Previously: After the break-in at Meredith’s, China opens her shop as usual. Her morning’s work is interrupted by a visit from Constance Letterman, who tells her that she’s learned from a “reliable source” (surprisingly, Violett Hall) that Jo and Roz were lovers and that she’s planning to include that juicy detail in the newspaper story she’s writing. At first, China is incredulous, then warns Constance against publishing this potential defaming information. She worries that the rumor is flying around Pecan Springs, where gossip travels at the speed of light. Now, she understands why Roz is so urgent about retrieving her letters and is glad when McQuaid brings her car back and she can safely retrieve the boxes in her car. Will they contain those letters?
Missed something? You can read (or reread) the earlier episodes here.
Dropping McQuaid at Hank’s Auto Repair took only about twenty minutes, and when I got back to the shop, Laurel was there. I’d planned to put her to work on the new apothecary garden, where we were planting a variety of medicinal plants. But I was itching to get to those boxes—the ones that Meredith’s burglar didn’t find because they were locked in my Datsun and my Datsun had spent the night at McQuaid’s house.
So I asked Laurel to shelve book orders and keep an eye on the shop while I took the boxes into my apartment, to see what Jo had left for me. Feeling the need for some tea, I lit the burner under the copper kettle.
There were two boxes, each bound with duct tape with “For China Bayles” scrawled across the top. Inside the first box was a terse note from Jo: China, I’d rather Meredith didn’t read these. Otherwise, do as you think best with them.
I laid it aside. If the letters contained references to Jo’s affair with Roz, I wasn’t surprised that she didn’t want Meredith to read them. The fact of the affair, if it was a fact, likely explained why she had kept her daughter at arm’s length. She hadn’t wanted Meredith to know about Roz.
The first box contained a couple of dozen letters still in their envelopes. In the second, heavier box were six spiral-bound steno notebooks, their pages filled with Jo’s writing. Her journals. I flipped through the top one quickly. The final entry, dated three months before, was on the last page of the book. Somewhere there must be another journal—the current one. I’d have to ask Meredith if she had found it.
But the teakettle was boiling. I poured water over a few fresh mint leaves in my favorite earthenware pot and left it to steep while I sat down to read. And on the top of the letters I found something unexpected. A document folded into a paper sleeve. Jo’s will?
No, it was Roz’s. It was short and simple. In the event of her death, everything of which she died possessed passed to her “beloved friend and faithful life’s companion, Josephine Gilbert.” It was dated two years ago, witnessed by people whose names I didn’t recognize, and notarized.
I folded the document and put it back in the sleeve. This will might have been superseded by a later one, naming the man she expected to marry—Senator Keenan. But I’d bet she wouldn’t do that until they were married, and that it would likely have been written by an army of attorneys. And even if Roz had made a new will, this one was ample evidence that her relationship with Jo—“faithful life’s companion”—had been more than casual friendship.
I laid the will aside and began pulling out the letters. They were arranged by date, oldest on the bottom. I counted quickly. Forty-two, covering a period of about four years. Better than half were clustered in the first year. There were only two letters in the last few months.
I began with the oldest. The paper was pink (naturally), slightly fragrant, and worn at the creases, where it had been folded and refolded. I read it once quickly, and then again, more slowly. Yes. Their relationship had not been simply a friendship. There were unabashed and explicit references to lovemaking, to nights spent together, to the longing of parted lovers. To Jo, they must have been intimate testimony of unreserved, enduring affection. But they were also a very real and potentially fatal threat to any hope Roz might have of becoming the Senator’s wife and, in due time, the nation’s First Lady.
I filled my cup with mint tea and added a slice of lemon and a spoonful of honey. I didn’t have to read any more of the letters to know how Roz and Jo had felt about each other when Roz left Pecan Springs for fame and fortune. But their feelings—Roz’s, at least—had evidently changed. I had to read the later letters to know whose feelings had altered, and how.
The next-to-last letter was dated six weeks ago. It was brief, only a couple of pages, and cool—not frigid, but not terribly friendly. Roz had obviously cooled. Had Jo? Without her letters I couldn’t be sure. But reading between the lines, I suspected that she hadn’t. I was sure of it when I read Roz’s last paragraph:
I must ask you once again to send my letters back. What I said to you over the phone last night is true, and final. I don’t intend to continue our relationship. I have been seeing someone else—a man—and I am now quite certain that something will come of it. Please send my letters immediately. Please.
I sipped my tea. I was beginning to piece things together. That phone conversation must have been the one Meredith overheard—the argument between her mother and Roz. Jo must have been desperately hurt by what felt like Roz’s rejection, a hurt that Meredith had picked up on when she said that her mother was “down.” But one that Jo couldn’t share with her daughter.
I put the letter back and picked up the last one, dated only two weeks ago. It was short, curt, written fast and hard, with savage slashes of the pen.
I don’t understand why you refuse to return the letters. If you think you can convince me to renew our relationship, you’re wrong. If you think you can use the letters to destroy my new relationship, think again.
I bit my lip, trying to feel the depth of Jo’s pain when she read the angry words, trying to put myself into that moment. Had her hurt, her disappointment, her grief been powerful enough to compel her to kill herself?
But there were even darker questions. I’d once worked on an ugly case where incriminating letters had led to blackmail, which in turn had led to the murder of someone who threatened to tell everything to the newspapers. Had Roz feared that Jo would go public with their secret?
Not likely. Jo had too much at stake—not least of which was the Coalition. If Arnold Griffin found out that Jo was gay, he’d use it to discredit her efforts to stop the airport.
But what if Roz feared that Jo might reveal the truth, not to the community, but to Senator Keenan? What if Jo, in a flash of anger and terrible despair, had threatened to show him the letters? In the game Roz was playing, the stakes were extraordinarily high—the Keenan millions, a chance at the White House.
What if Roz had decided she couldn’t trust Jo to keep her mouth shut?
What if—?
And there I was, right back where I’d been the night before.
Only now, I had a motive and the proof—the letters—to back it up. A motive for murder. What was I going to do about it?
I sipped my tea and thought. By the time I finished drinking, I’d come up with a plan. I knew what I had to do.
The drizzle had stopped and the sun was shining. Lounging comfortably in a white wicker chair on the patio outside the cottage, Roz was the picture of leisure. She was wearing a silky pink robe and matching pink satin mules with pink net rosettes. There was a glass of tomato juice, no doubt spiced with her morning’s ration of garlic, on the wicker table at her elbow, and she was reading a Danielle Steel novel. She put it down when she saw me coming through the herb garden.
“Hello, China.” She gestured at the pink roses gracing the stone wall. “I’m enjoying your lovely place. And the roses—so fragrant.”
I sat down, returning her smile. “I haven’t been a very good hostess, I’m afraid. I meant to ask if you wanted to do something together yesterday evening. I hope you weren’t too bored all alone.”
“I wasn’t alone,” Roz replied comfortably, sipping her juice. “I visited an old friend in Austin, somebody I knew when I was doing commercials and children’s theater. It was a great evening.”
Was she lying? I might find out with a few pointed questions, but I didn’t want to alert her. I’d thought of a better way. “I’m glad you enjoyed yourself.” I frowned. “Unfortunately, Meredith didn’t have such a pleasant evening. Somebody broke into her mother’s house, where she’s staying.”
Roz’s blue eyes widened. A manicured hand flew to her mouth in a close approximation to surprise. “Why, China—how awful! Did they take anything valuable?”
“Some antique silver,” I said. “But there was quite a mess. Meredith is very upset, of course. The police think it was probably kids, looking for drug money.” I hesitated. “Actually, I’m telling you because I don’t want you to worry.”
“Worry? About what?”
“About your letters. I was afraid you might hear about the break-in and think that they’d been taken. But that isn’t the case. They’re under my bed.”
Roz’s gasp was authentic. “You have the letters?”
“Isn’t that just the way?” I said, spreading my hands. “There you were, asking Meredith about them, and I was the one who had them—and I didn’t even know.”
“You didn’t know?”
“Not a clue,” I said cheerfully. “Sometime in the last few weeks, apparently, Jo boxed her journals and your letters and left me a note, asking me to dispose of them as I—”
“Journals?” A pregnant pause. “Jo kept journals?”
“Oh, yes,” I replied. “You didn’t know?”
“No, I didn’t.” Roz licked her lips. “Have you . . . read them?”
I rolled my eyes. “Roz, you wouldn’t believe how busy I’ve been. I opened the boxes for the first time just a little while ago. That’s what I wanted to tell you. Ruby’s coming over for dinner this evening, and we’re going to an art show at the university and won’t be back until late. It’ll be a day or two before I can organize things.”
Roz leaned forward eagerly. “I’ve got a better idea, China. Why don’t I just go with you now and get my letters? That’ll be one less batch of stuff you’ll have to sort.”
“Gosh, thanks, Roz,” I said. “It’s a generous offer, and it would make my job easier. But I don’t think that’ll work.”
“It won’t?” Roz asked faintly.
I straightened. “You see, since Jo left instructions to me to dispose of her papers as I see fit, I am no her literary executor.” That statement would stand up in court, but what I said next definitely wouldn’t. “Jo thought her papers would be of public interest. As you know, she was a prominent person here in Pecan Springs. She has designated the university library as the repository for her personal papers. I’ve contacted Dr. Alice Dale, the library director. She’s looking forward to receiving them.”
Roz’s face turned ashen. “The . . . library?”
I put on a pleased look. “Yes, isn’t it wonderful? Dr. Dale says the papers will go straight into the Notable Women of Texas Collection, where they’ll be available to the public.”
“But my letters!” Roz exclaimed hoarsely. “What about my letters?”
I leaned back and tented my fingers under my chin. Very much the lawyer. “The law is a funny thing, you know. It splits hairs. With regard to letters, the courts have held that the writer holds the copyright.”
“There you are,” Roz exclaimed triumphantly. “Copyright!”
I held up a hand. “The recipient, however, owns the physical documents and has decided to donate them to the library. You, as the owner of the copyright, can copy them for your collection. And of course you have first right of publication.”
“Publication?” She was trying to cope. “But what if I don’t intend to publish them? What if I want to . . . to burn them?”
“You can’t do that,” I said firmly. “They are the property of Jo’s estate, and the library. But you can prohibit their publication, of course. Their verbatim publication, that is.”
“What do you mean?”
“The copyright holder can deny anyone the right to quote from the letters. But scholars or writers who have access to Jo’s papers can use the information in them, as long as they are paraphrasing the content and the actual quotes don’t violate what the law calls ‘fair use.’” I smiled, showing all my teeth.
Roz pulled herself together. “I don’t want anybody using that personal information. I’ll sue.”
I shook my head. “You’ll lose. Wright v. Warner Books, just last year. In that case,” I added helpfully, “the court held that the biographer of author Richard Wright was entitled to use the facts she found in Wright’s personal letters and his journal.”
“But what about privacy?” Roz wailed. Her desperation was so real that I might have felt sorry for her if she hadn’t burgled Meredith’s house. And if it weren’t for my suspicion that she might have had something to do with Jo’s death.
I dismissed her question with a wave. “Meredith and I agree. There might be a skeleton or two in Jo’s closet, but both of us think it’s important for the life stories of public figures—especially women—to be made totally available.” I gave her a comforting smile. “You see? Your letters will be in very safe hands. They are a valuable resource for scholars to study and—”
Roz gave a weak whimper.
“I can see how pleased you are.” I stood up. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to the shop. As I said, I’ll be out until late this evening. But I’ll be home all day tomorrow, if you’d like to look at the letters and decide which ones the library should copy for you. No charge, of course. Dr. Dale made that clear.”
Roz stood up too. “Thank you,” she managed. She was holding herself together with a great effort. I was almost ashamed of myself.
Almost. But not quite.
Thanks for reading, everyone! Your Reader’s Notebook, Episode 15, should drop into your inboxes any minute now. We’re back to our usual format, with some answers to your questions from Susanna Brill, owner of The Rosemary House, and a few craft and cookery ideas.
So good, Susan! I devour each episode. :)
Love China being sneaky, playing cat and mouse with Roz!