Trumpet of Death

by Cynthia Riggs

  “May I come in?”

  Victoria recovered quickly. “Of course. I was seeing the image of your grandmother and forgot myself for a moment.”

  Abilene stepped into the kitchen. “I remember hearing her say how you and she were close friends.”

  “We used to bird-watch together. You’re like her, you know.”

  Abilene nodded. “I was only a child when I knew her. She seemed terribly old to me, although she was only in her seventies.”

  “Let’s sit where we can talk.” Victoria led the way into the cookroom. They sat at the table.

  “I understand you knew Samantha well,” Victoria said. “I didn’t know her at all and I’m hoping to learn something about her.”

  Abilene folded her hands in her lap and looked down at them. “I guess I don’t know where to begin.”

  Victoria stood up. “Would you like a cup of tea?”

  “Do you have herbal tea?”

  “I do. Do you like honey and lemon in it?”

  “Yes, indeed.” Abilene stood. “I’ll help.”

  Together they went through the tea-making ritual, discussing tea and the location of spoons.

  Seated at the table, Abilene said, “I might as well begin. Sammy and I were really close.”

  “I know,” said Victoria. “I understand you were lovers.”

  Abilene looked down into her tea. “Not everyone understands.”

  “Were you still close at the time of her death?”

  Abilene looked up again, and Victoria could see pain in her eyes. “Everybody saw Sammy as a spoiled rich girl who had everything.” She stopped.

  “But you saw her differently?”

  “She was all that.” Abilene paused. “Sammy’s mother divorced her father when Sammy was just a little girl. She was tossed back and forth in one court case after another, her parents fighting for custody. You can imagine what that does to a kid.”

  Victoria nodded.

  “He won. He had the money and the lawyers. Her mother lost. So he brought her up, if you can call it that.” Abilene sipped her tea and set the cup down. “Anything that money could buy. His idea of love is shoving money at his kid.”

  Victoria was quiet.

  “I’m no psychologist,” Abilene continued, “but it was so obvious. Sammy seeks love, and Daddy hands her more money. Sammy tries to attract his attention with crazy stuff, he never stops her, just throws more money at her. She wanted to see just how wild she could get before he did stop her.”

  “And he never did,” said Victoria. “Did she end up hurting you?”

  “Yes, she did. I loved her and she responded like a drooping plant when you water it. She was starved for love and I gave it to her.”

  “From the little I know about Samantha, she had an Island-wide reputation for wildness,” said Victoria.

  Abilene nodded. “She was what she was. I guess I was a small haven for her when she was desperate. I knew all about her drugs and drinking and boyfriends. I thought I could handle it. I understood where she was coming from. I never expected her to change.”

  “Do you have any thoughts on who might have killed her?”

  “She hurt a lot of people. Especially a small group of high school girls who got all caught up in the ‘wicked’ stuff they were doing.” Abilene made quote marks in the air. “Fun and grown up messing around with drugs and sex.”

  “You were close to Samantha despite how difficult she must have been,” said Victoria. “Right up to the end, weren’t you?”

  Abilene shrugged. “Sounds stupid, doesn’t it.”

  “Love can take us to strange places.” Victoria thought for a moment. “Tell me about your yoga practice. Do you have a studio?”

  Abilene smiled. “I share a really nice space I rent along with three other people.”

  “That sounds like a good arrangement,” said Victoria. “How often do you hold your yoga classes?”

  “Every weekday morning, from seven until noon.”

  “No wonder you’re in such wonderful shape,” said Victoria.

  Abilene smiled again. “Yoga is good exercise. Come over to my place sometime and I’ll show you around.”

  “Thank you.” Victoria wrote herself a note and checked her watch. “I’ve taken up a lot of your time, Abilene. You’ve been most helpful. Losing such a close friend is difficult enough without having to talk about it.”

  “You’re going to hear a lot of Sammy-bashing,” said Abilene.

  A car pulled up. Abilene looked out the window. “I’d better leave. I don’t want to face anyone right now.”

  Victoria pointed to the back door that led out of the cookroom, and before her next visitor knocked on the door, Abilene had disappeared.

  * * *

  Victoria anticipated the knock and opened the door. It took her a moment to recognize her caller.

  “Mr. Eberhardt. Good evening. This is a surprise.”

  Eberhardt looked gray and weary.

  “Please, sit down,” said Victoria. “What can I do for you?”

  “I needed to talk to someone, Mrs. Trumbull.”

  Victoria glanced at him. He was a parent who’d lost a child in the most chilling way possible and he was in anguish.

  “I think you need a stiff drink,” she said.

  He nodded.

  “Sit down.” Victoria pointed to a chair.

  He looked behind him and sat on the nearest seat. Set his elbows on his knees and lowered his head into his hands.

  “I can only imagine how you must be feeling,” she said.

  He shook his head as though in denial.

  “What can I do to help you?” Victoria stood watching him for a moment. “I seem to recall that you prefer bourbon. Will Jim Beam do?”

  He looked up. “Yes. Thank you.”

  Victoria fetched the bottle from the cabinet under the coffeemaker and set it on the table in front of him along with two glasses. He didn’t move.

  “We’ll be more comfortable in the cookroom. If you’ll take the glasses and bottle to the table in there, I’ll bring ice.”

  He stood, but didn’t move.

  She looked at him with concern. “When did you last eat?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t remember.”

  “Not for a while, I imagine.” She turned to the refrigerator and opened the freezer. “Here’s the ice. You pour yourself a drink, while I make an omelet.”

  “I can’t eat. I don’t want anything.”

  “Pour me a very light one, just a finger’s worth.” She held up her forefinger. “With water.”

  He moved. Dutifully dropped ice into their glasses, refilled the ice cube tray with water, made her a light drink and himself a heavy one, and went to the cookroom. He pulled out a chair. She heard the chair squeak as he sat. She heard him take a deep breath.

  She busied herself with the omelet. A hearty one with bacon and onion. She toasted two slices of bread. Buttered them and slathered them with strawberry jam.

  She glanced over to the cookroom. Eberhardt hadn’t touched his drink. His arms were folded on the table and he was staring out the window into the dark night.

  She carried a plate with his supper into the cookroom and sat in her usual chair. He looked at the omelet.

  “I can’t eat.”

  “Try a bit, otherwise you’ll hurt my feelings.”

  He lifted the fork. Cut into the omelet with its bacon and translucent onion. Took the smallest of mouthfuls. Chewed and swallowed. Looked up at Victoria again, this time with a faint smile and dug in.

  They said nothing until he’d scraped his plate clean, eaten every crumb of toast, and reached for his drink.

  “The world looks better once you’ve eaten.” Victoria reached for her own drink and took a small sip.

  He nodded.

  “You said you needed to talk. I’m a good listener.”

  “I’m not accustomed to asking anyone for anything, Mrs. Trumbull.” He folded his napkin and tossed i
t onto the table next to his clean plate. “Yet here I am, seeking you out.”

  “Losing a daughter like that would drive any parent to distraction.”

  Victoria waited.

  Eberhardt stared at his empty plate. “I don’t know where to start.”

  “We have plenty of time,” said Victoria.

  He took a deep breath. “Sammy was popular. She had a lot of friends.” He glanced at her.

  Victoria was not about to let him know what she had learned about Sammy’s friends.

  “I didn’t know most of them. Zack. She didn’t say much about him. Had no idea they were so involved.”

  Victoria took another small sip of her drink.

  “She was sure he intended to poison her,” said Eberhardt.

  Victoria looked down at her hands and said nothing. What could she say?

  He glanced at her. “I spoke with you after dinner that night and become convinced she was wrong. That he had good intentions.”

  Victoria looked up at the baskets hanging from the beams. She looked at the bookcases under the window that held her gardening books. She couldn’t meet his eyes.

  “I thought Sammy was probably overreacting,” he continued. “Which she’s inclined to do.” He studied his empty plate. “But Sammy was right. He intended to kill her. And this time he succeeded.”

  Victoria said nothing.

  “I identified her body at the mortuary. My baby girl.” His voice broke. “You can’t imagine what it was like. I wouldn’t have recognized that rotting flesh as my beautiful baby girl.”

  Victoria had seen the body.

  He began to speak again. “She had tattoos. I recognized them. The police officer was polite. Sensitive.” He took a small sip of his drink. “I swore I’d get even with that bastard. I swore I’d kill him. Swore that, right in front of the cop.”

  Victoria said nothing.

  “If that cop took me seriously…” His voice trailed off.

  “He understood,” said Victoria.

  “No one understands,” said Eberhardt. “I told myself killing was too good for him. I want to see him locked away in a prison where no one will ever find him. Every day I will curse him and the day he laid eyes on my Sammy.” He took a small swallow of his drink and set the glass down. “That stupid boy will not destroy me, too.”

  They sat quietly. Eberhardt stared at the window. The window reflected his image back to him. Victoria toyed with her drink, turning her glass around and around on the red-checked tablecloth.

  She broke the silence. “You’re right about his being stupid. He is a stupid boy. You’re wrong, though, about his killing your daughter. Someone else did.”

  “He intended to kill her.” Eberhardt picked up his glass and slammed it down on the table. “He killed her.”

  “He didn’t succeed,” said Victoria. “She was assaulted. He doesn’t have the nerve to assault anyone.” She set her own glass down. “We have to find who did kill her.”

  “I’ve found him, Mrs. Trumbull. And I’ll make sure he pays. He’ll regret the day he was born.”

  “He’ll be punished. He’s likely to be locked up for attempted poisoning, but he’s not the one who killed your daughter.” She took another small sip of her drink. “Surely, you don’t want the killer to go free.”

  “I know who the killer is, Mrs. Trumbull.”

  “I don’t think so, Mr. Eberhardt. Zack might poison, yes. Blunt instrument, no.”

  Eberhardt shook his head.

  “With your help, we’ll find the killer,” said Victoria.

  “No.”

  “Assume for a moment that Zack could not possibly have killed Samantha. That means we don’t know who the killer is. We need to track down the killer and see that he’s punished.”

  “Are you backing me into a corner, making me say I don’t want her killer punished?” Eberhardt wiped his forehead with his napkin. “Mrs. Trumbull, Zack wanted my Sammy dead. That’s enough for me.”

  How was she going to get through to this thick-headed man? Zack had no intention of killing Samantha with the trumpets of death. She would try a new approach.

  “You’re a risk taker, Mr. Eberhardt, aren’t you?”

  “That’s how I got where I am.”

  “I’m a gambler, myself. Shall we make a bet?” Victoria occasionally bought a lottery ticket.

  “What are we betting?”

  “Give me the support I need for the next ten days and I will find the real killer.”

  “Financial?” He raised his eyebrows.

  “Financial, and your time.”

  “And if you find the real killer is the one I’ve already identified?”

  “I’ll apologize.”

  He laughed. “Some bargain.”

  “It will take your mind off your suffering for the next ten days. At least, partly.”

  “And suppose you identify no one?”

  “We’ll find the killer, whether it’s a him or a her.”

  He held out a hand and she shook it. “I suppose you’ll want a signed affidavit to the effect of this agreement?”

  “The handshake will do,” said Victoria.

  CHAPTER 20

  When Mrs. Trumball pointed to the backdoor so she could avoid her visitor, Abilene slipped out of the cookroom into the former woodshed, where Mrs. Trumbull now kept her plants. From the woodshed a back door led to the outside, and Abilene could escape unseen.

  But Abilene wanted to know who was visiting Mrs. Trumbull. When she closed the cookroom door, she found she was on a flight of three steps leading down into a room. She sat on the top step. A half-moon shone through skylights, the only illumination. By moonlight she could make out the shapes of plants on the floor and hanging from the ceiling.

  She heard the kitchen door shut. She heard Victoria exclaim and a man answer, but couldn’t make out words. She pressed her ear against the door.

  Footsteps into the cookroom, a chair scraped, a chair creaked as someone sat heavily on it.

  More footsteps, lighter, clearly Mrs. Trumbull.

  “I can’t eat,” she heard the man say.

  Abilene recoiled. She heard him clearly. That familiar voice. Sammy’s father. That rotten excuse of a father. That arrogant, egotistical prick of a man. What was he doing here?

  They were speaking clearly enough so she stopped leaning against the door. She felt her face flush with anger.

  He’s playing a new role, grieving parent. The faker. How can Mrs. Trumbull possibly believe him? Grief? Love? His only thought during Sammy’s entire life was to keep her away from her mother. He’d buy her anything. Anything. He had no idea she was into drugs. Didn’t even know the names of her friends.

  She’d heard enough. She had to get out of here before he returned to his car and noticed hers. He’d recognize it.

  She stood and winced as the step creaked, a sound everyone in the vicinity surely heard. She eased down the steps and tiptoed past the potted plants and gardening tools, hoping she wouldn’t knock over something she couldn’t see in the darkness.

  Once outside, she could smell the faint odor of skunk. That’s all I need tonight, a run-in with a skunk, she thought. The night air was chilly and she shivered. She brushed against the shrubbery growing near the woodshed door, and the right side of her jeans got soaked with cold dew. Despite the bright moon, she could make out stars, millions and billions and more of stars. Phoenicians had navigated by those same stars. Now the Hubble Space Telescope was out there exploring the universe and its tens of thousands of galaxies. Hundreds of millions of galaxies. Too many to conceive of.

  And here she was, nothing. Not even a dust mote in the universe. Not even a recognizable entity on Earth. Even on this Island. Mrs. Trumbull called her by her grandmother’s name. Sammy really, truly, hadn’t given a damn about her. She’d thought she understood Sammy. But who was she to Sammy? Was there any purpose to her life? Abilene, hot tears of self-pity dripping down her face, reached her car without enco
untering the skunk. She slipped behind the wheel, started up the engine, and stole out of Mrs. Trumball’s drive without turning on the headlights.

  She would pay another visit to Mrs. Trumbull. Maybe Mrs. Trumbull would recognize her as Abilene Butler, a person in her own right, not the grandmother she hardly knew. As she’d listened to Samantha’s father and Mrs. Trumbull talking, she felt sick at the way Daddy had maneuvered Mrs. Trumbull into feeling sympathy for him so easily. That cold-blooded bastard.

  At the end of the drive she flipped on the headlights and waited for her eyesight to adjust before she turned onto the paved road.

  * * *

  After Eberhardt left, Victoria was thinking about their conversation when Elizabeth came home from work. Victoria had just taken her typewriter out of its case and was about to work on her column.

  Even after a day’s work, Elizabeth looked trim in her white uniform shirt and creased tan trousers. “I’m exhausted,” she said, flopping down in the chair Eberhardt had vacated. “How was your day, Gram?”

  Victoria told her about her visitors.

  “Lucky those two didn’t meet,” said Elizabeth. “I’d hate to see the bloodbath.”

  Victoria pushed her typewriter aside.

  “What did Samantha’s father have to say for himself?”

  “He fell to pieces after he had to identify his daughter.”

  “That I can understand. Awful for anyone. Even Bruno Eberhardt.”

  “Mr. Eberhardt was planning to take matters into his own hands,” said Victoria.

  “He told you that?”

  “Pretty much so. He told Sergeant Smalley at the mortuary that he was going to kill Zack.”

  “What on earth was he doing here?” asked Elizabeth.

  “He had no one to talk to.”

  Elizabeth stood. “Why you? I mean, I’d go to you when I needed someone to talk to, but that power-hungry excuse for a father?” She started toward the kitchen.

  “He was broken,” said Victoria.

  Elizabeth turned. “Don’t believe anything he says.”

  Victoria heard the refrigerator door open and shut.

  “I feel sorry for him,” Victoria said.

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Are you finding something to eat?”