I swallowed and opened the purse, reaching inside. Along with sand sticking to the fibers, I felt something cold and metal that had snagged near the top. It turned out to be a key with an Asilomar tag.
“There’s an obvious way to be sure the purse belonged to Izabelle,” Dinah said. Of course she was right, and we went out into the hall. We made sure it was empty, then slipped toward the door to Izabelle’s room. I had the key in my hand but I hesitated again. In all honesty I didn’t want the key to fit. I wanted the purse to belong to some random person who had nothing to do with our group. If it was Izabelle’s, it brought up a lot of questions, like how someone in the middle of an allergy attack would decide to lob her purse into the bushes.
Dinah nudged me and spoke in a low voice, urging me to stick the key in the lock. I took a deep breath and tried to put it in. It didn’t go. I felt a wave of relief and even laughed a little.
“So, I guess we were wrong,” I said, turning to go. Dinah took the key from my hand and turned it around. That way it fit perfectly, and with half a turn the door was unlocked and slipped open.
Neither of us made a move. If opening the purse felt strange, it was nothing compared to looking into her room. I was about to pull the door closed when something moved in the darkness and made a rustling sound. Both Dinah and I jumped as a shadow passed in front of the window. There was someone in the room. Instinctively I lunged forward, then slid on something as the shadow slipped out the window.
A moment later the room was flooded with light as Dinah flipped the switch. I skated across the floor on a flutter of papers, rushing toward the open window. But when I looked out, the small balcony was empty.
“What was that about?” Dinah said, her voice high-pitched with tension. My heart was still pounding as I took a deep breath.
“Somebody was in here.” I began to scoop up the papers, looking at them as I did. They had copy centered in the middle of the page. When Dinah saw one, she said they were galley pages.
“They must be from Izabelle’s book. The one she was making the big to-do about. Her fusion craft.” Dinah put on her creative writing teacher hat and explained the pages were typeset like the book. “It’s the last step before the book comes out.” Dinah pointed to a notation penciled in the margin. “She must have been proofreading them.”
As we piled them on the bed, Dinah held up a page in front of me. “Look at the title: The Needle and the Hook.”
“You think her big fusion craft was mixing knitting and crochet?” I asked.
“It looks that way.” Dinah riffled through the pages on the bed. “It also looks like most of the book is missing.”
We both looked toward the window. “Do you think the shadow was a woman, like maybe Adele? What if she found out the subject of Izabelle’s new craft and went bonkers?” I pictured Adele ranting about the fusion craft soiling the purity of crochet.
“I know she had a problem with crochet versus knitting, but do you think she’d go so far as to break into a room? And what would be the point of stealing the galleys? I’m sure the publisher has another copy. Finally, I think we know Adele well enough that if it had been her, we would have recognized her shape,” Dinah said.
By now our heartbeats had returned to normal, and all that was left was the rush from the adrenaline. I glanced around the room with a different perspective.
“I guess it’ll be my responsibility to pack up her things.”
Dinah gave me a sympathetic nod. “Yes, one more responsibility that goes along with the rhinestone clipboard.”
The room was laid out about the same as mine, except there was only one twin bed against the wall. Aside from the papers it seemed orderly. Izabelle’s personal items were in several unzipped pouches by the sink. A stack of plastic bins sat against the wall. Each of them had a label for a session of her workshop. When I lifted the lid of the top one, I saw pillowcases with thread crochet trim and a lot of flowers in different sizes and yarns, along with a copy of her book. I walked over to the closet and opened the door. A faint scent of her floral cologne clung to her neatly hung clothes and the suitcase stowed below. When I turned back to the room, Dinah was sitting on the bed with a laptop computer open next to her.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Checking my e-mail. You know how upset I’ve been about not bringing my laptop. This is even better. She has one of those cards that makes it so her computer can go online anywhere.” Dinah looked up and caught my expression of disapproval. “It’s all right. I’m just going to see what I have. And I want to check a quote for the memoir workshop. So technically I’m using it for the weekend. I’m sure Izabelle wouldn’t mind.” The reflection from the screen illuminated Dinah’s face after she’d pressed the power button.
“Hmm. It looks like Izabelle was in the middle of something and just let it go into hibernate mode.” Dinah turned the computer so I could see the screen. The body of an e-mail was in the center of the screen. It had no salutation and said Don’t do anything before you talk to me. Call me or at least answer your phone. It was signed Tom, ITA Sponsor. I sat down on the bed next to Dinah and put the computer on my lap, but I almost dropped it when my cell phone started to vibrate in my tote next to me. I hurried to get it before it started to ring. Dinah and I had kept our conversation to a whisper. Somehow, I didn’t want to make any noise.
I answered the phone with a whispered hello.
“Hey, babe,” Barry said. “Just calling to see how it’s going. I figured by now you’d be in your room… alone. Right, you are alone?”
There was dead air. I couldn’t lie when asked a direct question, but I also didn’t want to answer. Saying nothing seemed the safest bet. Unless you’re talking to a top-flight homicide detective who knows how to squeeze information out of the most reluctant suspects. In my case it was easy. He knew me well enough to recognize that the dead air meant something was up, probably something he wouldn’t be happy about. “Okay, Molly, let’s just save us both a lot of time and cut to the chase. Where are you, and what are you doing?”
“I was going to call you. There’s been a little incident.” I paused; what I was going to say next was going to get the reaction. “One of the presenters died.”
“What?” Barry said. I could practically hear his blood pressure go up.
“The doctor and the police think it was from some kind of allergic reaction.” I heard his breath come out in a gush.
“Then it wasn’t homicide. Good.”
I told him the doctor thought Izabelle had suddenly developed a life-threatening allergy.
“That sounds reasonable.” He began his standard speech. “The police will investigate. Stay out of it. Leave it to the professionals la la la la.” He didn’t actually say la la la la. That was the part where I wasn’t listening anymore. Eventually he figured out something else was up, and he knew me well enough to ask me directly. Like I said, when someone asks me a specific question, I always tell the truth. Barry asked where I was. I thought he took the information that I was in Izabelle’s room rather well. But since he didn’t ask about the purse, I didn’t tell. I let him think I was being overzealous about my responsibility to handle things.
“I understand you think it’s your task to pack up her things. But you have all weekend, and you might want to wait until you talk to her next of kin.”