Instead of returning to the police station, Geof invited Ailey home with us. We fixed strong coffee, then retired to the redwood deck that was attached to the back of the house. It was too muggy to enjoy being outside, but it beat sitting on the floor in the living room. Wife Number Two, Melissa, had taken her furniture with her. Geof, expecting to sell faster than his realtor could manage, never replaced it. There were two kitchen stools, enough furniture for one bedroom and a few patio chairs.
Ailey, Geof and I chose the latter. We had to talk quietly. It was one of those subdivisions in which large houses are jammed as close together as apartments and in which trees are considered natural enemies to that friend of civilization, the bulldozer.
“The course to take now,” Geof told us, “is to concentrate on the points of connection between McGee and Reich. They were members of the same platoon in Nam.” He ticked the points off on his angers. “They were connected, whether purposely or not, by Reich’s scheme for going AWOL. Connected by their pursuit of a share of Lobster’s estate; by having lived in Springfield, Illinois; and now by murder. Anything I’ve missed?”
His investigative subordinates shook their heads.
“All right,” he continued. “We should be able to draw lines between all those points of connection and make a picture out of it. Now”—he shifted in the webbed chair—“what about the fire at the harbor, and the vandalism of Goose Shattuck’s property? What about the charges of racism, and Webster Helms’ idea that somebody is trying to prevent the construction of Liberty Harbor? Are those connections we should include in our picture?”
Mason leaned forward and spoke carefully. “You always tell me to keep my eye on the ball. And it looks like the ball we need to watch is murder. Not arson, not vandalism. They might be connected to the murders, but they might not. I think I’d keep my eye on those points you listed, the ones between the two men who were killed,” He looked up quickly, then back down at the redwood floor.
“It would be different,” I contributed, “if it were only the members of my committee who might have killed Atheneum. That would seem to connect the whole thing irrefutably to Liberty Harbor. But that second door opens to . . . practically anybody.”
“It’s important to keep in mind,” Geof said, “that Reich’s murder may have been an accident. At least in the sense that the person who tampered with his brakes had no way of knowing for sure it would kill him.”
Mason snorted. “You can’t say the same about McGee’s death.”
We had not turned on the deck lights, but in the darkness I could sense Geof’s smile, “No, It’s unlikely that somebody tripped into McGee’s back with that cross.”
“The cross was in the sanctuary, right?” asked Mason.
“Propped against the pulpit,” Geof replied.
“Against the back of the pulpit,” I reminded him. “When Barbara got up to speak, she moved it there, remember? So it was kind of out of sight, I guess somebody came in, picked it up, then walked into the choir room. How many ways are there into the sanctuary?”
“How many petals in a peony?” Geof said gloomily. The figure of speech was so unlikely for the man that Mason and I exchanged glances and laughed. Again, I sensed Geof’s smile in the shadows. He said, “One double door to the center aisle, two side doors to the side aisles, the choir room door, a backdoor for the organist, a side door on the west wall for latecomers to the service, and for all I know a trapdoor under the pulpit and a stairway to heaven in the roof.”
“There’s another possibility,” I said slowly, having just thought of it. “We’re assuming the murderer came into the sanctuary from outside, picked up the cross, then entered the choir room. Isn’t it also possible that he went into the sanctuary from the choir room and then returned to it?”
“Yes,” Geof said, “it is.”
“Can I have some more coffee?” Ailey inquired.
“Help yourself,” I suggested, and he got up from his chair to do that. “Why don’t you bring the pot back with you, Ailey, and we’ll plug it in out here?”
When he was gone from the deck, Geof said softly, “I’ll have to go back to the station tonight.”
“I know.”
“It’s been a long time, Jenny.”
“I know that, too.”
“Somehow,” he said, “it seems morally indefensible that murder should take precedence over making love to the one I love.”
“There’s your motive.” I got up and walked over to him in the darkness. “Somebody wants to keep us apart.” I leaned down to kiss the top of his head, then his forehead, then the bridge of his nose, the space between his nose and his upper lip, one cheek, the other cheek, the point of his chin . . .
He grabbed my face in both of his hands and placed my lips, finally, on his. “Tease,” he whispered. “You’re such a tease.” He pulled me down on his lap. My back pressed uncomfortably against the metal armrests of the patio chair. “Don’t tease me about love and marriage, Jenny.”
“I wouldn’t do that.”
“Make up your mind, please. We’ve had our experiment in living together without benefit of matrimony. And it’s been fun, all right, but so are amusement parks and I wouldn’t want to live in one. Even this place . . .”—his arm swept the deck—“it’s just a halfway house between my last wife and you.”
“I thought we weren’t going to talk about this yet.”
“How can I buy furniture until I know if you’re going to sit in it, too? I want to go shopping for furniture, for God’s sake, with you! I want to get the hell out of this temporary shelter for the inadvertently single and . . .”
“My state of singleness is not entirely inadvertent, Geof. Neither, I think you would admit, is yours.”
“Don’t interrupt me when I’m twisting the facts to my own purpose.” He kissed a curve of my neck, sending goosebumps down to my groin. “I want a third chance at marriage, Jenny. Just think how you’ll benefit from all the experience I’ve gained with the first two wives. I made my mistakes with them, and God, knows they corrected a multitude of my faults. You can have me as I am now . . . perfect.”
I giggled.
“Kiss me there again, please,” I requested.
He did, murmuring into my clavicle, “I want to move out of this house and into a house of our own.”
“Ted’s your realtor,” I said gently. “You’d better talk to him about that. It’s not my indecision that keeps this house on the market.”
“Come on, Jenny.” Suddenly he was impatient. “We can afford to support two houses if we have to; hell! at one time I was paying the mortgage on this one, and part of the rent for both Melissa and Roberta.”
“Oh Geof, that’s the most depressing thing you’ve ever said. If I were your sister instead of your lover, and I told you I wanted to marry a man who was twice divorced, what would you say to me?”
“Talk about depressing,” he said, and slumped back in the chair. His grip on me loosened, as if the tension had evaporated from his muscles.
I jumped off his lap so he could get to the damned thing.
“Ailey,” he called. The young detective came through the back door with the coffee pot in one hand and his own mug in the other. “Call the station, will you, Ailey? See what they want from me.”
Mason wheeled again, taking pot and mug with him.
I reclaimed my chair.
We sat in the darkness waiting for Ailey. It was not a particularly companionable silence.
“Geof.” Ailey had forgotten to lower his voice. “They’ve got him! Those damned vigilantes have caught somebody vandalizing the harbor! It might be our man.”
Geof rose quickly and made for the door.
“Uh.” Mason blocked his way into the lighted kitchen. “We have to take her.”
“Me?”
“Jenny?”
“Yeah.” Even in the dim light from the kitchen I could see the suspicion in Mason’s eyes. “The suspect says he won’t talk to anybody until he sees Jennifer Cain.”