Watchdog

by Laurien Berenson

  “How’s that?”

  “Pardon me?”

  Detective Petrie leaned back in his chair. He did not look pleased. “I was just wondering how it was that you might have come up with some knowledge about the case. Unless you mean that your brother told you something that he might not have passed along to us.”

  “No, that’s not it.” I cleared my throat nervously. “I’m sure Frank told you everything.”

  Petrie’s only response to that was a noncommittal grunt.

  “It’s just that my brother’s been concerned about your viewing him as a suspect.”

  “Considering the extent of his involvement in the circumstances surrounding Mr. Rattigan’s murder, we would be foolish not to think of him as a suspect.”

  “Yes, of course. But I thought you might want to consider some other possibilities. I imagine you know that Rattigan’s ex-wife, Gloria, inherited nearly his entire estate?”

  Petrie nodded.

  “Are you aware that she is romantically involved with Rattigan’s vice-president, Ben Welch, who spied on Rattigan for her before the divorce? And that now that her ex-husband is gone, Gloria’s planning to appoint Ben to run the company?”

  I’d been hoping my information would surprise and amaze him. Unfortunately, judging by the expression on the detective’s face, I hadn’t succeeded in eliciting either emotion. Instead of asking for more facts, Petrie asked, “How do you know all this?”

  “Gloria told me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I asked her.”

  “Is she a friend of yours?”

  “No. But there’s more.” Somehow this was not going the way I’d hoped. I rushed on before he could ask any more questions. “At the time that he died, two of Rattigan’s projects were being protested by different groups that were hoping to shut them down. There were the neighbors who didn’t want the coffee bar conversion to take place, and also Preserve Our Wilderness—”

  “The old Waldheim estate,” said the detective. Now he looked almost bored. “We’re aware of all that.”

  “Then you’ve spoken to John Monaghan?”

  “We’ve spoken to everyone we feel we need to. Mr. Monaghan’s concern for the quality of life in his neighborhood seems quite understandable.”

  “Did he tell you that he and Marcus Rattigan were old friends? That they used to own a dog together?”

  Not one for large gestures, this time Petrie lifted a brow. “One dog? For the both of them?”

  “A show dog. Champion Wirerock Winter Fantasy. Monaghan was the breeder and Rattigan paid the bills so that she could have an extensive show career.” Petrie pulled out a pad of paper and made a note. “And this was a source of contention between them?”

  “No. As far as I know, they got along fine and the dog did a lot of winning.”

  He laid down his pen. “So what’s the problem?”

  I tried to figure out how I could phrase what I wanted to say without dragging my brother into it. “Don’t you think it’s odd that Monaghan would organize a protest against a building owned by an old friend?”

  “Perhaps a little. But no more so than that two friends could be Democrat and Republican, or black and white. Some friendships thrive on their differences.”

  I sat back and sighed. This wasn’t getting me anywhere. “I guess you know that Rattigan and his secretary had an affair.”

  “We’ve interviewed Ms. Barnum several times. She said the relationship ended almost a year ago. We saw no reason not to believe her.”

  “Okay, I give up.” As we’d talked I’d managed to ball up my jacket in my lap. I shook it out and got ready to put it on. “Do you have any other suspects besides my brother?”

  “I’m afraid I can’t comment on that.” Detective Petrie’s voice was firm, but his eyes were sympathetic. “The investigation is still ongoing at this point. The best thing your brother can do is make sure he’s told us everything he knows.”

  “I’ll tell him.” It hadn’t escaped my notice, as I was sure it wasn’t meant to, that this was the second time Petrie had implied that Frank might be holding something back.

  The detective stood and extended a hand. “You do that.”

  When I reached the Brickmans’ house, I could hear the noise coming from within as soon as I got out of the car. Of course it helped that the front door was standing open. I walked up and stuck my head inside. “Hello? Everyone alive in here?”

  “Come on in,” yelled Alice, her voice barely discernible above the din. Music from a CD warred with the Mario Brothers’ theme and was punctuated by the shrieks of three children at play.

  As I walked through the door, the two boys came flying into the hall and went up the stairs. A moment later, Joey’s two-and-a-half-year-old sister, Carly, appeared, her chubby legs pumping hard as she ran after them. Seeing me, she slid to a stop.

  “We’re playing tag,” she announced, touching my arm, then jumping back. “You’re it!”

  Alice came walking in from the kitchen. “Ms. Travis doesn’t want to play, honey. I think you’d better try and catch one of the boys.” She looked up at me. “Shut that door, would you? Our oil bills are through the roof. Joey just can’t seem to get it through his head that summer’s actually over.”

  Alice was several years older than me, an age gap that would have seemed insurmountable in high school. Now, with all we had in common, it made no difference at all. She had beautiful strawberry blond hair, which she usually wore pulled back out of the way, and lightly freckled fair skin. Today she looked paler than usual.

  I pushed the door closed and heard it latch. “You okay?”

  “I’m just tired. You know how it is with kids. You start at dawn and it never lets up.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” My tone was half accusing.

  Alice and I had met in a neighborhood play group shortly after our sons were born, and quickly become friends. Over the years we’d covered for each other more times than I could count. I used her, and she used me. The reason the system worked so well was because we were scrupulously honest with each other when something wasn’t convenient.

  “It’s no big deal,” said Alice. “Come on in the kitchen and have a cup of coffee with me. That’ll revive me.”

  “How’s Joe?” I asked as I followed her to the back of the house. Like the rest of the homes on the street, the Brickmans’ house was a Cape with a pretty basic floor plan. When Joe had started making some serious money at his law firm in Greenwich, they’d built an addition on the back that added a large family room to the first floor and another bedroom upstairs.

  Much as I considered Alice one of my best friends, I hardly knew her husband at all. He worked long hours at his job and wasn’t into socializing with Alice’s friends when he got home.

  “The same as always,” said Alice. She set up the coffeemaker and turned it on. “Joe never changes, or if he does, he’s not around enough for anyone to notice.”

  Ouch.

  “Anything I can do?” I asked.

  “Yeah, sit down and drink coffee with me and talk about something else.”

  That sounded easy enough. I took a seat at a built-in booth that had been added the same time as the family room, pushed Carly’s crayons and coloring books out of the way, and told her about Marcus Rattigan’s murder and my brother’s involvement in the whole mess.

  While I was talking, Alice put two mugs of steaming coffee and a carton of milk down on the table and joined me. By the time I’d finished, she’d brightened. “You know, that’s what I like about you, Melanie. No matter how bad my life seems, you’ve always got something worse going on.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “No, really. You have a real talent for putting my problems into perspective. What’s up with you and Sam these days?”

  “A week ago I thought he was about to propose.”

  “That’s great! Congratulations.”

  “Then he changed his mind.”

 
; “That’s not allowed.” Alice was outraged on my behalf. “If you want, I’ll call him and tell him so.”

  I shook my head. “Even if he changed his mind back, I’m not sure what I’d say. We had a bit of a disagreement.”

  “Your first?”

  “Pretty much so.”

  “So work things out.”

  Like Aunt Peg, Alice was a big fan of Sam’s. Actually, so were all the women I knew. And while the physical aspect certainly played a part, I knew there was more to it than that. Sam was smart and kind and fun to be around. He loved children and animals. He wasn’t perfect but he came closer than any other man I’d known.

  “I’ve been waiting for him to call me,” I said glumly. “I’ve been an idiot, haven’t I?”

  “Yup.”

  “How about you?” I countered. “Are you going to work things out with Joe?”

  “Of course I am. Do I look stupid to you?” There was a thunderous noise on the stairs as the three kids came running down into the kitchen. “Can you imagine me trying to find someone else willing to be saddled with those two?”

  “Sure,” I said, grinning.

  “You’re either an optimist or a liar.”

  “Put me down as an optimist,” I said. “It sounds better.”

  “Hey, Mom!” cried Davey.

  “Hey what?”

  “What’s for dinner?”

  The eternal question. “Wait and see,” I said. That’s the answer I use when I have no idea but I’m hoping to find something interesting in the freezer. I got up and carried my mug over to the sink. “Is Joe coming home for dinner?”

  “He said he would.” Alice shrugged. “Men.”

  I glanced at the boys. “Think ours will grow up to be any different?”

  Joey had a light saber he was swinging around the room with abandon. Davey ducked just in time as the toy passed over his head and narrowly missed sweeping the milk carton off the table.

  “Maybe.” Alice sighed. “If they live that long.”

  Eighteen

  The next day at school, I ducked out again during lunch. Yankee pot roast was on the menu, and its delicious aroma had been wafting through the halls all morning. For the sake of my stomach and my job, I hoped this kind of truant behavior didn’t get to be a habit.

  As I saw it, the only way I stood a chance of seeing Ben Welch was if I presented myself at Anaconda Properties and refused to take no for an answer. Liz Barnum could bar my access forever by phone. In person I might be able to make a more persuasive case.

  Liz was sitting at her desk and talking on the telephone when I arrived. She stared balefully in my direction and took her time about ending the call. By the time she hung up, I was leaning my hip against her desk and eavesdropping shamelessly. Too bad she wasn’t talking about anything interesting.

  “I’d like to see Ben Welch,” I said as soon as she put the receiver down.

  “He isn’t available.”

  “That’s what you told me yesterday.”

  Liz smiled condescendingly. “That’s because he wasn’t available then, either. If you’d care to leave a message . . .?”

  She would write it down and drop it into the wastebasket as soon as I left, I thought. “Why are you protecting him?”

  “I’m not. I’m simply telling you the truth. Ben isn’t available. He isn’t even here.”

  So much for my grand plan to storm his office if she wouldn’t let me by.

  “It seems like he’s been out of the office a lot lately.” Acting on a hunch, I added, “I guess he’s been with Gloria.”

  Liz’s smile froze. “I doubt that.”

  “I don’t. I gather they’ve been spending quite a lot of time together.”

  “They have business to discuss—”

  “I’m sure they do. But that’s not all that keeps Ben busy when he’s with Gloria.”

  Her fingers had been tapping an irritated rhythm on the desktop. Now her hand stilled. “Do you know what you’re talking about, or are you just trying to annoy me?”

  “I know enough.”

  She glanced down the hallway, then she pushed back her chair and stood. “Let’s go into Marcus’s office. I’d rather talk privately.”

  Once there, Liz shut the door carefully behind us. “I don’t think much of innuendo, so let’s get straight to facts. I know you’ve been asking a lot of questions. What exactly have you found out?”

  “Not so fast,” I said. “Before I tell you anything, we’re going to make a deal. I’m damn sick and tired of running around in circles. I’m neglecting my job, my boyfriend’s mad at me, and I’ve barely had a chance to walk my own dog. I’ll tell you what I know but only if you agree to do the same for me.”

  Liz thought for a moment, then nodded grudgingly. “I guess that’s fair enough.”

  I stuck out my hand. She looked surprised but didn’t hesitate, and we shook on the matter.

  “Did you ever wonder how Gloria found out about your affair with Marcus?” I asked.

  “No, not really. I just assumed he’d slipped up somewhere. Maybe I was hoping that subconsciously he’d wanted to be found out.”

  “So that Gloria would have a reason to divorce him?”

  Liz nodded.

  “She wouldn’t have, you know. Gloria’s the type of woman who wants desperately to be married. If she had to overlook a few transgressions on the part of her husband, I’m sure she could have managed it. Anyway, Rattigan didn’t get careless. Gloria told me herself that she had a spy in the company.”

  “A spy?” Liz snorted. “How very dramatic. It sounds just like something Gloria would think of.”

  “Apparently she wasn’t the first to come up with the idea. She claims that Rattigan had their servants keeping tabs on her, and that she was only retaliating.”

  The phone began to ring in the reception area. Liz seemed oblivious. “What does any of this have to do with Ben?”

  “He’s the one she chose to do her dirty work.”

  “No.” Her tone was emphatic. “Ben wouldn’t have done something like that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because ... because . . .” Liz’s hands flailed ineffectually.

  She seemed to be taking things personally, which made me think that my hunch had been right. Gloria wasn’t the only one who’d been looking for a successor after she lost Marcus, and Ben Welch had been even busier than I originally suspected.

  “Marcus was the one who gave Ben his start in business,” said Liz. “The two of them weren’t just co-workers, they were friends. I can’t believe he would have hurt Marcus that way.”

  “According to Gloria, she offered extra incentives. Their relationship doesn’t end with business.”

  “Gloria’s a liar!”

  “She’s not lying about this. Now that Rattigan’s gone, she’s planning to keep the company and let Ben run it.”

  Liz struggled to regain her composure. “She hasn’t made any announcement to that effect.”

  “No, but Ben knows.”

  “He doesn’t know anything of the sort. If he did, he would have told me.”

  “Are you sure? Obviously he hasn’t told you everything. No matter how close your relationship is.” I gazed out the window and let the thought dangle.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Liz snapped. “You’re thinking I went straight from Rattigan’s bed to Ben’s, but it wasn’t like that. Believe me, it wasn’t like that at all.”

  She began to walk around the room, letting her fingers glide softly over familiar objects. “Ben was the one who courted me. He knew what had happened with Marcus, of course. He offered me consolation, and a shoulder to cry on. It all started very innocently. We had lunch together a couple of times a week. From there, our feelings for each other just grew.”

  “So that’s why you didn’t leave the company after Marcus ended your affair?”

  “Partly, I suppose. But mostly because I have a damn good job here. Salary, ben
efits, and a lot of responsibility. I’d have had a hard time matching that anywhere else.”

  Last time she’d insisted that ending their relationship had been a mutual decision. This time, I noticed, she hadn’t corrected me. This lying thing was getting to be an epidemic. Not that I was immune certainly, but didn’t anyone tell the truth anymore?

  “Tell me about the day Rattigan died,” I said.

  Liz stopped wandering. She squared her shoulders and faced me. I was glad to see that anger seemed to be shoring up the chinks I’d made in her facade. “What about it?”

  “Why did Rattigan go to the coffee bar that evening?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You told the police that he had an appointment with Frank.”

  “I’m well aware of that,” Liz said stiffly.

  “I imagine you’re also aware that the police have been treating my brother as their chief suspect, at least partly as a result of what you told them.”

  “Frank did call here that day. All I did was embellish a bit. At the time I thought I had a good reason.”

  “Which was?”

  She grimaced slightly. “Ben didn’t have an alibi for the time Marcus was killed. He’d taken some work home from the office and spent the whole night by himself in his apartment going over some plans.”

  “Did he ask you to cover for him?”

  “No, it was nothing like that. It just occurred to me that naturally the police would be looking into Ben’s whereabouts. I thought that it wouldn’t hurt to shift some of the blame in another direction.”

  “You thought it wouldn’t hurt?” Lord, was I steamed. If I were a cartoon character, there would have been smoke coming out of my ears. “What made you choose my brother as your scapegoat?”

  “That part was obvious.” Aware of my annoyance, Liz was treading lightly now. “Frank is such a sweetheart. I thought anyone would be able to tell that he couldn’t have done it. Besides, it’s not like he had anything to gain from Marcus’s death.”

  Little did she know, I thought. It was beginning to look as though half the town of Stamford had had something to gain from Rattigan’s murder.