Last Puzzle & Testament

by Parnell Hall

  “I am not hung up on Daniel Hurley.”

  “Then what are you obsessing about?”

  “Something’s not right.”

  “Granted,” Cora agreed placidly. “In fact, there are a lot of things that aren’t right. But I assume you are referring to the arrest of Daniel Hurley.”

  “Of course I am. It simply makes no sense.”

  “I’m not saying I don’t agree, but you want to tell me why you think so?”

  “Come on,” Sherry protested. “He kills Annabel Hurley, holds on to the murder weapon, carries it around with him for a day and a half, and then—and only then—decides to get rid of it? I mean, what is his thought process supposed to be here, assuming he’s a clever murderer?”

  “That’s your argument?”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “Nothing, expect for one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Becky Baldwin should be making it.”

  Sherry glared at her sharply.

  Cora Felton put up her hand. “Sorry. But that’s the case. And that’s what’s hanging you up here. Daniel Hurley’s been busted, and who’s helping him? Becky Baldwin. Not you. And it’s not so much that you want to do it, it’s that you don’t want her to.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Maybe not. But you wouldn’t be normal if you didn’t feel that way. Hey, I feel that way, and I’m old enough to be her mother.” Cora fed a forkful of pasta salad into her mouth. “Now, eat, and let’s discuss this like normal people.”

  Sherry absently speared a piece of rotelli. “The premise is all wrong …”

  “Which premise?”

  “The whole thing. The idea Daniel Hurley is the killer.”

  “That’s a given. Besides that.”

  “The idea he was in league with Harvey Beerbaum.”

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “It doesn’t fly. Oh, I heard what Chief Harper said. Maybe old Emma Hurley let something slip, maybe Daniel Hurley knew all about the puzzle before her will was read, and that’s why Beerbaum was there the first night. But, granted all that, why does Harvey Beerbaum freak out last night and try to talk to you?”

  “Okay, why?”

  “Chief Harper’s theory is Harvey Beerbaum got nervous because he knew the puzzle we were all working on was bogus. Well, that works if Beerbaum was in league with Chester Hurley. Beerbaum would know it was bogus because he’d be the one who helped Chester rig it. But if he was helping Daniel Hurley, it just doesn’t fly. Because Daniel Hurley wouldn’t have had the fourth quadrant of the puzzle.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because you hadn’t given it out yet.”

  “Sure, but I hadn’t given it out to Chester, and he got it easy enough.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Suppose Daniel was as fast as Chester. Suppose he beat us to the puzzle pieces too.”

  “Yeah, but he didn’t,” Sherry said. “You remember where he went when he got the first piece of the puzzle? Well, you probably don’t, you were in no great shape. But that’s when he hooked up with Becky Baldwin. And if he was hanging out with her, he wasn’t solving the puzzle with Harvey Beerbaum.”

  “Then how do you account for Harvey Beerbaum?”

  “I can’t. And that’s the whole problem. By all rights, Harvey Beerbaum only saw the first three quadrants of the puzzle. So how could he know the puzzle was a fake?”

  “He couldn’t.”

  “Then what was bothering him?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe he did know the puzzle was a fake.”

  “How could he know? He’d only seen the first three quadrants. The first three quadrants are genuine.”

  “How do you know?”

  “How do I know anything?” Sherry shot back. “The first three quadrants are consistent with each other. They’re consistent with the missing quadrant Chester Hurley stole. The clues were typed on the same machine and are absolutely genuine.”

  “Well, they can’t be, by your premise. Have you looked them over?”

  “Of course I looked them over.”

  “Well, maybe I should,” Cora said. “You got a grid?”

  “You gonna do the puzzle?”

  “Don’t be silly. I can’t do puzzles, but I can read. Give me a grid three-quarters filled in, and the first three sets of clues.”

  Sherry got up, went into the office, came back with the pages. “Here’s your grid,” she said, “and here’s your clue sets.”

  “Which is the third set?”

  “The higher numbers, of course. Why, aren’t you starting with the first one?”

  Cora shook her head. “Harvey Beerbaum was panicked last night. After the third set of clues was handed out. If something was bothering him, it has to be in those clues.”

  Cora shoved aside her plate and bent over the pages. “Okay,” she muttered. “Here’s the three-quarters grid.”

  “And here’s the clues for the third quadrant.”

  ACROSS

  25. Amiable

  30. Chinese gelatin

  35. Perfect rejoinder

  40. Barbie’s buddy

  41. Do ____ (second chances)

  44. Wipe out

  48. Unfruitful

  52. Me first man

  57. Peru city

  61. Alda

  64. So far

  DOWN

  23. Attitudes

  25. Wolf gathering

  26. Monster

  27. Close recycling place, so to speak?

  31. Worry

  36. Golf course features

  45. Character in “Wheel of Time” books

  48. Stop

  49. Spry

  “Okay,” Cora said. “Let’s see. First the across. Amiable is polite. Chinese gelatin is agar, whatever that is. A perfect rejoinder is a crusher. Barbie’s buddy—that’s the one I got—is Ken. Do blank (second chances) is do overs.” She looked up. “That’s not very good.”

  “Cora.”

  “Wipe out is delete. Unfruitful is barren. A me first man is an egoist. Peru city is Lima. Alda is Alan. And So far is yet.”

  “That’s all the across. Then we have the downs.” Cora Felton’s eyes widened. “Oh!”

  “What?” Sherry said, leaning forward.

  “Alan Alda.”

  “What about him?”

  “You know who Alan Alda is?”

  “He’s an actor.”

  “Yes. He became famous for the TV show M*A*S*H.”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “M*A*S*H was one of the most popular TV shows ever. The final episode got huge ratings. It was the most-watched single episode of all time. In fact, I think it still is. Unless the Seinfeld finale beat it.”

  “So?”

  “M*A*S*H began in the nineteen seventies. Early seventies, maybe, but no earlier than that, because the movie came first, and the movie was nineteen seventy.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because I went with Randy, and I alwaۀy, and Iys regretted not marrying him.” Cora waved this away. “It’s not important. But the fact is, I know.”

  “Aunt Cora—?”

  “You miss it because you’re young. But Harvey Beerbaum’s old like me, so he gets it right away. This puzzle is supposed to be forty years old. Well, it can’t be, with Alan Alda in it. He may have been acting forty years ago, but he wasn’t famous then. He became famous for M*A*S*H, which is thirty years old, tops. You could have a puzzle twenty-five years old, maybe thirty, with Alan Alda’s name in it. But forty years old, never. I know it, and Harvey Beerbaum would have known it too.”

  “Let me see that.” Sherry snatched the clues and grid away from Cora and studied them.

  Looking over her shoulder, Cora said, “What’s forty-five down, Character in “Wheel of Time” books? Do you know what that is?”

  “No, I don’t. I filled it in from the words going across.”

  “You didn’t look
it up?”

  “No, but I will now,” Sherry said. She hurried down the hallway into the office, with Cora at her heels. Sherry sat at the computer and logged on to the Internet.

  “And what’s this here in the second quadrant?” Cora asked. “I shot a moose? You know what that is? The clue’s I shot blank, parenthesis, Stand-up Comic. And Stand-up Comic is capitalized and in quotes. You know why? It’s not just any stand-up comic. It’s Woody Allen, and Stand-up Comic is the name of the album. I used to have it. It’s old, but I bet it isn’t forty years old.” Cora’s eyes widened. “And you know what? I’m not sure the Ken doll’s even forty.”

  “Never mind that,” Sherry said. “Look at this. The Wheel of Time books are from the nineteen nineties.”

  Sherry and Cora looked at each other.

  “Nineteen nineties?” Cora said. “Well, that explains why good old Harvey was so upset.”

  “The whole puzzle is a fake?” Sherry said. “That makes no sense.”

  “It’s not necessarily bogus, but it doesn’t agree with what Emma Hurley said in her will. She said specifically the puzzle was forty years old. This puzzle isn’t. So, it’s either not Emma’s puzzle, or Emma Hurley was deliberately trying to mislead us.”

  “And why would she do that?” Sherry demanded.

  Cora frowned. “I really wouldn’t put anything past her. I never met the woman, but I feel like I know her. And I get the impression she’s laughing in her grave.”

  “You mean this whole thing was justۀhing was a joke? An elaborate trick played on all the heirs? That it all means nothing?”

  “Well, wouldn’t that be ironic? Particularly, with them killing each other over it?”

  “How is that possible?” Sherry said. “The money exists. There is an inheritance. Fifteen million dollars. It has to go to someone. And you’re in charge of saying who that someone is.”

  “No, I’m in charge of judging the puzzle. And my current assessment is there is no puzzle to judge.”

  “Then who does the money go to?”

  “That’s not my problem. I’m not a lawyer, just a referee. But I’m going to have to make a ruling. The question now is, forty years old or not, did Emma Hurley set up this puzzle?”

  “Misplaced modifier.”

  “What?”

  “Emma Hurley was not forty years old.”

  “Sherry. Stick with me here. We gotta work this out. We got two possibilities. One, this is the puzzle Emma Hurley mentioned in her will. The one she wants her heirs to solve. The one she asked me to judge. And she was merely mistaken about it being forty years old.

  “Or, two: this is not the forty-year-old puzzle Emma Hurley asked me to judge at all.”

  “How can that be?” Sherry asked. “The will was very specific. The first clue will be found in the writing desk in the master bedroom. We looked and there it was, exactly where she said it would be. We were all there, we all saw it.”

  “Yes,” Cora said. “Just as we were supposed to.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  Cora Felton was animated. “Sherry, all along, my problem with this puzzle has been it’s too easy. Well, not for me, but you know what I mean. You split it up and hide the clues around, big deal. It’s still a simple, dumb crossword puzzle. But if it’s an elaborate trick, I like that. I like the idea of the heirs running around solving it, and all the time it’s meaningless.”

  “But if it’s meaningless, what did Emma Hurley mean in her will?”

  “Just what she said.” Cora ticked the points off. “There’s a forty-year-old puzzle to solve. Her dough will go to the first heir to crack it. The first clue is in the writing desk in the master bedroom.”

  Cora pointed to the crossword puzzle.

  “And this isn’t it,” she said triumphantly.

  Sherry Carter put the crowbar down, and helped her aunt move the heavy sheet of plywood away from the window. “Are you happy now?” Sherry said. “You got your wish. We’re breaking into the Hurley house.”

  “Like we should have done two nights ago,” Cora Felton retorted, shining her flashlight. “Well, better late than never.” Cora stuck her hand through the broken glass, unsnapped the lock, and raised the window. “Come on, give me a boost.”

  “It’s easier from inside,” Sherry said. “I’ll go first.”

  Sherry climbed over the windowsill, then turned around to help her aunt.

  In her eagerness, Cora lost her balance climbing over the sill. Sherry grabbed her, and the two of them crashed to the floor. Cora’s flashlight flew out of her hand and skittered across the rug.

  “Aunt Cora!” Sherry exclaimed. “Take it easy!”

  “It’s all right. No harm done,” Cora said. “And the nice thing about a flashlight is it’s easy to find, as long as it doesn’t go out.”

  Cora pushed herself up on her hands and knees, crawled over, and picked up the flashlight. “There we go. Now, where are we?”

  Cora heaved herself to her feet, and shone her flashlight around the foyer. “Good lord! What’s that?”

  “Relax. It’s just a suit of armor,” Sherry said. “I would have warned you, but you’ve seen it before. Of course, you don’t remember, do you?”

  “Don’t snipe,” Cora said. She shone her flashlight on the battle-ax, nodded approvingly. “Is there anything else you’d like to warn me about despite the fact I’ve seen it before?”

  “Not in the foyer. But Evan Hurley’s portrait takes a little getting used to.”

  “Oh? And where is that?”

  “At the top of the stairs. The painting is rather unfortunate. It wasn’t really meant to be viewed close up.”

  “And how was it meant to be viewed?” Cora asked, starting up the circular staircase.

  “I would recommend pitch dark,” Sherry said.

  “It can’t be that bad.”

  “No? Evan Hurley makes Philip and Phyllis look good.”

  Cora climbed the stairs, shone the light on the painting. “Oh, yes,” she said. “The old Hurley bulldog jaw. You suppose Daniel has one under that beard?”

  Sherry shuddered. “That’s a frightening thought.”

  “ify">Well, it’s something to consider. So, where’s the bedroom?”

  “First doorway on the right,” Sherry said.

  They shone their lights, opened the door, slipped inside the shadows of the huge bedroom. Cora Felton ran her beam over the canopied bed, the bureau, the chair, the vanity table, and stopped on the writing desk. The rolltop was down and the key was in the lock.

  “Is it locked?” she asked.

  Sherry pushed the top; it rose easily. “Nope. That’s just the way it was.” She raised the top all the way up, shone her light. “And here’s where the clues were. Under the blotter. And before we found them, we checked out the drawers.”

  “All of the drawers?”

  “No. Or the cubbyholes, either. But we will now.”

  An exhaustive search of the cubbyholes of the desk turned up nothing more interesting than Emma Hurley’s phone bill, and a deck of pinochle cards.

  The desk drawers were no more productive. One was crammed with receipts. Another held bank statements from the Bakerhaven Savings & Loan.

  Cora Felton pulled a statement out of an envelope, shone her light on it, and whistled. “Wow. The woman had forty-six thousand dollars in her checking account, and over half a million in savings.”

  “Is that all?” Sherry said.

  “All?” Cora said. “Did you really apply the word all to half a million?”

  “She was worth a lot more than that. So where’s the rest of the money?”

  “In a secret drawer, perhaps? Is that how you’re thinking? Come on, Sherry. You’re the logical, rational one. I’m the wide-eyed romantic.”

  “You certainly are,” Sherry said. “I don’t recall mentioning any secret drawer.”

  “Well, that doesn’t mean there isn’t one,” Cora said. “And, like you say, the money’s g
ot to be somewhere. Come on, let’s check it out.”

  “Check what out?”

  “The desk. How deep are these drawers?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Is there room for anything behind them?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Well, let’s make sure. Come on. Pull one out.”

  Sherry pulled the top drawer all the way out and Cora shone the light where it had been.

  “Nothing in this one,” Cora reported. “Here. Let’s measure. Hold it up to the side of the desk.”

  Sherry held the drawer along the side of the desk. It went almost to the back. “It’s a full drawer. No room for anything behind it.”

  “Uh huh. Hold it up, let me check the bottom.”

  Sherry held the drawer up. Cora bent down, shone the light, banged on the bottom.

  “Okay, nothing there, just a simple wooden drawer. Put it back and let’s check the next.”

  “I bet they’re all the same.”

  “I bet they are too. That’s no reason not to look.”

  There were seven desk drawers, three on each side, and one thin pencil drawer across the middle. Sherry and Cora pulled each one out, checked each side and bottom.

  It was on the bottom of the middle drawer on the right side of the desk. Cora’s flashlight lit up a large circled inscription in black Magic Marker:

  #1.

  Underneath, also in black Magic Marker, was a rhymed couplet:

  The kitchen will do

  For your next clue

  Cora Felton grinned. “Well, this is more like it,” she said.

  “More like it?” Sherry exclaimed. “Are you kidding me? This is utterly fantastic! Are you telling me there’s a whole different puzzle?”

  “Why not? It’s what we were looking for.”

  “Even so. I don’t see how you can be so calm about it.”

  “Calm? Who’s calm? I’m jumping out of my skin.” Cora struck a pose. “Come on, let’s go! The kitchen will do for our next clue!”