The Grim Steeper

by Amanda Cooper

  “No, I can’t do that.”

  “No hints?”

  “I saw something weird, and I need to talk to her. I tried her cell, but she’s not answering. I didn’t leave a message because I didn’t know what to say. When you see her, tell her to call me right away. She has my number.”

  “Honey, are you okay? Kimmy? I’m worried about you. Are you all right?”

  “I don’t know. I’m going to see someone right now to try to straighten things out. Just give Sophie that message.” The line went dead.

  Chapter 22

  The day had wasted away. It was late afternoon and Sophie felt exhausted. She had been asked to stop at the police station, but if she went there it would take hours to tell them everything she was thinking, had conjectured and was wondering about. It would have to wait. She was determined to get down to the truth, now that she had an idea what it was. She entered through the back door to be met by Nana, who was pacing, with Pearl at her feet.

  “Oh, Sophie, I was so worried. I tried calling your cell phone. Why didn’t you answer?”

  Sophie grasped Nana’s forearms and made her sit down, concerned about how pale her grandmother looked. “I was in the car. I never answer while driving, you know that.”

  Nana nodded. “Of course. Kimmy Gabrielson called. She wouldn’t tell me what was wrong, but asked if you could call her. She said something that worried me a bit; she said she was going to see someone right then to try to straighten things out.”

  “That doesn’t sound too worrisome.”

  “You didn’t hear her tone. She was . . . puzzled. And upset.”

  Sophie eyed her grandmother and nodded. Nana had excellent people skills and was empathetic, which meant she must have sensed something over the phone line to be so worried about it. “What specifically are you worried about?”

  Nana picked Pearl up and cradled the cat in her arms. “That she was upset by whatever she saw, and yet was going ahead to talk to whomever it was that was involved.”

  Sophie pulled her phone out of her purse and checked it; Kimmy had tried to call multiple times, but whenever she was in the car driving Sophie ignored the phone. She hit the call button, but this time it was Kimmy who wasn’t answering. She left a message to call her, saying, “Hey, Kimmy, it’s Sophie. My grandmother was concerned about your call. Is everything okay? Call me back as soon as you can.”

  There was a tap at the kitchen door, and Sophie hopped over to answer it. Cissy Peterson, a cell phone in one hand and her other arm supporting Thelma, said, “Can we come in? Grandma needs to show you something.”

  Sophie pulled Cissy into the warm kitchen; the poor girl was shivering. She was always shivering if so much as a mild breeze was blowing. Thelma toddled in after her, and Sophie guided both women over to the small table and made them sit down. Thelma was oddly withdrawn, and Cissy abnormally buoyant.

  “What’s up?” Sophie asked.

  “You’re not going to believe this,” Cissy said. She played with the cell phone for a moment, bringing up images. “Grandma can’t figure out how to use this as a phone, but she sure has figured out how to take photos, even when she doesn’t know she’s taking photos. She took these from her second-floor window the night of the tea stroll, after everyone had gone, before she sent Gilda out to do the garbage. What do you think?”

  Sophie held it so Nana could see the screen. “It’s hard to tell what any of that is,” she said. “Wait, I think I can zoom in on this picture. Or even better . . .” She raced upstairs to her desk and linked the phone and her printer, then printed off the photos. By the time she came back down, Nana had hot cups of Auntie Rose’s Tea-riffic tea blend sitting in front of Cissy and Thelma. Sophie plunked the photos down on the table. “These are grainy, but . . . oh, good lord!” she said, staring more closely at the pictures, two in particular.

  “What is it?” Cissy and Nana said simultaneously as Thelma grunted.

  Sophie got a pen and circled something in the passenger side seat of the sports car she had heard that very night, and which was parked at the far curb. “Look at that, sticking up; that is the weapon, or at least a part of the weapon.” She circled a section of another photo of two people in an embrace of sorts. Sophie shivered and pointed her pen to the circle. “And that is a killer and murder victim. Dean Asquith never saw it coming.”

  The other women stared at it, and Nana got it after a moment. “I think we know who that is,” she said, and named the killer.

  Sophie nodded. “You’re right, Nana. Mrs. Earnshaw, you’re a genius, and you may have given us proof that the police can’t ignore.” She took the older woman’s hand. “Thank you for this.”

  Mrs. Earnshaw nodded. “I’m glad it helps. Couldn’t make hide nor hair of who it was myself, but you seem to know them all better than me. I’m glad because . . . well, because I know I caused you mischief with the salt in the sugar packets.”

  “Why on earth did you do it?” Nana asked.

  Mrs. Earnshaw shook her head. “I don’t know. Sometimes I swear, I see the world like it’s turned upside down.”

  Sophie kept her mouth shut. After years of managing employees, she felt like she’d attained some insight into human behavior; for some it was virtually impossible to release a grudge, no matter how old. She had her theories as to why Thelma did what she did—it involved old unresolved jealousy of Nana—but it wouldn’t do any good to rehash that distant past once again. Everyone thought that by talking things out they could dismiss old problems, but for some folks that didn’t work. That was true of Thelma Mae Earnshaw, still holding on to the sixty-year-old grievance that Rose stole her supposed beau.

  The photos were too grainy and too far away for anyone but those who knew what they were looking at to decipher. Cissy went back to Belle Époque, taking the photos and her grandmother with her. She was going to call Wally, who was at home right then, and tell him Sophie’s plan at just the right time. Sophie would let her know when.

  Nana was worried; Sophie could tell. But she would never stop her granddaughter from doing what she thought right. When Sophie graduated from high school Nana was the one constant, unwavering source of support for all her plans and dreams of culinary school and opening a restaurant.

  Her mother had always said that Sophie inherited her father’s business drive. She had certainly listened to him anytime he talked; those moments were precious to her, the longing to have his approval was constant in her teen years. Something he once told her had stuck; he said that in every case when he thought he was right, he preferred to beg for forgiveness after doing something, than ask for permission before doing it.

  She was putting that into action. Sophie left a message on Josh’s cell phone to call her as soon as he was able, then phoned Julia and explained what she now knew and what she planned, if Julia was willing to help.

  “Oh, my goodness . . . are you sure? I mean, can that be true? I never would have expected this.”

  “I’m pretty positive, but what alarms me most is that Paul Wechsler is missing and I’m concerned about the message from Kimmy Gabrielson, who is not answering my calls. I think we need to act on this right away so nobody else gets hurt. I know the police should be involved, but I’m afraid if they take control, they’ll have to wait for warrants and subpoenas, and I’m scared to death when we have a human life, and maybe two, hanging in the balance.” She paused, thought it through, then said, “But can you do your part if we do this my way? Can you play it off?”

  “If what you’re telling me is true, then I will do it, and I’ll do it well. In my misspent youth I was actually in, among other works, a rather awful off-off-Broadway play about a girl who manipulated people into giving her exactly what she needed. I was very Method; my parents still remember it as their six months of hell, because I lived in that bitchy girl’s skin. I did a lot of research, and tried out some of the techniques on
people. I can do this.”

  “But do you want to?” Sophie persisted. She was beginning to get cold feet. She could back out now, give all the information to Detective Morris and . . . and what? Wait while the detective and the DA decided if they had enough to nail the killer? Worry about Paul Wechsler, who no one had seen or heard from in twenty-four hours? Try to find Kimmy Gabrielson, who had gone off to who knows where? Her resolve hardened, but still . . . “I wouldn’t put you in harm’s way, Julia; not for the world. I’d never forgive—”

  “Sophie, this is my choice. The police could investigate this and likely make the arrest, or at least, try to make the arrest, but if we can provide them with a stronger case without it seeming like entrapment, I’m willing to do my part. What if you’re right and Paul Wechsler is in danger?”

  They set it up, and Julia made the calls that she needed to make, then reported back to Sophie that it was done. The meeting was set.

  “Really?” Sophia asked. “It was that easy?”

  “It was. But I think I’m being set up, if you wanted to know the truth. I said I wanted to get in on the bribery action. Our culprit is canny and insisted on knowing how I figured it all out. I said I wouldn’t talk until we met face-to-face.”

  Sophie had an uneasy feeling in her gut, a heck of a time for that to start acting up. “It’s not too late to back out, you know. In fact . . . Julia, we need to shut this down,” she said, her voice trembling. “I’m going to call the police and—”

  “No!” Julia said. “If you do that, I’ll set up the meeting for right now and do this on my own. We are going ahead.”

  Alarm growing, Sophie tried to talk her out of it, but ultimately she knew that the professor would be safer if they went ahead as Sophie had planned, because she had backup built into the plot. Over the next few hours she prepared and finally heard back from both Josh, whose technical ability was vital to the plan, and Jason, who was going to be Sophie’s escort.

  He listened as she explained the plan, and then burst out, “Sophie, that is insane! How could you put Julia in danger like this?”

  “I’ve had second thoughts about it. Jase, I tried to call it off, but Julia won’t let me. She threatened to go ahead alone. The only thing we can do now is be the safety net and get it right.”

  “No, there’s another way. I can be the pigeon. I’ll meet the lunatic and say I’m looking to get in on the action.”

  “That won’t work, and you know it,” Sophie said, pacing in her apartment, and then ducking to glance out the window in her front-facing bedroom. “You were set up to be the fall guy from the beginning; there’s no way you’d turn around and want in on the action.” She glanced at her alarm clock. “Time is too tight now to change it up. Josh is all set. You need to meet me there in half an hour so we can set everything up, make sure it’s right.” There was silence for a long minute, and Sophie felt everything hanging in the balance, including her future relationship with Jason. “Please, Jase! I know you don’t like this, but now that we’ve committed to it, it’s important to keep Julia protected.”

  “If Julia can’t be dissuaded, then we’ll work together to make sure she’s safe.”

  “I hope you know I never intended to put Julia in harm’s way. I should never have gone to her like I did; I should have waited until I could run it past you. But now she won’t back down. I’m sorry. I really am.”

  “I know. We’ll have to make sure nothing goes wrong.”

  * * *

  Sophie supervised the setup at SereniTea, but she hadn’t been able to eat dinner when they came back to Auntie Rose’s. Jason had wolfed down a few sandwiches. He had some course work on his laptop that he was checking over. He explained that in his course he left it optional to his students to submit their work on paper or electronically, but that he was going to change in future to all electronic. That way he could demand that his students run their work through a plagiarism-checking software. He had been too trusting for too long, and had recently become aware that some of his students were even paying others to do their essays for them. He had been naive, thinking he was being watchful enough, but no more.

  Sophie half listened, anxiously watching the clock. Nana, luckily, seemed distracted and spent the time on the phone and fussing around up in her own apartment. Sophie paced, ran upstairs to change her clothes into dark yoga pants and a sweatshirt, raced back downstairs and resumed pacing. But finally, it was time to move.

  When they emerged from Auntie Rose’s in the twilight, they were witness to an awesome sight. Their street was often populated by folks walking dogs or out strolling; that was not so unusual. But tonight it was who was there that was strange. Two elderly gentlemen (Malcolm Hodge and Horace Brubaker) helped Mr. Bellows, who leaned on a rollator walker as they strolled slowly up the street, in the direction of SereniTea. Nana was outside of Belle Époque having a heated argument with Thelma Mae Earnshaw, who had a large purse over her arm. Laverne pulled up to the tearoom with Gilda Bachman in her passenger seat.

  Sophie stopped dead. “Oh, my heavens! We have the Silver Spouts Investigative Team in full battle readiness.”

  Jason stifled a laugh as he took Sophie’s hand. “Indeed we do.”

  “I wish they weren’t doing this, but you cannot keep those folks down.”

  They walked up the hill, slipped into SereniTea, and concealed themselves in the private tearoom that shared a wall with the office. Josh had wired in a simple recording setup, and borrowed from his school’s audio video club some pairs of wireless headphones for Sophie, Jason, and himself, of course, because he would not be left out. Sophie had the cold shuddering horrors as she realized what she had done, dragging a pregnant woman, a teenage boy, her kinda-sorta boyfriend and even—inadvertently—a collection of oldsters into her mad scheme to out the villain.

  “Next time I get a brilliant idea I’m going to run it past you first,” she whispered fervently to Jason. “You’re the level head to my impulsivity.”

  “Next time,” he murmured back, squeezing her hand. “We’re in it now, so keep your head in the game.”

  They sank down together in the shadows by the wall, right near the door into the office, and Sophie prayed as she crouched in silence. There was some noise in the office. Sophie could hear Julia clear her throat and shuffle some papers, and she said softly, “Testing.” Sophie rapped on the floor in their prearranged signal.

  There was silence for a while, just the sound of Julia sighing, rattling through papers, muttering under her breath and her chair squeaking. But finally there was a tapping at the back door, which led directly from the office out to the parking area behind the shop. Sophie almost held her breath, listening.

  “You came,” Julia said. “I wasn’t sure you would.”

  There was a murmur. Sophie’s prayer switched to an earnest one that the confession-slash-revelation they hoped to get was audible on tape. Had Josh done everything right? Was the recording device on? Would the killer reveal everything they needed for a conviction? Had the police showed up outside, which was Cissy’s part in this all?

  “Have a seat and let’s get down to business.”

  Sophie almost didn’t recognize Julia’s voice, and she exchanged a glance with Jason. But he nodded; like most people, she probably had a voice she used normally, in conversation, and one she saved for talking to difficult people when the need to be stern overrode any desire to placate. Jason would have heard that businesslike tone before.

  “Let’s. I’m not quite sure what you meant by what you said on the phone, but if you think I have something to do with this whole grading mess, then I’m ready to listen.”

  Sophie took in a deep breath. So that was how Brenda Fletcher was going to play it, as the mystified innocent; okay, then Julia would have to be canny. She let her breath out quietly, hoping the professor could handle what was on her shoulders.

  Chapte
r 23

  “Come on, Brenda, I know you’re behind it all. Do you think I haven’t been working on figuring this out since Asquith first talked about the fake grade? And do you think I ever for a moment assumed it would be just one student’s grade? Quite frankly, Jason’s not smart enough to take money for changing a grade.”

  Sophie squeezed Jason’s hand in the dark. There had been no response from Brenda.

  “But I am,” Julia said.

  Sophie felt a spurt of fear; right now, on tape, that would play like a confession of grade changing from Julia. They needed Brenda to come through with her own confession.

  “Why don’t you tell me what happened?” Brenda asked, sitting down and shifting position, from the sounds coming through the headphones.

  There was silence for a long minute. Then Julia said, “I’ll tell you what I know. After a little digging I know that you were on the archery team while an undergrad.” That was amazingly simple to find out, since Brenda had done her undergrad degree at Cruickshank. It was all there, in the recent athletic history of the school. Sophie had discovered it in minutes once she knew what they were looking for.

  “And I know that when Coach Donovan approached you about upping the grades of some of his critical players, like Mac MacAlister, he also promised the cooperation of the football coach,” Julia continued. “You got the idea to also help out a particular grad student who is poised to go to the Olympics if she can keep training with the Cruickshank archery coach. For that she needs to keep her archery scholarship, which requires a B or better.”

  Sophie nodded. She was sticking to script.

  Brenda was silent, and so was Julia. But finally the assistant registrar said, “That’s quite the fairy tale you’ve spun.” There was suspicion in her voice.

  This was the moment; Sophie felt it. When you were trying to get someone to do something, there was always a moment when it hung suspended, on the precipice. Anything Julia said now would either tip Brenda over the edge into trust, or make her back away from the edge in hardened suspicion.