do with the horrible accident in the alley. I’ve been thinking about having the interior of my apartment painted, and I wanted to know the name of your painter-if you’ve found him competent and reliable, of course.”

There was, as Caron would say, A Distinct Lull. “Why, I suppose I could give you his name, but thus far they haven’t started painting. I’m afraid Winkie overstepped her authority when she promised the job to him and his assistant. National requires that we take bids in order to choose the most competitive rates, and I’m waiting to hear from several other contractors before I can finalize anything. Based on my one conversation with that man who claimed to know you, I’m as reluctant as you were to offer a recommendation. He’s quite a character, isn’t he? He’s so”-she hesitated to find a phrase suitable for a dean’s wife-”earthy and uninhibited.”

Or dirty and crude, some of us might say. I instead said, “I might as well take bids, too. His name?”

“I’ll have to find the folder.” Papers shuffled in the background as she continued to talk. “My husband is forever complaining about the piles of paperwork and the amount of time I dedicate to the chapter, but now that my children have moved away and married, it helps to fill the void. Sometimes I wonder if it’s immature of me to engross myself in what’s basically a college activity, but it was so vital to me then and I want to do everything I can to ensure that the girls still have a memorable experience. And it is something for which I have a talent.”

Serial killers had talent, too. “As long as you enjoy it,” I murmured inanely, having agreed with her supposition that it was immature to devote one’s energy to something that was indeed a college activity. It wasn’t simply the response to a vacuum, I suspected, but a need for power. Her children grown, she’d replaced them with a group of girls who were depleted each spring but replenished each fall during rush.

“Here it is,” she said with a laugh. “I feel as if I’ve been scuba diving through the paperwork. The primary contractor is Ed Whitbred.” She spelled it for me, gave me a telephone number, then said, “Bear in mind I’ve not yet hired him, although his bid is the lowest I’ve received. Winkle has attested to his character, but as house corps president, it’s my obligation to interview him personally and assure myself that’s he’s reputable and honest.”

“I don’t suppose you have Arnie’s address?”

“I believe I do. I needed to send some bidding forms to Mr. Whitbred’s office, but Arnie didn’t know that address and gave me his.” Papers again began to rustle like dried leaves; it was easy to imagine towering stacks of folders, each emblazoned with Kappa Theta Eta and of a uniform color. She made little noises of exasperation for a long while, then congratulated herself and said, “It was in the wrong folder. He lives at the Airport Arms Motel, which one can only assume is in the vicinity of the airport.”

“One can only assume.” I thanked her for her time and wished her a pleasant afternoon. Mine was less likely to be that, especially if I spent it tracking down and interrogating Arnie. Then again, if I stayed where I was, Caron and Inez were apt to appear to share medical insights about my deteriorating body or regale me with the details of Mrs. Verbena’s analysis. Peter certainly wouldn’t come by to visit.

Anyone who could find the airport could find the Airport Arms Motel. I picked up my purse and went to look for Arnie.