I paid my check at Cafe Pamplona, confirmed Montrose’s address from a slip of paper in my purse, and slowly walked in the direction of his street, which was only a few blocks away. Darkness was falling; lights came to life in shops and the area’s many university buildings. I paused at the comer.
Last chance to change your mind, Jess. You’ve been lucky so far that no ones reported you to the court. Let it go. You’re probably wrong anyway. Just a coincidence that two members of the same jury panel have died. Just a coincidence that both appeared to favor the defendant. You’re in Boston as a jury consultant, not to prove a conspiracy. You came here because an old friend, attorney Malcolm McLoon, asked you to come, and because you wanted to soak up the atmosphere of a real murder trial to use in your next murder mystery. Give it up, Jess. Go back to your lovely hotel suite, take a Jacuzzi, read a good book and—
I stood opposite Professor Montrose’s six-story apartment building, drew a deep breath, and looked up the one-way street. A car slowly approached; plenty of time for me to cross. But as I stepped off the curb, the sudden roar of its engine froze me in my tracks. I turned. The car was bearing down on me at racetrack speed. I twisted and hurled myself back in the direction of the curb, landing with a thud on the pavement, my cheek making painful contact with the concrete. The car, large and dark in color—brown? black? blue?—flashed by in a blur, its left tire missing my foot by less than an inch.
I didn’t give Professor Montrose, Juror Number Four, another thought until the smiling young doctor in Harvard University Hospital’s emergency room assured me my face was only scraped and bruised, nothing broken. By then, I wanted only to get back to my suite at the Omni Parker House, lock the door and shut the drapes against the outside world and all its potential violence. Before I could, however, the police wanted to question me about the incident. I told them everything I could remember, which wasn’t much. One thing I was sure of, I said. The driver of that dark car had deliberately tried to run me down.
“What were you doing on that particular street, Mrs. Fletcher?” one officer asked.
“I was—just sightseeing.”
“That’s a residential street,” he said. “Nothing touristy.”
“A pretty street,” I said. “I just sort of wandered down it.”
“You’re on the Brannigan defense team,” his partner said as they prepared to drive me back to the hotel.
“That’s right.”
“My wife’s been watching the trial on Court TV.”
“Oh? I’m not sure I agree with allowing television cameras into the courtroom,” I said, gingerly touching my fingertips to my stinging cheekbone. “But then again, there is the public’s right to know what goes on in its justice system.”
“Shame how those jurors died,” he said, holding open the rear door of the marked police car.
“Terrible,” I agreed.
He and his partner got in the front seat. The engine came to life and we pulled into Boston traffic. “Yeah,” the officer said, turning his head to speak directly to me. “Really strange, three people from the same jury dying like that.”
It took a moment for his words to sink in. When they did, I sprang forward and placed my hands on his shoulders. “Did you say three?”
“Yes, ma’am. That’s why I was interested in how come you were on that street when you were. That professor on the jury—Number Four I think was his number—fell off his roof just a little after you almost got run down.”
“Fell—off—his—roof?”
“Yup. Or got pushed.”
I slumped back in the seat and pressed my fingers to my temples. The stinging on my cheek had been replaced by a pounding, pulsating pain deep inside my head. I’d been right. It was no longer just a theory. Three members of the Billy Brannigan jury had died in less than a week. I believe in coincidence. I think it happens more than we realize.
But there’s coincidence, and then there’s coincidence.
Somebody was killing off the jurors, and it looked like only those who were sympathetic to the defense were marked for an accident.
And then it dawned on me that it wasn’t only jurors who were in jeopardy. This jury consultant had almost become coincidence number four.
“Could you drive a little faster?” I said. “I have some very important phone calls to make.”
Jessica Fletcher takes
a murderous vacation in the second
Murder, She Wrote novel—
RUM & RAZORS
After a cold winter in Cabot Cove, and with another soon-to-be-bestseller in the hands of her publisher, Jessica Fletcher is happily on her way to a much-needed vacation on balmy St. Thomas, with its aquamarine sea and white sand beaches.
But as soon as she arrives, there is trouble in paradise. When her friend Walter Marschalk is found dead at the water’s edge, it seems to be a case of brutal revenge. But when the suspects start multiplying, it will take all of the finely honed talents of Maise’s most adept amateur sleuth to unravel this mystery.
Don’t miss the mystery and intrigue
back home in Cabot Cove in the third
Murder, She Wrote novel—
BRANDY & BULLETS
Jessica Fletcher, America’s favorite tv sleuth, is thrilled when she hears that a local mansion is to be turned into an artists’ colony. No one, however, expected a creative killer.
As the death count rises at Worrell House, Jessica and her friends, Dr. Seth Hazlitt and Sheriff Mort Metzger, start to unravel the puzzle. But as they get closer to the truth, the danger grows, and time is running out. Can they solve the mystery before Jessica becomes the next victim of the literary-minded murderer?
Martinis and Mayhem Page 21