He wasn’t in his office or in the teacher’s lounge. I went back to the classroom, wondering if he’d returned there, but he hadn’t. I walked over to the dean’s office but no one had seen Oliver. There was no place left to check except the exhibit hall, so I headed over there, but what were the odds he’d be staring at his own paintings?
Good, apparently. I found Oliver looking at some of his earliest work. Paintings of homeless people and drug addicts in the late 1950s and early 1960s. He seemed lost in memories, and not happy ones either, based on the tears welling up in his eyes.
“Oliver,” I said quietly. “Are you okay?”
He jumped. “Heavens. Yes.” He wiped his eyes. “Yes, Nell, fine. Caught up in the past.”
I walked close to him to see what exactly he was looking at. It was a painting of a young man, unshaven and unwashed. He held a knife in his hand as if he were about to strike, but the eyes were blank. On the whole he was more sad than menacing.
It struck me all at once. “It’s you,” I said.
He nodded. “Many years ago.”
“I’m sorry.” The words came out of my mouth. “I mean, you look so sad that I’m sorry you ever felt that way.”
“So am I. Thank goodness I’m much happier now.”
“I guess my grandmother has something to do with that.”
Age and pain seemed to fall away from Oliver and he grinned widely. “That she has. She’s a lovely woman, your grandmother. Wise and smart and kind. I imagine she’s always been that way.”
“As long as I’ve known her.”
He nodded. “What she’s doing with a man like me, I can’t imagine.”
“Meaning?” This was my opening. This was where he would confess, I felt it in my bones.
Instead he sighed. “A tired old has-been.”
“You are a famous artist, a working artist,” I tried again. “You use models from the school, don’t you? You still paint and you still sell your work, so how could you be a has-been?”
Oliver took a few steps and stopped again. This time between Nobody and a painting of an unhappy woman unbuttoning her shirt. Both had shiny little gold-plated signs that read: “On loan from the Oliver White Collection.” I stared at the paintings for a moment before I realized it was the same person in both paintings.
“Is this Julie Young?” I guessed. Since he had more than one painting of her, it seemed logical that she was someone he’d had a relationship with, and Julie Young—the woman he’d pushed at the gallery opening—was the only name I knew.
He nodded. “That’s her. She was quite beautiful, or would have been if drugs hadn’t taken away her beauty.”
“Your models are still quite beautiful,” I said. “I’m kind of surprised I don’t recognize them, though, from around school.”
“So am I. I use a lot of the advanced students. It’s a good learning experience for an artist to try one’s hand at being a model. You learn about your own body as you pose. Especially how uncomfortable it is to stand in one position for a long time.” He smiled. “But it’s also extra money. And true to the cliché, there are a lot of starving artists out there.”
Suddenly my mind went in another direction. “Was Sandra one of your models?”
Oliver seemed startled at the thought. “No. Why would you ask me that?”
“I was walking down the hallway,” I lied, “and I saw you give her some money. It was the day she died.”
Oliver stiffened and took a deep breath. “You must be mistaken, Nell. I did no such thing.” He looked at this watch. “I have to go. A patron of the arts has commissioned a painting from me and I really must set to work.”
But I had one more question. “What’s the LSA Fellowship?” I asked.
Oliver stopped and turned. “Are you interested in attending the London School of the Arts?”
“No,” I stammered. “Kennette.”
“Well, she’s certainly got the talent for it. Fellowships are extremely hard to come by, but I’d be happy to recommend her.”
“Did you get one?”
Oliver paused. “I haven’t thought about that in years. I did receive the scholarship, yes. I wasn’t able to take advantage of it, though. I was leaving for the States.” He took several steps toward the door. “I’ll have to chat with Kennette about this next time I see her.”
“Well, she might be interested in work as a model, if you’re interested. To make extra money.” I threw it in, hoping for some reaction.
But there was only puzzlement.
“Really? She’s a bit shy, don’t you think?”
Then he was gone. I was left in the room with the unhappiest moments of his past on display. And a thousand new questions.
CHAPTER 37
I drove to the nearest Internet café and grabbed a coffee and donut, and then one of the computers. I might have waited until I got home and used my own computer for free, but I couldn’t wait.
I searched for the London School of the Arts. It had a splashy Web site and the names of several prominent English artists among its graduates. As he admitted, Oliver White wasn’t among them. Neither was Oliver Lyons.
I searched the LSA Fellowship recipients. The list went as far back as 1918, but Oliver wasn’t there. Of course he said he’d turned it down. So I went back to the search engine and typed in “LSA Fellowship” and “Oliver White.” No hits. I typed “LSA Fellowship” and “Oliver Lyons.” Nothing.
I tried again. I searched both of Oliver’s names crossed with “fellowships,” “awards,” “education,” and “London” in separate searches. While there was plenty about the accolades he received over the years, there wasn’t one hit for the London School of the Arts.
I leaned back in my chair and gulped some coffee. How had Kennette known about the LSA Fellowship? Had she been searching through his past like I had? Or more likely, had he mentioned it when he was painting her?
And that brought me to another question, why were they lying about it? I couldn’t imagine Eleanor caring about Kennette posing for Oliver. She wasn’t a prude. She understood that artists need models, and even with Kennette’s obvious crush on Oliver, my grandmother wasn’t so insecure as to let a little bit of modeling make her jealous.
There had to be another reason. And since I couldn’t ask either of them without admitting I’d been in Oliver’s house, I had to figure out another way. But after sitting there for almost an hour, I still hadn’t come up with an idea.
Frustrated, I drove toward home but without any intention of actually going there. I didn’t have to work and I didn’t feel up to going to Carrie’s, though I was tantalizingly close to finishing the mural.
I wanted to see Jesse. I did ask myself if I was jonesing to see him because I couldn’t, and because I hate being told what to do. But in my heart I knew it was simpler than that. I just wanted to see him. Aside from our potential relationship, Jesse had been a reliable and supportive friend. I liked the way his mind worked and I liked to talk things over with him—how things were going at the shop or in class or just anything. If we were sitting next to each other on the couch, he would stare off into space as I talked and I’d be absolutely sure he wasn’t listening to a word I was saying, but then suddenly he’d comment on it. And days later, when I’d forgotten the bulk of our conversation, he’d bring up a tiny little piece of it.
Except, of course, if I talked about the murders. That was something that was clearly off-limits. And it made me wish all the more that I could tell him what I was learning, and that instead of being angry at me, he’d be happy to have me on the case.
But that wasn’t going to happen, and I was at an impasse. I felt as though I were going around in circles. I found one clue after another, but instead of leading me in one direction they were leading in all directions. It was Kennette. It was Oliver. It was a stranger. It was a friend. The women knew each other. Their murders were unconnected. Everybody—Jesse, Powell, Kennette, Oliver, even me—seemed to have a secr
et, and I was no closer to finding out which one led to the killer.
I really needed more help than the girls could give, but without Jesse, I had no official channel through which to get it. Then, as I stopped at a red light in Morristown, I realized I finally had a destination. I parked in front of the police station and went inside.
“Chief Powell?” I asked the desk sergeant.
“Wait here,” he directed. “I’ll call him. What’s your name?”
“Nell Fitzgerald.”
I looked around the impressive station. There were marble columns near the front door, large plaques honoring officers over the years, a framed poster announcing a detective exam on March 1, and the city emblem inlaid in the tile floor.
This was definitely a more formal operation than the Archers Rest Police Department, but that made sense. Morristown was more than twice the size of our little village. We shared a fire department and a high school with them, as well as some other city services like garbage collection. It was almost as if Archers Rest was Morristown’s little brother, though I doubt any Archers residents would have admitted it. The only thing that reminded me of Archers Rest was the large poster announcing a fund-raising effort for bulletproof vests: bake sales and rubber bracelets and apparently anything they could think of to raise money. Archers Rest was always short of cash for even the most vital of police services.
“Nell.” Powell’s voice startled me.
I reached out my hand and he shook it vigorously.
“Do you have a minute?” I asked.
“Absolutely. Come back to my office.”
He motioned for me to follow him down a long hallway to a door at the end. Once inside he pointed to a chair and then sat on the other side of a large desk. He took a bottle of scotch from his desk and put it in a bottom drawer.
“What can I do for you?” he asked. “Not in any trouble I hope.”
“Not today.” I smiled. I watched him for a second as a smile broke across his face. Once he warmed up, he really was quite nice in a drill sergeant sort of way.
“How’s Jesse?”
I hesitated but what was the point? “Pretty annoyed with me.” Powell nodded. “The fingerprints.”
“He told you?”
“No. I was waiting for him to but, no, he hasn’t said anything.” He leaned forward. “It actually made me curious. Finding fingerprints on the windowsill was a terrific lead. People don’t usually enter an apartment from a fire escape.”
“I’m aware of that,” I admitted.
“Well never mind. Once I realized that Jesse hadn’t told me who the fingerprints belong to because they were yours, it all fit together.”
“How did you realize that?”
“I asked Greg to send me a copy of the report.”
“That’s pretty sneaky. He’s supposed to get Jesse’s permission, isn’t he?”
He laughed. “I would have thought you would admire that move. Besides, withholding information like that is suspicious.”
“You didn’t think Jesse was the killer?”
“I think everyone’s the killer. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”
“I guess I do too,” I said.
If I was going to get anything from him, I knew I needed to give him something in exchange, so I told him about Kennette’s secretive behavior and her knowledge of the LSA Fellowship.
“And I have a feeling there’s more going on between Oliver and Kennette than they are letting on,” I finished.
I wasn’t about to tell him about my visit to Oliver’s house. One episode of breaking and entering might amuse him; I couldn’t take the chance that he’d feel the same way about two.
“You’re really stuck on Oliver being the guy,” he said.
“More like I’m trying to prove he isn’t. You’re the one who called him in for questioning.”
“For all the good it did me,” he snorted. “Tell me why an innocent man refuses to cooperate in an investigation.”
“He said he wouldn’t help?” I asked.
“He told me that Sandra was a student, nothing more, and he had no knowledge of Lily Harmon. He was adamant about that.”
I didn’t ask him if he knew that Lily’s real name was Price. I assumed he did but didn’t want me to know. Instead I suggested a simple explanation for Oliver’s behavior. One I wasn’t sure I believed.
“Maybe he’s telling the truth,” I said.
“Then why refuse a consent search at his house?” Powell volleyed back. “Why refuse to provide fingerprints or DNA for comparison?”
“You have DNA of the killer?” I asked, stunned.
This was a huge break that Jesse had never mentioned. And the thought that he had kept it from me stung.
“No.” Powell said excitedly. “Not the killer. The victim.”
“That makes no sense. Why would . . .” And then it hit me. “You think Oliver and Sandra were related?”
Powell stared at the floor, shaking his head repeatedly as if he were trying to decide something.
“Okay,” he said eventually. “Maybe there are a few things you should know.”
He got up from his desk and walked over to a filing cabinet. He took out a box and walked back to the desk.
“This really is something I shouldn’t be sharing with you,” he said. “I can’t stress that enough. I expect you to be discreet with the information.”
Well that’s a mistake, I thought. I had five amateur detectives waiting for any information I could find.
“Absolutely,” I lied.
CHAPTER 38
There were newspaper clippings, gallery flyers downloaded from the Internet, photocopies of photographs—all about Oliver. I could barely look away from them I was so fascinated by the sheer volume of paper. But I had to know.
“Where did you get these?” I finally asked.
“Lily.” Powell grabbed a chair and pulled it next to mine. He started going through the papers until he found one he obviously wanted me to see. It was a marriage certificate for Oliver Lyons and Violet Hammel.
“Why would Lily have all this?” I asked.
“She was his granddaughter.”
“That’s not possible. He never had any kids.”
Powell got up and went to his desk. He opened a file and handed me a slip of paper.
“It’s a birth certificate,” I said. “It shows that Violet Kelly and Gerard Kelly had a daughter named Rachel on September 23, 1957, in London, England.” I handed him back the certificate. “I know Violet is Oliver’s ex-wife, but all this proves is that she remarried and had a family. There’s no tie to Oliver.”
“There is, if that little girl was actually Oliver’s daughter. Oliver’s divorce from Violet was finalized three days before she married Kelly. And the girl was born only two months later.”
“You think Oliver walked out on his pregnant wife?” I asked. “Then she just married some other guy.”
“It was 1957. She may not have felt like she could raise a kid on her own. How would she support it?” Powell tapped the paper. “And Oliver skipped the country.”
“Still, it seems pretty cold to leave your pregnant wife to fend for herself.”
“Doesn’t he seem like the type to you?”
I paused. Maybe not now. Now he seemed happy to be in the classroom or with my grandmother. But fifty years ago, based on everything I knew about him, I had to admit, he did seem the type.
“But this is just speculation,” I pointed out. “Can you prove Lily was Violet’s granddaughter?”
Powell shrugged. “I’m working with Canadian authorities to get the birth certificates for Rachel’s children. Then I can at least prove Lily’s relationship to Violet.”
“But that doesn’t prove Oliver’s related.”
Powell shook his head. “But because Rachel’s birth certificate lists Gerard Kelly as the father, I’d need DNA from White to prove that he’s actually Rachel’s father—and therefore Lily’s grandfather.”
>
“Why not get DNA from Rachel?”
“That only proves she’s related to Lily,” Powell said, “and that’s taken care of. I need Oliver to confirm the rest.”
“Does Oliver know that’s why you need his DNA?” I asked.
The whole situation was puzzling. I’d come in here looking for information about Oliver’s night of interrogation, but this was more than I had bargained for.
“The night I tracked down where Lily had been living, that was the night I brought Oliver in. I showed him all of it,” Powell said. “I explained that we found this among Lily’s things. He didn’t seem interested.”
“He denied it?”
“No. He just sat there staring into space. He didn’t ask any questions. He didn’t answer any. He certainly didn’t cooperate. Strange for an innocent man, don’t you think?”
I did. “But why would Oliver kill his granddaughter? Maybe he would kill a lover, like Sandra, if they were lovers,” I said, “but why kill his granddaughter?”
“That’s why I wanted a consent search of his house. I wanted to find first, evidence that Lily or Sandra or both had been there; and second, a motive,” Powell said. “I know in my gut that he’s hiding something in that house.”
I searched my brain for anything that might fit what Powell was searching for. There was only one suspicious item—the painting of Kennette. But even if I’d been willing to tell him I’d seen it, it would hardly help find a motive for Lily’s death.
“Can’t you just get a warrant?”
“Not enough probable cause. If I can’t prove a connection to Lily, then I can’t get a warrant to search the house. And if I can’t search his house, I can’t get the connection. It’s so damned frustrating.”
“You said you found the certificate among Lily’s things,” I remembered. “Where did you find Lily’s things?”
“She had a small apartment near Peekskill,” he said. “She was subleasing it from some guy, so the whole thing was illegal. That’s why it took so long to find. She had a roommate but that person was long gone when we arrived. The place was trashed, but I found these.”
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