“What about you, Frank?” she asked. “Can you verify what your brothers have said?”
“Of course he can,” said Bert. “He was home too.”
Frank put his hands into his pockets. He looked from Bert to Gus and back again. He seemed perfectly calm, even, Emma thought, ever so slightly satisfied with the scene around him.
Emma shivered.
Gus must have caught something in the quality of the silence. He lifted his head. His eyes narrowed.
Frank’s expression shifted to a slow, sinking regret.
Emma felt the hairs on the back of her neck lift up. What are you doing, Frank?
“There’s a problem, Bert,” Frank said. “You weren’t home all night last night.”
Emma sucked in a sharp breath. The sound made Oliver sit up abruptly, and plop onto his hindquarters.
“Frank?” said Bert sharply. “What the hell are you doing?”
Frank ignored him. Instead, he faced Constance. “Are you sure, Detective? About the Jag showing up in the video, I mean?”
“We’ve got a very clear shot of the license plate,” she answered. “And you have to admit, the car itself is fairly distinctive.”
Yes, it is. Emma frowned. Oliver was scratching his chin, hard. Why would you take that car to kill somebody? Especially somebody you knew?
Frank was turning toward Bert now, his expression sad, but his body language—there was a disconnect between the way he walked and the sadness on his face. It was too smooth, too assured.
“I’m sorry, Bert,” breathed Frank. “I can’t let you do this.”
“I’m not doing anything!” Bert shot back.
Emma looked to Constance to see if she had noticed anything was wrong with Frank’s attitude. But the detective’s face was absolutely stony. Whatever she was thinking, she was giving none of it away.
“I couldn’t sleep last night.” Frank was speaking to them all, but he kept his attention fixed on Bert’s face. “We’d had a shake-up here, like Gus said, and, I was up thinking about, well, life in general, and my life in particular. My bedroom overlooks the gardens. I saw Bert come out of the house and go to the garage. I watched him pull out in the Jag. I remember thinking it was strange that he’d be taking it. It’s really Gus’s car.”
“And you’re sure it was Bert?” said Constance. “It would have been dark by then.”
Frank nodded. “It’s easy to tell them apart from the window. Bert’s got a lot more hair.”
Everybody was looking at Frank and Bert. Nobody was looking to Gus, except Emma. She saw his expression shifting, from fear, to resignation, to comprehension.
“Frank?” Bert was saying. “What do you think you’re doing?”
But Frank just met his brother’s wide, confused gaze, and slowly shook his head.
He’s enjoying this, thought Emma suddenly. He’s having fun.
“Bert, you were the one who took the Jaguar out last night,” said Frank. “You killed Caite Hope-Johnston, and I’m ready to swear to that in court.”
53
All at once, Gus shoved himself to his feet. His eyes were red, his face pasty gray. Moving like a much older man, Gus walked past Frank, straight up to Bert. He opened his mouth. Raj tensed. So did Constance.
Frank just stood back, relaxed and smiling.
“You told me I should drop her,” Gus croaked. “You said she was going to make trouble for everybody!”
Raj moved uncertainly toward Constance. But Constance held up her hand, gesturing for him to stay put. She kept her eyes fixed on the brothers.
“No, Gus.” Bert fought to put on a smile, to be calm, to be charming. “I was happy for you. I swear! I wished you both the best.”
But Gus didn’t seem to hear him.
“This whole disaster is your fault!” The force of his shout balled up both Gus’s hands. “Yours! None of this would have happened if you hadn’t been such a . . . a . . . bully! You resented Marcie because she owned the grange. You did everything you could to undermine her! You wanted to be in charge! You thought if you controlled the property, you could control the rest of us. But Caite was onto you.” Gus grinned at him, and Emma felt herself shrinking back. “She told me you were just trying to get your hands on the grange. Following in the family tradition, she said. I bet . . .” Gus grinned suddenly. “I bet you even checked with the solicitors weeks ago to find out if there was a will.”
“Yeah, that’d be just like you, wouldn’t it?” whispered Frank.
“And when they said there wasn’t any, you figured you had a fighting chance to get your hands on the grange, if you could just get Marcie out of the way.”
“You lost your minds,” said Bert firmly. “Both of you.”
“No,” said Gus. He sounded exhausted but steady. “I’ve made up my mind.”
“Listen to me, Gus, Frank. Think about this. You do not want to do this. You haven’t got the nerve. Either one of you.”
Gus didn’t bother to answer him. Instead, he turned around to face Constance and Raj. “You need to drag the pond. Right near the middle. You’ll find Marcie’s handbag there.”
“And how do you know about this?” inquired Constance pleasantly.
“Because I threw it in there.”
She arched her brows in an expression of mild surprise. “Because?”
“Because Caite stole it. She was trying to cover up what Marcie had been doing the day she died.” He held up his hand. “And before you ask, she was doing it because she thought I’d killed Marcie.”
“Did you?”
“No,” said Gus. “No. I knew she was planning on selling the grange, and I was glad. It was the right thing to do.”
“He told me that,” said Emma. “On the way here.”
That may have been a mistake, because it reminded Bert that she was there. He looked directly at her. If looks could kill, Emma knew she would have been dead as several dozen doornails.
If Constance noticed, she didn’t give any sign. “Well, I think this is a conversation we really ought to be having up at the station. I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you all to come with us. We’ll be able to take your statements, and you can have your solicitor meet us there,” she added to Bert.
Bert shook his head. To Emma’s surprise, he chuckled.
“You don’t know it yet, Detective, but your career is over. I’ll have your badge, and I’ll have your head,” he added to Emma, and then he gave her a particularly nasty smile. “And your little dog too.”
“Wait!” shouted Emma.
Everybody was looking at her, and Emma blushed beet red. What am I doing?
“Emma?” said Constance, her voice studiously bland.
“Erm.” Take it back, she told herself. Say sorry.
But she couldn’t. “I . . . think. No.” She took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders. “I know we’re missing something.”
Bert threw up his hands. “Oh, here it comes. Are you going to start waving around a bloody knife and yelling ‘J’accuse!’?”
“Are you, Emma?” inquired Constance.
“No. But—”
But what? Whatever it was, she needed to think of it fast. Then, she did. Emma held up both hands.
“Please. I . . . just one second.” Emma turned on her heel and bolted out the door.
She raced down the corridor to the front door, not caring if anybody followed. But of course somebody did.
“Emma! Emma! What are you doing, Emma?” barked Oliver.
Emma shoved her way out the front door, then stopped. “Oliver,” she gasped. “I need you to go find Dash, all right? Just get him up to the sitting room.”
“Okay, Emma!” Oliver wheeled around. “Do we need help now?” he asked.
“We need backup,” she said, and ran out the door.
“Right!” Oliver bounced down the top steps and nosed at the gravel, and charged off to the left.
Emma found the doorstop and kicked it into place so neither she nor the dogs would be shut out. Then she hurried to snatch her briefcase out of the Mini, and ran back.
Constance was at the sitting room door, holding it open.
“Well?” she said. “What did you find?”
“I object to all of this,” said Bert. “It’s bad enough that we’re being accused . . .”
Emma didn’t listen. She dropped the satchel onto the marquetry table. A whole stack of festival posters slithered to the floor.
“We’ll get those later,” said Constance.
Emma pulled out the three ledgers and the folders of bank accounts.
“You want to tell me what I’m looking at?”
“Inventories,” said Emma. “Every year, there’s an inventory made of the contents of the grange. This was for the year Stewart Cochrane died in a boating accident.” Emma flipped open the ledger for 1976 to the newspaper articles. “And this was the year Richard and Evelyn Cochrane died.” She opened 2000’s book.
Constance leaned close and ran a finger down the first article for 2000. “Marcie was looking into the family accidents?”
“No,” said Gus. “Caite and I were. But Marcie found out.”
“Probably put ideas into her head,” said Frank. “I mean, you were hoping to find out that Dad had killed Stewart to inherit the grange, right?”
This was too much for Bert. “You can’t say that!”
“Believe it or not, I can’t,” said Gus. “I mean, I admit it. I thought we’d find out it really was murder, but there’s no signs, not for them, not for Uncle Stewart. Those were accidents. Nothing more.”
Emma watched Frank. That uncanny assurance she’d noticed before slipped, just a little.
“So why did Marcie keep all this?” Constance waved her hand over the ledgers.
“That’s what I’ve been wondering,” said Emma. “And why did she keep it in her office? The information she really wanted to keep safe, she left with her solicitor. That’s in here.” She opened last year’s ledger to the screenshots.
Constance ran one finger down the page displaying the tea set for sale. “Very nice.”
“Marcie found out somebody was stealing from the estate. This was her proof.”
“And this somebody was?” asked Constance.
Emma lifted her gaze to the middle of the Cochrane brothers. “Do you want to tell her Frank, or should I?”
54
Oliver followed his nose into the gardens. It was a warm day. The bees were buzzing and all the flowers were in bloom. A hundred different smells blew past on the fresh breeze. But Oliver made himself ignore them all. There was only one trail he needed to follow.
He found Dash asleep in the shade of a sprawling hydrangea bush.
“Dash! Dash!” Oliver barked.
Dash peeled open one eye. “Go away!”
“No!” Oliver poked his muzzle at Dash’s front paws. “Wake up!”
Dash snapped at him, sending Oliver scuttling backward. “What is the matter with you, corgi?”
“I need your help! Emma needs your help!”
“Oh. More Emma.” Dash rolled over onto his other side and curled himself up so he could lay his tail on his nose.
“No, Dash! She needs your help now! Marcie, your human, needs your help.”
“Marcie’s gone,” mumbled Dash. “She can’t need help.”
“But we know why she’s gone! We know who took her away!”
Dash lifted his head. “You know?”
“Emma knows! She’s there now. She wants to tell everybody, but she needs our help!”
Dash shook his ears and laid his head back down.
Oh, no! What was he going to do? Emma needed him back in the room with the people. She needed Dash. But Dash wouldn’t move.
A noble corgi does what he must.
“There’s roast beef!” barked Oliver.
Dash’s ears cocked up. He climbed to his feet and ducked his head down, so his muzzle was close to Oliver’s. The big mutt pulled his lips back, just enough to show a few teeth. “You better be telling me the truth, little chap.”
“You have to come.” Oliver thrust his nose at Dash’s flank. “You have to!”
Dash shook himself. “Where?”
* * *
* * *
Emma watched Frank, and had to resist the urge to bite her fingernails like a schoolgirl.
His dark eyes had gone cold and assessing. She wanted to believe she saw that he was nervous, that she’d scored some kind of hit on whatever he was holding back, but she’d just be kidding herself.
“How’d you find out it was Frank who sold the antiques, Emma?” prompted Constance.
“I talked to the owners at Vintage Style, and they said Frank had come in, asking to sell some antiques.”
“Oh!” Frank exclaimed. “Is that what this is about? Yes, I did go to David and Charles. And they should have told you it was because Marcie asked me to and that I didn’t have the proper paperwork. I thanked them, came home, told Marcie, and she said she’d sort it out. Obviously, she’d decided to try for a more anonymous method.” He waved at the ledger.
“But there’s a problem,” said Emma. “I went over the estate accounts, and Marcie’s personal accounts—”
Bert evidently decided that he’d been left out of the conversation long enough. “You mean you stole private papers,” said Bert. “Do go on.”
“Actually, I didn’t,” said Emma, finally feeling like she was on steady ground. “Helen asked me to help her and Daphne sort things out.”
“You?” Bert sneered.
“She’s an accountant as well as a baker,” said Constance. “Never judge a book by its cover, or a cake by its icing, I suppose.”
“Accountant or no, she’s still wrong about me stealing from the estate,” said Frank calmly. “I didn’t need to. I’m a day trader, and I do pretty well, which after my pretty worthless time at uni would have surprised my parents no end,” he added blandly. “And, yes, I have my allowance off the estate, and, yes, I admit it, I did make some extra draws now and then, which you probably saw in those accounts.” He shrugged without taking his hands out of his pockets. “Why would I need to steal?” Yes, why? Emma looked to Constance. “Why does anyone steal?”
The detective pursed her lips. “Personal circumstance,” she said. Her gaze roved across all three of the brothers, and Emma. Emma wondered what she was looking for. “There’s maybe three types of thieves. There’s your Jean Valjeans—the ones who steal because they’re desperate and it’s the only way they can figure to get by. There’s your habituals. They’re the nasty, organized ones. It’s all business with them. Then there’s the thrill seekers.”
“Sorry?” said Emma.
“They’re the white-collar thieves. They’re in it for the excitement. It can be anything from stealing a lipstick from the chemist’s or ten thousand from a stock fund. They don’t really need it; there’s just some part of them that wants to know they can get away with it.”
“So, it’s the adrenaline?” Like driving fast cars or sailing in bad weather.
“And to show who’s boss,” said Constance. “If you’re taking whatever you want, you’re the strong one, aren’t you?”
Emma looked at shattered Gus. She looked at grim, determined, confident, Bert. And Frank. Frank who was trying to bring his ex-wife back, and who she was sure had stolen from the estate he was living off.
She thought about what Brian had said, about people and their cars. How Gus wanted the speed, but he was careless. How Bert wanted the prestige, and the control. But Frank, Frank was the one who liked the rush.
Frank sighed dramatically. “Detecti
ve, I appreciate a good fairy story as much as the next person, even when I’m being cast as the villain. But shouldn’t you ask whether Ms. Reed can prove anything she’s saying?”
“It’s a fair question, Emma,” said Constance. Her meaning was very clear. I’m giving you a lot of latitude. I need you to give me something back.
Emma pulled the stack of bank accounts out of their folders. She flipped through the pages, mentally adding up what Frank was drawing in addition to his allowance.
Where on earth did it all go? she asked herself.
Never mind that, she answered herself. Just think about the numbers. The numbers don’t have motives. They don’t tell lies. The story is right there in the numbers.
And it was. On the very last statement.
Bert, green fees . . .
Gus, Jag repairs . . .
It was the by-now familiar list of the brothers’ expenses that Marcie had noted down and confirmed every month, except for one thing.
There was nothing for Frank.
Emma lifted her head.
“Marcie cut him off,” she breathed.
“Which him?” asked Constance.
“Frank,” said Emma. “Marcie found out Frank was stealing from the estate, and she cut him off, and then he killed her.”
Frank raised his eyebrows.
Bert groaned. “Marcie killed herself. Why the hell are we even listening to this?” he demanded.
“Because I find it very interesting,” said Constance. “Go on, Emma.”
“But he didn’t just plan to murder Marcie,” Emma went on, her certainty growing with every word. “He planned to frame Bert for it.”
Bert froze. “You cannot possibly be serious.”
“It’s the only way it makes sense,” said Emma. “From the start, I kept thinking that Marcie’s death looked like both a murder and a suicide. There she was at the bottom of the window. She could have fallen or jumped. Except, the body had been moved, and the window latch had been tampered with, and it looked like maybe Marcie had been afraid she’d be killed, and she was trying to leave clues behind, in the inventories from 1976 and 2000. But she’d left the other ledger—last year’s—with the evidence that the estate was being robbed with her solicitor. And why would she be so cryptic about it? Marcie wasn’t cryptic. She liked order, and certainty.” She held up the sheaf of bank accounts.
Murder Always Barks Twice Page 31