War and Peas

meeting.“
    “So Georgia must have also suspected that Regina wanted her out?“ Jane said.
    “Yes, I imagine—“ Sharlene stopped and her eyes got very wide. “You don’t think Georgia shot Ms. Palmer—?“
    “Sharlene, somebody did,“ Shelley said.

Fourteen

    Nobody would kill to keep a position on a volunteer board,“ Jane said.
    They’d returned to the museum, and Jane and Shelley were alone in the boardroom again. Sharlene had thanked them effusively for the lunch and gone back to work in Regina’s office.
    “In fact, I would think there would be a fair percentage of the population that would do anything up to and including murder to get off,“ Jane continued.
    “But not if it was because of embezzlement,“ Shelley argued. “Off the board and into jail isn’t a very good option.“
    “But if the rest of the board had accepted Georgia’s doctored version of her fund-raising all these years, wouldn’t they have just held the threat over her head to force her to resign? Making a big deal of it would make the museum look incompetent.“
    “Probably, but could she count on that? Maybe not,“ Shelley said. “Suppose Regina had evidence that she’d stepped up her cheating and had really taken them to the cleaners on something? Or what if Regina had already privately warned her that she should resign and Georgia had indicated she wasn’t going to and Regina had vowed to Reveal All?“
    “Still—killing her wouldn’t solve Georgia’s problem, just delay the revelation. Surely if Regina knew about some grand-scale cheating, the accountant on the board knew about it too.“
    “The accountant’s in Alaska, remember. Regina might have been the only one who knew, and told Georgia she was going to give her findings to the accountant when he returned.“
    “Why wouldn’t Regina call and tell him right away, before having a showdown with Georgia?”
    Shelley shrugged. “Maybe she couldn’t reach him. Or maybe she knew he wouldn’t have had his books with him on vacation. Why would he? I don’t think this museum is his primary business. It’s probably just a volunteer, pro bono kind of thing he does on the side.“
    “Hmm. That might explain Regina’s office being searched, wouldn’t it?“
    “Yes, it could have been Georgia trying to find whatever evidence Regina had.“
    “But then what about the basement? Why would Regina think, with the whole museum in which to hide something—presuming Regina had the need to hide it—that anybody would choose the basement? Surely there’s a safe somewhere. Or if Regina had been concerned about a single copy of something being stolen, wouldn’t she have made a copy or two and spread them around?“
    “I don’t know,“ Shelley said. “Maybe Georgia just lost her head and tried to think of where she herself would have hidden something.”
    Jane shook her head. “I don’t know that I’d believe that. I think Georgia—or whoever it was—had good reason to believe something she wanted was down there.“
    “Perhaps,“ Shelley said.
    “I can’t quite picture Georgia as a murderer for some reason. She’s obnoxious and, it seems, a petty thief—“
    “Maybe not so petty,“ Shelley said. “If Regina had been driven to get rid of her after all these years of graciously overlooking her pilfering, there might have been a lot of money involved. And keep in mind that Regina was killed during the Pea Festival. A big money-raising opportunity for the museum. Couldn’t it be that Regina had already seen evidence of Georgia’s thievery?“
    “Like what?“
    “I don’t know!“ Shelley said, becoming a bit defensive. “Maybe people pay to rent those booths and Regina found out from one of them that they’d paid Georgia a whole lot more than they’re supposed to?”
    Jane nodded. “I guess that could be. You know what I’m really having trouble with? The idea of the board allowing her to get away with stealing. I can’t imagine Jumper or Babs letting it go, and I’ve never known an accountant who could ignore something wrong with the books.
    Getting the information out of Sharlene wasn’t all that easy, so I don’t think she’s lying, but couldn’t she be mistaken?”
    Shelley stuck her purse in the drawer next to where Jane was working and started assembling her papers. “Could be. It might be a matter of interpretation. It’s possible they suspected her, but couldn’t find any evidence at all. You know, I was thinking about