"You'll see," she said with a glower. "'Bout this outfit, Stoke bought it for me. I think it makes me look like I'm plugged inta a outlet. Say, Quill. The girls, I mean the organ'zation members, sent me up to see if you're comin' to the meeting."
"The H. O. W. meeting?" Quill stepped barefoot into the room, the sash to her bathrobe trailing. "Boy, Doreen, I'm just so - OW!" Tatiana, who'd been hiding under the couch, retreated as soon as her needle teeth got Quill's ankle.
Crash! Doreen wielded the broom with prompt efficiency. "Durn thing," Doreen said glumly. "She'll do that. Ain't hit her yet."
"It doesn't seem to me that you try very hard." Quill nursed her ankle with one hand and hobbled to the couch. "Why is she up here?"
"She follers me around. Why it is, durn'd if I know."
"Is Tutti here?"
"Yeah."
"She's not at the shower for Claire, is she?"
"Heck, no. She's in the H. O. W. meeting. Where you bin, anyways?"
"To Syracuse. Why?"
"Big hoo-ha here this afternoon, I can tell you."
She remembered suddenly: s‚ance. And Meg anxious to tell her about it just before Quill lobbed verbal fireballs at her over the tenderloin. "Did something happen at the s‚ance?"
"You bet it did. That Tutti's amazin'. She ought to be on TV. You know how many serial killers that one'd catch if she went public?"
"What?! What serial killer?"
Doreen gave a patient sigh. "This one that killed that Dorset and that poor Nora Cahill. He spoke to us. Right there in the Proven‡al suite next to the fireplace. We don't have to worry about him. He's dead. Deader than a doornail. Which is how come he come back from Beyond to speak through Tutti. You shoulda heard him. You know how Tutti has that nice sweet voice? Well, it was like somethin' from that movie where the devil was in that Linda Blair and turnt her head right around like a screw cap. Ol' Tutti's head turnt around - "
"All the way?" Quill asked sarcastically.
"No, ma'am. Just partways. Then this here voice comes out. Low. Ugly-like. A man, of course." Doreen's voice, although hoarse, was generally clearly feminine. She pitched it several octaves lower than usual and growled, "I DONE FOR 'EM. I DONE FOR 'EM BOTH."
"Yap!" went Tatiana, "yap, yap!!"
"See, the dog's a familiar, like. Tutti don't do her sayance without her. Good girl," Doreen cooed suddenly. "Good girl. She got two mice in the storeroom today, too."
Tatiana made a noise like a Norelco shaver. Quill shifted back nervously. "Did Tutti say anything else?"
"You mean he, the murderer. Oh, yeah. RABBIT! RABBIT!"
Quill opened her mouth, then closed it. Nobody knew about her rabbit hat. Except Dorset, and he was dead. Except herself, and she didn't do it. Except the murderer, who had worn it.
Tutti? Impossible. She was too short. Too round. And the murderer was a male - Quill wasn't entirely sure how she knew that, except that she'd been no more than three feet away from him while he slashed Frank Dorset's throat. The sound of his breath, the way that he walked on the videotape. And the arms, she thought suddenly. The arms extended way past the sleeves of her coat. So the murderer was a man. She trusted her painter's eye that far. And Tutti, for reasons known only to herself, was letting the murderer know she knew.
But why? To stop Santini from marrying Claire? If she knew about the rabbit hat, she knew enough to turn Santini in to Myles. It didn't make any sense for Tutti to warn a man who had killed twice already.
"Alphonse Santini was at the s‚ance, wasn't he, Doreen?"
"Yep. Shook him up some, I'll tell you that."
"I'll bet it did."
What did Tutti know? And how had she found out? More important, a man who had killed twice wouldn't shy away from killing again. Now that Tutti had revealed her hand, she was in danger.
Unless Tutti were protected, there'd be one less guest at that wedding, Quill thought, and it wouldn't be Alphonse Santini.
"Is the senator still in the dining room?"
"Yep."
"Doreen. You've got to get back to the H. O. W. meeting right away. I believe Tutti's in danger."
"Nah, Tutti said the murderer's dead. That no matter how long the sheriff - Myles, I mean - searches for him, he'll on'y find him in the next world."
"Or at her daughter's side at the church." Quill shook her head to clear it. "Doreen, you don't believe all this s‚ance hooey."
There was an all-too-recognizable glint in Doreen's beady black eyes. "Tell you the truth, I was feelin' kinda psychic myself, the longer that there sayance went on. Anyhow, Tutti's holding another one for the wimmin of H. O. W., to help us find out ways we can get these men off our backs and into their proper role, she says." Doreen took a deep breath. "You comin'?"
"Of course I'm coming! We don't want a third corpse in Hemlock Falls. What time is it?"
"Nine-thirty."
Two and half hours until Myles came. "You get down there right now. And stick to Tutti like glue, you hear me? Don't let Alphonse Santini come within a country mile of her."
"If you say so," Doreen said doubtfully.
"Is everyone as dressed up as you are?"
"Not them boobs in the S. O. A. P. meeting. Members of the organ'zation have the sense to dress with respect. So you get dressed with respect. I'll see you down there." She turned and marched out the door, mop slung over her shoulder. Tatiana poked her blunt little nose out from under the couch and eyed Quill with suspicion.
"Go on," Quill said encouragingly. "Go find Doreen."
Tatiana rolled her upper lip over her teeth and advanced sideways, like a mongoose stalking a cobra. Quill jumped up on the oak chest. "Beat it, Tatiana. Go hunt some ghosts. Better yet, go bite the senator."
The prospect of senatorial flesh between her jaws apparently appealed to Tatiana. She cocked her head, trotted off, and Quill climbed down from the chest. She was so tired she felt as though she were swimming through mud.
She pulled on a stretchy ankle-length velvet dress over her head, swept her hair into a knot, and slid on a pair of black sandals. "The well-dressed host," she muttered, spraying herself with musk perfume, "goes to meet her fate."
She heard the drone of Tutti's voice halfway down the hall. The conference room was only three years old, and John had designed it for several purposes. Wood panels on the walls opened up to reveal whiteboards and film screens. The long credenza on the south wall opened up into a serving bar. And the long mahogany table in the center of the room could hold more than twenty people in a pinch.
Quill knocked on the door and opened it in a single motion. The room was dark, except for a single lamp at the head of the table. It was a lava lamp in the shape of a globe, the viscous red liquid churning like the contents t of somebody's stomach. Tutti's round face hung over the lamp like a wrinkly white moon.
"Nnnnnnnnmmmmmmmm," she hummed.
"Nummmmmmmmmmm," responded the members of the Hemlock Organization of Women.
"Shut the damn door," somebody called out. Quill flipped on the light. Doreen sat at Tutti's left, Marge Schmidt at her right. Tatiana barked from the safety of Tutti's lap. Tutti herself blinked owlishly and smiled. She was dressed in a fuzzy angora sweater, a long plaid taffeta skirt, and an emerald necklace that weighed more than her dog.