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I took little notice of Andrea Felder's murder; but had the news reports mentioned her ex-husband's name, I would have paid attention. My friend Denise Seaford was the one who enlightened me about the victim's identity.
When Denise appeared at the prescription pick-up window, my pharmacy in the Food Go supermarket was busy. I'd just filled a script for naproxen, an anti-inflammatory drug, and was counseling the patient, a thin man in his early twenties. "This is for your sore elbow, Mr. Welles," I told him. "Be sure to take it with food or milk so it doesn't bother your stomach." I handed the prescription to him. "And if you need something for headache or pain, Tylenol would be safest while you're on this medication."
"Thanks for cluing me in about the generic," he said before he walked away. "I really appreciate the savings."
His doctor had authorized Naprosyn, the brand name drug, but had signed on the "substitution permissible" side of the prescription form, meaning the patient could request a generic. I knew my customer was still paying off his student loans, so I'd mentioned the less expensive generic equivalent.
Looking down now at the badge pinned to my white jacket, "Ruth Kantor Morris, Pharmacy Manager," I felt more like a professional than I did when simply counting out pills. Then again, I reminded myself, I'd studied many years to learn which pills and how they should be used. And, of course, those early years were difficult because I'd become a registered pharmacist at a time when few women entered the profession.
I noticed that Denise could hardly wait for my customer to leave before she began to speak. "Ruthie, something terrible has happened."
Accustomed to her flair for melodrama, I wasn't too worried by Denise's words. As always, her clothes today reflected that dramatic streak: a black and white geometric print dress and, pinned to one shoulder, a scarf in several shades of green. Matching eyeshadow lent a greenish tint to her gray eyes, and dangling earrings repeated the various greens of the scarf.
Denise worked in the Food Go coffee shop where the waitresses wore bright green aprons. Although I couldn't see her apron from where I stood behind the pharmacy counter, I had no doubt it also matched the scarf. I smiled to myself. Then I looked more closely at Denise and realized how agitated she seemed.
"Is something wrong?"
"Ruthie, didn't you hear about the murder?"
"Which one?" Even in Scottsdale, murder is no longer a singular occurrence.
"Sterling's wife, of course." She hesitated for a moment. "I mean ex-wife."
"I didn't see anything about a Harraday murder. Come to think of it, didn't his ex remarry?" I asked. "The name would be different."
"She's always used her maiden name. Andrea Felder."
"Felder! But that's the name of the man you help care for."
Denise had recently taken on this second job as part-time caregiver for Sterling Harraday's former father-in-law. I'd wondered at the time whether it would work out, but I knew she was determined to save money for training as a dental hygienist.
Suddenly, with the news about Sterling's ex-wife, I felt apprehensive for Denise without quite knowing the reason. Despite her obvious interest in Sterling, she'd never mentioned Andrea Felder. Sterling himself, however, had once talked to me about his former wife, telling me that the divorce was her idea and that she'd remarried immediately afterwards.
"Where was Andrea Felder murdered?" I asked now.
"I'm not sure, but I have a terrible feeling it happened where I work—at her father's home."
"Why? Did you see her there?"
"No, not yesterday—that's when they found her. But I did work there the same morning before my shift in the coffee shop. Amos—that's Mr. Felder—told me not to prepare lunch. He said his daughter would be taking him out to eat."
"Who else would have been there?" I asked. "Someone must have cared for him when you weren't available."
"Excuse me." The speaker was a heavy-set woman with two chubby children in tow. "This is all very interesting, but I need my medicine."
I apologized and took care of the customer while Denise waited. The flow of people continued, making it impossible for us to talk. "I'll come to the coffee shop as soon as my shift is over," I told her, and we both returned to work.
When Louise Rettenberg, my staff pharmacist arrived, I was nearly caught up. "I'll get the window," she said. "Or would you rather I worked at the computer?"
I still marvel at the way Louise has changed over the past few months. For a time, she'd been barely civil, convinced that her new pharmacy degree made her more knowledgeable than an oldtimer like me. She now was tacitly atoning for her previous lack of confidence in me, especially for her belief that I'd made a deadly mistake. She had seemed so cynical and aloof at one time, but I'd come to realize most of that was a pose to hide her own want of assurance in this, her first full-time pharmacy position.
"The window is fine," I said. She tossed her long dark braid over one shoulder and went to help an elderly woman who'd just walked up to the pharmacy.
We worked together until it was time for me to hang up my white lab jacket and leave. It was early March and, in Scottsdale, that means cool mornings and warm afternoons. I was wearing my navy print, a short-sleeved silk dress, and looked down to check whether it had become too wrinkled during my workday. Not bad, I thought. That's one advantage to a job where I must stand, even at the computer. I decided to leave my sweater on the coat rack. Tomorrow, I'd be on the late shift and wouldn't need it until it was time to go home.
Denise was busy at the other end of the coffee shop when I took my usual seat at a corner table. I smiled to see that her green apron did pick up one of the scarf colors. The smile faded, however, as I thought about the murder. I remembered how happy Denise had been when she announced her plans to work for Amos Felder. It was at her New Year's Eve party, only a couple of months ago.
"I'm planning a small gathering," she'd said by way of invitation. "Bring Michael if he can come up from Tucson."
Michael Loring and I had been in love many years ago when we were both pharmacy students at the University of Arizona in Tucson, but we'd lost track of each other after I made it clear that I couldn't marry a non-Jew. Meanwhile, Michael had married and divorced. My own marriage to Bob Morris, a happy one, had left me widowed more than two years ago..
When Michael's son-in-law was murdered last summer, Michael and I were thrown together again. At first, I'd tried to hide my reawakened feelings for him from Denise and especially from myself. It was now understood, though, that his frequent drives from Tucson to Scottsdale were to see me as well as the daughter who lived next door to Denise and was expecting her first child.
Michael did join us on New Year's Eve and so did Sterling Harraday, the attorney I'd hired after being accused of a fatal prescription error. "I'm finally going to earn enough money to train as a dental hygienist," Denise had told us that night.
"Doesn't the new job require nursing experience?" I'd asked after hearing the details.
Sterling Harraday had shifted his horn-rimmed glasses closer to his eyes. "That's no problem," he'd said in his slightly pompous way. "You see, I suggested Denise. The patient is my former father-in-law. He's wheelchair-bound."
These reflections evaporated now as Denise appeared at my table in the coffee shop. "I'll get your food and then take a coffee break," she told me. "Do you want the usual?"
I'd had no chance for lunch and suddenly realized how hungry I was. The usual, a tuna salad sandwich and iced tea, arrived quickly along with a mug of coffee for herself. Denise removed the green apron, to signify she was off-duty, and placed it on the back of her chair. "Where were we?" she asked.
"You were about to tell me who looks after Mr. Felder when you're not there."
"A nurse's aide and another caregiver divide the time. Also, he has one of those dog companions." She smiled as if remembering something humorous. "You'd have to see that dog in action to believe it. He even turns lights on and off for Amos."
"What about Andrea? How often was she around?"
"Andrea is—was—very good about being there whenever he needed her."
"Did she know about you and Sterling?"
"Could be. We never talked about him, but I think so." She was looking at the coffee mug in her hand and not at me. I knew she wasn't telling me the whole story.
"Denise, unless the police solve this right away, they'll surely question you."
"You don't have to look at me that way. I didn't kill her."
"I know that."
She got up quickly and went to refill our beverages. I thought about Denise's reaction. It wasn't like her to be so defensive and, yet, I meant what I said. Last summer, I'd briefly suspected Denise of murder. Two things had happened since then to keep me from doubting her again. We'd been through so much together that I felt I knew her better as a person and, after having been unjustly accused myself, I was now less likely to jump to conclusions about other people.
"What do you know about Andrea?" I asked when Denise returned to the table. She held the iced tea pitcher in one hand and the coffee pot in the other, carefully filling first my glass and then her mug. Without answering, she moved away to replace pitcher and coffee pot.
"Okay," I said as she sat down again. "If I'm being too nosy, say so, and we'll change the subject."
"That's not it," she insisted. "After all, I'm the one who brought it up in the first place."
"I thought you looked upset; that's why I asked."
"Not for myself. For Sterling."
"Denise! You don't seriously think he . . ."
"It's just that they've been quarreling lately. I'm afraid it will look bad for him when that gets out."
"But their divorce was old news. Hadn't things settled down?" I thought about it. Sterling, as the victim's ex-husband, would surely be a prime suspect; but Andrea's current husband seemed a likelier one. Didn't the police always look at the surviving spouse first?
"The divorce was a bitter one," Denise said. "She was having an affair with this guy, the one she married right afterwards. Sterling trusted her; he didn't have any idea what was going on."
"And since the divorce? Doesn't he have the children every weekend?" I knew that Denise had met Sterling's son and daughter but not how much they saw of each other.
"They're terrific kids," she said. "But the divorce was tough for them."
"Denise, something is wrong with this picture. Sterling's kids surely visit their grandfather, and they know you've been seeing their father . . ."
"Okay. I'll tell you." This time she didn't try to avoid my eyes. "We had words."
"You argued with Andrea?"
"She wanted her dad to fire me. When he refused, she tried to get me to quit."
"Because of Sterling?"
"Naturally."
"Why should Andrea care . . . have cared? If the divorce was her idea and she married again, why should she interfere with you and Sterling?"
Denise sighed, another unusual reaction from her. She looked toward the coffee pot on the counter and started to stand up. I put out my hand to stop her. "No more excuses," I said. "Just tell me about it or tell me it's none of my business."
"I want you to know. Maybe you can help me figure out what's happening." She was silent for a moment but made no further attempt to leave the table. "Andrea didn't object to the fact that Sterling was dating. She objected to me."
"To you? What could she have against you?"
Denise reached behind her and pulled the green apron forward, thrusting it toward me. I could see the effort it cost her to continue. "You always wondered why I'm so set on becoming a dental hygienist. Well, I'm tired of being labeled 'waitress.' It's okay for people working their way through school. Or professionals who work at upscale restaurants." She crumpled the apron into a ball. "But a woman of my age working in a coffee shop tells everyone that's all she can do."
"That's sheer ignorance. Why should it matter to other people if you're doing an honest job and doing it well?"
"You're different, Ruthie. You look at me as a person, but others only see this." She took the balled-up apron and flung it on the table between us.
I had known that Denise viewed her occupation as a dead-end job, but she'd never spoken so strongly before. For the first time, I understood the desperation that drove her first to try borrowing money and then to save for more schooling.
"What exactly did Andrea say?" I asked quietly.
"That if Sterling was going to expose her children to other women, she wanted them to be people they could look up to."
"She sounds like someone who could incite murder."
"Just self-centered."
"What I mean," I told her, "is other people were probably on the receiving end, too. Maybe where she worked, where she lived . . . It's unlikely you were the only target for such cruelty."
"But Sterling and I were the ones with opportunity."
"Sometimes, you can be your own worst enemy," I told Denise.
"Just trying to be realistic."
"What about her father?"
"He can't get out of his wheelchair unaided," Denise said.
"Well, there's sure to be others that we don't know about." I started to ask Denise whether she'd ever met Andrea's second husband but was interrupted by the store manager's voice on the Food Go loudspeaker system.
"Ruth Morris, please return to the pharmacy. Ruth Morris, you are wanted in the pharmacy."
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