Who’s That Girl Page 9

  Melanie’s face twisted, then she shook her head. “I don’t know, honest.”

  “Think hard,” Kate urged. “This could be vitally important. If Casey told you she was being followed, she may have given some indication as to who was doing it.”

  Melanie’s forehead puckered again. Finally she looked at Kate and said, “I really can’t tell you. And I mean that,” she added quickly, as if to forestall the question already forming on Kate’s lips. “It isn’t that I won’t tell you. I can’t. All Casey said was that someone was following her.” She caught her breath. “Wait. There was one thing. She referred to the person as ‘he.’ Does that help any?”

  Kate leaned forward. “Yes, it might. Try to remember more. Could she have been speaking of someone she knew well? A relative perhaps? Did she seem familiar with the person?”

  Her thoughts turned unwillingly to the visit she and Paul had with Nehemiah Jacobs and his comments about the crotchety older man Casey had come to see. But Nehemiah had also told them that the “curmudgeon” had passed away. She could cross him off her list of people Casey might be fearful of.

  Melanie shook her head. “I wasn’t listening for anything like that, but I don’t think so. Nothing stood out to me that would indicate that. And besides, Casey gave the impression that her family lived far away. When she said someone was following her, it seemed like she was watching out for someone there, at the school. And she did seem cautious. She looked around before she went outside the dorm or walked across campus by herself, things like that.”

  Kate tucked that information away for future reference. “Do you know if Casey had any enemies at Haywood? Other students, perhaps?”

  “No.” Melanie’s tone held no trace of doubt. “Everyone I know likes her.” Her voice trailed off. “But we didn’t do a very good job of acting like it, did we?”

  Kate reached out to clasp Melanie’s hand and gave it a light squeeze. “Don’t be too hard on yourself. It sounds like Casey didn’t make it easy for anyone to know her well.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  The following morning, Kate kissed Paul good-bye and reached for the phone. It had been too late to call Skip when she got home from her visit with Melanie McLaughlin the previous evening. And besides, she admitted to herself, she’d been too tired to pass along her news coherently.

  After three rings, a female voice answered.

  “Is Deputy Spencer in?”

  “He’s out on a call right now. May I take a message, or is this an emergency?”

  “No emergency,” Kate answered. “But I do have some information I need to pass along, and I’d like to give it to him directly. Would you ask him to call Kate Hanlon when he gets back?”

  She spent the rest of the morning alternating between cleaning the house and watching the clock, willing the phone to ring. Skip’s call finally came through while Kate was stirring up a batch of her special chicken salad for lunch. Paul would be home for lunch, and she planned to serve tomatoes stuffed with the creamy mixture. She picked up the kitchen phone with one hand and spooned in a dollop of pickle relish with the other.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s Skip Spencer, Missus Hanlon. Dispatch said you called me?”

  “That’s right.” Kate wedged the receiver between her chin and her shoulder while she continued stirring. In a few brief sentences, she filled Skip in on tracking down Roger White from the sketch of the crest and the monogram, along with a summary of the professor’s suspicious behavior.

  Skip gave a low whistle. “That’s sure great work, Missus Hanlon. I’ll let Sheriff Roberts know right away. Thanks for passing that along.”

  “Wait,” Kate put in hurriedly before he could hang up. “As long as I have you on the phone, I was hoping you could tell me if you’ve learned anything else about the case.”

  “As a matter of fact, I have.”

  From the excitement in Skip’s voice, Kate guessed the news must be significant. She stopped stirring the salad and gave him her full attention. “I’m listening.”

  “Well, the lab tested that note you brought in. The blood on the note is the same blood type as the girl’s...Casey Barnes’, I mean.”

  Kate’s heart hammered, and she leaned her spoon against the side of the bowl, the better to concentrate on what Skip was saying. “So it’s her blood?”

  “Well, see, I didn’t say that. It’s the same type, but finding out whether it’s actually hers or not would require a DNA match. And those take a long time in real life, no matter what they show on those cop shows on TV.”

  “Oh.” Kate’s pulse rate slowed to a near-normal level. “So where does that leave us?”

  “Well, either way, it’s a pretty good bet the blood is hers. The lab matched her fingerprints to the ones on the note.”

  Kate caught her breath in a quick gasp, then asked a question that had been forming in her mind. “What do you think about providing Casey with round-the-clock protection?”

  Skip’s snort of disbelief was clearly audible over the line. When Kate maintained a cool silence, he finally said, “That’s quite a jump, Missus Hanlon. You weren’t serious were you?”

  “I certainly was,” Kate said with a degree of irritation. “I know that must sound melodramatic, but Melanie McLaughlin told me that someone had been following Casey. Melanie was very serious about it, and she doesn’t strike me as the lying type.”

  “I don’t doubt that,” Skip said. “But I wonder if maybe Casey was stretchin’ things a bit when she told all that to Melanie. You know how kids that age can be.”

  Kate bit her lip to hold back a chuckle. It hadn’t been all that long ago that Skip was in the same age group before reaching his current ripe old age of twenty-five.

  “You’ll think about it, though, won’t you?” she asked. “You can do that much, at least.”

  Reluctance was evident in Skip’s voice when he said, “I’ll think about it, Missus Hanlon. I might mention it to Sheriff Roberts and see what he says. But that’s all I can promise.”

  Kate hung up, convinced now that Casey Barnes wrote the note and dropped it in the restroom at the campground. But that only reminded Kate of other questions—chief among them was how Casey knew Kate’s name and why she had asked for her in the emergency room.

  She finished mixing up the chicken salad, then reached for the phone again. When the information operator answered, Kate said, “I’d like the number for Haywood College in Chattanooga, please.”

  Moments later, after going through a series of transfers, she had Dr. White on the line. “Good morning,” she began. “This is Kate Hanlon. I stopped by your office yesterday...”

  Silence met her introduction. Finally the professor responded in a wary voice. “I remember. As I said yesterday, there isn’t anything I can tell you about that cuff link you found, so—”

  “I’m calling about a different matter today, Dr. White. I wanted to ask about a student named Casey Barnes.”

  “We do have a school policy regarding the privacy of our students,” he said in a clipped tone. “If you’re looking for information, the registrar’s office would be better able to help you.”

  “Can you at least tell me if you know Casey? Do you have her in one of your classes?”

  “Let me ask you a question, Mrs. Hanlon. What connection do you have with this young woman, and why on earth are you asking me these questions?”

  Kate paused a moment to gather her thoughts. She wanted to offer enough information to justify her query, but not so much that he would cut her off again.

  “Something has happened involving Casey Barnes, and I’m trying to help sort it out. Call it a penchant for puzzles, if you will.”

  A long sigh came over the line. “You’re a very persistent woman, I’ll give you that. If it will help to shorten this conversation, I’ll tell you this much: Casey was in one of my classes last fall, as were several dozen other students. She did nothing to distinguish herself academically, so there is no re
ason for her to stand out in my mind.”

  But I didn’t ask him about her being an outstanding student. Kate wondered if the comment was significant or just the aloof professor’s way of getting rid of an unwanted pest.

  “Can you tell me if she seemed nervous or worried about anything?”

  “No more than any of my other students.” He gave a dry chuckle. “At that stage of life, there’s no such thing as a minor problem. If you’ve had teenagers of your own, I’m sure you understand.”

  Kate gave a noncommittal murmur. While a tendency for the dramatic was present in many teens, she felt the answer seemed less than professional. “Is there anything else you can tell me?”

  “I’m afraid you’re going to have to look elsewhere, Mrs. Hanlon. There’s nothing else I can do for you.”

  After hanging up the phone, Kate went about finishing the preparations for lunch while mulling over the information—or lack thereof—she had gotten from Dr. White. She didn’t know any more about how well the professor knew Casey than before she’d made the call. And there were still more things to consider, like Casey’s reason for being at the campground in the first place when it was closed for the winter. And what—or who—caused her injuries.

  KATE SAID AS MUCH to Paul when they sat down to eat their stuffed tomatoes. “This whole thing is such a muddle. It seems like every time I make a little bit of headway, I only run into another roadblock.”

  “Mmm,” Paul murmured. “It’s a puzzle, all right.”

  “I was so elated to think I’d managed to track that cuff link down and find out Casey’s identity. But it really hasn’t put me all that far ahead. I have one piece of the what: her name. But I don’t have answers for any of the whys, and there sure are a lot of those.”

  Paul nodded and pushed a bit of chicken around his plate with his fork.

  “And on the list of hows,” Kate continued, building up momentum as she spoke, “is one very big question: How did Dr. White’s cuff link get into that restroom?”

  She turned to Paul with a questioning look, then noticed he’d hardly touched his lunch. He usually dug into her stuffed tomatoes with gusto, but that afternoon his appetite seemed to be missing.

  Kate glanced down at her own helping. She’d been so busy talking that she hadn’t tried a bite of it yet. A dreadful suspicion entered her mind. She’d been talking to Skip on the phone while she prepared the salad. Had she gotten sidetracked during their conversation and neglected to add some vital ingredient?

  Kate took a cautious bite of her meal and chewed slowly. The mingled flavors of chicken, salad dressing, and tomato blended in harmony. It tasted fine to her.

  She turned her attention back to Paul. “Do you have any ideas? Until Casey is able and willing to talk more about what happened, I feel like I’m coming up empty-handed.”

  “Mm-hmm,” he murmured.

  Kate folded her arms on the edge of the table and leaned over to look directly into his face. “Paul Hanlon, have you heard a word I’ve been saying?”

  He blinked and shook his head like someone being roused from a dream. “What’s that?”

  Kate sighed. “I asked if you’ve heard anything I said since we started eating.”

  A look of remorse spread over his face. “I’m sorry, honey. What are we supposed to be talking about?”

  Concern replaced Kate’s irritation, and she reached out to lay her hand on his arm. “This isn’t like you. What’s wrong?”

  Paul covered her hand with his. “Nothing, I hope. And I truly am sorry I wasn’t paying attention. I guess I’m just a little distracted.”

  “Is it anything you can tell me about?”

  While the two of them shared almost everything with each other, Kate knew there were some counseling situations that Paul had to hold in strictest confidence. She made it a point not to press him for information on anything that might fall into that category.

  Paul stared down at his barely touched plate for a long moment, then he pulled himself together and looked up at her again. “Yes, in fact I should have talked to you about it right away instead of keeping it to myself.”

  A prickle of fear skittered up Kate’s spine, and she tightened her grip on Paul’s arm. “Is there something wrong, then? With you, I mean?”

  “No, honey. That isn’t it at all.” He gave her that lopsided grin she loved, and relief flooded her heart. “I got a call this morning from Millie’s boss at the SuperMart.”

  Kate tilted her head, trying to imagine what the supervisor at the big store in Pine Ridge had to do with what was bothering Paul.

  “He was checking to see how Millie was doing,” Paul went on. “He said she called in sick last Friday and again yesterday, and he wanted to make sure she was okay.”

  Kate sat back in her chair and stared at him. “She missed work on both Friday and Monday? What did you tell him?”

  Paul looked down at the table and toyed with the salt-shaker. “His question caught me totally off guard, especially considering that Millie was at work at the church both of those days. I felt like I’d stepped right into the middle of one of those crazy dreams that doesn’t make any sense at all. All I could think to do was thank him for his concern and tell him that as far as I knew, Millie was all right.”

  He raised his head, and Kate could see the concern etched on his face. “I don’t understand it. She hasn’t missed a day at the church office, and everything has been business as usual, as far as I can see. She didn’t say anything to me about feeling unwell or not going to her other job. Now I’m wondering if I’ve been missing clues that something out of the ordinary is going on.”

  Kate felt as mystified as Paul did. “She didn’t mention feeling ill?”

  “Not a word. I’m at a loss as to what’s going on here.”

  The memory of Millie’s set face as she limped toward the library exit flashed into Kate’s mind. “Oh dear. I’ve wondered all along if that fall at the campground hurt her worse than she’s willing to admit.”

  “Fall?” Paul’s bemused expression looked almost comical. “What fall?”

  Quickly, Kate filled him in on the incident at the cleanup day. “And now she’s been missing work because of it. No, wait a minute.” Kate remembered the time line Paul had indicated. “You said she called in sick on Monday and Friday?”

  Paul nodded. “And we did the cleanup on Saturday, so all this—whatever it is—started before then.” He paused, then added, “Now that I think of it, though, Millie has been acting a little strange lately.”

  Kate’s attention perked up immediately. So Paul had noticed it too!

  “Since we’re on the subject,” she began, “maybe I ought to tell you what happened yesterday.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Quickly, Kate filled Paul in on the way Millie had acted when she stopped by the church office and later at the library.

  “I wasn’t sure whether to say anything about it,” she added. “I didn’t want you to feel like I was complaining or trying to get Millie in trouble, especially since I thought she might just be upset with me about that fall she took.”

  Paul stood and pulled Kate to her feet, then folded her in his arms and cradled her head against his chest. “Katie, you’re the most important person in the world to me. I always want you to tell me when something like that happens.”

  Kate wrapped her arms around Paul’s waist and leaned against him, enjoying the comfort he always gave her. A thought struck her, and she looked up at him.

  “I just remembered. While I was at the church yesterday, Millie said something about needing to finish up whatever she was working on before she left for her job at the SuperMart. It certainly didn’t sound like she was planning to call in sick. What on earth is going on?”

  Paul planted a gentle kiss on her forehead. “Why don’t I help you clear the table, then we can go sit in the living room. I think we need to talk about this some more.”

  In a matter of moments, Kate had removed t
he dishes from the kitchen table and stacked them in the sink. After Paul wiped the crumbs off the table, they headed into the living room and settled themselves on the couch.

  Paul linked his fingers with Kate’s and leaned back against the cushion as he spoke. “As I said, Millie has been acting a little odd lately, but I didn’t think too much of it until her supervisor called. What signals could I have missed that might point to the reason for her actions?”

  “Why don’t you tell me what you remember,” Kate suggested.

  Paul brushed his thumb over the backs of Kate’s fingers while he thought. “Okay, how about this? Last week, Renee asked me to visit one of her neighbors who hasn’t been feeling well. I made the visit and got back to the church earlier than I’d expected to. When I walked into Millie’s office from the parking lot, I didn’t see her at first. After I took a couple of steps inside, I saw her down on her hands and knees in front of that small cupboard on the far side of her desk. Something about the way she was acting seemed odd, almost as if she was trying to hide something.”

  Kate sandwiched his hand in hers. “What was she doing?”

  “That’s exactly what I wondered. In fact, the words slipped out of my mouth before I could stop them.” Paul grimaced. “I must have startled her badly. Millie’s head shot up, and she turned around. Her face was pale, almost chalky. For a moment, I was afraid she was having a heart attack.”

  “Oh, Paul!” Kate sat bolt upright. “I know exactly what you mean. I was worried about her having some sort of heart issue right after she fell, with the way she grabbed at her chest. So did you ever find out what she was doing?”

  Paul shook his head. When Kate stared at him, he spread his hands wide. “Call me a clueless male, but I have no idea.”

  “But didn’t she say anything?”

  Paul’s shoulders slumped. “To tell you the truth, I was so startled myself that I didn’t pay a lot of attention to details right then. I had the impression she might have been looking for something, though. I do remember that she had a thick stack of papers in her hands. She shoved them back into the cabinet and got up before I could ask her anything more. Then she gave me a look.”