Ghost Wanted

by Carolyn Hart

  JoLee’s signature was smudged. Perhaps by her tears. Perhaps by Susannah’s. Perhaps by mine.

  JoLee was right. Susannah was a fighter. Did she know the identity of JoLee’s tormentor when she went to the office that September day? I rather thought she did. JoLee had told Susannah on one of her visits how much she hated . . . someone. She never told Susannah why. On the day she died, Susannah received JoLee’s letter and learned the reason for JoLee’s anger. A distraught Susannah tucked the letter in her purse and went directly to the Dean of Students Office. Susannah saw the woman JoLee hated. Was there anyone in the office who could testify that Susannah came that day and saw the dean or assistant dean? It would be useful confirmation, but it was not proof of the contents of the letter. I was sure Susannah saw either Eleanor Sheridan or Jeanne Bracewell because JoLee wrote that “she” called JoLee into her “office.” There were two offices, one for the dean, one for the assistant dean. One or the other, Sheridan or Bracewell.

  I slipped the sheets back into the lavender envelope. A woman with power and authority forced JoLee to act as an accomplice in creating a compromising situation for an unnamed man. I suspected this was a pattern of behavior, the woman pinpointing possible blackmail victims, using students to frame the victims. Was Mike forced to set up a romantic encounter with a male professor? There could be other scenarios, drugs perhaps, or gambling or underage sexual encounters. I had no doubt the brains behind the scheme found it easy to ensnare victims. The subjects of blackmail weren’t the only victims. The students used were also victims. Perhaps the woman usually chose students who faced drug, alcohol, honor code, or sexual accusations, promising the records would be destroyed if they cooperated. In the case of JoLee, she’d taken advantage of a student who had to have a job and had no defense against a false accusation.

  A sexy red teddy and a man photographed in an embrace likely spelled a man in the upper reaches of the college administration or a professor who could afford payoffs to avoid scandal. Blackmail can be very profitable. If the right victims were chosen, it would be possible to milk them for years.

  The haunting strains of Ravel’s Boléro combined with the sylvan setting to create a sense of exotic release on the wooden porch of Eleanor Sheridan’s A-frame. A petite blonde stretched at ease in a hammock. Loose in her lap was a trade paperback. I skimmed close enough to see the title: Collected Poems by Louise Bogan. On this sunny October morning, shaded by oaks and sycamores that crowded close to the porch, she appeared comfortable and relaxed, lips curved in a slight smile. She appeared to be a woman without worries or cares.

  Inside the A-frame, all was light and color: a brightly patterned Navajo rug hanging on one wall, a large canvas with brilliant splashes of orange and red on another. The furniture was Western in style, but there was a spartan simplicity to the decor. I didn’t see many personal knickknacks. Tucked on either side of the front door were a bathroom and a large storage closet. An open loft contained a queen bed, dresser, closet, and bath.

  The open area downstairs contained a sofa, easy chairs, a fireplace, a dining room table, a kitchen with an island and tall stools, and an office area. On a desk was a studio portrait of a man with a thatch of dark curly hair, Robert Taylor–handsome features, and a confident smile. Keeping an ear attuned for the sliding door to the porch, I checked the contents of the desk, a personal checkbook with a balance of $4,265. Folders for insurance, medical bills, car title, receipts, warranties, and investments. Hmm. Her stock account amounted to almost three hundred thousand. A tidy sum for someone her age. However, she was a well-paid administrator, single, and possibly savvy at investing.

  I pulled open the central drawer. Pens, postage, a calculator, stationery, a campus telephone directory.

  The sliding door from the porch moved in its metal frame. I eased the drawer shut.

  Eleanor strolled inside. She placed the book in an empty space in a bookcase near the fireplace, walked toward the kitchen area.

  I spotted a turquoise cloth handbag on an entryway table. As she stood at the refrigerator and ice plunked into a glass, I eased the handbag open. I found her cell phone, tapped the phone, found the number. I slid the phone into the bag.

  Suddenly she turned. She stared at the bag, her face puzzled. She must have glimpsed a movement. There was a sharp, intent expression on her face.

  It was time for me to leave.

  Storms had spattered wind-driven mud against the peeling facade of the small-frame house. A portion of the picket fence leaned inward. Cracks marred the concrete sidewalk to the front porch. Large pottery vases on either side of the front door held humps of dead vegetation in dry brown dirt. The screen door sagged, one bracket loose at the top.

  I found Jeanne Bracewell in an immaculate small living room. She slumped against the cushions of an overstuffed chair. Perhaps everyone is vulnerable when observed in solitude. I was saddened by what I saw, a middle-aged woman whose face offered no defense against the world, dark brown eyes staring emptily into the distance, muscles flaccid. She was neat and crisp: short iron gray hair neatly combed, a touch of pink lipstick, a fresh white polo and tan slacks, but it was as if a wax mannequin rested in the chair. Her expression and posture revealed sorrow and defeat.

  “Jeanne.” The cry was faint, scarcely audible, but Jeanne was on her feet immediately. She moved quickly down the hall to the first bedroom. By the time she stepped inside, her face was transformed by care and kindness.

  An emaciated figure lay beneath a single sheet. The woman, her head bald, looked up weakly. “. . . feel so sick again. Please, Jeanne, hold my hand.” Pain and suffering marked her face, but the thin hands on the coverlet were unwrinkled. She was likely in her forties.

  The bedroom held the scent of illness yet it glistened with cleanliness, not a speck of dust. Buttercup yellow curtains framed windows with sparkling clear panes. An iPad lay on the bedside table, and music sounded softly: Johann Strauss’s “Voices of Spring.”

  “Let me fix you an ice. I’ll flavor it with blue raspberry. Like the time we went to Hawaii.”

  The woman shook her head, a tiny suggestion of movement. “Can’t do any more.”

  Jeanne sat in a straight chair close to the bed, gently grasped limp fingers. “The doctors are encouraging. Only four more treatments, Bebe. Please. I’ll help you. You know I’ll be with you.”

  Bebe gazed up. “Need to let me go.”

  “No.” Jeanne was brusque, her voice deep. “You can do it, Bebe. Please. For me.”

  Bebe moved uncomfortably. “Tried . . . so . . . hard. Last year. Now again. And the money. It costs so much mo—”

  “Damn money.” Jeanne was harsh. “What’s money when it’s your life? We’re managing. Everything is fine. I’ve got enough money.”

  Bebe closed her eyes, sank deeper into the pillow.

  When I’d seen the shabby house, I’d almost turned away. Blackmailers can afford to keep a home in good repair. I’d expected to step into slovenliness, but the interior of the house reflected care and thought and effort. Jeanne would do everything in her power to maintain nurturing surroundings for this very sick woman. Did Bebe notice the disarray of the exterior? Perhaps Jeanne brushed off any queries with reassurances: Those repairs would make too much noise now, be disruptive; you need peace and quiet. Bebe was too frail, too ill, to press her.

  I found a businesslike metal desk in an alcove near the kitchen. It didn’t take long to see that bills were stacked high and that some creditors were pressing her. Could the fruits of blackmail have been her answer to the ravening need for money?

  A little cuckoo clock marked the quarter hour. Fifteen minutes after two. Minutes and hours fled before me. If I had time, if I had the resources of the police, I could determine the financial backgrounds of Jeanne Bracewell and Eleanor Sheridan, though it was quite possible that a canny blackmailer had very effectively hidden any unexplained sum
s of money. I didn’t have the luxury of time and financial inquiries.

  Tomorrow morning the acting chief would order Michelle Hoyt’s arrest, this time on suspicion of shooting Ben Douglas, unless I discovered and trapped JoLee’s she.

  Perhaps I could lure Ben’s killer out of hiding if I set a trap with irresistible bait.

  Going from there to here in a heartbeat is a ghostly perk. Uh-oh. Wiggins does abhor the term ghost. Excuse me, Wiggins. In case you are listening, I meant simply that incorporeal travel moves one instantly to the desired location. Think and go. Which has a nice ring to it.

  The instant I entered Chief Cobb’s office, I knew all hell—excuse me, Wiggins—had broken loose. Howie Warren looked like he’d been plucked from the golf course in a watermelon pink polo over pink and green tartan Bermuda shorts. His face was red from both sun and irritation. He paced up and down, jabbing a stubby forefinger occasionally toward Detectives Smith and Weitz, who stood stiffly in front of the blackboard. Smith was as tall, dark, and handsome as ever but his lips were closed in a grim line. Weitz stared stonily in front of her. She stood with her shoulders back, her dark eyes hot with anger.

  “. . . and somebody’s going to get canned. Who the hell’s been using my computer?”

  I raised an eyebrow. His computer? That would be news to Chief Cobb.

  Warren’s amber-colored pig eyes looked at Smith and Weitz, then swung toward a half-dozen officers crowded near the door. “Who’s tired of being a cop? I want fingerprints made of everybody in this building and we’ll run them against the keyboard—”

  Honestly, I was surprised at Howie’s acumen. If a wayward cop had been responsible for the e-mails I’d signed as acting chief, likely the culprit would have been revealed by fingerprints. However, Howie wasn’t going to find any prints on that keyboard other than his and those that remained from Sam Cobb’s last use.

  “—and somebody’s going to get his butt kicked big-time.”

  Chief Cobb would be appalled at Howie’s language. “Crudity diminishes a message.” My tone was stiff.

  Howie’s head jerked up. He looked at Weitz and three uniformed female officers. “Who’s being cute? That’s what I want to know. Which one of you said that?”

  Smith’s face folded in a frown. “Not Weitz. I’m right here. I would’ve heard her.”

  A tall, thin woman with sharp features was brusque. “None of us said a word.” She looked at the male officer nearest the door. “That right, Jed?”

  Jed looked like he wanted to be in the break room, but he took a quick breath, and said quickly, “Not a peep from over here, sir.”

  I couldn’t resist. I intoned in my best sepulchral voice, “Tomorrow all will be revealed. Await instructions.”

  Howie’s round face puckered in fury. “Okay. The joke’s over. I’m not stupid. I’ll find the ventriloquist, but right now I want an APB out for that student. Wanted on suspicion of murder. That cock-and-bull story about somebody trapping her in a house is so much crap. She stole that book. They found it in her apartment. She must have gone back to get something else when she shot the night watchman . . .”

  I didn’t have time to make the phone calls from the police station that I felt sure would lure she out of hiding. I had to find Michelle. Before the police did.

  Inside Michelle’s apartment—I didn’t wait on the nicety of appearing and knocking—I called out, “Michelle? Joe?”

  George lifted his furry head from a cushion in a window seat and regarded me sleepily.

  No answer. No movement.

  Thunderous knocks sounded at the door. My heart lurched. An APB must have gone out already and a nearby patrol dispatched.

  George flew to the floor.

  “No problem for you, buddy.” I took a moment to give him a reassuring pat.

  I felt a huge sweep of relief when I reached Old Ethel, high on its hill, and saw no flurry of official activity there, no police cars, no officers on foot surrounding the building. Detectives Smith and Weitz might eventually remember Michelle’s association with Joe Cooper, but right now Michelle should be safe in Joe’s office, if indeed that’s where she was.

  A yellow Beetle slammed to a stop in front of Old Ethel, ignoring the adjacent fire hydrant. Moki’s Pizza was splashed in psychedelic letters on the passenger door. The motor was still running and a radio blared: “Just in from the news desk. Police are looking for a Goddard student in conjunction with murder of night watchman. Police identify the suspect as Michelle Hoyt. The police said Hoyt is five foot seven and has black hair and brown eyes. Police said she was last seen wearing red-and-white-striped blouse and red slacks. . . .”

  I popped into Joe’s office. Michelle looked fetching in the redand white cotton blouse and red slacks, although her expression was strained, her dark brows drawn down in concern as she stared at a laptop balanced on her knees. If the pizza delivery man saw her, she was all but in jail.