As I clicked through the website, the pages were increasingly less glossy and professionally designed. The “About Us” page should have been called “About Me,” as Kevin was the only staff member mentioned. The list of recommendations from satisfied clients was equally sparse, and when I clicked on the links, most of them gave me an error.

  I’m well aware that it can take time to build a successful business. Companies have to grow; seed money has to be raised; contacts nurtured; good employees hired. I considered it highly unlikely Kevin had any more of the needed time. From what little I knew about cryptocurrency, it had already passed as the next big thing. I then did a wider search on Kevin and his wife, Cindy, and found nothing unexpected. They’d lived in New York City until little over a year ago, when they moved to Rudolph. Cindy worked for an insurance broker, as I’d been told. She was involved in several community groups, as suited someone new to town, trying to make friends. She was a member of a bridge club, served on the hospital fundraising committee, and put in one day a week at the hospital’s secondhand shop. I found a photo of her dressed in a green and red sweater and skirt, smiling broadly as she served hot apple cider at last year’s children’s holiday party. My dad was in the background, in his full Santa Claus uniform, Alan next to him in his role of head toymaker.

  Kevin himself didn’t seem to have any outside interests. He had a business degree from NYU, and he’d been employed by a major investment bank in New York City. He’d quit or been let go (details were murky), and he and Cindy moved to Rudolph, where he started Crypto-Masters. As I am not a hacker, I had no way of telling how he was financially able to manage leaving his job. A bank loan, most likely. If so, the bank would expect to be repaid at some point. Maybe he’d taken the money out of the couple’s savings. In that case, Cindy would not be happy to realize the business was not working out as planned.

  I closed my computer. Kevin needed money. He believed his father-in-law had money. Jim Cole couldn’t have bankrolled his son-in-law if he wanted to, but instead of saying so, he’d put up a pretext of expecting to be closely involved in the business. I considered it likely he’d known Kevin would never agree.

  The question was, had Kevin taken steps to get the money without having Jim interfering in the company, which in turn would mean Jim would have discovered exactly how badly Kevin was doing?

  All speculation. I sat back with a sigh. I was spinning my wheels and getting nowhere. Plenty of people had reason to want Jim Cole dead, and I knew next to none of them.

  He really must have been an awful man. Even dead, he brought out the worst in people.

  It would be nice if Trish or Louise had spat out a confession in front of Detective Simmonds. Trish called Louise a gold digger. Louise was a considerable number of years younger than Jim; therefore, it was easy to conclude she’d been with him because she thought he was wealthy. What might she have done if she discovered such was not the case?

  What might Trish have done if she thought Jim was going to leave Louise and come back to her, when she found out he had no intention of doing so?

  “Enough,” I said to Mattie. “We have to get up early tomorrow, so let’s have our walk and get to bed.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Vicky picked Mattie and me up at seven as arranged. Rubbing sleep out of my eyes and trying to pat down my hair, I’d grumbled about the time, and she cheerfully reminded me she’d put in three hours of work already. “Besides, it’s a bright and sunny Monday morning. We need to catch the Muddites before they disperse for what they laughably call a day’s work.”

  The state maintains the highway between Rudolph and Muddle Harbor, which is just as well as otherwise it would be nothing but a muddy, overgrown track these days. Old rivalries sometimes die hard, if ever they do die, and traffic rarely moves along this stretch of road. From my, admittedly biased, point of view, the estrangement between our towns was entirely on the people of Muddle Harbor. They could have tried to ride Rudolph’s coat tails to success by offering overflow accommodation and satellite activities, but they stubbornly refused to admit we were doing better than them. They occasionally came up with a brilliant idea that would grant them instant prosperity, but without people like my dad to actually put in the work of making those ideas come to fruition, their town continued to decline.

  “What’s your plan?” Vicky said.

  “You’re assuming I have a plan.”

  “Don’t look at me. This wasn’t my idea.”

  “All I want is to gather information. My in-depth investigative reporting tells me no descendants of Henry Cole himself are still living, other than Cindy Farrar, daughter of Jim. So that seals off one line of enquiry.”

  “By in-depth investigative reporting, you mean Mrs. D’Angelo told you.”

  “Yes, but I first asked the right question. It’s sad, when you come to think of it. Henry Cole had four children. All these generations later he has but one living descendent. Cindy would be his great granddaughter.”

  “Speaking of Cindy, what did you eventually find out about her and her husband?”

  “Plenty. On his part anyway.” I related what I’d learned and concluded by saying, “Kevin Farrar had good reason to want Jim dead. Not only to possibly inherit, but he must have been worried Jim would find out the real situation at Crypto-Masters. Jim was an out and out mean man, and to be that mean, he had to enjoy digging up the dirt on people.”

  “How about Cindy? For the inheritance?”

  “I might be wrong, but I can’t see it. They might have been estranged most of her life, but Jim was still her father and that’s a powerful bond.”

  “Do we know anything about the current whereabouts of Cindy’s mother? She had reason to hate Jim Cole.”

  I winced. “I never thought to check into her. I also didn’t ask Simmonds if Kevin and Cindy have alibis.”

  “Some detective you are, Merry Wilkinson.”

  Vicky had brought the bakery van this morning, rather than her two-seater car. Mattie stuck his wet nose between the seats, reminding me he was there. I gave his ears a rub. “As I keep saying, I don’t want to be a detective. I just seem to get involved in things I’d rather not.”

  “Thus the trip to Muddle Harbor. Tell me again why we’re doing this when I could be hard at work at my own place. Which, by the way, took some considerable time to clean after yesterday’s foofaraw. You can be sure I’ve itemized every jar of preserves and piece of china that got broken. Not to mention the overtime for my staff to clean up.”

  “Our sandwiches and Jackie’s tea. I never did get lunch.”

  “It’s on the list.”

  “Back to the matter at hand. We’ve accounted for all the descendants of Henry and Charles who might think they have a claim on Emmeline’s estate, that being only Jim and through him Cindy and Kevin. If any relatives of Charles’s wife, Ethel, still live in Muddle Harbor, I’d like to know more about them.”

  “Under what pretext are you going to get this information?”

  “You are, Vicky. You’ve bought Ethel’s house, and you want to know more about its history and the history of the family who lived there. You have to admit, it is a fascinating story. Although a tragic one. Poor Ethel.”

  “I suppose I can do that.”

  “I’d like to know if anyone had any contact with Emmeline after she moved away. If so, that person, or their descendants, might have had some expectation of getting something when she died.”

  “Something like my house?”

  “Or even just a minor bequest. We can then try, cleverly and subtly, to work Trish Dawson into the conversation. Maybe she’s bragging around town about how she’s about to be rich rich rich.”

  Vicky touched the brakes as the speed limit decreased when we crossed into the town of Muddle Harbor. The rising sun disappeared behind a thick bank of clouds, and the temperature dropped a good ten degrees. Main Street was largely deserted, many of the shops boarded up, dusty displays in the few struggling to stay in business, tattered curtains in the windows of the apartments above.

  Mattie let out a low whine and retreated to the back seat.

  “I’m surprised no one’s ever suggested setting a movie here,” Vicky said. “A Stephen King eight-part horror series or a postapocalyptic saga. They wouldn’t even have to do much work—just film everyday Muddites going about their business.”

  As usual, the only sign of activity along the main street was at the Muddle Harbor Café. Lights glimmered in the windows, and a row of cars was parked outside. Vicky slipped her car between a couple of rust-covered pickups.

  Lights were on inside the restaurant, the windows were clean, and every bulb in the sign worked. I almost salivated. I love a good old-fashioned American diner breakfast, and the Muddle Harbor Café did a great one. Vicky would pretend to be totally dismissive of the high-fat, high-cholesterol, low-vegetable offerings. And then she’d try to steal a piece of bacon off my plate.

  I told Mattie to stay, and he promptly curled himself into a ball and closed his eyes.

  We opened the door of the café to be enveloped by the marvelous scents of hot buttered toast, fried grease, and fresh coffee.

  Nothing had changed since the last time Vicky and I had been here. I’ve been to places in Manhattan that have spent a lot of money trying to recreate 1950s soda fountain decor. The Muddle Harbor Café hadn’t needed to spend a cent: they’d never tried to keep up with the times. Black-and-white-checked tiles on the floor and the walls, red vinyl–topped stools in front of the long counter, booth seating around the room. The pictures of smiling young people holding soda bottles and advertising for long since departed products that hung on the walls were not modern art; they were the real thing. There were even a couple of posters of tough-looking men on horseback, smoking cigarettes.

  The café might be out of date, but it was spotlessly clean and even welcoming.

  A group of young mothers, babies in arms or toddlers snoozing in strollers, exchanged news over their coffee. A cluster of old men crowded into a booth, complaining about the weather, their wives and children, and the price they were getting for their crops, as they and their fathers before them had no doubt done every Monday morning for the past hundred years. An elderly couple had newspapers propped in front of them, and spooned up eggs and bacon without looking at each other or speaking. In contrast, a teenage couple, clearly on their way to school, were tucked into the back of a booth, holding hands across the table as they stared deeply into each other’s eyes. They even had tall glasses of milkshakes in front of them. They didn’t talk either, but unlike the long-married couple, they were saying plenty.

  A collection of businessmen were seated around the big center table. I knew Randy Baumgartner, mayor of Muddle Harbor, and Jack Benedict, real estate agent and brother of Janice, owner and head waitress of the café. Two men I didn’t know had open binders in front of them. One wore an out-of-place suit and tie, the other was equally out of place in a golf shirt and ironed pants. Dirty plates and empty coffee cups had been pushed aside. Randy and Jack were in sports team T-shirts.

  Janice looked up from pouring a round of fresh coffee as Vicky and I came in. She was short and heavyset, round cheeks and wiggling jowls, brown hair streaked with gray pulled sharply off her face and folded into a clip at the back of her head. She wore a gray and white waitress uniform with a frilly pink apron, black stockings, and thick-soled brown shoes. The day had barely started, and she already looked as though her feet hurt, but her eyes crinkled in amusement as she saw us. “At last. They’re here. That’s twenty bucks you owe me, Jack.”

  Grumbling, Jack pulled out his wallet and peeled off a bill. He slapped it into Janice’s hand.

  “What’s that for?” Vicky asked.

  “Folks are saying there’s been yet another murder in Rudolph,” Janice said. “I figured you two would show up sooner or later with your suspicions and your questions. Jack said you’d be here yesterday. I bet on today. Randy, pay up. I think you were in for ten.”

  Randy also handed her some money.

  “Seats free at the counter,” Janice said, although she needn’t have bothered. No one was sitting at the counter. She poured coffee into one waiting cup as she bellowed toward the serving hatch leading to the kitchen. “Two poached eggs, soft, with bacon and sausage. Side of mushrooms and onions. Hash browns done to the point of being burned. Wheat toast.”

  That was for me. Janice was a darn good diner waitress: I didn’t even have to order. I slid onto a stool. Vicky perched awkwardly on hers.

  “Couple of extra rashers of bacon to-go for the dog?” Janice asked me.

  “Yes, thanks.”

  Vicky clicked her tongue in disapproval.

  “What’ll you have, hon?” Janice asked my friend. “Dry bread and water good enough for ya? ’Cept my bread isn’t made with hand-ground flour made from wheat descended from Egyptian pharaohs.”

  “Neither’s mine,” Vicky said. “Just good old prairie-grown wheat and rye. With, sometimes, a handful of barely or oats added for extra nutrition.”

  I threw Vicky a glare. She shrugged.

  “Okay,” I said. “We’re here. As expected. I come to your place because I enjoy your food, Janice. I hope you know that.”

  She shrugged, slightly mollified.

  “Vicky has some questions, don’t you Vicky?”

  “What?”

  “Questions. About the house. Vicky and her fiancé bought Cole House in Rudolph. Do you know where that is?”

  “Of course we know where that is,” Mayor Baumgartner yelled. “Place is ten miles down the road.”

  “I mean the house, not the town.”

  “I heard it was for sale,” Jack Benedict said. “Got sold before I could so much as arrange a showing for my clients.”

  “Did you have much interest in it?” I asked.

  “Not immediately,” he admitted. “But there would have been some. Eventually. I think.”

  “The mother of the previous owner was from Muddle Harbor, wasn’t she?” I asked.

  “As if you didn’t know,” Janice said.

  “Poached eggs, soft, bacon and sausage. Hash browns and side of mushrooms and onions, up,” came a voice from behind the serving hatch. Janice put the laden plate in front of me. I reached eagerly for the ketchup.

  “You can run home,” Vicky whispered. “You’ll have to work some of that off.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t catch that. I was too busy chewing. Sure you don’t want some?”

  “Dry bread coming up.” Janice slapped a plate containing one piece of soft, pure white bread in front of Vicky. “Minimum order is ten bucks.”

  “Ten dollars!”

  “Comes with butter and jam.” Janice put down a saucer containing individual little packets. Vicky poked at them with the edge of a knife.

  “Bacon to go!” the cook called.

  “Okay, you’re here now.” Janice put a foil-wrapped package next to me. “We might as well talk. Ethel Edwards married Charles Cole in 1935, and she moved to his father’s house in Rudolph. Back then folks didn’t know better than to move to Rudolph.”

  “Most amusing.” Vicky squeezed a piece of her bread between her fingers. It remained squished when she took her fingers away.

  “Does she have relatives still living here?” I asked.

  “Jack!” Janice called. “Know of any Edwardes still around?”

  “Other than our grandma? No.” He laughed heartily.

  “What’s all this about?” one of the men at his table asked.

  “Nothin’. Just nosy neighbors. Now, let’s get back to it. You’re interested in bringin’ your hotels to our town. We’re interested in hearin’ what you have to say—right, Randy?”

  “You got it, Jack,” Randy said.

  Plenty of businessmen passed through the Muddle Harbor Café. Information was exchanged, notes made, hands shaken. Very little ever happened after that.

  “Your grandmother?” I prompted Janice.

  “Our grandma, Iris, was Ethel’s younger sister.”

  “That’s … interesting.”

  “Ethel was never happy in that big, drafty house. Once she moved to Rudolph, she had a lot of tragedy in her life. You heard about her two daughters?”

  “Yes. So sad.”

  “Iris and Ethel grew up close, but Iris, our grandma, had her own family eventually, so she couldn’t do much to help her sister when tragedy struck.” Janice leaned one hip against the counter, prepared to settle in for a nice long chat. I continued eating. Vicky hesitantly spread jam on her bread. “It was a bad marriage from the get-go, Ethel’s was. Or so the story goes. Not much anyone could do about a bad marriage in those days. Not even a loving younger sister. Eventually, they just stopped visiting, and then stopped writing letters. Nothing but a card at Christmastime toward the end.”

  ‘Did anyone else in the family try to keep in touch over the years?”

  “Iris and Ethel were the only kids in their family. Their mom died when they were young. Their father was happy to marry Ethel off to a rich man as soon as he could. She was a great beauty, or so folks said. Iris married a farmer from Muddle Harbor, but she ended up the better off of the two. She was a good grandmother. Wasn’t she, Jack?”

  “What?”

  “Iris was a good grandma.”

  “Oh yeah. Those parties we had on the farm. I remember eating my weight in corn picked straight out of the field. Slathered with butter she churned herself. Her tomatoes, best in the state everyone said.”

  I was pleased someone in that family had had a good life. “What about later? Did you know Ethel’s daughter, Emmeline?”

  “No. Charles died long before Ethel, but by then the sisters had nothing in common. I don’t recall ever visiting. Do you, Jack?”