Vampires, Bones and Treacle Scones

by Kaitlyn Dunnett

  “You keep it. Talk to the people at the bank for me. I’ll write you a note authorizing you to act on my behalf. Someone there might remember something useful.”

  “Such as what? That Ned opened an account? I’m sure the state police have already asked everything I would.” To be honest, Liss couldn’t think of all that many questions to pose, whether she brought a note from Margaret or not.

  Margaret drew in a steadying breath. “Please, Liss. I need you to do this for me.” She ran hot water into the sink and started to wash the dishes that had accumulated while she was in a funk.

  “Are you sure you want to know what Ned was up to?” It would not be anything honest. Liss was certain of that much.

  “I’m sure. Once I know all there is to know, I can deal with it. It’s not knowing that’s so difficult to handle.”

  “Then I’ll see what I can find out.”

  First thing the next morning, Liss drove to Fallstown, the county seat, and introduced herself to the bank manager at the Fallstown Savings Bank. It was a small, local institution with an excellent rating. It also had the advantage of employing tellers who knew most of their regular customers by name. In spite of that fact, Liss didn’t hold out much hope that anyone would remember her cousin.

  “You’re here about Edward Boyd?” The bank manager was a thin woman in her fifties. Behind the lenses of her rimless glasses, her eyes widened slightly as she repeated the name. “Perhaps you’d better come into my office,” she suggested.

  The wall separating it from the rest of the small branch bank—three teller windows, one of which also manned the drive-through—was glass. Liss sat with her back to it, but that was fine with her. She had no interest in anyone other than the woman across the desk from her, who looked as if she’d rather be anywhere but where she was. Her name plate identified her as Shirley Jacobson.

  Liss cleared her throat.

  With a start, Ms. Jacobson stopped worrying the long, beaded necklace she wore. “Yes. Well. Edward Boyd.” She glanced at the papers Liss had given her—a copy of Ned’s death certificate; proof that his mother was his legal heir; and Aunt Margaret’s notarized authorization for Liss to act on Margaret’s behalf in making inquiries about the bank account. “I suppose you want to know how to transfer Mr. Boyd’s balance to his mother’s bank account.”

  Without waiting for an answer, she extracted several forms from a desk drawer. Liss barely glanced at them. She’d take them home to Aunt Margaret to be signed, but that wasn’t her main concern.

  “Do you remember opening Mr. Boyd’s account?” Liss asked.

  Ms. Jacobson didn’t look up from her keyboard. “It isn’t easy to forget someone who walks in with thousands of dollars in hundred dollar bills and asks to start a savings account.”

  “Hundred dollar—?”

  Holding up one finger to signal Liss to wait, the bank manager continued to type numbers and commands. A moment later, paper began to spew out of a nearby printer. Ms. Jacobson collated and stapled and then handed everything over to Liss.

  “Mr. Boyd opened this account six months ago, in September. There was activity in September and October. The police notified us of his death on Monday, the second of November. They had authorization to monitor any future activity, but there has been none.”

  “Which is no doubt why the state police finally gave the account number to my aunt and told her it was all right to claim her inheritance.”

  “You don’t mind if I verify that?” She reached for the phone. What was unmistakably one of Gordon Tandy’s business cards was in her free hand.

  “Of course not.” Liss shifted her focus to the statements. There had been only three deposits, including the one with which Ned had opened the account. The second had been for the same amount, $6,000. The third had been $5,800. Liss’s heart sank. No wonder Gordon suspected Ned of blackmailing someone. Those nearly identical amounts screamed payoff! But who had he extorted? And was that someone the same person who later killed him?

  Ms. Jacobson looked marginally less stressed when she ended her phone call to Gordon. She tapped the bottom of one of the forms she’d supplied. “If you’ll have Mrs. Boyd sign here and—”

  “I have a few more questions,” Liss interrupted.

  Ms. Jacobson subsided into her chair. “There isn’t much else I can tell you about the account.”

  “You can tell me if anyone here remembers seeing Ned when he made the other two deposits. Perhaps one of the tellers talked to him?”

  “The police asked that, too,” Ms. Jacobson admitted, “and they questioned the two tellers who handled those later deposits.”

  “Did either of them remember my cousin?”

  The slightest of smiles skittered across Ms. Jacobson’s face. “Both of them remembered the transactions, for the same reason I recollect my encounter with Mr. Boyd. Those deposits were also in cash—neat packets of hundred dollar bills.”

  “Didn’t that raise a red flag?”

  Ms. Jacobson shifted uncomfortably in her chair. It was very nearly a squirm. “If the amount had been higher. . . .”

  As the woman’s voice trailed off, Liss remembered reading somewhere that at $10,000, someone was automatically notified. The FDIC? The IRS? She had no idea and didn’t really care.

  “All hundreds,” she repeated. “All cash. Surely that must be somewhat unusual in this day and age. Didn’t you worry that Ned might be . . . oh, I don’t know . . . a bookie or a loan shark . . . or a thief?”

  The slightest hint of color came into Ms. Jacobson’s face. “I did . . . express curiosity about that initial deposit. Mr. Boyd said he’d sold his car and been paid in cash. I had no reason to question that statement.”

  “And if he’d said he found the money stuffed in a mattress?”

  “What do you think I should have done, Ms. Ruskin? We had no grounds to turn him away, and no reason to report him to the police.”

  “What about serial numbers? Did you check to see if the money was stolen? Or had been used to pay a ransom?”

  Even before Ms. Jacobson spoke, the pained look on her face warned Liss that this concept, gleaned from detective fiction, wouldn’t fly in the real world. “We don’t have the ability to check random serial numbers. The only time those numbers come into play is when we’ve received an alert.”

  Checking serial numbers had seemed a reasonable action to Liss, but she had to accept the bank manager’s explanation. Now that she thought about it, she supposed that some local businesses still dealt largely in cash. Customers at Moosetookalook Scottish Emporium preferred to use their credit cards, but there were exceptions. At a guess, places like fast food restaurants and arcades probably made large deposits on a daily basis.

  “Was there anything else you wanted to know?” Ms. Jacobson’s tone edged toward the frosty.

  “Could you tell if the bills were . . . old? Maybe really old.”

  “I do not have that information,” Ms. Jacobson said.

  The possibility that Ned might have found Blackie O’Hare’s loot, and that it had literally been a cache of cash, seemed remote, but any port in a storm. Or, as she’d once heard Boxer say, “any port-a-potty in a storm.” Liss hid a smile and racked her brain for something else to ask.

  “We are not in the business of questioning the form in which our customers make their deposits,” Ms. Jacobson added, “or in gossiping about their transactions.”

  Liss could almost see the icicles depending from each word. The bank manager sat with her back ramrod straight and her hands primly folded on the desk blotter. It was a posture that warned Liss to be very careful what she said next.

  “I’d appreciate it if you could tell me a bit more about the other two deposits,” she said with a conciliatory smile.

  Ms. Jacobson thawed slightly. “They were both left in the night drop. No one waited on your cousin in person.”

  “The last one was smaller than the previous two. Fifty-eight hundred instead of six thousa
nd.”

  “Fifty-eight hundred dollars was the amount left in the night deposit drawer.” A defensive tone came into Ms. Jacobson’s voice.

  Liss held up both hands, palms out. “Please. I’m not accusing your teller of shorting the deposit. My cousin was probably paid six thousand dollars the third time, too, and kept two hundred dollars back for expenses.”

  He must have had some, even if he had saved on housing by squatting at the mansion. Food. Gas.

  Liss frowned. Gas for what? Ned had gotten himself to Fallstown, but as far as she knew, he didn’t own a car. He hadn’t had one to sell for the initial $6,000 in cash and hadn’t owned a second one to drive himself around in.

  “Do you have a security camera aimed at the night deposit slot?” she asked.

  The bank manager hesitated.

  “I’m not asking to see your videotapes or film or digital images—whatever it is you record with these days. But if you gave what you had to the police, maybe you could just tell me what was on it?”

  A considering expression on her pale, plain face, Ms. Jacobson relented. “I suppose it can’t do any harm. The first of the night deposits was made just before midnight. Mr. Boyd pulled up alongside the night drop. He was visible in profile but he wore a hoodie, making it difficult to see his face.”

  “But you’re sure it was him?” Liss had heard Sherri and Pete curse the ubiquitous hoodies often enough. They’d become the uniform of robbers, purse snatchers, and carjackers, as much of a cliché as dressing a cat burglar in unrelieved black.

  Ms. Jacobson hesitated. “I certainly thought it was. And the state police officer viewing the image agreed with me.”

  “That would be Gordon Tandy?”

  The other woman nodded. Satisfied, Liss accepted that Ned had made the deposit. She wasn’t sure if Gordon had ever met Ned in person, but he’d certainly seen plenty of photos of her cousin.

  “What kind of car was he driving?” she asked.

  “An old Chevy. At least, that’s what the officer said it was. I’m no good at identifying makes and models.”

  “And when he made the last deposit?”

  “It was the same car.” Again, Ms. Jacobson hesitated.

  “But?”

  “The person making the deposit was not Mr. Boyd, not that last time. It was a woman.”

  “You’re sure?”

  Ms. Jacobson’s tone was dry. “I think I can tell the difference.”

  “Did Officer Tandy recognize her? Did you?”

  “No. And no. Like Mr. Boyd, she took pains to avoid looking at the camera, and she wore a Red Sox ball cap, pulled low.”

  “Hair color?”

  “At night, it’s difficult to tell.”

  “Build?”

  “She was in a car,” Ms. Jacobson reminded her, “and she had on a bulky sweater. Still, I didn’t get the impression that she was a big woman. Not fat, certainly.” She shook her head. “The image isn’t the best. I’m sure you’ve seen security camera footage on TV. The news programs run it every time someone robs a bank or a pharmacy.”

  The quality was universally poor. Liss wondered how much it could be improved in a crime lab. In TV shows, forensics worked wonders. In real life? Who knew?

  She stared at the bank statement on the desk in front of her. Perhaps it had been the mystery woman who’d shorted the deposit by $200. Pass GO. Collect $200?

  “What if there had been additional cash deposits?” she mused aloud. “What if they had continued for several months? For a year? At what point—?”

  But Ms. Jacobson was no longer listening. She was staring through the glass wall. Liss glanced over her shoulder. The lines at each teller’s station were three deep—a traffic jam in this part of the world.

  “You’ll have to excuse me, Ms. Ruskin.”

  “The point was moot anyway,” Liss admitted as the other woman hurried out to lend a hand.

  She gathered up the paperwork she’d been given and left the bank in a thoughtful frame of mind.

  “Every time I think I’m going to find answers, I end up with more questions,” Liss complained to Sherri the next day.

  “I don’t know what you think you’re going to find out here,” Sherri grumbled as the two of them entered the kitchen at the Chadwick mansion. “We’ve been keeping an eye on the place. There’s been no indication that anyone has been out here since we investigated those holes dug in the basement floor.”

  “I’m sure you’re right, but I still want to go through the place one last time.” Liss placed the blueprints she’d brought with her on the dinette table and unrolled them. “Ned got that cash somewhere. Seventeen thousand eight hundred dollars all told. Maybe that’s not much by today’s standards, but it was a heck of a lot back in Blackie O’Hare’s day.”

  “How can you be sure Ned didn’t sell a car? That’s what he told the bank manager. Maybe it was the truth.”

  “Three times? One car for each deposit? I don’t think so.”

  “All right, then. The next logical supposition is that he helped himself to some of the antiques scattered around this mausoleum and pawned them.” Sherri sent a pointed look toward the door that led to the rest of the house. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again—who’d miss a few?”

  “It’s possible Ned stole items from the mansion. Certainly more likely than Boxer having done so. But I’m positive that Ned did not own a car when he got out of jail. He had to sell the one he used to own, along with just about everything else of value, to pay his lawyer. Even so, Margaret ended up footing most of the bill.”

  “Yet he was driving a car in the bank’s security footage. And it’s unlikely that he walked all the way to Moosetookalook from the state lockup.”

  “You’re not telling me anything I haven’t already thought of. But you see what I mean about more questions? There’s another one—did he hitchhike? Or did someone know he was getting out and pick him up?” Liss peeled off the floor plan for the attic. “I want to compare these blueprints to what’s actually here. If there was one hidden room, there could be another. We stopped looking after we found the tunnel. Maybe we also stopped too soon once we located the room behind the linen closet.”

  With dragging feet, Sherri trailed after her up two flights of stairs. They investigated each room on the attic level. Liss looked in particular for loose floorboards that might conceal a space large enough to hide stacks of hundred dollar bills. She even climbed up to the room at the top of the tower to tap on floors and walls in search of a hollow hidey-hole.

  They repeated the process on the second floor.

  “We aren’t going to find anything,” Sherri said when they finished searching the last bedroom and came up empty again. “There are other ways Ned could have gotten that much money in cash. I’m still leaning toward fencing stolen antiques.”

  “I wonder if there’s any way to tell what’s supposed to be in the house. Did anyone ever make an inventory?” Liss frowned as her gaze ran over the furnishings. It seemed to her that some object was missing, but she couldn’t put her finger on what that item might be.

  “No idea,” Sherri said, and sneezed. There was dust everywhere. “Then again, I’m not seeing a lot of bare spots. Maybe nothing has been taken after all.” She sounded disappointed.

  “If Ned didn’t find a cache of cash and he didn’t sell stolen antiques,” Liss said as they headed back down to the first floor, “then that leaves blackmail.”

  “But who on earth could Ned have been blackmailing? He’d just gotten out of jail. He didn’t have time to dig up any dirt on anyone.”

  “Any new dirt.”

  “If it was old dirt, then shouldn’t he have been collecting hush money all along?”

  “And again . . . more questions.” Liss cast a wary eye toward the parlor door as she reached the bottom of the staircase. “We need to make sure there are no more secret panels or other hiding places.” She jerked her head in the direction of the room where Ned had been
murdered. “In there. And in the dining room, the library, the conservatory, and the kitchen.”

  “Don’t forget the basement,” Sherri muttered.

  “Tell you what—if you’ll take the parlor and dining room, I’ll do the rest.” Even the dank depths of a dirt-floored basement had more appeal than a return to the room where she’d found Ned’s body.

  Liss started in the conservatory. It still gave her the creeps. Grimacing each time, she lifted every single stuffed bird off its perch to check for a hollowed-out middle. She’d barely finished when Sherri joined her.

  “Done already?”

  Sherri shrugged, making Liss suspect her search had been cursory at best. She clearly thought the effort was a gigantic waste of time but, true friend that she was, she offered to do the library while Liss moved on into the kitchen.

  Liss accepted. She couldn’t do it all by herself and Sherri’s help was better than nothing.

  It didn’t take long to check the obvious spots for a hidden “safe” in the kitchen. The cracked linoleum formed a solid barrier to hollowed out spaces in the floor. The pattern of the wallpaper likewise made a secret panel unlikely, although she took care to rap with her knuckles and listen for any difference that might indicate a hollow area behind the wallboard. Unfortunately, in an old house without much insulation, almost everywhere not only sounded hollow, it was hollow.

  The cabinets, conveniently empty, showed no obvious difference in depth. Short of pulling all the appliances away from the walls, Liss could think of nowhere else to look for a secret compartment. She turned to eye the closed door to the basement. No one had gotten in since the last time she visited the mansion—hadn’t Sherri just assured her of that? Before she could chicken out, Liss opened the door, turned on the lights, and went swiftly down the steps. At the bottom, she stopped short.

  Everything was not as it had been when she’d last seen it. There was another hole, and it appeared to be much deeper than the previous ones.