Рита Браун - The Purrfect Murder

“Anyone other than you interested in guns?”

“Not that I know of. Golf was the big sport. You don’t need to be entirely sober to play golf, but you’d better damned well be sober if you have a firearm in your hands.”

“Where do you think it all went wrong?”

“Will was attracted to Linda,” he named his first wife, “and she returned the compliment. If you’ve ever seen photographs of Linda, you know she is a knockout. Always will be. Her vanity will ensure that. I was accustomed to men wanting her. I just wasn’t accustomed to her wanting them back.” He paused a moment and then gallantly referred to his current wife. “Mind you, Babs is no slouch.” He folded his hands together. “You want to know the secret of happiness? Marry the right woman.”

“I did.” Rick smiled.

The two men relaxed for a moment.

“Lucky us.” Harvey smiled back.

“How did you find out about them?”

“She told me.”

Rick hadn’t expected that. “She did?”

Harvey threw up his hands. “Oh, I’d caught her in some lame excuses about staying out late. She fessed up. I’ll give her points for honesty.”

“Did you confront Will?”

“Damned straight I did. He lied through his teeth. Affected shock, then hurt, then anger. Quite the performance.”

“How long did your marriage last after that?”

“About two minutes.”

“Given the size of the medical community in this county, the various fund-raisers for disease cures, you must have run into Will and Benita a lot.”

“I did. I was polite. I am a Virginian, after all.”

“A special breed,” Rick sardonically added, since he, too, was one.

“No point in making everyone around you uncomfortable. Babs likes Benita. Well, who doesn’t? Obviously, they weren’t close.”

“How’d you meet Babs?”

“Blind date, would you believe it? At the end of the date—she lived in D.C. then, and I’d drive up to go to the Kennedy Center with her—well, anyway, she looked at me and said, ”You’re not the first man to be betrayed by his wife and best friend. If you stay bitter, they win.“ I drove all the way back to Charlottesville furious. I mean bullshit mad. I got up the next morning and I was going to call her and tell her just what I thought about that statement. When I heard her voice on the line, I knew she was right. I asked her out. Any woman sensitive to me that way, telling me the truth, I wanted to know her.”

“And Will?”

“He knew better than to cast one sidelong glance at her. I swear I would have killed him, and I know I’m under suspicion now.”

“Harvey, did it ever occur to you that Linda lied to you?”

“Why?” His eyes grew larger, since it never had once crossed his mind.

“Some women like to hurt men, like power over us. Maybe she was one of them. She wanted to hurt you.”

As this sunk in, Harvey breathed deeply, then said, “She richly succeeded, but I’m grateful. I found the right woman, and she gave me a daughter who is truly the joy of my life.”

“You never could forgive Will, assuming Linda told you the truth?”

“No. Betrayal is betrayal. Maybe someone else could forgive, but I couldn’t.” He folded his hands together. “In time the wound healed. Scar faded. It’s still there, but I don’t much notice it.”

“You had motive and the skill to kill him.”

“Why do you say that?”

“One clean shot straight through the heart.”

“An easy death.” Harvey struggled with conflicting emotions. “So be it.”

“Did you kill Will?”

“No. Wouldn’t it have made sense for me to kill him a long time ago?”

“Revenge is a dish best served cold.”

7

The rain continued, slackening at times only to pick up again. Harry, frustrated since she wanted to paint the tack room in the barn, decided to clean out the trunks in the center aisle. She no sooner opened the first one by the tack room than she closed it.

“It’s too damp.” She looked at Mrs. Murphy, Pewter, Tucker, all looking up at her. “Let’s make a run for it.”

“Use the umbrella.” Pewter didn’t like getting wet.

“The one in the tack room?” Tucker asked.

“Yes,” Pewter said.

“Has holes in it,” Mrs. Murphy answered.

“Then why doesn’t she throw it out?” Frustrated, Pewter walked to the end of the barn, knowing she’d be drenched by the time she reached the porch door.

Tucker laughed. “Pewter, you know Harry never throws out anything.”

“What can anyone do with a Swiss cheese umbrella?” the gray cat wondered.

“She’ll convince herself that the silk can be cut up and used to patch things.” Mrs. Murphy jumped back as a gust of wind sent rain inside the large open double doors.

“You might want to wait,” Tucker advised Harry, who had jumped back also.

“Know what? Let’s sit in the tack room until the worst of this passes.”

Before the sentence was completed, all three animals rushed to the tack room.

Once inside the cozy little place—its odor of cleaned leather was pleasing to Harry—she knelt down to turn the dial on the small wall heater.

“Chill in the air.” Pewter snuggled on a lambskin saddle pad.

“September can fool you.” Harry dropped into the director’s chair by the old desk.

The phone, an old wall unit, rang. Harry picked it up, smiling when she heard Miranda Hogendobber’s voice. The two had worked together for years at the post office.

“Harry, what are you doing?”

“Waiting out the rain in the tack room.”

The older woman’s voice was warm. “Going to be a long wait. I called to see how you’re doing. Haven’t seen you at all this week.”

“Busy as cat’s hair.” Harry smiled as Mrs. Murphy hopped onto her lap. “What about you?”

“Pretty much like you. Not enough hours in the day.” She paused. “I liked it better when we saw each other Monday through Friday.”

“Me, too.”

“Isn’t it awful about Will Wylde? I can’t believe it.”

“It’s a shock, but I’m starting to think evil is the norm and good is unusual.”

Miranda paused. “Oh, I hope not, but people have changed. They’ll say and do things we would never have done way back in my day.”

“True enough, but I expect even then there were murderers, cranks. You just didn’t have twenty-four-hour media to inundate you. Actually, I think coverage encourages more crime. Just sets nutcases right off. They become antiheroes.” Harry noticed a mouse pop out from behind the tack trunk up against the wall, the one containing her special coolers. “I haven’t seen the news or read the paper today. Spent the morning at a vestry-board meeting. Anything new?”

“No. Mim’s in a tiz.” Miranda mentioned her old friend, Big Mim Sanburne, a very wealthy and imperious resident of Crozet.

Although only a size 4, Mim was called Big because her daughter—same name—was called Little.

Many whispered “the Queen of Crozet” behind Big Mim’s back.

“About Will?”

“She can’t stand things like that. I know there are times when she can pluck my last nerve, but she does have a strong sense of justice. She’s been on the phone canvassing everyone since she found out.”

“What does she think she’ll find that Rick won’t?”

“She believes people will tell her things they might not tell the sheriff, especially other women.” Miranda summed up Big Mim’s thoughts.

“She has a point there,” Harry conceded.

“And the other thing is, she’s furious at Little Mim, so furious she won’t speak to her.”

This past summer Little Mim had married a male model, Blair Bainbridge. Her mother spent a small fortune on her daughter’s exquisite wedding, a second marriage at that, and she expected obedience. But then, Mim expected obedience from everyone.