The Scarlet Suit Murder

by Anisa Claire West

  Finally, after about ten minutes of explaining, the detective interrupted me. “That’s all for now. But I may need to interview you again once the cause of death is determined. An autopsy will reveal whether this was a natural death…or an unnatural one.” The detective’s lips set grimly as he finished the sentence.

  “You mean a homicide?” I gasped.

  “Let’s just leave it at ‘unnatural death’ for now,” the detective said with a distinctive chill in his voice.

  “Okay,” I said, feeling utterly helpless. “I don’t know what to do now.”

  “I would suggest gathering your things together and checking into a hotel. Until we determine the official cause of death, this apartment is going to be sealed off as a crime scene. Standard police procedure.”

  “Well that’s fine because I definitely couldn’t stay here after what happened!” I exclaimed, feeling the impulse to pack all my belongings and never return to Paris at all. After Robin’s death, I wasn’t sure if I could ever go back to being a flight attendant. But my career was the least of my concerns. As the words “crime scene” echoed in my head, I seriously considered the possibility that Robin been murdered. But who would want her dead?

  As I was pondering the variables, the second police officer emerged from Robin’s bedroom and pulled Detective LeRoi aside. The two men stood exchanging grave whispers as I leaned back into the small comfort of the couch, not even caring where I spent the night. I could check into the grandest penthouse suite in all of Paris and surely not get even a minute of sleep. The memory of finding Robin’s body was going to haunt me for a very long time; I was sure of it.

  Detective LeRoi and his partner stood over the couch, looking down at me inquisitively. “We’re going to need to ask you a few more questions,” Detective LeRoi announced.

  “Sure, go ahead,” I said agreeably, wondering what had changed. Had the other detective found something in Robin’s room that made him suspect a homicide?

  “You said that you had a dinner date earlier this evening, correct?” Detective LeRoi prodded.

  “Yes, at Le Jules Verne at the Eiffel…”

  “I’m quite familiar with the restaurant,” Detective LeRoi interrupted with an air of arrogance. “Who did you dine with and what time did you arrive back at your apartment to find Mademoiselle Yardley?”

  “I had dinner with a man named Stavros and we came back here at around 9:30. I don’t remember the exact time,” I said, recalling how the louse had run out of the apartment like a terrified little boy.

  “Stavros who?” Detective LeRoi asked searchingly.

  “Um,” I faltered, feeling like a moron because I didn’t know my date’s last name. “I honestly don’t know. It was only my second date with him,” I explained.

  “You said he came back to the apartment with you, oui? So where is he now?” Detective LeRoi inquired, sweeping his gaze deliberately around the room before muttering, “Is he the Invisible Man? The Invisible Man with no last name?”

  The detective’s sarcasm struck a nerve in me as I suddenly realized that I might be under suspicion for murdering Robin! Why hadn’t I realized it before? I was so emotionally fraught and confused, not to mention jet lagged, that I hadn’t even considered that I might be viewed as a suspect. But it made perfect sense. I lived with Robin and worked with her. We could easily have had some falling out that, in the detectives’ eyes, would have caused me to snap and murder her.

  “Mademoiselle?” Detective LeRoi pressed.

  “Stavros was here, but he left as soon as I told him that I found a dead body. He seemed very scared.”

  “And he just left you here by yourself?” Detective LeRoi went on as I thought: yes, by myself…and without an alibi.

  “Yes, that’s right,” I said firmly.

  “Do you have any idea where this mysterious Stavros lives in Paris so that we can have a word with him to confirm your story?” Detective LeRoi’s sarcasm pounded into my skull like a jackhammer.

  “Actually, I don’t think he lives in Paris. He’s from Greece and is just staying here right now,” I replied, hoping the handsome dirt bag hadn’t already boarded a plane back to his native Santorini.

  “Well, then how do you suggest we find the man?” Detective LeRoi looked at me questioningly, as though he expected me to whip up an instant solution to the problem like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat.

  “I know!” I burst out as the detectives kept their mocking gazes fixed on my face. “Stavros was a passenger on one of my flights. His name and home address must be in the airline’s records, so you can find out about him that way!”

  “It’s not that simple. Flight records are regulated by the government. The records would have to be subpoenaed in order for us to access them,” Detective LeRoi explained as I refused to be deflated.

  “But it’s still possible. You can track Stavros down that way,” I insisted. Hesitantly, I added, “Listen, I can tell that you’re suspicious of me. But I promise you I had nothing to do with Robin’s death. I loved her like a sister. Like a best friend! I’ll cooperate and do whatever you need me to do to help. That’s a promise.”

  “No one has accused you of anything, Mademoiselle McGleason. But you were the last person to see Robin Yardley alive. You were also the person who lived with her. So it’s to be expected that we would have some tough questions to ask you,” Detective LeRoi spoke diplomatically, but I knew it was all a façade. I was a suspect plain and simple.

  “Can I ask what you found in Robin’s bedroom that made you think she was murdered?” I asked boldly.

  “What makes you think we found something in her bedroom?” The other detective finally spoke, posing the question with false innocence.

  “I’m not blind. I saw you come out and whisper something to Detective LeRoi. So I just came to the conclusion…”

  “No, you just jumped to the conclusion,” Detective LeRoi corrected harshly.

  Forget about semantics! I wanted to yell at the officers. Instead, I calmly agreed, “You’re right. I jumped to conclusions. But believe me, I want to find out what happened to Robin as much as you do.”

  As Robin’s pretty face and adorable bouncy bob hairstyle floated into my mind, I knew that those were the truest words spoken all night. Forget about government regulations and red tape:

  I was going to find Stavros for the police. And I was going to find Robin’s killer too!

  Chapter 3

  My head gently lifted off a squishy pillow that smelled oddly of moth balls and burnt toast. As I scanned the room, my surroundings were unnervingly foreign. I sat up in the double bed and rubbed my swollen eyes. Sleep in the dank hotel room had only come to me at some point after 4 am, and I hadn’t checked into the hotel until after midnight. Finding a hotel room in Paris on short notice in April is a bit like finding the Christmas gift you want the day after Black Friday sales.

  The officers and paramedics had dispersed shortly after my interrogation, leaving me in what had transformed from a delightful riverfront apartment to a foreboding graveyard in the span of one fateful evening. Robin’s body had been taken to the morgue while I hastily threw a few garments into an overnight bag and hailed a taxi. Sitting inside the taxi, my head spinning like an out of control windmill, I had made about a dozen calls to different hotels.

  “Where do you want to go, Mademoiselle?” The taxi driver had asked impatiently, pointing to the meter as the cab remained parked at the curb.

  “Je ne sais pas! I don’t know!” I had replied despondently. “But I’ll pay the whole fee, don’t worry.”

  Finally, I had found an open room in a 2-star hotel that we would call a “no tell motel” at home in the States. I had hardly noticed the brazenly roaming eyes of the clerk who checked me in. All I had wanted was to lay my heavy head on a pillow and lose consciousness. Maybe when I woke up, I would discover that Robin’s death was all a jet lag-induced nightmare. But it wasn’t a nightmare at all. It was only too real.r />
  Sitting up in bed, I texted a few members of the crew including our immediate supervisor, Christine, and the pilot, Charles. I also sent a message to Annalise, one of the French stewardesses who would hopefully be able to help me navigate my way around police procedures in order to figure out what had happened to Robin. My texts to everyone were simple but urgent:

  Meet me at La Boulangerie de Louis. It’s urgent. Be there at 9 am.

  Predictably, they all texted me back, panicked to find out what was so urgent. Universally, I replied:

  Not appropriate to discuss through text. Just meet me there. Don’t ask any questions. Please.

  There was no way I was going to break the news of Robin’s death through the impersonal medium of text messaging. Guys had broken up with me more than once through text, a behavior so spineless that no woman could condone it. As I rose from bed to shower, I couldn’t decide which was worse: ending a 3 year relationship using sad face emoticons or leaving a woman alone with a dead body as Stavros had.

  As I walked onto the sidewalk at 8:45, I knew that my face bore all the telltale signs of a miserable night’s sleep. As soon as my colleagues saw me, they would know that something terrible had happened. I glanced around at the sun-radiant skyline, noting how different it was from Manhattan’s imposing horizon. There were no skyscrapers in Paris, and most of the architecture had a classical feel that was absent in edgy, modern Manhattan. I passed a street musician playing the accordion and dropped a few coins into his bucket. Just the sight of a musician made me wonder where Stavros had slithered off to. I should have known the man was far too beautiful to be trusted.

  La Boulangerie de Louis sat at the corner of a dangerous intersection, crowded with customers fetching their morning coffee and croissants. I had chosen the place simply because everyone knew how to find it; in happier days, I had met the crew at the bakery for a laughter-spiced breakfast directly after disembarking a brutally turbulent flight.

  “Natalie! Over here!” Christine called as she stood at the door of the bakery. The golden blonde still spoke with a charming Texas accent, despite having lived between New York and Paris for the past decade.

  “Hey Christine,” I replied flatly.

  “Okay, what’s going on? Your text messages scared the heck out of me!” Christine scolded.

  “Let’s wait for Charles and Annalise to get here. I definitely don’t want to have to say this more than once,” I stalled.

  “Now you’ve got me really freaking out! Is it Robin? Is she okay?” Christine demanded frantically.

  “What makes you think it’s Robin?”

  “Because she practically fainted on the flight! I don’t know if that girl had some kind of food poisoning or what, but her face was as white as toothpaste!” Christine exclaimed as I narrowed my eyes at her.

  I didn’t appreciate her casual metaphor regarding how sick Robin had been. But I had to forgive Christine because she didn’t know just how serious the situation had become.

  “Let’s wait for the others to get here,” I repeated firmly as Christine shrugged and pressed her gloss painted lips into a frown.

  At a jogging pace, Charles maneuvered his way across the street, dodging a black Peugeot whose driver had a clear case of road rage. “Natalie! Christine!” The tall, boyishly handsome pilot with the hypnotizing blue eyes hurried over to us. Once upon a time, I had nursed a little crush on the pilot…until I found out that intimate relationships between co-workers were strictly forbidden by company policy.

  “Hi Charles,” I greeted somberly. “We’re just waiting for Annalise.”

  “What’s going on, Natalie?” Charles demanded gruffly.

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to find out! But she won’t say anything until we’re all together.” Christine sighed impatiently.

  “This doesn’t sound good,” Charles said ominously, his sandy hair blowing in the spring breeze.

  Gratefully, I watched petite, 100-pound Annalise sprint over to us as she popped out of a taxi. Dressed in a navy business suit, she looked every inch the Parisian native. In my sweats and raggedy sweater, I knew I looked like I belonged somewhere in a New Jersey suburb.

  “I’m here!” She announced effervescently, clearly oblivious to the severity of the situation.

  “Let’s go inside and have some coffee,” I suggested.

  “Not until you tell us what’s going on!” Christine countered defiantly.

  “I think a round of coffee would be more civilized…” I said, my strength and patience beginning to wane.

  “Don’t keep us in suspense any longer, Natalie. It’s not right,” Charles sided with Christine.

  A lump rose up in my throat as I realized that I couldn’t put off telling them the news any longer. Better for them to hear it from me, from someone who actually cared about Robin, before the story was splashed all over the newspaper headlines as macabre entertainment.

  “I’m so sorry to be the one to tell you this. And I’m so sorry I have to tell you this at all…” My voice became trapped in my throat as tears escaped my eyes. “Robin…passed away. I found her last night in her bed.”

  “Passed away?” Annalise echoed in her soft French accent. “You mean died?!”

  “Yes.” I nodded sadly and looked towards the ground.

  Christine started bawling, the sound of her emotional outburst drawing appalled stares from passersby. Annalise’s display of emotion was far more dignified as silent tears streamed from her huge doe eyes. Charles, meanwhile, appeared completely shell-shocked, not moving a muscle in his body or uttering the slightest sound.

  “This can’t be true,” Annalise said sadly. “She was so young! What could she possibly die of?”

  “I don’t know…murder maybe,” I said under my breath as Christine’s bawling ceased for an instant.

  “Murder? Why would you think that? She was so ill on the plane!” Christine pointed out.

  “I’m not the one who thinks it. The police seem to believe that Robin was murdered even though they didn’t say it in so many words…”

  “Who would murder that angel?” Charles finally spoke, and his voice was flooded with tremors.

  “That’s what I want to know!” I cried.

  “Has anyone contacted her parents yet?” Annalise asked, wiping away a teardrop.

  “She doesn’t have any parents to contact,” I informed. “Her parents died when she was only 9. She didn’t really have any family that I know of.”

  “That’s awful! Poor Robin! I didn’t realize she was all alone,” Annalise said regretfully. “I would have invited her to stay with my family during the holidays if I had known she was all alone!”

  As Annalise ranted, Charles remained immovable in his spot, his face whitening the way Robin’s had when she fell ill. “Charles, are you feeling okay?” I asked cautiously. Maybe there really was some mysterious virus going around after all. I was taking shots in the dark, but they were all I had at the moment. “You look like you’re feeling sick.”

  “I do feel sick,” he replied stonily.

  “What is it? Your head? Your stomach?” I asked.

  “No, I don’t feel sick in that way!” He protested angrily. “I’m just sick from hearing this news. Robin was one of our best stewardesses.”

  “She really was,” Christine concurred on a shaky exhalation. “But maybe you are coming down with something, Charles. Maybe it’s the same illness that Robin had.”

  “Would you stop it! I don’t have any illness,” Charles raged, as I wondered why he was reacting so severely.

  “Well maybe you don’t have any illness, but we should notify the other crew members and see if any of them are feeling sick. Not to mention our 300 passengers,” Christine spoke like a mother hen, the commanding way she always did.

  “I guess you’re right, Christine,” I admitted. “We can’t rule out an illness yet. But I feel fine. Physically, at least.”

  “So do I,” Annalise agreed.

&
nbsp; “I had a splitting headache last night,” Christine countered. “I just hope that’s not how Robin’s illness started.” She bit her lower lip in a blatant gesture of nervousness.

  “Don’t even think that way, Christine. Like I said, the police seem to suspect homicide.” I didn’t add that the police seemed to suspect me too.

  “I don’t mean to run off, but we’re only in Paris for a couple of days, and I really need to see my parents,” Annalise said shyly as though she were afraid of offending anyone.

  I wanted to get her alone to talk about how I could bypass the police and launch my own investigation, but I would just have to wait. Or maybe forget that idea altogether… What could a girl like Annalise with equal passions in fashion and flying possibly know about murder investigations? I had been idealistic believing that she could help me.

  “Go ahead. Be with your parents,” Christine encouraged. “I’m going to see if I can get some errands done.”

  I grimaced, knowing that for Christine the word “errands” was synonymous with “shopping.” Annalise nodded, giving Christine and me kisses on each cheek before waving goodbye to Charles. Christine glided off in the opposite direction as Charles and I stood awkwardly facing one another on the sidewalk.

  Shoving his hands in the pocket of his olive khaki pants, Charles whispered so low that I wasn’t sure if he had spoken at all: “I need to confess something…”

  Chapter 4

  The words disappeared with the wind as Charles stared tight-lipped at the concrete. I examined his features, seeing there a curious combination of grief and remorse. What was he hiding? What did he need to confess? Delicately, I tried to extract more information from him.

  “You said you need to confess something?”

  Clearing his throat and standing up straight, Charles said gruffly, “No, I didn’t say that.”

  “But I heard you…”

  “No, you’re just upset right now, Natalie. You must have heard me wrong.”

  “You said, ‘I need to confess something,’” I insisted.