He walked toward me and stopped just as I was preparing to throw a right cross at him.
"Except..." he paused, and his face twisted as if he was considering a puzzle, "you're no longer the honest person I thought you were. This changes the game slightly. I'm now going to have to remain on my toes." He nodded. "Yes, honest people are so much easier. You'll be a bit of a challenge. That's ok, I like a challenge."
"What are you going to do?"
"Me? Nothing. The ball, as they say, is no longer in my court. I made my offer already. We'll see each other again, don’t worry."
"I'm not worried," I said.
"The tremble in your voice tells a different story. But no worries, Miss Darby, no worries at all." He smiled at me, a mouthful of perfectly straight, white teeth. And he turned and walked down Maggie Childsworth's driveway and down the block, his hands in his pockets, and whistling.
Yes, whistling. For some reason, that part creeped me out.
However, as I watched him, something occurred to me. Why was he here? Was he really following my every move? As far as he was concerned, I was a side project. He had other things to do besides watch me 24/7. So, what was he doing here?
Could he, in fact, merely be keeping an eye on his latest "arrangement"?
That's what he called them. Arrangements. Maybe they really were. After all, a guy committing murder is one thing, but a guy who arranges – rather like a wedding planner who isn’t actually getting married but makes sure it all goes smoothly from behind the scenes – is nothing more than just that, a director.
It was then that I formed a simple, elegant solution to Maggie Childsworth's murder.
I took out my phone and sent her a text. It read, simply:
Candace Young is out of her coma, memory restored, and is recovering at home. Thank you for all your help and support!
I didn’t get a response, of course. It would have been silly to expect one from a dead woman.
So I texted my friend Detective Lester Moore of the Carl's Cove homicide division. I needed a few things. And I needed him to deliver them to me.
#
Everything was all set and ready to go. I paced back and forth in Candace Young's kitchen, where this whole thing had begun. My guests pretty much arrived in the order I expected them to: Amanda first, followed shortly by Bernadette. Then Daisy Schiff arrived. I was happy to have such punctual acquaintances.
"Is she upstairs?" said Daisy.
"No," I said, "she's still in the hospital."
"I don’t understand," said Amanda. "Is she coming home?"
"No, they want to keep her for a little more observation. Her memory still hasn’t returned fully. They're still performing tests."
The three woman exchanged glances.
"What's going on here?" said Bernadette.
"Exactly," I said. "What's going on, indeed!"
There was a commotion from outside.
"Ah," I said, "that will be our final guest."
One of Lester's guys was staked out in the bushes, watching intently for the person described to him.
I have to admit, it was a little tough to convince Lester that I was right. All the evidence converged neatly.
And so, Lester's guy escorted Maggie Childsworth into the house.
"Found her snooping around outside," he said.
Maggie Childsworth looked like a very shrewd deer caught in a very dim headlight.
"Larry," I said to the cop, "I owe you a six-pack."
"I accept, but I'm just doing my job."
"So," I said to Maggie, "I had a feeling you'd come here once you got my text."
"She was packing," said Larry the cop, holding up a nine millimeter automatic.
"I see. Come here to finish the job, Maggie?"
"It's not what you think," Maggie said frantically. "I kept it for protection!"
"What's going on here?" said Amanda.
"Ladies," I said, "Say hello to Maggie Childsworth, recently deceased."
"You're not explaining any of this," said Bernadette.
"Don’t listen to her," yelled Maggie. "She doesn’t understand. I had to go into hiding."
"That's an ok story for in case you got caught."
I took out my phone and shot Lester a text. Ok, it said.
And we heard a loud thud come from directly above us.
"Right on cue," I said. "Ladies, would you follow me upstairs? Larry, bring Ms. Childsworth up front here. I want to make sure she's got the best seat in the house."
We went upstairs to Kyle Young's office. I knocked once on the door, and Lester Moore opened it.
"Thank you, Detective," I said. "Ladies step right on in."
Seeing the contraption for the first time in this manner filled me with pride. It was quite ingenious.
Suspended from the rafter was a short cord, and tied tightly to the end of it was a very old book. The book was suspended over a large cooler filled with water.
"This very old book here suspended from the ceiling is a copy of The House on Pooh Corner by A.A. Milne. It is a true collector's copy. Mint condition. The person who owned it kept it very well. That's how you treat valuable heirlooms. Anyway, you're probably wondering why that book is suspended in that way. Well, I won’t tell you why just yet. Instead, I'm going to hand this problem over to Maggie. But first, I want you all to look up at the rafter where the other end of this cord is tied."
They all looked up and I pointed out what Lester had placed there according to my strict instructions.
"It's a small block of ice. It fits on that rafter so neatly. Whoever put it there would have to have known that it would fit. They would have to have been here to this very room on at least one occasion. And, um, not for nothing, but there's one vantage point in this room where one could have gotten a very good look at that rafter. It's over there on that couch. If one were, say, lying down on that couch, looking up. I'll say no more."
"What's going on?" said Amanda.
I looked over at Maggie, who had her hand over her mouth in apparent shock.
"Well, Amanda my darling, I'll tell you exactly what's going on. That cord is made from PVA – polyvinyl alcohol. PVA has a lot of applications and is known for a very unusual quality. I think Maggie here knows that quality."
I watched Maggie, who had not moved from her position of staring at that quickly-melting block of ice.
"Are you worried for some reason right now, Maggie?"
She shook her head.
"Are you sure? Because you look awfully worried."
"What is this supposed to mean?" she said.
"What do you think it means? Why are you so worried about the fate of that book? Would it be because you know exactly what's about to happen?"
"Stop this," the woman said, her voice wracked with panic. "I don’t know what you're talking about."
"Then why are you worried?"
"I'm not worried!"
"Then why should I stop this?"
"Because!" she screamed.
And that's when the cord gave out, dissolved as it was from the melting ice. And the book splashed down into the cooler of water.
"No!" Maggie screamed, and rushed toward the cooler.
Larry and Lester restrained her. I went over and fished the book out.
"It's an old college text book," I said. "I left it in the trunk of my car for about ten years."
Maggie stared at the book, wide-eyed.
"Ok," said Bernadette, "I think we've all had enough."
"Yes," I said, "and you all witnessed it. Just as you all can attest to the sound of a thud coming from above, which we all heard downstairs, and which our friend Larry heard too. It was pretty much the same sound we all heard that night. This time it was Lester jumping off the couch and landing flat-footed on the floor. Sorry, Lester. Didn't mean to call you a flat foot."
"No offense taken," said Lester.
"Oh my God," said Daisy, her head in her hands.
I went over to he
r. "I'm sorry you were a part of this."
"A part of what?" said Amanda.
I took a deep breath. "On the night Kyle Young died, he'd gone out for a run in the rain. He did everything a guy running in the rain would do. He set his running app to track his time and mileage. He took his usual route around the block. What he didn’t expect was that he'd meet Maggie Childsworth along the way. Maggie and Kyle were having an affair. It shouldn't be news to anyone who knew Kyle Young. He’d had quite a few affairs. The thing is, Maggie was somewhat new to the game. She didn’t realize that she wasn't the only one. But she found out soon enough. Like I said, Kyle's antics were well known and it was only a matter of time before Maggie found out. Maggie had help in arranging a plan for revenge. Through her help, she secured the services of William Restocruz, a body-builder in need of some cash. Maggie accosted Kyle Young in the rain, right around, hmmm, thirty yards from the large tree on the corner of Chester Street and Biggs Avenue. Perhaps accosted isn’t the right word. She approached him with a lovey-dovey, 'fancy meeting you here' tone of voice, most likely. And she hugged him and told him to maybe come to her place. And that's when Restocruz snuck up behind Kyle and jabbed him in the back of the neck with a syringe full of a tincture made from the seeds of the cerbera odallam plant. More on this horrid little piece of botany in a minute. Kyle Young was dead in a matter of two minutes flat. They loaded him into a car and drove him here to his home.
"Now, how to make it look like death from natural causes? Well, easy in the case of cerbera odallam. Cerbera poison has the uncanny ability to mimic the effect of death by heart attack. So that part was already taken care of. Next, they had to have the house empty. No problem. Thanks to Candace Young's suggestion, a rainy night was the perfect opportunity to get out of the house and go to a movie. You see, Candace had been keeping an eye on the weather for quite some time. That nasty little storm we had was perfect. They'd been predicting it all week. What a great opportunity. You see, Candace knew it all. Knew about Kyle's philandering. Knew about Maggie. Maggie approached Candace one day with the intention of socking it to Kyle by confessing the affair to Kyle's wife. The two wound up seeing eye-to-eye. All Maggie needed was an opportunity, she said. She had everything all arranged. They dragged Kyle's body up here to this room, easy for a bodybuilder like Restocruz. They strung him up here very much like the way I did with this book. And the ice was put into place. The thing about PVA is that the colder the water, the longer it takes to dissolve. Yes, they took their chances with the plan, but it worked. It worked very well. Kyle's rain-soaked clothing dissolved the rest of the cord that was tied around him and under his armpits. The ice took care of the rest. The body landed with a thump on the floor. We all heard it. After they strung up his body they closed that door. It has a mechanism that snap-locks automatically, giving the impression that someone locked it from the inside. They left a typewritten note, typical of someone as methodical and officious as Kyle Young. Only they neglected to consider that there might be another grammar snob in the house, namely yours truly. At any rate, that concluded the first part of the problem of killing Kyle Young."
I looked at the faces of my audience before I continued. I was very satisfied with their rapt attention.
#
I gathered my thoughts and continued:
"There were two variables in this mess. One was Restocruz. The other was Candace Young. Planning a murder must eat away at the conscience. Maggie became paranoid. So, she decided to take care of the situation in advance by tainting Candace's Valium with the cerbera tincture. Luckily it wasn't enough to cause death. But it did cause Candace to slip into a coma and safely out of the way as far as Maggie was concerned. Maggie then began worrying about Restocruz. She feared he was going to talk to the cops. So she met with him under some pretense one night. They took a walk down by the Yacht Club. And she stuck him with the needle. Restocruz went down. Maggie dumped his body into the water. The trouble with Maggie is that she's not a professional. She got sloppy and needed to escape. The same help she had in arranging the murder helped fake her own death. A visual match? A payoff to the mortuary? Who knows. There's a lot of fingers in a lot of pies in the criminal underworld. We'll figure it out. For now, Maggie was safely hidden herself. Until she got my text that Candace was out of her coma and had gotten her memory back. She was out of poison, so she came back here to finish the job with that gun."
"You can’t prove any of this," Maggie said with a sneer.
"Well, not really. Not here anyway. Detective?"
Detective Moore, my wonderful beau, went behind the couch and brought out the reflective parka that Kyle Young was wearing when he went out. Lester brought it with him on my request and stashed it there.
I went and took it from him.
"That's evidence," said Lester. "Be careful."
"I will," I said. "Now, if you take a look at this parka, which Lester's boys did – and they took samples which will be analyzed tomorrow – you'll find PVA residue in the material. It's hard to find, even if you know what you're looking for. But they'll find it, because it's there. Trust me."
"That proves nothing," said Maggie.
"Not on its own, but Owen Schiff knows about this too."
I looked at Daisy, who still had her head in her hands.
"Daisy's husband also had an affair with Maggie. She enlisted his help in a very significant way. She got Owen to smuggle cerbera seeds out of Madagascar when he was there on business. She had no money to give him, so she made a trade: a book worth about ten thousand dollars at auction. A first edition of House on Pooh Corner. That bought the seeds as well as his silence."
I walked up to Daisy.
"Daisy, I'm sorry about all of this. Folks, Daisy was in on it too, in a way. Forced into silence by her husband, their marriage was already on the rocks. Then, amidst all the stress and tension, she found out about his affair with Maggie. She couldn’t take it anymore and promptly filed for divorce. She feared for her life after that. I can tell you this: Daisy tried to do what was right."
I walked over to Daisy and whispered in her ear, "I know it was you who sent the email." She merely looked at me with a sad, yet comforted expression on her face.
"And now, Maggie," I continued, "to answer your accusation of no evidence, I'm afraid there's one last piece of evidence, and it just happens to be in Daisy's house: the book. Owen was quick to list it on eBay. The police are on their way to your house as we speak, Daisy. They are going to arrest Owen when they find him."
"They found him," said Lester, "I just got the text."
"Well, there you have it," I said. "Where did they find him?"
"He was in the house he shared with his soon-to-be ex-wife. He was waiting for her to come home. He was waiting there with a pistol."
"Oh my God," said Daisy, her hand on her head as if warding off a fainting spell.
"I think I'm done here. Lester?"
"Ms. Childsworth," he said, "you're under arrest for the murder of Kyle Young..."
EPILOGUE
"You're now a tried and true private investigator," said Tanya.
We were drinking tea in our pajamas. I had just finished telling her the entire story from top to bottom.
She stared at me, a quizzical look on her face.
"What?" I said, blowing over the rim of my teacup.
"Mr. X. What’s up with that?"
"I have a physical description. Nothing else. No proof of anything. He's insulated pretty well."
"But he did help Maggie fake her death."
"I have no proof of that. I don’t even know the guy's name."
"There's got to be something."
"There is," I said confidently.
"What is it?"
"I don’t know yet. But I'll find it."
"Until then, what?" she said. "You're just going to let him harass or extort you into selling him the brewery?"
"Of course not," I said. "I can’t put my finger on it, but something tells me
that that isn’t his game. He knows what I'm capable of when it comes to solving these crimes and he wants to profit off it. It came to me in a flash. That's his game. He's a businessman and he sees an opportunity. I think he thinks he can intimidate me by threatening to acquire the brewery. Without the brewery, I'll do the private eye thing full time. With my keeping the brewery, he can up his bargaining tactics to try and get me to lose the brewery and do the private eye thing full time. Like I said, he's a businessman and he's trying to strategize based on the number of possible outcomes."
"What if he really is a nasty person?" Tanya said quietly.
"What do you mean?"
"What if he's right about everything? The police chief being in his pocket and all. You said it yourself. The chief told Lester to back off the case. If Mr. X really is in control, he could have orchestrated that very easily. So my question still remains: what if he's as bad as he implied he is? What then?"
I thought about it. And I blew over my cup and took another healthy sip of delicious, soothing tea. And maybe it was the euphoria from having solved another case that was governing my words, but I sat back and said, "So what? Let him try to get the best of me."
She shrugged. I sipped. And later on I went to bed and slept very well indeed.
~~~
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Murder Brewed At Home (Microbrewery Mysteries Book 3) Page 8