by Ann B. Ross
“What kind of noise?”
“I don’t know, just something, a shuffle or movement of some kind, and I had to get out of there. I was terrified, and of course I wanted to get help for Connie. I couldn’t stay in that house alone, by myself, with the corpse of somebody I barely knew for another minute.”
“So you called somebody?”
“What? No, I didn’t have my cell phone, and I certainly wasn’t about to go looking around that dark house with strange noises emanating from deep within while I looked for a telephone. So, no, all I could do was go where I knew someone was—the security guard at the gate. And that’s what I did, because I didn’t see another soul all the way from Connie’s house to the gate. Now,” I said firmly, relieved that I’d done my duty, “you’ll have to get the rest of the story from him because when he left to go to the house, I left, too. And that’s all I know, and that’s all I have to say.”
“And you didn’t go back to the house? Just left the crime scene and went home.”
“I’d already left the crime scene, Detective Ellis. To get help. So I’d gotten it, and after urging the guard to call you folks, there was nothing else for me to do. Besides, I was cold, hungry, and scared out of my mind.”
“Okay, then. Is there anything else you’d like to add to your statement? You want it to be full and complete.”
“I can’t think of anything, but I might later on. Oh, wait, one other thing if you want it full and complete. Connie’s step-ins were pink, if that makes a difference.”
He stared at me for a minute, then he frowned. “You think it does?”
“I have no idea. Just trying to cover everything, but I will say that pink nylon step-ins surprised me. I’d have thought that Connie Clayborn was more your basic, traditional white cotton type.”
Detective Ellis’s frown would’ve gotten deeper if the door hadn’t banged open and Binkie Enloe Bates, my curly-headed lawyer, hadn’t barreled in full of sound and fury.
Wearing jeans, lace-up hiking boots, and a fleece pullover sprinkled with sawdust, the curls on her head shaking with outrage, she slammed the door closed in Lieutenant Peavey’s face.
“This interview is over!” she announced, glaring at Detective Ellis. “I’m surprised at you, Detective. You knew I was on the way. You had no right to interrogate my client after she’d asked for an attorney.”
“I didn’t . . .” he began, getting to his feet.
Binkie whirled toward me. “Did he give you a waiver to sign? Did you sign it?”
“I, well, I signed something. A permission slip or something.” I looked at Detective Ellis for help. “What was it that I signed?”
Binkie didn’t give him a chance to answer. She clenched her fists and yelled right in his face, “Insupportable! This whole interview is insupportable. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Detective!”
“It’s all right, Binkie,” I said, wanting to soothe her. “I just told him what happened, that’s all.”
“Right,” Detective Ellis said, regaining a tinge of authority as he picked up the recorder. “I’ll just have this typed up, Mrs. Murdoch, then you can read it over, sign it, and that’ll be all. We appreciate your cooperation in getting to the bottom of this horrific crime. We wish all our citizens were as helpful. Evening, Ms. Bates.” And out he went, hurriedly.
“Miss Julia,” Binkie said as she slid into the chair that Detective Ellis had just vacated, “what did you tell him?”
“The truth, Binkie. That’s all I told him, and he really didn’t question me. We just had a little chat about what I did and what I saw, and that was it.”
“Oh, me,” Binkie said, folding her arms on the table and leaning over them. “Never, ever just have a little chat with a police officer or a sheriff’s deputy without your lawyer at your side.”
“Even to tell the truth?”
“Honey,” she said, half smiling, as she reached across the table to pat my arm, “especially when you tell the truth.”
Chapter 14
After Binkie looked over my typed statement, questioned me about a few details, and gave me the okay to sign it, we left, collecting Sam on our way. He’d been waiting in the tiny reception area, pacing the whole time, from the looks of him.
“Julia,” he said, rushing up to me, “are you all right?”
“I’m fine, Sam. There was really nothing to it, so, Binkie, I’m sorry we bothered you on such a minor matter.”
Binkie and Sam looked at each other, then at me. “Not so minor, Julia,” Sam said. “A murder investigation—if that’s what it is—is extremely serious, and I hate that you’ve been caught up in it.”
“But I’m not caught up in it, and now they know I’m not.”
Binkie’s eyes rolled just a little. “Okay, but let me tell you right now that you are not to say one other word to anybody—friend, foe, or family. If they come back to you about anything, whether it’s to clarify something or to get more details, you are to call me before you say anything.” She shook her finger at me. “Understand?”
“Well, if you put it that way, of course I will. But, Binkie, we tried to call you before I left home and couldn’t get you.”
“I know,” she said, resignedly. “I took Gracie to watch the guys work on Coleman’s platform. Some of their children were there, and she was so excited about playing with them and watching her daddy hammer and saw that I left my cell phone in the car.”
“Oh, that’s too bad,” I said. “I was hoping Coleman had gotten over his strange urge to climb a billboard.”
“Not a chance,” Binkie said with a wry laugh. “I think he’s going up later this week when old man Carver says we’ll have a few balmy days in the sixties. If you believe in black gum trees.”
By this time we’d left the sheriff’s office and gotten into Sam’s car. He had, indeed, gone to pick up Binkie when he’d been unable to reach her by phone and, luckily, got there just as they returned home from their carpentry workshop. Which I later learned had been in the garage of a K9 officer who made furniture as a hobby.
“Well,” Binkie said as she leaned up from the backseat, “that cell phone’s going to be glued to my body until this mess is cleared up. So don’t hesitate to call me day or night if you hear from anyone official. Be sure, both of you, that my number is in your contacts list.”
“But, Binkie,” I said, shivering as I turned the heat dial up, “I think it’s all over as far as I’m concerned. I’ve told them all I know, so now they’ll be looking for whoever actually attacked Connie. But I’ll tell you both,” I went on, reaching for Sam’s free hand, “it’s just really hitting me that someone I know has been a victim of something so awful. I mean, things like that just don’t happen in Abbotsville.”
Neither Sam nor Binkie replied, and I realized that in their line of work, they knew that such things did happen in Abbotsville.
“Binkie?” I asked, to clear my mind of images of blood and coffee and pink bloomers. “Will Coleman take enough food with him for four days? How’s he going to eat?”
“Oh, he’ll eat, all right. Probably better than at home. Some of the restaurants on the boulevard want to feed him—they’ve worked out a schedule. FATZ one day, KFC another, and Outback another—he’ll probably gain weight.”
“That’s only three days. Let us have a day—maybe Sunday? But how would we get it to him? Does he come down to eat?”
“Oh, no, he’ll have a pulley system. He’ll lower a box for food and a bucket when anybody stops to donate. And thanks, Miss Julia, but the First Baptist ladies already have Sunday.” Binkie laughed. “He says he can’t wait. Those Baptist ladies can cook!”
“Well, let’s don’t tell Lillian. I expect she’ll want to send him some snacks or a dessert or two.”
“He’ll love it. Listen, if you take him anything, just park right there on the side of the bo
ulevard. There’s a little path from there to the foot of the sign. He’ll see you and lower the bucket or the box or whatever.” Binkie stopped, then went on. “Only thing is, you have to climb over the guardrail. It’s not high—couple of feet, maybe, so wear something suitable or, even better, send Lloyd.”
Sam said, “How’s he going to get his platform up there, Binkie? That sign’s pretty high off the ground.”
“They’ll use a ladder truck from the fire department,” Binkie said. “Coleman’s got his generator, TV, DVD player, some concert speakers, and a heater that they’ll set up at the same time.”
“My goodness,” I said, somewhat in awe at all the preparations.
“All the comforts of home,” Sam said.
“Not quite,” Binkie said, laughing. “He won’t have me.”
• • •
With profuse thanks and good wishes for Coleman’s survival if he stayed his course, we dropped Binkie off at her house, then proceeded home in silence. There was so much to talk about, yet neither Sam nor I seemed able to start a conversation. I was tired, for one thing. It was past my bedtime, and I was anxious to close my mind to the events of the last few hours and sleep.
But to tell the truth, the memory of finding Connie had receded to the point that it was almost as if I’d seen it on a television show. Come to think of it, I probably had. Not with Connie in it, of course, but a similar, yet made-up, crime scene.
What was much closer and more clear in my mind was having been in the clutches of the law. Did they really suspect me? I understood the need to eliminate all the possibilities until only one was left standing, but who could ever believe that could be me?
• • •
“Sam,” I said as we walked into the house, “I wish I’d pointed out to Detective Ellis the age and size differences between Connie and me. They couldn’t possibly think that I could—even if I’d wanted to, which I didn’t—do what was done to her. I’d be the one lying on the kitchen floor if that had happened. Not that I’m in the habit of fighting with anyone, especially to the death.” Then, without warning, tears filled my eyes, my nose began to drip, and I wanted to bawl my head off. Finding Connie had been bad enough, but to be suspected of causing great bodily harm to another human being was beyond my ability to handle.
“Sweetheart,” Sam said. He came over, put his hands on my shoulders, then drew me close. “They know that. But they have to consider all the possibilities from an accident to a home invasion to a domestic dispute to . . .”
“That could be it!” I jerked my head off Sam’s shoulder, aware now that there was another, more likely suspect. “Her husband! Where is he? Nobody around here has ever even seen him. Maybe they had an argument, maybe it escalated and he killed her. Listen, Sam, it stands to reason because the door was unlocked, meaning that somebody just opened it, or unlocked it with his own key, then went in, did what he did, and left. There was no break-in, because none of the windows were broken. None that I saw, I mean. Of course,” I said, slowing down, “I didn’t specifically look for a broken window. But I would’ve noticed if a pane in the door had been broken.”
“I’m sure you would’ve. But, Julia, why did you go out there, anyway? All I’ve heard this week has been Connie this and Connie that, and none of it good. What possessed you to call on her?”
“Well,” I said, temporizing as I realized how imperative it was that I be released from the promise made to Pastor Ledbetter. And he’d better release me, too, because this was getting sticky. Even Sam was questioning my motivation, and I did not like being less than open with him. To say nothing of withholding information from Detective Ellis.
“She asked me to,” I said. “I didn’t just show up and knock on her door without being invited. And I so wish I hadn’t accepted.”
“I’m a little surprised that you did,” Sam said as we walked into the library and sat together on the sofa. “You’ve been ambivalent about her all week—first deciding that you wanted nothing to do with her, then changing your mind by adding her to your party list just to demonstrate some local social customs.”
I nodded. He was right. “I guess that was part of my reason for going out there. I was feeling bad about all the negative feelings I’d had toward her—you know, after she’d criticized us so roundly. I thought a one-on-one conversation would help her fit in a little better. Sam,” I said, looking directly at him, “I promise you that I went out there with the best of intentions, hoping to be helpful to a newcomer and to, well, some others as well.”
There. I’d come as close as I could to revealing the real reason for visiting Connie. But, come morning, I was going to make another visit and Pastor Ledbetter had better be prepared.
“So,” I went on, hoping to change the subject, “I guess that brings up another question. Should I cancel my Christmas soiree? I mean, out of respect for Connie?”
“Soiree?” Sam said with a smile.
“Oh, I guess I haven’t told you. I decided to make this year’s tea special and invite a large group and have live music—that would be Sara O’Neill and her harp—and, you know, just go all out. Which, I remind you, was mostly for Connie’s benefit. So she’d learn something. Now I don’t know what to do.”
“When’re you having this wingding?”
“About a week before Christmas.”
“Honey,” Sam said, almost laughing at me, “it’s not even the middle of November, and it’s not as if Mrs. Clayborn were a close friend. I think you’d be perfectly correct to go ahead with your plans if you want to.”
“Well, I do and I don’t. But I may feel better about it after some time has passed. Of course, there’d be no question about canceling if it had been somebody close to me. Which I can’t even imagine.” But I could, for Emma Sue came immediately to mind. Not because I feared an attack on her but because now, with Connie unable to reassure her, she might simply shrivel up and fade away.
“Speaking of canceling plans,” Sam said, “I’ve decided not to go to Raleigh. With things so unsettled here, I’d feel better staying here with you.”
“Oh, you shouldn’t do that, Sam. It’ll be your first meeting and it’s only for a few days. Besides, the governor might regret appointing you if you don’t show up.”
Sam gave me a wry smile. “I doubt he’ll know, either way. But I’ll see how things go, then decide.”
I nodded, but I would encourage him to go. The sooner things got back to normal, the better I’d feel.
But just as I thought that I could begin to think of other matters—like Coleman’s climb and Sam’s trip to the capitol—the image of Connie’s broken body returned to mind in sharp relief. “Will they be able to tell what killed her?” I asked. “I mean, exactly how she died?”
“I expect they will,” Sam said, nodding. “They’ll do an autopsy, probably not here since foul play may be involved. They’ll send the body to Chapel Hill most likely, so it’ll be some days before they get a report back.” Then, as if his experience with criminals of all kinds from his years in the practice of law suddenly emerged, he calmly asked, “Was she shot or bludgeoned? Could you tell?”
“My word, Sam, I don’t know,” I said, drawing back from him. “I didn’t examine her! But I can say that most of the blood came from her head. I mean, that’s where the biggest puddle was. But from the way she was lying, I couldn’t see the wound.”
“Well, the autopsy will show what kind of weapon or object was used to strike her—if that’s what happened. The size and shape of it, that is. And if she was shot, they’ll probably be able to identify the type of firearm.”
“My goodness,” I murmured, trying to visualize what had been in Connie’s kitchen. “I didn’t see a firearm anywhere—I would’ve noticed that. And I don’t think I saw a thing that could’ve done that kind of damage. Certainly not a dust mop or any of the pots and pans on the floor�
�they all looked like the lightweight aluminum kind. Not like an iron skillet or anything like that, which could do some damage. Of course, I didn’t look around, so something could’ve been there.”
“Listen,” Sam said, clasping my hand, “the thing to do is try not to dwell on it. The experts will figure it out, and if it was a random attack, whoever it was probably took the weapon with him. Certainly would’ve if it had been planned in advance.”
“Oh, don’t say that,” I said, my hand going to my mouth. “She hadn’t been here long enough for anybody to dislike her enough to plan anything. Unless it was her husband—I guess he’d known her long enough. Actually, I don’t like thinking of either one—random or planned. None of us would be safe.”
“I know,” Sam said soothingly, “and we shouldn’t even be discussing it. In the meantime, though, at least until we know more, we should be careful to keep the doors locked, especially when you and Lillian are here alone during the day.”
“Don’t worry, we will. I’d hate for anybody to walk in and find what I found at Connie’s house.” Especially if it was Lillian or me they found on the floor.
Chapter 15
“Sam?” I said. We were in bed, nestled close, and from his breathing I knew he was close to sleep while I stared wide-eyed at the ceiling.
“Hm-m?”
“You know what my problem is?”
“Julia,” he said with a muffled laugh as he raised his head from the pillow. “I wouldn’t touch that with a ten-foot pole.”
“Oh, you,” I said, giving him a nudge. “I’m serious, because I’ve just realized that I really don’t like change. I don’t like change in any way, shape, or form. That’s why I was so upset with Connie. She came in here telling us we should change everything—tear down and demolish, then refurbish, rehabilitate, or rebuild. And I didn’t like it one little bit. I mean, who gave her the authority to demand such a thing? Just thinking of such arrogance bothers me all over again. And now, right at this minute, she’s in a hearse on her way to an autopsy table. And I feel so bad, I don’t know what to do. It’s almost as if my anger at her had something to do with what happened, and when I think of how terrified she must’ve been when somebody—well, I wish I’d gotten there earlier and maybe protected her in some way. The whole thing just tears me up.”