A Veiled Deception Page 17

  Whoa. Jasmine and the cake lady had come to Mystic around the same time?

  Was there a connection?

  Twenty-four

  Fashion is gentility running away from vulgarity and afraid of being overtaken.—WILLIAM HAZLITT

  Werner went back to searching the sewing room, probing and examining objects while I got ready to fit Sherry.

  “I’ll bet the news of your sister’s engagement to Vancortland the Fifth hit every society page in the country, knowing Mrs. Vancortland.”

  “I’ll take that bet. I saw it myself in the New York papers, and though Deborah was never fond of Sherry, she certainly shouted that engagement far and wide.”

  “Well,” Werner said, “she hadn’t met Jasmine yet. And methinks the lady likes publicity.” He pointed to a framed newspaper clipping of Deborah’s wedding announcement on the wall.

  I hadn’t noticed that before. Was Deborah trying to impress an old ghost? I wondered. “Deborah likes publicity, but not gossip.”

  “You were right; she isn’t in mourning.” Werner took a book from the shelf. “If you ask me, she seems relieved—”

  We locked gazes, mine of surprise and Lytton’s of regret, probably for his slip. Could Deborah be the killer? “Lytton, what are you really looking for?”

  “You know I can’t discuss an open case.”

  “But I helped you. Does it have anything to do with the picture of Deborah and Mrs. Updike together as girls? Because that tip came from me, don’t forget.”

  “For that, I thank you; great lead, which is more than I should say. Have you learned anything else that might help?”

  “Oh, so I can share with you, but you can’t share with me?”

  He shrugged. “We’re both trying to free your sister of suspicion. Isn’t that enough?”

  “You got me, but all I have is homegrown gossip.”

  He sighed. “I’ve had Mystick Falls gossip to my arm-pits. Why don’t you leave the investigating to us?”

  “In case you hadn’t noticed, my sister got screwed out of a mother, and preparing for her wedding should be the happiest time of her life. Sherry needs to catch a break here.”

  “You did good by her, Mad, mother-wise.”

  “I’m your thorn and you’re being nice to me. I don’t know how to deal. Cut it out. Anyway, I want her to have the wedding of—” I sighed. “Deborah’s dreams.”

  Werner chuckled. “Mrs. Vancortland is a force to be reckoned with.”

  “Why, thank you, Detective,” Deborah said, walking in on us. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  Humble and dense.

  She put her arm through Werner’s. “Tea is being served in the drawing room, but it’s being delivered to your men on the job, assuming they’re not allowed to stop ransacking. We hoped you’d join us, Detective. Madeira?” She offered me her other arm.

  “No, thanks, really.”

  Werner gave me a “help me” look as Deborah escorted him out the door. He probably only acquiesced for a chance to grill Deborah, who’d loved Jasmine one minute and forgot she existed the next.

  I jotted down the date of Deborah’s wedding, embossed in gold on her album, so I could compare it to the date of Justin’s birth, which I’d get from Sherry later.

  In Deborah’s wedding album, I found angle shots of her in the gown. I grabbed my sketch pad, and sketched the dress, old and new, fully prepared, if I heard footsteps, to slide the pad into my ’93 Jean Paul Gaultier “Bag of Biblical Proportions.”

  As I sketched, it came to me. Deborah had been slim as a reed. The gown hugged her torso from cleavage to thighs. I knew body styles. Her stomach was concave, never mind convex.

  So the gossips were wrong. Not pregnant at her wedding. What an odd coincidence for the gossip to come out now, as if it mattered . . . now.

  And who started it?

  The doorknob turned, and that fast, my sketch pad was in my bag. Sherry slipped in through a sliver of a door opening.

  Justin tried to charm her into letting him in, but she blew him a kiss and locked him out.

  I chuckled. “Bit hard to get away?”

  “You have no idea.”

  “I guess I don’t. I take it the wedding is still on?”

  “Sorry, Mad, I didn’t mean to sound smug.”

  I hugged her. “Happy. You sound happy, which makes me happy.”

  “You’re the best.”

  “Strip. I have to start pinning. Why you insisted on getting married so soon—” I stopped and examined her figure.

  Sherry put her hands on her hips and huffed. “I’m not pregnant. I’m in love. It’s getting harder to sleep alone.”

  “Which is why Justin spends half his nights at our house.”

  She played coy. “Hardly the same. It isn’t our house.”

  “You’re moving into Justin’s downtown Victorian, I take it?” I slipped the gown over her head.

  “Yes, and I love what I’m doing to make it mine. Changing curtains and rugs, redecorating the master suite, and making Justin sleep in a spare room when he’s not at our house, so we can use our decadent new bedroom for the first time together as a married couple.”

  “It sounds wonderful.”

  “After you open your shop, you can come to lunch during school breaks. We’ll be just around the corner from the carriage house.”

  “Hmm. Guess my shop is old news, and I haven’t seen the paperwork yet.”

  “Yep, everybody knows. I’m happy for you, Mad, but I’m selfishly happy for me, too. I’ve missed you something fierce since you went to New York. Dad, too, though he’ll never admit it. And Nick, he’s probably doing cartwheels in his rigid FBI-controlled mind.”

  I chuckled as I buttoned her into the gown.

  “Why haven’t you and Nick tied the knot?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Neither of us is ready to step into the inferno.”

  Sherry paused and then nodded her head in understanding. “The minute you get close to the heat, you both pull away?”

  “Bingo! I like to think of it as fire dancing. Nick is my perfect partner.”

  “Don’t worry,” my baby sister said. “You’ll know when you’re ready.”

  “I’m not worried. I’m enjoying the dance. And I’m really excited about my potential new shop. You know, this gown is a little tight in the breasts for you. You’re bustier than Deborah, so I’ll have to adjust the darts—but I have plenty of material. You also have a smaller waist and trimmer hips.”

  Sherry began to hum “Get Me to the Church on Time,” like the happy bride I wanted her to be, but when I finished pinning the gown’s torso and moved up to pin the pouf from her sleeves so she could see what they would look like, my world shimmered. Once again, I saw a different bride in a different time, but in the same place.

  Pearl was all decked out. Gown and veil, pricey necklace and earrings.

  The gloves covering her work-worn hands seemed to give her confidence. She held herself straighter and looked taller, hands relaxed at her sides.

  She looked down at her seamstress. “I’d like the shoulders plainer with less pouf.”

  Ah, Pearl had an eye for style.

  “Yes, miss,” the seamstress said with a bite in her tone, a resentful staffer forced to treat a peer as her better.

  The door flew open and hit the wall, startling everyone, even me.

  Deborah in a snit, a sight to behold. “Get out,” she snapped at the seamstress, who was only too happy to comply, and fast.

  Deborah stared at Pearl. A definite if-looks-could-kill, poison-dart look. Oy. Lucifer’s mistress, her toxic smile revealing a side of Deborah I’d only suspected. “Take. Off. My. Gown.”

  Pearl raised her chin. “It’s my gown,” she said, way less confident than she pretended, her shoulders no longer as straight, one hand on her heart, the other clutching her pearl necklace. “Cort is marrying me. He loves me.”

  Deborah smiled. “Not enough to keep him from sleep
ing with me at the country club, where—you’ll notice—he doesn’t take the help. Cort is marrying me, not you.

  “I’m carrying his child.”

  Twenty-five

  My role is that of a seducer.

  —JOHN GALLIANO

  When I roused from my light-headedness, Sherry smiled with relief. “Are you okay, Mad? I waited for you to come out of it on your own. What did you see?”

  A shark and her prey, for one thing, and a familiar pair of earrings, though I didn’t know why they looked familiar.

  I mentally frowned at the universe. I need a hint here, please. “Sis, can I tell you in a few? I need to talk to Cort.”

  Sherry grabbed my hand. “You won’t hurt him . . . with memories, I mean. He’s such a good man.”

  I squeezed her hand. “And he’s getting an incredible daughter-in-law.” I grabbed my Bag of Biblical Proportions and slipped it over my shoulder.

  “Oh, before I go, when is Justin’s birthday and how old is he going to be?”

  “He’ll be twenty-seven on September fifteenth. Why?”

  “Tell you later. Lock the door behind me until that dress is back in its garment bag, then take it out and put it in the trunk of the pimpmobile, will you?”

  Eyes twinkling, Sherry agreed. I heard the lock click into place behind me.

  Deborah hadn’t been pregnant with Justin when she married Cort, and they’d had no other children, so either Deborah lied or she had a miscarriage.

  “Deborah,” I said, joining her guests in the drawing room. “Do you know where Cort went? I need to talk with him.”

  “Is it something I can help you with?” she asked, clearly curious and maybe a little miffed at being kept out of the loop.

  “No, it has to do with our tour of the servants’ quarters.” I’d purposely brought up her personal taboo, and—if there was justice in the world—her worst nightmare, just to see her reaction.

  The way she stilled spoke volumes. “He’s around somewhere,” she said, dismissing me in a way that only Deborah could.

  So much for being her friend.

  I climbed the back stairs to the servants’ quarters and called Cort’s name as I did.

  He looked down from the top landing. “Madeira?”

  “Can I talk to you?”

  “Sure, come on up.”

  Back at his desk, he waved me in. “I never have company,” he said, “and now twice this week. Deborah rarely comes up here.” His smile became a grin, then a chuckle.

  The poor man had to run away from home in his own house.

  I opened my bag. “Here’s your picture of Pearl. Thank you for letting me borrow it. My sketch of the coat came out great. And, I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of making a detailed sketch of her face and getting it framed. I thought you might like to have it.”

  He ate up the sketch with his gaze, ran his hand over the old photo, and slipped that into a drawer. My sketch, he hung on the wall in its place.

  I knew that I’d managed to catch the love in her eyes.

  Cort swallowed as he examined it. “This means a lot to me, Madeira. Thank you.”

  “I signed the drawing,” I said, “but I’d also like to write her name and the date on the back for posterity. May I?”

  He took the sketch down and handed it to me.

  I slipped the backing from the frame and took a sketching pencil from my bag. I wrote “Pearl” and then I looked at him to supply her last name.

  “Morales. Pearl Morales,” he said.

  I wrote her last name and the date, put the frame back together, and offered the sketch to him, but he seemed to be gazing beyond me, to better times, perhaps.

  Maybe he and Deborah were happy in their own way. Who was I to judge?

  On the other hand, if I’d been in Pearl’s place, that volley of Deborah’s about Cort not taking me to the country club would have sent me running.

  Deborah was a slick operator.

  “When did you go to New Orleans looking for her?”

  “Before I married Deborah. Madeira, I put all that behind me. I’m sure Pearl has, too. Obviously, or she wouldn’t have left me.”

  “I’m glad it’s behind you, Cort.”

  He touched the sketch on the wall as I left. Sure, he’d put it behind him.

  I hadn’t meant to bring up old hurts, but I needed to find out why the universe had shown me these things. Why had I seen Pearl in the gown, Mildred as Deborah’s nurse, yet no glimpse of the past when I fitted Dolly for her vintage gown?

  There must be a reason that only certain pieces of vintage clothing spoke to me.

  I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of being played by the universe like a puppet. I needed to speak to Aunt Fiona about that. Besides, I hadn’t told her yet about meeting Dante.

  When I left the servants’ wing and stepped into the house proper from the back stairs, I interrupted Werner and several of his men.

  He raised a hand to them, putting the discussion on hold. “Ms. Cutler.”

  I nodded. “May I speak with you, Detective? In private?”

  “Certainly. Carry on with your search, men.”

  Lytton followed me toward the sewing room but stopped just short of my destination. “Mad, you could have talked to me anytime during the last mile.”

  “Not without anyone hearing, I couldn’t.” I grabbed his wrist, pulled him into the sewing room, and shut the door.

  “Why, Maddie Cutler, how impetuous of you.” He stepped closer.

  “Back up, buster.”

  “I will, if you stop manhandling me.”

  “Oh, sorry.” I let him go.

  Werner tugged on his cuffs. “Forgive me for teasing you. Just don’t manhandle me in front of my men, okay?”

  “You called me Ms. Cutler for their benefit.”

  “And for yours, and you used my title in return. I appreciate that. You wanted to talk to me?”

  “Two things. Have you found any boat tourists who might have seen Sherry and Justin in the boathouse?”

  “We’re checking on the ones who used credit cards to buy their tickets that evening. We’ll only put Justin’s ass on the six o’clock news as a last resort.”

  I smiled. “I’m sure Deborah appreciates that.” I took a deep breath. “I think you should search her papers.” For the one that Mildred Saunders signed, I thought, but didn’t dare say.

  How could I? Visions, indeed.

  “Because she seems relieved Jasmine’s gone?” Werner asked. He quizzed me with his look.

  “I don’t know, but I think maybe Deborah’s hiding something.” And if she wasn’t, my suggestion couldn’t hurt.

  Twenty-six

  A search for new values led to “Flower Power” and the Hippie movement, as well as interest in the occult . . .

  —GERDA BUXBAUM

  Where had I seen those pearl earrings before? Scrap! It could have been at a vintage shop in New York years ago or at the butcher shop on a local yesterday, for all I knew.

  I checked the pimpmobile’s trunk to make sure the gown was in there before I left Cortland House while several police cars came and went.

  The swans on the estate gates as they parted reminded me of the earrings, kissing swans with pearl bodies and diamond eyes. Cort might have had the earrings commissioned, but I wouldn’t ask. Sherry was right. He had painful memories.

  I’d never seen Deborah wear anything like those earrings. Too sweet. Innocent. Her tastes ran to large sparkles of the diamond variety, pieces just short of neon signs flashing her worth. Mrs. Moneybags, my father had taken to calling her since our dinner here the other night.

  My cell phone rang. “Hi, Eve, got anything juicy to report?”

  “Not exactly, but I learned that Mildred Saunders and Deborah Knight were classmates at the same finishing school.”

  “No surprise there. Anything else?”

  “That’s it. What about Pearl; did you get a last name?”

  “Just g
ot it. It’s Morales. Feel like going to New Orleans with me? I found an address on the back of a photo Cort has.”

  Eve sighed. “I’m giving a class twice a week. When did you want to go?”

  “First thing in the morning. Want to see if you can book us a flight?”

  “I can’t go tomorrow. I can’t miss the first class.”

  “Bummer,” I said, sincerely disappointed. “I’ll go by myself then. It can’t wait.”

  “Madeira Cutler, you are not trying to solve a murder by yourself?”

  “I’ve had a couple more visions and I need answers.”

  “I’d like to go on record as saying that I don’t think you should go alone, but it’s too late to cancel my class.”

  “I’m going. Book me a flight?”

  “I’m not your computer secretary, but of course I will, as usual.”

  “You’re a keeper, Mizz Meyers. Do you need my credit card number?”

  “No, I have it memorized. I use it all the time.”

  I scoffed. “I wouldn’t mind if you did, for something besides your black fighter-pilot look.”

  “In your dreams. I am who I am.”

  “Whatever you say, Popeye. Thanks.”

  My phone rang again before I had a chance to put it back in my biblical bag. “Hello, Aunt Fiona. What’s up?”

  “The title on the Underhill-Sweet property is clear. Are you sure you want to go through with this?”

  “Do you think I shouldn’t?”

  “What I think doesn’t matter. If you’re ready to move on this, you need to come and sign a few things before I can process any more paperwork. If you’re not sure, I think you need a sounding board. I’m here, Madeira.”

  “I won’t kid you. It’s moving fast, even for me,” I said, “and I do need to talk. I’m leaving Cortland House now. Can I come right over?”

  “See you in a few.”

  Aunt Fiona sat on her front porch waiting for me with iced tea and a frown.

  I took the garment bag with the gown from the trunk. “Can I hang this inside while I’m here?” I asked, coming up the walk.

  Fiona stood waiting for me. “Is that Sherry’s wedding gown? Do I get a peek?”