“Did Robyn say why she wanted to see me?” It didn’t have to be another problem at Trinity, I told myself. “About anything in particular?”
“About several dozen things in particular, none of them particularly urgent or important.” Mother’s voice held just a touch of asperity. I deduced that Robyn must not be in the room. “This nonsense in the columbarium has unsettled her. I think it would help if you could drop by, fill her in on just where we are, and reassure her that you’re dealing with things.”
“I’ll talk to Robyn if you can take on a small project for Judge Jane. It’s more up your alley than mine, anyway.” I explained about the biscuit jar for Lacey. “I have no idea what she’s talking about—I was going to ask Horace to show me the photos and then start rooting around on the Internet.”
“I’m sure I know exactly what she means. But I can double-check with Horace. Leave it to me.” Mother almost purred at the thought of going antique shopping—and with someone else’s money.
Just then a text came in from the chief, saying that he’d be finished interviewing Mrs. Washington soon. So I thanked Mother and told her I had to run.
But before heading out to Mrs. Washington’s house, I pondered whether to call the chief and tell him what I’d learned from Judge Jane. I decided to email rather than call him. I could avoid interrupting him, and perhaps gloss over the fact that I’d jumped the gun and talked to Judge Jane before he did. I called up my email program and spent some time—probably much more time than it was worth—coming up with just the right wording.
“Judge Jane Shiffley says she’s next of kin for Lacey,” I wrote. “Whose husband may have done time with one or more of the jewel robbers. She’s getting info on that and will let you know.”
I reread the wording and decided it worked. Without being inaccurate, it left room for him to think Judge Jane had dashed off to investigate with no prompting from me. I hit SEND and looked at the time. Almost eleven. Time to tackle Mrs. Washington. Presumably the chief had just left her house. If I could catch her in and interview her before I went over to see Robyn, I could report that I’d touched base with a third of the next of kin. And there were advantages to dropping by to see Robyn at lunchtime. With Robyn on strict bed rest, every cook in the parish—in fact, in the whole town—had joined the effort to keep her properly fed. Her husband, Matt, was already starting to worry that he was gaining almost as much weight as she was. What they couldn’t eat went to the women’s shelter and the homeless shelter and the parish shut-ins, but they wouldn’t mind sharing a bit with me.
I double-checked Mrs. Washington’s address and headed out to visit her.
Mrs. Washington’s house was a tiny bungalow on a postage-stamp lot in a block full of similar houses and lots. None of the houses looked run-down or neglected, but none of them looked glossy and shiny, either. No bright colors. No toys in any of the yards. The whole block had a faded, careful look about it.
Mrs. Washington’s house looked better than most, I decided as I parked in front of it. Her white picket fence wasn’t actually in dire need of paint. Her gate latch was tricky, but not actually broken. You had to watch your step a bit on the flagstone walk, but it wasn’t so horribly uneven that you’d have to repair it immediately.
When the door opened, I could see that the interior matched the exterior, neat but faded. Mrs. Washington, though, did not. She was tiny but stood ramrod straight. She wore a simple navy-blue dress with white collar and cuffs that flattered her slender form, and her iron-gray hair was done up in a skillful French braid.
“Yes?” She stood in the doorway, not unfriendly but not exactly welcoming, either.
“Mrs. Washington? I’m Meg Langslow. Robyn Smith sent me—”
“Come in.” She stepped aside and gestured for me to enter. I stepped past her into the tiny beige and blue living room. Tiny, but at least she hadn’t made it look overcrowded by squeezing in too much furniture, too many bright colors, or any large items. The love seat where she gestured for me to sit and the small armchair on which she perched were perfect for the space. And the almost complete lack of extraneous objects also helped.
But however soothing her minimalist décor might be to the claustrophobic, it was also irritatingly devoid of any clues to her personality and history.
“I understand that Trinity will take care of reinterring my husband in the columbarium,” she said.
“That’s right,” I said. “We just need to know your wishes.”
“My wishes?” She uttered a short noise that could have been a mirthless chuckle or just a snort. “To have him back in his niche where he belongs, with a minimum of fuss.”
“We can take care of that,” I said. “Trinity will repair or replace the panel that covers his niche, and also the urn if that was damaged, and reinter him as soon as Chief Burke allows.”
She nodded.
“If you should decide you want a small service when the reinterment takes place—” I began.
“I’m not an overly religious person,” she said. “He’s already had one funeral; I think that should be sufficient.”
Well, that was that. I’d fulfilled Robyn’s orders to find out what Mrs. Washington wanted. The fact that I hadn’t learned anything to bring me any closer to knowing what had happened was, after all, my problem.
I was wondering if I should take my leave when she spoke up again.
“What other niches were disturbed?” she asked.
“Dolores Hagley, P. Jefferson Blair, Lacey Shiffley, Mrs. Van der Lynden, and a John Doe who was buried at Trinity for reasons I haven’t yet learned.” I watched her face as I recited the list of names, but she didn’t seem surprised by any of them.
“Then they’ll be dragging up that wretched robbery again.” Her face wore a look of … distaste? Nothing stronger, really.
“Seems likely,” I said. “Though I have no idea why anyone would kill anyone over a thirty-year-old crime.”
“Because they still haven’t found the jewelry.” Her voice was bitter, but it was an old, faded, well-used bitterness. “My husband was shunned and suspected for twenty years, thanks to her. Mrs. Van der Lynden, I mean. First she fired him. Then she tried to blame him for letting the robbers in. She even accused him of being in cahoots with them himself, when everyone knew it was her and that son of hers. The case may be thirty years old, but some of us are still living with the aftermath.”
“I’m so sorry to hear it,” I said.
“They say Henry Burke is a pretty good detective.”
“He is,” I said. “Though I’m not sure even he can solve a thirty-year-old cold case.”
“Particularly one that was so badly bungled from the start,” she said. “But he can try. Which is more than they did thirty years ago. Yes, I’m bitter,” she added, with a wry smile. “Tell me, will there be any difficulty with burying me beside Jim when my time comes?”
“No—why should there be?” The question surprised me, and not just because of the sudden shift in subject. “The niches are designed for two urns, you know.”
“I’m not technically Episcopalian,” she said. “Left the Catholic Church to marry Jim and never regularized things with your lot.”
“I’m not sure anyone would bother about that,” I said. “After all, your husband was Episcopalian. I don’t think anyone at Trinity would want to put you asunder.”
She smiled slightly at that.
“If you don’t mention it, I imagine everyone will just assume you are Episcopalian,” I went on. “I certainly won’t tell. If there’s nothing in the records, everyone will blame Dr. Womble. And remember that Trinity took in the John Doe who was found in our graveyard. We have no idea if he’s Episcopalian or not. For all we know, he could be an atheist.”
“I always wondered about that,” she said. “Wondered if someone actually knew who he was and told your minister. If that’s why he was taken in.”
“Not that I know of,” I said. “But it’s an interesting idea. I’ll ask Dr. Womble when I see him. Since he was the one who arranged to have the John Doe buried at Trinity, I’m considering him the next of kin, unless they manage to get a DNA match and figure out who he is.”
“I remember when they found that body,” she said. “Even after I heard no one recognized it, I kept hoping it would turn out to be young Archie—I think he was out by that time. Out after less than five years. I never thought that quite fair. Archie and his college friend get token sentences, and I bet the other two are still in prison.”
“One died there,” I said. “And the other was still there in December, when Fred Singer wrote his article about the thirtieth anniversary of the robbery.”
“I thought as much.”
“You said ‘everyone knew it was her and that son of hers,’” I began.
“That would be Mrs. Van der Lynden and Archie,” she said.
“So I assumed. But who do you mean by everyone?”
“The rest of the staff. We kept in touch with some of them even after Jim was fired. They all knew the truth.”
“That he was innocent?”
“And that she’d have thrown any one of them under the bus if Jim hadn’t been around to blame it on.”
“So who did the staff think was to blame?”
“They were all sure Mrs. Van der Lynden had set up the whole thing. Most of them were convinced she still had the jewelry. A few of them thought maybe Archie had screwed up—dropped the jewelry someplace, hidden it and forgot where, or maybe hidden it someplace so obvious that the real crooks found it. Want to know what Jim always said?”
I nodded.
“He said he bet Archie rowed out to the middle of the lake with the jewelry boxes and dropped them in. And then he cut a notch in the side of the boat so he’d remember where he dropped them.”
I was so unprepared for her to say anything even slightly humorous that it took me a few moments to recognize the old joke.
“Almost had you there,” she said, with a slight but genuine chuckle.
“Was there actually a lake?”
“And several boats, and Archie was almost that dim. But I think the insurance company had the lake dredged at some point.”
“Darn,” I said. “I guess I’ll take back the scuba gear I rented.”
Her mouth twitched in what I guessed was a fleeting smile.
“You work for Randall Shiffley, am I right?” she asked.
“That’s right.” Her sudden jumps from one topic to another were slightly disconcerting, but at least they kept me from being bored.
“Doing what?”
“Officially, special projects. Christmas in Caerphilly, the Un-Fair, things like that.”
“And unofficially?”
“Anything he wants done that isn’t getting done. Or isn’t getting done the way he wants it when he wants it.”
She smiled faintly.
“That’s good,” she said. “Randall’s father took Jim on when no one else in town would hire him. And Randall kept him on long past the point he could do the job, to keep us going until Jim was eligible for Social Security. It may not look like much”—she waved her hand to show that she meant the house around us—“but I wouldn’t have this much if not for them. They’re good people, those two. You tell Randall hello when you see him.”
“Will do.”
“What’s the procedure for going to visit Jim—once he’s back in the vault? I went over there once or twice, and the door was always locked. Don’t Episcopalians go in for visiting graves? Leaving wreaths?”
“Absolutely,” I said. “Just ask in the church office to borrow the key. We lock it up to prevent problems—vandalism, kids trying to spook each other, teenagers looking for privacy even in the least appropriate places—”
“Grave robbers,” she added.
“Especially them,” I agreed. “But mourners are always welcome.”
“That’s good to know. I was a little resentful the first time I found myself locked out. Now, I realize perhaps you were trying to prevent exactly what occurred last night.”
“I only wish we could have prevented that,” I said.
“Thank you. I know it’s distressing to everyone at Trinity.”
“Though not nearly as distressing as to the families whose loved ones were disturbed. We’ll be working with the chief to see if there’s anything we can do to improve security—without making it even harder for families to visit, of course.”
“Good.”
“And I won’t take up any more of your time,” I said. “Just let me know if you have any questions about what’s happening with Mr. Washington’s ashes.” I scribbled my cell phone number on a sheet of paper and handed it to her.
She took it, nodded, and set it in lone splendor on the otherwise empty coffee table. Then she saw me to the door and said good-bye with just a hint more warmth than she’d shown on my arrival.
Not exactly a people person, Mrs. Washington, I thought, as I returned to my car. And I still felt a certain nagging curiosity about her. Why? I paused for a moment to analyze the question. I didn’t exactly see her as a prime candidate for coshing elderly but tallish men over the head and using a crowbar to pry open niches. Of course, I could think of nothing to prove she hadn’t hidden the ring and the other jewels in her husband’s niche in the first place. But if they’d had the jewels all those years, they wouldn’t have needed the jobs that Randall and his father had provided. And she sounded genuinely grateful about that.
And I got the sense that if she knew who had the jewels, she’d almost certainly have told me—or the chief—in the hopes that it would provide posthumous vindication for her husband.
My nagging curiosity was probably just that. Curiosity. In fact, nosiness. I could think of no good reason to pry any further into poor Mrs. Washington’s sad, lonely life.
Especially since Mother could probably tell me everything I could possibly want to know if I later decided my curiosity had any useful purpose.
My stomach growled as if to remind me that my next stop was Robyn’s—where with any luck I could feast on the town’s bounty while calming down Robyn.
I was more optimistic about the feasting than the calming.