by Leslie Caine
Linda replied cautiously, “That’s interesting. Though I have to ask how you happened to come across this document.”
“She’s a new client. And I was working in her office. Designing.” True statements. If vague.
“And she just happened to leave an incriminating document out in the open for you to see?”
“Which I also photographed, as luck would have it,” I replied, hoping my voice sounded breezy and guileless.
“My. That is lucky.” She paused. Rather than risk trying to bluster my way through an additional explanation of my rifling through Stephanie’s files, I eyed the poplar saplings in a nearby lawn; the owners were going to regret their choice of a quick-growing, short-lived tree. Plus, their front steps were dreadful; they looked like cinderblocks. The steps should been curved, less steep, and much less angular.
I rolled my eyes, annoyed with myself. It was one thing to mentally redecorate to calm myself, but my stress-level must be off the charts for me to be doing drive-by designs.
“While we’re on the subject of your clients,” Linda said at last, “we’ve removed the crime-scene tape from Helen Walker’s residence. Helen can move back home.”
“Oh, good.” I waited, hoping she’d announce with the next breath that Rachel Schwartz had confessed to her husband’s murder. Helen didn’t like her to begin with, so she would be the least traumatic suspect I could think of offhand. When Linda remained silent, I prodded, “So...does this mean you have a suspect in custody?”
“‘Fraid not. Turns out Jack Schwartz was hard of hearing and might not have heard the garage door open after all.”
“He was? He wasn’t wearing a hearing aid when I met him, and I sure didn’t pick up on any indications that he was partially deaf.”
“He was, though. O’Reilly says hearing loss can throw off a person’s balance, and he’s decided it’s likely that he just tripped. As for all the water in the basement, a tap near one of the window wells had been left running, and the window was open.”
“Which further makes it look like the killer deliberately flooded the basement,” I protested. “Cats never willingly wade through water, so for the flooding to be an accident, Vator had to have crossed the basement floor back when it was still dry. In any case, Helen always keeps the basement door shut. So how did the cat get in?”
“O’Reilly thinks she climbed in through the one window that was cracked open a couple of inches.”
“But if all this water was pouring through the window well, Vator would have avoided that window like the plague! It’s way more likely someone picked up the cat, carried her across the wet floor, and left her on the stack of boxes. Then, after getting to the dry stairs, he or she deliberately dropped the electric cord into the water. Don’t you think?”
“Probably. But, be that as it may, we’re calling this an accidental death, for the time-being at least.”
“What?!”
“We’ve got a new chief of police, and a whole lot of bureaucratic red tape to deal with right now, so unless we find any subsequent information...In any case, you didn’t hear any of this from me, okay?”
I rubbed my forehead in annoyance, but for Linda’s sake, replied jovially, “Hear what?”
“Is Ms. Walker doing all right?” Linda asked.
“I haven’t seen her since first thing this morning. Audrey has the day off, so I’m guessing that the two of them have been taking a lengthy stroll down memory lane...exchanging stories about when Audrey’s sons were in junior high and Helen was teaching there.”
“Were they friends back then?” She was speaking in her investigating-officer tones.
“More like allies. Helen was a major positive influence on Audrey’s oldest son, when he was a troubled teen.”
There was a pause. “So Audrey’s opened her house to someone who taught her kid twenty-plus years ago, and your having spent all of, what? Twelve hours in the woman’s company?”
If that. Wanting to voice my confidence in Helen, I replied, “Sometimes that’s all it takes to get a good feel for a person’s character.”
“Or at least for the image they choose to project,” she grumbled.
“You know, Linda, the loveliest colors imaginable look dull till you see them in sunlight.”
“And the nastiest, most ruthless people you’d ever want to meet can seem as sweet and complacent as can be, till you get them under the spotlight and interrogate them.”
“Thanks for sharing, girlfriend,” I shot back sarcastically. “You really know how to brighten my day.”
She laughed. “Take care, Erin. Talk to you soon.”
Just as I’d started to pull away from the house with the unfortunate landscaping, my cell phone bleated. I pulled over once more and answered. It was Helen. “That nasty detective from last night called and said that I can move back home,” she told me. “Can you please give me a ride?”
“Right now?”
“Yes. If you don’t mind, Erin. I asked Audrey to drive me there, but she’s stalling. She obviously isn’t sure I should move back in and wants to discuss the matter with you.”
I glanced at my watch. Thanks to my not working at Helen’s house today, my schedule was light, and I had the next two hours free.
In the background, I could hear Audrey’s protestations over Helen’s statement. I said to Helen, “Tell Audrey I’ll be home in five minutes.”
Helen had changed back into the clothes she’d been wearing last night. She was waiting by the door when I arrived. Audrey, on the other hand, dragged me into the kitchen to speak to me in private, then quietly asked, “Are you sure it’s safe for her to go home so soon?”
“No, I’m not. But the police seem to think it is, and this is Helen’s decision.”
From the parlor, Helen called out, “I have excellent hearing. It’s lovely of you to offer to let me stay on, Audrey, but I’d rather get resettled into my own house.”
Audrey ushered me back into the parlor. Firmly, she told Helen, “I fail to see how you can manage to feel all that ‘settled’ when you’re terrified someone who’s trying to kill you has a key to your house.”
“Well, I know, dear, but I’m afraid that could be my one and only chance to move back home.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked in alarm.
“I really don’t want to go into this at length, but Stephanie has been trying to boot me out of my home, and she—” Helen’s eyes filled with tears.
“Your niece is trying to kick you out of your house?” Audrey shrieked. “We have to stop her! I know lots of influential people in this town, and—”
“No, Audrey. I need to deal with my own family in my own way,” Helen said. “Let me give returning to my house a try, and if I find myself quivering at each little creaking board, we’ll reevaluate.”
Audrey flashed her patient smile that indicated she was losing her patience. “Fine. I have some errands to run anyway, so I’ll tag along, just to make sure I can’t convince you to change your mind and stay a second day at my home.”
After wrangling with some logistic challenges, we piled into Audrey’s car, with me in the backseat. The two of them chattered away—the kind of mindless, nervous prattle that old friends might exchange on their way to a scheduled biopsy.
The tension dissipated a little when Audrey pulled into Helen’s driveway. The home exterior was as charming and inviting as ever. Audrey praised Helen’s house to the hilt as they climbed the front steps. When Helen let us inside, however, Audrey turned a little green around the gills as she eyed the various piles and stacks throughout the living room. For my part, I had to remind myself that we’d already come leaps and bounds from how the house had looked just three days earlier.
“Look at all the footprints in the carpet!” Helen exclaimed as she picked her way across the room. “A whole platoon of officers must have marched through my house! Even the air smells different.” She hugged her arms tight across her chest and added in a small voice, �
��It feels as though I’ve been violated. Someone was touching my things...setting a deadly trap. Poor Jack. He was such a decent person. A real sweetheart.”
“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather turn right around and go back to my house?” Audrey suggested gently.
Helen shook her head, her lips set firmly, but I got the impression that she didn’t trust her voice just then. She glanced around as though trying to decide if she should sit down, but was uncomfortable with the notion. We followed her into the kitchen, now the neatest room in the house. (Although that wasn’t saying much.) She eyed the closed basement door and forced a smile. “Ella and Vator should be here soon, and I’ll feel better then. They’re with Kay. I called her from the police station last night, and she fetched them for me. The house feels so empty without my little darlings.”
There was an awkward pause. Then Audrey said with false cheer, “While we’re waiting for your cats, how about taking us on a tour of your home?”
Helen shook her head. “Why don’t you let Erin show you around? You’ll like the upstairs. I don’t go up there. Makes me too nervous.”
“I really would like to see the second floor,” Audrey told me. Her expression made it quite clear that she had an ulterior motive for wanting to go up there.
We climbed the stairs, and Audrey promptly shut the door to Lois’s old room behind us. “My God, Erin,” she whispered, grabbing my arm, “This place is closer to a messy storage shed than a person’s home! Please tell me this isn’t a visit from The Ghost of Christmas Future, giving me a peek at what my own house will be like, ten short years from now.”
“You’re not going to turn your home into a storage shed, Audrey. I won’t allow you to, for one thing. And I’m remedying the situation at Helen’s too, for that matter.”
“You mean, it used to be worse?”
“Yes. I’m hoping that we’ll make so much progress that we’ll have the whole place livable in a couple of weeks.” I sighed and looked around. “Let’s take quick peeks in all her closets and make sure there are no more horrid surprises. I don’t want to leave her to fend for herself till we know there’s nobody hiding here.”
We checked Lois’s room and closet, the bathroom, and went into Helen’s room. We nearly set off an avalanche by opening her closet door. “For sure nobody’s hiding in this closet,” Audrey grumbled as we worked to pile the toppling mountain of clothes and shoe boxes back far enough into the closet to allow us to shut the door.
Afterwards, we rejoined Helen in the kitchen. Taking a positive slant, Audrey said, “Your upstairs rooms have oodles of potential. Your house is so cozy and quaint. We really should check out the basement, though,” she added, glancing at me, “just to make sure it’s truly safe now.”
“I won’t go down there,” Helen declared.
“You don’t have to,” I interjected hastily. “Audrey and I can investigate.”
Instead of making a move to join me, Audrey said, “Can I make you some tea, Helen?”
Helen said, “No, thank you, dear,” and sank into a seat at the kitchen table.
Not to be a baby, but I didn’t particularly want to go downstairs by myself, either. I stalled and said, “Your homeowner’s insurance will probably cover the damage to your possessions in the basement. We need to sort through everything and see what can be salvaged so—”
“Let’s let that go,” Helen interrupted. “Maybe in a couple of weeks, I’ll be up for the task, but right now, every item down there will only remind me of poor Jack.”
“I understand.” Although procrastinating was probably going to lead to even greater losses, as the mold and mildew took hold. Then again, her basement possessions were probably even less valuable than the four sets of rusted cookware that she’d hoarded in her kitchen. We really should check for prowlers, just to be cautious. For Audrey’s ears, I hinted, “Maybe the status of your basement will be enlightening. I’d like to figure out how the police could possibly conclude that Jack’s death was accidental.”
“So would I!” Helen exclaimed. “The officer told me they found a ruptured hose in the yard with my fingerprints on the nozzle. It’s true that I have a hose out there, but it was perfectly fine the last time I used it. The police claim the water came in through the window well...that the window was open. But I would never leave my water running. And I didn’t open the window. Plus, I always keep the basement door shut, so how did Vator manage to get herself locked down there?”
“It’s all very peculiar, all right,” I replied. Audrey took a seat at the table next to Helen. So much for having a partner in spelunking through a basement where I’d recently found a body. “I’ll go take that look downstairs now,” I grumbled.
I flicked on the light switch and picked my way down the junk-free strip in the center of the steps. The place seemed a little less spooky with the overhead lights working, but the air smelled dank and musty—rife with wet cardboard, although the cement floor was now dry, and there was no other evidence of the lethal two inches of water in which Jack had died just last night.
The small square of soggy carpeting at the base of the stairs had been removed. The extension cord was also gone. The electrical socket was now visible between the boxes. A particularly large box right next to the socket formed a ledge a couple of feet from the bottom step. I whipped out my tape measure, extended it, and easily touched the ledge. The killer could have placed the cord on that ledge, flooded the basement, put Vator on top of a stack of boxes, then used a broom handle—or perhaps the infamous wooden dowel—to shove the cord off the ledge and into the water. I sidestepped along the perimeter of the small open area at the base of the stairs, unwilling to walk directly on the spot where Jack’s body had lain.
I scanned the head-high stacks of boxes occupying most of the remaining floor space. The police had made an aisle to the window where the water had gotten in, supposedly from the busted hose. I examined the walls of boxes as I made my way through the aisle. Curiously, unlike any other boxes in the house, these had been labeled; each had a small letter and a number written on a corner.
I peered up at the nearest window well. A chunk had been broken out of the plastic cover. It looked as though someone had kicked it in. The window itself was open about four inches—wide enough for Vator to have squeezed through. From there, as long as you ignored the powerful feline aversion to getting wet, the cat might very well have leaped onto one stack of boxes after another, but refrained from jumping down when she spotted the water below her. Again, however, no way was cat going to jump from the lawn into a flooded window well in the first place.
Just as I turned away, I heard a noise outside and whirled back around. I gasped at the sight of a pair of ankles framed by the window well. They were clad in support hose, and the accompanying pair of feet was clad in white soft-soled nurse shoes.
A moment later, a face peered down through the Plexiglas well-cover at me. Kay, too, gasped and drew back instantly, no doubt startled at unexpectedly seeing me staring up at her.
“Goodness, Erin!” she cried. “You gave me such a fright! What are you doing in Helen’s basement?”
“Looking for storage space,” I fibbed.
“And are you looking for the Holy Grail, while you’re at it?” she said with a laugh.
“What are you doing in Helen’s backyard?”
“Being nosey.” She chuckled. “I’m going to come inside, rather then throw my neck out of whack by continuing to chat with you through this window.”
“Sounds wise.”
She was being more than pleasant, but my cynicism had kicked in full force. Kay Livingston’s devotion to Helen could all be an act. She could very well have been double checking the scene of her crime to insure that all looked well in the daylight.
I emerged in the kitchen at the same moment that Kay knocked, rather than ring the doorbell. “Oh, Kay’s here,” Helen said, rising.
“Yes. I saw her through the basement window just now. She was in y
our backyard, peering into the window well.”
Apparently unconcerned about her friend’s snooping, Helen happily threw open the door and invited her inside. Two cat carriers were on the stoop, to either side of Kay.
Kay pulled Helen into a hug, saying, “As horrible as this is, thank God you’re unharmed!”
“I do have to remember to be thankful for that much,” Helen said sadly.
Helen introduced Kay to Audrey, then we brought the carriers inside and Helen cooed over her beloved pets. The two cats dashed past her with indignant meows the instant she’d opened the carrier doors. Ella darted underneath the vinyl lounge chair and Vator raced past Audrey and me into the kitchen. “Thank goodness the police allowed me a second phone call, so I could find someone to watch my cats. I can’t thank you enough, Kay,” Helen said.
“Well, they were perfectly wonderful house guests, not counting how hard it was to get them back into their cages. I positively couldn’t manage the feat on my own. A very nice policeman helped me last night, and I had to get Teddy to help me today. Both of us got scratches on our arms in the process.”
“Teddy helped you?” Helen asked in obvious surprise.
Kay didn’t answer. She was staring at Audrey as though mesmerized. Finally, she snapped her fingers and grinned. “Oh, my! I know who you are! You have that TV show: Domestic Bliss with Audrey Munroe.”
“That’s right,” Audrey said, beaming.
“I’ve been meaning to write in to you and suggest that you invite Helen onto your show. She’s unbelievably good at scrapbooking.” Kay made her way over to the stack of albums. “Mind you, Helen’s too modest for her own good, but let me show you a book or two.” She handed Audrey the top book on the stack, but then bent down a little for a closer look at the labeled spines. “George Miller?” she read aloud. Helen’s late brother-in-law, I remembered.
Kay turned to face Helen. Kay’s face had gone very pale. “I thought you told me you lost this one!”