Valerie Malmont: Death, Snow, and Mistletoe

“I think it is something serious. Remember at dinner, when Uncle Zeke drank from Greta's glass by mistake?”

She nodded. “Sure. So?”

“So, it's been nagging at my subconscious ever since. Then, while we were singing, it came to me.”

“What came to you? For Pete's sake, Tori. You're not making any sense.”

“Give me a minute, Ginnie.” My voice sounded curt, even to me. “I'm sorry. What I'm trying to say is it made me think about Bernice drinking poison from the Goblet of Life.”

“And…”

“And I suddenly thought maybe her death was really a mistake.”

“You mean you think the poison got into the cup by accident?”

I shook my head. “No. I mean I think someone put the poison in the cup intentionally, but then the wrong person drank it.”

“That hardly seems possible, Tori.”

“That's what I thought, too, but when Uncle Zeke and Greta talked about him drinking Greta's juice, it made me recall the first rehearsal I attended. And I remembered it wasn't Bernice who drank from the Goblet of Life-it was Oretta.”

Ginnie's eyes widened. “You're right. I remember that now.”

“At the break, Bernice went up to Oretta and started to argue with her. I didn't stick around to listen, but I'll bet Bernice was reminding Oretta that according to the script she was the one who was supposed to drink from the goblet.”

“But the killer didn't know that,” Ginnie said.

“Right. Oretta got carried away by the moment at rehearsal and drank the stuff by mistake. The killer must have decided right then that he could kill Oretta by putting poison in the cup.”

“Only at the dress rehearsal, Bernice drank from the cup as she was supposed to and got the poison meant for Oretta.”

“Right.” My mind was in high gear now. “When the killer realized he'd murdered the wrong woman, he had to revise his plan-he paid a late-night visit to Oretta, shot her, and started the fire to hide the crime.”

Ginnie picked up a Santa Claus snow globe from the coffee table, shook it, and watched the miniature snow fall for a minute. “You could be on to something,” she said. “But there's something wrong with your scenario. Two things, actually.”

“What?”

She put the snow globe down. “The killer must have known that an autopsy would reveal that Oretta had been shot.”

“Of course. There had to be another reason he set the fire.” I realized Ginnie had said there were two things wrong with my interpretation. “Help me, Ginnie. What else have I come up with that's offtrack?”

“It's just that you keep referring to the killer as he. It could be a woman!”

“Excuse me,” I said with a hint of sarcasm in my voice, “if I wasn't politically correct. I referred to the killer by the masculine gender out of convenience. Actually, I have given some thought to him-or her-being a woman.”

“Really? Who?”

“Weezie Clopper for one. But don't you breathe a word to anyone, or I'll deny I ever said it.”

“Weezie? Why?”

“She had a grudge against Bernice and even sent her one of her poison-pen letters. But if I'm right about the intended victim being Oretta, then that rules Weezie out.”

“Weezie and her husband had a feud going with Matavious and Oretta about the Clopper land,” Ginnie pointed out. “I've always heard that to find a murderer you should look at the money angle.”

“True. But Oretta really wasn't involved. The land was inherited by Matavious, and he held the title in his name. Killing Oretta wouldn't stop the sale.” I stood up. “I'm going to go home, fix myself a cup of tea, and think about this some more. I'm sure something will come to me.”

“Do you want me to come with you? Two heads are usually better than one.”

“No, thanks, Ginnie. I need to be alone.”

By the front door, I thrust my feet into my boots while Greta tried to keep me from leaving. “It's so early. We still have the scavenger hunt to do, and Santa will be arriving by sleigh in about an hour.”

“Something's come up,” I told her. “I really have to go.”

She hugged me. “Drive carefully,” she said, opening the front door.

As if I had a choice. “Thanks for inviting me.” The windblown snow hid the fields around the farmhouse from my vision. I stood at the top of the porch steps for a moment and pulled the hood of my quilted jacket over my hair. Behind me, I heard Greta call out, “Okay, kids, it's pinata time!”

The door clicked shut, and I wanted to go back in, to the place where everybody was happy and warm and having fun, but I knew I couldn't. There were pieces of the puzzle to be put together, and I needed to be alone to do it.

In some places, the snow had drifted up to my knees.

It slid inside my ankle-high boots and turned my toes into ice cubes. The wind gusted so strongly I had to cling to the trucks parked along the driveway to keep from blowing over until I finally reached Garnet's truck. Although I was worried about the battery, it started up right away and I moved out onto the main road, saying a little prayer of thanks to the inventor of the four-wheel drive.

The roads were not as bad as I'd expected. Judging from the drifts of snow on the shoulders, the snowplows had been through at least once. But driving was still difficult, and sensible people were sitting out the storm in their homes.

When, at long last, I drove through the gateway of the Moon Lake development, I was struck by the total darkness around me. Black clouds above obscured the moon, and there was no light at all coming from any of the mansions’ windows.

Power failure! Thankfully, I'd prepared for the worst.

I lit several candles and greeted the cats, who showed me they were very glad I was home by leaning up against me and meowing pitifully.

“I thought you guys could see in the dark,” I said as I stroked them. “A power failure shouldn't bother you at all.”

When they'd been soothed by a handful of Tasty Tabby Treats I went upstairs and stripped off my green velvet skirt. It had seen me through many a winter party in New York, but one Pennsylvania farm Christmas had done it in. Oh, well, I thought, dropping the soggy thing in the trash, it was time for a new Christmas outfit. Comfortably dressed in a warm sweatsuit, I joined the cats downstairs.

Although the house was heated by oil, the thermostat was electrically controlled, so the temperature was dropping rapidly. The cats helped me prepare a fire by batting crumpled newspapers around the front parlor while I tossed match after match into the fireplace. Once it finally caught, I felt as proud as if I were Daniel Boone. My first fire!

The ringing of the telephone startled me. I'd assumed if the power was off, the phone would be out of commission, too. Cassie's voice cut through the static. “Tori, I've been trying to reach you all evening. I finally got through to the sheriff's office in Jasper, Texas.”

“What did you find out?”

“Not a whole lot. The sheriff said he remembered the Douglas murder-suicide very well because it was his first case as a deputy. He said the saddest part of it all for him was seeing what happened to Eugenia after her parents died.”

“What happened?”

“There were no relatives to take her in. So she was placed with a foster family. The worst happened there. She was physically and sexually abused for at least six months before anybody found out.”

“That's awful.”

“It was. He said she was so traumatized that she had to be institutionalized.”

“Forever?”

“No. After about six months, she was adopted by an out-of-state family. He never heard any more about her.”

“Can the family be traced?”

“He says it can't. I guess we'll never be able to let her know about her brother's body being found.”