Murder With Peacocks(24)

The neighbors two houses down had recently put up an eight-foot fence to keep in their Labradors. When we started down the street, I saw Michael trying to pull a small furry dog away from that very fence. The little dog was barking almost hysterically and leaping repeatedly at the fence. We heard an occasional bored bark from one of the Labs. Michael finally succeeded in dragging his dog away, and they headed in our direction. When the dog caught sight of us he quickened his pace.

"Oh, what a cute little dog," the bridesmaid cooed as we came near them.

"If you say so," Michael said. "I consider him--don't!" he shouted, as she bent down to pet the dog. "He'll take your nose off," he explained, as the dog went into a frenzy of snarling and snapping. "Bad dog, Spike," he said rather mechanically, as if he had to say it rather often.

"Oh, his name's Spike," she said inanely.

"No, actually Mother calls him Sweetie-cakes, or Cutesy-poo, or something like that," Michael said, with disgust. "I don't think even a nasty little dog like him deserves that, so I've decided to call him Spike. After a bully I knew in grade school." As if he understood what Michael was saying, Spike glanced up at him balefully and curled his lip.

"Charming," I said. Spike was a small dustmop of black and white fur with a petulant, pushed-in face. I prefer cats and collies, myself.

"Mom rescued him from an animal shelter where she was doing some volunteer work."

"Oh, that's so nice," the bridesmaid said.

"She is fond of remarking that he must have been mistreated," Michael said, "and will mellow when he learns to expect food and kindness instead of ill treatment."

"Oh, then she hasn't had him long," I said.

"Only seven years. At this rate, I think he'll go senile before he mellows."

Spike trotted over to the neighbors' mailbox and lifted his leg. However, he lifted the wrong leg, and instead of watering the post came perilously close to spraying the bridesmaid and me.

"We'd better go," she said, wrinkling her nose. "Samantha will be getting impatient."

"The caterer is showing signs of rebellion," I said. "We're gathering a posse to deal with him."

"Good luck. Are you bringing your friend Eileen in later today?"

"If she shows up," I said. "Mother took a garbled message from her yesterday. Something about her and Steven running away to the beach."

"Perhaps they're eloping."

"Don't get my hopes up."

We dealt with the caterer by phone, and then spent what seemed like hours in earnest discussion over whether or not there should be finger bowls, and if so, whether they should have flowers or paper-thin lemon slices floating in them. Left to my own devices, I could have settled this in thirty seconds.

When this weighty issue had been decided and I had my marching orders, Samantha and her bridesmaid went off to meet yet another bridesmaid for lunch. Probably going to split a lettuce leaf between the three of them, I thought, guiltily remembering the muffin with which I'd already undermined my day's calorie count.

I went home, fixed myself an early and depressingly meager lunch, and spent the next few hours on the back porch swing with the phone, racking up long distance charges. One of Eileen's bridesmaids, from Tennessee, had provided two completely contradictory shoe sizes, and I had to elicit the truth.

One of Mother's more elusive cousins had to be tracked down--as it turned out, to a commune in California. After failing miserably to find out through any other means the phone number of the Cape May bed and breakfast where Eileen and Steven were reputed to be hiding, I called Barry at Professor Donleavy's and managed to extract the information without actually promising to go out with him. And finally, I reached Eileen and Steven and made Eileen promise to come home within a day or two to decide on her dress and ours.

Having reached the end of my patience, I retired to the hammock and addressed envelopes for a few hours. When Mother hadn't shown up by six o'clock, I began fixing some dinner. When she hadn't shown up by seven-thirty, I ate it. Jake finally dropped her off after nine, tired but happy and laden with parcels.

Not a wildly exciting or productive afternoon, but trivial as my activities were to the progress of the weddings, they loomed large in the light of subsequent events.





Wednesday, June 1



Subsequent events began happening the next morning at breakfast.

"Meg, have you seen Mrs. Grover?" Mother asked while waiting for me to finish fixing her a fresh fruit salad.

"Yes," I said. "I met her at the party, remember? At both parties."

"Yes, but have you seen her since? Jake called a little while ago to say she didn't come home last night. He wanted to report her missing to the sheriff, but for some silly reason you can't do much until she's been gone for twenty-four hours."