A Star-Spangled Murder Read online

  “We’ve met,” Susan said. Apparently Titania’s mother was too distracted to ask when and where—if she cared.

  “Where are your sisters?” Tricia asked, putting her arm around her oldest child. “I hope they haven’t wandered off. I need to speak with you all.”

  “Theresa and Tierney are waiting for you—in the kitchen,” their older sister explained. “They’re baking cookies. Chocolate chip.”

  Tricia hurried away.

  “I thought it would be best if they were kept busy,” Titania explained quietly to Susan. “They didn’t like Humphrey—we all hated him—but this is still going to be upsetting. You know?”

  “I know.” Susan thought it was going to be more than upsetting if they didn’t find the murderer fairly quickly—or if it turned out to be someone the girls knew, someone they cared about. “This is beautiful woodwork,” Susan said, trying to keep the tone light and motioning to the soaring gull carved into the door.

  “My father found a woodworker who carved all the doors for him. Daddy designed all three of them; there are seals and starfish and sea urchins on the other two. But the best thing is the mantel in the living room. It’s fabulous—everyone says so. It has the family history carved right into it.”

  “I’d like to see that,” Susan said absently. They were entering the house now, and she thought she heard voices other than those of Titania’s sisters—women’s voices that seemed to be coming toward them from down a spiraling stairway at the end of the large flagstone entryway where they stood.

  “Oh Gawd.” Titania looked horrified. “They’re here. I thought they were going for a ride on the mail boat this morning.” She gave Susan a desperate look. “We have to keep them occupied. They shouldn’t be around when Mom tells my sisters about all this. Please help me, Mrs. Henshaw.”

  “What do you want me to do?” The voices were getting louder; there was little time for questions.

  “Ahhh …” Titania looked around as though expecting to find the answer to that question emblazoned across the pristine white walls. “Get them out of here. Take them someplace. They were talking about going for a hike in the national park this afternoon.… Please,” she added, “it’s very, very important.”

  Susan didn’t understand the urgency, but she decided to do what she could to help the girl. When the two women followed their voices into the room, she was ready to introduce herself. “Hi!” She sounded unusually perky even to her own ears. “I’m Susan Henshaw. I have the next cottage down the cove.”

  “Oh? The little gray one?” This was said by the shorter of the two women, a shapely redhead.

  “This is Mrs. Briane. Judy Briane,” Titania identified the woman. She was wearing turquoise silk capri pants, a creamy silk man-tailored shirt, silver metallic sandals, and a small fortune in Navaho jewelry. She didn’t look at home on the Maine coast, but she looked spectacular. And her tone of voice matched her first question about Susan’s cottage. Judy Briane might be short, but that didn’t prevent her from looking down on people.

  “And this is Sally Harter,” Titania continued. Unlike her companion, Sally’s clothing was exactly what one would expect to find on the Maine coast. Except that everything she wore was brand-new, still bearing the imprint of the plastic bags in which it was sold. “Mrs. Henshaw knows all about Acadia National Park. She can probably answer all your questions,” Titania continued, talking to Sally Harter while she and Susan shook hands. “I’ll go get that trail map like I promised, and you can do it right now.” And, without waiting for an adult response, Titania ran from the room.

  “Did I leave those maps in the kitchen?” Sally Harter wondered aloud.

  “They’re on the desk in the living room. She’s probably just going to see that animal she likes so much,” Judy Briane suggested, not bothering to change her tone of voice. Or possibly she was only capable of sarcasm? Susan wondered.

  Sally seemed to hesitate, perhaps unsure what to do. “I do know something about the trails in the park,” Susan assured her. “I’ve been hiking there since I was a child. In fact, we were planning on heading up Precipice this afternoon,” she lied, hoping Kathleen was up to the hike.

  “Really? Who’s we?” Sally asked, leading the way to the two-story living room.

  While Sally Harter looked over the pile of pamphlets and maps on a tiny cherry desk in one corner of the room and Judy Briane collapsed onto a large red leather couch as though too tired to live, Susan looked around. The massive stone chimney with its carved wood mantel dominated the room, even drawing attention away from the view, which was spectacular. Birch logs were piled high on heavy iron andirons which Susan recognized as the work of an island blacksmith. The carved mantelpiece would have to wait for closer examination. A handwoven rug lay on the floor, and a mobile flew from a crossbeam near the ceiling. And, except for the couch, the desk in the corner, and a half dozen cheap wicker chairs, the room was completely empty. No pictures on the walls, no shelves, no books, nothing.

  “Ted believes that each piece of furniture should be chosen carefully over time—so everything will be perfect,” Judy Briane explained in a bored voice, apparently having noticed Susan’s examination of the room.

  “Found it!” Sally announced, not giving Susan time to respond to the other woman. “Now, let’s see. You said Precipice trail. Right?”

  “Yes. We climb it every year.” Susan moved a little closer to the window while speaking.

  “And you’re all going up this afternoon?”

  “Yes.” Susan stopped for a moment. “Well, no. My family isn’t up here yet. But a friend is with me, and we’re going to hike together.” Susan was so busy watching out the window that she didn’t see what was coming, and before she knew it, she had agreed that Sally and Judy should join them for the long trek. She would have preferred to do something that required spending less time with these two women, but she had promised Titania. In fact, she had enthusiastically endorsed Sally’s suggestion before she knew what she was doing. She would have been more careful of her time and more selective of her companions if she hadn’t been wondering what Titania was heaving into the ocean.

  Three hours later, Susan and Kathleen were in Acadia National Park gazing up at Champlain Mountain from the parking lot at its base. In the distance, they could barely make out hikers climbing to the mountain’s summit.

  “You do this every year?” Kathleen sounded doubtful.

  “Every year when the peregrine falcons aren’t nesting—the trail is closed then.”

  “I wonder where our fellow hikers are,” Kathleen said, leaning back against the trunk of Susan’s Jeep. “The last time I saw them, they were right behind us.”

  “They pulled off back at Jordan Pond House. I was watching in my rearview mirror. I assumed that they had to use the bathroom since we ate lunch less than an hour ago.”

  “Only an hour? I thought it was more than that!” After two days together, Kathleen’s answer didn’t come as much of a surprise to Susan. She reached into the back of her car and pulled out a navy day pack bearing the logo of the Audubon Society. “I picked up some munchies at the grocery and made a thermos of hot coffee so we can have a snack at the top.”

  Kathleen smiled. “Great! Hey, isn’t that Sally’s car?” she asked as a white BMW pulled into the lot.

  “It’s about time. I wonder where they’ve been,” Susan said, slamming her car door and locking it.

  “Hi! We didn’t keep you waiting, did we?” Judy asked, getting out of the car. She had a bigger smile on her face than Susan had seen there before. “We found this wonderful gift shop and I just had to buy some pillows for my daybed in the study. They’re hand-stenciled—not tacky tourist stuff.”

  “We have been waiting,” Kathleen said. Susan admired her lack of tact.

  Her comment was ignored. Both women were staring up at the mountain. “Are you sure we can just walk up that thing? I saw some kids in hiking boots with ropes and stuff going down the road.…”
Sally began.

  “That was a group from Outward Bound. They’re learning technical climbing. This is nothing like that,” Susan assured them. “This is a hike, not a climb. The worst that might happen is slipping on a rock and twisting an ankle.” (She glanced at everyone’s choice of footwear. She had been very definite about the need for boots or sturdy hiking shoes, so she didn’t feel guilty about the slipperlike things Judy wore.) “Come on,” she urged. “Chrissy was going up and down this trail when she was three years old.” She hoped to get the women past the large warning sign at the beginning of the ascent. She wasn’t sure, but she thought that there was some mention of past fatalities on this, the steepest trail in the park.

  “How long is the hike?” Kathleen asked.

  Susan wondered if she was anxious to get to the snack. “It depends on how fast we walk. Chad once made it down to the bottom in thirty minutes. Of course, going up is longer.” She didn’t mention that Chad had run down the trail and that she and Jed, going their fastest to keep up, had taken over an hour. Information like that wouldn’t encourage her companions—nor would the knowledge that there were dozens of metal ladders and rungs placed in outcroppings of rock to prevent climbers from falling into large boulder fields below.

  “Well, the sooner we start, the sooner we’ll be finished,” Sally said logically, lifting a tan leather pack from the backseat of her car and slinging it over her shoulder. Susan could see that it was stuffed full. More lunch?

  “So let’s start.” Judy was less well equipped, although a pair of very expensive German binoculars hung from a cord around her neck.

  Susan hastily finished locking her car and trotted after the other women. Fortunately a large group of young people was huddled around the illustrated sign at the bottom of the trail, and apparently no one thought there was any reason to delay their start and wait to read it. They started up the trail, Susan in the lead following the red splashes of paint.

  Half an hour later she was at the rear of the group, actively discussing various islands with Sally in an attempt to pretend that she didn’t mind not being able to keep up with Kathleen and Judy (inappropriate shoes and all).

  Another hour had passed before she was sitting on the top of the mountain. Unlike those less fortunate than herself, she had managed to reach the peak without breaking anything other than all the nails on her left hand and the skin of her knee. “At least I’ve got the food.” She forced a smile to her face and started to pull the backpack off her shoulders.

  “Oh, we’ve already eaten,” Sally said.

  “But we were so hungry that we ate up everything we brought. Kathleen said that you had your own snack,” Judy added. “What did you bring? We’ve had fresh cream cheese on some zucchini bread that Sally made, gingersnaps, peaches, and white wine.”

  “I brought coffee, apples, gorp, and lemon drops,” Susan said. “It’s what we always bring on Precipice.”

  “Traditions are so nice,” Kathleen offered, but she had the grace to look embarrassed. “And Susan’s family has been climbing in the park for years.”

  Susan thought that Kathleen was straining for enthusiasm just a bit. She bit into an apple rather defiantly. There was a worm trail through the white flesh. “Some view, isn’t it?” she asked.

  “Sure is,” Sally agreed enthusiastically. “Everything in Maine is beautiful. We’ve been having a great time ever since we arrived at the Taylors’. I just wish Trish had come with us. She really could have left those girls alone. Sometimes she’s so overprotective!”

  “Can you blame her?” Judy asked. “Just think how terribly they’ve been acting since the divorce. I’ve never heard of anything like it. You’d think no one had ever had divorced parents—or that Humphrey is some sort of monster.”

  “I think—” Sally began, glancing at Susan and Kathleen.

  “Every store we go into seems to have people standing around talking about Trish and Humphrey and the girls! I think there are a lot of silly rumors flying around the island, and it’s time they were stopped,” Judy insisted, not waiting to hear her friend’s opinion.

  “There might be good reason to keep everything quiet,” Sally said.

  “If you’re talking about those death threats, you can just sit back and relax. No one is going to kill Humphrey Taylor.”

  Susan was so startled by Judy’s assertion that she could only stare. Kathleen was less intimidated. “Exactly who said anything about murdering Humphrey Taylor?” she asked quickly.

  “I don’t think we should talk about this,” Sally insisted loudly enough for a couple of young hikers to glance nervously in their direction.

  “I think you should,” Susan said, putting away her snack uneaten. “If you don’t want to tell us, you could speak with Janet Shapiro—she’s the official law enforcement on the island. You see, Humphrey Taylor has been murdered.”

  Neither woman said anything, although Sally opened her mouth, glanced at Judy, and shut it again.

  “Mr. Taylor is being identified by his brother Ted—”

  Susan’s explanation was interrupted by Judy Briane. “Exactly how do you know this?” she asked.

  “I was with Janet Shapiro when she left to find Ted Taylor. And there’s no doubt that Humphrey was murdered,” Susan continued.

  “How did it happen?” Sally asked quietly.

  “Apparently he was hit on the head with a heavy object,” Susan answered, deciding not to tell more than necessary.

  “How Agatha Christie,” was Judy’s only comment.

  “When …” Sally began.

  “Yesterday probably,” Kathleen answered the unasked question.

  “I don’t understand why you two know about it—about the murder. You don’t have anything to do with the Taylors, do you?” Sally asked.

  “Mr. Taylor’s body was found in Susan’s living room,” Kathleen explained.

  “He was killed at your house? What was he doing there?” Judy asked.

  “We don’t kno—”

  “He may not have been killed where he was found,” Kathleen interrupted Susan.

  Susan glanced at her gratefully. She was more interested in the reactions of the two women. Or, more honestly, Judy’s cool response. Of course, she reminded herself, they could be only casual friends of the Taylors’, the type of people you might invite for a visit to your summer home, hoping to become closer. But, naturally, where there was a murder, there were questions to be asked, relationships to be investigated.

  Except, she reminded herself, this had nothing to do with her. These people weren’t friends or even acquaintances. They were only the people who had moved in next door, people who couldn’t keep their dead bodies to themselves.

  “We must get back to Tricia.” Judy wasn’t going to pussyfoot around. “I’d never have left her if I had known the pain she must be going through. How long will it take to get back down this damn mountain?” She glared at Susan. “And no more stories about your family—please!”

  FIVE

  Arriving home, Susan was surprised to find Titania perched on the steps leading to her front porch, a fluffy golden retriever by her side.

  “Good,” Kathleen said, spying a large box on the old wicker table standing in the middle of the porch. “There are the doughnuts we bought yesterday. I’m starving.”

  “That shouldn’t be a problem,” Susan said, greeting Titania. “You bought at least two of each kind the bakery makes.”

  “There were lots,” Titania agreed cheerfully. “But I’m afraid Karma ate them. I hope she doesn’t get sick. Sugar isn’t good for her.”

  “Karma?” Kathleen repeated the word as a question. Susan, looking closely, saw that the dog had chocolate glaze on her whiskers.

  “I’m sorry. She jumped up and grabbed them off the table before I was halfway up the stairs. This dog eats everything. She’s always stealing food at home. Mom says she’s a thief!” But Titania made the accusations in a loving voice as she caressed the animal’s he
ad, pulling the fur back from intelligent and satisfied brown eyes.

  “The dog’s name is Karma?” Susan guessed.

  “Yes,” Titania said. “She’s only a baby—just six months old. My father gave her to me for my birthday. He named her. He said she would bring me good luck.”

  “She’s beautiful,” Kathleen said, reaching down to pet the animal.

  “Isn’t she rather large for a retriever?” Susan asked.

  “She’s a big golden.” Titania was obviously ready to defend her precious pet against any slights. “Her grandfather was a champion.”

  “How nice,” Susan commented, although she had noticed that owners were always saying that there was a champion somewhere in their pet’s background. Either there were a lot of champions or a few dogs were awfully busy.

  “My father says dogs are the aristocrats of the animal world,” Titania insisted, hugging Karma.

  “That’s possible. I don’t know much about dogs,” Susan admitted.

  “But you like Karma, don’t you, Mrs. Henshaw?” the girl asked.

  Sensing that the correct answer was important, Susan offered a polite lie. “She’s a beautiful dog. It would be impossible not to like her.”

  “That’s great!” Titania leapt up, startling the dog, who fled in circles around the porch. “We have to go home. I told my mother I’d take care of my little sisters this afternoon. She has to go to Blue Hill to make arrangements for the body or something. Oh, and my father is at the house. He wants to talk to you—he said it wouldn’t take long. You’ll come over, won’t you?”

  “Sure she will,” Kathleen said. “I’m going to go into town and do some shopping. You were saying that you wanted to spend the afternoon just getting the house ready for the summer, remember?” Kathleen reminded Susan.

  “Okay …”

  “My dad will only take a few minutes. Please come. Please.”

  Susan, surprised by the desperation in Titania’s voice, agreed to follow her to the point on the cove. She dumped her backpack on the porch, pulled Karma away from it, and headed out with the girl and her pet. They didn’t talk much on the way, Susan preoccupied with questions about the murder but not wanting to interrogate Titania, who was kept busy pulling mushrooms, branches, moss, and broken seashells from her dog’s mouth.