“I have to ask,” Liz said, “was the husband injured in the attack on his surfboard?”
“No, luckily he had wiped out. When the board shot out of the wave, the great white caught it in its mouth.”
Iris came in and cleared away everyone’s dishes.
Aunt Amelia called over to Liz, “Shall I bring in coffee and dessert, Liz?”
Luckily, before Pierre had tried to “surprise” Liz with the main dish, he’d already made dessert, Julia Child’s Cherry Clafouti. Pierre had added a little lemon zest to the recipe and sprinkled sugar on top before baking the eggy dessert akin to Yorkshire pudding. “No, Auntie, Iris and I will bring it in. Stay put.”
Liz stood and put her napkin on the table. As she turned for the kitchen, she heard David Worth’s raised voice. “I will not keep quiet any longer. I refuse to sit in a room with that Casanova, Captain Clyde, acting like he didn’t make a play for my dearly departed wife. I even have proof! I found a bottle of Chanel perfume with a note in my wife’s Birkin.” David tried to stand, but he wobbled and plopped back onto his seat. There was a second bottle of wine on the table, and it was half empty. David was high or drunk—or both.
Ryan said, “Steady, old boy. Let me help you to your suite.”
“I don’t want to go to my suite. What right did he have to give her Coco Mademoiselle!”
Both Betty and Aunt Amelia said in unison, “Coco Mademoiselle!” Then they each turned to Captain Netherton, who had a cat-that-ate-the-canary look on his face.
Uh-oh. It looked like Captain Netherton had been buying the same perfume for all his ladies.
“My beautiful wife was not a ‘mademoiselle’! She was happily married to me!”
Agent Pearson stood, then went over to David.
David had lost all his bluster and his chin was on his chest, his eyes glassy from the wine and drugs. She said, “Ryan, please escort Mr. Worth to his suite.” Then she turned and said, “Mr. Netherton, could you please meet me in the lobby?”
The captain stood and performed a little bow. “Of course. My pleasure.”
Chapter 30
After dinner, Betty and Ryan met Liz at the door to the library. Liz put the antique key in the keyhole, opened the door, and ushered them in. Then she locked the door behind them.
Betty walked to the desk and rifled through her handbag for the printed photo of the note tied to the rock. She took it out, then dove back in for the copies of the rent checks Liz had given her before dinner. Liz could see why she was having a hard time finding anything in her handbag, which was more of an overnight satchel. She extracted an iPad, crochet hooks, tape measures, three granny squares and a neon orange skein of yarn, just to name a few of the items. Betty belonged on the TV game show Let’s Make a Deal. Aunt Amelia had already been on the show in the late sixties, when she lived in Burbank. When Monty Hall had come up the aisle and asked Aunt Amelia if she had a tube of toothpaste in her handbag, Aunt Amelia almost fainted. She not only had toothpaste, but also a toothbrush, dental floss, and a pair of false buckteeth she’d used for one of her parts in the sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies.
Aunt Amelia’s “pocketbook” held so many surprises that when Liz was a child, she would close her eyes, reach in, and call out an item. If she guessed it right, her great-aunt would allow her a single stick of Wrigley’s Spearmint gum. She’d explained to Liz that when she was a young girl, during WWII, Wrigley’s Spearmint gum wasn’t available at her local candy store because the company sent their entire inventory overseas to the GIs fighting for America’s freedom. To this day, when Liz was near Aunt Amelia and her handbag was open, the scent of Wrigley’s Spearmint gum took her back to her own childhood.
Betty pulled out the copies of canceled rent checks and compared them against the writing on the note. Bingo! Francie Jenkins was the winner.
Liz wasn’t surprised. They’d solved that puzzle, but it only opened the door to more questions. Could Francie also be the one who had murdered Regina and stabbed David? It seemed a big leap. “If Francie doesn’t come in to the emporium tomorrow, I’ll go to her cottage and talk to her. I don’t think we should tell Agent Pearson anything about this until afterward.”
“It might be too late,” Ryan said. “Remember, I told you earlier that Agent Pearson was at the emporium looking for Francie.”
Betty put the photocopies back in her bag. “Liz, I’d suggest that you get up early to go see Francie.”
“I will. Now, why don’t we have a seat and talk about what Ryan uncovered in David Worth’s suite.”
He grinned. “How do you know I found anything?”
“’Cause you’re a snoopy pants,” Liz said.
“Spoken like a true bossy pants.”
Liz and Betty sat on one of the sofas and Ryan pulled an armchair up next to them. He retrieved his phone from his pocket and said, “What if I told you I’d discovered a copy of Regina and David Worth’s prenup—and a copy of Regina’s will?”
“I’d say, ‘No, you didn’t!’” Liz exclaimed.
“Did,” he said. “However, just from all the photos I took with my phone, it doesn’t look like he stands to inherit anything from her death.”
He tapped his screen, then handed Betty his phone.
“May I e-mail or text these to my iPad? I need a bigger screen to view them.”
“Of course,” he replied.
Liz added, “I’d love a copy, too.”
“Sure,” Ryan said.
Betty stopped for a minute and looked over at Ryan. “Stellar work, Mr. Stone. You even took a photo of his prescription bottle, which gives us his doctor’s name, where maybe we can find more about…”
“His wound and whether it was self-inflicted,” Ryan finished.
“But if it was self-inflicted,” Liz asked, “what would his motive be if he doesn’t stand to inherit anything?”
“At this point, if it wasn’t self-inflicted, it would just be a confirmation that he’s not in the upper echelon of our suspect list,” Betty replied.
“Speaking of a suspect list,” Liz said. “What do you think of David’s accusation against Captain Netherton?” Betty pretended to be busy e-mailing, but pink flushed her cheeks. “Come on, Betty, confession time. Did you happen to also receive a bottle of Chanel’s Coco Mademoiselle from our captain?”
She looked up. “Yes. And I checked online. It wasn’t cheap. If he’s handing Chanel perfume out to all his women, he must be getting a whopping pension from the Coast Guard and lots of tip money from skippering Queen of the Seas.”
“That doesn’t make him a murderer, though,” Ryan said.
“How about a thief?” Liz asked. “My father told me the necklace and earrings that were stolen were almost priceless.”
“But very hard to fence,” Ryan said. “If someone melted the gold and took out the emeralds, they’d only get a small percentage of their actual insured value.”
“Minna and Francie told me Regina wasn’t left anything in her father’s will from the loot he’d recovered in his treasure hunts. She was only allowed to wear the jewelry, and upon her death everything would go to museums. The same with the property at Castlemara.”
When Betty was done e-mailing Liz the photos of the will, the prenup, and the pill bottle, Liz stood. “I’d better get back to the kitchen and make sure everything is shipshape. And I want to check on Pierre.”
Betty gave Liz a knowing glance, and Liz explained to Ryan about Pierre’s recent memory loss and befuddled behavior.
“My nana had Alzheimer’s and she did well on medication,” Ryan said. “So there’s always hope.”
Liz and Ryan locked gazes, both thinking about the firefighter from Ryan’s company who’d been in the car accident. There was always hope.
“I’ll check on Pierre when I go upstairs,” Betty said. “Liz, you should get some
rest. You have an early day tomorrow.”
“Thanks. Let’s reconvene after I talk to Francie and we look over the photos Ryan took.”
“I feel like one of the Hardy Boys. Do we need a name for our new mystery club?” Ryan grinned.
Liz laughed and turned to Betty. “Can I tell him?”
“Yes, but if he discloses my secret to anyone, it will be under penalty of death.”
Liz told Ryan about Betty’s ghostwriting career.
“My mom read Nancy Drew and my dad read the Hardy Boys,” Ryan said. “I think Dad still has them somewhere. I read them all, too. They were blue-spined hardcovers.”
Darn, Liz thought. Another plus to put under Ryan’s Nice column, almost offsetting the Naughty.
Later, when Liz entered the lobby to make sure the hotel was secure, she found Captain Netherton sitting on a wicker chaise, sucking on the stem of his unlit pipe. It was the first time the debonair captain had looked his seventy years.
He gave Liz a weak smile that didn’t engage the laugh lines near his blue-green eyes.
“Are you okay, Captain?”
“Yes, my dear. I always rally, even when I’m up against the perfect storm.”
“Did you and Agent Pearson get everything straightened out?”
“Of course. I explained to her that I was just repaying Mrs. Harrington-Worth for the exorbitant tip she gave me when she chartered the Queen of the Seas.”
“And Betty and Aunt Amelia?”
“Ah, the lovely ladies of the Indialantic by the Sea. Yes, I bought them the same perfume. Your great-aunt for all her generosity in letting me stay here and giving me something to do to fill my retirement days. And the lovely mystery writer for being so accommodating to my big mutt, Killer. That David Worth is out of his gourd with grief, I suppose. And he seemed as drunk as can be, so I’ll cut him a little slack.”
Liz remembered how badly Regina had treated her husband and wondered if there was a side to him that no one ever saw. If he didn’t marry her for her money, that must be the Regina he was grieving for.
“Your suite is next to the Worths’—I mean, where the Worths were staying…um, prior to the robbery. Did you ever overhear anything? Arguing, any visitors?” she asked.
“Not that I can think of. These are all the same questions the lovely detective keeps asking.”
“How about Saturday? Anything strange?”
“Well, just as you, I was at the emporium, manning the raffle table. Now that I think about it, before going down to dinner I heard Regina raising her voice at her husband. She asked him if he was drunk, because he was slurring his words. I didn’t hear anything after that, and I went downstairs to the dining room, where Iris served me dinner.”
“What time was that?” Liz asked.
“Around seven.”
“And what time did you hear the commotion later?”
He put down his pipe and yawned before answering. “It was around seven thirty.”
“Were you with Iris the entire time?”
“I know you’re trying to make sense of everything. I myself have started a logbook about that night. Must be my military training, but there is no way that Iris was out of my sight for more than a few minutes. Between you and me, we actually shared dinner together.”
Liz would probably find a bottle of Coco Mademoiselle in Iris’s bathroom. “One last question, when you found David and Regina, was David conscious?”
“David was in a semi-stupor. He crawled into the sitting room and kept repeating, ‘Why does it hurt so much? Why does it hurt so much?’”
After leaving Captain Netherton, Liz went back to check the kitchen. Iris had cleaned up and everything was sparkling. She grabbed her handbag from the pantry and went out the kitchen door. After the door closed behind her, she grabbed the handle and tested it. Locked. Would things ever return to normal?
Once home, she printed the photos that Ryan had taken on his phone while he’d been in David Worth’s suite. He would be an asset to the CIA. Regina’s will was as Ryan had said it was when he’d perused it. David stood to gain nothing from her death. What Minna and Francie had told her must be true. Castlemara would be left to the Barrier Island Historical Society and all the treasure would go into museums after her death, which was the reason Regina hadn’t been allowed to sell any of the jewelry from the San Carlos. Any true assets that Regina had upon her death would go to her feline, Venus. That last fact said a lot for what Regina had thought of her husband.
Liz then looked at David and Regina’s prenup. It stated that David had assets of a million dollars, which included real estate and the Bentley. Regina’s assets were almost nonexistent: She received a monthly stipend of forty thousand dollars from her father’s estate, nothing to sneeze about, but not enough to rebuild on her father’s property after Castlemara was demolished. Nothing related to her father’s treasure haul was listed.
The Barrier Island Historical Society had a lot to gain from Regina’s death, but not David. Liz had a feeling that the knife wound wasn’t self-inflicted. If it had been, Agent Pearson would already have him in a locked cell. Another motive for Regina’s murder might simply be robbery. Pawn the pieces off, or find a collector from another country to buy them.
Later that night, when Liz got in bed, she picked up Evil Under the Sun. She was near the end of the book. Even though she’d already read it in her teens, she still felt the excitement at the fast approaching “aha” moment, when the loose ends would be neatly tied up with Agatha Christie’s usual flair.
If only Regina Harrington-Worth’s murder could be solved as easily.
Chapter 31
Tuesday morning, Liz pulled up a few doors down from Francie and Minna’s cottage. She waited until Minna’s BMW pulled out of the driveway. Betty’s Blue Bomber was easy to spot, and Liz was happy Minna didn’t glance Liz’s way as she drove north toward the emporium. Earlier, Liz had talked to Minna on the phone, and she’d said Francie had planned on staying home for another day of rest.
Liz got out of the Caddy. Before leaving the beach house, she’d toyed with the idea of putting the ancient convertible top down. Betty said the automatic switch to lower the top was broken, but she was sure it would work manually. Liz hadn’t wanted to take a chance, in case one of the island’s sudden storms broke. Yesterday’s storm had passed, but as usual in the tropics, another one looked to be approaching. She walked to the passenger’s door, opened it, and retrieved two items from a box on the seat—one was a carafe of Pierre’s French roast, the other a Bienenstich cake, or bee sting cake, made from brioche dough and filled with lemon custard, then topped with a crunchy honey-almond glaze. The aroma reminded Liz of early mornings in Paris when she’d walk by a boulangerie’s open doorway and get drawn inside by the tempting scents wafting out onto the cobblestone streets. Her thoughts segued to Travis, who was fond of long weekends on the Seine. As she headed toward Minna and Francie’s charming cottage, Liz realized that not all of her memories of Travis were bad.
Minna and Francie’s cottage was painted pale yellow, with vintage aqua shutters worn by the sun and sea spray. It sat on the west side of the highway and had a small second-floor balcony with an ocean view. The cottage reminded her of those in Key West. When Liz was a teen, she and her father would take road trips down to the Keys. She smiled at the thought and climbed the steps to the cottage’s front porch. One hand held the carafe, the other the cake plate, so she rang the doorbell with her elbow.
Francie opened the door, blinking from the sunlight. Her skin was sallow, and she had blue-black bags under her eyes. Her hair stuck out in all directions, and her fifties-style housecoat had a huge yellow stain on it. On Francie’s left foot, was a lavender bunny slipper, on her right, a pink piggy.
“Liz? Is everything okay? What’s happened? Come in.”
Liz stepped inside and set the carafe
and cake on a table in the entranceway. “Everything’s fine. I wanted to check on you and bring you something hot out of Pierre’s oven.”
Francie slunk over to the sofa in the living room and collapsed. On the walls were huge canvases of Minna’s fabulous mixed-media art. The furniture in the room was vintage-modern with a Scandinavian flair. Liz took a seat on a leather and light wood recliner with matching ottoman. As she leaned back and put her feet up on the ottoman, she pictured herself in her therapist’s office in Manhattan. Dr. Browning was another fan of midcentury modern décor.
Liz thought about how to delicately put what she wanted to say, but before she had a chance, Francie said, “I did it. I confessed to Agent Pearson. Oh, Liz, are they going to arrest me? Do I need to hire your father?” Francie began to sob. She grabbed the box of tissues beside her and blew her nose. She crumpled the tissue and tossed it on top of an already towering pile on the coffee table, then pulled out another from the box. Liz got up and went to the sofa, pushed aside a stack of sewing magazines, and sat down. She put her arm around Francie, thinking that these couldn’t be the tears of a murderer. “Slow down, Francie. Deep breaths. Why don’t you tell me everything, then we can decide whether you need a lawyer?”
Francie sniffled. “I did it. I threw a rock at the Worths’ Bentley. I was so mad! I couldn’t believe that witch was going to tear down such a beautiful mansion. My parents were friends with the Harringtons. My father and Percival Harrington II started the Barrier Island Historical Society together.”
“Very understandable. I’m sure if you tell David Worth this, he won’t press charges, just perhaps have you pay for the damages. What does Agent Pearson say?”
Death by the Sea Page 18