by Edie Claire
Leigh wasn’t buying it. “Why make him drive you all the way into town? Why not use our branch in McCandless?”
Allison’s nose twitched. “Well, I like the main library better. It’s bigger.”
Leigh waited.
Allison sighed. “And they have old copies of the Post-Gazette on microfilm.”
Aha! Leigh thought. “You want to research that first murder, don’t you?”
The girl nodded solemnly. “But I’ll be perfectly safe,” she repeated.
Leigh studied her daughter, carefully contemplating the various risks. A couple hours in the library wouldn’t violate the doctor’s orders, at least. The swelling and redness around Allison’s eye had resolved nicely, and up to now she’d been good about not straining her vision. As for her mind straying where it shouldn’t — Leigh was certain that would happen regardless of where the girl was located. But the most critical point was that every moment Allison spent dwelling on events that happened in the sixties would be a moment she was not creating trouble for herself in the here and now.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go to the skating rink with the others this afternoon?” Leigh asked, giving the more age-appropriate alternative one last chance. “Lenna will miss you, you know.”
“No, she won’t,” Allison replied. “She’s meeting her friend Megan.”
Leigh gave up. “Okay, then. Fine.”
Allison smiled brilliantly. “Thanks, Mom!”
The girl’s unbridled excitement made Leigh question her decision. But it was too late now. According to her phone, Warren had texted twice since she’d hung up and was already on his way. “Apparently your dad was pretty sure I’d cave, because he’s coming here to pick you up,” she informed Allison, swinging the front door open again. “Until then, we can wait outside in the parking lot.”
It was stupid, she knew. A hundred-year-old collection of bricks and mortar and wood and beams could not logically, in and of itself, conspire to endanger the wellbeing of her only daughter.
But she wasn’t taking any chances.
Chapter 13
Leigh had just sent Allison off with Warren and unlocked the door of the van to drive herself home when her mother’s Taurus rolled up beside her in the parking lot. After catching the look of righteous indignation on Frances’s face, Leigh was seriously tempted to wave and make a run for it, but her sense of daughterly duty won out. That, and the fact that she was pretty sure that she herself wasn’t the object of Frances’ wrath — at least not at the moment. She steeled herself, relocked the van, and dragged her feet over to the Taurus’s driver’s side.
“What’s up Mom?” she asked carefully.
Frances arose from the car in stages, first checking the seat and mirror positions (which most people did only when getting in a car), then switching off all applicable dashboard controls, and only then — in a predictable order which Leigh had memorized early in childhood — checking her lipstick, collecting her giant bag, retouching her lipstick, readjusting the mirror, smoothing her skirt or slacks, moving the giant bag to her shoulder, pulling the keys from the ignition, exiting the car, locking the car, then dropping the keys into the giant bag.
“What’s up,” Frances replied, her ears not visibly steaming, but glowing beet red nevertheless, “is that despite my stellar record of a lifetime of church and community service, I have just spent half the morning being subjected to interrogation by a county detective, and all over that miserable Mr. Marconi!”
“I’m sure they know you had nothing to do with it, Mom,” Leigh soothed, feeling sympathetic. “It’s no fun being treated like a suspect. Believe me, I know. But they have to ask the questions.”
Frances’ back went ramrod straight. “Me, a suspect? Why they wouldn’t dare insinuate such a thing!”
“Um… no?” Leigh said uncertainly.
“Certainly not!” Frances declared. “It’s bad enough that I’m expected to tell tales on our good friends and neighbors who respect decency and deplore moral turpitude! The very idea that one of them could have become unhinged enough to commit murder… Really! It’s an insult to honest citizens everywhere! I told that detective in no uncertain terms that he should be looking for Marconi’s murderer in the gutter, not a church pew. The man dealt in a dirty business, and you know what they say, ‘you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas!’ Except not in any decent household. Any competent wife is perfectly capable of keeping a home free of fleas and other vermin, provided she has the proper—”
“Mom,” Leigh interrupted quickly, “Detective Stroth is inside the building right now.”
Frances’ eyebrows rose. “Why would he be?”
Leigh summarized the news about Sonia Crane, which Stroth had evidently not yet known when he interviewed Frances earlier in the morning. As far as Leigh could tell, Frances had spent every minute since her interview personally warning every former member of the Citizens Against Indecency and Moral Turpitude of their risk of impending persecution.
Leigh was beginning to feel sorry for Detective Stroth.
“It’s positively dreadful for a defenseless woman to be attacked in broad daylight,” Frances opined with regard to Sonia. “But I daresay that particular woman has lain down with some dogs herself. I doubt it has anything to do with the theater.”
Leigh wished she could believe that.
“Still,” Frances continued, “I think it’s best if you and the children remain at home for a few days. It’s prime time for spring cleaning, you know. Those curtains in your living—”
“I’m on my way home now, Mom,” Leigh assured, pulling out her keys. But in fact she found herself wavering. What was taking Stroth so long? Was he interviewing the workmen as well as Bess? All three of them (as well as Camille and the entire cast of the play) had heard Bess berate Sonia for her interference with the theater. Leigh could only hope that Bess had arrived at the building this morning before the assault occurred — and that she had witnesses to prove it.
“Are you staying or going?” Frances demanded when Leigh hesitated.
“I—” Leigh did not have the chance to answer. Bess popped out the side door of the building and held it open while gesturing wildly in their direction. “Leigh!” she said urgently. “Don’t go! Come here!”
Leigh hastened to the door with Frances following. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong, kiddo,” Bess said more mildly, shutting the door after them. “Not now that you’re here, anyway.”
“Me?” Leigh repeated. “Where’s Detective Stroth?”
“Oh, he left a while ago.” Bess gestured for the women to follow her toward the sanctuary. “And yes, you. I’m so glad I caught you in time. I told them you’d be perfect!”
Leigh tensed. “You told who what, now?”
“For heaven’s sake, Bess,” Frances broke in, “What did the detective say to you? Are you in danger of arrest? Should we call a family meeting?”
Bess whirled in her tracks, causing Leigh to bump into her and Frances to bump into Leigh. “Don’t be ridiculous, Francie!” Bess protested. “I’m not in danger of anything, and neither is anybody else!”
“You have an alibi, then?” Leigh inquired, rubbing the heel that had just been clipped by the toe of Frances’ sensible shoe.
“Not that I should need one!” Bess replied, pretending offense. “But as it happens, I stopped by the animal shelter on my way in this morning, which puts me safely up in Franklin Park at the time in question. Angie and Jackie can both vouch for me.”
Leigh exhaled with relief. “That’s good.”
“Nevertheless, we should start collecting a bail fund just in case,” Frances offered. She threw a sideways glance at Leigh. “You never know who in the family might need it.”
Leigh’s face reddened. She was offended, but she would be more offended if she hadn’t had the same idea herself.
They walked into the sanctuary in single file to find assembled on the chan
cel most of the cast members Leigh had met the day before. While waiting with Allison in the parking lot, Leigh had seen Gordon leave and the actors arrive, but she had somehow missed Stroth’s exit. She wondered if he had parked on the secondary street that ran down the building’s other side.
“Leigh’s your woman!” Bess called, giving her niece a shove in the direction of the chancel.
“Fabulous!” said a crisp, businesslike actress with a cell phone headset stuck over her ear. She thrust a playbook into Leigh’s hands and pulled her by the elbow up toward the altar. “So here’s the deal. I’m the spinster business tycoon, you’re the free-spirited third-world missionary. We’re sisters, and we’ve been fighting since we were toddlers. Our baby sister is getting married tomorrow, and we’ve both come to the wedding, but we haven’t seen or talked to each other in years, because the last time we were together was at my wedding, which never happened because you seduced my fiancé at the altar. Got it?”
“Um…” Leigh stammered.
“So you just read all the lines that say ‘Cat’ and we’ll take it from there, okay? Thanks!”
“Carol couldn’t get off work,” Bess explained, more to Frances than to Leigh. “So I told them Leigh fancied herself an actress and would be thrilled to stand in!”
Leigh frowned. Fancied herself an actress?
She tightened her grip on the playbook, cleared her throat, and smiled. She did love to act, but she’d had no time since high school to indulge herself by actually being in a show. For a thoroughly enjoyable, heady half hour, she faked her way through the role, becoming so absorbed that she temporarily forgot her reservations about their ill-fated venue.
Then she caught sight of Stroth.
A knock at the front door had been answered by one of the actors; seconds later Stroth entered the sanctuary and settled himself in an audience chair in the first row. The same actor disappeared out the door to the alcove, presumably on his way to fetch Bess — or somebody — from the basement.
“Cat?” Somebody was shouting at her. “Cat! Your line?”
Leigh jumped. “Oh, right. Sorry.” She delivered the line mechanically while the majority of her brain sought an explanation for the detective’s reappearance. He must have been around the building somewhere the whole time. Yet Bess was under the impression he had left. Where had he been? She was certain he had not walked through the parking lot. Could he have been outdoors on the other side of the annex?
A sudden image flashed in her mind of a certain pair of elderly people beckoning across the road with broad smiles. Merle and Earl.
Oh, dear.
“Cat? Your line again!”
“Sorry, sorry!” Leigh redoubled her efforts to pay attention, but failed miserably. Had Stroth got an earful from Merle and Earl about the “religious crazies?” If so, he might very well be back to continue grilling her mother. And what if they had told him about all the “bobbing lights” and other oddities that convinced them someone had been sneaking in and out of the building for years? It couldn’t have been Marconi himself, so who was it? And would that whole line of speculation make Bess look more, or less, guilty of using foul play to acquire the building?
Leigh couldn’t seem to think straight. It did not help matters when she noticed that Stroth’s attention had been caught by something on the floor by his feet. He leaned down to pick it up.
“This is the part where you kiss me,” informed a handsome actor in his mid-thirties.
Leigh snapped back to attention. “Say what?”
The man chuckled. “We can fake it if you want to. Just put your arms around my neck.”
Leigh cast a quick glance at Stroth. He had dropped something into his pocket and was now searching around the nearby chairs. Before he could do so thoroughly, however, Bess and Frances appeared in the alcove doorway. He straightened and moved toward them.
Leigh drew in a breath, looked back at her script, and threw her arms around the actor as directed. “You’re right,” she cooed in a weak attempt at a seductive tone. “And for the record, I am jealous. Very jealous.”
They remained clenched for only a second before the actress playing the business tycoon bounded onto the stage with a roar of indignation so real that Leigh forgot for one terrifying moment that the other woman was acting. Pandemonium ensued until at last the character of Cat was allowed to make an exit. Leigh slipped off the chancel and started toward the back of the sanctuary, where Stroth appeared to be in deep conversation with both Bess and Frances. Bess looked both frustrated and annoyed; Frances just looked worried. But Leigh had taken no more than two steps before “Cat” was summoned back up on stage again.
Holy crap, this actress has a lot of lines!
She plowed through the rest of the scene as best she could, keeping one eye on her script and the other on the detective. Bess appeared to become increasingly defensive as they talked, even as Frances became more contemplative… and more grave. Then Bess seemed to capitulate, stepping back from Stroth and gesturing him toward the stairs to the basement.
The hired men? Leigh thought curiously. Why would the detective want to interview them?
She had little opportunity to ponder the question as the play’s action suddenly became nonstop. Everyone in the cast was coming and going like whack-a-moles except for Leigh’s own character, who was apparently never allowed to leave the stage. By the time the third act had concluded and the cast decided to call it an afternoon, Leigh had lost track of both her mother and her aunt and hadn’t seen Stroth in half an hour.
Her first action was to check out the area where Stroth had been sitting. What had he pocketed? Had someone spilled something? It seemed unlikely, with Frances in the building, that any spill would last long. Leigh saw nothing on the floor by Stroth’s chair, but as she scouted around to either side, she did find something lying on top of another chair seat.
It was a business card. She snatched it up and read it.
Sonia J. Crane, Esquire. Crane Legal Services, LLC. Specializing in Real Estate and Property Law.
And under the title banner, the address of an office in Sewickley.
Leigh sank down onto the chair. Sonia had handed these out to the cast last night, and at least two people had discarded them immediately. There were probably several others lying around the building as well. But what of it? The information was all readily available online, if not in a printed phone book.
Still, Stroth’s pocketing the card did not look good. Everyone present last night — including the entire cast, the hired men, the Pack, and virtually all Leigh’s female relatives — had overheard Sonia’s desperate spiel and witnessed her eviction.
So whom did Stroth suspect? And what was he up to now?
Leigh rose, headed for the basement staircase, and crept quietly down it. But if she hoped to eavesdrop on the detective as he conducted his interviews with the hired help, she was to be disappointed. Hearing no voice other than Bess’s, Leigh push opened the door into the basement to see her aunt engaged in conversation with all three of the men and Stroth nowhere in sight.
“Don’t look so miserable, Ned,” Bess said comfortingly. “It doesn’t mean a thing, truly, it doesn’t. Detectives have to ask questions. That’s their job.”
“But it was the type of questions he asked,” Chaz whined like a child. “What if he suspects us of something?”
“I’m sure he doesn’t,” Bess soothed, delivering a gentle pat to one of Ned’s hunched shoulders. Bess was right — Ned did look miserable. Confusion and fear in equal proportion had turned his face to putty and dilated his pupils to twice their normal size. With his wild gray hair looking even wilder than normal — thanks to liberal flecking with cream-colored paint — the mere sight of the man made Leigh want to run screaming. If Stroth was looking for suspects based on cinematic resemblance to villains of low-budget slasher films, he could pack up his investigation now.
Fortunately for Ned, inherent creepiness seemed not to be an issue.<
br />
Diarrhea of the mouth, on the other hand, seemed to carry some risk.
“But how can you be sure?” Chaz continued to whine, shuffling his feet like a fifth grader. “I didn’t know what he wanted at first, or I wouldn’t have said so much! I just went on and on about what my grandma says about the devil worshippers — I don’t even know if it’s true, really; it’s just what she said! But there were so many weird things that happened with the haunted houses — one guy brought in a devil statue and put it up on this platform, and the next morning it was on the ground and smashed to bits — now how could you not think that just maybe this place was haunted by devil worshippers after something like that? And my grandma, you know, she’s just the kind of person who likes to talk, and sometimes we all get so tired of hearing it but you really can’t shut her up, you know? And ever since we found the body in the attic she and her friends have come up with all these theories, about satanists worshipping in here at night, and a whole cult using this place for its sacrificial ceremonies—”
“That’s all total bunk!” Bess said forcefully, stamping her foot. “And don’t you say another word about it or we’ll lose Ned altogether!”
Leigh didn’t doubt the statement. Ned had lost whatever color he started with and was beginning to sway on his feet.
Without a word, Gerardo appeared with a folding chair and deposited it behind Ned’s knees. Then he put his hands on the older man’s trembling shoulders and shoved him none too kindly down onto it.
“There are no satanists here, nor have there ever been,” Bess declared fiercely. “And I absolutely forbid any more discussion of the matter. Detective Stroth wasn’t asking about that anyway — you’re the one who brought it up!”
“He asked what we knew about Marconi’s murder,” Chaz insisted. “Some people do think the two are related, you know. I was only trying to be helpful!”
Bess rolled her eyes, then tossed her head in Gerardo’s direction. “And the detective interviewed him in Spanish?” she asked, seeming to know the answer already.