Lieutenant Binder had warned me off the case, told me there might be a dangerous killer on the loose. But from the moment I’d remembered the gift certificates, I’d been convinced there was a connection among the diners. The yacht club photo gave me proof. Binder was a good cop and his approach of identifying the victim and then tracking his associates might eventually work. It was true, as he said, that just because someone brought those people to the restaurant that evening didn’t mean any of them had a connection to the victim, or the killer. On the other hand, I was increasingly sure there was and I wanted to prove it, but how?
Clearly, whatever I did, I had to stay away from the Bennetts. I was sure it was Phil who complained to Binder.
I collected my car from Mom’s garage and headed toward the Baywater Community for Active Adults. Besides Deborah Bennett, the Caswells had been the most welcoming to me when I stopped by the day before.
They’d also lied. Those adorable pixies had lied. Or Caroline had while Henry sat there. “I don’t really know any of those people,” she’d said of the others.
I pulled into Baywater, driving carefully over the speed bumps. Since my last visit, someone had tacked up a wreath on the unused gatehouse, getting ready for the holiday to come. There was a small group of dog walkers in the road, collars up against the wind. I edged by them and stopped in front of the Caswell house.
Caroline answered my knock. “Hello, Julia. I wasn’t expecting to see you again so soon.”
“I know. I apologize for dropping by. Is this an okay time? I have a few follow-up questions from yesterday.”
She stepped back from the door so I could enter, but her face was uncertain. “Henry’s at the gym. He just left, so he’ll be a while. That is, if you wanted to speak to both of us.”
I was happy to talk to Caroline alone. I don’t know why, but I sensed that made it more likely she would open up to me.
“Come,” she said. “We’ll sit . . . over there.” It seemed that after two years in the open-concept house, Caroline still had trouble putting names to spaces. She sat me again at the table near the kitchen where we’d been the day before.
“Coffee?”
I was awash in the tea the Snugg sisters had given me, but I thought it best to say yes. When Caroline finally sat, I took my copy of the yacht club photo out of my tote bag and handed it to her.
“Oh.” She was clearly surprised. Moments ticked by before she spoke again. Then the round “O” of her mouth relaxed into a small smile. “I haven’t seen this for years. We were so young.”
“My neighbors, Fee and Vee Snugg, said something about the Rabble Point set.”
“That is what they called us. I suppose it fit. We were all close in age, the oldest kids in the group, the original baby boomers.”
She turned the photo in her hands. “When I was growing up, we came to the cottages at Rabble Point every summer, year after golden year. On that private lane we ran completely free, in and out of each other’s houses all day long. The grown-ups drank, smoked, played bridge, and argued about politics, but we were utterly carefree. We played tennis and swam at the little beach across the road. The water was freezing, but you’d never get one of us to admit it. I don’t think there was a group of children anywhere as completely happy as we were.” Her voice was thick with emotion. She looked at the photo, and then looked away.
I gave her a moment to compose herself. “And you were all members of the yacht club?”
“All of us kids learned to sail there. And later, when some of us could finally drive, we hung out there all the time, leaving the moms and the little kids back at Rabble Point. Except Franny Chapman, of course. She didn’t summer at Rabble Point or belong to the yacht club. Her mom cleaned for the Lowes and often brought her along to play with us when she was little. She grew up to be so beautiful and smart and funny. Each of the boys had a crush on her at one time or another.”
Beautiful and smart and funny. The Fran Walker I knew, the bent-over woman with the giant pocketbook, seemed defeated by life.
“Caroline, when I was here yesterday, you said you didn’t know the other people in the restaurant the night of the murder. And yet here you all are in the photograph.”
She chewed on her lip. “I said I didn’t really know them. And truly, I don’t. We were all in college when this photo was taken in. We grew apart, followed different paths in life, lived in different states.” She looked at me to see if I believed her. I kept my expression neutral. Evidently that wasn’t good enough, because she continued. “I haven’t talked to any of these people except Henry in more than forty years. Honestly, when they came into the restaurant, I didn’t even recognize Fran and Barry. I didn’t know they were a couple for one thing. And they’ve let themselves get so old. And Deborah.” Caroline shuddered. “You’d think all that plastic surgery would make a person look younger, more recognizable, but the person I saw that night didn’t resemble the Deborah I knew at all.”
I pointed at the man in uniform who stood next to Deborah Bennett. “Who is he?”
“Oh, poor Dan Johnson.” Caroline sighed. “He was a couple of years older than the rest of us, finished with university by the time this was taken and an ensign in the navy. He died in Vietnam less than three months later.”
“And then Deborah married Phil?”
“More or less.” Caroline squirmed in her seat. “Eventually.”