1 Forget Me Knot (7 page)

C
HAPTER
11

I took out my black cast iron skillet. I preferred cast iron over any other kind of cookware. A well-seasoned pan had a natural nonstick quality and cast iron distributed the heat evenly. My bubbie was the best cook I’d ever known, and she always used cast iron pans, one set for meat and one for dairy. The weight of those pans made the wooden shelves in the pantry sag over time. My uncle Isaac still lived in our old house, still cooked with those pans, and the shelves still sagged. I totally got why he didn’t fix them; doing so would be like erasing decades of family history.

I put slices of sharp cheddar cheese on pieces of challah and sprinkled each with a hint of powdered garlic. I slapped a second piece of bread on top of each one and buttered the outside of the sandwiches. When the pan was hot enough, I cooked the sandwiches a couple minutes on each side. The bread turned a golden brown and the yellow cheese dripped luxuriously down the crust of the bread. I garnished each plate with a handful of baby carrots and fresh apple quarters. You had to draw the calorie line somewhere.

Since the dining table was covered with quilts, we sat at the kitchen island. The island served as a divider between the cooking area and the living area and also served as an informal eating surface. We climbed on the high stools, and Lucy’s were the only feet resting on the floor. Birdie and I dangled like children at the grown-ups’ table. Birdie picked up her sandwich and turned it over. “Does anybody see an image in their grilled cheese?”

I munched on an apple quarter and studied my plate. “I think I see a picture of Elvis Presley.”

Lucy perked up and reached for my plate. “For real? His image could bring hundreds on eBay. Let me see.”

Birdie started to giggle.

“Dang it, Martha.” Lucy handed my plate back.

When we finished eating, we washed the grease off our hands and examined Claire’s quilts again.

Finally Lucy stepped away from the table and looked at me. “I’m not seeing anything new.”

Birdie shook her head. “Me neither.”

I took several photos of each quilt with my digital camera and then folded them back up. “We need more data. I’m going back to Claire’s house and search for the list of quilts Siobhan mentioned.”

“We’d offer to go, but both Birdie and I need to get back home.”

“Tomorrow’s Quilty Tuesday anyway. Let’s meet here at the usual time, if that’s okay with you. I should have the list by then.”

Birdie picked up the empty pink bakery box and put it in the recycle bin next to my sink. “Don’t worry about getting goodies. I’ll bake something tonight.”

“Great. Thanks.” I hoped Birdie would either make her coconut ginger cookies or my very favorite, her applesauce cake. She was very liberal with the sugar and the butter, just the way I liked it. I hugged each one before they walked out the door. “See you
mañana
at the usual time.”

After they left, I put the quilts back in the pillowcases. I was afraid if the thief ever figured out the quilts were in my house, he wouldn’t hesitate to come after them, so I put them at the bottom of the laundry hamper under some dirty clothes. I was pretty sure he wouldn’t go through my dirty laundry. Another chess move. What I didn’t realize at the time was although thieves can come when you’re not at home, they can also come when you’re there.

I arrived at Claire’s around two and let myself in with the key. The cat ran up to greet me. “Come on, kitty. Let’s check on your food.” I entered Claire’s sewing room five minutes later and immediately saw something was very wrong. The quilt cupboard I emptied yesterday and relocked had been jimmied open. Siobhan was right about the thief coming back for Claire’s quilts. I looked inside the empty cupboard but didn’t touch anything. If my plan worked, the thief’s prints would be all over it.

If I got the heck out of the house and called Detective Beavers about the open cupboard, he’d make this a crime scene again, and I’d never get to finish my search. The quilts were due to go back to the Terrys in two days, but first I wanted to make sure I was alone. I picked up a pair of eight-inch sewing shears to defend myself and tiptoed through the house, my heart pounding in my throat. The cat padded right beside me. “Why couldn’t you be a Rottweiler?” I whispered.

There was a broken window in the guest room, with glass all over the floor. The window faced the front of the house and was hidden behind a tall, dense hibiscus—the perfect secluded entry point. The thief broke the stationary side of the window in order to reach in and unlock it. Then he removed the screen and slid aside the moving half of the window, creating a smooth entryway. A five-minute search of the house confirmed the thief was long gone. I definitely ought to call Beavers. Just not yet.

I headed back to the sewing room to look for a quilter’s diary. Many quilters kept a sort of journal with photos and histories of each of their quilts—like when it was made and who it was made for.

A journal might also contain small samples of the fabrics used or anecdotal comments such as
This quilt took me three years to complete
, or
The floral fabrics came from my daughter’s little dresses and my grandmother’s feed sacks
. I kept thick loose leaf binders with separate pages of photos and text about every quilt I made. I was on my fifth binder.

I searched the wall of books first but didn’t find anything. I opened the drawers and cupboards one by one. Nothing. Where could Claire’s journals be?

The cat and I walked back through the bedroom to Claire’s office, passing again the luxurious silks and Mary Cassatt painting.
Funny the thief didn’t take the painting. Maybe he didn’t know what it was worth
. A four-drawer metal file cabinet stood against the office wall.

I hesitated to touch Claire’s personal files. I reminded myself I was only after the list of her quilts, so I shouldn’t snoop into anything else. Right. Like I was really going to listen to myself.

The files were color coded and neatly labeled. I went to the green Income section first, thinking that since she had sold many of her quilts, she would have filed the list there. Wrong.

Well heck, since I was already there, I might as well take a teensy little peek at her financials. I knew from watching lots of crime shows that money was one of the main motives for murder. So, who might benefit from her death?

Claire kept a huge investment portfolio managed by J.P. Morgan and had a half-million-dollar annual income from something called the Terry Family Trust. I could have lived on the income from her CDs alone and still had enough left over to buy a new Corolla every year.

Claire had been very wealthy but she hadn’t flaunted it. She seemed so shy at the guild meetings and liked talking to Birdie. From her modest behavior, I would never have guessed she was worth so much. If the rumors about her messy divorce were true, I could see why. A lot of money had been at stake.

In the purple tax section, there was a folder with some check registers going back a couple of years. She made out checks to a Jerry Bell on a monthly basis, ranging from one thousand dollars to ten thousand dollars, as far back as the record went. Who was Jerry Bell, anyway? Her lover? If so, did he manage to con a small income out of her? Or maybe he was a blackmailer. What could he have blackmailed her about? I made copies of the registers on Claire’s copier and put the originals back in their folder.

Then I found a folder labeled Jerry Bell. Inside was his name, phone number, and address, which I copied into my notepad. Strange. Why such a dearth of information? Claire was an obsessively detailed person. Why wouldn’t there also be a record in his file of the payments she made to him? This was beginning to smell more and more like blackmail.

I noticed she paid for appointments at a well-known spa located near Little Armenia in Hollywood. Los Angeles was known to have natural hot springs made possible by the unique geology of the area; something having to do with the subducting of the Pacific tectonic plate beneath the North American plate. Back in the 1920s and ’30s, a number of Turkish bathhouses around the city tapped into the various hot springs and capitalized on the natural steam and mineral water.

As the city grew and developed, the pipes were eventually capped off and the bathhouses disappeared under high-rises. To my knowledge, this spa was the only one of its kind remaining in LA. A person could soak in the hot bubbling water or get a massage, body scrub, acupuncture, mud wrap, or facial. Judging from the weekly checks, Claire liked her little luxuries on a regular basis.

On spa days, Claire also wrote a check to Mai’s Nail Palace. What a life. Go to the spa, get a massage and a facial, and then go get a mani-pedi. Must be nice.

There were also weekly checks in her check registers made out to a Dr. Alexander Godwin, but they stopped about eight months ago. What kind of doctor did someone see on a weekly basis? A chiropractor? Acupuncturist? Psychiatrist?

I pulled out a folder with his name. Dr. Godwin was a shrink. Why was Claire in therapy? Knowing why might lead straight to the killer. Godwin could be a gold mine of information, but I doubted he’d divulge anything to me. I wrote down his name, address, and phone number anyway. I could always give him a shot.

I looked through the folders in the yellow section marked Charitable Contributions and found one for the Blind Children’s Association. There were several receipts for thousands of dollars she donated on a regular basis.

At the back of the file was a letter on the association’s stationery thanking Claire for including them in her “long-term giving” plan. Claire named BCA as a beneficiary of her will. Some nonprofits were relentless in their pursuit of bequests. Looked like BCA managed to snag a big fish with Claire. Did someone in the organization get tired of waiting for her to grow old and die?

In the left-hand margin of the BCA letterhead was a list of board members. At the top of the list was the name of the chairman: Alexander Godwin, MD. Well, well . . .

I went on to search the orange section marked Miscellaneous. Bingo! A folder labeled Quilts. My heart sped up a little as I opened it.

Empty.

Darn!
The thief must have taken the list of quilts. How did he know the list existed? He might have known Claire or known about the custom of keeping a quilt journal, like another quilter would. Carlotta Hudson’s sour face popped into my head.

Was Lucy right? Did Carlotta Hudson kill Claire in a fit of jealousy? Carlotta couldn’t have stolen the quilts from the show, but an accomplice could have. Was she the one trying to get her hands on the rest of Claire’s quilts?

I hoped Claire kept a backup copy of the missing list somewhere on her computer. I booted up the laptop on her desk. Password protected.
Darn again
.

Then I realized—whatever the thief touched in the filing cabinet I also touched. If he left any fingerprints, I just screwed them up. Detective Beavers was going to be really, really mad. The only thing I hadn’t touched was the sewing room cabinet, so maybe they could still get fingerprints from that.

I looked at my watch; nearly six. I closed the file drawers and stuffed the copies of the check registers and the notepad in my purse. I took the laptop out to my car and put it in my trunk. If only I could find the password, I could look at her document files. There was sure to be a copy of the list there.

I sat on the bench outside the front door. The card Detective Beavers gave me at the quilt show was still in my purse. I called him on my cell phone.

“Arlo Beavers.”

“This is Martha Rose. I’m afraid someone has broken in to Claire Terry’s house.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I’m here, at her house.”

“Impossible. How did you manage to pop up at yet another crime scene?”

I didn’t much care for his tone of voice. “I came to get something Claire’s mother wanted and discovered someone broke in. The window in the guest room was shattered. The door to her quilt cabinet was jimmied open. I think the thief came looking for the four quilts I took home with me.”

“Sit tight. Don’t touch anything. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

I called Siobhan next.

“Siobhan, this is Martha Rose. I’m at Claire’s house looking for the list of quilts you mentioned.”

“Did you find one?”

“No. Someone else beat me to it. The folder where she kept the list was empty. The thief came in through a window and broke into her quilt cabinet. You were right about his coming back for the rest of her quilts.”

“Are you all right?”

“Yes, but I’m concerned about the Mary Cassatt painting in her bedroom. The thief apparently didn’t know enough to take it. Shouldn’t you move it to a safer place?”

“Oh, I forgot all about that painting. Thanks for reminding me. I’ll have Will take care of it.”

“Another thing, Siobhan. Did Claire have a boyfriend?”

“If she did, she didn’t say. After her divorce from James years ago, she didn’t seem interested in dating.”

“Did you say James?”

“Yes. James Trueville.”

“Did Claire ever call him Jamey?”

Siobhan sighed. “Yes. That was her pet name for him.”

“I know this sounds weird, but was he ever unfaithful to Claire?”

“Yes. His infidelity was the primary reason for the divorce. Why do you ask?”

“It has to do with one of the quilts. I’ll tell you more when I can. Meanwhile, the police are on their way so I don’t have much time. Do I have your permission to take Claire’s laptop home to search for the list?”

“Of course. When you find it, please fax me a copy at this same number.”

“Right. Do you have any idea what her password is?”

“I’m sorry. I don’t know anything about computers.”

I looked up. The cat stood at the front door. “One last thing—what do you want to do about her cat? The police are probably going to seal off the house again.”