Scone Cold Dead

by Kaitlyn Dunnett

  The phone rang just as they finished warming up. Drenched in sweat but feeling limber and flexible enough to twist herself into a knot if she wanted to, Liss swiped damp hair out of her eyes. She glanced through the window as she reached for the receiver. Last night’s rain was long gone, but a gusty wind had set the flag in the town square flapping and the sky was an ominous gray. And a state police cruiser was just pulling away from the curb in front of the Emporium.

  She snatched at the phone. “What’s wrong?”

  On the other end of the line, Fiona chuckled. “Not a thing. I just got the ledgers back. Do you still want to see them?”

  Liss’s heart slowed to its normal speed. “Yes, I would, but can you bring them over here? We’re halfway through a workout.”

  If she’d still been dancing for a living, her concern would have made more sense, but Fiona understood that she was trying to avoid a chill. The body was an instrument, and weather affected how it would play. You didn’t work up a sweat and then go out in a windstorm.

  “I’d be happy to,” Fiona agreed, “if you promise to lock up that cat and vacuum first. I don’t feel like doping myself up on antihistamines.”

  “Give me ten minutes.”

  Half the task was done already. As soon as she hung up, Liss fished the vacuum cleaner out of the closet to take care of the rest. “I doubt that will get rid of every speck of cat hair and dander,” she said to Zara and Beth, “but Fiona won’t be staying very long.”

  “Anything we can do to help?” Zara asked.

  “Go on with your practice session.” As long as she kept moving, Liss knew that her muscles would stay warm. She could finish the rest of her physical therapy routine after Fiona left.

  Zara put on a tape of “Monymusk,” a suitable tune for practicing the Highland Fling. “Why is Fiona coming over?” she asked as Beth ran through the steps Zara had taught her.

  “The police have finally returned the company’s ledgers. I’m going to take a look at them. See if there is money missing. Fiona thinks there is, and that Victor took it.”

  Zara looked thoughtful. “If he did, he may have kept two sets of books to hide it. This set may look perfectly legit.”

  “Not what I want to hear!” Liss finished vacuuming while Zara worked with Beth, this time without the music.

  “Bow, rise on the balls of your feet and take your arms to first position. Good. Now disassemble on the left foot and execute the shedding movement with the right foot—one, two, three, four. Good. Now beginning with the spring—right foot—instead of the disassemble, repeat bar one with the other foot—five, six, seven, eight. Good.”

  Fiona breezed in looking windblown and a trifle breathless. “Is the weather always this unpredictable in March?”

  “Yup, but wait a minute and it’ll change.”

  Liss accepted the ledgers from Fiona and placed them on a convenient table. “The cat’s locked in the library and I just vacuumed. I think you’re safe if you want to stay for a cup of coffee.”

  Fiona looked nervously around for Lumpkin. Her gaze fell on Beth and she frowned. “Thanks, but no. I need to get going.”

  “At least sit for a minute.” Liss indicated the sofa, which had been turned around so that it faced the pocket doors that led to the hall and foyer and away from the area in which Beth had been practicing. “Did the police tell you anything?”

  Reluctantly, Fiona slipped out of her coat and sat. Zara joined them, leaning over the back of the sofa, as interested as Liss was to hear Fiona’s answer.

  “He didn’t drop a single hint about what’s going on,” Fiona complained. “Just handed over the ledgers and left again. It wasn’t even that nice Detective Tandy. He sent a uniformed officer I’d never seen before.”

  “Well, no news is good news, I guess. They had to let Sandy go.”

  Fiona looked surprised, but if she secretly thought he’d killed Victor she didn’t say so. Not with Zara standing right there. “I brought you this, too,” she said instead, digging a memory stick out of the pocket of her skirt. “Personnel files for the company. If you’re going to take over, you’ll want to have a look at them. In case you want to make changes.”

  “I’d like to keep everyone right where they are, you included.” Liss took the small electronic storage device and tucked it into her own pocket.

  “Sorry, Liss. Not a chance. End of this tour and I’m gone.”

  “When do we go back on the road?” Zara asked.

  “I . . . I’m not sure. I hoped staying on here would result in answers, but now I wonder if the police will ever discover who killed Victor. I don’t believe they know any more now than they did when they started. Sometimes I think it would have been better for everyone, Liss, if your friend had left well enough alone. Then everyone would still think Victor had died by accident.”

  “Simpler, maybe, but not better. Fiona, I—”

  Without warning, Fiona sneezed.

  At the explosive sound, Lumpkin leapt straight into the air, landing on the back of the sofa, fur bristling. When Fiona turned, they were face-to-face. Her expression contorted horribly and almost at once she sneezed again.

  That sent Lumpkin into total panic. He ran straight over Liss, who was sitting next to Fiona on the sofa. Zara tried to get out of his way, but he hit her legs at calf-level with enough force to send her sprawling. Her flailing arm hit the table with the ledgers.

  Zara knew how to fall. She went limp, minimizing the damage when she landed but not the shock of being bowled over by a fifteen-pound feline. The heavy books tumbled down on top of her.

  Liss recovered first. She gave Fiona a box of tissues and offered Zara, who was staring at the ceiling with a dazed expression, a hand up. Then she looked around for Beth. The girl stood in the middle of the open space, her big brown eyes open even wider than usual and a distinctly guilty look on her face.

  “I guess I don’t have to ask who let the cat out,” Liss muttered.

  Her words galvanized Beth. “I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt,” she wailed, flinging herself at Zara.

  Bemused, Zara hugged the girl. “What just happened?”

  “Where’s the damn cat?” Fiona barely got the question out before she convulsed in another fit of sneezing.

  “Upstairs. Probably hiding under a bed.” Liss had caught a glimpse of his bushy tail as he’d rounded the newel post.

  Still sneezing, Fiona staggered to her feet, grabbed her coat from the rack where Liss had draped it, and fumbled for the door. A moment later, a blast of cold air marked her passing.

  Quiet descended, broken only by Beth’s sniffles.

  “Stop that and come here.” Liss waited until the girl had left the safety of Zara’s embrace and was standing in front of her. “Why did you let Lumpkin out when you know Fiona is allergic to cats?”

  “It was just an experiment.” Beth blew her nose on the tissue Liss thrust at her. “Sherri said sometimes people say they’re allergic but they really aren’t. I thought Fiona just didn’t like cats. That she made up the allergy stuff. I’m sorry I put Lumpkin behind the sofa.”

  Liss studied her, thinking hard. She didn’t know all that much about children, but she didn’t think she should let this kind of behavior pass unpunished. Forgive and forget was a dangerous way to go when Beth’s actions might have caused real harm. “Zara could have struck her head when she fell, or broken an arm or a leg. Apologize to her, not to me.”

  Beth did, with obvious sincerity.

  “You owe Fiona an apology, too.” At Beth’s stricken look, Liss relented slightly. Perhaps it would be best to keep the two of them apart just now. “You will write her a letter explaining what you did and why and why it was wrong, but you’ll have to deliver it in person.”

  Beth looked mutinous but agreed.

  “Good. Why don’t you go home and get started on it now? Take your time. Make it a very good letter. You don’t have to take it to her until, say, tomorrow.”

  Afte
r Beth left, Liss and Zara pushed the furniture back where it belonged and picked up the ledgers. “As a distraction,” Zara said, “that was a doozy, but I think, if you haven’t anything else in mind, that I’d just as soon sit here quietly and go through the accounts until it’s time for rehearsal.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  For once, Liss was glad there were no customers in Moosetookalook Scottish Emporium. Now that the dancers had all gone to rehearsal at The Spruces, she could finally take a look at the memory stick containing their personnel files. Liss assumed what she had was a copy of the original documents kept by the board of directors, but she wasn’t sure what to expect when she plugged the “key” into her laptop and waited for the menu to surface.

  She felt a little guilty about snooping into confidential files on Strathspey employees, but she told herself it wasn’t any worse than asking pointed questions. Besides, the police had undoubtedly gone through another copy of these files already, just as they’d gone over the company’s books.

  Was it only wishful thinking that these electronic files might be more helpful? Zara had examined the financial records and almost immediately reached two conclusions. One, Victor had invented his own bookkeeping system. That was going to make things considerably more complicated. Two, and perhaps more importantly, she would need to see the company’s bank statements in order to make comparisons.

  There had been one thing even Liss could spot: income had dropped drastically over the course of the last six months. This couldn’t be explained by increased wages paid to members of Strathspey. The payroll records—a separate ledger—were all in perfect order. No one had gotten a raise in the last three years. In fact, Emily was being paid considerably less than Liss had earned.

  Resisting the temptation to read Emily’s file first, Liss called up Zara Lowery’s. As she’d already admitted to Liss, she had a background in accounting. Somewhere along the line she’d been advised, Liss supposed, to train for a “practical” career. Many creative people were pushed to do likewise, on the theory that a career in the arts wasn’t likely to put bread on the table. It looked as if Zara had worked in a bank until Victor “discovered” her at a Scottish dance competition and signed her up for Strathspey. Until then, dancing had just been a hobby. She found nothing else of interest under Zara’s name, certainly no hint that Victor had suspected her of embezzlement.

  Liss took a look at her own personnel file next, finding it in a folder marked FORMER EMPLOYEES. She barely remembered what she’d written when she’d filled out her application to join the company eight years earlier. It looked pretty standard to her—high school, her associate’s degree in business, the awards she’d won for dancing. She winced at the photograph she’d submitted—she looked very young and very innocent.

  Next she skipped to the yearly evaluations. Victor’s comments were brief and to the point. He had meticulously listed all her nondancing contributions to the company. He’d been downright generous in giving her credit for designing Strathspey’s Web page, and for other work in the area of public relations. Her career-ending accident, however, had been summed up in a brief paragraph that ended with “Resigned. Replaced.”

  The sound of footsteps on the stairs behind her had Liss quickly closing the laptop. Fiona and Zara were the only ones who knew she had a copy of the records and she wanted to keep it that way. She fixed a smile on her face as Lee Annie swanned through the door.

  “I’m going for a drive,” she announced.

  “I thought Fiona had the car.”

  “I have a rental car of my own now.”

  Liss wondered when she’d managed to arrange that but didn’t suppose it mattered. She’d just as soon have Lee Annie out of the way while she went through the rest of the personnel files. “Is Winona still upstairs?”

  Lee Annie nodded. “She’s reading. She said she’ll probably take a nice long nap a little later. She didn’t sleep very well last night. Gotta go. Bye.”

  Curious, Liss watched her through the window. Lee Annie got into a bright red sports car and took off with a roar, even squealing her tires a little as she rounded the corner.

  She’d better watch out, Liss thought. The police station was just across the square.

  Back at the laptop, Liss took a look at Lee Annie’s personnel record. Well, well, she thought. Yet another person who’d been to business college. Had she studied basic accounting there?

  If that old mystery-novel cliché that the least likely suspect would turn out to be the killer were true, then Lee Annie Neville would be a shoo-in for the role. Liss considered what she knew of the other woman. Lee Annie was older than she was. If, only eight years after graduating, Liss had forgotten most of what she’d learned about bookkeeping, then Lee Annie’s skills weren’t current, either. Then again, Liss had given herself a crash course in the subject when she’d taken over the Emporium’s finances, bringing herself up to date on the latest software and refreshing her basic math skills. Lee Annie might have done the same.

  A headache had begun to pound at the back of Liss’s skull. She wasn’t even certain that bookkeeping skills would have been necessary in order to steal from Victor Owens. He’d been exceedingly careless about keeping track of the company’s money. She still hadn’t found a record of how much should have been in the company coffers.

  Shutting down Lee Annie’s personnel file, she called up the next one. For the most part her colleagues’ records made dull reading. She learned very little that she didn’t already know. One or two of the dancers—Serena and Cal—were older than she’d supposed. Paul, their one-man stage crew under Ray, had once studied to be a minister.

  Fiona had taken charge of the company before, shortly after Liss’s departure. Liss wondered if that had been when Victor first found out he was ill. Had his absence from the company provided the opportunity for someone to start stealing? Fiona would have been less familiar with the financial end of things, though not, it seemed to Liss, any more easily duped.

  Emily’s record came in for particular scrutiny, but Liss could find nothing in her background that raised any flags. That Emily was talented, ambitious, and out for herself, Liss already knew. The dancer had grown up in Chicago and done both dancing and acting there. In the photo she’d submitted with her application, she’d struck a glamorous pose that looked anything but innocent!

  Finally, Liss had only one file left to read, one in the FORMER EMPLOYEES folder with her own. Nothing in Sarah Bartlett’s background seemed out of the ordinary, except that Victor had made a note to the effect that she had a twin sister named Susan. The cynical thought that he’d probably been hoping for a twosome crossed Liss’s mind.

  She scrolled down the page, stopping when she came to Sarah’s picture. She studied the head shot for a long time, trying to decide why Sarah, a stunning redhead, looked so familiar. With a little fiddling, she figured out how to enlarge the photograph and the memory she’d been reaching for clicked into place—the woman dining alone at the Sinclair House. That had been Sarah Bartlett.

  Liss fumbled for the phone on the other end of the counter, then realized she didn’t know what number to call. She had to hunt for the telephone directory, but once she had the Yellow Pages open to hotels, it was easy enough to locate the ad for the Sinclair House.

  “Do you have a Sarah Bartlett registered there?” Liss asked when a cheerful, very young-sounding male voice answered the phone. College student, she guessed, working his way through school.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Shall I ring her room?”

  “No! I mean, no, thank you. Is Mrs. Sinclair there? Corrie Sinclair?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The voice sounded a bit more cautious. “I’ll connect you.”

  Corrie came on the line a moment later, having already been briefed by her employee. “This is Mrs. Sinclair. To whom am I speaking?”

  “Corrie, this is Liss MacCrimmon. Gordon Tandy introduced us the other night.”

  “Oh, of course I r
emember you, Liss. How can I help you?”

  “I know this is an odd request, but you have a guest staying there—Sarah Bartlett. She used to be a member of the dance company I once belonged to and I . . . well, I need to know how long she’s been there.”

  “Does this have something to do with the murder investigation Gordon is working on?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  She could hear Corrie’s hesitation even over the phone, but apparently Liss’s connection to Gordon carried some weight. “I’ll check the computer,” Corrie said. After a few faint clicking noises, she reported that Sarah had arrived on the same day Ray Adams moved into Dan’s house.

  Thanking her, Liss hung up. Now what? It could be just a coincidence, but Liss didn’t buy that explanation. Be a good citizen, she told herself. More to the point, Be smart. She punched in the number Gordon had given her when he’d first asked for her help.

  She was frowning when she hung up. She’d expected to reach state police headquarters. Or perhaps Gordon’s voice mail. Or maybe a pager. Instead she’d gotten one of those annoying cell phone company messages that told her the customer was unavailable. That could mean anything. He might have turned off his cell phone because he was in court, or he could be in one of the county’s many “dead” zones, where a cell phone signal simply could not reach.

  Wherever Gordon was, Liss wasn’t about to wait around for him to become available again. What if the desk clerk was the chatty type? He might tell Sarah someone had been asking for her.

  Liss glanced at her watch. Sherri was still at work. Dan was stuck at the hotel—he was taking his “babysitting” duties even more seriously after catching Charlie and Jock trespassing. If Winona’s still awake, Liss bargained with herself, and she’s willing to mind the store, I’ll just take a quick run over to Waycross Springs and see if Sarah will talk to me.

  She was on her way ten minutes later.

  Liss pulled in under the porte cochere at the Sinclair House and turned her keys over to the valet. On impulse, she asked the young man—obviously yet another college student—if he knew Miss Bartlett.