A Murder in Mohair Read online

  “Why not? I’ve never been. It could be fun. Why don’t we ask her to come to the shop on Thursday night? We’re supposed to meet here anyway this week.”

  Their knitting group met every Thursday night at seven, rotating between everyone’s house and the shop. Lucy thought it was a good suggestion.

  “Good idea. We already know that’s a night everyone can make it. As long as you don’t mind having a séance in your shop.”

  Lucy was teasing Maggie now a bit, though it would seem a little weird, sitting around the worktable—so far reserved for knitting, eating, and gossiping—and summoning up spirits.

  “Oh, I don’t mind at all. Do you think she’ll make us hold hands or any of that silly stuff? Maybe we can knit while she does her thing,” Maggie mused. “It will be just like a regular meeting—except we’ll be chatting with voices from beyond.”

  “Whoa . . . what am I hearing down here?” Phoebe’s apartment on the second floor was connected by a stairway in the storeroom, and she came down the last few steps two at a time. She landed in front of Maggie.

  “You are not seriously planning to hold a séance in our shop, are you?” Phoebe turned her wide brown eyes first on Lucy, then Maggie.

  Maggie sighed and handed Phoebe a mug of coffee. “Calm down, Phoebe. We’re positive the woman is a phony. We’re trying to help Edie debunk her.”

  “Fine, fine . . . easy for you to say. But I’m the one who has to sleep here. This house must be a zillion years old and some wacky psychic could stir up all kinds of nasty energy.”

  Poor Phoebe. Lucy found her reaction amusing at first, but quickly realized she was truly alarmed.

  Maggie touched Phoebe’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. Nothing like that is going to happen. You’ve been watching too many scary movies.”

  “Easy for you to say. I already hear spirits wandering around down here at night. What if knitting needles start flying around?”

  Maggie’s serious, sympathetic expression melted into a smile. “I’d like to see that; it could be very amusing. Maybe the yarn swift will wind a few skeins for me. My least favorite job. Maybe the needles will grab some yarn and start knitting some pattern samples? Do you think I could leave them a to-do list?”

  “Okay, be like that. You won’t think it’s very funny when this place is totally haunted by dead people knitting.”

  “Don’t worry, Phoebe. If the spirits of knitters past decide to take over the shop, you can stay in my guest room until we get a ghost exterminator. I’ve heard that most ghosts are totally harmless. And you have Van Gogh. Cats are very sensitive to spirit energy. Van Gogh can let us know if any restless spirits are hanging around.”

  Phoebe had an active imagination, that was for sure. But Lucy still sympathized with her. It might be fun to have the psychic here, but not if Phoebe was lying awake every night afterward.

  “I’m pretty sure she can just read some cards and make predictions about the future. No knitting ghosts or spirit messengers involved. Would that be all right with you?”

  Phoebe looked calmer but still not convinced. “Like tarot cards, you mean? Not a Ouija board . . . right?”

  “I draw the line at a Ouija board myself. That is creepy and it’s all just your own nervous energy,” Maggie said.

  They all turned at the sound of someone coming into the store.

  “Yoo-hoo! Anybody home in here?” Lucy heard Edie call out.

  “We’re back in the storeroom, Edie. Be right out,” Maggie called back. “Would you like some coffee?”

  “I’m good, thanks. Already filled my tank,” she reported.

  They walked back into the shop to find Edie settled in an armchair, rummaging through her knitting bag. “I just ran in for a little more yarn for my project.” Edie pulled out a sweet little baby hat and held it up to show everyone. “Yellow, yellow, yellow. I’m about to puke, but what can you do? These young gals never want to know the sex of their babies. When did that go out of style? I’m getting sick of making yellow hats and booties and blankets . . . or boring old white.”

  “I hear you,” Maggie agreed. She was already checking a cubby near the counter for the yarn Edie needed. “But once the baby arrives you can make something to match, in blue or pink,” she suggested.

  “By then I’ll have some other pregnant relative to knit for. On to the next baby. That’s the motto in our family—very prodigious.”

  “How did your session with Cassandra go?” Lucy asked. “Did you see her?”

  “Did I ever.” Edie’s head tilted back, her small eyes growing wide behind glasses.

  Phoebe jumped forward from behind the counter, where she’d been sipping her coffee and scanning Maggie’s laptop.

  “Tell the truth, Edie . . . does she conjure up troubled spirits?” Phoebe seemed to be bracing herself.

  Edie shook her head. “Nothing like that. She does all sorts of silly things to put you at ease about that ever happening—waves white feathers around your head and then she burns a bunch of dried leaves and fans the smoke all over. I tell you, it smells like a bathing suit fell in a campfire. Nearly scared me off, too.”

  “Sounds very reassuring.” Maggie’s sarcasm seemed to go unnoticed by Edie. And Phoebe, too, for that matter, Lucy noticed.

  “What did she tell you, Edie? Did you figure out her tricks?” Lucy asked.

  Edie looked uncomfortable at that question. “Oh, she said a lot of stuff. A lot about George,” she added, mentioning her husband, who had passed away more than ten years ago. “Passing to the other side must have really loosened his vocal cords. The man could barely string three words together when he was alive—‘What’s for dinner?’ ‘Where’s the remote?’ ‘Get me a beer, hon?’ ”

  Maggie laughed. “George had been a man of few words,” she agreed. Without adding that Edie talked enough for both of them, Lucy thought.

  “Now it seems he’s got a lot to say. He’s proud of the way I’ve been running the diner and doesn’t want me to give any more money to our son, Chad. Not until he can get his act together.”

  “Did she really say that? That specifically?” Lucy asked.

  Edie cocked her head to one side. “See . . . that’s where it gets a little fuzzy. It’s more like she gets some feeling or hint about something and has you filling in the blanks.”

  “Interesting. So you’re feeding her information without realizing it?” Maggie said.

  “Sometimes. I guess you are. You must be. Otherwise . . . well, how would she know?” Edie picked up the skein of yarn Maggie had found, and checked the label. “The thing is, from time to time, she does come out with the darnedest things. She knew some stuff about me I couldn’t have been just giving away. Stuff from way back.” Edie shook her head, clearly confounded as she opened her coin purse and picked out a few bills to pay for her purchase. “I tell you, it spooked me.”

  Phoebe looked uneasy again. She glanced at Lucy. “See . . . what did I tell you? Do we really want to mess with this stuff?”

  Lucy felt a bit alarmed, too, though she didn’t want to admit it. “Like what? Can you just give us a hint?”

  Edie sighed. She looked like she wanted to confide the specifics but something was holding her back. It was probably too personal, Lucy realized. Which made the whole question of Cassandra’s credibility even more complicated.

  “You have to see for yourself. I can’t explain.” Edie snapped her purse shut and dumped it in her knitting bag.

  “You’re going to book a session with her, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, we want to have it here at the shop, on Thursday night if she’ll come,” Maggie replied.

  “Oh, I have a feeling she’ll come,” Edie said. “I have to admit, I didn’t really figure out how she managed to pull the wool over my eyes . . . and has been doing that to poor Nora for weeks now. But maybe you gals will,” Edie said hopefully. “I’m counting on you now.”

  “We’ll try our best, Edie,” Lucy said.

  “I m
ight be out that night. But I’ll be cheering for them,” Phoebe added.

  Maggie patted Edie’s arm as she walked with her to the door.

  “Don’t worry, Edie. I’m sure there’s a logical explanation for Ms. Waters’s extraordinary powers of perception, however spooky they may seem. We’ll get to the bottom of it. The more people who try to observe her objectively, the better, right?”

  “I hope so. Nora won’t hear a word against her. And I couldn’t catch the woman doing anything all that suspicious with me. But I still smell a rat,” Edie said finally. “And it’s not just that funky incense she uses.”

  The door closed behind Edie, and Maggie let loose a sigh. “I’ve known Edie a long time. I’ve rarely seen her this worked up. I wonder what Cassandra said that got her so rattled. Edie is usually so forthcoming. She’ll tell you anything. I mean anything. Too much information, most of the time.” Maggie shook her head. “She doesn’t seem to know the meaning of the word ‘discretion.’ ”

  Lucy knew that was true. “It must be something very sensitive and private. A real secret for Edie.”

  “Which makes it even stranger that Cassandra knew . . . and asked about it,” Maggie added.

  “Don’t you mean, that the spirit voices told Cassandra to ask Edie about it?” Lucy was just pushing her buttons a little.

  “Ah . . . yes, the spirit voices. Almost forgot about them.” Maggie turned to Phoebe, who was working at the counter on the laptop again. “You don’t have to come Thursday night, Phoebe, if you don’t want to. We all understand and no one wants to push you into anything that you don’t want to do.”

  Phoebe looked up. “It’s all right. If I get freaked, I’ll just run upstairs and watch I Love Lucy.” Phoebe had found a set of DVDs at a yard sale, which had quickly become her go-to for instant stress relief. “I guess I’m curious, too, to hear what’s in my future. With my new business and love life, and all that.”

  Phoebe had been dating but hadn’t met any guy that she really clicked with in a while. She definitely wasn’t rushing into anything, after her long-standing relationship with a musician had fizzled out last winter. Her energies had constructively been focused on her online entrepreneurial venture—selling her knitted socks and other handmade creations on the Crafty Cricket website for independent artisans. Socks by Phoebe was catching on and she was branching out to headbands and bikinis. The Black Sheep were very proud of her.

  “Love and money. I guess those are the top two subjects most people ask about,” Maggie mused.

  Lucy agreed. “With a few questions about health thrown in here and there.”

  “Exactly. I just googled that routine with the burning herbs and white feathers that Edie told us about,” Phoebe reported. “Standard procedure for clearing negative energy. This website says it’s very potent and reliable.”

  Lucy could see Maggie force a serious expression. “I’m glad that sets your mind at ease. We should try it sometime, when we get a nasty customer in here.”

  “Yeah, we should,” Phoebe agreed brightly. She shut the computer and headed to the worktable, where Lucy saw a few open cartons of yarn that needed to be unpacked.

  Lucy glanced through the bay window at the front of the shop and checked on her dogs. They stood side by side, tails wagging as they watched activity on the street. They’d soon be bored, she knew, and start putting their noses—and then paws—on Maggie’s window. Never a good idea to leave them out there that long.

  “I’d better go. I’ll get in touch with Cassandra Waters and ask for an appointment Thursday night around seven. I’ll let everyone know if she confirms,” Lucy added.

  “Perfect.” Maggie was looking over the contents of a carton that sat open on the counter, checking it against a long white order sheet. “Even though I’ve sworn off sticking my nose in police investigations, helping Edie this way is almost as much fun. And Charles never has to know.”

  Lucy was already at the door, but turned to reply. “Unless we find out that Cassandra Waters is up to something illegal. Then we will have to tell the police.”

  “Right. I didn’t think of that.” Maggie looked at her a moment, then shrugged. “We’ll cross that Ouija board when we come to it.”

  “Good plan.”

  Out on the porch, she untangled Tink’s and Wally’s leads from the wooden rails, and wondered if they really would debunk Cassandra Waters. The psychic had been able to fool a lot of paying customers for a few months now in this town. Not to mentioned many other places she must have set up her crystal ball. Why would they be the ones to unmask her?

  The answer popped into her mind. “ ‘You can fool some of the people some of the time and all of the people some of the time. But you can’t fool all of the people all of the time,’ ” she said aloud. Lucy glanced down at the dogs as they headed home. “Remember that, the next time you decide to sleep on the sofa.”

  * * *

  Lucy was working on a project that was due on Wednesday, by five o’clock—a full-color brochure for a company that sold paving stones. It was not the most artistic project she’d ever taken on, but the client was easy to deal with, paid well, and didn’t expect a masterpiece. Just a well-designed, easy-to-read catalog that showed off the stones in pleasant settings, mostly set in paths around swimming pools, where smiling model moms and children frolicked. Or close shots of curving paths that cut through sumptuous green lawns. Proud homeowners, in designer sportswear, stood cheerfully admiring their property . . . and their choice of deluxe pavement.

  She’d once known a talented sculptor who earned the larger part of his living from carving excruciatingly cute bears from chunks of wood. He would sell these creations at a hefty profit to garden centers and landscapers. Hence his term, “lawn bears”—and his philosophy that most artists need to “carve the lawn bears” in order to make ends meet and no shame in it.

  Lucy knew that jobs like the paving stone brochure were her “lawn bears”—and a small price to pay for freedom from office cubicles. She’d spent her fair share of time enclosed in those padded walls, poking her head up from time to time, like an anxious gopher or meerkat. Those years seemed another lifetime ago now. Making a living outside the cubicle maze required scrambling at times, but she had a steady client list these days and would never return to a corporate job again.

  She’d moved out to Plum Harbor from Boston several summers ago, a few months after her divorce, and very soon after her aunt Claire died and left her cottage in the Marshes to Lucy and her older sister, Ellen. Ellen was married with two adorable girls and lived a short distance from Boston, in historic, upscale Lexington, her life much like one pictured in the paving stone brochure.

  Lucy’s sister didn’t care much for the cottage or Plum Harbor and was happy to have Lucy living there so the property wouldn’t get run down by renters.

  Lucy hadn’t made too many changes in the cottage since she’d moved in, except to paint some walls and rearrange the furniture to make room for Matt and his belongings when he moved in about a year ago. Including a collection of retro electric guitars, that had started out front and center, on a prominent wall in the living room . . . but had slowly worked its way into the TV room and then out to the enclosed porch.

  The frat house decorating touch was a small price to pay for living with the man she loved and had been amazed to find loved her. She liked to think of herself as a person who knew when to focus on the big picture and not the lint of life, things that didn’t really matter. Retro guitar collection? Lint. Matt’s love and companionship? Big picture.

  This week, for some reason, Suzanne’s needling about engagement rings and commitment conversations—which to Lucy’s thinking was definitely in the lint category—was still distracting her, as if the probe had struck a filling Lucy hadn’t even realized was loose. Many a harmless dental exam had set off a toothache, that was for sure.

  Whenever her mind wandered back to the annoying topic, she forced herself to focus on paving
stones. And by Wednesday at four, she found herself finished with the project. She happily delivered it via e-mail, with time to spare for a quick spin around the neighborhood before Matt got home.

  When she returned to the cottage, Matt’s truck was in the driveway and she found him out back, cleaning the grill.

  “Hey, honey, have a good ride?” Matt looked up and smiled at her as he scoured the grate with a wire brush.

  “Short but fun. I’ve been at the computer all week. It was good to get the kinks out.” Lucy often found herself alternating between exercising too much and sitting too much.

  “Wait until you get your new bike. Did you decide on the model? We need to order it soon if you want it for your birthday. Wait till you see the water bottle I found. State-of-the-art. It even has a charcoal filter.”

  Lucy met his glance and forced a smile. A few days ago, such a comment would have elicited a big, happy “Aren’t I a lucky gal?” sigh. But Suzanne’s pestering had tainted that perception and Lucy was silently mad at her pal . . . and yes, she had to admit it, feeling cranky with Matt about the entire subject.

  “I’m not sure yet,” she said quietly. She took a long drink of water while he watched her. Then she forced a smile. “I’m going to take a shower. Be right out.”

  “Take your time. I’ll start dinner.”

  She touched his arm and kissed his cheek as she walked by. He watched her, sensing she wasn’t quite herself. While a little voice in her head wished that Matt would ask her what was wrong, another, more persuasive voice, didn’t want to go there and hurried her into the house and up the stairs.

  When Lucy came down, she quickly fixed a salad, then joined Matt on the patio, where the table was set for two and a platter of perfectly grilled chicken and vegetables took center stage. Her troubled thoughts melted into the soft, purple dusk and the flash of fireflies in the garden, as she and Matt shared the events of their day.

  Matt had operated on a hamster, his first time performing surgery on such a small, delicate creature. “It was tricky but looks like the little guy is going to make it.”