Grime and Punishment

running down her chin and her bra stuffed with seeds,“ Shelley put in.
    They tossed off progressively sillier ideas for a few minutes, and Suzie finally said, “Bless your sneaky little heart, Jane, you’ve made me almost forget my cramps. Will you both stay for lunch? It’s getting to be that time.”
    Shelley stood up, wiping her eyes. “Thanks, no, Suzie. I want to get as many of these dishes back as I can.”
    Suzie walked them to the door, still giggling. But as they started to walk away, she grew serious. “Jane, do you really think that’s what the murder was about? Edith blackmailing someone? Is that what your cocky, handsome detective thinks?“
    “Who knows what he thinks? He interviewed you, I hear.“
    “Yes, but he didn’t get anywhere,“ she said with a lecherous look. “I didn’t reveal any neighborhood secrets.“
    “Do you really know any?“
    “Sure, so do you, if you stop and think about it. Quiet little abortions before it was legal, affairs, questionable incomes, that sort of thing. But if we know them, they’re not exactly secrets anyway. But Jane, there’s something you ought to think about while you’re on this little private quest for the truth
    “What?“
    “Nobody’s ever had the balls to try a thing like blackmail on me. Partly because I don’t have anything nasty enough for it to work. But if it had been true—if she had been blackmailing me and you’d asked me—Jane, I’d have said exactly the same thing to you as I did.”

Sixteen

    “Who do you think you are—Miss Marple?“ Shelley demanded when they got back in the car. She was obviously torn between anger and amusement.
    “Well, somebody has to get to the bottom of this, and I don’t have much faith in our friend Detective VanDyne, do you?“
    “It is his job, you know.“
    “I know that, and he’s probably pretty good at it, but this has to do with private things. Do you think anybody’s going to tell him—a man, a cop, an outsider—what they were being blackmailed about?”
    Shelley fished her keys out of her purse, started the engine, and backed out of Suzie’s driveway at a much higher speed than was usual for her. “Probably not. No more than they’re going to tell you.“
    “Yes, they will.”
    Shelley stopped at the corner and looked at her for a long moment before driving on. “Like Suzie did, huh?“
    “I’ll admit I struck out on that one. But I’ve learned a valuable lesson, and I never for a moment suspected Suzie anyway. It was a sort of trial run, you see.“
    “Oh, sure. If you don’t suspect her, who do you suspect?“
    “Actually, I think it may have been Robbie Jones.“ She glanced at Shelley. “You do too, don’t you?”
    Shelley cleared her face of the slight smile that had been starting at the corners of her mouth. “That’s not fair of either of us, Jane. She’s just homely and dull. That’s no reason to suspect her of murder, for God’s sake.“
    “Shelley, if anybody’s going to be suspected, it might as well be her—and I’m not going by her looks. The fact is, she’s more the type than any of us. She’s a superb organizer. A cold-blooded organizer, you might say. And murdering that cleaning lady took a cool head and good planning. Also, I keep thinking of that time we were having some kind of meeting and somebody mentioned how odd it was that her daughter didn’t have her beautiful red hair. Remember?“
    “Vaguely. She said something about her taking after her father. So what?“
    “Then Suzie said she saw no resemblance to Harry, and Robbie said, no, her daughter’s father was her first husband. Not the daughter’s husband, Robbie’s.“
    “Oh, yes, I remember there was a stir about that later. Nobody knew she’d been married before, and Suzie was carrying on about how she couldn’t find a man to marry and Robbie had found two and it proved life wasn’t fair.“
    “Right. But remember how Robbie clammed up after that, and nobody could get her to say another word about the first husband?“
    “Yes, but none of that means a damn thing. We know lots of people who made a bad first marriage and just don’t like to talk about it. Before I met Paul, I was engaged to a man once that I’d sooner die than admit I knew. I could have married him, and I certainly wouldn’t want to talk about it. So what?“
    “The marriage isn’t what matters here, it’s her secretiveness.“
    “Pretty thin, Jane.“
    “I know it is. But Shelley, think