“No.” She stared at him, looking stricken. “This is Mele. My beloved Mele. What are you doing to her?”
“I can’t explain right now. It’s something that has to be taken care of. Please go out and wait….”
“No.” She shook her head adamantly, her eyes burning with a strange sort of fire. “Sorry Captain. I can’t let you do this. I know you’re angry right now, but you can’t take it out on Mele. I won’t let you.”
He swallowed and I could see that this was hard for him.
“Bebe, I came into this room and found Mele going through the pockets of coats people had left here. I can’t just ignore that. It’s my job to…”
“No.” Bebe shook her head. “You are more than just that damn job. You’re a man. A fair and honest man. I admire you. I trust you. You can’t do this. This isn’t right.” She turned to me. “What happened? Why are you in here?”
I sighed with relief. “Okay, here’s what happened,” I said to her. “Debbie called me this afternoon and said she wanted help with a problem. I didn’t know until we got here just what her problem was.” I explained quickly what Debbie had told me, leaving out the antipathy I felt toward both Marilyn and Wayne. I emphasized how Debbie had needed help and that I was pleased to help her find her local thief. “I was checking out the area when I saw suspicious shadows here in this dark room, so I came in. Someone ran out, leaving the wallet on the floor with credit cards and money falling out of it. So I was trying to figure out which coat it had come from, when Captain Stone came in and found me here.”
Bebe looked at the Captain. “Why don’t you believe her?”
He stared back at her for a moment, then looked at the doorway I’d seen the thief run through. He frowned, walked over and picked up a cloak lying just outside the doorway. He brought it in and handed it to me.
“Is this yours?” he said.
I looked at it. My heart jumped. I hadn’t expected this. “Yes,” I said softly, though I noted that my ruby broach was gone. “Yes, it’s mine.”
He looked at Bebe. “The cloak the perpetrator was wearing,” he said simply.
Bebe shook her head. “But if the perpetrator dropped it outside the door….”
She scrunched her face up, thinking. It didn’t make sense. I knew it too.
“Listen,” I said with sudden inspiration. “If you can get Debbie in here to tell you how she hired me, maybe we can clear this up.”
Bebe nodded, her eyes bright and eager. “I’ll get her,” she said, and off she went.
Captain Stone stared at the wall. I stared at him. Moments later, Bebe was back with Debbie in tow. The problem was, Carlton was right behind her and I cringed. This was going to be awkward.
Debbie was stunned, wringing her hands and looking from one of us to the other while Captain Stone gave her a brief explanation of where we stood.
“So the question is, did you hire Mele Keahi to do some investigation of suspects in personal theft matters in your home? As far as you know, was she in fact searching for evidence against someone at the time she came into this room? And what were the names of the persons you had asked her to watch this evening?”
“What?” She looked at her father, then at me, then back at her father, her eyes wide and scared. “I…I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. She glanced at me, then away again. “She’s crazy. I…I just wanted her to come to the party, that’s all. She’s a friend. That’s all.”
“Debbie,” I cried, shocked and unbelieving. “Debbie, tell the man the truth. He’s going to try to lock me away if you don’t tell the truth!”
She shook her head. “Mele, don’t,” she said. “Just don’t.” Turning, she headed out of the room. Carlton stayed behind, still digesting what was going on and looking totally at sea.
“Okay,” Stone said, turning to me. “You’re alibi just flaked on you. I’m going to have to keep you somewhere secure while I wait for backup from the station.”
He looked questioningly at Carlton, who nodded, looking troubled.
“I’ve got just the place,” he said. “The butler’s pantry is right around the corner. She’ll be secure there.”
Bebe drew her breath in sharply. “Stone, if you do this, we’re so over,” she said, tears in her eyes.
The captain hesitated, his face vulnerable for just a moment. He tried to reach for her, but she turned and stormed off and his jaw tightened. He turned back.
“Let’s go,” he said to me. “The butler’s pantry it is.”
The butler’s pantry wasn’t so bad.
I sat there for awhile, a thousand things racing through my mind. This was so unbelievable. This really couldn’t be happening. Captain Stone had been suspicious of me before, but he’d always been pretty reasonable in the end. Now he seemed to be dead set against me.
I glanced around the room. It was small but well-equipped with all the things a modern butler would need to put on a dinner party, including chafing dishes and extra stocks of crystal ware and table coverings. There were counters with space for staging fancy dishes and pantries for canned goods and garnishes. Typical stuff for a fancy place like this. I sat on a plain straight-backed chair and contemplated my fate.
I wasn’t the thief. But who was? And was it the same person Debbie had been trying to catch?
Debbie! Oh! I wanted to wring her neck. I knew why she’d done it. With her father standing right there, she didn’t dare let him know she’d hired me basically to catch Marilyn in the act, in hopes she could get rid of the woman from their lives. That wouldn’t have gone over well. But still, to throw me to the dogs like that. She could have at least tried to think of something as a cover story. She didn’t have to cut me dead.
And anyway, from what I’d seen, she didn’t have a case against the woman. Marilyn was a bimbo in a lot of ways, but she was an honest bimbo as far as I could see. Just because Debbie didn’t like her didn’t give her the justification for charging her with crimes. I was afraid things weren’t going to be that easy. Maybe she was going to have to be honest with her father and tell him how she really felt.
Not that she would get anything out of that. In my experience, people who were smitten didn’t want to hear things against their current loves. They had to come to the realization themselves. You couldn’t do it for them. Debbie was just going to have to grin and bear it and hope her father came to his senses in time. You paid your money and you took your chances. Sorry.
And then there was Wayne. What about him? What on earth had made Debbie think he was a good prospect for happily ever after? As far as I was concerned he had proven himself a real jerk and was bound to go after girls behind Debbie’s back even before the honeymoon started. Right now I was feeling it might just serve her right, but I was mad at her. I knew those feelings would fade once a little time had passed. And regardless, I didn’t want to see her in a life of misery such as Wayne would surely provide for her. Someone had to make her face the truth and it might as well be me.
But was he the thief? I had no idea. He hadn’t done anything that would let me pin anything on him. He was lecherous and greedy and self centered. But was he the thief? Arrgg!
If only I had a clear idea of who the villain was, maybe I could talk my way out of this problem. Problem? Nightmare!
And that reminded me—where was my little Siamese ghost cat? And come to think of it—where was Dante? Deserted in my hour of need! That was the trouble with ghosts of all kinds. They usually disappeared just when you needed them most.
So, okay, maybe it was time to concentrate on the man—or woman—who had knocked against me and run from the coatroom, leaving the wallet he’d been plundering behind.
What did I know about this person? Could it have been Marilyn? Could it have been Wayne? Why not? Either one of them might have been behind that run for the hills I’d been a casual victim of. If only I’d still been free, I could have tracked them down and done some needling, teasing, sleuthing of my own to see
how they reacted. But I was stuck in the butler’s pantry. Darn.
Okay, concentrate. Try to remember something about the person in the cloak. I closed my eyes and did a little Hawaiian chant, one that often calmed me down and helped me focus when I got a little overwrought.
Aiya I kai, I ka moana,
Aiya I lailaka waiya Kane.
(In the sea and in the ocean,
the water belongs to Kane)
I said the ancient Hawaiian words over and over, until I was in a state of oneness with the air around me. Then I stopped and swayed back and forth while I went over every second I had spent in that coatroom, going in slow motion.
The shadow man—I was going to go on the assumption it was a man-- had come out from behind a coatrack and moved toward me. He had lifted his arm to put the cloak up over his face and the bulk of it swirled around him. He came toward me and I froze. He came so fast. I tried to stop time, to listen so carefully. Had he said anything? No, I didn’t think so. Had he made any sound? Did I hear his voice? Did his shoes squeak? Did he breathe heavily? Did he grunt?
No, I didn’t think any of those things had happened. The only sound I could remember was the sound of that cloak coming at me through the dark.
Had he touched me? Yes, he’d knocked against my shoulder and pushed me into the wall. He’d felt hard…male. He’d hit against me on purpose to throw me off and he’d felt like he was used to physical contact.
Had he done anything else? No.
In my mind, I ran over all the males I knew who I’d seen, one way or another, tonight. Ginny Genera and her brother. The guy who’d danced with me for a moment out in the middle of the crowd. Reggie the butler. Jagger.
Oh yeah. Jagger. He was a frequent visitor here and he knew the place well. And he’d been hanging around all afternoon and didn’t seem very anxious to say what he was doing here. I’d seen him with Jill, but had it been right before I saw the Siamese cat? Had there been time for him to….? No. Not really. And anyway, I didn’t think he would steal things from a house that was one of his bases of operation. Not Jagger. He was too smart for that.
I sighed and went back to my internal survey. The man who had bumped into me--had he carried a scent? Breath mints? Gum? Hair oil?
Yes. There was a scent. What was it? I couldn’t think of what it was exactly, but there had been a scent.
I opened my eyes and tried to remember. What had I smelled as he swirled past me?
Lemon.
Was that right? Had I really thought that? Or did I just remember the tart lemon I’d smelled when Reggie the butler had danced with me?
That had to be it. I was mixing two different instances. I shook my head and came out of my semi-trance. It hadn’t done me much good, had it?
Chapter Seven
Reggie the butler. How about him? I hadn’t really considered that before. He lived in the house too. Why wasn’t he a suspect in all the thievery? Because he was sort of a member of the family? Maybe that was it. They’d known him for so long they couldn’t imagine him doing such things. Besides, he had a good deal here with people who considered him a family member. Why would he want to screw that up?
Suddenly, I heard voices just outside the door. I listened hard, trying to make out the words. Someone was guarding me in here, and someone else was asking to be let in. Wait. I didn’t know who the guard was but the questioner was Reggie, the butler. He was angry and he raised his voice. He needed to come in to do some butler things, and the guard wasn’t letting him in.
“I need my gloves,” he was saying angrily. “I’ve got to have a fresh pair of gloves. I’ll just be in there for a minute….”
But they didn’t let him in.
Darn. If people could come in, I might be able to slip out. Oh well. Maybe next time.
Another voice, this time low and not angry. The lock rattled and the door opened. Carlton came in and the door closed and locked again.
He stood and stared at me. I looked up at him and for just a moment, I thought I was going to cry. But I fought it with all my heart and strength, and thank God, I held it back.
“What did Debbie hire you for?” he asked me, his voice low and rough with emotion.
Oh no. How was I going to handle this one? “Uh…Carlton, I’m sorry, but I really can’t talk to you about that. I mean, isn’t there some sort of confidentiality clause to this sort of thing? You’ll have to ask her. I can’t say.”
“Mele, you know me. I’m a fair guy. I’m not an ogre. Can’t you give me the information in some sort of roundabout way? Just nod yes or no. Did Debbie hire you to check out Marilyn?”
Oh boy. This was too hard. I took a deep breath. “Carlton, Debbie wanted help. She told me things were going missing. Your coins for instance. And she just wanted to get some assistance in watching certain valuables. It was not directed at any one person.”
There. Was that okay? I wasn’t sure, but all I wanted to do was reassure the poor guy that his daughter wasn’t hiring people to check out his girl friend. Because as far as I understood it, that was only part of it all and Carlton didn’t need to know about it. Maybe. Or was I wrong?
Hey, what did it matter now? I was the one being accused. I was the one facing arrest and criminal charges. What the heck!
Someone knocked on the door and said, “Time’s up,” and Carlton gave me a look, then left the room. The lock turned again. There was certainly no chance for me to slip past anyone.
I sat there for a few more minutes, wondering how long it was going to take for Stone to get back up out here so I could be released from this room. It was beginning to feel claustrophobic. I ought to think of something to do to pass the time. Maybe I should look for Reggie’s gloves so I could offer to hand them to him if he came back again.
I opened one cabinet door and found a pile of silver trays. Another revealed hot pads and mounting racks. This wasn’t getting me anywhere, but at least it was taking my mind off my misery. What did butlers do with their time anyway? It seemed like Reggie spent most of his prowling around for females to harass. Well, to flirt with. I suppose he was mainly harmless. And Debbie liked him.
There was a long, thin drawer in the opposite counter. It looked like gloves might be found there. I went over and pulled it open, and then I immediately closed it again. I’d seen something in there. My heart was beating so hard I thought it would fly out of my chest. I’d seen something familiar. In fact, it was mine. I’d seen my ruby broach.
I had to calm myself down before I could open that drawer again. My hands were shaking. I looked inside, not sure. Was I imagining things? Nope. There it was. My ruby broach. That meant…that meant that Reggie had been the man who knocked me down in the coatroom. Reggie had been going through pockets hoping to find money. Reggie was a thief.
I closed the drawer and covered my face with my hands. What now? Who did I tell about this? What next?
I was shivering and as jumpy as a cat. I couldn’t just sit here, knowing what I knew. I went to the door.
“Hello?” I said. “Listen, I’ve got something to tell Captain Stone. Can you get him for me?”
“He’ll be back any time now,” the man who seemed to be my guard said. “Just wait.”
“But this is important.”
“I’m not allowed to talk to you. Just wait. He’ll be back.”
I sighed and turned back. Then it occurred to me—if he had my broach hidden in here, he probably had other things. I began to go through the drawers, moving feverishly. Things were fairly orderly, but I took a toll on that. By the time I got through with each drawer, it looked like chimps had been organizing things. Then I got a brilliant idea. I reached up high to take down the flour and sugar canisters. I dumped the flour out on the counter. A dust storm filled the room, but when it cleared, low and behold, a pair of beautiful diamond earring showed up in the mess. I dumped the sugar and there was a set of gold coins.
I was breathing hard now, hardly knowing what to do next. I’d c
aught the thief! But nobody knew about it. They had to let me talk to Captain Stone. I turned back toward the door, but there was yelling out there again. Reggie was back.
Oh well. Surely they wouldn’t let him in. All I had to do was wait until….
“I got permission from Captain Stone,” he was shouting at the guard. “I just need to get my gloves. If Carlton can go in…”
I couldn’t hear what the guard was saying, but somehow I knew it wasn’t good. I sat tall in my uncomfortable chair, listening intently. This time I wanted him to stay out. This time I was scared to have him in here. My heart fluttered like a captured bird and I was totally out of breath.
And then the door opened. Reggie came in.
“No!” I started to yell, but he moved so fast, his hand was over my mouth in time to stop me. He jerked me up, twisting my arm and holding me still.
The door had closed behind him. He looked at the mess and at the things I’d uncovered, and I swear he growled. He knew that I knew. We stared at each other for what seemed like eternity.
He pulled his hand off my mouth, but by then he had a knife in his other hand. I looked at it and couldn’t have yelled if I’d tried.
“There’s a way out of here,” he whispered hoarsely, grabbing up the coins and the jewelry and shoving them into his pocket. “Come on. I’ll show you.”
He opened the large door to the food pantry and began to pull out shelves, still holding me against him with the knife dangerously close to my throat.
“We can go out this way. It opens into the garage, right by where my car is parked. We get out this way and we head for Mexico. You game?”
“What?” I couldn’t understand what he was talking about.
He was pulling out shelves. Obviously there was a false back to the pantry and it opened into the garage below. He was ready to run.
“Mexico. I’ve got enough stuff already packed away to keep us for years, but we have to hurry. Come on. Let’s go.”
Mele's Ghostly Halloween Caper: Plus Sami's Story by J.D. Winters and Dakota Kahn (Destiny Bay Cozies Mysteries Book 6) Page 5