The Complete H-Series of The Eulalie Park Mysteries

by Fiona Snyckers

  Eulalie tutted. “What do you suppose the clients think when they walk in and see him sitting there like a plump princeling?”

  “The clients love him. He’s a big hit with everyone who comes into the office.”

  “Hmm.” She went to the kitchen to throw away the containers from her lunch. “I’ll be working on the new insurance matter for the rest of the afternoon, Mrs. B.”

  “Let me know if you need anything.”

  Eulalie sat at her desk and tried to concentrate. The events of the morning had thrown her off her game. Her natural tendency to turn a mystery over and over in her mind until she had solved it meant that she kept thinking about Rochelle Chirac and what might have happened to her.

  It wasn’t her business, she reminded herself.

  Queen’s Town Federal Life, on the other hand, was a big, important client that had hired her to investigate a series of system-wide computer crashes that had hit businesses across the city. Those businesses all happened to be clients of Federal Life and were now submitting claims to the insurance company. There was something suspiciously similar about each of the system crashes, and the company wanted to know whether it was sabotage.

  If it was, and if the sabotage originated from within the affected companies, their insurance policies would be void and Federal Life wouldn’t have to pay up. If it was an outside attack, however, they would.

  With her background in computer science, Eulalie was the perfect investigator for the job.

  She had requested login details from the affected companies that would allow her to access their computer systems remotely. While she waited for those, she reviewed CCTV footage from the days when the crashes had taken place. They had all happened within a ten-day period, and Eulalie wanted to see whether she could identify a particular hacker or saboteur who had been physically present on the premises before or after the crashes.

  Reviewing footage from six separate sites took hours. She ran facial recognition software to help her sort through the sea of faces. It threw up several matches. Someone had visited the bank - Lafayette Savings and Loan – on one day and the drugstore – Script-Rite Medipharm – on another. Another person had visited the Prince’s Museum of Modern Art on one day and Flite courier company on another.

  For the same person to appear at two of the sites could be regarded as a coincidence. When that happened, Eulalie took a screenshot of the person’s face, made a note of the dates and times that they appeared, and saved the information in a file. She would investigate each one but would only get excited if she found three appearances by the same person.

  As the afternoon drew to a close, she had flagged three appearances by a man in a gray scarf. He attracted her attention because scarves of any color were not a common sight in the subtropical climate of Prince William Island. In each case, the man’s face was turned away from the security cameras. It was almost as though he was trying to hide his identity.

  Eulalie had just found a fourth sighting of the man when Mrs. Belfast tapped lightly on her office door.

  “Yes, Mrs. B?”

  Her secretary ushered a man into her office. “It’s Mr. Chirac to see you, dear.”

  Chapter 3

  Eulalie hid her surprise. She walked around the desk to shake the man’s hand.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Belfast. Bonjour, Monsieur Chirac. Voulez-vous…”

  “Sorry,” he interrupted. “I don’t speak French. I know I have a French surname and my father was French, but I was brought up speaking English by my mother.”

  “My mistake. I apologize.” She pulled out a chair for him and they sat on opposite sides of her desk. “What can I do for you, Mr. Chirac?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t have an appointment.”

  “That’s not a problem. We take walk-in clients all the time.”

  “It’s just that your grandmother told me where you worked and said I could come straight here.”

  “My grandmother?” said Eulalie.

  “Yes. I saw her at the school. I’ve just come from there. The police phoned me when they found the note about my daughter.”

  Eulalie nodded sympathetically. “I’m sorry. This must be a very difficult time for you.”

  He looked at the floor, and then up again to meet her eyes. “I’ve always known she was dead. From the moment they told me she had run away, I knew she would never do that voluntarily. This note they found has given me hope. For the first time in fifteen years I feel as though I might find out what happened to my daughter.”

  “My grandmother and I went through something similar. After years of not knowing what had happened to my mother, we were finally able to find out the truth. By that stage, we just wanted to know.”

  He nodded. “That’s exactly how I feel, and that’s why I’ve come to see you today. I want you to investigate my daughter’s death. Your grandmother told me you could.”

  With a great effort of will, Eulalie managed not to sigh.

  “Mr. Chirac,” she said. “My grandmother means well, but she hasn’t thought this through. This matter is in the hands of the Queen’s Town police. I can assure you that they will investigate it thoroughly. You don’t need to hire a private investigator for…”

  “The Queen’s Town Police,” he said. “I’m not sure I trust them. They have a reputation for incompetence and corruption.”

  “That was a few years ago, sir. It’s not like that anymore. Ever since the new chief of police took over, corruption has been a thing of the past. He has made a huge difference to the station. Even the media are starting to change their minds about the police force.”

  “But he is still just one man. Can you really deny that the police department is chronically short-staffed and under-resourced?”

  Eulalie had to be honest.

  “No,” she said. “I can’t deny that.”

  “I don’t want my daughter’s investigation to be handled by a police department that is stretched too thin. I’m sure they will do their best, and I believe you when you say that their standard of police work has improved, but I want someone who works for me. I want someone who will give this their full attention and send me regular progress reports. I promise I will make it worth your while. I earn a good living and I’m choosing to invest some of it in something that’s important to me. I want to know what happened to my daughter.”

  “Look, I’ll take the case if you want me to, but you must understand that I will be investigating everyone who had contact with your daughter at the time of her disappearance.”

  “That’s what I’d expect.”

  “That includes you, Mr. Chirac.”

  “Me?”

  “When teenage girls disappear, the men in their lives are always the first suspects - namely their fathers, stepfathers, and boyfriends. You must be prepared for that.”

  “Why would I be hiring you if I were guilty? That makes no sense.”

  “It could be a piece of misdirection – an attempt to deflect attention away from yourself.”

  “Oh.” He sank back in his chair.

  “This is going to happen whether you hire me or not, Mr. Chirac. The police will investigate you. The question is whether you want a private investigator to be doing the same thing. I take on new clients all the time, but I don’t allow them to tell me what I can and can’t investigate. If you still want to hire me on those terms, I’ll ask my secretary to draw up a contract.”

  Eulalie was sure he would back out. He seemed to be wrestling with himself. Then he sat up again.

  “I accept your terms. You can investigate me as much as you like. As long as I find out what happened to Rochelle, it will be worth it. Give me the contract. I’m ready to sign.”

  Eulalie looked up as Mrs. Belfast came into her office later. “Looks like Angel was right after all. I am now officially involved in this matter.”

  “When has Angel ever not been right?” The secretary laid a document in front of her. “Here’s the contract. When you have signed i
t, I’ll send Mr. Chirac a copy by registered mail.”

  Eulalie scribbled her name on the signature line. “It’s going to be tricky juggling a murder investigation with this insurance fraud matter.”

  “I can help if you like.”

  “Thanks. I can’t afford to drop the ball with such an important client. Murder might be interesting, but commercial work pays better.”

  “Is that what you’re busy with now? The insurance matter?” Mrs. Belfast glanced at the computer screen.

  “I’m still waiting for the hacked companies to give me remote access to their computer systems. I think they’re afraid that I’m a hacker too.”

  “What are you doing in the meanwhile?”

  “I’m going through the security camera footage from the six buildings on the days they were hacked. I’m running facial recognition software to see if the same people show up on camera. The likelihood is that the companies were hacked remotely, but someone might have been there in person to survey the premises. This is something you can carry on with tomorrow while I’m out of the office. I’ll set it up so that you just have to run the program. If you notice anything suspicious, you can freeze the footage and take a screenshot.”

  “That’s fascinating, dear.” Mrs. Belfast tapped on a face in the crowd. She squeaked happily when the image enlarged and sharpened in response to the cursor. “What have you found so far?”

  “I’ve identified a few people who were at two of the buildings on different days. I know that’s not much to go on, but I’ve saved their faces anyway.” She showed her secretary how to save an image to a particular folder. “Then there’s this guy. Mr. Gray Scarf, as I like to call him.”

  “His face isn’t visible at all.”

  “That’s right, which is why the software program hasn’t picked him up. But who wears a gray scarf pulled up over his face every time he goes into a building on Prince William Island?”

  “Suspicious, indeed.”

  “Look here.” Eulalie clicked on an image. “He had a moment of carelessness, and I was able to get a partial glimpse of his face. He’s quite distinctive looking, don’t you think?”

  There was silence in the room.

  “Mrs. B?”

  Eulalie turned to see that her secretary was staring at the image intently.

  “Do you recognize him?”

  The silence continued.

  “Mrs. B.?”

  “What’s that? Oh no, dear. Not at all. For a moment, I thought he looked like someone I knew, but the man I’m thinking of is much younger.”

  “Okay.”

  Mrs. Belfast bent to stroke the cat. When she stood up again, her face was calm.

  “I have some shopping to do on the way home this afternoon, so I’ll be off now. Have a good evening, dear.”

  She turned and walked out of the office. Eulalie watched through the window as she got into her car and drove away.

  “Hmm.”

  She turned back to her desk to look at the screen. The man in the gray scarf was still there. Less than half his face was visible, but it was very distinctive, especially when she enhanced and sharpened the image. She took a screenshot of the enhanced image, saved it, and printed a copy for herself. Then she ordered the computer to create a mock-up of what the man’s face might look like based on this incomplete image. She watched as it formed on the screen, lines and shading appearing as the computer worked to achieve the most accurate image. The face that appeared didn’t look quite human.

  She reminded herself that people’s faces were never entirely symmetrical. Creating a mirror image of one half of a face always produced strange results. In this case, the computer didn’t even have half a face to work with, so it had extrapolated details of the nose and mouth.

  Eulalie cupped her chin in her hand and stared at the screen.

  She was looking at a well-preserved man of late middle age – definitely over fifty-five. His hair had once been dark but was now grizzled. He had highly arched, winged eyebrows that gave him a saturnine look. His skin was quite dark for a white man. His nose was prominent and dominated his whole face. The mouth was a guess on the part of the program, based on his facial type. Eulalie had a feeling that his mouth would turn out to be quite different.

  “Who are you?” she asked the screen. “And what do you have to do with Mrs. Belfast?”

  She jumped when something bumped against her calf.

  “Oh, it’s you.”

  The cat made a meowing sound and stropped himself energetically against her legs. Then he looked at the stairs.

  “All right, all right.”

  She printed a copy of the facial mock-up and collected it from the printer tray. Then she shut down her computer, switched off the lights, and locked up.

  “Come on, then.”

  She tramped up the stairs towards her apartment, with the cat at her heels. She was surprised to see that she was still wearing the micro-shorts and strappy top from that morning. The first thing she would do on reaching her apartment was change her clothes.

  The cat meowed again.

  “Yes, okay. The first thing I’ll do is feed you. Then I can pick out an outfit for dinner.”

  Once she had fed the cat, she flopped on the couch and switched on the local television news. The hatching day story was the lead item.

  “A day of celebration and nostalgia turned to tragedy today, as a blast from the past rocked Queen’s Town Middle School,” said the PWIN roving reporter. She was standing with her back to the paddock where the time capsule had been dug up, police tape clearly visible behind her.

  “She makes it sound like there was an explosion,” Eulalie told the cat. He propped himself against her thigh, so he could wash his stomach.

  “Rochelle Chirac has been listed as a missing person since she disappeared fifteen years ago,” said the reporter. “We asked Detective Wesley Wright of the missing persons division what he thought about this development.”

  The image on the screen changed to the face of Eulalie’s least favorite member of the police department. She and Detective Wright had disliked each other on sight, and still did.

  “The case of Rochelle Chirac has been open and unsolved for fifteen years,” Detective Wright said. “While the investigation has remained active, this is the first significant breakthrough we’ve had. You can be sure we will be throwing all our resources into this investigation.”

  The camera cut back to the on-the-scene reporter.

  “One can only imagine how Rochelle Chirac’s family are feeling tonight, knowing that they finally have news of their missing daughter - but what grim news. PWIN tried to get in touch with Roland Chirac – Rochelle’s father who still lives on-island – but received no response to our enquiries.”

  “Vultures.”

  Eulalie made a mental note to tell her client not to make any statements to the media or to anyone else, besides the police. Tabloid journalists had been known to pose as concerned strangers in the hope of getting a quote from a family member.

  “We spoke to Rosalind Grier who was at school with Rochelle Chirac, and who was present at the Hatching Day ceremony.”

  Eulalie sat up and paid attention as the image on the screen changed to the face of a woman with a blond bob and a crisp white shirt who opened her eyes wide for the camera.

  “I’m devastated by this news, just devastated. Rochelle was such a sweet girl. Everyone loved her. I can’t begin to imagine who could have done such a thing. My chakras are completely out of balance. I don’t know how I’m going to sleep tonight. I’ll have to go straight home to the Reiki Wellness Center that my husband and I recently founded and do an aura cleansing. That’s the Reiki Wellness Center at 212 Cobble Alley, just off Lafayette Drive. Aura cleansings start at a hundred and eighty dollars an hour and…”

  The microphone was whisked away from her and the screen went blank. Then the roving reporter appeared again.

  “You heard it from the horse’s mouth, islanders
. A young woman beloved by all was cut down in the prime of her life. Who did it and why? Stay tuned for the latest developments in the Rochelle Chirac case.”

  They went to a commercial break, and Eulalie switched the TV off. She reached for her phone and texted Chief Macgregor.

  Eulalie: Dinner at Angel’s Place – 7 pm?

  Chief Macgregor: Sure. See you then.

  She put on a little black dress with cap sleeves, a scooped neckline, and a scalloped hem. She kept her hair loose, just taming it with hairspray and a brush. She freshened her lipstick, slid her feet into wedge-heeled pumps, and considered herself good to go.

  “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t,” she called to the cat who was sitting in an open window in the kitchen, contemplating his own night on the tiles.

  She took her Vespa to downtown Queen’s Town where Angel’s Place, her grandmother’s bar and restaurant, was warming up for a mellow night. Angel’s Place was loved by locals and tourists alike. It was mentioned in several guidebooks as an excellent place to sample the local cuisine of Prince William Island.

  Angel enjoyed her evenings in the restaurant. She drifted in and out of the kitchen, sampling sauces and giving advice to her chefs and sous chefs. She kept a close eye on the standard of service of the waitstaff and the bartenders.

  Above all, she loved seeing people enjoying themselves. She liked to mingle with the crowd, whether they were regulars of many years standing or tourists who had just landed that morning. At night, Angel was in her element.

  She had hired a popular jazz quartet for the evening, Eulalie noticed as she walked in. They were playing discreetly in a corner near the dance floor. The noise level would rise as the night wore on, but for now it was just a pleasant accompaniment to dinner.