Owls Well That Ends Well

by Donna Andrews

  “I’ll try,” I said. “And since Arnold Schmidt was just leaving when she walked in—”

  “Oh, please let it be him,” Giles said. “He’s the most insufferable snob in the department.”

  “I’ll keep you posted,” I said.

  “Please do,” Giles said. He returned to his paperwork, looking almost cheerful.

  I felt a momentary twinge of irritation. Was Giles doing anything to help himself, or just sitting back and waiting for me to clear him? He could at least have offered to help me find Schmidt. The way Michael would, if he weren’t back at the yard sale, trying to keep it under control while simultaneously humoring Mother.

  Then I realized I was being too hard on Giles. Not fair to expect a mild-mannered, reclusive English professor to turn into Sam Spade in a pinch, even if he was a vintage mystery fan. And definitely not fair to compare him with Michael. Giles needed rescuing. And the next step was to tackle Schmidt.

  Of course, first I had to find Schmidt.

  Chapter 29

  I headed toward Westlake, where Professor Schmidt lived. Like much of Caerphilly, it had been built in quaint, mock-Tudor style, but in Westlake the houses were closer to manors than cottages, and the lawns were so impeccable that I suspected the owners made their gardeners manicure the grass blades with nail scissors. A very posh neighborhood filled with astronomical mortgages and the department heads and professors emeriti who could afford them. Even full professors probably steered clear of Westlake unless they were independently wealthy or had a spouse with a well-paying job. Michael and I hadn’t done much house hunting there, partly because we could never have afforded it, and partly because the houses there hardly ever went on the market anyway.

  My route led through a part of Caerphilly I’d seen far too often since Mother’s arrival a week ago, since it contained most of the town’s antique stores. Including Gordon McCoy’s Antique and Junque Emporium, though that was on the very fringes of the district, merging into a neighborhood of stores where normal people shopped and restaurants that served iceberg lettuce instead of its snooty Italian cousins. Out of curiosity, I took the street that went past Gordon’s shop.

  How strange. Three of Caerphilly’s small supply of police vehicles were parked outside the Antique and Junque Emporium, along with the chief’s blue Chrysler. Had the epicenter of the murder investigation moved from our house to Caerphilly, unnoticed by the crowds hovering around the yard sale? And for that matter, unnoticed by the various print and broadcast journalists?

  I cruised past the shop at about ten miles per hour, but I didn’t see anyone, so I circled the block and came round again. Still nothing to see, so this time, as soon as I turned, I parked the car on the empty side street. If it hadn’t been for the police cars, I might have thought I was in one of those science fiction flicks where the heroine wakes up to find that everyone else has left the planet.

  I strolled up to the front of the store, nonchalantly, and peered in the open door.

  Gordon’s front room was just as I remembered it, a cluttered warren without any apparent theme or organization. Priceless antiques stood next to items I’d have assumed were tacky pieces of junk except that their presence in Gordon’s stock meant they were actually valuable collectibles. Chinese brush paintings hung beside painted velvet renditions of bullfighters and paint-by-number oils of puppies and kittens. Rare art pottery and Ming vases shared shelf space with vintage Coke bottles. Enameled samovars and hookahs shouldered a humongous scale model of the Starship Enterprise, and tiny bronze Degas ballet dancers loitered in corners with the sort of elaborate, special edition Barbie dolls that would probably run away screaming if a small child ever tried to pick them up.

  There were at least a dozen more rooms much like this one, though the most obscenely expensive stuff lived in the front room, where Gordon could show it off. And where it might catch the eye of a passing collector.

  Come to think of it, that was the theme—stuff Gordon could sell for obscenely high prices.

  Though one room always felt different—the one where Gordon kept the used and rare books. I remembered it as way in the back, so I had to go through five or six other rooms to reach it, but perhaps deep in the heart of the shop would be a more accurate description. Was it only my bias that made this room feel like a serene oasis in a chaotic jumble? Or did it reflect how Gordon felt about the books? Endicott, his former partner, did say books were Gordon’s first love.

  I could relate to that. I’d noticed in the last several weeks that books were among the few material objects I didn’t feel ambivalent about. In fact—

  Stop it, I told myself. I was on the verge of feeling sorry for Gordon, and apart from being a strange and disturbing feeling it wouldn’t help me find his murderer. And I didn’t have time to worry about it now. Chief Burke was standing inside the shop, and I’d lingered long enough at the door that he’d turned and spotted me. Too late to slip away quietly, so I waved and smiled at him.

  “What’s up?” I asked.

  “Give me strength,” Chief Burke said, rolling his eyes upward. Then he lowered them, fixed them on me, and frowned. “Just what are you doing here?”

  “Rubbernecking,” I said. “Morbid curiosity.”

  “Not trying to solve the murder case yourself?”

  “I have every confidence that by the time you finish your investigation, you’ll be convinced that Giles had nothing to do with Gordon’s death,” I said. “Of course, if I come across any information that will help speed up the process …”

  “You’ll pass it along, instead of going off half-cocked and getting yourself in a world of trouble,” Burke said. “Naturally.”

  He didn’t sound as if he believed it.

  “Naturally,” I said. “So what’s going on?”

  “Someone broke into Mr. McCoy’s antique store,” Burke said. “I don’t suppose you remember what you were doing last night around midnight?”

  “Michael and I were over at Giles Rathbone’s house, having sherry and discussing his case,” I said.

  “Having sherry with your boyfriend and my prime suspect,” Burke said, nodding. “Figures.”

  “Why would you suspect me of breaking into Gordon’s store?” I asked.

  “Looks like your style,” he said. “There wasn’t anything missing or damaged, and he had plenty of things a real burglar would have taken—a fair amount of cash, not to mention some nice jewelry and silver. But whoever broke in last night just disarranged some of the papers in his office. I figure it was someone snooping around for information.”

  “And you assume that someone was me?”

  “If you didn’t do it, I apologize, and point out that it wouldn’t exactly be out of character, and if you did, I do hope you were careful and wore gloves.”

  “I always do when I’m burgling,” I said. “Incidentally, that was a joke.”

  “Hmmm,” the chief said, studying me.

  “What was the burglar looking for?” I asked.

  “If I knew that, I’d know who did it, wouldn’t I?” the chief said. “They were messing around in his business records.”

  “Maybe it was someone who felt cheated by Gordon,” I suggested. “And wanted proof so they could file a claim against the estate.”

  “Like as not,” the chief said, nodding. “Of course, that doesn’t narrow down my field of suspects. I have yet to find anyone who didn’t feel cheated by Gordon.”

  “Well, I didn’t, but that’s mostly because I never did any business with him,” I said.

  “Why not?” the chief asked. “Did you have something against him?”

  “Not particularly,” I said. “We had him in to look over Mrs. Sprocket’s antiques before the yard sale, but since he’d usually offer about half of what the other dealers would pay, we never sold him anything. And you’ve seen the yard sale—you can imagine about how much we need to buy junk. Or antiques.”

  “So you’d have no reason to want him dead,” the
chief said.

  “Apart from a few stray homicidal urges when he knocked on our door before dawn, no,” I said. “Out of my life, yes; but I wouldn’t have needed to kill him to achieve that, because I knew once we were through with the yard sale, he would be. Out of my life, that is.”

  “I see,” the chief said.

  “Does this mean that you’re seriously considering the possibility that Giles didn’t do it?”

  “I’d be a fool not to look at a suspect who just waltzes right into my investigation,” the chief said.

  I decided to assume this was a subtle hint that I’d overstayed my welcome, so I wished him luck and left.

  I glanced up and down the street when I stepped out of Gordon’s shop, and could have sworn I spotted someone peering around the corner of the building at the end of the block and then ducking back when he saw me.

  I sauntered to the other end of the block, turned the corner, and then ran as fast as I could. Luckily I didn’t have to go all around the block. An alley halfway down the cross street ran through the block, giving access to the back doors of the shops on either side. I raced through the alley to the next cross street and then carefully stuck my head out.

  The someone was peering around the corner again. He ducked back, and I recognized him.

  Professor Schmidt.

  Chapter 30

  I waited until Schmidt peered around the corner again and was absorbed in whatever he saw. Then I crept up behind him.

  “Looking for something?” I asked.

  He jumped a foot in the air and uttered a rather undignified squeak. When he saw who it was, he tried to return to his usual pompous manner, but I decided I liked him better off balance.

  “So, first you lie to Chief Burke, and now you’re spying on him,” I said. “Want to tell me why?”

  “I beg your pardon,” he said, but I could see he was nervous.

  “Why don’t you just tell Chief Burke what really happened in the barn?” I asked.

  “What do you mean, what really happened?” he said. “I went there because Gordon offered to sell me some papers. He didn’t have the papers with him, so I advised him to stop wasting my time and went away again. That’s all that happened.”

  “Oh, sure,” I said. And a sudden thought hit me— Schmidt wasn’t just eager to buy the papers from Gordon—he was nearly frantic. What kind of papers would make anyone that upset?

  “And you didn’t burgle Gordon’s shop last night?” I asked. “I suppose that was one of his other blackmail victims.”

  It was a gamble, but it worked.

  “Blackmail,” he exclaimed. “What are you talking about?” But from the way he flinched and the fearful look on his face, I knew I’d guessed right.

  “Oh, come on, professor,” I said. “I know he was blackmailing you. I heard that much. But I don’t understand what he had on you.”

  For that matter, I was having a hard time imagining Schmidt doing anything worth blackmailing about. Perhaps in his long-distant youth, before he’d become such a pompous jackass.

  “Mrs. Pruitt,” he said, finally.

  I pondered that for a few moments. Were we talking about the same Mrs. Pruitt? The long-dead poetess? I’d seen the portrait, and all the photographer’s art couldn’t make her look like anything but what she was: a stout, hatchet-faced woman in her fifties. She’d been closer to ninety when she died, and that was still several decades before Professor Schmidt was born.

  “Well, obviously it was about Mrs. Pruitt,” I said. “But I’m not sure I understand the details.”

  He sighed, loudly, and stared at the ground for a while.

  “And if I can’t understand it,” I went on. “Well, maybe the police won’t, either, but I’ll just have to take that chance, and tell them everything I do know.”

  That finally worked.

  “As I’m sure you know,” he said, “I’ve made Mrs. Pruitt my life’s work.”

  I nodded encouragingly.

  “Not just analyzing her work, but defending it.”

  “Defending it against whom?” I said.

  “Her work has sadly fallen out of fashion,” he said, indignantly. “It’s become quite trendy to belittle her work. Not just its quality, but its originality.”

  “They find her work derivative?” I asked.

  “Derivative would be a kinder way of putting it,” he said. “There have been a number of articles written over the years that claim she was a plagiarist—that she took the works of more commercially successful poets and … well, changed enough of the words to make it look like a different poem, and passed it off for original work.”

  “And did she?”

  “I’ve always contended that she was merely strongly influenced by her favorite poets,” he said. “And that her profound reverence for them manifested itself in an unconscious imitation of their forms and meters.”

  I took that for a reluctant yes.

  “But Gordon had something that proved otherwise, right?” I asked.

  “He’d gotten hold of a box of books from her library,” Schmidt said. “Books of poetry by Longfellow, Tennyson—people like that. A lot of the poems were all marked up in her handwriting, showing how she’d taken their poems and produced her versions. Changing a couple of words in each line, until it looked different enough to pass off as her own.”

  “Hard to defend that as unconscious imitation,” I said.

  He nodded slightly.

  “Not exactly good for your career,” I suggested.

  He shook his head.

  A wild suspicion hit me, and I decided to run with it.

  “Especially if it came out where Gordon got them,” I said. “However did you let them fall into his hands?”

  He winced.

  “It was my wife, and her damned decluttering,” he said. “The damned box had been gathering dust in our attic for twenty years. And then, while I was off in England at a conference, she went to this damned class on getting rid of clutter.”

  “Really? Where?” I asked. Sounded useful, that class. Maybe I could go, and take my whole family.

  “I don’t know,” Schmidt said, frowning. “One of those places that gives stupid classes for housewives with too much time on their hands.”

  “I see,” I said, and hoped it didn’t come out sounding too much like a snarl. I found myself hoping, for Mrs. Schmidt’s sake, that he turned out to be the murderer and got a good, long prison sentence.

  “Anyway, one of the stupid decluttering rules they gave her was if you hadn’t opened a box for more than a year, you should get rid of it without opening it. The stupid cow called Gordon and had him clean out the whole attic.”

  “So Gordon not only had the goods on Mrs. Pruitt, he knew you’d found out about her plagiarism and covered it up,” I said.

  He nodded.

  “Sounds like motive for murder to me,” I said.

  “Not really,” he said. “I may have my shortcomings as a scholar, but I have a very well-honed sense of self-preservation. Why would I kill Gordon without getting back the evidence? Who knows who’ll get hold of those books now that he’s dead? But whoever it is, I very much doubt it will be anyone as greedy, grasping, and dishonest as Gordon.”

  “So I take it you don’t have them?”

  “Would I still be trying to find them if I did?”

  Maybe, I thought, if you wanted to look less like a murder suspect.

  “So someone else has them,” I said aloud. “Or will get them, whenever they turn up. And you’re afraid that someone will make them public, and you’re trying to get them first.”

  He nodded.

  “So if you didn’t kill him and you didn’t get your books back, just what did happen between you and Gordon yesterday?” I asked.

  “Nothing,” he said.

  “Try again.”

  He pursed his lips as if afraid something incriminating would slip out. I just waited.

  “Nothing happened because he was al
ready dead when I went into the barn.”

  Chapter 31

  Yes! I thought. I hadn’t entirely trusted the Hummel lady’s story, that she’d never seen Gordon, but now I had independent confirmation that Gordon was already dead before Giles entered the barn. I wasn’t sure whether to cheer, knowing that this was probably enough to clear Giles, or shake Schmidt for lying and helping to implicate Giles in the first place.

  “He was already dead?” I repeated.

  “Definitely dead,” Schmidt said. “When I first walked in, I saw his stuff lying all around, and I figured he was there—maybe snooping in the hayloft, that was about his style. So I called out for him to come down, that we needed to talk about the books. And he didn’t say anything. And I went over to the ladder to the hayloft and he was just lying there, dead, with this bloody bookend by his head.”

  “What did you do then?” I asked, though I was beginning to have a suspicion.

  “I panicked. I was afraid someone would find him, and know that I’d come into the barn to talk to him. I figured the longer it took them to find him, the less chance anyone would jump to the wrong conclusion and suspect me. So I thought maybe if they didn’t find the body …”

  “So you hid it.”

  “In the trunk,” he said, nodding. “It was right there. And I put the bookend in, too.”

  “And you took the key with you and hid it in a bowl of old keys.”

  “Yes,” he said. “I was just going to throw it away somewhere, but as I was leaving, I saw the bowl of keys on one of the tables, so I wiped the trunk key off and threw it in there.”

  “And you ran away without even looking for your books.”

  “I looked,” he said. “They weren’t there.”

  I studied his face. He looked embarrassed, depressed, defensive, hostile, and generally miserable. But I had no idea if he looked truthful. For all I knew, he could still be covering something up.

  I wasn’t convinced he didn’t have motive for murder. But I also had a hard time imagining that he could bludgeon Gordon to death with the bookend. He looked like the sort of person whose idea of taking stern and decisive action was to write a querulous letter to the Caerphilly Clarion, and then whine for weeks if the editor pruned a single adverb. Perhaps I should let him fret for a while, and try to find either confirmation that Gordon had been dead already when Schmidt entered the barn or something to disprove it.