A Mold For Murder

by Myers, Tim

  If Diana had murdered Connie Brown, did I really want to be the one who proved her guilt? I would do it if I had to, but not until I’d exhausted every other suspect on my list.

  Barry Hill’s temper had bothered me from the first time I’d heard him snarl. He had been in the middle of a confrontation with Sharon when Molly and I had shown up. But what had they been fighting about? It had appeared to me that Barry was threatening Sharon in some way, but she hadn’t said a word about what it might have been. Molly hadn’t been able to get anything out of him, but maybe I’d have more luck this morning. He’d had some time to think about it, so maybe I could catch his guard down.

  I found the same maid who’d tipped me off to his presence cleaning Barry Hill’s room as I started to knock on his door.

  “Good morning,” I said. “Do you have any idea where Mr. Hill is?”

  “He’s gone,” she said. “I’m sorry you missed him.”

  “Do you have any idea when he’s coming back?” I needed to speak with him, and this particular maid had proved to be resourceful in the past.

  “No, you don’t understand. When I say he’s gone, I mean he’s gone. He checked out early this morning.”

  “Blast it all,” I said. “I need to find out where he went.”

  “Max won’t tell you,” she said as I raced for the door. “So it won’t even do you any good to try. He acts like he owns this place, and all of our guests are his family.”

  “I get it,” I said, reaching into my wallet for a twenty.

  “I don’t want your money,” she said. “Not that I wouldn’t take it if I had some information for you, but I honestly don’t know where the man went.”

  “Sorry,” I said, as I put my wallet back in my pocket.

  She accepted the apology with a smile. “You don’t have to apologize to me, but you should know that I won’t cheat you by lying to you. That’s where I draw the line.”

  “Thanks,” I said as I left. “I appreciate that.”

  We all have our own levels of how far we’ll go, where we’ll draw the line and say, “there and no more.” I could accept the maid’s rationalization, mostly because I knew that I made them myself from time to time.

  I called Molly, though I wasn’t happy about the prospect of talking to her.

  When she finally picked up, I said, “Barry Hill checked out early this morning, and no one knows where he’s gone.”

  “Ben, do you make soap at all anymore, or are you too busy playing detective?”

  “I try to fit them both in whenever I can,” I said, a little harsher than I should have. “I just thought you’d like to know that one of your suspects was taking off.” Then, without giving her the chance to say another word, I hung up on her. I’d taken enough guff that morning, and I wasn’t in the mood to take any more.

  My phone rang twenty seconds later, and I considered not answering it, but then I realized that would be a childish reaction, and I decided to pick up anyway.

  “Okay, I’m sorry. I was out of line just then.”

  I couldn’t believe it. Molly actually sounded contrite. “I’m the one who should apologize. I had a fight with Diana and her family earlier, and it shook me up more than I’d like to admit.”

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “I didn’t mean to, but before I left their house, I ended up accusing all three of them of murder,” I said, then hastily corrected, “No, it wasn’t as bad as that. All I really did was ask them for their alibis, but you’d think I’d done a lot worse by the way they reacted.”

  “I already talked to the Longs,” Molly said. “They were in Charlotte for a doctor’s appointment with a specialist. It checked out.”

  “Information I could have used before I said anything,” I admitted. “Sorry, I know you aren’t under any obligation to keep me in the loop. Is there any chance you’ve cleared Diana, too?”

  “No such luck,” she said, “and if you tell anybody I said one word to you about this case, I’ll deny it and call you a liar.”

  “I completely understand,” I said. “And in the spirit of you not telling me anything, were you able to find out what Sharon was doing when Connie Brown was getting murdered at my shop?”

  “She claims she overslept, but when Jean tried to get into her room to clean, she said the door was locked. No one saw her as she left the bed-and-breakfast to head over to the soap shop, at least we haven’t found any witnesses yet. It’s the best we’ve been able to come up with.”

  “What about Barry? Does he have an alibi you can check out?” I wasn’t at all certain how long Molly would be in the mood to share, but I was going to wring every ounce of information out of her I could in the meantime.

  “He claims he was walking aimlessly around town, but again, I haven’t found anybody yet who is willing to swear that they saw him.” She hesitated, then added, “I looked into Brian Ross’s log for that day, because I knew you’d want to know. He was actually writing a parking ticket across town at the time of the murder, but there’s something odd about it.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Somebody wrote over the time entry on the ticket. He claims he made a mistake and corrected it, but I’m going to look at the ticket and see if the numbers match, or if Ross changed it after the fact.”

  “Thanks for that,” I said. “I appreciate you keeping your options open.”

  “Until I can prove who killed your contessa, everyone’s a suspect.”

  “In the first place,” I said, “she’s not my contessa.”

  “I don’t want to hear the other places, thank you very much. Listen, I’ve got to go, Ben. I’ll talk to you later. And don’t worry about Barry Hill. He can’t go far. We’ll find him soon enough.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “Have faith in me and my fellow officers,” Molly said, and then she hung up.

  I hoped she was right. By fleeing town, Barry Hill was admitting to the world that he was either guilty of murder, or afraid that he might be the next victim.

  But which was it?

  TWELVE

  I decided I wasn’t ready to go back to Where There’s Soap just yet, so I drove out to the Mountain Lake Motel to see what Sharon thought about Barry Hill running away. Maybe I could get something else out of her.

  I had to knock on the door three times before I got any response, and I was beginning to believe that there had been a mass exodus of suspects from Harper’s Landing.

  When she finally opened the door, I was more than a little relieved that she was still in town.

  When she saw me, Sharon said, “Hi, Ben. Come on in. Sorry it took me so long to answer the door, but I was just on the phone. It turns out my stipend isn’t going to last as long as I’d hoped it would. Connie’s business manager told me I could stay here one more night, and then I was going to have to finance it myself if I wanted to hang around Harper’s Landing. There’s some good news, though. He wants me back at Connie’s so I can help him sort through her papers, and he’s going to pay me while I’m doing it. Connie was a terrible record keeper, and it’s going to take forever to sort the mess out, so I don’t have to worry about running out and finding a job anytime soon. I’m sorry I can’t stay longer.”

  “You won’t be the first one to leave,” I said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Barry Hill left this morning. I was wondering if he might have stopped by here on his way out of town.”

  “No, he didn’t come by,” she said. “I can’t believe the police would just let him leave like that.”

  “They didn’t have anything on him,” I said. “Are you sure you don’t want to tell me what happened last night? It was pretty obvious you two were arguing about something.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said simply.

  I wasn’t about to let her off that easy, but there was something else I wanted to ask her first before I managed to alienate her, too, along with every other
suspect I was considering. “Sharon, I’d like to talk to you about the day Connie was killed.”

  “Ben, I’ve already been over this with the police. I overslept, and that’s something I never do.” She bit her lower lip, then said, “You know what? I think it might not have been an accident that I missed the signing.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The night before Connie was murdered, I was with her in her room. She told me she wanted some rest time by herself, and I understood, since we’d been working hard on her next book. Anyway, when I got back to my room, a few things were out of place, and my bottled water wasn’t exactly where I’d left it. Is it possible that someone drugged my drink so I would be absent the next day at the signing?”

  “Why would someone want you out of the picture?” I asked.

  “Connie demanded constant attention whenever she appeared in public. If the killer was planning to get rid of her all along at your shop, wouldn’t it make sense to get me out of the way first?”

  I would be the first to admit that Connie Brown had been demanding the day of the signing, and I wasn’t even one of her employees. It wasn’t that big a stretch to believe that she’d have had Sharon jumping through hoops to have everything just so. “But who could have done it?”

  “I know you’re not going to like to hear this, but Diana was at the bed-and-breakfast that night.”

  “Don’t forget, so were Brian Ross and Barry Hill.”

  “True. The only suspect it rules out is Betsy Blair. Unless she slipped in without me seeing her, I doubt she could have done that.”

  “But neither one of us can say for sure, can we? There’s just too much I don’t know right now,” I said.

  Sharon nodded. “Don’t beat yourself up about it, Ben. From the way Molly was talking, she’s not any closer to figuring out who killed Connie than you are, and she’s a professional.”

  “That’s because we don’t have all the facts,” I said. “If you’d tell her why you were fighting with Barry Hill, maybe it would help.”

  She bit her lower lip, then said, “What can it hurt now? You were right. He was threatening me.”

  “About what?”

  “I saw him when I came to the signing late. He was loitering near the edge of your shop, and he told me if I told anybody else that I’d seen him there, he’d make me regret it.”

  “He’s already admitted to the police that he was walking around town,” I said.

  “Yes, but did he confess that he was hovering near your shop? That’s not all. When I saw him, I noticed that there was something on his shirt when I ran into him. I’m no expert, but it looked like there were a few flecks of blood on it.”

  “That might have been helpful to know when he was still around,” I said angrily.

  “He threatened me,” Sharon whined. “What could I do?”

  “Hang on one second,” I said. “I need to make a call.”

  “What are you going to do? You said it yourself. Barry’s already gone.”

  “Molly’s got the state police out looking for him,” I said. “She needs to hear this.”

  I couldn’t get a signal on my cell phone in the room. “I need to step outside to make this call.”

  “I’ll be right here.”

  I called Molly and told her what I’d just heard. She didn’t sound all that surprised as she said, “That’s just one more thing I can ask him, if he ever turns up.”

  “I figured he’d be easy to snag,” I said.

  “So did I. I’m still not sure how he’s managing it, but so far, nobody’s laid eyes on him.”

  I knocked on the door again, and saw that Sharon was packing. “I thought you had one more day,” I said as I saw her stuff a blue dress, two pairs of jeans, a crimson hat, more frilly undergarments than one woman should need on a proposed three-day stay, and a paisley scarf into her bag.

  “I do,” she said, “but I’m getting antsy just sitting here in this room. I’ve got to get back to Connie’s place. There’s so much work that needs to be done.”

  “I understand,” I said. “But do me one favor. Call me before you leave, okay?”

  “I will,” she said as she continued to stuff things into her bag.

  “Speaking of bags, you left Connie’s at the bed-and-breakfast. I suppose you’ll be wanting them, won’t you?”

  “You can give them to charity for all I care,” she said.

  “Fine, I’ll take care of it.”

  She hesitated, then said, “On second thought, I’d better take them back with me. Do you have them in your car?”

  The bags in question were indeed currently in my trunk, but I wasn’t ready to admit that. If I could keep Sharon in town a little longer, she might just help solve the case. I had a feeling the woman knew more than she even realized. “I’ll have to bring them by later.”

  “If you don’t have time, I’ll pick them up on my way out of town,” she said. “Sorry I held back on you before.”

  “You were frightened,” I said. “It’s easy enough to understand. Was that it, though?”

  She looked confused by the question. “What do you mean?”

  “Is there anything, anything at all, that you might not be telling us? Even if it doesn’t seem all that important, you need to tell me everything.”

  She looked as though she was ready to cry. “I’ve told you all I know.” As she sniffed into a tissue, she asked, “Was Molly mad?”

  “With her, it’s hard to tell lately. Sharon, be careful while you’re here, okay?”

  “Who would want to hurt me, Ben? I didn’t see anything, I wasn’t even around when Connie was murdered, and I barely have two dimes to my name.”

  “You saw Barry with blood on his shirt,” I said solemnly. “That might be enough.”

  “I’ll be careful,” she said.

  I drove back to the soap shop, wondering if there could be anything in Connie’s suitcase or garment bag that might give me some idea who had murdered her. Molly had already looked through them, and I probably wouldn’t have any more luck than she had in her search, but I had the time, and it wasn’t like many more leads were raining down on me. I snuck in the back way at the soap shop, barely acknowledged my brothers with a slight wave, then hurried upstairs before someone could ask me if I was going on a trip.

  My desk was covered with paperwork, so I used my grandfather’s work space. He hadn’t used it in ages, and there was a thin layer of dust on top of it.

  I opened Connie’s luggage and started digging through the two pieces, but that wasn’t getting me anywhere. I finally decided to put them on the floor and pull each item out and look at it as I went. Her lingerie, and she had a lot of it, must have been expensive, based on the diaphanous nature of her collection. I felt really strange going through her delicates. At least there weren’t places anything could be concealed, whether while being worn or not.

  I looked in the garment bag, knowing that Connie—in her guise as the contessa—would require more formal wear. There were dresses, soft-brimmed hats, and shoes in the pouches, but nothing that looked like it didn’t belong. I smiled when I realized that she had complete outfits in blue and green, from the shoes to the dresses and gloves to the floppy hats.

  As I suspected, there were no blue jeans in either bag, no comfortable clothes at all except a bathrobe that looked well worn. I was about ready to give up on that when I noticed that there was a makeup bag buried within the folds of the robe. I decided that, since I was searching, I’d do a thorough job of it, but if there was something there that was out of place, it was beyond my scope of knowledge to figure it out. I packed everything back up and wondered what I had missed. Something nagged at the back of my mind, but I couldn’t put my finger on it, and the harder I tried, the less chance I had of capturing it. It would come to me eventually—I knew that from past experience—and there was nothing I could do to rush it.

  In the meantime, I still had a murder to solve.

&nb
sp; There was a knock on the door, though it was Paulus’s office, not mine.

  “Come in,” I said as I latched the suitcase shut and put it down beside the garment bag.

  “Oh, it’s you, Benjamin,” Mom said as she came into the room. “I was wondering if your grandfather came back early from Europe and neglected to tell anyone of his arrival.”

  “I needed some space.”

  “Have you uncovered anything yet?”

  “That’s the problem. I’ve got reasons each of my suspects could have done it. Instead of narrowing the field, I’m expanding it. At the rate I’m going, I’ll have all of Harper’s Landing in my sights before long.”

  She patted my shoulder. “You’ll do it, Benjamin, I have faith in you.” She gestured to the luggage. “Are you going somewhere?”

  “These are Connie’s things. Sharon left them at Jean’s bed-and-breakfast, and I promised to get them to her before she goes.”

  “So you thought the most direct route was through this office?”

  I couldn’t exactly deny what I’d been doing. “I admit it. I got nosy and started snooping.”

  “It’s not being nosy, you’re being productive. So, what did you find?”

  “I learned that Connie hated blue jeans, but loved to coordinate her outfits from top to bottom.”

  Mom nodded. “She liked to play the role of diva, didn’t she? You must remember, though, she may have done some bad things in her life, but she was still a soapmaker at heart.”

  “Is that supposed to absolve her of everything else, just because she shared our vocation?”

  “Benjamin, you know better than that. Keep digging. I believe you will uncover the truth.”

  “I’m glad one of us does,” I said. “Walk back to my office with me. I want to show you something.”

  “Certainly,” she said, then gestured to the suitcases. “What are you going to do with those?”

  “Let’s just leave them here for now,” I said. “I’ll give them to Sharon when she comes by later. She’s leaving town, and Barry Hill is already gone. I’m beginning to wonder if we’ll ever solve this while our suspects are still around.”