A Farewell to Yarns

VanDyne’s direction first. As yet, she hadn’t gotten the nerve or the opportunity. Now here she was, frayed and bedraggled, and he was greeting her with “Oh, no.“
    “Mrs. Jeffry, do you really know these people?”
    Jane bristled. “I wouldn’t be butting in otherwise. It’s my friend Phyllis Wagner and her son, Bobby Bryant.“
    “Come in, then. But don’t touch anything. Just sit down for a few minutes, would you?”
    The living room was bare of furniture as yet, but there was a lovely table and six matching chairs in the dining room next to it. A police officer had some forms spread out on the table and was having a cryptic conversation with a walkie-talkie. Jane sat down obediently and waited for Mel, who had gone up the stairs. She ought to go straight to Phyllis to help comfort her, but she knew if she started wandering around the house, Mel would have her head.
    As she waited, a medical attendant called down the stairs to his co-worker, “Bring me that extra blood pressure cuff, would you? This one’s sprung a leak.”
    At least Bobby wasn’t dead, if they were taking his blood pressure. Probably not even hurt too badly, judging from the man’s tone. Of course, those guys weren’t supposed to act hysterical, but he’d sounded downright casual. The other attendant went back to the ambulance and then upstairs. A moment later, both of them came down carrying a stretcher.
    The body on it was completely covered.
    Jane looked away quickly. Poor, poor Phyllis! To have found her long lost son, only to lose him. What in the world had happened to him?
    Mel came back down the stairs carrying a little book of some sort. He pulled up another chair and said, “Could you look through this address book and tell me who ought to be notified of the death?“
    “It was an accident, wasn’t it?“ Jane asked.
    Mel cocked an eyebrow. “I don’t normally get sent out when people slip in the bathtub or fall off ladders. No, it was no accident. It was murder. I’m sorry, Mrs. Jeffry. Are these people goods friends of yours?“
    “Not really. I’d never heard of Bobby until yesterday, and I hadn’t seen Phyllis for fifteen or sixteen years. Poor Phyllis. How’s she doing?“
    “I beg your pardon?“
    “How’s she taking it?”
    Mel paused a moment, then to Jane’s astonishment, he took her hand. “I guess you’d say she’s taking it badly. She was murdered.”
     

Eleven
     
    “Phyllis—murdered!“ Jane gasped.
    “I’m afraid so,“ Mel VanDyne said, withdrawing his hand, which she’d clutched so hard his fingers hurt. “Why did you assume otherwise?“
    “I don’t know. But—but—how? Why? Who?“
    “That’s what I hope you might help me find out. That is,“ he put up his hand in a “stop“ gesture, “help me just a little.”
    Jane was still too stunned to understand the implication. “Where’s Bobby, then?“
    “Upstairs. Recovering. He’s about half drunk and half hung over and he’s been violent. Fell over trying to attack one of my men, and hit his head on the door frame. He’ll be okay. Why did you think he was the one who’d died?“
    “Just because he’s so horrible, I guess. Do you have a cigarette?“ He handed her one and lit it for her. “I’m trying to quit,“ she said, exhaling. “Fiona Howard called me. She seemed to think it was Bobby. Who in the world would want to kill Phyllis? She never hurt anybody in her life. This is awful.“
    “We’ll find out. Don’t worry. Now, you can help by telling me about her. What was she doing here? The local police have this house listed as vacant. They’ve been keeping an eye on it periodically to prevent a break-in.“
    “It was vacant, until last night.“ She drew a deep breath, trying to compress an explanation of who Phyllis was into as few words as possible. Among Mel VanDyne’s traits was a certain tendency to regard Jane’s explanations as wordy and full of trivialities. “Phyllis and I knew each other seventeen years ago—“
    “Seventeen years—?“ he said brokenly, as if expecting a day by day accounting of the entire duration.
    Pruning it to the minimum, she got the story out.
    “Now, let me get this straight,“ Mel said after he’d thought for a few minutes. “Mrs. Wagner and her husband have no children together, but he has two sons from a previous marriage, and she had one she’d given up for adoption: this Bobby Bryant. Where’s her husband?“
    “I’m not sure. Possibly on the