Manor of Dying

by Kathleen Bridge

  “Claire told me about you meeting Patrick Seaton. She also said if you come in to take this.”

  “Ahh, how conniving.” I paused at the thought of a poetry group that included Patrick Seaton. For a millisecond I forgot about Langston’s possible relation to murderess Marian Fortune. Then I remembered Patrick was the screenwriter for Mr. & Mrs. Winslow. “Thanks, Georgia. What do I owe you?”

  “A gift from me. Claire wants me to join their little group, too. But I have so much going on, I don’t know if I have the time. But you should do it. I know a little tidbit you might enjoy hearing. The last time Patrick and his publicist—”

  “Beautiful publicist,” I added.

  “Not half as gorgeous as you. Anyway, they didn’t seem to be getting along. So the door’s open.” Then she hesitated. “If you want it open?”

  “I’m pretty busy too.”

  “Claire certainly is a great addition to our circle, isn’t she?”

  “The best,” I answered.

  “Maybe you could bring Cole along to the poetry club?” She winked.

  “You devil. Maybe I will.”

  “And if you do decide to join, might I suggest you redeem the gift certificate Barb gave you for your birthday for cooking lessons with Chef Patou? You don’t want to poison anyone, do you?”

  “Poison . . . Hmmm, maybe I should speak to Doc. Or you could. Just see if they found anything in Blake Nightingale’s system besides champagne.”

  “All roads lead to mystery and murder with you,” she said, laughing. “I’ll see if he can find anything out, nonchalantly. What about Elle’s fiancé? Can’t he get the info?”

  “It’s under Southampton’s jurisdiction. He probably could, but I don’t want to push it.”

  “Doc and I have been discussing the case. Did Doc know you were working at Nightingale Manor?”

  “No. When we met on Monday at Paddy’s I told him about Mr. & Mrs. Winslow but not the location. And so far there hasn’t been any mention in the news of the miniseries being filmed at Nightingale Manor. I have to say, Doc does look pretty fit. Is that any of your doing? He even ordered oatmeal instead of eggs benedict.”

  She smiled. “You’ll be happy to know he’s lowered his cholesterol and is off his meds. And his heart is a happy ticker.”

  “That is good news.”

  Georgia bagged the book and handed it to me. I donned my coat, slipped on my boots and headed for the door. Mr. Whiskers followed.

  I looked down. “Masochist. Sorry, buddy. Don’t want to be responsible for what my wayward feline does to you next.”

  Georgia laughed and scooped him up. “Keep in touch. I expect updates from you for my peace of mind.”

  I saluted. “Yes, ma’am.” Then I opened the door and stepped into the bracing wind.

  • • •

  After returning home and feeding the beast her dinner, I took my laptop to the card table and started my search. I typed in Bunny Bonnie Fortune and Bridgehampton. Bingo. A dozen pictures popped up on the screen of Bunny from when she was in her early twenties, always in a society photo at some art installment. There was also a photo attached to her obituary. Even in her later years, Bunny was a handsome woman. I scanned the text in a New York Times obit and found Langston Reed listed as one of Bunny’s three grandsons, as was a nephew named Grayson. The same name in the letter from Arden Hunter that mentioned Grayson as Marian’s son. It was just as Georgia said. Langston Reed was Marian Fortune’s great-nephew. If Bunny was still alive she would have been of a similar age to Marian Fortune. Perhaps a little bit older. I continued searching the web until my eyes started closing and Jo told me it was time for bed by plopping all of her twenty-three pounds on my laptop’s keyboard. The same thing she liked to do during a board or card game. “You cheeky thing,” I scolded. “I saw your boytoy, Mr. Whiskers, and his ear is healing up nicely. No thanks to you.”

  Jo’s eye looked away, and she had that cat-ate-the-canary smirk on her mouth.

  “Shoo, shoo. I need to sign off. You win.”

  For once she listened, but not before swishing her huge Maine coon tail near my mouth. A layer of fur stuck to my lip gloss. “Ugh! What am I going to do with you!” I, for one, was never a cat lover. Dogs had always held a special place in my heart. Especially after meeting Cole’s three-legged dog, Tripod. When Detective Shoner, aka Arthur, and Elle talked me into adopting Jo, I’d only acquiesced when promised inside information on a murder case I was involved in.

  Now, I couldn’t imagine not having her in my life.

  After wiping my mouth with a tissue and the keyboard with a duster, I went to turn off the laptop. Raising my finger above the Off button, I paused. There it was, second line from the bottom of the page. A Long Island Newsday article with the headline “Bunny Fortune Defends Sister in Murder of Famed Actress.”

  Chapter 21

  Sleep had been fleeting and my mind was still fogged from the knowledge that Langston Reed’s great-aunt murdered Arden Hunter, but I still managed to get up Sunday morning from my warm, toasty bed and dress in anticipation of the arrival of Duke and Duke Jr., along with the truck of furniture from my storage unit.

  I was in the kitchen on my second cup of coffee when the light near the kitchen door flashed. My heart hiccupped. I galloped to the door and opened it.

  “Elle! What are you doing here?”

  “Is that any kind of greeting? You think I would miss helping you arrange your cottage to those floor plans we’ve been going over for months? Plus, I brought you a present in the back of my truck.”

  I glanced behind her and saw something humongous covered in a heavy moving blanket and secured with bungie cords. I also saw about a foot of snow. Thankfully, I had a snowplow company on retainer and they’d already been and gone. “What is it?” I asked her, clapping my hands in excitement.

  “You gonna let me in? It’s cold out here. You can’t see it until after the truck arrives.”

  I ushered her inside. After giving her a bone-crushing hug, I closed the door. “I can’t believe you drove here in all this snow. It’s not like you at all, you rogue.”

  “Like the mail carriers, Through rain, sleet, or snow—I’m here to deliver your early Christmas present. Plus, Arthur told me the roads were all salted and cleared. It pays to have a cop as a fiancé. Smells heavenly.” She passed me then beelined to the coffeepot on the counter, took a mug from the cupboard and poured herself some dark roast. Something had changed. I had a feeling it had to do with her fiancé and a decision about his new job. I let it go. She would share when she wanted to.

  After adding milk and sugar to her coffee, Elle turned. She scanned my face with her large chestnut eyes and said, “You look awful. Are those dark circles from yesterday’s mascara?”

  “Thanks. No. They’re from a bad night’s sleep.”

  “Too excited to unload the truck?”

  “Not exactly.” I told her about what I’d learned about Langston Reed and Dr. Lewis.

  “Oh, boy. But what does it all mean? I see Dr. Lewis’s motive. But why would Langston kill Dr. Blake?”

  “I don’t have an answer to that. I looked at some old streaming episodes of Bungled, and it’s true they don’t show one clip of Dr. Blake doing the actual surgery.”

  “You have to admit, Dr. Blake was tons more handsome and personable as a television personality compared to his partner. But I would love to ask . . .” Elle’s phone rang. She pulled it from the pocket of her down vest and answered. “Hi, Felicity . . . Are you sure? . . . I’ll ask her . . . I’ll have to tell Arthur, so he can have an officer meet you. Of course. I’ll call you as soon as I talk to him. Can you hold on for a sec?” She tapped the screen and turned to me. “It’s Felicity. Should I tell her about Langston? She’s heading to Nightingale Manor. Langston is meeting her there with a moving van and they’re picking out the furniture to go to Windy Willows. She wants us to come and pack up some boxes of smalls. She shouldn’t be alone. Especially after wha
t you told me.”

  “I wouldn’t tell her about Langston until you ask Arthur. I doubt her life is in danger.”

  “Famous last words.” Elle took the call off hold and said into the phone, “Okay, Felicity, I’m going to call Arthur right now. Meg’s coming too. See you soon.”

  Elle placed another call and walked out onto the screened porch. I took a seat at the card table. I had to catch my breath. Things were happening too fast and I was the type that needed to analyze and put things in their proper place, like when working on one of my decorating boards for a client’s cottage.

  When Elle came in from the porch, she gave me a thumbs-up. “Arthur’s going to meet us at the ferry. He called ahead for someone from the Southampton PD to go to the Nightingale estate. They should get there the same time Felicity does.”

  Elle went to the kitchen, grabbed her coffee from the counter, topped it off and went to the window. “Truck’s here!”

  I hurried to the kitchen door, opened it and propped open the vintage aqua screen door that I’d found at a Brooklyn salvage company. The door had reminded me of one you might find in one of my favorite movies, To Kill a Mockingbird.

  I called over my shoulder to Elle, “Do you mind collapsing the card table and chairs?” I’d already moved the boxes I’d packed from Little Grey and stacked them with the others in the guest bedroom. “I’m gonna run upstairs and put in my hearing aids and make sure Jo is locked in the bathroom. Not that she’d escape into the snow, but she might purposely trip Duke or Duke Junior.”

  “Sure,” she answered, laughing. “I told Felicity we would be on the eleven o’clock ferry. And we’ll be going home on the four o’clock. I’m not taking a chance the storm comes twelve hours early. And we aren’t taking that elevator.”

  “Agreed. Did you tell Arthur about Langston’s tie to the old murder?”

  “Yes.”

  “Great,” I said, making my way to the staircase.

  “He also told me to tell you that the woman who was suing Dr. Blake for malpractice is in the clear. They have her on video surveillance at a hotel in Manhattan during the time of death.”

  I had already learned that yesterday when I’d been eavesdropping. In the past Arthur and Chief Pell never got along. The chief always thought the detective was too concerned about his fancy attire and the A-list functions he attended to be a real cop. Time and time again Chief Pell was proven wrong. Maybe he had something to do with Arthur’s new job in Manhattan. I had a vision of us catching Dr. Blake’s killer and Arthur getting an accommodation and promotion. “I never really thought she was guilty, but at least we can take her off the list.” I recalled the piece of paper she’d dropped at the Southampton police station and how torn up she was. I was hopeful the press wouldn’t find out her last name.

  When I came back downstairs, the area rug in the main room was down and Duke and his son were coming through the doorway carrying my sofa. I didn’t realize how much I missed it and almost jumped on top and let them carry me Cleopatra-style to the designated spot Elle was directing them to. “Come back a little . . . to the left, no, a little to the right . . .”

  That was my girl.

  My home would soon be my home.

  Chapter 22

  Arthur met us at the ferry. When we’d pulled up he was outside his car chatting with Captain Chris. I saw him hold his phone up to the ferry captain’s face and the captain nodded in the affirmative. Elle parked the pickup next to Arthur’s Lexus. Then she motioned to him to hurry and come over. Arthur raised the heel of his right hand to say we should stay put. That wasn’t a problem seeing the outside temperature was somewhere in the low twenties, not counting the windchill. The skies were partly cloudy with peeks of sun, but the choppy seas and whitecaps on the bay forecasted another storm was on the way. It was scheduled to hit hard around midnight but leave quickly thereafter. As I’d learned many times since moving to the east end of Long Island, when you’re surrounded by water, Mother Nature could be very fickle. At the thought of being stranded again, I realized Elle was right, we needed to get in and out of that house of horrors as quickly as possible.

  “Hope your fiancé’s getting some good intel about the case,” I said, checking my phone. I’d contacted Doc to see if any of his PD fishing buddies could find out the details on Dr. Blake’s autopsy, falsely reassuring him I wouldn’t go near Nightingale Manor, because at the time I hadn’t planned to. I was hopeful if there’d been anything worthwhile relating to who killed Dr. Blake, Arthur would have told me. Or at least his fiancée, for her safety alone. I recalled Langston telling us that on the night Dr. Blake was murdered, he’d consumed a lot of champagne. I wondered if there was anything more in that champagne.

  I’d reread the newspaper reports on the internet and realized something—Dr. Tobias Nightingale had been the only witness to Arden Hunter’s stabbing with the ice pick. It wasn’t a case of he said/she said, it was more a case of the doctor said, the insane accused would have no say. What if Marian had read the note from Arden telling her about the tickets in the rag doll and had been the one who had torn the doll’s arms off to search for the train tickets? When Arden didn’t show up, she went to search her out?

  Too many questions, but hopefully after confronting Langston about his great-aunt, Marian Fortune, they might get some answers.

  Elle was biting her cuticles, no doubt nervous about getting to Nightingale Manor before something else happened. Trying to distract her, I said, “Have you and Arthur chosen a date, or at least a month for your nuptials?”

  “We had a long talk last night.”

  “And?”

  “We’re going to try to do the long-distance thing. He gets out early on Fridays, so if he hits the road, it shouldn’t be that bad. He might even have the use of a helicopter.”

  “Who knows,” I said, “maybe you’ll see more of him than you do now. His position on the East Hampton Town PD keeps him busy and stressed. The new job sounds pretty cushy.”

  “We planned on getting married in the spring, nothing fancy . . .”

  “In my walled garden,” I added.

  “Yes, but we might have to make it September. See how the job goes.”

  “Still a beautiful time out here.”

  Our conversation was shortened by Arthur opening the driver’s side door. “Okay, sorry about that, but I’ve just learned something very interesting.”

  “About the Nightingale murder?”

  “Yes, Ms. . . . Meg. Hop out. We’ll take my car on the ferry.”

  “Do you have an emergency roadside kit in your trunk?” Elle asked as we got out.

  “A what?” he asked.

  “A foldable shovel, flares, a special blanket to go under the wheels if you get stuck in the mud or snow. Need I go on?”

  “No. I don’t have any of that. I do have a jack and spare tire. I usually depend on my police radio if I need help.”

  “Well, buster, you’re getting one for Christmas. Especially if you’ll be making the commute from the city on the treacherous Long Island Expressway. You can grab mine from the truck’s bed.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain Gorgeous,” he said, laughing. “I like the role reversal, it’s usually me giving you the concerned-father speech.”

  Elle smiled.

  He got the emergency kit from the bed of the pickup and put it in the trunk of the Lexus, then we hurried to his car.

  “A few minutes in this weather, you might freeze to death fixing a flat tire,” I said, opening the backseat door, happy the car was still running and was warm and toasty inside.

  “No, Meg. Get in the front seat,” Elle ordered from behind.

  “Thanks, pal.” I held the door as she got in the backseat, then closed it. I opened the front passenger’s side door and sat, then pulled the door shut just as a wicked gust of air caused all the papers on Arthur’s dash to scatter everywhere. Oops.

  Arthur opened his door and got inside, then turned his head toward the backseat and
gave Elle a questioning look as to why I was sitting next to him.

  “Meg needs to be able to read your lips on the ferry,” she said. “The background noises are too loud for her to hear about what you’ve just learned from the captain. This way she can listen and read your lips at the same time.”

  “How considerate, buddy,” I said, looking back at her and throwing her an air kiss.

  “Plus,” Elle added, “now I can lie down, not look out the window at the rough seas, and while I’m closing my eyes, I’ll repeat a few mantras and prayers there won’t be another dead body at Nightingale Manor when we arrive.”

  I wanted to laugh her off, but I’d had the same thoughts.

  Arthur put the car in Drive and we went up the ramp to the ferry. He turned to me, making sure I could read his lips and whispered, “Why are you holding my papers, Ms. Barrett?” The fact he used my last name wasn’t lost on me.

  “When I opened the door, the wind blew them off the dash and I nicely collected them for you.” I grabbed the disorderly pile from my lap and offered them to him. “I wasn’t snooping, it was the wind. I swear.”

  He arched a thick black eyebrow but didn’t question me further. Now I was dying to see what information was on them.

  We parked next to a pair of utility trucks from the electric company, and as if reading my thoughts, Arthur grabbed the papers from my lap and stuffed them in the arm console. After we were settled in, I couldn’t hold it any longer. “So, what were you talking to Captain Chris about, Arthur?”

  “I haven’t even called it in to Southampton PD yet, but in a nutshell, the vagabond who frequents closed homes on the island during the winter months was rescued by Captain Chris and taken to a men’s shelter in Sag Harbor.”

  “When was that?” I asked.

  “Wednesday around noon.”

  “How do you know he’s the same man the handyman from Sylvester Manor spotted?”