Her face turned the faintest pink, and she resumed her seat. "I left for only a minute or two after they announced dinner. To wash my hands."
"You know that's located in the same hallway as the linen room, don't you?"
"I didn't then. I do now. The police pointed it out to me." She sounded bitter, then leaned forward, eager to talk, her fingers kneading the balled-up handkerchief. "You haven't asked me if I saw Amanda after she took the statues to Harry."
"Did you?"
"As it happens, I did." She licked her lips briefly. "And she looked nervous. On her way back to her table, she passed close to me, and her face seemed flushed. Since she's a woman who never shows emotion, I couldn't help noticing the change."
So maybe the harpy had a motive, like a lower salary than a man in the same job would have received. I knew sex discrimination was still alive and well in corporate America.
"What time did she do that?"
"Before we went into the dining room."
"Have you spoken to her since Saturday? Did you ask her why she looked nervous?"
"She telephoned me the next day, asking questions, but she refused to answer mine, almost slammed the receiver in my ear."
I took that as an opening. "So you and Amanda Dillon aren't exactly on friendly terms."
She spent an inordinate amount of time twisting the handkerchief into a small rope. "You might as well know the truth. I think she was having an affair with my husband."
Her statement struck me into silence. The harpy had some other qualities besides understanding spreadsheets? Even more shocking, was mild-mannered Harry having an affair with her? Years had passed since I'd seen him, but I suppose he was entitled to a midlife crisis like anyone else.
Finally, I asked, "How do you know? Did he admit it?"
Her voice dropped to a lower pitch. "He wouldn't."
"Then why do you think so?"
"Because she's a gold digger."
The old-fashioned expression made me visualize 1940s movies.
"Did she want him to marry her, or did he give her money?"
She sighed. "Maybe both. I'm not sure. Olivia, you're a mature woman. You've been married twice and divorced. You've been, er, out there."
Before I could stop myself, I said, "It's a jungle out there."
Rose ignored my comment and leaned toward me. "You know that women don't age as gracefully as men. Men have character lines. Women have wrinkles. Men become more distinguished looking. Women just get old."
True or not, I'd always pictured Rose as too sophisticated to utter such clichés.
"Furthermore, my husband is—was—very wealthy, and wealthy men are targets for young women who want to advance themselves. To steal a man from his wife and enjoy the good things that the wife helped him create in the first place…" She seemed to realize the bitterness in her voice, stopped, pursed her lips, and leaned back, closing her eyes.
I used the moment to change my mental image of Amanda to that of a younger woman. Still a harpy but under senior-discount age.
"I know what you mean, but nobody said life is supposed to be fair." Embarrassed, I clamped my mouth shut over my second cliché in two minutes.
Rose opened her eyes and spoke in a quieter tone. "I'm afraid it's no secret that Harry and I hadn't been perceived as the perfect couple for some time. We didn't go many places together because his business always interfered, and you know how rumors start when a man hires a woman to an important position."
"Is it true he made Amanda his executive assistant?"
"More than that. He retained the title of president of the firm, but I worried he'd begin to call himself chairman of the board and make her the president."
"That's a radical move. Is she that good?"
The bitterness returned. "At her job or as his mistress?"
"Whatever."
She relaxed slightly, but a frown creased her forehead. "It's not pleasant to be the object of pity among one's friends."
"But you loved Harry. After so many years together, perhaps if you ignored it, his infatuation with her would have ended. That's probably all it amounted to."
"I don't think I loved him anymore."
Another startling revelation. Debra was wrong. Brad was right. "Well then, a divorce could take care of everything. You'd probably have received a good settlement."
"And let him have a trophy wife?" She apparently regretted the remark and softened her tone. "Besides, getting alimony in California isn't easy. Plus, if you remarry, it disappears."
At first, the years since I'd seen Rose had dropped away, but as she spoke, I began to feel that both of us had changed dramatically in the interim. Another thought nagged me. Could Rose be surveying the jungle herself? Did she have husband number two waiting in the wings already?
She disabused me of that notion. "Men! They're all alike. Youth and beauty are all they want in a woman." She twisted the handkerchief rope some more, a lot like strangling someone of youth and beauty. Yet, could the harpy be beautiful or only in Rose's estimation?
She dropped the hanky-rope in her lap. "Of course, assets are important. After all, I have no skills or training to earn money myself. Women in my position just don't. Still, I also enjoyed a great deal of prestige in being Mrs. Harold Hammond. In spite of the rumors, I went to all the best social events, even when he couldn't attend. I had a certain stature."
She straightened up even more, as if slouching ranked a step below streetwalking. Her frown lines multiplied like ripples in a stream. "After a divorce, my friends would have deserted me."
"Surely, if they were true friends…" I stopped, thinking how she and I had drifted apart, and that came about due to my husband's death, not hers.
"You don't understand. People can be cruel. I've seen it. My friend Mona went through a divorce, and everyone dropped her, afraid the stigma would rub off on them, afraid to allow a single woman around their husbands."
I knew the feeling. In my case, I'd been widowed before my divorce, so I supposed I'd already adjusted to watching old friends disappear and being forced to make new ones. Luckily, I'd always adapted easily to new situations.
Rose waved a hand. "Mona did one thing right, though. She made sure her alimony increased annually for inflation."
I felt my mouth drop open. Which of the ninety thousand lawyers in California thought that one up?
"However, she only gets three hundred thousand a year, and it's not the same as being in control of a million or two. Or being known as the wife of the head of a multinational corporation."
I shook my head in despair at that sad story. Poor Mona. Only three hundred thousand. And I thought I managed very well on what she'd no doubt consider Starbuck's coffee money. I moved in the wrong circles.
Depression followed. Not at the thought I didn't have that kind of income but at the picture Rose had painted for me. I didn't want Brad to be right, but her attitude certainly sounded like a motive for murder. She'd admitted she'd gone to the ladies' room. Maybe she went into the linen room first, picked up the statue, and smashed Harry's head with it. Presto! No more divorce or alimony problems for her.
As quickly as the notion came, I squelched it. Rose was no stranger, in spite of the years that had passed since we'd been close friends. The real Rose Hammond, the person I knew, wouldn't harm a killer bee.
"Rose, I know you didn't murder Harry."
"The police think so. Their attitude made it perfectly clear, even if they didn't have a reason to put me in jail."
I changed the subject again. "Exactly what will happen now that Harry's gone? Not your personal finances. I mean the business. Will you inherit it?"
"The company is privately owned. I'll inherit more shares, but I might have no say in the running of it." She stiffened again and clipped her words. "Probably Amanda will be in charge. Perhaps you should question her. In my opinion, she's the one with a motive for murder."
I tried for a reassuring smile. "I'm certain the police a
gree."
"And Brad? Will he investigate Amanda too?"
"Oh, yes. Very thoroughly. He's probably doing that right now." I got up to leave. "I'm so sorry about all this, Rose. I hope my questions didn't make things worse for you."
"No, of course not. I wanted to talk to you. Please come and see me often. To keep me informed. I want to know everything Brad finds out." We hugged again.
Driving away, I imagined my friendship with Rose rekindled and planned to see her often in the future. That was, unless Rose killed Harry and ended up living in a six-by-eight roomette with iron instead of damask at the window.
CHAPTER FOUR
I stopped for a sandwich-to-go in the coffee shop on the first floor of our building and ate my lunch at the desk in the secretary's office. Furnished similarly to Brad's, it held a swivel chair with a long credenza behind it and two straight chairs against the wall opposite. A philodendron sat on top of a filing cabinet, and prints of the Golden Gate Bridge and Coit Tower hung on the bare white walls. I bought the latter from a street artist in the Embarcadero.
After lunch, I typed up my conversation with Rose into the computer, printed it out, and added it to the pages I'd already put in the Hammond file.
In spite of the circumstances, seeing Rose again made me feel younger for a little while. I remembered the long talks we had over coffee at a kitchen table, carpooling to club meetings, shopping trips to the mall. Yet, when I thought of the dinners and other times our husbands had been with us, my spirits drooped. Perhaps, now that we were both widows, we could start our friendship over again. I just hoped she hadn't killed Harry.
At one-thirty, Brad returned. I jumped up from my chair and followed him into his office. "I saw Rose Hammond. You'll find my notes in the folder."
He plopped himself in his chair, faced his desk, and reached for the file. "Is she guilty? Should I give up the case?"
"Of course she's not guilty." My old loyalty returned, but I wondered what he'd make of her admission of marital problems. By this time, Brad had thumbed through several pages of my printed contribution.
"You not only interviewed Rose, but you typed up the whole conversation?" He dropped the folder on the desk and stood, as if what I'd done required some flattering comment. "This is remarkable."
I took on a modest look. "I know you didn't ask me to do that, but it seemed like the right thing. If you didn't need that information at the moment, you might later."
"You don't understand." He came close to where I stood and looked earnestly into my eyes. "You see, I just came from Warren's office, and we talked about you doing this very thing."
"You and Warren talked about me?" I knew he referred to his mentor, the PI he'd worked with for six months.
"What did you tell him?"
"I just said you were helping out as my secretary, and he asked questions about you."
"What kind of questions?"
"Like were you reliable, discreet, trustworthy."
"Did you tell him I'm your sister?"
"Of course. Right away he assumed you were loyal…"
"That's encouraging."
"He repeated a few things I'd heard him say before about women investigators, that they were often better than men at getting information from reluctant witnesses. They were often easier to talk to and definitely less confrontational."
"Goody. Let's hear it for women."
"Did I say immodest?"
I laughed. "Sorry." I turned aside. "Did he suggest I might type up my notes from the visit with Rose?"
"Not in so many words. He just asked if you could be relied on to share anything you learned so you could help with a case of mine."
"And I just did." I sat in the chair in front of the desk until Brad approached and resumed his place. While he went back to turning pages, I asked a question. "Who did you talk to while I was gone?"
He pulled out his pocket recorder and handed it to me. "Here you go."
"How about a summary? Now that I'm helping you, I need to be up-to-date."
"Since you're typing up my notes, you'll find out anyway." He grinned, then sighed loudly, as if doing this under duress. My brother, the actor.
"First I visited my buddy on the police force, Tom Ortega. You remember him, don't you?"
I did. He and Brad had become friends in high school, although Tom was a year older. Now, both were detectives, but Tom had remained on the police force.
Brad leaned back in his chair. "He couldn't give me much, but he did say they're sure the murderer used one of the awards statues as the murder weapon. It's heavy, about a foot tall, with a square pedestal. He said they found no fingerprints."
"No fingerprints? The murderer wore gloves?"
"Maybe. It's more likely he wiped his prints off afterward or used a napkin to pick up the statue. The room where Hammond died is filled with tablecloths and napkins. I went over there, leaned over the yellow police tape blocking the door, and managed to get a look inside."
"Did the police find a wrinkled napkin?"
"No, but it's possible the killer took it away with him. At first, they didn't even find the statue he used. He replaced it in the box with the others."
I visualized someone entering, maybe talking briefly. Then Harry turned away for a moment, and the murderer picked up one of the heavy metal statues and struck Harry with it. He wiped off his fingerprints, put the statue back in the box, pocketed the napkin, and left. Pretty cold-blooded man. Or woman.
"On closer inspection, they found one of the statues had bits of hair and skin on the pedestal."
I winced at the thought of searching for tissue from someone's head, but then that's why I wasn't a doctor or nurse. I didn't like to see a needle go into my arm, or anyone else's for that matter. I even turned away when they did it to some actor in a film.
However, I didn't mention that to Brad. I needed to look and act like a fearless woman of the 21st century. "I can understand the murderer leaving the statue behind. After all, it couldn't be stuffed in a pocket. Still, what about the napkin? Can they get prints from cloth?"
"I don't know. If he left any of his own blood or hairs on it, they might be able to get a DNA match, but it's unlikely he did."
"Then why take it?"
"Maybe he doesn't know if they can get fingerprints from cloth. Safer just to keep it until he can drop it in the bay."
That made sense to me. "So, with no fingerprints, what do they do now? Who do the police suspect, besides Mrs. Hammond?"
"Tom couldn't tell me that. They questioned everyone who attended the banquet Saturday night, and if they've narrowed it down to a few, they aren't telling."
He swiveled his chair around absentmindedly. "Then I went to see Carl Novotny at Hammond headquarters."
Aha, one of the suspects. "What do you think? Did he really just find the body, or could he have killed Harry?"
Brad put his feet on his desk. "Everyone's a suspect, like Tom said, but Novotny seems like a straightforward guy. I asked him if he saw anyone enter or leave the linen room that night, but he says so many people were milling around the reception area, that anyone could have gone in there and wouldn't be noticed. However…"
"Yes?"
"He did see Amanda go in that direction."
"We already know that. She brought the box with statues that Harry planned to give out during the awards ceremony." I remembered something else. "Rose says a young man carried the box for her. You'll need to find him and learn if he left immediately or stayed there."
Brad nodded, and I leaned forward, thinking out loud. "That means that anyone who went into the linen room before Amanda couldn't have killed Harry, because the statues weren't there yet. On the other hand, if left alone with Harry for a while, Amanda could have done it."
"True, but as you said about Debra asking me to find the murderer, it seems a little obvious for someone to wait until she brings the statues then use one to kill him." He paused. "Assuming she had a motive."
I settled back in my chair again. "I see what you mean. Using an object everyone knows you handled isn't very smart. What about the question of passion? In the heat of the moment, during an argument, people sometimes lose control and forget what's in their own best interests."
"Maybe, but we'd need to know if they argued and why."
"Did you interview her today?"
"Her secretary said she wasn't in, but I left a card and a message for her to call me."
His answer disappointed me. I wanted to meet the harpy, that is, Amanda Dillon. I liked the idea Harry hired a woman as his administrative assistant, although I secretly thought that often became a euphemism for secretary. However, from what Rose told me, it didn't apply in her case.
"Well, did Novotny see anyone go in the linen room after Amanda delivered the statues?"
"No. Being in that hallway, the doorway to it couldn't be seen from the dining room."
"Did he see anyone go in that direction? Like to the men's room?" Rose had admitted going to the ladies' room, and I didn't want Brad to think that fact incriminated her, as well as to give the other sex their shot at being under suspicion.
"He says he didn't notice." Brad pulled his feet off his desk and swiveled his chair 180 degrees to glance out the window. I was pretty sure, though, that he could see only similar white-concrete-and-blue-glass office buildings and a piece of the bridge over the bay.
He turned back toward me. "After I left Novotny and stood waiting for the elevator, I saw him come into the hall, and a very pretty girl came barreling up to him."
The plot thickened. I leaned forward again. "So what happened?"
"They argued."
"Did you hear what they said?"
"No, I couldn't make it out. He looked angry, but she did all the talking."
"Perhaps accusing him of something, like murder?"
"I don't know. The elevator doors opened and people waited for me to get on, so I did."
I frowned. "You should have pretended to be waiting to go up instead of down and stayed there and watched."
"Oh yeah? And let people spot me eavesdropping? Your one interview hasn't made you a detective yet, you know."
Dead Men's Tales (Olivia Grant Mysteries Book 2) Page 3