A Stitch in Crime Read online

  We went back outside, and when I held my arm out, I could barely see my hand. As we walked down the path, a deer rushed in front of us, appearing as confused as we were.

  “Pink, what are you going to do?” Adele said.

  I had considered lots of things that might happen during the weekend, but being caught inside a cloud wasn’t one of them. I gave up hope for a hot shower and a change of clothes. Maybe after breakfast. I suggested we move on to the dining hall.

  “What are you going to do, Pink?” Adele said again, walking on one side of me.

  “Molly will come up with something,” Dinah said from the other side. Sheila appeared overwhelmed by the fog and stayed close to Dinah.

  “The obvious thing is to postpone everything until the campers get here,” I said as the bell began to ring, announcing breakfast.

  “Good morning, ladies,” an all-too-cheerful male voice said from behind us. Dinah stiffened and moved closer to Sheila. As Commander Blaine caught up with us, I began to see Dinah’s point. He was too eager, too cheerful, and his cargo pants too wrinkle-free. He rushed ahead as we walked up the stairs to the dining hall, grabbed the door, and held it open for us. Did he even notice the fog?

  Two women and a man were standing in the entrance, blocking our way as we came inside.

  “Are any of you with the Shedd & Royal creative weekend?” a woman in lavender pants and a white sweatshirt with lavender trim asked.

  Adele gave me a nudge to the front. “She’s the one you want to talk to.”

  The woman said they had arrived late the night before. “It was terrible finding this place in the dark and with the fog coming in.” Then she brightened. “But we’re here now, and we can’t wait for the workshops to begin. Where do we register?”

  Adele nudged me again. “Pink, you better break the news to them.”

  “News?” the other woman said.

  “Have you looked outside?” I mentioned the fog, the messages from the other campers, and finally my plan to postpone the start of the activities until everyone could get there.

  The woman in the lavender pants appeared displeased with what I said. “So the workshop presenters can’t get here?” she said.

  “No, they’re all here,” I said.

  She seemed upset with my answer and turned to the man. “Edward, do something.”

  Edward straightened and cleared his throat. It turned out he was a lawyer, and he gave me some legal mumbo jumbo about implied contracts and we had to perform or we’d be in breach. He threw the word sue around a few times. I knew it was probably just hot air, and that even though Mason didn’t practice that kind of law, he could still probably outlawyer Edward. But did I want three unhappy campers? Three unhappy campers who might spread the word around Tarzana that I had ruined their weekend?

  “Well, of course you’re right.” I explained that I’d made the plan to postpone when I thought no campers had arrived. “But now that I know you’re here, we’ll have some workshops today.” They seemed satisfied and hadn’t picked up on my mention of some workshops. I said I would get them their orientation packets after breakfast and sent them over to tables by the window.

  Izabelle came in on a cloud of floral perfume. Before I could mention the table for our group, Adele had already stepped in and was guiding Izabelle to our corner. I heard a snippet of conversation as Adele moved her head around to show off her earrings. Something about their being made with double picot stitches.

  “We might as well sit down,” I said, stepping in from the entrance.

  “Who are they?” Sheila said. She started to point, then caught herself and gestured with her chin. They were a man and woman at a table in the far corner of the room.

  “That’s the guy I saw in the hall when we first got here. He looked so angry, all I could think of was that if looks could kill, I would have been dead,” I said. Sheila sucked in her breath, and I said I was just trying to be clever. “I don’t think he was angry with me. He just glanced my way. I don’t even know who he is.”

  I hadn’t noticed that Commander had left us until he rejoined us and grabbed my arm.

  “We’ve got a problem,” he said, leading me toward the kitchen. I knew Dinah wanted to stay at the table, but true-blue friend that she is, she followed along.

  When we got to the kitchen, Commander pointed to two women sitting by a counter, leaning on their elbows. Only now did I realize that there had been no food smells when we walked in. One of the women explained they worked cleanup and knew nothing about cooking. They lived nearby and had been able to walk to Asilomar. None of the cook staff could get there.

  “I have an idea,” Commander began. “I just wanted to get your okay first.”

  When I heard it involved his getting breakfast, I couldn’t say yes fast enough.

  I stepped back into the dining room and announced there would be a delay of breakfast, then went back to the kitchen to help.

  A short time later, I returned and invited our group to get their food. It turned out the two employees were good at helping once they were told what to do. Commander had a wonderful recipe for a breakfast casserole. It was amazing what he’d done with some eggs, bread, green onions and shredded cheese. Dinah and I had found fruit to cut up for salad and made pots of coffee. There was orange juice, too. We’d set up the food buffet style on the stainless steel counter.

  Everything smelled delicious, and the small group began to help themselves.

  “Well, Sunshine, good job with breakfast,” Mason said as he picked up a plate. I was still getting used to his outfit. I was accustomed to seeing him in finely tailored suits or high-end casual wear. The white cotton pants and kimono jacket over a long-sleeve knit shirt seemed out of place on him along with the black cotton shoes. As usual, a lock of his warm brown hair had fallen across his forehead, giving him an earnest look as he put some food on his plate.

  “Commander deserves the credit. He pulled it all together. We just did the grunt work.”

  Mason picked up a mug for coffee. “Is there any milk?” One of the Asilomar employees got a carton of milk from the refrigerator and started to put it on the counter, but Commander wanted her to pour it into a small pitcher. I noticed a photo of a little girl on the carton. Dinah did, too.

  “I didn’t know they were still running those pictures of missing kids,” she said. “That little girl looks like Ashley-Angela.” For a moment Dinah sounded wistful, then she straightened up. “Just tell me to shut up,” she said with a laugh. Ashley-Angela and her fraternal twin brother, E. Conner, were the children of Dinah’s ex and his second wife, who was now an ex, too. In some bizarre twist of fate, Dinah had ended up caring for the kids and had gotten attached to them. She was truly sorry to see them go when their father finally came for them. But she was glad to get her freedom back, too. Sometimes when she saw a kid who resembled one of the twins, she still got sad and missed them.

  “This girl is older than Ashley-Angela,” I said, looking at the carton.

  “They just made the picture look that way. The girl has probably been missing for a couple of years. Kids change a lot, and somehow they fix the picture so it shows how she would look.” Dinah poured some milk in a little pitcher and handed it to Mason.

  Some more people came in, and I noticed Adele talking to the woman I’d seen sitting in the dining room. I caught a snippet of the conversation and was surprised to hear Adele doing her spiel about knitters trying to take over the world. The angry man came across the room to me.

  “Hi, I’m Spenser Futterman,” he said, putting out his hand. “And that’s my niece Marni.” He gestured toward the woman talking to Adele. “We’re not part of your group, but we were supposed to get breakfast . . .”

  He let his voice trail off, and I got the message. They were hungry and wanted to join us. When I looked at him close up, he had a rather pleasant face now that he wasn’t angry.

  “We all have to stick together,” I said, inviting them to help th
emselves. As Spenser poured two glasses of juice, Izabelle came in. Spenser looked up, and their eyes met.

  “You’re here?” she said. She sounded surprised and anything but happy to see him.

  “I need to talk to you.” He stepped closer to her, and she moved away.

  “There’s nothing to say,” Izabelle said, taking a plate of fruit and going back to the dining hall. She walked past Marni without any sign of recognition.

  “What was that about?” Dinah asked, coming up next to me.

  “Why do I think it’s trouble?” I replied.

  CHAPTER 7

  I WAITED UNTIL EVERYONE WAS EATING AND then dashed back to my room for a shower. While helping serve breakfast, I’d come up with a solution that would pacify Miss Lavender Pants and her crew. The hot shower felt good until I stepped out into the cold room. So cold that steam rose off my hot body. Great! Just what I needed! Fog inside, too. I threw on fresh clothes and got back to the dining hall just as everyone was having their second cup of coffee.

  I stood between the tables to make my announcement. “Even though most of the retreaters aren’t here, we’re going to have some workshop sessions after lunch.” At the word lunch Commander Blaine popped out of his seat.

  “Don’t worry about lunch,” he said. “I’m setting up a do-it-yourself sandwich bar.” I waited until he sat down to continue.

  “Dinah Lyons will be putting on a writing workshop, followed by a crochet class with Izabelle Landers. Since there are so few retreaters, I’m hoping all of you will support Dinah and Izabelle and come to both sessions.”

  I was relieved when I got a round of affirmative nods. However, Bennett said not to count on his wife participating. As the meal broke up, Miss Lavender Pants went over to Commander Blaine to shower him with praise about breakfast and his plan for lunch. I had to laugh at Dinah. She kept trying to ignore Commander, but when Miss Lavender Pants explained that Edward, the lawyer, was her brother and made the point that she was unattached, the spark in Dinah’s eyes gave her away. She was interested, even if she wouldn’t admit it.

  I headed over to the administration building to check on the fog news. The redheaded desk clerk had his head down on the counter. When I woke him, he said nothing had changed.

  Commander Blaine came in behind me, carrying a large box. He put it down on the long table set up for our campers’ registration.

  “Mind if I put these underneath?” he asked, pulling the boxes of folders to the edge of the table.

  “It looks like no one is going to be coming until this fog lifts, so why not?” I said, wondering what he was doing. He had my boxes out of the way in a flash and flipped the lid off the box he’d brought. It took me a moment to figure out what was in it, and then I recognized rows of gift-size shopping bags. “What are those for?” I asked as he began to put them in rows on the table.

  He took the rhinestone clipboard off the table where I’d put it and flipped to the schedule. “It’s the first activity I have planned. After the afternoon workshops, there’s a s’mores break.”

  “Right,” I said, remembering his s’more discussion earlier. “But are you sure you want to do that with so few people here?”

  “Yes. I think it’s even more important to do something special.” He took out a pile of long wire forks and stuck them in a metal container, then picked up one of the treat bags to show me its contents. There was a packet of marshmallows, four graham crackers, and four pieces of chocolate. “This is your basic everyday variety, but I have also made up gourmet versions.” He showed me the stickers on the fronts of the bags. He was a little over the top, insisting on listing the different fillings. Did I really need to know there was a choice of dark chocolate, white chocolate, plain milk chocolate, milk chocolate with peanut butter, chocolate with almonds, and chocolate with coconut?

  “I thought I would put the things out now, so I could go to the workshops like you asked.” Commander Blaine didn’t say it, but by the way his eyes brightened, I imagined he was thinking about Dinah’s workshop in particular. I helped him set up the rest of the bags. There were far more bags than people, but he wanted to make sure everyone could have their choice. By the time we finished, it was noon. Commander rushed ahead to make the final arrangements for lunch while I looked for Dinah.

  “All I can say is your fussy friend is a gem,” I said as Dinah and I walked into the dining hall.

  “He’s not my friend,” Dinah protested, “though he deserves points for breakfast and lunch.”

  The lights were on in the dining hall and something smelled good. Commander came out from the kitchen and said he’d set up the sandwich bar and hot soup.

  Everyone seemed satisfied with lunch. Mason had brought me some tomato soup and a Swiss cheese sandwich, but I was too keyed up about the afternoon to eat.

  I was glad I’d picked Dinah’s workshop to kick off with. Her years of teaching English to reluctant freshmen had made her a master at handling any kind of group. This crowd would be a snap. Right after lunch, I led the group to a small building that housed meeting rooms. A long table was at the front along with several rows of school chairs with table arms. From inside, the trees just a few feet away melted into the thick white. The bonus was that all the white reflected back into the room, making it seem brighter.

  Dinah set down her supplies while everyone but Commander found a seat. He hung around the front, offering to help. She gave him a stack of small notebooks and pens to hand out. Dinah leaned against the front of the table and began to talk memoir writing.

  I had never seen my friend in action, so I took a seat at the back of the room.

  “Anything can get you started,” Dinah began. “I’m going to give you what may seem like a silly assignment, but when we read what you’ve written, you’ll see how your take on it is unique and shows who you are.” She paused to build up the suspense. “I want you to write about orange soda for ten minutes.” I heard a collective huh, and for a moment I wondered if she knew what she was doing. She seemed to expect the panicky stares, and told them just to put their pens on the paper and write anything that came to mind. She set a timer, and surprisingly, after a few moments everyone began to write. When the bell went off, Dinah told them to stop.

  “Okay, let’s see what you wrote. Anyone want to start?” Miss Lavender Pants’s attorney brother raised his hand first. His piece had something to do with a client who claimed to have found a dead roach in a bottle of the bright soda.

  “My client took the settlement they offered before we went to court. I know I would have won if she had just agreed to let me go to trial. Like everything else, I just didn’t get my fair chance.”

  There was a smattering of applause as he sat down. Now I got what Dinah had said. Edward had certainly tipped his hand that he felt like a victim.

  Izabelle volunteered next. Edward had just read his piece—she presented hers.

  “Orange soda,” she said, making eye contact with members of the group. “Personally, I don’t like it. I think it looks like paint and tastes like carbonated candy.” Izabelle must have had very good recall of what she wrote as she glanced only occasionally at her paper as she spoke. No wonder she volunteered. She had said something about wanting as much opportunity as possible to be in front of a group before she went out on the road with her mystery craft presentations.

  “I was going to say I never drink it, but then I remembered there was one time. My sister and I went to Tina Geyser’s birthday party. It was in her backyard, and so hot I could feel the sweat drip down my sides. Some of the kids turned on the sprinklers and started running through the spray. Mrs. Geyser came out and yelled at them. I always thought she looked like the evil queen in Snow White. She said unless we all sat down at the picnic table, we would have to go home without having cake.”

  Izabelle made sure she still had everyone’s attention. Nobody could accuse her of having writer’s block.

  “Tina’s mother brought out plastic glasses of sod
a on a hammered aluminum tray. There were two glasses of orange soda, and the rest were lemon-lime. My sister got all upset when Mrs. Geyser started at the other end of the table and Billy Palmer took one of the glasses of orange soda.

  “ ‘I have dibs on the other,’ she called out, but Mrs. Geyser said there would be no dibs, and she would have to wait her turn like everybody else. Each time somebody reached for a glass, my sister moaned because she thought they were going to take the orange. But nobody did. Mrs. Geyser got to me, and my sister started to relax. I pretended to reach for a glass of lemon-lime, but at the last second, I took the orange instead. I drank the whole glass while my sister cried. I guess she didn’t get it was a joke.”

  And neither did the rest of us. There was a moment of dead air, and then a hesitant trickle of applause as Dinah stepped in and commented on Izabelle’s good use of storytelling. That was how Dinah won over all those unruly freshmen. She knew how to find the positive.

  Dinah glanced at her watch and said there was time for one more person to read. Adele was out of her chair before Dinah finished the sentence. Adele’s piece detailed how she had played orange soda in a modern dance recital and described being dressed in yards and yards of orange gauze.

  While Dinah gave them the next writing assignment, I left to get some soft drinks ready for the break. I hoped that after all the attention orange soda had just gotten, nobody asked for any, since all we had was cola and lemon-lime. I came back at the end of the allotted time and announced that the next workshop would begin in twenty minutes.

  Bennett stopped on his way to the door. “Sorry, here’s where I draw the line about being a good sport. I’m probably doing you a favor. My attempt at crocheting would give you nightmares.” Commander excused himself as well, saying he had to make sure the fire pit was ready for the next activity. I thought Miss Lavender Pants’s brother and Mason might make some excuses, too, but they both surprised me by saying they’d be back. Izabelle pointed to a large plastic box under the table and asked if I would set up her supplies before she rushed out.