by Norma Huss
Maizie’s Diner was only a block from the downtown bus transfer point. The lines radiated from there to everywhere in Queensboro. I was hungry. I sat at Keisha’s table.
As she handed me the menu, she bubbled over. “You sure are my good luck charm. I’ve got two jobs now. I clean four days a week at the museum and work here weekends.” Confidingly, she whispered, “I get tips here. Oh, but you don’t have to tip.”
The child had a lot to learn.
“Only, this job might not last. I mean, they usually just stay open for lunch during the week, you know, for office workers. Now they’re trying weekends and nights too.”
“Looks like you’re picking up some tourist trade.”
“It’s a start, but I won’t have evenings off. I mean I won’t get the weekend evenings off. I still get all the other nights off.”
“I’ll have a cup of tea.” I stared at the menu. “While I decide, how about an update on what you learned at the museum?”
“I tell you, I learned lots,” she said. “They fired the wrong people. They didn’t do anything. I mean the wrong people—the fired people. The bosses, they’re covering something up. The robber might have been a volunteer, but probably not. It was somebody higher up. The staff was watched every minute while they unloaded that old stuff.”
Higher ups had the power to get rid of underlings, and blame them at the same time. But, could the word from disgruntled employees be trusted? “Did they say who watched them?”
Keisha shook her head.
“Very interesting,” I said, without a Laugh-In accent. One mustn’t date oneself. “Will you bring a BLT and two chocolate chip cookies as well?”
I could spend a little time here, lingering over my early lunch. My free breakfast had been a tiny plastic cup of orange flavored water, a donut, and coffee with powdered imitation cream. I ate my sandwich, nibbled cookies, and drank my tea. I was still starving. I ordered a salad and more tea, and settled in for an hour of meditation.
At least Keisha hadn’t jumped to any more strange conclusions, like the one about Barb being in danger.
But that list of names on the scrap envelope. What did it mean?
Chapter 36
Waterman’s Museum, unlike Abbott Computing Services and Freedom, Inc, was open on Sunday. No doubt all those “higher ups” Keisha and the staff blamed were at home, but I didn’t need, or want them.
“Is Nell Nordstrum here today?” I asked the attendant who took my two dollars.
“Oh, no. Not this Sunday,” she said like there was something special about the date.
“I’m glad, really. She deserves more time off.”
“Do you need to reach her?”
I’d planned my exact words. “I just stopped in on the off chance she’d be here. But never mind. I’ll see her later.” I hesitated, with the appearance of a sudden bright idea. “Perhaps you can help me. Nell mentioned that one of your board members arranged for the English exhibit. A person like that should be nominated for the Queensboro Historian Award. Do you know who it was?”
“Not really,” she said, without any concern that she’d never heard of such an award. “Maybe I can find out.” She pulled out drawers, a ledger, and a pile of paper and studied each carefully. “I’m not sure who it was, but this brochure lists all our personnel.”
The folder included names and photographs of the curator, directors of restoration and other programs, and the board members. It didn’t mention the maintenance crew, but most of them had been fired anyway. I recognized only one—board member Mr. Talbit of Abbott Computing Services.
If I were Keisha, I’d say, “Wow!” He might have arranged the exhibit. He could easily have traveled to England. A heavy museum exhibit would certainly hide a few pounds of smuggled goods.
“Mr. Talbit might know,” the attendant said, and I realized I hadn’t moved.
“Mr. Talbit?”
Nodding, she continued. “He’s upstairs in the Boardroom. I’m sure he’ll know.”
“Thanks,” I said, glancing around. “I will certainly ask him.”
Not. Most definitely not.
I immediately distanced myself from her and anyone else who might see me. What the job needed was another body, someone Mr. Talbit wouldn’t recognize.
Sylvie answered on the eighth ring.
“Come to Waterman’s Museum immediately,” I said.
“I’m not speaking to you. We are not compatible.”
Quickly, before she hung up, I asked, “Want to solve the case?” And, since cell phone calls floated free in the air, I merely added, “Someone needs following.”
“A suspect?”
“Yes.”
“Waterman’s Museum, you say? I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
Generally, twenty minutes to Sylvie meant thirty minutes or more, but she arrived in eighteen. When I stepped out from behind a large sail boat model, her greeting was, “This better be good.”
“Mr. Talbit from Abbott Computing Services is in the building right now. He’s a board member.”
“And a board member arranged for the shipment that included the gold ring.”
Nodding, I said, “He’d be the ideal person to go to England and arrange it all. Maybe he’s here picking up his loot.”
“Wasn’t there a key involved?”
“Uh-huh.” I resisted the urge to pat my body pocket with the key inside. “This brochure has his picture.”
“And, since he knows you, I get to confront him, right?”
“Lord love a duck! No. Follow him.”
“I have to find him first.”
“He’s in the Boardroom, according to the woman in the lobby. This diagram shows...”
“Just a minute,” Sylvie said as she marched away, heading straight for the attendant in the lobby.
I rubbed my brow in frustration. Sylvie would ruin the whole thing. I turned away, but stayed close enough to listen. She asked if there was a board meeting, which there wasn’t, and if anyone was in the board room, which there was. Mr. Talbit.
“That’s exactly what I told you,” I said when Sylvie joined me.
“But you didn’t know the whole picture. A detective must know the whole picture. He’s in the room alone. Or, at least the woman thinks so. Now, that’s the complete picture.”
“Which may very well change while we yammer away. You’ll want to see if he’s carrying anything. It needn’t be large, just large enough to hide the ring.”
Sylvie lifted her chin, the better to look down her nose at me. “I can figure it out,” she said and headed for the ornate main staircase.
I followed at a discrete distance, moving quickly to the rear of the museum where there was another stairway. I held my notebook as a prop. Mr. Talbit shouldn’t be in the back, but if he was, I could study my paper intently, my face obscured, my pencil at the ready.
Sylvie was nowhere in sight. True, the Boardroom was also out of sight down a corridor. I chose to stand over display counters with a view of the main stairs. I checked out exhibits of brass buttons, sailors’ mess kits, and the empty case where the gold ring had resided.
I paced, passing the brass buttons a second time, then a third. I studied a display of shells, another of rocks. What was keeping him? I’d almost completed a fourth circuit before Mr. Talbit came through carrying his briefcase. Sylvie was right behind him. She beckoned. Of course, if I’d been ahead and beckoned, she’d have insisted she knew what to do. Well, so did I. I followed, but only after Mr. Talbit was almost out of sight.
She waited for me at the door. “I’ll get the car and pull up for you to hop in,” she whispered, then darted away.
I could see the wisdom of her plan, especially if her car were right next to Mr. Talbit’s. What neither of us had foreseen was Mr. Talbit’s speed, once he reached his automobile.
Less than five minutes later, Sylvie careened to a rolling stop, forcing me to leap into a moving car. She roared off before I got the door shut.
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“What’s going on,” I demanded as I buckled my seat belt. “Trying to kill me?”
“He drove out the other exit. I should have left you behind. There, that way.” She shot forward, turning suddenly onto a small street.
“It’s one way! The other way,” I shouted.
She cut into an alley, thumping into pot holes and over speed bumps, past back yards full of swing sets and lilac bushes. “I thought for sure he went that way,” she said.
“Obviously not. What’s his car look like?”
She turned onto a main avenue. “Silver. There it is.” She was on the trail again, and managed to follow the car right into downtown Queensboro. Of course, we still lost him when his car made a light that we missed.
“Maybe he went home,” I suggested.
We both knew where that was, courtesy of our breaking and entering caper. Sylvie made a beeline for his house. She pulled into a side street and stopped before she asked, “Okay, tell me this. Why are we following him?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“No.”
“He’s a suspect.”
But of course, that wasn’t enough. Sylvie was right. Watching Mr. Talbit inside the museum might lead to incriminating evidence, but following him to his home, or almost anywhere else, wouldn’t prove a thing.
Without discussing it, we ended up circling Mr. Talbit’s block. His car was in the driveway.
“There’s nothing else to do, really,” Sylvie said. “Shall we peak in a window?”
“And get caught again? No way.”
She hadn’t noticed the neighbors, but after passing the house again, she agreed with me. Families were out in force, trimming hedges, washing cars, and tossing baseballs. “Sunday gardeners,” she muttered and gave up the whole idea of casing Mr. Talbit’s home.
“We can try the office.”
“Why?”
“Like you said, there’s really nothing else to do. Ed Hemingway blackmailed someone, and I have the number.”
“You do? You have the phone number?”
“And if it’s an office number, we can check it out,” I said, like she hadn’t interrupted. “Besides, there’s the ‘Questionable’ list.’”
“What kind of list?”
“I had it in my bag the whole time and never even knew it. It may be our answer.”
“What list?” she shouted.
“A list of names and dollar amounts,” I said slowly. “One name is the same as one of the unpaid receivables I told you about. I’m thinking embezzlement.”
Sarcastically, she asked, “You mean besides murder, smuggling, theft, and a whole lot of hanky-panky?”
I suppressed a growl and kept the conversation pleasant. Eventually, we declared a truce, and she agreed to go to the office with me. We had quite a civil discussion about any possible smuggling operation.
Sylvie started with a confusing statement. “I’ve been thinking about that jewelry list.”
I shook my head in bewilderment.
“You should remember. We talked about it at Pink Peach. The restaurant—you know.” She paused, waiting for light bulbs to go off in my head. They didn’t. “The jewelry list in my collector’s magazine and then in the newspaper.”
Oddly, I did remember, but vaguely. “Rubies, emeralds, gold, and silver.”
“The newspaper and the magazine both had the same list. Identical, so let’s say Mr. Talbit is the ringleader. He organized the exhibit.”
“Hey, slow down. What is the jewelry connection to Francine Hemingway’s murder?”
“It was stolen from Europe someplace.”
Sylvie could be obtuse, but I caught on. “And the gold ring was on the list, right? You mean that’s what they smuggled?”
“Actually, it wasn’t on the list. But it’s possible, isn’t it? I mean, they may not have listed every item.”
Slowly, I nodded. It was eminently possible. “Okay, say Mr. Talbit stole the gems and organized the exhibit. He couldn’t do it alone.”
Sylvie picked it up. “First he’d need someone in England to pack the goodies, say with foam molded around the contraband. Then anyone could unpack the crates.”
“Except they missed the ring. His ally on this side of the ocean goofed up.”
“Maybe he did that himself,” Sylvie said.
“Or Francine unpacked the box.”
“Yes, Francine! She made off with the goods and he killed her. That’s it!”
“No,” I said slowly. “He wouldn’t kill her without getting the loot first. And he’s looking for her key.”
“Not important,” Sylvie said, shaking her head. “He needed someone on both sides of the Atlantic.”
“He definitely needed an accomplice in England. How could he bring packing material into a museum without arousing suspicion?”
Sylvie rubbed her nose. “It’s getting too complicated.”
I had to agree. We left it at Mr. Talbit working alone, bouncing across the Atlantic, or up to a total of four or more co-conspirators, possibly each without the knowledge of the others.
Once we reached the Abbot Computing Service office, we had another major controversy.
“I go inside with you this time,” Sylvie said.
“But what if we’re surprised. Your system worked beautifully last time.”
“Then I go in and you stay out. I’ll not be left behind. You did ask for my help, remember?”
“And how would you know what to look for?”
“I go inside, or we turn around this minute,” Sylvie said. And, she was unyielding. We went in together. I changed my tactics as well. We entered, using Francine’s key, but I turned on the lights like we belonged there. I even left the door unlocked. If Barb walked in, I’d just tell her what I was doing. Which was, let’s see. I was making sure I hadn’t misfiled something or other. And Sylvie was along for the ride. Or, I should say, along as the ride.
At least, if Barb discovered me, I wouldn’t be in the embarrassing position of crawling on the floor.
All I really wanted was a confirmation of the number Mr. Hemingway called. Employees’ names and phone numbers weren’t listed, but the telephone on each desk had buttons labeled with names. While Sylvie headed for the file cabinets with my list, I started at the top, pushing the button opposite Mr. Talbit’s name.
His answer machine didn’t pick up. A woman did, saying, “Hello.” Was she the same woman I’d heard before?
I did what I had to do. I gave the number Ed Hemingway had called, asked if that was hers. When she said it was, I hung up.
“It is Mr. Talbit’s number,” I said.
“That means Mr. Hemingway blackmailed him, right?”
“Yes, but does it mean he’s the killer?”
Sylvie turned didactic. “We must ask ourselves, why was the dead woman’s husband blackmailing Mr. Talbit? An obvious answer is that he had something on Mr. Talbit, some evidence he found in the house. Was Francine Mr. Talbit’s accomplice or his enemy? Was she a blackmailer, or even a double-crosser? Don’t count out the estranged husband as her confidant. Stranger things have happened.”
“Mr. Talbit wanted a key,” I said. If it was the small one I found, it was safe inside my body pocket. “Sylvie, did you find anything in the files?”
She shrugged. I looked over her shoulder as she opened drawer after drawer, looking for the names on the envelope. The files didn’t held the answer, for not one of the listed names was there.
“How about that room?” Sylvie asked, indicating Mr. Talbit’s office.
“We can check.”
Mr. Talbit’s drawers were locked and there was no handy key in the pencil holder on top. We searched his bookcase which contained nothing but business books, not even a hidden bottle of brandy. I was ready to call it a day.
Suddenly, a masculine voice said, “What the hell?”
I hadn’t heard the door open. Slowly, I turned toward the voice.
It was Mr. Talbit, standing at
the door to his office, hands on his hips, murder in his eyes.
Chapter 37
Mr. Talbit advanced on me, looming like thunder on a collision course, his face livid, his voice rasping, his language blue.
“Oh, he didn’t say that!” Sylvie clasped her hand to her open mouth, then turned to me and shook her head.
He had. He had us cornered. No place to run. I had to face him. Bag lady ditz hadn’t impressed him before. And saying, “Dear me, you caught me with my hands in the cookie jar,” wouldn’t work either.
I smiled hopefully and advanced with my right hand extended, which didn’t alter his belligerence, and babbled. “I’m so glad to see you. I didn’t know how to reach you on a weekend, and, as you can see, since I’m inside your office, I found more keys. My sister kindly brought me over to check if they were the right ones, and they were. One of them opened the office door. Did you want either of these?”
He ignored my hand. In a voice of rough granite, he said, “What I want is a better explanation of why two women are inside my private office.”
Dangling the key chain, I asked, “You don’t want the keys?”
“Yes,” he said, snatching them. He fingered the two keys remaining on Francine’s ring. “But these aren’t the keys I want. I want a single key, not a key ring.”
“I don’t know.”
“Why are you searching my office?”
“I wasn’t, believe me.” So what was I doing? “I’m returning the keys. I planned to call you later.” Wonderful explanation, except he didn’t buy it. “And my sister wanted to see where I’d worked. And you, of course. She’s heard so much about you. Socially, I mean.” I could feel Sylvie’s daggers on my back.
The daggers Mr. Talbit shot my way were worse. “Give me one reason I shouldn’t call the police.”
I could think of several reasons, but none would interest Mr. Talbit. “Maybe you should call the police if you don’t trust me. I told you I’d let you know if I found a key. And I found one.”
“You found one key?”
“More than one,” I said quickly. “Those you have in your hand.”