Anything Goes

the girls had claimed something of hers had been stolen, but it usually turned out that it had just been mislaid. On the rare occasions when the missing object didn’t turn up, could Sissy have been responsible? Or maybe this was an aberration that had come to her later? Lily hadn’t been in touch with Sissy for years until last week. Might Sissy have taken anything else? Or...
    Lily’s thoughts took a sharp turn. And having done so went leaping along a whole new string of events.
    This could be it. Maybe she’d solved more than just the mystery of the missing money. But how could anything be proved? She sat down in the chair where Sissy had said she’d left the missing scarf and just let her mind race. Images she’d ignored suddenly came to light. As well as a conversation she’d overheard and paid no attention to.
    Then she jumped up and ran to find Mr. Prinney. If there was proof, he probably had it and didn’t even know it.
     

Chapter 25
     
    At the end of Lily’s hour-long discussion with Mr. Prinney, he was convinced.
    “But how can we prove it?“ he asked.
    “You have the proof of the motive. Or probably could with a single phone call. But we’re going to have to get a confession. The weight of the evidence...“
    “A confession?“
    “A confession that’s witnessed by a lot of people,“ Lily said. “I propose that we reassemble the people who were on the boat. Except for Uncle and Billy Smith, of course. We could call it a housewarming party.“
    “Won’t that make everyone wary, to gather them together again?“
    “We don’t need to tell anyone who else is invited. And we’ll invite Chief Henderson, Jack Summer and his cousin the deputy as well. And we couldn’t leave out the doctor. Dr. Polhemus, isn’t that his name? Will Mrs. Prinney be willing to feed that many people?“
    “She’d love nothing better. But I don’t see how this is going to work...“
    “It may not,“ Lily said. “But we have to try. And we shouldn’t let anyone but the two of us and Robert know what the real purpose is.“
    “The three of us could make first-class fools of ourselves,“ Mr. Prinney said.
    “We could. But you know as well as I do that we’re right.“
    “Oh, yes. There’s no question. Everything fits.“ He sat back in the chair in his small office for a moment, his hands to the sides of his face, and after a moment, he nodded. “We’ll do it. This Thursday? That will give everyone time to get an invitation and respond. If the right person begs off, it will just be a housewarming party and we’ll have to rethink things.“
    “In what way?“
    “Well, if we had a competent police chief, we could just present the information we have to him and keep ourselves out of it. We’ll have to do that eventually anyway.“
    “I’ll tell Robert everything and then ask Mrs. Prinney to start planning the menu,“ Lily said.
     
    From Monday to Thursday seemed to last years. The only relief from the tension was that the weather finally cooled. Even Robert was edgy and paced around mumbling to himself. Lily took a number of entirely unnecessary naps, just to keep herself from thinking about what they were about to do and fretting about whether it would work.
    The invitations went out on Monday afternoon by telephone to the city people and notes to the locals. And by Tuesday, the Winslows had responded favorably. Sissy came over to confirm to Lily that they would be delighted to attend the party.
    “We were going to go back to our apartment in the City if the weather stays nice, but Mummy said we couldn’t miss your housewarming, being as we’re next-door neighbors.“ Then she asked if Robert was around and Lily said unfortunately not, that he’d gone to town on an errand. Sissy found another feeble excuse to visit again on Wednesday, once again trying to latch onto Robert—who had seen her coming and was hiding in his room.
    “She’s got a crush on you,“ Lily said after she’d gotten rid of Sissy for the second time in two days.
    “Anybody whose family was trying to marry them off to Claude would,“ he said. “It’s not a compliment.”
    Sissy’s visits were a horrible annoyance but Lily had to pretend to be friendly. She had to practically bite her lip to keep from tackling Sissy about the theft of the ten-dollar bill.
    Both Mr. Winningham and Mr. Eggers replied that they would be happy to attend the housewarming, even though it meant a train trip from New York. Lily was