The Body In The Basement

Ten

The Athertons came back at 9:30.

When Valerie had first left the room, Pix had not been anxious for their return, but as dusk fel , her muscles and her nerves were crying out for some sort of change. And what that might be was something she had been speculating about for hours—silently. Samantha was calmer and had even dozed off at one point. Pix had felt drowsy herself, yet she dared not shut her eyes. She heard them before she saw them, rapid footsteps on the stairs.

The door opened and with a flick, light flooded the room, blinding Pix temporarily with its abrupt brightness.

She could see how frightened Samantha was now. Her eyes were wide open, pupils dilated, like a fawn teetering about on the road, caught in the beams of a car's headlights.

“I stil say we should take the silver service," Valerie was whining.

“We'l buy another. It's not that special and it weighs too much. We'l be lucky to make any speed at al with everything you've packed." He bent down and untied Pix's ankles. The pain was intense but bearable. She knew she could walk. The question was, could she run? He helped them to their feet and said, "Get going—slowly in front of us, and don't try anything. Any noise and I'l shoot you both”

So much for Pix's plan to scream her head off the moment she was outside. They didn't know the gag was loose. With the way sound travels over water, the whole island would have been alerted. Only no one would be able to get there in time.

She started to head for the spiral staircase.

“No, the other way”

They filed down the hal past doors to rooms whose decor Pix could merely imagine. She had no doubt that had Jim not been around, Valerie would pul the trigger in a moment just because she was having to leave her fabulous house. And given her treatment of husband number one, Jim ought to be looking around a great deal, Pix thought rueful y. Her hands were tied behind her back and she gave a little wave to Samantha. Jim didn't want to leave two bodies behind. Pix was convinced they would remain alive, she told herself fervently. The question was, where?

They marched through the kitchen and out the back door. It was very dark. The moon had not risen yet and Pix stumbled on the stairs. If she broke a leg, would they shoot her?

“Down to the dock," Jim ordered.

As they left the house, lighted up like a Christmas tree to indicate occupancy, Pix wondered what they had done with her car. Another thought struck her. What had they done with Duncan? He was stil on the island as far as she knew.

They reached the dock. Jim's Boston Whaler was pul ed up.

“We're al going to take a little boat ride," he said.

"Honey, you get in first." Pix was pretty sure he didn't mean either of them. Valerie slid by them awkwardly. She was struggling with a heavy canvas bag that she must have picked up on their way out. She was dressed for the voyage: heavy pants, jacket, and a kerchief tied over her hair. Pix gasped in surprise. Not at Valerie's outfit, but at what she was wearing on her feet—running shoes with twinkling red lights that flickered on and off as she got into the boat.

It hadn't been Duncan at al .

Why hadn't Pix tripped her, pushed her body straight over the side—this monstrous woman who had knocked Samantha to the ground, leaving her injured, with no more compunction than she would have felt swatting a mosquito?

It was al Pix could do not to yel out every filthy name she had ever heard. But even if they didn't kil her, they would surely tighten the gag, and if she had sent Valerie sprawling into the sea, Pix herself might have fol owed her.

No, there was absolutely nothing she could do.

They got in the boat. If she had been in the mood, Pix would have been amused at the sight of a large wicker picnic basket—a few bottles of the bubbly and other assorted goodies for a midnight feast on the bounding main? Valerie set her bag next to it with a defiant look at her husband. The silver after al ?

“We should be in Nova Scotia before dawn," Jim said with obvious pleasure, anticipating the trip. He was where he was happiest—on the water.

“Duncan won't be back until late—if he comes here at al . He'l probably sleep in his moldy old cabin as usual."

“I liked that `good mother' touch." Jim chuckled. "How he wouldn't be seeing his friends for a while and you wanted to treat them al to pizza and the movies. Here, you steer. I've got to change my shoes.”

Valerie took over. She was in a boat, steering a boat.

The phobia, like everything else, had been fake.

Jim sat beside Pix companionably. They could see Valerie at the helm, shifting her feet every once in a while, causing the lights in her shoes to flash. Jim chuckled.

"Technology. What next? Shoes that talk or sing? Sorry about Samantha, incidental y. Valerie must have pushed her a bit harder than she'd planned. We had merely intended to give you a scare so you'd stop sticking your nose into things. We hoped Samantha would see the lights and assume it was Dunc. It al worked out perfectly.”

Depending on one's viewpoint. Pix was reaching the boiling point.

She saw they were headed for a smal island that she knew belonged to the camp. It was a long way from shore.

They used it for overnights, teaching the kids survival skil s.

Now it appeared it would test Pix's own. Valerie cut the motor and eased the boat into shal ow water. Jim jumped out, pul ing them farther onto the beach. The hul scraped along the rough sand, then al was quiet. The only sound was that of the waves gently breaking to either side.

“Last stop," Jim said heartily. He reached in the boat and picked Pix up, depositing her more or less upright on the sand. Samantha was next.

Pix had never noticed how strong he was. She'd never noticed a lot of things about Jim.

“Toss me the rope, Val. I won't be a minute." He pul ed a gun from his pocket. "Okay, up the path”

Pix couldn't imagine where he was taking them, and although the night was stil warm, she felt a cold sweat break out. Was it real y going to be the last stop? Behind her, Samantha moaned.

They walked to a clearing in the middle of the island.

Some summer's campers had built a lean-to and it was this that was apparently their destination.

“Get in and lie down. Let's not make things hard. I do so wish you two had not become involved. Believe me, I hate doing this," Jim said as he began to expertly bind Samantha's feet together again.

Pix thought about trying to kick the gun from his hand.

She could do it easily, though with her hands behind her back, it would gain her nothing. Every plan she had devised had come to naught. She had failed miserably. But she would not cry, she told herself angrily. She would not let the bastard see her cry.

He finished with Samantha and went to work on Pix. In a moment, he was standing up.

“Wel , good-bye, I guess. There's real y nothing else to say.”

A few minutes later, they heard the boat start up again.

Mother and daughter started talking at once. "Mom, they're gone!”

“Are you al right?”

They were almost giddy with relief. They were alive.

But, Pix soon realized, taking stock of the situation, not in good shape.

The island was uninhabited, and tied securely the way they were, there was no way they could attract attention tomorrow morning from a passing boat. When the Athertons didn't turn up at the camp and it became apparent that Pix and Samantha were also missing, a search would be made, yet it was unlikely that anyone would think to come here. There were countless islands of varying size dotted throughout Penobscot Bay. It could be days or even weeks before they were found.

Jim wasn't going to be directly responsible for their deaths. Obviously, he'd come up with a plan that effectively kept them out of the way while the Athertons headed for the Canadian border and stil kept his hands clean. Pix could almost hear him explaining it to "sweet-cakes,”

“That's al we need, a few hours. If they're found, fine. If not ...”

If not .. .

“Samantha, we have to try to cut these ropes with something. Can you stand up?"

“I don't know" She strained to bend her knees and get into a sitting position. "It's no use. He's tied our hands and feet together."

“Maybe I can untie the knot. My fingers are free.”

Pix rol ed over to Samantha and began to pick at the knot at her ankles. Her fingers soon began to ache and she wished she hadn't kept her nails so short. Manicures didn't last long gardening.

“At least one of us has to get down to the shore and start yel ing. There's always the chance that a boat could have pul ed into the cove for the night. Distract me. Sing.

Anything." The pain and frustration were intense.

“Al right. What shal I sing?" Samantha's mind was suddenly blank. She and Mom had rather different tastes in music. The latest from the Indigo Girls would not do much to speed the process. "I know—what you and Daddy used to sing to me when I couldn't get to sleep." Her voice started out shakily and got stronger. "Hush, little baby, don't say a word. Papa's gonna buy you a mockingbird.”

By the time Papa had purchased the sixth horse and cart, Pix had undone the knot and Samantha's feet and hands were no longer tied together. She stood up.

“Look and see if there are any nails in the wal or anything sharp you could use to try to undo mine " Pix did not want her daughter to suffer the way she had; she knew her fingers were bleeding from the rough rope.

Samantha hopped around the lean-to. The moon had risen. It was past eleven o'clock.

“Here's a bunch of nails. They must have hung stuff on them. I'l try to get one with my teeth."

“Be careful!" Al those years of orthodontics, fluoride treatments, sealants. She watched Samantha hop back toward her with a rusty nail in her mouth and kneel by her side. Samantha dropped the nail to the floor and deftly picked it up, starting in on the knot, looking over her shoulder the same way her mother had.

“Boy, are we going to be stiff in the morning.”

“Yes," Pix agreed, stiff, but not stiffs.

“Al right, it's your turn.”

Pix started to sing. This time Mama bought.

After what seemed like hours, Pix was somewhat freed also and they gingerly made their way down to the shore. Coming through the trees, the ocean with the moon streaking across it like a beacon was a welcome sight. Pix had almost fal en in the woods and now she fel on purpose, rol ing over and over toward the shoreline, wel away from the ledges. She closed her eyes as the hard rocks pressed into her body, then opened them when she reached the smoother sand. Samantha fol owed her and they began to cal , "Help! Help! Please, someone help us!”

They decided to take turns, then figured they might as wel wait until morning. No one was within earshot. Pix once more lay as close as she could to her daughter. The wind was picking up. It was getting. colder. Even if they could free themselves, it was too far to swim to the mainland through the frigid waters. Pix reassured Samantha. It offered a measure of comfort for herself, too, despite the disbelief of a quick rescue steadily rising like the tide.

“Don't worry, everything wil be al right in the morning.

Why don't you close your eyes"

“I don't think I can sleep."

“Hush, little baby ..

Before she could get very far into the lul aby, Pix thought she heard the sound of an oar or a paddle. She lifted her head. Wishful thinking. Then the sound came again, more distinctly.

“Yoo hoo! Pix? Samantha? Where are you?" It was Mother.

The three women and Duncan made a somewhat outlandish grouping as they sat on the deck of the Athertons' house waiting for Earl. Neither Pix nor Samantha had wanted to go inside, so Duncan had fetched blankets for them to wrap around themselves and a bottle of brandy and glasses at Mrs. Rowe's suggestion. Pix was drinking from the Baccarat after al . The teenagers had Cokes and were steadily devouring a bag of potato chips. Although hungry, Pix herself did not feel like eating anything from this particular larder.

Warm, the brandy seeping into her weary bones and bloodstream, Pix wanted her mother to tel the story again

—and again just as a child with a favorite book. Like most other parents she knew, she had more quotations from Doctor Seuss and Margaret Wise Brown to hand than Doctor Seuss and Margaret Wise Brown to hand than Shakespeare.

“You actual y have Duncan here to thank more than me," Ursula said.

“I know," Pix answered, and gave the boy yet another hug. Since her mother had climbed out of the canoe and deftly cut their ropes with the Swiss army knife she always carried, Pix had been doing a great deal of hugging.

“I knew something was weird. They had been treating me like shit—excuse me." Duncan flushed and looked at Ursula. "I mean, they had been yel ing at me and saying I was never coming back here, then suddenly Mom gives me some money and tel s me to take al my friends out." He shook his head. "She's been real jittery al summer and it's been worse lately. I thought because of what was happening at camp, and"—he lowered his voice

—"because of what they thought I was doing.”

Pix was indignant. "We owe you an enormous apology!"

“Don't worry about it. I probably would have thought it was me, too. Like who would have thought Mom would go out and buy the same shoes? They're for kids.”

Pix pul ed the blanket closer around her. The wind was picking up and it seemed they might final y get the rain they'd been waiting for al these weeks. It could come. The Fairchilds' foundation was dry. Even if Seth couldn't work for a few days, the ground was so parched, it would be worth it.

The deck they were sitting on seemed another island and time was suspended, making it difficult for her to decide to move. Behind them the house was stil il uminated, a gaudy backdrop to the dark landscape on either side. The waning moon shone across the water and the stars were out, mixing with clouds moving across the sky in an ever-increasing number. The air was fresh. Tilting her head back, Pix drank it in grateful y.

She realized she hadn't been listening to the conversation, and Duncan, uncharacteristical y, was continuing to talk.

“So I go to my friends, `Let's blow the pizza, get snacks, and see the early movie.' I wanted to check out what was happening. I came back here alone. Al the lights were on, but no one was home. They weren't in the office at camp, either, and al the campers and staff were in their cabins. Mom's car was in the driveway and when I looked in the garage, Jim's was there, but yours was, too. It didn't make any sense. You couldn't have al gone somewhere together, unless someone else had picked you up, but you didn't seem to be that kind of friends, anyway. I decided to cal your house. I was going to hang up when you answered so you wouldn't think I was a jerk. When you didn't answer, I began to get this funny feeling. I couldn't cal Earl. We aren't exactly buddies. So I thought of your grandmother. She seemed okay.”

Ursula took up the tale. "I couldn't imagine who was cal ing me at such an hour. Duncan wanted to know if you were there and of course you weren't. I told him I'd be right over." What Ursula did not say was that she knew immediately something was very very wrong. It was a summer out of sync and the disappearance of her daughter and granddaughter had to be serious. She stopped at their house to make sure and found it dark, completely empty.

“It's amazing what we can do when our adrenaline gets going," Pix marveled, thanking God that she had not known at the time her octogenarian mother, who had not driven for years, was racing from The Pines across the causeway to the Athertons in the dead of night in her venerable

"Woody"—a 1949 Plymouth Suburban wagon.

“Fortunate that I had just had the car serviced for Arnie and Claire to use while they're here. Anyway, Duncan had been doing some investigating of his own while I was on my way. When I arrived, he told me there were many things missing from the house—valuable things—and the lobster boat was gone; the Whaler was at the mooring. I cal ed the police, then decided to take the canoe out. Duncan had found some rope and your purse on the floor in one of the rooms upstairs and we were both convinced that you'd been taken someplace under duress”

Pix liked her mother's choice of words—a quaint way to describe the terror that she and Samantha had just suffered.

She looked at the group. It was very late and they were al in one stage or another of extreme exhaustion.

“I think we'd better go home, especial y because it seems a storm is on the way. I know Earl was coming here, but surely the state police have been in touch with him and told him we're al right. He'l know we went home—and al of us are sticking together for the rest of this night, anyway”

When Duncan had reached Earl, the sergeant had immediately launched a search of the area around the camp, including the quarry, cal ing back to tel the boy to stay put with the Mil ers if they turned up at the house.

There was one more thing Duncan wanted to say.

Everyone was being so nice and he felt guilty. "I didn't think Mrs. Rowe should go out in the canoe like that, but I don't know how to paddle one, and she was pretty insistent.”

Mother had won the Women's Singles Canoe Trophy at various events on the Concord River for more years than Pix could remember and had been paddling the Penobscot since she was a child. And "pretty insistent" was definitely a euphemism.

“She's very good at it, in fact, she'l teach you"

Samantha thought it was time Duncan had some new interests and she ful y intended to take her rescuer under her wing, if he would let her.

“That would be great," he said, then mumbled, "except I don't know if I'l be here.”

Pix had studiously been avoiding any reference to Duncan's parents. It did not seem the moment to break it to the boy that his mother was a murderer, including of his natural father, and that both Jim and Valerie were involved in larceny up to their shirt-pocket emblems. Seeing him on the dock, as soon as they were within shouting distance, they'd cal ed to him to phone the state police and get the Coast Guard to stop Jim's boat. Other than this, al mention of their captors had been moot.

“But Granny, why did you go to the island?" Samantha asked the one question that had not yet been answered.

Pix felt foolish not to have thought of it. Why indeed?

“It was the only place that made sense. Their boat was gone. If you were stil alive, and I believed you were, they had to put you someplace, but it couldn't be close to the camp. So, I simply started paddling along the shore, then out toward sea. Plus, I heard you shouting.”

Sgt. Earl Dickinson was surprised and happy to see a group of laughing, obviously healthy friends as he drove up.

Someone had been in time.

“Start throwing things overboard!" Jim shouted to his wife.

“What?" She couldn't hear him above the gale-force winds and rain that had greeted them farther out to sea.

He motioned with his hands and spoke louder, "Get rid of some of this stuff. We're too heavy."

“Are you crazy?”

He left the cabin, went to the back of the boat, and started tossing bags into the water. Valerie fel upon him, screeching, "My boxes! My col ection of Battersea boxes!

What are you doing!”

He slapped her hard across the face. "Shut up! I'm going to try to make for shore. We can't ride it out and we're not exactly in a position to radio for help.”

She began to cry. "I'm scared, Jim."

“So am I. Now, do what I said and come back under cover." They were both soaking wet.

She threw the wicker hamper over the side and then the silver. We can always buy more, she told herself. We can always buy more.

At the wheel, Jim reached for a handkerchief to dry his face and found Pix's car keys in his pocket. She won't be needing these, he thought, and lobbed them in a long arc into the churning water. Then he turned the boat toward land, looking for a safe harbor.

The raging storm hampered the Coast Guard's search for the next few days. It was not until the sun broke out on Saturday that some children found a life buoy with the name VAL 'N JIM washed up on the shore—along with an empty wicker picnic basket.

“It's a great party," Faith Fairchild said to her friend, Pix. They were sitting side by side on the back steps of the Mil ers' house, watching a variety of activities. A large convivial group—with Pix's brother, Arnie, at the center—

continued to consume lobsters at the large picnic table.

"Frankly, at my age I'd rather have a talking frog" was obviously the punch line to a very funny joke. They al burst into laughter. Sam, who had once again made a mad dash for his loved ones, arriving early Thursday morning, started to tel one of his.

“He never gets this one right," Pix told Faith, "but he laughs so much while he's tel ing it that everybody laughs with him, anyway." Faith nodded. As far as she was concerned, the world was divided into people who could tel jokes and people who couldn't. Total y unable to remember even the most sidesplitting gem, she didn't even try, and kept to strictly off-the-cuff.

Another group was playing croquet. Pix watched her mother tap some poor person's bal miles off course, recal ing that even when they were children, Ursula had played to win. "Otherwise, you won't learn," she'd explained with triumphant sweetness. Claire, Arnie's wife, had obviously drunk from the same wel . Her bal hurtled through a hoop, smashed into another, which she briskly sent into the tal grass. Claire had been out for a long bicycle ride and stil wore her black Lycra biking shorts with a bright periwinkle blue oversized linen shirt. She was one of those petite, nicely-put-together women who always made Pix feel much tal er and much clumsier than she actual y was—

like Alice after eating the first cakes. Pix never knew what to do with her hands and feet when someone like Claire was around. Pix had assumed that in middle age you'd stop caring about what other people thought of you.

Supposedly, it was one of the perks. She was stil waiting.

The children were al over the place. Samantha and Arlene had immediately taken command of the Fairchild offspring, to Faith's unabashed delight. They seemed to be playing a game that involved a great deal of running and screeching, with little Amy riding piggyback and the dogs racing at their heels, barking happily. Duncan was with them. There had been no sudden transformation. He stil wore a black concert T-shirt and black jeans, but his hair was clean and he and Fred were joining the game with every appearance of friendship.

There had been no word about the Athertons, other than the finding of the life buoy, and they were assumed lost. Duncan's paternal grandparents had been notified and were only too happy to have him come live with them. Pix did have a passing thought as to when they'd seen him last, but it seemed that they had always disliked Valerie intensely, especial y after their son's death, when she'd contested his wil , seeking to prevent certain bequests, among them a trust fund for Duncan. The Cowleys had told her they didn't care to see her anymore and she had retaliated by keeping Duncan from them, never al owing the boy to visit. He was living with John Eggleston at the moment and John was going to take him south the fol owing week. John had been the one to break the news of his mother's probable death to Duncan. He'd told Pix the boy had pretended indifference at first, saying he'd never real y loved her, since she'd never loved him. Then he'd sobbed for hours. Looking at him now playing like the child he stil was in part, Pix hoped he would find what he needed from his grandparents. At any rate, it would certainly be an improvement.

“It is a good party, if I do say so myself," Pix said tritely and complacently. "What could be easier than lobster, especial y when my guests brought almost everything else?”

Ever since Faith and family had arrived on Thursday, leaving Aleford as soon as they heard of Pix and Samantha's ordeal, Faith found she was happiest right by her friend's side. First, of course, she had to hear about it al . Then she realized she simply wanted the reassurance of physical presence.

“Do you think people are ready for dessert?" Faith had made a tableful of blueberry tartes with the succulent wild Maine blueberries now in season.

“Not yet. Arnie's stil oozing butter and charm." Pix looked at her brother fondly. He'd been sticking to her side, too. He was reaching for a thick wedge of the corn bread*

Louise Frazier had brought. She insisted that this treasured family recipe from the Deep South went perfectly with Down East fare. And she was right.

“Now that the rain has stopped, we can get a better look at the house. Do you want to drive out after everyone leaves?" Pix remarked. "It should also be a beautiful sunset." The Fairchilds had bravely faced the storm yesterday, but after driving out to the Point, they didn't even attempt to get out of the car. "These weren't drops; these were tidal waves," Faith had told Pix. "Wonderful climate."

“It is." Pix had stoutly defended what she thought of as her native clime. "Think how hot it is in Boston. I'd rather have rain, and especial y fog, any day." Maine without its occasional soft, dense gray fogs molding land and sea alike into new shapes was unthinkable.

“I'd like to go out, especial y for the sunset, and you can tel us what it's al going to look like”

Pix was a bit shamefaced. "I do feel that I should have been after Seth sooner. You might even have had the roof by now"

“Pix! No grades, remember? Did I tel you or did you tel me that life is not a final exam? Except maybe final y.

Never mind. How you can possibly think this is your fault is total y absurd. Next, you'l be taking responsibility for what the crazy Athertons did!"

“Absolutely not!"

“Absolutely not what?" It was Jil —arm in arm with Earl, Pix noted with pleasure.

“Too complicated to explain," Faith said.

“Speaking of which .. " Earl gave Jil a surprisingly piercing look.

She drew the word out, "Yes, I suppose now is as good a time as any. I do need to talk to you, Pix.”

Faith stood up. "I'l leave you to it, then, and rescue the long-suffering teenagers from my adoring progeny." She didn't real y mean it, and fortunately Jil said, "Oh you don't have to leave, Faith. It's not exactly a secret." Faith resumed her place, aware that good manners often paid off.

Jil sat down on the lawn. Earl stretched out next to her.

She was finding it hard to begin, pul ing at tufts of grass beside her until Pix began to worry seriously she'd have to reseed.

“You know I started carrying antiques at the end of last season and stocked even more this year. They've been doing very wel and I've made more money at the store than ever before."

“That's wonderful," Faith said. Pix had told her about Jil 's cupboard, not exactly Old Mother Hubbard's, and she wanted to keep the young woman's turgid flow of conversation moving.

“Not real y. You see, almost al the antiques I bought from Mitch were fakes—and these were the bulk of my stock.”

No one said anything.

“I didn't know it when I bought them, of course. I should have been suspicious, since they weren't as expensive as similar things I'd priced at other dealers', but I thought he was giving me a good deal because he liked me. Then there began to be al this talk about phony antiques after his death. I got scared. If he was involved in something, I might be charged as a receiver. And I'd sold a good many. I had to be sure what I had were fakes for sure, so I began to go up to the library in Bangor and read whatever I could. I also talked on the way up and back to some dealers, without saying why or giving my name."

“And here we were spouting off about it at the clambake." Pix was sympathetic.

“Yes. I know it was wrong. I should have told Earl in the first place, but ... wel , I just didn't. Maybe I didn't want him to know what I'd done. No, make that definitely—I didn't want him to know what a fool he had for a girlfriend.”

Earl put his arm around Jil . She didn't shrug it off and she continued speaking as she leaned toward him. "Once I was certain, I took everything from Mitch out of the store and put it al upstairs”

Faith gave Pix's hand a knowing squeeze.

“Despite Mitch's giving me a break, I was stil out a lot of money and I couldn't afford the loss. I simply didn't know what to do, so I decided to talk to Seth."

“Why Seth?" Faith asked. Earl looked a little grim.

“I've known Seth al my life and I knew I could trust him.

He was a good friend of Mitch's, plus he hears things."

Faith finished her sentence silently for her: Things an officer of the law might not.

“And I thought he might know where the fakes had come from and maybe I could get some or al of my money back. I knew Mitch couldn't be making quilts, though he probably was manufacturing the furniture and the wood carvings. Seth was furious. If Mitch hadn't already been dead, Seth would have gone after him himself. He told me he'd do a little investigating on his own"

“What did he turn up?" Faith had assumed the role of chief interrogator. It was fun—so long as you were sitting in the afternoon sun at a backyard Maine lobster fest.

“Nothing much. We both suspected Norman Osgood, the antiques dealer who was staying at Addie and Rebecca's. Seth fol owed him when he went off-island a couple of times, but al he did was go in and out of antique shops, just as he said he was. We couldn't have been more wrong." She looked at Earl, who was grinning broadly.

“Norman Osgood is an undercover agent investigating antiques fraud. He's tickled pink that you, Pix, your mother, and Samantha somehow managed to crack a ring he's been fol owing up and down the entire East Coast for a couple of years. The Athertons fortunately did not think to erase their computer files and Norman has been having a field day."

“I was right!" Faith exclaimed. "He wasn't a dealer!”

It was Jil 's turn again. "I final y told Seth I'd have to tel Earl, what with the whole island talking about us, and besides, I missed him. That's when Seth had the idea that I could sel the fakes, just not as antiques. He helped me label every piece as a reproduction—indelible ink on the quilts, marks burned into the wooden pieces. They're very good copies and I have a big sign—'Genuine Fakes, Guaranteed to Fool Your Friends.' People think it's some more Maine humor, like the sign Wal y Sanford has had outside his store for years—'Clams Dressed and Undressed.' It's true, and so is mine. I've already sold two quilts and one of the carvings since I put them out yesterday.”

Such being the joys of confession, Jil went with Earl to join the croquet game, an almost-noticeable weight lifted from her lovely shoulders.

“Is there anything left?" Faith asked.

“What do you mean?"

“Are al the loose ends tied up? Anybody not accounted for? Clues left dangling? Red herrings?”

Pix realized her friend was indeed much more adept at al this than she was.

“I think so." She leaned back against the gray shingles of the house.

She thought about her list. The columns with

"Suspects"; "Causes of Death"; "Who Benefits?"; and

“Quilts." Duncan, Seth, John, Norman—al eliminated.

Sonny Prescott had been right al along: unknown partners in crime. Except they had known them, especial y Jim.

“It's pretty clear that Valerie was not overly maternal—

or wifely. But what an actress! I can hear her now speaking about Duncan's father—he was à saint' and so forth. She wished Duncan could be more like him. Maybe Duncan was like him and she hated them both. You should have seen her horror at the sails and the bloody bats! As soon as I heard it was latex paint, I should have known it was one of them. But Jim—an Eagle Scout! And the camp, it was like his child, wife, everything al in one."

“Until he met Valerie, my dear Watson"

“Now, don't be so patronizing. Just because you want to be Holmes, I don't have to be the poor dense doctor."

“My point is, don't underestimate the power of good old sex," Faith said.

“And in this case, the seduction of good old money"

“I'm sorry about the Watson crack," Faith apologized.

Appeased, Pix said, "Jil 's cleared up the last question I had. It must have been Valerie who came in and clipped off the X from my quilt. Which just about does it, I'd say."

“They never did find the weapon that kil ed Mitch?"

“No. Earl thought it might have been the knife the kids found in Duncan's trunk, but that turned out to be a special limited edition one belonging to Bernard Cowley. The knife had never been used for anything. And now, how about dessert?"

“Yes, but it's so hard to move. I could sit here in the sun for the rest of the day. Look at the kids. They are having a bal . Fred seems very nice, and I'm sure he and Arlene wil be model parents, unlike some of the rest of us." Fred was showing Ben how to climb the apple tree.

"Look, Arlene is wearing bel -bottoms! I should have saved al those clothes I wore in the sixties," Pix commented.

Faith disagreed. "You did the right thing. Trust me.”

Pix was cutting the tartes and Faith was putting everything on another table that had been set up out of the sun. Earlier, Samantha had picked a large bouquet of wildflowers and put them in an old white ironstone pitcher fil ed with water. Faith added a few roses from Pix's garden and several stalks of delphinium. She placed it on the dessert table now with the tartes and several large bowls of fresh strawberries. Pix had provided whipped cream and sugar, although preferring her berries straight. These were so ful of flavor, they didn't need anything, even the crème de cassis Faith favored when she got tired of them plain.

This never happened to Pix.

Arnie and Claire had apparently cleaned out Louel a Prescott's entire stock of cookies—chocolate chip, oatmeal, and hermits—and surprisingly the Bainbridges'

butterscotch shortbread. Apparently, Rebecca was not the one who hoarded the secret recipes. There was hope of sherry-nutmeg cake yet.

Pix was arranging the cookies on a large blue wil ow platter. Ursrula had come in to get a sun hat and see whether her daughter needed help.

“These are the most delicious cookies. I hope Rebecca wil give me the recipe, too," Pix said, eating one that had conveniently broken in the box.

“I'm sure she wil , dear." Her mother gave her a quick kiss, something that had become a habit of late.

Her daughter and granddaughter safe and sound, her beloved son in residence, Ursula should have been in clover, and she was—almost. But Pix thought she could stil detect a wrong note in her mother's voice. She started to ask her about it when Faith came in with the empty tray to get the rest of the things.

“Everyone's already at the desserts. Tom says it's Maine air. Gives him an appetite. And this from a man who has consumed two lobsters, coleslaw, and untold pieces of corn bread al in the recent past!”

As soon as she left, Pix said to her mother bluntly, "Tel me what's bothering you." When her mother did not reply at once, Pix suddenly realized it was always when the Bainbridges' name came up that Ursula seemed perturbed.

Could her mother miss Adelaide to such an extent? They had been close but not the best of friends. Addie. Faith had been talking about putting the last pieces in place. Surely the picture was complete. The card table could be cleared for another puzzle or tucked in a hal closet to make room for other activities. Wasn't it time to put everything away?

“Does it have to do with Addie? Are you worried about Rebecca? Oh, Mother, surely you don't think the Athertons kil ed Addie, too? I always thought the quilt was too much of a coincidence! She must have discovered what they were doing!”

Her mother sat down on a stool by the kitchen window.

The voices outside were clearly audible. Arnie was teasing his wife about the size of the piece of blueberry tarte she'd taken. When Ursula spoke, Pix had trouble hearing—and believing—what her mother said.

“The Athertons didn't kil Adelaide, but the quilt was not a coincidence. I know she'l tel one of us soon. I've been waiting and waiting. Perhaps me, maybe Earl, or maybe you. She's a good woman, though very disturbed in mind, and is probably home thinking about it right this very minute."

“You can't mean Rebecca!"

“Addie was very difficult to live with, especial y these last years," Ursula said slowly, "and Rebecca did long for a room with a view.”

Myrtle Rowe Mil er, better known as Pix, lay flat on her back in the cemetery. The bright blue sky seemed very close, almost brushing the tip of the long piece of grass she was chewing on. She'd slipped out from Arnie and Claire's going-away party at The Pines, ostensibly to see how the plot had fared in the heat and subsequent rains. She doubted she'd be missed.

The last two weeks had been fil ed with picnics and excursions of one sort or another. Arnie had, in fact, taken her to Vinalhaven, a lovely long, lazy sail.

Samantha had not remained jobless for long; the camp having obviously shut down, much to the loudly expressed sorrow of Susannah and Geoff, who had begged Samantha to take over. Now Arlene and Samantha were working for Louel a, rising early to help bake, then tending the register while Louel a kept cooking.

And Seth seemed to be accomplishing miracles of construction at the Fairchilds'. Pix went every day, watching the house rising from its foundation before her eyes.

Everything had turned out al right after al —except two people on the island were dead who should stil be alive.

She rol ed over and propped herself up on one elbow, looking at the stone that marked her father's grave. What was the line from Edna St. Vincent Mil ay? "I am not resigned to the shutting away/of loving hearts in the hard ground"? That was it. And Pix was not resigned. Not for her father, nor Mitch, nor Addie.

Rebecca had told Earl, the same day as the party Pix gave for her brother. Possibly while the Mil ers and Fairchilds were gazing at a magnificent pink-and-purple sunset from a spot on the Point where al hoped a deck would be by Labor Day.

Lilies of the val ey—they grew in dense clusters on the edges of the cemetery. A British friend of Pix's had once told her it used to be considered very bad luck in her country to plant a bed of lilies of the val ey, that the person who did would be the next to die.

But it was not the person who sowed who perished.

Rebecca had given Addie the plant poison in every way imaginable. She'd brewed her sister-in-law's tea from the deadly roots and added the water in which she'd placed the cut leaves to Addie's juice. She'd even, she confessed to Earl, pushed Addie's tiny quilting needles into the berries, hoping she might mortal y prick herself. One or al had worked.

And the quilt was no coincidence: End of Day.

Rebecca had made it herself years ago, hiding it away when Addie had criticized the handiwork—hidden away, but not forgotten.

Had she wanted to be caught? If she hadn't wrapped Addie in the quilt to try to link her crime with the other, no autopsy would have been done on someone Addie's age.

And the autopsy, like so many others, had not been able to pick up this natural poison. It mimicked heart failure. A failure of the heart—Addie's. Rebecca's.

Pix lay back down again. It felt good. Peaceful. The only noise was the raucous cries of the gul s and, if she listened very hard, the sound of her own blood pulsing.

Slow, steady—reliable. She sighed. Another epitaph? But the reliable part wasn't so bad. They were reliable women: her mother, her daughter, and Pix herself. So different—

and so alike. She was looking forward to spending the rest of the summer in their company. Maybe she'd get to the attic.

Maybe not.

EXCERPTS FROM

HAVE FAITH

IN YOUR KITCHEN BY

Faith Sibley Fairchild

and Friends

A WORK IN PROGRESS

PIX ROWE MILLER'S . FAMILY FISH CHOWDER

6-7 slices of bacon,

1/4" thick

2 cans (3 cups) evaporated milk