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Her announcement was met with general approval and applause. Then Zach Starr cleared his throat and asked, “What about the chocolate? You going to share that, too?”
Franny’s answer was quick. “No. No way,” she said, which got a big laugh.
Some people began to leave, others tucked into the donuts and coffee, and Lucy approached Franny for a quick interview.
“Congratulations,” she said, by way of beginning. “What made you decide to sell the egg and donate the money?”
“Well, it’s something I’ve been thinking about for a long time. I didn’t discover golf until I retired but I absolutely love it. I feel I missed out, I might’ve been playing my whole life, but it just never seemed like something I could do. Golf was for the menfolk, at least when I was a girl. So I thought it would be great to get a program going that would encourage girls to give it a try. I’ve already spoken to the pro, Billy Esterhaus, and he’s all for it. Now, thanks to this egg, I think we can get it up and running very soon.”
“Okay,” said Lucy. “That sounds great.”
Franny turned, taking a step toward Corney, when Lucy gently took her elbow. “One more thing, Franny. Just between you and me, last time we spoke you mentioned that you thought Sandy Lenk was having an affair . . . why did you think that?”
“You think Dave knew and that’s why . . .”
“Maybe,” admitted Lucy. “He had that trial coming up and, well, if he’d been expecting Sandy’s support, learning she’d been unfaithful certainly wouldn’t have helped.”
Franny nodded in agreement. “Well, I don’t know for sure, but I began to wonder what was going on when she stopped playing golf, right in the middle of the tourney. She was so good, it didn’t make sense, unless there was some new interest.”
“That’s all?” asked Lucy, thinking that was rather thin evidence.
“Uh, no,” began Franny, lowering her voice to a whisper. “One day last winter I was coming back from Christmas shopping, thinking about my list and not paying much attention really to my driving, which I know isn’t good but sometimes you sort of go on a mental automatic pilot, you know, and I ended up on Lakeside Drive. So there I was, on a dead-end road where I didn’t want to be.”
Lucy nodded, she knew the road.
“It’s all seasonal cottages down there and I was looking for a place to turn around when I spotted a couple of cars parked outside one of the A-frames, which kind of caught my interest. I mean, everything was shut up down there, so it seemed odd, and then I recognized the cars. One was Des Jasper’s Corvette and the other was Sandy Lenk’s Audi. You can’t miss that car of hers, with the ROLEX license plate.” She shrugged. “Of course, they could’ve been talking business, it could’ve been a real estate deal.” Her cheeks reddened. “Forget what I said, Lucy, I really shouldn’t have said anything. Especially now that Dave’s, um, gone, and poor Sandy has a lot to cope with. I’m really ashamed of myself, I mean, whatever was going on was absolutely none of my business.”
Oh, Franny, thought Lucy, watching her make her way through the crowd. Couldn’t resist the temptation to share a salacious bit of gossip, even though she knew better. And what about you, Lucy? she asked herself. You’re no better, and you do it in print.
* * *
Dave’s funeral was the day before Easter and just about everyone attended, including all the Chamber members. Sandy was every bit the stoic widow, dressed in black and supported by her aging parents, the Lenks. The snowbirds had returned earlier than usual from their senior residence in Florida in order to attend the funeral and be with “poor dear Sandy,” something they repeated to anyone who’d listen when they all gathered in the church hall for the reception following the very brief service.
Dave, the person whose life was being celebrated, was hardly mentioned. Lucy thought this might be because his death was officially a suicide, but she learned that this wasn’t necessarily the case. She was putting a couple of mini sandwiches on her plate when Officer Sally joined her. “They’re opening an investigation,” she told Lucy, speaking in a low tone. “There was a gun at the scene, like you’d expect at a suicide, but it looks like the crime lab may have screwed up the ballistics test.”
Lucy almost dropped her plate. “What?”
“Seems like there’s a big scandal at the state crime lab.” Sally looked over her shoulder and spotted her cousin, police chief Jim Kirwan. “I can’t say more,” she whispered, and hurried away to offer her condolences to the Lenks.
“So sorry,” Lucy heard her say, barely getting the words out before Sandy’s father began his tale of woe. “Had to leave sunny Florida a month early . . .”
Lucy was thinking about Sally’s tip, and how she really ought to follow up, but decided there was no rush. She had a dinner party to organize and there’d be plenty of time to tackle the story on Monday.
* * *
Lucy was up bright and early on Monday morning, but instead of rushing into the office to investigate the state crime lab, she was taking out the trash. Bill’s requested Easter dinner party had been a big success, she thought, at least if you went by the overflowing garbage can and the number of empty wine bottles in the recycling bin. As she tied up the liner bag she thought about the prior evening, when the Goodmans, Finches, and Stillingses had all been gathered around her table, sharing good food, lively conversation, and plenty of wine. Bob was pleased with the way the case was developing against Mike Green, who would be tried in a couple of months. Rachel reported that Rosie was continuing the artist-in-residence program with Karl Klaus, who no longer lived at the estate but was commuting a couple of days a week from his barn studio.
There was quite a bit of discussion about Dave’s death, too, and whether or not it was actually suicide. “It’s pretty bad when you can’t trust the state crime lab,” complained Bob. “Did you see the story in the Portland Sunday paper this morning? Front page.”
Lucy hadn’t. She’d been busy deciding what tablecloth to use.
“I did,” grumbled Ted. “Wish we’d broken it.”
Lucy bit her lip, unwilling to admit she’d actually had a tip about the story from Sally.
“First it was DNA, now it’s ballistics,” Bob was saying. “It seems they’ve just been giving prosecutors the evidence they want in order to get a conviction. They’ve got to do a major housecleaning over there.”
“Were there a lot of wrongful convictions?” asked Bill.
