A Knife to Remember

about the lunch in her yard and Lynette Harwell’s devastating bit of information about her affair with Jane’s late husband. “Poor Mike just unraveled. He stormed out of the house, hurling accusations at me. When he got back, he’d calmed down some, but you could tell he was crushed. Then, before we could even thrash it out, he mentioned what happened to the kitchen.”
    Shelley held up her hands. “Kitchen? Hold it! What are you talking about? Has this unhinged you completely?“
    “I just hadn’t gotten to that part yet. Somebody came in while I was showering and trashed my kitchen.“
    “Probably trying to find your recipe for cheese bread to destroy it before you destroyed the world with it,“ Shelley said with a smile, which faded quickly. “You aren’t serious, are you?“
    “ ‘Fraid so. Drawers jerked out and rummaged through, cabinets partly emptied. A few broken dishes. There were trash and pots and pans all over the floor and counters and flour everyplace. I managed to just sweep everything into the guest bathroom and close the door on it before the police took over the kitchen. That’s why Mel was here. Mike called the police and so we were sitting here with Mel when Butch came in with his hand gashed—”
    Shelley’s mouth dropped open. “Butch? Who in the world is Butch?“
    “Jake’s assistant. A really nice kid. About twenty, New Jersey accent, no neck. He’d cut his hand pretty badly and Maisie brought him in here to wash it off and fix him up. He got all panicked that Jake would be mad at him for leaving his job, so Mel volunteered to pass the message along to Jake for him. Mel was going to go out back anyway and ask people if anyone had seen somebody coming in my house. Anyhow, Mel found Jake’s body in the props truck.”
    Shelley shivered. “God, that’s awful! How was he killed?“
    “I don’t know. Mel didn’t say.“
    “So, while I was frittering away my time at the library, you unearthed a nasty family secret,“ she said, ticking off her fingers, “had your house vandalized, invited in a guest with a bloody hand, and sent another visitor out to discover a dead body? Jane, sometimes you amaze me.“
    “But I had nothing to do with any of it, except that I live here. It’s not as if I pried the information out of Harwell—God knows I didn’t want to hear about her and Steve—or went out searching for somebody to wreck my kitchen!“
    “Mel’s not going to see it that way,“ Shelley warned. “Especially if you’re backing out on the romantic weekend.“
    “I don’t know that I am yet. I still haven’t had a chance to talk to Mike. I just don’t want him to feel that I’m abandoning him at a bad time in his life. For him, this must be like losing his father all over again. First Steve died, and now even Mike’s memory of him has to be drastically revised. That’s tough, especially when you’re still so young. Shelley, I told him about Steve leaving us the night he died. I didn’t want him to ever know, but I heard myself telling him and I was appalled.“
    “Jane, he’s a tough kid. He’ll survive it and I’ve always thought you should have told him. He was bound to find out sooner or later. Better that it came from you. Where are your kids anyway?“
    “As soon as Katie and Todd got home from school, Mike took my side about them not going out in the yard. Of course, he’s just afraid they’ll somehow find out what he learned. He took Todd to a movie, after getting into a screaming match with Katie. She’s in the back bedroom watching out the window—and no doubt plotting revenge on Mike and me both. I could have used her help cleaning up the kitchen. It was an unholy mess, but I didn’t want to have one more thing to fight about. With anybody.”
    Both women fell silent for a while, watching the activities outside and thinking.
    In the kitchen, the police officer questioned a hippy-dippy individual who was expounding on why she never wore a watch and couldn’t possibly tell him what time anybody did anything because time was an artificial concept that had caused most of the misery in the world and ought to be outlawed so that the fascist pigs couldn’t try to trip people up by asking about it. To his credit, the officer just went on to the next question without any comment.
    “Oh, Jane—what a lot you have to sort out,“ Shelley said quietly.
    Jane sighed. “Oh, I don’t know. The police have to sort out Jake’s murder, and Mike