“Don’t worry,” I said. “Horace took photos. And they may need help identifying the victim, so I’m sure you’ll get to look at them eventually.”
I could tell this wasn’t a satisfactory answer. He wanted photos he could pore over, looking for clues. Not just a full-face photo but detailed close-ups of the wound, as well. He wandered off after giving me a reproachful look most parents wouldn’t inflict on their kids unless they’d done something illegal or immoral.
Mother and Minerva Burke returned bearing plates of cookies, and we all stood back as the crowd descended on them like a flock of ravenous seagulls.
“What were you planning to do about dinner?” Mother asked, in a stage whisper.
“Nothing special,” I said. “Michael will be tired from the faculty meeting, so I thought we’d stay in.”
“I meant for your guests,” Mother said.
“You mean the croquet players and the construction workers?” I said. “Send the locals home to find their own dinners, and give the students directions to Luigi’s.”
Mother shook her head. She should have realized by now that as a hostess, I’d never live up to her expectations. I usually exceeded her worst fears.
“Some of your guests aren’t getting along,” she murmured. I glanced up hastily. The last time she’d said that, I’d had to break up a fistfight between two cousins. This time, to my relief, no actual combat had begun. Mrs. Pruitt and the other Dames had gathered at one end of the room, pointedly not looking at Mrs. Briggs and the clones, who had clustered at the other end, ostentatiously ignoring Mrs. Pruitt and the Dames.
“Perhaps if you introduced them?” Mother suggested. “Drew them into conversation together?”
“Mother, it’s a police investigation, not a party,” I said. “If anyone’s the host, it’s Chief Burke.”
“And he knows better than to expect those two lots to get along,” Minerva Burke added. “You’re lucky—they’re behaving better than usual.”
“It’s a long-standing thing, then?” I asked. “I just assumed they were carrying the croquet rivalry too far.”
“Where have you been, girl?” Minerva said. “Obviously not clawing your way up in Caerphilly society.”
“Trying to avoid it,” I said. “Why don’t they like each other?”
“Mrs. Pruitt and her crowd make a big fuss about being descendants of the founding families of Caerphilly.”
“And Mrs. Briggs and the clones aren’t from around here,” I said, nodding.
“Worse—they make money bringing in more people who aren’t from around here,” Mrs. Burke said. “May Briggs’s husband built that development of town houses Mrs. Pruitt and her gang tried so hard to block. And Lady Pruitt still hasn’t forgiven the clones for selling a house in Westlake to that professional basketball player. They did manage to stay civil to one another in public until the whole outlet-mall thing broke.”
“Outlet mall?” Mother asked, her keen shopper’s instincts coming to full alert.
“There’s a rumor that Evan Briggs wants to build a big outlet mall in town,” I said.
“More than a rumor,” Mrs. Burke said. “He and the clones have put together a formal proposal. Three million square feet—larger than Potomac Mills, which might make it the largest in the country. Henrietta Pruitt’s leading the battle against it—the only useful thing I’ve seen her do in the four years we’ve been in town.”
“Ah,” I said. “So that’s why they’ve all been so surly. Maybe I accidentally did something right, keeping them on different croquet fields all day. Probably prevented—well, who knows what.”
I started to say bloodshed, then remembered Jane Doe.
“So what if the murdered woman is allied to one side or the other in the battle over the outlet mall?” I said aloud. “That might make anyone on the other side a logical suspect. We just have to look for the connection.”
“If you find one, I’m sure Henry would be much obliged for the information,” Mrs. Burke said, her tone sharper than usual.
“Naturally.”
“How nice,” Mother said. No doubt she’d heard Mrs. Burke’s tone and thought another social rift needed mending. “I know Meg always enjoys assisting the police in their investigations—isn’t that what they call it?”
“Usually, when the police say that, it means they’re about to arrest the person, Mother,” I said. “I’ll just try not to get in the chief’s way.”