1 52 Steps to Murder

by Steve Demaree

  “Of course I didn’t know anything about the tape until we arrived at Miss Nelson’s. Luckily, once I arrived at my conclusion, I memorized everything I could about any of Miss Nelson’s phone calls. When I narrowed my suspect list and decided who murdered Mrs. Nelson and Mrs. Jarvis, I had to devise a plan to capture her. It was then I thought of the two, white envelopes that Miss Penrod told us about and the two envelopes Hornwell made sure Officer Davis saw. Our murderers knew Miss Penrod might tell us about the envelopes, so they had to have a story ready in case we confronted them with it. After some thought, I came up with the idea of trying to get Miss Nelson to agree to assisted suicide. If we could get her to agree to that and catch her in a lie, I felt we could get her to break.

  “In addition, we got a search warrant for Hornwell’s cabin. Just before I left the house this morning I received a phone call telling me that the rest of Mrs. Jarvis’s money had been found. Yesterday afternoon, a Mr. Anderson contacted the department. He said Mrs. Jarvis knew someone found out where she had hidden her money, and she thought that person or those persons would try to steal it. She confided in Anderson, who isn’t known to anyone else on Hilltop Place. Mrs. Jarvis gave Anderson a list of all the serial numbers of the bills and told him that under no condition would she allow the money to leave her house before her death. An officer picked up that list and Mrs. Jarvis’s note from Anderson last night. Some of the serial numbers matched the money we found in the house Hartley rented from Hornwell. The others matched the bills they found in the safe in Hornwell’s cabin.

  “But that’s not all, Lou. We found some samples of Mrs. Jarvis’s handwriting. I believe we will find that tests will prove that the note about the money is actually her handwriting, while the “will” Hornwell has is a forgery. And one more thing, the guys up north did some more checking today. They located the people who have the cabin next to Hornwell. They arrived at their cabin around noon on Friday and left Monday morning. They said Hornwell wasn’t at his cabin at any time on Friday, but arrived sometime late Saturday night. Hornwell had not arrived by the time his neighbors walked their dog around 10:00 Saturday night, but his car was there when they took the dog for a walk early Sunday morning. The couple even commented that they were surprised to see Hornwell’s car on Sunday morning, because on the weekends Hornwell uses his cabin, he arrives sometime early Friday evening and leaves Sunday afternoon. Other than the weekend of the murder, his neighbors have never known him to vary from this routine. While his neighbors didn’t see Hornwell arrive, they did see him leave Sunday afternoon. They were sure it was Hornwell. He waved to them as he left. Our boys up north had already determined that there was only one set of tire tracks and one set of footprints leading to and from the cabin. Evidently, Hornwell only went to the general store on Friday, then hightailed back to Hilltop Place and never set foot in his cabin until late Saturday night when he called his wife from the cabin phone to establish an alibi.”

  “Cy, you just never cease to amaze me, but there are a couple of things I still don’t understand.”

  “Such as?”

  “First of all, why didn’t they just strangle Mrs. Nelson? Why such a production?”

  “Miss Nelson said Hornwell called the shots. First of all, Hornwell is the kind of guy who wants to match wits with the police, to show that he is smarter. Second, Miss Nelson said Hornwell thought with all the modern technology we would’ve been able to prove murder anyway. If he choked her, marks would show on her throat. If he used a towel, we might’ve been able to find fibers in her mouth. Plus, Hornwell was so afraid that Mrs. Jarvis would talk and cast suspicion on one or both of them, so he felt they had to do away with her, too. He didn’t figure anyone would believe two deaths by natural causes so close in proximity and time.”

  “But why didn’t Hornwell kill Mrs. Nelson instead of taking a chance on Miss Nelson being able to do it?”

  “This is all conjecture on my part, but I believe that Hornwell wanted Angela Nelson in as deep as he was. I don’t think Hornwell would’ve committed either murder unless he had to. When we sent Angela away, Hornwell had to make a decision. Either he had to let Mrs. Jarvis live, or he had to kill her.”

  “Well, like I said, Cy, you never cease to amaze me.”

  “I should’ve amazed you sooner.”

  “Or I should’ve amazed you. After all, I was privy to most of what you knew.”

  “So what are we going to do now?”

  “I’m not sure there’s anything to do. We just need to wait for the trial, if there is one.”

  “No, I mean now.”

  “Oh, you mean now now. Well, it looks to me like it’s lunchtime.”

  Lou and I were happy to conclude another case. A closed case meant more time for eating, dating, reading, and watching TV. But who knew when we’d get called in on another murder case? As it turned out, another murder has already taken place. I’ll fill you in later.