Setting the Stage for Murder

by Robert W. Gregg

  “I try not to dislike people, Carol, much less think about killing them. Either Gerlach’s strangler came unhinged for some reason or the killer had a much more serious grievance than we know about.”

  “Maybe Conklin’s had more on his mind than his late wife’s affair. We’ll see if he unburdens himself when we confront him about his luncheon with Gerlach. The one thing we know for sure is that he never mentioned it when I interviewed him the night we discovered Harley’s body.”

  Tuesday promised to be a very busy day.

  CHAPTER 48

  Carol had insisted that they be on their way by 8:20 at the latest, which had the effect of depriving Kevin of the early swim he had dreamed of off and on all night. But Sean Carpenter would be waiting for the sheriff at his office in downtown Rochester at 9:45, and she was determined to be there early if possible and on time at the latest. They would be coming into town during rush hour, and MapQuest had indicated that there would be quite a few twists and turns before they reached the parking lot of Carpenter’s firm of CPAs.

  But the trip was pleasant, the roads lightly traveled for the first three-quarters of the way. They had gone over the questions they would ask the night before, and chose to spend the drive drinking a second cup of coffee and listening to one of Kevin’s CDs, an opera by Britten. Carol had reluctantly agreed to hear it, but by the time they had reached the city limits, she had decided that it was probably not a good introduction to opera for a novice. Kevin had inferred as much from her facial expression, or lack thereof, and turned it off before she asked him to. Next time he would go back to Mozart, or perhaps Verdi.

  In spite of the traffic, they pulled into a lot next to a building identified as The Ontario Complex at almost exactly 9:45. The directory in the lobby told them that Winston, Laidlaw, and Carpenter, CPAs, was on the fifth floor. The office was directly across from the bank of elevators, and a white-haired woman of approximately 70 years of age invited them to take seats and offered them coffee. Kevin said yes, Carol no, and the woman disappeared momentarily. When she reappeared with his coffee, Kevin thought he detected a hint of suppressed curiosity. She must have known who they were, or at least who the sheriff was, but it was doubtful that Carpenter had told her why they had made the appointment. Kevin wondered if Sean had ever discussed with her what he had been up to during the summer when he left the office early for the trip over to Crooked Lake. Probably not.

  Carpenter and his colleagues had separate offices, so the conversation Carol and Kevin would be having with the man who was to have sung Rinuccio in Puccini’s opera would be a private one. Carpenter himself came out to greet them, and they soon found themselves in a simply furnished room, sitting around a large walnut desk, their backs to shelves lined with rows of official-looking books which were apparently the guide to complex tax laws for CPAs.

  “You’ve come quite a distance. And so early,” Carpenter said. “Naturally, I’m hoping you are here to tell me you’ve arrested Gerlach’s killer.”

  “I wish we were,” Carol said, “but I’m not there yet. I still have questions. I brought Professor Whitman along because he’s in a better position than I am to talk with you about one of those questions.”

  She turned to Kevin and asked him to go ahead.

  “Sean—do you mind if I call you Sean? After all those weeks of rehearsing our opera, Mr. Carpenter would be much too formal, don’t you think?”

  “Of course. I’m Sean, and you’re Kevin.”

  “Good. I remember that when you first met with me, back when I was casting the opera, you told me how much you loved opera. You said something about wanting to be a world-class tenor in your next incarnation. Well, I can’t comment on reincarnation, but you have a naturally lovely voice. It’s a shame that the good people of Crooked Lake never got a chance to hear you.”

  “That’s very kind of you.”

  “I mean it,” Kevin said. “But I sometimes wondered why you didn’t pursue a career in opera. Like Mr. Gerlach did. He had a good voice, but no better than yours. And, of course, you’re a tenor, and we know how much in demand good tenors are. Anyway, as you know, I teach music down in the city, and I know some people at the Met. I was talking with someone there not that long ago, and we got to discussing how people were chosen for the Met chorus. It was just an academic conversation, but we soon found ourselves talking about the process. And that led to this man sharing an anecdote that involved Harley Gerlach back when he was in the chorus.”

  Kevin paused to take a sip of his cooling coffee. He was watching Carpenter, who was listening intently, his posture rigid.

  “It seems that the Met has a chorus member or two serve on panels that audition candidates for the chorus. Gerlach did that for several years in the late ‘90s. It seems he became somewhat erratic, even biased in his judgment. He finally had to be removed from the panel. There were stories about particular candidates that Gerlach voted down. One of them sounded very much like you. Of course the person I was talking with couldn’t remember a name. Maybe he’d never heard the name. But when you told me about wanting to be an opera singer, I was reminded of that story. By any chance did you actually try out for the Met chorus?”

  Kevin knew that he had stretched the truth, but he hadn’t gone so far as to say that his interlocutor at the Met had told him that Gerlach had blackballed someone named Carpenter. The problem confronting Carpenter was whether to admit to auditioning for the chorus, and, if he did so, whether to acknowledge Gerlach’s role in his failure to become a member of that chorus. In other words, would he tell them what he had told Heather Merriman or would he put his story in conflict with hers once again.

  What Carpenter did was split the difference.

  “I did audition for the Met chorus. It was many years ago, and I had pretty much forgotten about it. I did it as sort of a lark. If I’d been selected, I’d have had to take a big cut in income, relocate downstate. For whatever reason, I didn’t pass muster. Not that it mattered. I couldn’t have uprooted my family. It would have meant my wife giving up her job, the kids changing schools, the whole bit.”

  “Did they ever tell you why they didn’t offer you a place in the chorus?”

  “No. Just the standard ‘thank you’ for trying out.”

  “Did you know that Gerlach was on the panel?”

  “I didn’t know any of them. It wasn’t like American Idol, where the panel members are celebrities themselves.”

  “And when you joined our opera company down at Brae Loch, did you recognize Gerlach as one of the panelists?”

  “After all those years? I didn’t pay attention to the individual panelists when I auditioned. I couldn’t even tell you now how many were men, how many women. So no, I didn’t recognize Gerlach.”

  Kevin’s role in the questioning of Sean Carpenter had come to an end. He had not been aggressive. To the contrary, he had been polite, sympathetic. But the thrust of the questions would not have been lost on Carpenter. Now it was Carol’s turn.

  “I appreciate your candor,” she said, well aware that he had not been candid. “Now I’d like to focus on something else. Or someone else. Have you heard about Mercedes Redman?”

  “Redman? What do you mean?”

  “She’s dead, or hadn’t you heard?”

  “Dead?” It would have been hard for anyone to have feigned the look of absolute astonishment on Carpenter’s face.

  “Yes, I’m afraid that Mercedes is dead. She died last Wednesday. And you knew nothing about it?”

  “Of course not. Why would I know about it? Has it been on national news? I don’t look at the local news, and she’s not from here in any event.”

  There was none of the matter-of-fact tone which he had used in answering Kevin’s questions. Sean Carpenter was now on the defensive, obviously troubled that the sheriff should assume that he’d know anything about yet another death of a member of the opera troupe.

  “I’m sorry to be sharing the bad news with you,” Carol sa
id. “Mercedes died in her apartment in Ithaca. When she was found, the police also found a note, and that is what I want to ask you about. It was a very brief note, unsigned. It had apparently arrived in the mail only a few days before her death. It said that Mercedes should leave her alone and that she should remember Gerlach. It didn’t say who ‘her’ was. Naturally, the Ithaca police were interested in who sent the note because it had threatened Ms. Redman and now she is dead. Perhaps the writer of the note had killed her.”

  “But why are you telling me this?”

  “Quite simply, Mr. Carpenter, because we believe you wrote that note.”

  “But that’s absurd. Why would I be writing a note to Mercedes Redman? And why on earth would you suspect me of killing her?”

  “I haven’t said anything about you killing her. I only said that the police had a logical reason to infer that the note and Ms. Redman’s death were related. That doesn’t mean that the person who wrote the note did kill her. But I think you can understand why they might have thought so.”

  “But why would the police think that I wrote that note to Mercedes?”

  “They didn’t. I did. The Ithaca police didn’t know who Gerlach was, and they had never heard of you either. But I knew who Gerlach was, and the fact that he was mentioned in the note started me thinking about the opera company to which both you and Redman had belonged. Let’s think about it. Everybody in the company knew Gerlach, of course. But what member of the company also had a reason to warn Redman to stay away from another woman?”

  Sean Carpenter suddenly looked very uncomfortable.

  “It wasn’t really a complicated deduction. The only woman Mercedes was known to have been close to by members of the Brae Loch opera troupe was Heather Merriman. And who was known to be more than professionally interested in Miss Merriman? That would be you, Mr. Carpenter. You had made your interest in Miss Merriman very obvious to everyone in the company. And surely you knew from day-to-day observation that Redman was interested in her, too. Others might have seen her interest in Heather as simply a matter of wanting to mentor her, to cultivate her talent. But you knew that there was more to it than that. You’re an observant man, and you suspected, rightly, that Mercedes was a lesbian and that her interest in Heather was physical as well as professional. She was competition, potentially serious competition. So you wrote the note, warning her off.”

  “You can’t prove that,” Carpenter said.

  “Oh, I think there’s a pretty good chance that we can. But it may be beside the point. We now know that Mercedes Redman died of a heart attack. We also know that she had a physical altercation with her roommate—her partner, if you will—before her death. It would appear that the partner saw Heather as a threat, just as you saw Mercedes as a threat. It is unlikely that anyone will be indicted for having been involved in Mercedes’ death. But that doesn’t absolve you of responsibility for threatening her.”

  Carpenter now looked pensive, as of weighing the pros and cons of admitting that he had sent the message to Redman.

  “Do you really think it’s a crime to ask someone to stay away from someone else? I’ll bet it happens all the time. I’m no lawyer, but it sounds like a free-speech issue to me.”

  “Perhaps,” Carol answered. “But I am a lawyer, and I’d strongly recommend that you make it a policy not to threaten anyone, anytime, in any way. That’s dangerous territory, and I don’t think you want to test the limits of the first amendment. I also think we’ve touched on all the issues we came to talk about. We have to be getting back to the lake.”

  She and Kevin pushed back their chairs and got up. The handshakes with Sean Carpenter were perfunctory, even chilly.

  “Do you really think you could indict him for that letter he sent to Redman?” Kevin asked on the drive home.

  “It would probably not be worth the time or effort. There’ve been some recent cases, mostly involving the Internet, but the law is ambiguous. But I think he did write the ‘leave her alone’ note, don’t you?”

  “I’m as sure of it as I am that Conklin wrote the ‘how about Tuesday noon’ note to Gerlach,” Kevin said. They both hoped to bring that issue to closure that afternoon.

  CHAPTER 49

  They arrived back at the cottage in time for a leisurely lunch before heading for Geneva and Arthur Conklin’s house. There were two messages on Kevin’s answering machine, one for him and one for Carol. Hers was from her office, his from Heather Merriman.

  The message for Carol had to do with a problem other than the Gerlach case, so she called and left instructions for Bridges. Merriman wanted to see Kevin. He called her right back.

  “Professor Whitman? Oh, there I go again—I know you don’t like that. But look, I really need to see you, show you something. Or maybe I should say listen to something. I know you must have a CD player. Can I come over?”

  “I’m going to be tied up for awhile this afternoon. Is tomorrow morning soon enough?”

  “Of course,” she replied. “I don’t like to bother you, but it may be important. What’s a good time?”

  “I expect to be here all morning. Let’s make it ten.”

  “Good. I’ll be there.”

  “What’s this, another revelation about our friend Carpenter?” Carol asked when he hung up the phone.

  “No idea. I wasn’t anxious to have her coming over later today, and I thought you’d be up and gone well before ten in the morning. Okay?”

  “You don’t think she’ll want me to be here?” Carol asked.

  “It didn’t sound that way. She asked to see me.”

  “I hope that she hasn’t decided to make a play for you now that she’s on the rebound from Carpenter.”

  “That’s sick, Carol.”

  “You never know, though. At least you’re not married, and you haven’t been sending threatening messages to anyone.”

  “Let’s cut the comedy and have lunch,” Kevin said.

  After a minute or two of opening and closing cupboard doors and checking the refrigerator, Kevin spelled out the bad news.

  “Not much here,” he reported. “Salami, a few slices of swiss, peanut butter, and some cream cheese. No, scratch the cream cheese. That’s for the bagels and breakfast.”

  Carol shook her head.

  “I guess it’ll have to be a peanut butter and salami sandwich.”

  “Are you okay? I mean, what’s all this smart-ass stuff?”

  “I’m fine, just a little giddy. I’ve got this hunch that we’re in the home stretch, that we’ll have Gerlach’s killer in a matter of days.”

  “Who’s it going to be?” Kevin asked.

  “I have no idea.”

  _____

  Conklin had agreed to meet the sheriff at his office, which was actually the converted family room in his home. On the drive to Geneva they found themselves discussing the fact that Carol had never had a one-on-one conversation with him since the night of Gerlach’s death. Two people had given Kevin their impressions of him: a neighbor, Sherri somebody, and a fellow member of the string quartet, Sandy Temple. They had learned something of his whereabouts on the afternoon of Gerlach’s death from people at his nurseries, and Ginny Smith, the bartender at The Cedar Post, had placed him at The Post during the lunch hour on that same day. But the result of these several conversations was a puzzle from which a great many pieces were missing. Conklin was a suspect because his wife, now deceased, had had a relatively recent affair with Gerlach, an affair which Conklin himself had readily acknowledged. The picture which emerged from the conversations with the neighbor and the violist was impressionistic and of limited value. The only thing that Carol and Kevin knew for sure, other than Helen Conklin’s infidelity, was that Conklin had failed to mention his luncheon with Gerlach when Carol had interviewed him some two weeks earlier. And that had been the proximate cause of their trip to Geneva and to the elegant old house into whose driveway Carol was now turning her car.

  Arthur Conklin was gracious. Whether
he had been disturbed or not by the sheriff’s request to talk with him, there was no evidence of it when they took seats in the spacious and beautifully furnished living room.

  “I don’t have anyone to help me with the amenities anymore, you know, but I can bring you iced tea or, if you prefer, coffee.”

  “That’s kind of you, but no thanks,” Carol said.

  “Please just ignore me,” Kevin spoke up. “I just happen to be with the sheriff this afternoon; we’ve been going over some loose ends regarding my use of Wayne Hall at the college.”

  “Glad to see you, Kevin. It’s the first time since that dreadful day two weeks ago.”

  Carol gave Kevin a look which, however guarded, said that he was to let her do the talking.

  “I’m sorry not to have paid you the courtesy of a call sooner than this, Mr. Conklin. The investigation has been going rather slowly, unfortunately. This is a busy time of the summer for my department—we seem to have a lot on our plate. Anyway, I do have a few things I’d like to talk about.”

  “Sure. Go right ahead.”

  Kevin was having trouble reading Conklin’s face. His expression was opaque. Either he has nothing whatsoever to fear, or he’s a master at dissembling.

  “I might as well get right to my most important question. I have learned that, on the day Harley Gerlach died, you and he had lunch together at The Cedar Post, that restaurant up north of West Branch. When we spoke that evening after his body had been discovered, you never mentioned it. Why don’t you tell me about it?”

  Conklin smiled what looked like a rueful smile.

  “I’m sorry about that, Sheriff. It really wasn’t necessary for me not to mention it. I suppose I thought—subconsciously, you know—that you were just beginning your investigation and that you’d seize on anything that looked the least bit suspicious.”

  “But why would you have believed that I’d be suspicious? After all, we all eat lunch quite often with friends and colleagues. I can’t imagine why I would have imagined any relationship between your lunch with Gerlach and his death later that afternoon.”