The second was a hang-up, but the third told me what I wanted to know.
Hanging up, I turned to Lennox and Silas and said, “Okay, now we have to go back to my house. The answers are all there.”
So, we loaded up again, this time in—would you believe it—the police department’s unmarked Plymouth Voyager and headed back toward the south side. Steven Hyatt and Harry had made friends, I was glad to see. They sat together on the backseat of the van, and Janie and I sat in the middle seat. Silas drove and Lennox sat in the passenger seat—you know—the seat where Jimmy had died in that other—the green—Plymouth Voyager. “They’re real comfortable, aren’t they?” I asked no one in particular.
At home, I led the group around to the back of the house. It was way dark by now, and we headed for the gazebo. Entering the little step-up place, I bent over and raised a small flagstone right behind the first latticed wall and picked up the piece of paper I found there.
“Now, let’s go in the house,” I said, resuming the leadership position toward that goal.
“What the …” Captain Lennox swore when he saw the mountain of packages stacked against my front door.
Present drama notwithstanding, Janie and I squealed and said, “They delivered.”
The guys brought in the brightly packaged boxes and sacks from Laura Ashley and first sat them on the bottom stair landing on my instructions. “No,” I amended, “would y’all mind taking them on up to my room? Then I won’t have to later.” I looked at Janie, and she nodded her agreement as the four men took the parcels upstairs.
The woman side of us lost the battle to run up and unwrap our new stuff. Instead we made do with “Can you believe we bought so much?” and “Gosh, I hope we still like it.”
By the time the men trooped back downstairs, I was sitting in the green chair closest to the red lamp, reading the paper I’d retrieved from the garden.
“So?” said Harry.
“So,” I replied firmly, not intimidated by his tone. “So this.” And I started right in, not even waiting until they’d all seated themselves. “Seventeen years ago, my father, Joseph Huckleberry, a patent researcher of some renown, was offered a patent from an inventor who didn’t have the resources or faith in his discovery to pursue it to its conclusion. Instead, he offered it to my father for a small but decent sum.” I’d made up that part, but knowing what an honest man my father was, I was sure it was true. I paused and looked at Steven Hyatt for approval.
He nodded and smiled, and so I went on.
“Father enjoyed making models of the more intriguing inventions that crossed his desk, and this one he particularly liked because he thought it had a good chance of succeeding. It was a fuel converter that was inexpensive to make and easy to install. Combined with one of the experimental formulas—remember this was during the seventies fuel crisis—it had the potential to revolutionize the automotive and oil industries.”
“Honey, I don’t understand what this—” Silas was becoming restless, but Lennox punched at his sleeve and waved for me to continue.
“My father offered the fuel-converter to two or more of the biggest oil companies. After carefully studying it, they bid against each other, all offering him enormous sums for it.” I crossed my fingers and said, “Just how much I don’t know, but it was enough so that Father needed a partner to help him to negotiate the price and to represent him at the meetings. You see, my mother was not well during this time.” Janie nodded in sympathetic understanding.
“The plans were so good, and the competition for them so earnest that my father had to devise a secret code to communicate with his emissary.”
“And he chose ‘How Far Is It Called to the Grave?’ “ Steven Hyatt guessed.
“Yes, Steven. You remember that father sat up there night after night, listening to us rattle on about—oh—everything,” and I stopped, looking self-conscious about some of my memories of what we’d discussed. But when he smiled understandingly, I turned to Captain Lennox and asked, “Do you understand how the game worked?”
“Silas explained it to me,” he answered. “Let me get this straight. You think your father used your and Steven Hyatt’s little game as the password for a … a …?”
When he faltered, searching for the right words, I interjected, “An international financial agreement?” A bit dramatic, but I do love dramatic, superlative stories.
Lennox looked dubious but answered, “Well, if not exactly that, at least a deal important enough to change—”
“But it didn’t, though. Change anything, I mean,” said Harry. “If it had, why are we still dependent on gasoline and—”
“That’s just it,” Steven Hyatt added, excited at his thought. “Honey’s father sold the blasted thing, but the oil company never used it. They wanted it so no one else could have it.”
“That’s not illegal, is it?” I asked.
“Not that I know of, Miss Huckleberry. Just because you buy something doesn’t mean you have to use it. The oil company was just protecting its own interests.”
Janie was indignant. “But what about the interests of mankind … of future generations?” she sputtered.
“Sod ’em,” said Harry. “That’s what they would have said, ’cause that’s the way they think.” I smiled at him. Harry understood the them game.
The group was really getting into it now.
It was Silas who brought it back to the original purpose for which we were gathered together in my living room. “Honey,” he said, forgetting to call me Miss Huckleberry for the captain’s benefit, “what does all this have to do with the two murders—Steven Miller and Jimmy the … well … whatever his name is?”
“I’m glad you asked, Silas. And I might can answer you, if you can tell me this: Was there any blood other than Steven Miller’s found on my carpet? The night Miller was killed?”
Silas looked surprised. He and Lennox exchanged looks. “Why, yes, there was. We think it was the killer’s. Why? Why do you ask, Honey?”
I smiled, “ ’Cause now I know who killed Steven Miller.”
“And Jimmy the … whoever?” asked Janie.
“Yep,” I said.
“Who?” they all asked.
I quit smiling. In fact, I was more than a little sad over my answer. “Steven Bondesky,” I said.
THIRTY
Silas was the first to speak. He said, “You mean the guy we saw at the funeral this morning?” The fact that it was already the next day’s morning seemed irrelevant to him and the rest of the astonished assembly in my living room.
“Bondesky! Your business manager?” From Janie.
Steven Hyatt knew him as, “Your accountant?”
And Harry said, “Who?”
Only Lennox remained calm and professional at my announcement. “Would you like to explain that remark, Miss Huckleberry?”
“Sure,” I said.
“As I told you, Father had to have an accomplice—no, wrong choice of words—a negotiator—that’s better—to help him with the bargaining. So,”—and I gave the word all its implications—“he used Bondesky.”
“How do you know?” asked Lennox patiently.
“I suspected, but wasn’t sure until I read this note. You saw me pick it up out at the gazebo? Well, sure you did. Anyway, I was thinking that Bondesky was the only other person around who knew my father—besides me and Steven Hyatt.” Everyone swung their heads around to look at my longtime friend. “And, of course, he didn’t do it,” I finished emphatically. Some of the eyes that looked upon him weren’t so sure that I was right, so I hurried on with my explanation.
“Bondesky knew my father. Father knew the code. The code was used in the mysterious telephone call I received two weeks ago. And I later discovered that the call referred to an explosion and murder in Florence, Italy, one that had to do with alternate fuel.”
“So?” I couldn’t single out any one voice in the chorus of vocal reaction, but I recognized Silas Sampson as he voiced a dif
ferent and individual criticism of my report. “Florence, Italy?” So, I turned to address his remark.
“Yes, Florence, Italy. It’s a long story, told to me by a friend who is supposedly deceased, but, in fact, is assisting me with this investigation. He is the one who left me the note under the rock since he was the one who took it from the murderer in Italy who was attempting to kill him. My friend’s name is Arthur Stephen Roselli. That’s Stephen spelled S-t-e-p-h-e-n.”
Lennox persisted with his questioning. “And this Roselli told you that Bondesky killed Steven Miller?”
“No, Captain. I’m telling you.”
“How do you know Bondesky is the killer?”
“This,” I said and handed him the piece of old white paper—part of an envelope actually—that I had put in my pocket for the narrative part of my disclosure.
On its creased and dirty surface, my father’s handwriting was still visible; a handsome strong script that would have pleased his Aunt Eddie. The words had faded a little but were still very legible. There was the code written on it, just as Stephen had related to me over the telephone, and two smudged telephone numbers. One was mine—had been Father’s those many years ago. And the other was, as Stephen had also reported, a number that was no longer in service.
“When Bondesky computerized his accounting system, he had to install a separate line for the modem,” I told my captive audience. “He got two new numbers, and this one—the one on the old envelope—was dropped from service. But seventeen years ago, when my Father was alive, it was Steven Bondesky’s business telephone number.”
They were awestruck and, at a curt nod from Lennox, Silas moved toward the telephone, then halted when his boss asked, “But what about the bloodstains? And the murders here in Fort Worth?”
Silas made a move back toward his seat, but Lennox told him, “No, Sampson, go ahead and put out a pickup on Bondesky. We need to question him anyway. Now, Miss Huckleberry, tell us the rest of your story.” And his dark eyes demanded the truth—the whole truth.
I told them about Arthur Stephen Roselli, who was supposedly dead but was not. I told them about Steven Miller saying “Lydia” before he died. I told them about feeling the blood on Steven Miller’s flashlight and wondering later if it had any connection with the dirty bandage Bondesky’s assistant had tied around his head. I told them that I thought it did, that I thought Jimmy the Geek had killed Steven Miller.
“Why?” Captain Lennox asked.
And I told them my first lie of the evening. With my eyes averted from Lennox, I said, “I don’t know.” I wasn’t going to say, “Because I think they were looking for the probably millions of dollars stashed in my kitchen pantry.” Lennox had said the patent deal sounded legal to him, but I wasn’t too sure. And then there were taxes and stuff. I’d given them the murderer: let them figure out why.
“Who killed Jimmy then?” Lennox wanted to know.
I shrugged. “Bondesky himself? Maybe, maybe not. They’re a lot of strange characters that hang out over there at his office, including not a few policepersons.”
“How can I talk to Roselli?” Lennox suddenly wanted to know.
“I’ll see if I can arrange that,” I answered. “He’ll probably be glad to not be dead anymore.” And I pushed open the ceiling-high sliding doors that led into the entry hall, walked to the first newel post, and called up the stairs. “Stephen? Do you want to talk to these people? They want to talk to you.”
The door to the war room swung slowly open and he came out and started down the steps. “Well done, Honey,” said Joaquin.
I responded with, “Thank you, Stephen.”
THIRTY–ONE
“We ought to paint the room first,” I protested as Janie tore open the Laura Ashley bags, spilling their contents onto the hardwood floor of my bedroom.
She didn’t bother to even give me a glance as she unfurled the new sprigged sheets. “We don’t have time. I’ve gotta be in West in less than two hours. How do you expect me to run a business if I’m all the time involved in chasin’ murderers and gettin’ pulled in by the cops?” My crime-loving friend stopped her self-imposed chore of making up my bed with the new linens long enough to gather up the top sheet and hug it to her bosom with a little rigor of delight as she thought of the past two days.
I grabbed half the sheet from her, and together we got it to float over the bed and settle down in perfect folds over the mattress. “You love it,” I told her.
“Yeah, I do,” was her honest answer. “You know, Honey, all those books I’ve read on crime—true crime as well as made-up mysteries? Well, there’re nothing like the real thing. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m sorry the people are dead. Steven Miller and Jimmy … what did Lennox say his last name was?” She struggled to fit the new down comforter into a blooming duvet cover.
“I didn’t kill them. Wouldn’t have killed them. Couldn’t have killed them. But, now that they are dead, I’m glad I could be of some help in solving their murders.” She smoothed a matching sham before stuffing it full of pillow. “I did, didn’t I? Help you? I mean, you figured it out, but I meant to ask you last night—sorry I conked out on you like that, but I was so tired—how did you know Joaquin was Stephen? I understand about the Bondesky role, but not about Joaquin.”
“Little things,” I answered. “He had a European, not Californian, feel about him for one, and then, too, I didn’t have any instinctive fear toward him. So, when I knew that he had taken the tape, I tried to figure out a positive reason. And getting rid of the accidentally taped conversation was all I could come up with.”
We were still opening bags and ripping price tags off towels while I tried to verbalize the reasons I had correctly pegged Joaquin as the mysterious Stephen X. “Oh, and the blueprint and the model for the fuel converter is missing from my Father’s collection. Since Steven Hyatt and I saw it only—when was it? Night before last? We guessed that Joaquin had taken it.”
We’d about finished unpacking the new stuff and I ran downstairs to get a plastic garbage bag to stuff the empty sacks into. Janie folded hers carefully before jamming them into the bag. She was uncharacteristically quiet as we worked to clean up the mess the new purchases had made. She seemed to be thinking and finally, she said, “There’s got to be more to it than that.”
“Well, yeah, I guess there is. You see, Janie, the message I left on the machine? Before we went to the police station? Well, I told Stephen X to leave the note where I used to sing with my parents, that he’d remember where that was, and he did.”
“And that was where? Honestly, Honey.” Janie wanted me to dot the i’s.
“The gazebo out back. The only person I’d told that story to was Joaquin. On Saturday night. That was the clincher. When I called from the police station to get my messages, his said, ‘Okay, I understand.’ I prayed all the time I was taking y’all out to the gazebo that it would be there, and when it was, well, that was that. Stephen had to be Joaquin.”
“I gotta go. I gotta open Pages.”
“Why? You’re the owner. What difference will it make if you’re a few minutes late? Or your husband can open the bookstore.”
“Him,” she said without emotion, leaving me to again wonder about her husband.
“Leave the curtains,” I said as she tried to hold them up to one of the windows. “I’ll get Ralph to find someone to hang them.”
She put the curtains on the window seat, and we stood back to look at the little miracle we’d wrought. Spring might be slow starting this year in Fort Worth, but it was a blooming greenhouse in my bedroom. Pink and green … I should say so.
“Do you like it?” Janie asked in a funny voice.
“It scares me, but, yes, I do. I think so, anyway.” We started down the stairs, me dragging the wastepaper-stuffed garbage bag. “Stop long enough for coffee before you go,” I entreated. “And you can fix it in that percolator you like. Reckon I’ll have to learn, ’cause instant won’t ever taste the same to me agai
n.”
“All right,” she agreed. “But just long enough for you to tell me about the dead man we found in the van.”
“Plymouth Voyager. It’s called a Plymouth Voyager, and I think it’s mine, but I’ll have to check that out with Bondesky.”
We were suddenly quiet, thinking of the man who had been arrested last night.
“Wonder why?” Janie asked.
I sat down at the kitchen table as she ran the water for the coffee. “I don’t know, but I bet I find out today.”
“Have you talked to Joaquin?”
“No, I went to bed right after you did. Right after he went off with Lennox and Silas.”
“Was it any fun for you, Honey, being involved in such a mess and having to come up with the answers?”
“Well, I didn’t get the same thrill that you did. Solving murders that happen in my living room—and parking lot—are not my cup of tea as they are yours. But, yeah, there’s a part of me that says, ‘My, wasn’t that exciting.’ “ I hurried to add, “But not enough so that I want to do it again … anytime soon.”
Coffee didn’t take long, and a little after nine, Janie took a long last look around the living room, sighed, and gathered her things together. I tried to get her to take the nightgown and slippers I’d bought her the day before, but she patted my hand and said, “No, put them in that chest of drawers in your mother’s room. That way they’ll be there when I come again. If you ever want me to come again?”
Telling her not to be silly, we walked arm-in-arm to her car still parked under the only remaining oak tree in front. I thanked her again for … for everything. And she thanked me for the same. And finally, with one last good-bye wave, she was off around the corner and gone. I walked back toward the house, counting in my mind how many other good-byes I’d have to make that day.
The Complete Honey Huckleberry Box Set Page 16