by Gin Jones
"I didn't get a chance to talk to you at the funeral home," Judge Nolan said as she approached. "I wanted to tell you how sorry I am for what you went through. You must have been traumatized by finding Melissa's body."
Not as traumatized as I'd been by the living Melissa.
But that was old business, and, while the judge's face didn't reveal any emotion, her presence indicated that she was truly upset about the consequence of her decision. From what the radio station manager had said, it wasn't common for the judge to admit to a mistake, and here she was, not just admitting it to herself but saying it out loud. Not in writing, of course, and there were no witnesses to her admission, but still it had to have been difficult for the judge to say the words. Helen wasn't sure she, herself, would have had the courage to do it.
In any event, Melissa's death hadn't been the judge's fault, and there was no need to make the woman feel any worse than she obviously did. Plus, she needed to keep on the judge's good side as long as Jack was the prime suspect. "I appreciate your concern. I'm fine now."
"If only…" Judge Nolan looked away.
Helen finished the thought: if only the judge had issued the restraining order, Melissa might still be alive. Of course, the restraining order might not have changed anything. Melissa might well have ignored the court order, the way she'd ignored everything else she hadn't wanted to hear.
Judge Nolan smiled ruefully. "Judges aren't supposed to admit to any regrets. We all have them, though. It doesn't make any difference now, but I thought you'd want to know how sorry I am. I hope this whole business doesn't scare you away from Wharton. It's really quite a nice little town."
"I'm not going anywhere. You won't get rid of me that easily."
Judge Nolan laughed. "I'm glad. Strong women are always good for a community."
"You're the only person around who thinks I'm strong." Helen tapped her cane on the walkway beside her. "The police took one look at this thing and assumed I was a doddering old fool. Even when they were here, having to admit they got the wrong murder weapon and searching for the right one, they couldn't acknowledge that they might be wrong about other things in this case."
"Did they find what they were looking for?"
Helen nodded. "They originally thought the murder weapon was a branch, but it turned out to be a cane. My cane. The one I had before this one. They were here with a search warrant this morning, and they found it out there." She used her cane to point toward the woods across from the back deck.
"I signed the warrant, but I didn't realize the police had been here already," the judge said, glancing in the direction Helen had pointed. "They don't usually act this fast on non-emergencies. They're understaffed like police departments everywhere."
"All municipal departments are struggling, I'm told," Helen said. "I heard that there have been some cutbacks at the town's nursing home."
Judge Nolan shook her head irritably. "I don't know why people keep saying that. The nursing home is in solid financial shape. Fully staffed and no problems paying them what they deserve. I'm on the board of directors, you know, and my mother lives there. I wouldn't let anything happen to that place or its residents."
"That's good to know," Helen said. "I've met some nice people there, and I've read too many newspaper stories about people taking advantage of the elderly and the frail."
"Good thing we're both strong women," Judge Nolan said. "No one will ever take advantage of us."
"Right," Helen agreed.
As the judge got into her car and drove away, Helen couldn't help thinking that Melissa had been a strong woman too. Stronger, at least physically, than either Judge Nolan or Helen. And yet, Melissa was dead.
* * *
After the judge left, Helen wandered from her built-in desk to her recliner to the kitchen island and then around the room again, unable to settle anywhere while trying to think of who else might want to kill Melissa. Even without Jack's input, she was fairly sure that no one at the radio station was even worth adding to her spreadsheet of possible suspects, and Betty and Josie were still being held incommunicado in their rooms at the nursing home.
Eventually she heard Tate's car coming to a stop outside the garage, followed a few minutes later by the sound of his lathe. She'd thought he'd left for the day, but he'd apparently just taken a late lunch. It was tempting to go out and see if he agreed with her about the unlikeliness of the radio station employees as suspects, but Tate deserved a little uninterrupted time to do his woodworking. Better to save her interruptions for when she had a solid lead to discuss with him.
As Helen went past the kitchen island one more time intending to make a cup of tea, a movement out on the back deck caught the corner of her eye. She blinked and looked again, and there was Jack, waving to her through the glass door.
What was he doing out of jail?
Helen limped over to the door and let him in. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine." Jack scurried over to the kitchen island where he'd be out of the line of sight for anyone who might be looking in through the glass doors. "The court-appointed attorney got me out on bail. She said they don't have enough evidence to hold me on the murder charge, and the judge agreed. But I'm supposed to stay in Wharton where they can find me if the situation changes."
"I'm afraid it is going to change," Helen said, returning to the sink to fill the kettle with enough water for a whole pot of tea. "They found the real murder weapon this morning, and it's probably got your fingerprints on it."
"That's not possible," Jack said from his seat on the far side of the kitchen island. "I didn't do it. You know I didn't do it."
"I've been telling everyone that you didn't do it, but they aren't listening to me," Helen said as she set a mug in front of Jack. "The problem is that the murder weapon was actually my other cane, and I'm pretty sure you held it for me a few times. Unless they can affix a timeframe to the fingerprints and compare it to the time of the murder, it won't look good for you. I'm so sorry you got involved in this."
"It isn't your fault," Jack said, slumping deeper in his seat until he was barely visible over the island's top. "I should never have stolen all those remote controls. They wouldn't suspect me otherwise."
"I still feel responsible. I was the one who figured out you'd stolen them."
"But you didn't rat me out. It had to have been Tate." He sounded resigned, rather than angry.
Helen shook her head. "Tate wouldn't do that. It's against the rules for lawyers, I think. Even if it weren't, he's too busy with his woodworking to bother turning you in as long as he didn't think you were going to commit any other crimes."
"I've completely given up burglary," Jack said, straightening a little for emphasis. "Trust me, there's no way I'm risking jail again. Some friends of my cousins—the ones who didn't hire Tate—have done time in state prisons, and they said it wasn't so bad, but I'm pretty sure now that they were lying. The holding cell was bad enough, and I'm absolutely sure prison is worse. They wouldn't even let me have my smartphone so I could play games on it."
Helen poured the boiling water into the teapot. "I'll do what I can to make sure you don't do any time for the burglaries."
"I'm not so worried about that," Jack said. "My attorney said I should be able to get a plea bargain that's nothing more than probation and restitution. Probably a fine too, but no jail time. It's a whole 'nother story if they charge me with Melissa's murder."
"I'm working on that. Tate is too." The sound of the lathe in the garage contradicted her. "The woodworking helps him to think."
The lathe stopped, and Jack glanced in the direction of the garage. "Are you sure he didn't turn me in?"
"I'm sure."
The garage door opened, and Tate walked out into the yard carrying a four-foot length of wood toward the front of the cottage.
"I'd better go," Jack said, sliding out of his chair but remaining crouched down low, as if that made him less visible. "I'm not actually supposed to be here. Conditi
on of my bail: stay away from you and the scene of the crime. All the crime scenes. But I couldn't stay away from here. I had to be sure you didn't think I'd killed Melissa. I wouldn't hurt anyone."
"I know," Helen said. "And I'm glad you're here. Before you leave, I need to know everything you can tell me about the people who work at the local radio station. Anyone there who has a history of violence or any motive for killing Melissa."
Jack was silent as he slunk over to the glass doors. When he reached them he shook his head. "I can't think of anyone who's ever been in trouble. They talk big, but it's just words. They'd never do anything."
"That's good to know." Helen saw Tate approaching the front steps. "Don't worry about anything. Just take care of yourself. And stay away from here until we get everything cleared up. Tate is here most of the daytime, and he'd probably have to report you if he knows you're not supposed to be here."
Jack hesitated with his hand on the back door. "How are you going to get around town without me?"
"I'll manage," Helen said, pushing him back out onto the deck. "Just until you return to work, I promise, and then I'll be calling you again. Now go."
Jack had just disappeared into the woods on the other side of the cottage from where the murder weapon had been found when Tate knocked on the front door of the cottage. Helen moved as quickly as she could, hoping to convince Tate to come inside, where there was no chance of him catching a glimpse of Jack. Otherwise, Tate might feel obliged to turn Jack in for violating the terms of his bail.
"Come in, come in," Helen said.
Tate's eyebrows rose. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong," Helen said. "Why would you think something was wrong?"
"You answered the door the first time I knocked," he said. "You hate unannounced visitors."
"Ignoring people isn't working." Helen stealthily peeked outside, reassuring herself that wherever Jack had gone, he wasn't easily spotted from the cottage. She closed the door behind Tate. "I figured I'd try a new strategy. Maybe if I'm nice to visitors, they won't feel the urge to pester me so often."
"Are you going to offer me a drink next?" he asked, with obvious suspicion. "Like the little old ladies in Arsenic and Old Lace?"
"I'm not old," Helen reminded him. "I don't need to poison anyone. I'm still strong enough to thwap my victims on the head with my cane. Which I'm going to do to you if you don't tell me what you're doing here and then go away so I can figure out who killed Melissa."
"I knew the 'nice' wouldn't last." Tate held up the piece of wood. "I'm making you a new walking cane to replace the missing one. I just need to get a rough idea of how long it should be."
"You don't need to do that," Helen said. She was indebted to him enough already. "I've got another cane."
"I'm not really doing it for you." He held the wood against her side and made a pencil mark at a point even with her waist. "I needed a new challenge."
"You could help me solve Melissa's murder."
He shook his head. "Not that kind of challenge. That's too much like work."
Fat lot of good it did her, having him around. He wouldn't help her investigate, and he wasn't much of a security guard, especially when he was running the lathe with his ear protection on. If Jack were really a killer she'd be dead by now.
"You've got the measurement you needed," Helen said, "so don't let me keep you from your workshop."
"There's no rush," he said. "I've got time to hear about what Jack was doing here and how he got out of jail.
"You saw him?"
Tate shook his head and then pointed the soon-to-be-cane toward a jacket on the kitchen chair Jack had just vacated. "He left his coat behind."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Tate accepted her explanation for Jack's visit without either calling the cops or having a change of heart with respect to helping her find additional suspects for Melissa's murder. After he left, she checked with the nursing home only to find that Betty and Josie were still confined to their rooms. For their own good, was the implicit explanation, but Helen had the distinct feeling that Betty and Josie wouldn't have agreed.
First thing the next morning, though, she got an email from Betty that they'd been released to join the other ambulatory patients in the activity room for the morning, and they were looking forward to a visit.
When Helen arrived Betty and Josie were seated in their usual spot in front of the unlit fireplace, working on their knitting and crochet. They weren't entirely free of restrictions, though. A petite young woman in pastel scrubs and a suspicious expression was leaning against Josie's chair, apparently charged with making sure the women didn't exhaust themselves again. Her nametag identified her as a CNA, but she was acting more like a bodyguard, vetting anyone who came too near her clients. Why wouldn't the woman be happy that Betty and Josie had a visitor? Unless she had something to hide from those visitors. Could she have been involved with the big story Geoff Loring had been pursuing? Or was it something about Helen's investigation into Melissa's death that made the CNA anxious? Had she ever worked with Melissa?
Betty and Josie would know, but she didn't want to get them into trouble. She'd have to wait to do her questioning until they were alone. It shouldn't be too difficult to convince the CNA that Helen offered no risk to her patients, since most people started out with the assumption that Helen was powerless, but she resented having to encourage an impression she usually worked so hard to dispel. Still, she owed it to Jack to do whatever it took to keep him from going to prison for a murder he hadn't done.
"Thanks for making time to help me," she told Betty and Josie. "I'm ready to learn how to crochet now."
Josie looked surprised and said, "But didn't you—"
Betty interrupted, saying "We never turn away new volunteers," and tossing a skein of yarn that landed with a surprisingly solid thump in Josie's lap.
The two women exchanged a look, with Betty flicking a glance at the hovering CNA, and then Josie said, "Right. We can use this yarn that Betty so kindly gave me to start your lessons. Pull up a chair."
The hovering CNA said, "I'll get it."
While she was gone Betty leaned forward and whispered, "Don't trust anyone. Wait until she's gone."
Helen nodded, and Josie began digging through her Hello Kitty bag for a spare crochet hook.
The CNA returned with a chair for Helen just as Josie raised a triumphant fist holding a crochet hook. "I knew there was one in here. We'll have you making hats in no time at all. I used to be a teacher, you know. High school science. Lots more complicated than crochet, but my students all did great."
Helen accepted the crochet hook and watched Josie's demonstrations as if she hadn't seen them before. Helen could tell the woman had been a good teacher, but unfortunately that didn't mean she herself was a good student. She didn't have to pretend to act like she'd never seen the demonstrations before. The movements that seemed so obvious in Josie's hands remained awkward for Helen, bordering on painful. At least her incompetence was useful for convincing the suspicious CNA that Helen truly was a rank beginner at crochet, and nothing more stressful than a few dropped stitches was likely to be discussed.
After about ten minutes of Josie's instructions and Helen's incompetent but determined attempts to follow them, the CNA finally grew bored enough to wander away and find a new person to impose her supervision on.
Josie immediately asked, "So, have you figured out who killed Melissa yet?"
"Not quite," Helen said, dropping her yarn and needle into her lap. "I've run out of suspects. I was hoping you two might have some leads for me. Tell me everything you know about Melissa."
"That would take forever," Josie said. "We might not live long enough to tell you everything we know about her."
"Speak for yourself. I plan to live until I've knit a cap in every imaginable color and pattern, and that could take fifty years." Betty turned to Helen. "Josie is right, though, that it would take a while to go over everything we've ever heard about M
elissa. We know everything that goes on here. The staff assumes that everyone here has short-term memory issues, so they don't watch what they say in front of us."
"Let's start with what the staff are saying about Melissa."
After a brief silence Betty said, "They thought it was odd that Pierce offered her a job."
"I always figured she had some leverage she could use against him," Josie said. "Something she'd learned from a patient. But we couldn't figure out what it could have been. He's practically the only person in town who hasn't had a relative staying here at some point during Melissa's tenure here."
"Maybe he made a blanket job offer to all the nurses here, and Melissa was the only one interested in it."
"None of the other nurses were offered jobs, though," Betty said. "Just Melissa. I doubt any of them would have accepted, but they were all a little irritated that they hadn't at least been asked."
That was odd, Helen thought. "Why would Pierce have singled her out? Was she that much better than all the other nurses?"
"We couldn't ever figure that out. He couldn't have wanted her for her medical knowledge," Josie said. "And she wasn't any good at all with the geriatric patients here. Mostly, we just want someone to listen to us, and she wouldn't. She was like an old-fashioned schoolmarm, like you used to read about, with rulers to rap your knuckles. Except she didn't do anything physical to her patients, because that would have left evidence and gotten her fired. Instead, she used to play mind games, terrifying the patients into obeying her."
Betty nodded. "One of her favorite tricks was to steal the patient's walker if they didn't do what she told them to. Without it, they couldn't leave the room, and she wouldn't give it back until they promised to obey her. One time, she had a particularly stubborn patient, and somehow she convinced the management that the patient had thrown it out his window, where it was run over by an arriving ambulance. It turned out the walker had some sort of special customization, so the patient was bedridden for over a week until a replacement could be obtained."