A Wee Homicide in the Hotel

by Fran Stewart

  “Why don’t you stand first? Then it’ll be easier to pick up the dog.”

  She looked confused, as if such a simple procedure were beyond her. Finally, some sort of reasoning took over and she gathered her feet underneath her. When she lifted the dog, it whined and scrabbled its paws a bit, but settled fairly quickly, its hairy chin on Peggy’s shoulder. Harper could see a small strand of insulation caught in the dog’s splayed eyebrows. He reached out slowly and recovered it.

  Harper traded places with Murphy and followed Peggy out of the room. Behind him, Murphy said, “The manager said we could use her office for questioning witnesses.”

  “Right,” said Harper. “Send word when Dr. Olafson arrives, will you?”

  * * *

  I was more aware of Harper’s hand on the middle of my back than anything else. Not Silla whimpering softly in my arms, not the other police officers in the hall, not the people milling around in the lobby. Just Harper’s hand. And Macbeath walking beside me down the wide hallway. The manager led the way to her office, stepped aside for us to enter, and closed the door behind us as soon as we were inside. When Harper took his hand away, it left, just above my waist, a warm spot that quickly turned cold.

  “You’re shivering,” he said, and removed his dark blue Windbreaker.

  “I canna give ye the shawl wi’out the constable wondering how it appeared.”

  “I know,” I said. “That’s okay.”

  Dirk stepped quickly to one side as Harper wrapped the jacket around me, and around Silla as well. I felt very grateful for that small kindness. It held the heat of his body. Silla barely seemed to register it. Poor thing. Could dogs go into shock?

  “Are you able to talk about this, or do you want to wait to answer a few questions?”

  “I thought you had to get statements right away.”

  He just looked at me, and his charcoal eyes gave me permission to take all the time I needed.

  “I can do this,” I said. Silla whimpered again, and Dirk reached out to lay his hand very gently on her head. She sighed and I felt her head go limp against my shoulder. I pulled my head back and studied her. Her eyes were closed.

  “The wee doggie has been through enough this day. Her heart is hurting, would ye no say?”

  “Poor sweetie,” I said.

  “Can you tell me what happened?”

  “I think she just fell asleep,” I said. My ghost just worked his magic.

  “I mean, what happened with Mr. Bowman.”

  “Oh.”

  After I went through the day’s events, slowly this time, one step at a time, he asked me when was the last time I’d seen Big Willie, only he referred to him as Mr. Bowman.

  I thought back. “I ate lunch with him yesterday at the Logg Cabin.”

  I could see Harper’s involuntary glance at Silla.

  “We ate at the outside tables. He asked me if I’d be willing to hold Silla for him while he competed so he wouldn’t have to leave her in the room.” I felt myself shudder. “That’s why I went to the caber field a little before ten this morning.”

  “So, yesterday around noon was the last time you saw him?”

  “I think it was more like one o’clock, but yes. No, wait. He and Silla took a walk after that—he’d told me they were going to.”

  Harper looked confused. “Are you sure you don’t mean yesterday morning?”

  “No. I mean yes, I’m sure. He did take a walk in the morning, but he said he wanted one alone—just he and Silla—after lunch. I think the morning walk was the one he took with Shay. Shay Burns. She . . .” Did I want to use the word confronted? “They had a conversation in the ScotShop, and then they left together. They headed up Main. That was when I saw you coming out of Sweetie’s Jellybeans.” I stopped talking. I still didn’t know what his favorite candy was.

  He seemed to be studying me. “What was it you were going to say?”

  I gulped. “That I don’t know what your favorite candy is.”

  “I dinna think that is what he was asking ye about.”

  Harper opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again. “I meant, what were you going to say about Shay?”

  “Oh.” Dirk was right, doggone him. “Well, they seemed to be having some sort of an argument. Of course, Shay was the one doing all the talking, the way she usually does.”

  “Why do you think it was an argument?”

  “Later, Gilda told me she’d heard Shay tell Willie—order him was the word Gilda used—to leave town. She accused him of something.”

  “Of what?”

  “Gilda didn’t say. We had customers, and I told Gilda not to say anything.”

  “But you didn’t hear any of the argument yourself?”

  I shook my head, and Silla stirred. I stroked her back beneath the Windbreaker.

  “So then, they walked up the hill and the next time you saw him was at lunch? Is that right?”

  I thought back to Scamp’s woof from the window yesterday afternoon. “Yes, but then I saw him—them—again. I assume they were returning from the afternoon walk, although they weren’t gone very long. When I spotted them, they were headed down Main, just past Sweetie’s. They turned in at the alley leading to the big grassy area behind the hotel. I think he liked to go to his room that way so he wouldn’t have to walk the dog through the lobby.”

  “Do you know what time that was?”

  “Everything’s a jumble. I don’t . . . Maybe it was . . . about two?”

  If I hadn’t been looking at Harper’s face, I wouldn’t have seen the shadow that crossed it. Luckily, Dirk spotted it as well. “Something has bothered our constable. Something about the time of day, forebye.”

  Hmm. Dirk must have mellowed a bit toward Harper. Before, he always called Harper the constable. Now it was our constable.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  Harper’s eyes narrowed. Not in suspicion, not in doubt. In pain? That’s what it looked like. “I must have just missed him,” he said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “It was right around two when I checked Bowman’s room. There wasn’t an answer to my knock, so I looked in through the outside window.”

  “I did, too. This morning, like I told you, after he didn’t show up at the caber toss.”

  He nodded, but I wasn’t sure he really heard me. “I went back up to the lobby. He must have come in right after that. If only I’d waited another few minutes, he’d still . . .”

  He sounded like he was going to say something else, but his voice faded out to nothing.

  “He’d still what?”

  Harper started, as if he’d forgotten I was there. “He might still be alive.”

  “Why?”

  “I was trying to arrest him.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Arrest him?”

  “I thought he was the fellow who was trying to assassinate the president.”

  “You have to be kidding. Big Willie?”

  Harper groaned and passed a hand across his face. “I know it sounds crazy now. I’d been tailing him since yesterday morning. He looked like he might be the guy in the mug shot who had eluded the Secret Service.”

  “Aye,” Dirk said. “The man they put in the big carriage”—he meant the car, I thought—“looked a wee bit like our Large William.” Dirk had better long-distance eyesight than I had—that was for sure.

  “But what does that have to do with Big Willie still being alive?”

  “If I’d brought Bowman in for questioning . . .” He took a deep breath. “Bowman and the dog . . . then maybe—” He stopped as if he’d thought of something. “I need to find out what Olafson says about the probable time of death.” He looked at his watch. “He should be here by now. Will you be okay if I leave you in the lobby?”

  “Can I go back to the ScotSho
p? Gilda’s good, but I shouldn’t leave her on her own this long during our busiest season.” How could I be talking about store sales while Big Willie was still lying facedown in a bathroom? With bagpipe cords around his neck. I swallowed the lump I felt forming at the back of my throat.

  “Yes. Just don’t talk about this to anyone.” He looked like he was going to add something, but he just shook his head.

  “Right.” I unwrapped myself from his Windbreaker and handed it back to him. I could feel the tears beginning down by my toes, now that this was almost over. “Thanks.”

  “One more question.”

  “Umm?” I could barely talk.

  “What did his room look like when you peeked in the window this morning?”

  I didn’t have to think about it. “Messy.” I gulped back my tears. “I remember feeling kind of disappointed that he wasn’t . . . tidier somehow.”

  “As messy as it is now?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “When I looked in his window yesterday, it was one of the tidiest rooms I’ve ever seen. The dog bed was set up, and the suitcase was on the luggage rack.” He looked like he was about to say something else, but all he added was “That was about all.” I wondered what else he’d seen.

  It was funny how relieved I felt, though, to know that Big Willie had truly been a tidy person. Silla whined in my arms, as if she were agreeing with me.

  “And you didn’t see him at all after he walked down the street around two o’clock yesterday? Thursday.”

  I shook my head. “No. He didn’t make it to the opening ceremonies last night. I looked around for him, but he wasn’t there. I’m pretty sure I would have seen him.” And if I’d missed him, Dirk would have spotted him.

  “If ye hadna seen him, I would ha’.”

  I smiled at Dirk, and saw Harper looking a question at me.

  “I’m glad Silla feels comfortable with me,” I said. “I’ll take her home until you can find out—” I stopped because I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say. Silla whimpered again, and I knew I wanted to help her through this. I hugged her closer and stepped toward the door.

  “Peggy?”

  My name sounded golden in his mouth. I gulped. Even with the image of Big Willie before me, I was totally aware of Harper. Here. Now. “Yes?”

  “It’s chocolate. Dark chocolate.”

  “What is?”

  “My favorite candy.”

  I left the hotel in something of a daze, narrowly avoiding running into a man carrying a large black case of some sort.

  17

  Is now most still, most secret, and most grave.

  ACT 3, SCENE 4

  Harper hated to send her away like that, but he didn’t have a choice. Dr. Olafson walked into the lobby just as Peggy was leaving, and Harper had to shift gears back to cop mode. Nothing but a cop.

  He knew Olafson had been mentored by Dr. Gunn, the state ME. Both men liked to see the scene by themselves at first. Harper was relieved to find that Murphy, after having taken pictures of everything, had cleared out and was waiting in the hallway.

  White male, deceased was all that Harper had said to Olafson. Olafson nodded and studied the entryway of the room before he stepped in, just one step, and appeared to study everything one more time from this different perspective. After the third step, followed by the third stop, Harper gave up and turned to Murphy. “Any surprises?”

  “How closely did you look at the body?”

  “Not very. I was more interested—” If he were being truthful, he’d have to admit he was more interested in comforting Peggy, but he couldn’t very well say that. He cleared his throat. “I was more interested in getting the witness statement.”

  Murphy studied him.

  Harper was determined not to squirm. “So, what did you see?”

  “Back of the neck. Deep depression.”

  “From the bagpipe cords?” Harper didn’t think so. The cords were only long enough to wrap around the front and sides of the neck. Particularly a neck as massive as Bowman’s.

  “No,” Murphy said. “More like the victim had been chopped with a judo or karate move. The head’s at a funny angle. I’d say his neck’s broken.”

  “Think it comes through well enough on the photos?”

  “Ayuh. Sure do.”

  Harper waited a long time and then walked into the room, still careful not to disturb anything lying on the floor. The crime scene technicians would have conniptions if anyone disturbed possible evidence. Somebody had been looking for something—that seemed fairly clear, although he tried never to make assumptions this early in a case. All the zippers on the suitcase were unzipped, and the main compartment of it gaped open. The drawers of the wardrobe hung open. The ruffled skirt around the bottom of the bed was all messed up, as if someone had thrust an arm in as far as he could reach, sweeping back and forth to see if anything was secreted between mattress and box spring. He was surprised the mattress hadn’t been upended onto the floor. The bedspread itself was thrown back, the sheets all awry. The bagpipes that had been so carefully spread out on the bed when he’d first looked in . . . Harper did not want to complete that thought.

  He paused outside the bathroom door. Olafson was still crouched over the body, but now he looked up. “I want to turn him over. Come help, please.”

  At least he’d said please, which was a big improvement over the brusque orders Dr. Gunn always had given at the crime scenes Harper and Gunn had been at together. Olafson was a lot more pleasant, but Harper sure hoped he was as competent as Gunn. Harper stepped carefully into place, judging the best angle to lift from so he wouldn’t throw his back out.

  Olafson had already positioned a body bag, opened to its full extent. Even though Harper didn’t require an explanation, Olafson said, “I want to move the body as little as possible. If we try to lift it onto the bag or slide the bag onto the body, we could lose vital evidence. I have the feeling there’s a bigger story here, and I want to see what’s underneath.”

  Big Willie was built like a linebacker. Even with decomposition well under way, Harper knew the body would be heavy. Olafson had placed a soft brace on Bowman’s neck, and it held the head steady in relation to the body.

  Harper knew better than to ask if Olafson had made any preliminary deductions. When the medical examiner was ready, he’d give out information. Before that, Harper might as well save his breath.

  So he was surprised when Olafson paused and said, “You might want to look for someone with knowledge of jujitsu, karate, or one of the other martial arts.”

  Just what Murphy had suggested, but of course Harper didn’t say anything about that. “Was a karate blow the cause of death?”

  Olafson took in a long breath. Harper wondered how he could do that this close to a day-old dead body. “The neck appears to be broken, but that may have resulted only in partial paralysis. Let’s get this man turned over.”

  Together they hefted the bulk, lifting as carefully as possible on his shoulder and hip. Once Bowman’s body was faceup on the body bag, Harper could see the wisdom of Olafson’s decision. A clump of long black hair protruded from Bowman’s belt buckle.

  Olafson photographed it and then, using tweezers, pulled on one hair. The entire clump dislodged and fell to the side.

  Olafson placed the hair in an evidence bag, labeled it, and stood. Indicating the hole in the wall, he said, “Any preliminary information on what caused that?”

  “The victim owned a dog,” Harper said. “A Scottie.”

  Once he’d finished telling what he knew so far, Olafson asked, “Was that the dog I saw a woman carrying out the door when I came in?”

  Harper nodded.

  “Do you have easy access to the dog?”

  This time when he nodded, Harper hoped Olafson wasn’t a mind reader, wasn’t able to see Harper’s mental
image of Peggy clutching the dog in her arms.

  “I’ll need a hair,” Olafson said.

  Harper nodded for the third time.

  “The autopsy will give me the final answers. Death may have resulted from strangulation with the bagpipe cords.”

  Harper held his breath. It was so unlike Olafson to give out information prior to an autopsy, he was afraid to move for fear of stopping the flow.

  “My dad had a bagpipe a lot like this one,” Olafson said, gesturing to the object under discussion. “Only he loved it and cared for it. He never would have put it to such use.”

  “As far as I know,” Harper ventured, “this belonged to the victim.”

  “Ah,” said Olafson. “That would make more sense, then.” And with that, he snapped back into his usual demeanor. “Thank you, Captain. You may wait outside. I’ll call you when I’m ready to have the body transported.”

  * * *

  My first impulse, of course, was to close the shop for the rest of today—not that there was that much time left till our normal closing hour—and maybe even close it tomorrow, too. Close the store, call Karaline, call my twin, call my dad. But as I crossed the street, I knew I couldn’t do that. I’d been very fortunate; the ScotShop was doing well. But I had to face facts. Sales during all four days of the Hamelin Highland Games represented a major chunk of my yearly gross income. If I cut out even one afternoon, much less one whole day, people would find other places to spend their money, and there was no guarantee they’d come back when I reopened.

  But what was I going to do with Silla? What had Big Willie called her? My brave little trooper. She’d certainly proven that by digging her way out of the room and coming for help. Well, she was going to have to be even braver now. I pasted what I hoped was a pleasant look on my face—I couldn’t create a smile to save my soul—and opened the door of my ScotShop.

  I should have known. Scamp was there, almost as if he’d been waiting for me. For us. I kept Silla in my arms, but when Scamp let out one of his commanding woofs, she wiggled and I let her down. The two dogs disappeared under the Fair Isle sweater rack, and within moments I saw four front paws peeking out from beneath the natural wool. I reached in between two sweaters and unhooked the leash—Scamp’s blue-handled leash—from her red collar. Scamp’s black nose appeared. His tongue shot out and licked Silla’s paw, the one she’d been favoring. What natural healers dogs are, I thought. Just in case, though, I asked Dirk to keep an eye on her. “I don’t want her running out into traffic if someone leaves the door open too long.”