1 52 Steps to Murder

by Steve Demaree

  “Would you like a bite?” I asked, trying to be hospitable.

  She shook her head. Her mannerisms told me that this had offended her as much as if I had licked the candy before offering her a bite.

  After she declined my offer, I unwrapped the paper from my candy bar, took a bite, carefully rewrapped it, and slid it back into my pocket. I never go anywhere without my Hershey Almond candy bars. Well, nowhere except church. I never know when a case will prolong lunch, and anyone knows a good detective works better when his stomach’s full. But I never eat a whole candy bar at one time. Well, almost never.

  Call me meticulous, if you like, but I follow a pattern when eating my candy. Each time I remove the candy bar from my coat pocket, take one bite, rewrap the candy bar, and return it to my pocket until it’s time for another bite. People laugh at me, but each time I carefully eat only one almond at a time. I determine the size of my bite by how close one almond is to the next. If two almonds are separated by only a minute amount of chocolate, I reach into my pants pocket, remove my pocketknife, and carefully cut my next bite, so as not to overstep my bounds and bite into the next almond. Sgt. Murdock and I like to have fun at each other’s expense. More than once he has told me he plans to buy a Payday, which he plans to eat one peanut at a time.

  Evidently, my actions disturbed Angela Nelson, because I noticed her looking at Sgt. Murdock, fully expecting him to have a Hershey Almond candy bar, too. Lou does carry candy, but he opts for M&Ms instead of Hershey Almonds.

  Not wanting to take all day questioning Miss Nelson, I resumed my interrogation.

  “Miss Nelson, what do you do for a living?”

  “I’m a buyer. I travel around the country buying merchandise for McAdams Department Store. You’re familiar with McAdams, aren’t you, Lieutenant?”

  “A fine establishment. Do you enjoy your job, Miss Nelson?”

  “I do, but sometimes I’m away from home more than I like. Still, buying in person gives me a better feel for the merchandise than buying online.”

  “And that takes you away from your grandmother. Tell me, Miss Nelson, how many grandchildren did you grandmother have?”

  “I was the only one.”

  “Did your grandmother have any other living relatives?” I asked as I settled into a chair across from Angela Nelson.

  Sgt. Murdock continued to stand, as did Officer Davis. The sergeant rested against one wall, while the rookie leaned against a breakfront. Angela Nelson looked at both of them, offered each of them a seat, which they both declined. Then, she faced me again and answered my question about her grandmother’s family.

  “My father died of a heart attack, and my mother died of cancer. My grandmother was my only living relative, as I was hers. She had two sisters and a brother, but all of them have been dead for quite a few years.”

  “Miss Nelson, as best you can, tell me how you came to be here today and what happened after you arrived.”

  “Well, I returned early this morning from a three-week buying trip. I hadn’t seen my grandmother in all this time and I wanted to check on her, so I decided to take a taxi here and see her before I went home. As tired as I was from the last three weeks, I knew that if I went home first I would fall into bed and not leave the house again today.”

  “You didn’t call your grandmother while you were gone?”

  “I never get back to the hotel until late, and by then she’s already in bed.”

  After answering my question, the young woman looked away from me as Sgt. Murdock reached into his pocket and removed a package of M&Ms. He ripped open the corner with his teeth and swallowed a few from the bag. The fact that both of us chose to eat candy while I questioned Miss Nelson seemed to bother her just a little. I still was not convinced that she didn’t want any candy.

  I wanted to learn what else Angela Nelson knew about what had happened earlier that day, so I continued my questioning.

  “So, you took a taxi here after your plane landed. Don’t you own a car?”

  “I do, but I prefer not to leave it in long-term parking at the airport, so I always leave it at home and take a taxi any time I travel.”

  Angela Nelson had stopped wringing her hands and had placed them in her lap, but her sad look remained.

  “What time did you arrive, Miss Nelson?”

  “I’m not sure exactly. The cab company might have a record. Anyway, I got out and instructed the driver to take my luggage to my home. I didn’t want to lug it all over the place.”

  “You trusted the taxi driver with your luggage?”

  I could not believe someone would do that in these times. Maybe it was just the policeman in me coming out.

  “Oh, sure. I’ve done it several times before, and my luggage always gets home okay. They take much better care of it than the airlines do. Of course, if I had known that you were going to be here, I would have kept it with me and let you carry it up when you arrived,” she said as her face broke into a smile for the first time.

  Try as he might, Officer Davis was unable to suppress a grin, although he turned away from me to hide it.

  I wasn’t about to let anyone get the best of me, so I replied, “Oh, I’m sure any good, well-meaning taxi driver would’ve carried your luggage up the steps, and Sgt. Murdock and I would have been willing to sit on your suitcases and slide down the hill when you left.”

  Angela Nelson laughed and replied, “And I would’ve let you do that as long as I could’ve watched, especially if you’d aimed for a tree.”

  I’d already noticed how beautiful Angela Nelson was, but I noticed that her smile improved her looks even more.

  “We have digressed, Miss Nelson. Please tell me what you did when you arrived here this morning.”

  Angela Nelson’s smile disappeared.

  “I rang the bell. My grandmother didn’t answer, so I rang it again. When she didn’t answer the second time, I went to check with Miss Penrod to see if she had any news of my grandmother.”

  “Miss Penrod?”

  “Yes, Irene Penrod. She lives next door at 121. She checks on my grandmother occasionally and more often if I’m out of town.”

  “Don’t you have a key to your grandmother’s house?” I asked as I removed the Hershey bar from my coat pocket and plunked another almond and the surrounding chocolate into my mouth.

  Angela Nelson cast a glance at Sgt. Murdock to see if he pulled out his package of M&Ms, but he didn’t.

  “Yes, I have a key, but the door was bolted.”

  “But won’t your key unlock the bolted door?”

  Angela Nelson didn’t appear to have heard the question. Once again, she watched as I removed a knife from my pocket and sliced off another bite of chocolate.

  “Miss Nelson?”

  “I’m sorry, Lieutenant. What was that again?”

  I repeated the question and licked the chocolate from my hands.

  She shuddered and then answered my question.

  “The door was double bolted. My key will unlock the dead-bolt lock, but not the second one. You can check it out.”

  She reached into her purse, removed her keys, and flipped them to me. “It’s that one,” she said, indicating the key to the front door.

  I got up from my chair, walked over to the door, and rewrapped my Hershey bar as I looked at the double bolt. I slid the key into the lock and turned the key. I looked at the other keys. None of them fit. I finished my experiment, returned Miss Nelson’s keys to her, and resumed my questioning.

  “Miss Nelson, do you have any idea who else had a key to this house?’

  “Well, of course my grandmother had a key and Miss Penrod had one, too. I’m sure of those two, but my grandmother told me she gave keys to other neighbors, as well. Oh, and come to think of it, Mrs. Murphy, the cleaning lady had one, as did Bobby, the grocery boy, Mr. Hornwell, her attorney, and Mr. Hartley, the mailman. But it really doesn’t matter who had a key. See, even if someone had a key, there’s no way they could have gotten
into the house unless my grandmother pushed the button or went to the door and unlocked the sliding bolt.”

  As Miss Nelson mentioned the names, I jotted them down in my notebook.

  “Back to Miss Penrod, Miss Nelson. What did she have to say when you went over this morning?”

  “Miss Penrod didn’t answer her bell, either, so I came back here and rang again, figuring that maybe my grandmother had been in the bathroom, or had fallen asleep on the sun porch and hadn’t heard the bell. When she didn’t answer the second time, I called the police and they sent out Officer Davis.”

  “I assume you used your cell phone.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Why didn’t you use it to call your grandmother or Miss Penrod?”

  “I figured if my grandmother didn’t answer the door, she wouldn’t answer the phone, either.”

  “And Miss Penrod?”

  “I have no idea what her number is.”

  “And how long after you called did Officer Davis arrive?”

  “Oh, probably ten minutes or less.”

  She laughed.

  “What’s so funny, Miss Nelson?”

  “Well, for a minute there I thought I was going to have to call the police to report an accident.”

  Officer Davis looked down and hid his eyes. I suspected Sgt. Murdock and I were about to learn more than Officer Davis had told us upstairs.

  “Go on, Miss Nelson.”

  “Well, I heard tires screech and looked up to see this police cruiser barreling down the street. Just when it looked like it was going to crash into the two trees at the end of the street, the officer must have returned to reality, because he applied the brakes and came to an abrupt halt.”

  I could see why Officer Davis hadn’t told me everything.

  “Please continue, Miss Nelson.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t have been so candid.”

  “No, we want to know everything from your perspective.”

  I said “we” wanted, but I knew that one of us didn’t want the other two to know what had really happened.

  “Well, he backed into a drive, turned around, and pulled up in front of this house. He seemed to call in, as if to let someone know that he had gotten where they told him to go. Then, he got out and stood there, as if the climb was too much for him.”

  I wanted to smile, but I couldn’t. This was definitely a different version than the one Officer Davis shared upstairs.

  “I did my best to put him at ease. I told him that I was the one who called, that there were only fifty-two steps, and he could hold on to the handrail as he climbed.”

  How could telling someone they had fifty-two steps to climb comfort them? At least, I had found out how many steps Lou and I had conquered.

  “And then what happened, Miss Nelson?”

  “Well, I told Officer Davis why I’d called, and told him that we needed to break in to see if my grandmother was okay. First, he insisted on trying my key, even though I’d already tried that. Then, he said he couldn’t do anything unless he called in first.”

  This time I couldn’t suppress my grin, and Miss Nelson grinned, as well. So, she too figured Officer Davis couldn’t do anything unless he called in first.

  “He seemed to take forever, but finally he returned. He insisted on ringing again before he cut a hole in the glass. Eventually, we entered through the living room window.”

  “And what did you do next?”

  3

  Angela Nelson had become more comfortable with the questioning. She had her hands folded calmly in her lap and had crossed her legs. Angela Nelson’s legs were long, shapely, and tanned just enough that they neither resembled Addams Family white nor did they look like she had fallen asleep in a tanning bed. I wished I were ten to fifteen years younger. As a detective, I’m paid to notice things. I’m paid to notice people, too. Because I’m a man, I pay particular attention to beautiful women. The more Angela Nelson shifted in her seat or crossed her legs, the more I noticed that I was in the presence of a strikingly beautiful woman.

  I even began to notice her clothes. Other than a light-weight jacket, I had no idea what I was wearing that day, but I checked out her outfit. Instead of traveling in a business suit or a casual pants outfit, Angela Nelson wore a white skirt, a knit green-and-white top, and white sandals with a thin strap between the big toe and the second one. Later, when I relayed this information to Mary, one of our police dispatchers, she replied, “A white skirt and sandals this late in the year?” As far as I was concerned, Angela Nelson could wear a bikini in December and I wouldn’t mind.

  Because God gave me the handicap of being a man who has lived alone most of my adult life, I had no idea what colors a person should wear in what season. I do well to button my shirts the right way, so that both sides end at the same place at the bottom. But I did notice that the white in Angela Nelson’s clothing contrasted with her tan. The green in her top highlighted the green in her eyes. Her thick, straight, auburn-colored hair fell to her shoulders and framed her face quite nicely. She wore only a little make-up. She didn’t need it. She was quite beautiful without it. Everything about Angela Nelson, her tan, her hair, her eyes, her clothing, complemented everything else.

  I noticed no tattoos on Angela Nelson’s body, but then if a woman is dressed properly only an ankle tattoo would be visible. I can remember when only sailors marked their bodies with tattoos. Angela Nelson didn’t need to make a decision that would alter her body for life. The thought of tattoos caused me to smile to myself as I thought of the young women I had witnessed at the mall who bent over and showed off their tattoos, and more. Too bad I won’t be alive sixty years from now when elderly women will sport indiscernible tattoos on their wrinkled backsides.

  Miss Nelson must have been able to read my mind, because she cleared her throat. My thoughts returned to the matter at hand. I glanced at Angela Nelson once more and gained further evidence that the young woman was easy on the eyes. Then I raised my eyes to make contact with Miss Nelson’s eyes and waited to hear her answer to my question. I was thankful she remembered what I’d asked; I wasn’t sure I could have at that moment.

  “I told Officer Davis that my grandmother has, uh, had a heart problem and that it would be best if he let me look for her, so that she wouldn’t become scared when confronted by a stranger. I told him I’d call him if I needed him.”

  I raised my eyebrows and interrupted Angela Nelson.

  “Pardon me for breaking in, Miss Nelson, but wouldn’t your grandmother have been frightened by seeing you, as well?”

  “I don’t understand, Lieutenant.”

  The look in her eyes echoed her statement.

  “Your grandmother didn’t admit you to the house, so wouldn’t she have been frightened if she saw anyone?”

  “I never thought of that, Lieutenant. I guess that’s possible, but more than likely she would’ve been less frightened of me than a stranger.”

  “Please go on, Miss Nelson. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

  Angela Nelson knew that I did mean to interrupt her, but didn’t pursue the point and continued with the details of her search.

  “Sometimes my grandmother sat out on the sun porch and watched the birds fly in and out of the yard, so I headed to the back of the house to see if she was there. When I didn’t find her, I came back and told Officer Davis that I was going to look upstairs. He followed me halfway up the stairs.”

  “Officer Davis didn’t accompany you?”

  “There was no need. He was just on the stairs a few feet away.”

  I made a note that Officer Davis didn’t tell us he didn’t accompany her.

  “And how long were you gone?”

  “Probably not more than a minute.”

  “Thanks, Miss Nelson. Please continue.”

  “Where was I? Oh, yes. I went upstairs, started with the rooms closer to the stairwell, and eventually found my grandmother in her bedroom.”

  I interrupted again.
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  “Sorry to break in again, Miss Nelson, but when you went upstairs, why didn’t you go to her bedroom first? Wouldn’t you think that would be the most likely upstairs room to find your grandmother?”

  “Not necessarily. My grandmother spent some time in her sewing room, and anyway, when you’re looking for someone, it just makes sense to start in the room closest to where you are.”

  I reached into my pocket and again removed the Hershey bar. By this time, I’d eaten almost half of the chocolate bar. Lou followed my action, pulled out his bag of M&Ms, and gulped down a few more.

  “Go ahead, Miss Nelson. Pick up where you left off with your upstairs search.”

  “After I saw my grandmother wasn’t in the sewing room and the bathroom door was open, I thought maybe she was asleep and that was the reason why she didn’t answer the bell, so I rushed to her bedroom. When I first saw her, I figured I was right, and I just stood there a few seconds looking at her. As I drew closer to the bed, I couldn’t hear her breathing, so I picked up her arm to check her pulse. I’m not sure, but I think that when I couldn’t feel her pulse, I screamed and Officer Davis came running up the stairs.”

  Angela Nelson did her best to keep from breaking down again, and while she didn’t cry, her expression showed that she was becoming emotional once more. I paused for a moment to let her regain her composure and then continued.

  “Miss Nelson, how long was it from the time you first went upstairs until you screamed and Officer Davis came running?”

  “I don’t know, Lieutenant. Officer Davis could probably tell you better than I could. I assume just a few seconds, but things were pretty fuzzy for me at that point.”

  I didn’t tell her that I didn’t agree with her assertion that Officer Davis could probably better tell me.

  “Please go on, Miss Nelson. I know you’re anxious to get this over with.”

  “Well, when Officer Davis came into the room, I explained to him what had happened. He said he needed to report it, and we headed to the stairs. As we made our way down the stairs, we heard someone running through the house and out the front door.”