A Slaying in Savannah by Jessica Fletcher Read Free Book Online Page A

gasped and started coughing. Samantha jumped up and pounded on my back. I put my hand up. “I’m all right,” I managed to get out.
    She took the snifter and put it on the glass-topped cart. “That stuff is too powerful,” she said, as she returned with a glass of water. “Really, General, why did you give it to her?”
    “Wanted to see what stuff she was made of,” he said. He raised his glass. “Welcome, Mrs. Fletcher.” He consumed the drink in a single swallow.
    The water soothed my burning throat, but I was afraid to speak in case the effort would set off another paroxysm of coughing. I drank it slowly, eyeing Pettigrew and wondering what I had done to gain his animosity so quickly. Mr. Richardson owed me a lot of explanations and I intended to get them from him.
    As if I had conjured him by thinking of his name, a small man, easily in his eighties, limped into the doorway, leaning on a cane. He wore a three-piece suit and a bow tie, just as I had pictured him in our telephone conversation.
    “Ah, the cavalry has arrived just in time,” Pettigrew said. “Mrs. Fletcher, have you met your sergeant at arms? Say hello to the esteemed Roland Richardson the Third.”

Chapter Five
    The dining room table had been set for six. Two tall chairs upholstered in a floral tapestry were drawn up to either side of the oval table, with matching armchairs at the head and foot. Extra chairs had been pulled back out of the way and lined one wall. For some reason they reminded me of the row of chairs outside the principal’s office when I taught high school English, except these were much prettier.
    The room had a sparkle that the parlor lacked. Mrs. Goodall had placed silver candlesticks on the mahogany sideboard with a matching pair flanking an ormolu clock on the mantel. A gilded Cupid rested on the clock, his head cocked at a little bird perched on his hand. Light from a crystal chandelier above the table was reflected by Tillie’s good china and glassware, lending the room a warm glow.
    Mr. Richardson, the attorney whose phone call had lured me to Savannah, indicated the chair at the head of the table—it must have been Tillie’s—and nodded at me. He rested his hand on the top until I took my seat; then limped around to the other end and claimed his spot. The tenants of the guesthouse sat in what I presume were their usual chairs, with the one between the general and me left empty.
    Once we were seated, Mrs. Goodall arrived with a tray containing the first course. The kitchen was downstairs on the basement level, which was not uncommon in many of the houses in the landmark district.
    “We’re missing one,” Richardson observed.
    “The doc says y’all go on ahead and eat without him,” Mrs. Goodall said. “He’s still at the hospital, but he say he join you when he can.”
    “What do you have for us tonight, Mrs. Goodall?” Artie Grogan rubbed his hands together in anticipation.
    “Shrimp and grits,” she replied, pointedly circling the table away from Grogan and his wife even though Samantha’s seat was closest to the butler’s pantry and the back stairs.
    Samantha stretched her neck to see what was on the tray. “Isn’t that traditionally a breakfast dish?” she asked.
    “Up north, mebbe. But not this ’un,” Mrs. Goodall said.
    Richardson smiled. “By ‘up north,’ she means South Carolina. Don’t you, ma’am?”
    Mrs. Goodall chuckled, and came to my side.
    I took a small plate from the tray. On it were three large shrimp, sprinkled with lemon and bits of bacon and onion. Accompanying the shrimp was a triangle of deep-fried grits.
    “I made this special for you. I remember you liked it last time.”
    “I’m sure I did,” I said, marveling that she could remember what dish I had liked so long ago.
    She brought the tray to Attorney Richardson next and announced, “I’ll serve the appetizer; then y’all jus’ help yourselves to the rest I be putting on the sideboard: baked buttermilk