Death With Dostoevsky

by Katherine Bolger Hyde

  He gave her another minute, then said, ‘Are you able to put those feelings aside for now and look at Richard as a suspect on a rational level?’

  ‘I’ll try. As you said, he is a wimp, but I could almost imagine him lashing out if sufficiently provoked. And he did have motivation beyond the fact that Taylor had rejected his advances. She had proof that he had plagiarized a student’s essay and published it as his own.’

  Luke whistled. ‘That’s pretty serious, isn’t it?’

  ‘Grounds for dismissal. Even for a tenured prof.’

  ‘Sounds like he’s in the running, then. And he had opportunity?’

  ‘His office is down the hall from hers. I don’t know if he was there last night, though. That’ll be for Colin to figure out.’ She swallowed. ‘But I guess I’d better tell Colin about the plagiarism.’

  ‘You didn’t tell him that? How come?’

  ‘Because of the way I found out. Marguerite recorded a conversation between Richard and Taylor without his knowledge. She used my phone and I didn’t stop her, so that makes me complicit.’

  ‘You better tell Colin. They’ll need physical evidence to arrest someone anyway, so that recording being inadmissible shouldn’t be a game-changer.’

  ‘OK. I’ll tell him when he calls.’

  ‘So, Richard aside, who’s your second choice?’

  ‘Heavens, I don’t know. I’d like it to be Saul Goldstein, because he’s so obnoxious and it would help Svetlana and Daniel to have him out of the way. But that doesn’t mean he’s any more likely to be guilty than anyone else. Less, probably, because his weapon of choice is the law.’

  ‘Good point. Third choice?’

  She gave a half-laugh. ‘The Russian mafia enforcer. Except then I’d have to give evidence against him, and his buddies would come after me. So I don’t actually want it to be him.’

  ‘I notice Daniel is not in your top three.’

  ‘No. He had the most motive of anyone, but I can’t believe it of him. Well, I don’t want to believe it. He has his whole life ahead of him. Why would he throw it away by taking such a risk? And using his own statuette to do it? Daniel is many things, but he isn’t stupid.’

  ‘OK. And the ex-husband? You ruling him out too?’

  ‘Not ruling him out, exactly.’ In fact, her estimate of Douglas’s potential as a killer had been raised significantly by the encounter she’d overheard on the morning before Taylor’s death. ‘I guess I’d have to put him in fourth place. Before yesterday, I would have said Douglas was too civilized to kill in that bloody, violent way. He hated her, certainly, but I would have said he’d go for poison, maybe, or stage some sort of accident. But since that quarrel Marguerite and I overheard – well, like Richard, he could have been provoked to violence on the spur of the moment. Even to the point of risking getting blood on his custom-made suit.’

  ‘Sounds like whoever did it must have been pretty well spattered with blood. That’s bound to be useful unless the murderer’s a lot cleverer than any murderer I’ve ever met.’

  ‘Yeah.’ She sighed. ‘This waiting to hear what’s happening is killing me. I’ve been spoiled, being in on every detail with you.’

  ‘I’m sure Colin will get in touch as soon as he can. Bound to have been a long day with not a minute to himself.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re right.’ She felt her phone vibrate. ‘Oh, maybe that’s him! Can I call you back?’

  She hit the button to accept the incoming call. It was Colin.

  ‘Hey, Emily. Just calling with an update like I promised.’ His voice dripped exhaustion. ‘We’re holding Daniel Razumov.’

  THIRTEEN

  ‘You’re holding Daniel? Why?’

  ‘The murder weapon has his fingerprints and no one else’s, for one.’

  Ouch. So much for the idea that it could have been a different statuette belonging to someone else.

  ‘You know for sure what the murder weapon was?’

  ‘The ME says the wounds to the skull have a distinctive shape. Only one thing fits. Plus it’s pretty much covered in blood.’

  ‘But were Daniel’s fingerprints in the blood, or under the blood?’

  A pause as Colin presumably consulted his notes. ‘Under the blood, apparently. Or on spots not covered in blood. None actually in the blood.’

  ‘So then all it proves is that the statuette belongs to Daniel. It doesn’t prove he’s the one who wielded it. The murderer must have worn gloves.’

  ‘Wait a minute – I never said it was a statuette.’

  ‘Oh, well, I saw it at the scene this morning and it was pretty obvious that was the weapon. Didn’t I say?’

  ‘No. You did not.’

  ‘I just figured you’d see it, as I did. It’s not like it was hard to find.’ She knew her tone was too bright, artificially bright, but she couldn’t seem to control it.

  ‘Or you recognized it and didn’t want to implicate Daniel.’

  Dang, this kid was smart. Possibly even smarter than his uncle.

  ‘Or maybe that. But after all, you did figure it out with no help from me.’

  ‘Is there anything else you didn’t happen to mention?’

  She swallowed. ‘Now you bring it up, I did remember one thing. A possible motive for Richard McClintock.’

  ‘Oh? What’s that?’

  ‘Taylor had evidence that he’d plagiarized a student’s essay and published it as his own. I don’t think he realized anyone else knew, so he could have killed her to shut her up. I’m not saying he did, mind you. But it is a motive.’

  Colin asked the question she’d been hoping he wouldn’t ask. ‘So how did you find out about this?’

  ‘Marguerite and I sort of eavesdropped on a conversation between Richard and Taylor. We weren’t just being nosy – we’d insisted he confront Taylor about her harassment of Daniel, but we didn’t trust him not to let her off the hook. So Marguerite set up our two phones to listen in and record what they said.’

  ‘And Curzon threatened McClintock with exposure?’

  ‘It was a counter-threat – if he pursued sanctions for her behavior, she’d get him fired for plagiarism.’

  ‘I think I need to listen to this recording. It wouldn’t be admissible in court, but I might be able to confirm the information another way.’

  ‘Sure. If you track me down tomorrow, I’ll play it for you.’

  ‘Can’t you send me the file?’

  At least Emily knew what that meant now. But she still didn’t know how to do it. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know how. I’m a newbie where tech stuff is concerned. But I can get Marguerite to show me in the morning.’

  ‘Oh, right, Uncle Luke mentioned you were kind of a Luddite. OK, please do that first thing.’ He paused, presumably making notes. ‘Anything else you’ve remembered since we talked?’

  Her conscience compelled her to come clean. ‘I did happen to overhear one other conversation. Not recorded, though. Between Taylor and Douglas Curzon. Her office door was ajar when I was passing by.’

  ‘And? What was said?’

  ‘I couldn’t tell you word for word, but it was pretty heated. There’s some family heirloom of Douglas’s that Taylor had essentially stolen and was refusing to give back. She was taunting him. It got kind of … personal. So I guess that gives him a stronger motive as well.’

  Colin huffed. ‘You really should have told me all this earlier, you know.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Colin. I should have said. Honestly, I was embarrassed about the eavesdropping, and I didn’t want to be the one to implicate a potentially innocent person. But since you’re holding Daniel – I just can’t believe he’s guilty. Is the weapon all you have on him?’

  ‘No. His name is down in her appointment book for ten-thirty last night. Well, his initials, and we don’t know of anyone else connected with the case who shares them. Plus we have a witness who puts him at the scene within an hour of the probable time of death.’

  ‘What? Who? And
when?’

  ‘Sidney Sharpe saw Daniel enter the floor where the office is located at ten-fifteen p.m. The ME figures time of death between eleven and midnight.’

  ‘If Sidney saw Daniel there, that means he was there himself.’

  ‘Yeah, but he was leaving at that point. He’s vouched for at that coffee shop, the Paradox – funny name for a coffee shop – from ten-thirty to eleven. Besides, he has no motive.’

  ‘True.’ Unless he was trying to help Daniel and Svetlana. But surely his doglike devotion would not extend to murder. Emily could not imagine that his Nietzschean pretensions could ever be translated into action. ‘OK, so Daniel was in the building. So what? There must have been other people there too.’

  ‘Not that we’ve been able to find out. Except the victim herself, of course. Unless everybody’s lying. Of course there are no security cameras.’

  ‘Do the others have provable alibis?’

  ‘Haven’t got as far as proving them yet. We’re looking at a big field here. You said yourself, to know her was to hate her.’

  ‘Yes, but surely not everyone is equally likely.’

  ‘Presumably not. We’re working on opportunity, but you’re better placed to identify motive since you know them all. You’ve given me a couple of good ones already. Anybody else you’d say is more or less likely, motive-wise?’

  Emily hated to sit in judgment on her friends and colleagues, but she could hardly get out of it now. ‘Let’s see … I told you who was directly involved with Taylor. Of those, you can rule out Marguerite Grenier. She had no personal axe to grind with Taylor; she was just working for the good of the department.’

  ‘Check.’

  ‘And I’d say you can rule out Svetlana. She’s a gentle soul, and she’s deeply in love with Daniel. I doubt she could ever kill anyone, but if she did, she certainly wouldn’t let Daniel take the blame.’

  ‘Early days on that – we haven’t even arrested him yet. And her love gives her motive. I’m keeping her on the list for now.’

  ‘If you must.’ Emily was confident Colin would ultimately see the justice of her views on Svetlana. The girl’s innocence was palpable. ‘So besides Richard McClintock and Douglas Curzon, that leaves Saul Goldstein. He was angry enough with Taylor to do just about anything. Plus our putative Russian mafia guy.’

  ‘So four, maybe five suspects with known motive. That’s a small enough field to dig deeper on. I may need you to come in and look at some photos, maybe work with our sketch artist, for the Russian guy.’

  ‘No problem. And will you release Daniel in the meantime?’

  ‘Not unless we get something solid on one of these four.’

  ‘But you have to get more evidence against Daniel to actually arrest him, don’t you? Everything you have is circumstantial.’

  ‘Except that Razumov has sort of confessed.’

  ‘Sort of confessed? How can you sort of confess?’

  ‘He says he doesn’t remember the night at all. Had some sort of blackout. But he says he wanted her dead, so he probably did kill her.’

  ‘Probably is not a confession. If he doesn’t remember, he can’t confess.’

  ‘We did also find blood on some of the clothes in his laundry.’

  ‘Is it Curzon’s blood?’

  ‘Don’t know yet. Have to wait for the lab on that one.’

  Emily huffed in frustration. ‘I just can’t believe your boss is being so precipitate.’

  ‘If Razumov’s memory doesn’t return and if the lab doesn’t come back positive on Curzon’s blood within forty-eight hours, we will have to let him go. Doesn’t mean we’ll stop looking at him, but we will have to get something solid before we can arrest him.’

  ‘Thank goodness for that. May I visit him in the meantime?’

  ‘Not while he’s in the holding cell. No protocol for that. After his arrest, yeah, I can arrange it.’

  A massive yawn came over the line. ‘Listen, Emily, I’ve got to get some sleep. Call me if you have any more ideas. Tomorrow, that is. Not tonight.’

  ‘No. I’ll sleep on it tonight.’

  But whether she could sleep knowing Daniel was in jail was another question. The more she thought about it, the more certain she became that he was innocent – and that she would have to be the one to prove it. She could not allow Taylor Curzon to continue to victimize Daniel from beyond the grave.

  Emily thought she might see Svetlana in the library next morning, even without Daniel. But she had the place to herself. Working on her book seemed pointless and selfish when a young man’s life hung in the balance. She set off in search of Svetlana.

  Halfway across campus she met the girl walking the other way. ‘Oh, Emily,’ Svetlana gasped, running up to her and grabbing her hands. ‘They’ve arrested Daniel!’

  ‘Not exactly arrested,’ Emily said gently. ‘They’re holding him. That’s not the same thing.’

  ‘But they think he did it! It isn’t possible, Emily. Really it isn’t. He may talk like he thinks murder is justifiable, but he doesn’t really believe that. He couldn’t actually do it. You do believe me, don’t you?’ Svetlana gazed at Emily as if her whole world depended on her answer.

  ‘As a matter of fact, I do tend to believe Daniel is innocent,’ she said cautiously. ‘And the evidence they have against him is all circumstantial. They don’t have enough to charge him yet. The problem is they have nothing at all on anyone else.’

  Svetlana wrung her ungloved hands, which had a bluish tinge. The thermometer had not risen above freezing this morning. Emily feared that between her emotional brittleness and impending frostbite the girl might shatter. ‘I was just going for coffee. Come with me and we can talk inside where it’s warm.’

  They scurried to the Paradox. Emily ordered plain coffees, for the speed of it, while Svetlana collapsed on to a couch.

  The girl received her coffee gratefully but barely sipped it; she needed it more as a hand-warmer than as refreshment. ‘I want my father to represent Daniel, but he refuses. He thinks he’s guilty. Can you imagine? My own father believes I could love a man who was capable of murder.’

  ‘I’m sure he doesn’t see it in those terms. And anyway, would your father be able to practice in Oregon? I assume he’s licensed in Massachusetts.’

  ‘Oh. I guess that’s true. But the way he said it, it sounded like he wouldn’t consider doing it even if he could.’

  Emily squeezed Svetlana’s hand. ‘I understand your father’s attitude is an extra burden when you really need his support. But it doesn’t change anything for Daniel.’

  The girl shook her head mournfully. ‘You don’t understand. My father won’t let me visit him or even write to him. He wants me to leave Bede and transfer to Harvard or Radcliffe. Never see Daniel again.’

  ‘And you can’t just decide to stay, because he’s paying the bills.’

  She nodded. ‘I don’t even have a part-time job. I’ve kind of made Daniel my job. If I refuse to go home with my father, I’ll have nothing to live on at all. And then how can I help Daniel?’

  Emily made a snap decision. ‘I can give you a job, at least for the next couple of weeks. You can be my research assistant. I just bought a computer, and I need someone to help me input all my notes.’

  Svetlana looked up, her face brightening slightly. ‘I could do that,’ she said. ‘I’m a good typist. And I can do OCR on my phone, too, so if you wanted a passage from a book I wouldn’t have to type it in by hand.’

  ‘OCR?’

  ‘Optical character recognition. You take a picture of the page, and the app translates it into text you can edit, copy, whatever.’

  That sounded like a small miracle. ‘Great. You’re hired.’

  ‘Only … if my father withdraws me from Bede, I won’t be able to stay in the dorm.’

  ‘Good point. I can offer you my spare bedroom until my tenants come back at the end of Paideia, if that would help.’

  ‘That would be perfect! By then I’ll
be able to figure something else out.’

  Emily had a sudden vision of Saul Goldstein’s reaction to this plan. ‘Best not to tell your father until the last minute, though, OK? I mean, you’ll have to tell him you’re not going, but I’d appreciate if you’d leave me out of it. If you can.’ Emily felt like a coward, but she didn’t see how diverting Goldstein’s anger toward herself would help Svetlana.

  ‘He’s planning for us to leave tomorrow. He’s only giving me today to pack.’

  ‘Has he cleared that with the police? I’d think they’d want everyone connected with the case to stick around until they’ve closed it.’

  ‘I don’t think he’s thought of that. He doesn’t see himself as being connected.’

  ‘I’m afraid the police would disagree. He had a definite grievance against Curzon. They can’t rule him out automatically.’

  ‘Good news and bad news, then. I have to put up with him longer, but he won’t officially withdraw me from Bede until we’re able to leave town. It would mean an extra hotel bill.’

  ‘Your father cares about a hotel bill? I thought he was wealthy.’

  ‘He is, but he’s also kind of tight. He’ll spend when he needs to, but he can’t stand anything he sees as wasteful spending. The dorm’s already paid for through Paideia, so he’ll want to use it.’

  ‘That works in your favor, then. At least for right now.’

  Svetlana turned her still-full cup in her hands. ‘Emily … I hate to ask one more thing of you, when you’re already doing so much. But … well, I heard a rumor that you’ve been involved in solving some murders in Stony Beach. Is there any way you could help Daniel? Try to figure out who really did it?’

  ‘I’m already planning to. As it happens, I have a police connection here, and he’s promised to keep me informed about the case. He’s consulted me about background, too. So yes, I’ll be doing what I can.’

  ‘Bless you!’ Svetlana grabbed her hand and kissed it.

  Embarrassed, Emily gently pulled her hand away. ‘You can help me too. The first thing I need to know is exactly what Daniel did on Monday. As far as you know it.’