A Toast to Murder

by Allyson K. Abbott

  Half an hour later, Mal and I were both dressed and downstairs in the bar. Over the next hour, I placed some orders for extra bottles of champagne, dug out some New Year’s themed decorations I had in the basement, and cut up some fruit for drinks. Mal spent this time down in the basement of the new section, presumably doing something related to the elevator project.

  He reappeared just before eleven-thirty, but by the time I finished what I was doing and we both got bundled up to head out, we were leaving fifteen minutes later than planned. It didn’t matter; we had no specific agenda, and technically we had until Monday if the deadline in the letter could be trusted. But that article in the paper had changed everything, and I was worried that the rules to this nasty little game were about to change really fast.

  Mitchell Park wasn’t far away, and we pulled into the parking lot beside The Domes just before noon. Mal was huddled inside his coat as we walked toward the entrance. My crutches prevented me from huddling, and the frigid air eked its way between the layers of clothing I had on with each swinging step I took. The cold made me want to hurry inside, but I stopped at a human sundial located at the entryway to the building.

  “What is this?” Mal asked.

  “It’s a human sundial. My father brought me here to The Domes several times when I was a kid, always on Sunday mornings, and always around the same time of day. That’s because the bar didn’t open until five on Sundays, and those mornings were our main free time together. I remember thinking the sundial was a scam because it always showed the same time of day whenever I saw it. Once, when I was in high school, some friends and I went to Mitchell Park, and in the late afternoon I wandered over to that sundial to try it out, to see if it really could show a different time.”

  “And did it?” Mal asked.

  “It did.” As I said this, I flashed back to that day, recalling how one of my classmates caught me being a human sundial, and teased me about it. The other kids who had been there joined in, all of them poking good-natured fun at me for a few minutes. The memory of it made me blush now the way I had then, triggering a sensation of hot sauce on my tongue.

  “How does it work?” Mal asked, as I shook off the memory.

  I pointed toward a rectangular metal plate embedded in the concrete that had the months of the year stamped into it, each one in its own little box. In two arcs of small, embedded metal circles above the months—one arc of circles below the other—were the numbers one through twelve, though not in perfect numerical order. One of the arcs started with the number six, the one above it with the number seven.

  “Stand in the box for the current month and face north.” I pointed to one of four other metal circles embedded in the sidewalk, each one with a letter stamped into it that marked the four points of the compass. “Put your arms up over your head, clasp your hands together, and your shadow will point to the current time. One set of numbers is for daylight saving time, and the other is for regular time.”

  Mal dutifully stood in the December box and did as instructed. And the shadow of his hands pointed straight to the twelve in one row and the one in the other. He lowered his arms and glanced at his watch. “Cool,” he said, giving himself a hug and shivering against the cold, making his comment perfectly appropriate. “Can we go inside now?”

  I was more than happy to oblige. When we went through the main entrance, we had to stop and pay an admission fee. Mal proffered his wallet, and I didn’t object.

  “There is only one dome open,” the girl dispensing tickets said with an apologetic look. “But the farmers’ market is in full swing, and there is a beautiful poinsettia display in the open dome, our Show Dome.”

  “That’s okay,” I assured her with a smile. We made our way into the connecting portion of the building. To our right were the entries to the two closed domes; to our left was the open Floral Show Dome. We made our way there and entered into a mini Christmas wonderland. The interior was filled with poinsettias of all colors: red, salmon, pink, white, yellow, purple, and several variegated varieties. They were displayed in strategic groupings bordering a cobbled path that wended its way through mini Christmas villages and other holiday dioramas, decorated Christmas trees, and benches that invited observers to sit back, relax, and take it all in.

  Beautiful as it was, relaxation was not on the agenda for me. My head was filled with synesthetic reactions to the piped-in holiday music, the many smells of the plants, and the elaborate visual displays.

  “This isn’t going to be easy,” I said to Mal, squeezing my eyes closed and taking a moment to try to parse my reactions. Though I was getting better at it, deconstructing my synesthetic responses this way was new to me. In the past, I eventually learned real from synesthetic through a combination of listening to others’ descriptions of things, a smidge of intuition, and a few suppressive efforts that were more of a game I played with myself. But now, with my interpretations being key to my ability to analyze something as important as a crime scene, separating my “normal” reactions—though the muddled, mixed-up experiences I had were my norm—from the synesthetic ones was more involved.

  I recalled the specific reactions I’d had to the smell and feel of the smears on the letter. Starting with the smell, I sifted through the many musical sounds I was experiencing—some louder than others, most likely because of proximity—and tried to zero in on one that matched the sound I’d heard with the letter. All the sounds were woodwind types of notes, everything from oboes to flutes. Despite the fact that I couldn’t carry a note when it came to singing, I was able to identify a single note unfailingly. I studied music in school and quickly discovered that each note came with its own color. A D-sharp is a certain shade of yellow, slightly greener than a plain D, which isn’t as pale as the yellow of a D-flat. The sound I’d heard with the letter had definitely been a low A, a solid, rich, royal purple note.

  Mal and I walked along the path, and I focused on the various notes. Every time I heard that low A note, we stopped, and I zeroed in on the specific plants creating the sound. Once I made sure no one was watching me, I gently prodded the insides of the flower, disturbing the pollen and then rubbing it between my fingers. Rubbing the pollen on the letter had triggered a green and white, jagged, arcing line, but by the time we were halfway around the interior of the Show Dome, I had yet to experience that same visual. I saw arcing lines, but they were smoother, or of a different color, or thicker, or straighter than the one I’d seen with the letter. Each time I touched some pollen, I had to wipe my fingers thoroughly, doing so on the inside of my coat. At one point, I even stuck them in a small pond that was part of a display. I was beginning to lose hope when we came across a collection of pink and green variegated poinsettias growing around a small diorama of a gingerbread house. This time, when I rubbed my fingers together, everything fell into place. I saw the jagged, green and white arcing line.

  “This is the spot,” I said to Mal, eyeing the large patch of plants. “But how are we supposed to dig in here?” I looked around us at all the other sightseers meandering inside the dome, searching for anyone who looked official. “We’ll get busted and tossed out of here for sure, maybe worse.”

  Mal looked around too. “What choice do we have?” he asked rhetorically.

  I thought back to the poem, rereading it in my mind. “The word edge was used,” I said. “Maybe that means I’m supposed to look along the border of this particular garden.” It was a reach, and we both knew it, but as Mal had said, what other choice did we have?

  I sat down on the low stone wall bordering the planting area and casually sank my hand into the dirt behind it. The soil was loose and soft, and I plunged my fingers down into it, thumb toward the wall, pinky toward the center of the planting area. I did this a number of times, moving forward a half inch or so with each subsequent plunge, hoping I might feel or strike something. Mal saw what I was doing, and he positioned himself in a way that provided me with some screening from the eyes of others nearby.

&
nbsp; When I had explored as much of the area as I could from where I was sitting, I got up and moved to a different spot along the wall, hiding my dirt-smeared hand inside my pocket. I sat on a different section of wall, acting as if I was admiring the gingerbread house display. While I looked at the house, my hand got busy poking holes in the dirt. For once, I was glad to have my crutches to haul around. Their presence, along with my cast, made it less strange for me to be sitting on the walls. My dirt-covered hand, however, was a little less easy to explain. I figured if anyone noticed it and asked, I would say I lost my balance and fell, plunging my hand into the dirt in an effort to catch myself.

  The path, and hence the wall bordering it and the patch of poinsettias we were focused on, was curved. I had started my search in the middle of the planted area, and now I had reached one end of it. So far, I’d found nothing but dirt. I looked at Mal, shook my head, and got up again, this time heading to the other end of the wall. This portion was located at an intersection of pathways, making it even more difficult to do what I was doing without drawing unwanted attention. I positioned myself a foot or so from the end of the variegated poinsettia area and once again sat on the wall.

  Mal and I let a few people pass by before I started mining the dirt again. In one spot, the soil felt noticeably different, looser. My heart picked up its pace, and a second later, my fingers hit up against something solid that felt like it was covered in plastic wrap. I dug my fingers a little deeper down one side of it and felt a bottom edge. After a quick glance around to see if anyone was watching what I was doing, I grabbed it as tight as I could and pulled it loose from its grave, flinging dirt onto my lap in the process.

  It was a small tin, like the kind you can buy with mints in them, covered in plastic wrap. After again glancing around to see if anyone was watching us—no one appeared to be—I handed the tin to Mal, grabbed my crutches, and struggled back to my feet.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said, wiggling the fingers on my dirt-encrusted hand. In my coat pocket, I had a pair of gloves that I had worn there, but I didn’t want to stick my filthy hand into one of them. And because of my crutches, I couldn’t hide my hand in my coat pocket either.

  We followed a meandering path back to the entrance to this particular dome and then out into the main connecting area. I held my breath the entire way, half expecting someone official to stop and threaten us with expulsion or, worse, the police. How ironic that would have been.

  Once we reached the main hall area, I saw a solution to my nervousness. “Can you wait while I visit the ladies’ room?” I said to Mal. “I really want to wash my hand off.”

  “Of course.”

  It took me longer than I liked, but I had to dig impacted dirt from beneath my fingernails, and the soil clung with an amazing tenacity to every line in the skin of my hand. When I was done and went back out to the main area, Mal was standing near the entrance talking to a man wearing a uniform with THE DOMES printed on the shirt. My heart skipped a beat, and I hesitated, unsure if I should approach him or act like I didn’t know him. Mal didn’t look distressed or upset, and the man he was talking to was smiling and nodding as Mal spoke. I decided to go over to him, and when I saw Mal look at me and smile, I felt my tension ease away.

  “Thanks,” Mal said, shaking the man’s hand as I neared. “You’ve been a big help.”

  The uniformed man smiled and said, “My pleasure,” and with a brief nod toward me, he headed off.

  “What was that about?” I asked Mal. “I had a bit of a panic when I saw you talking to an official. I thought we were about to be busted.”

  “Nah, I was just getting some information from him.” We headed for the exit, and Mal kept talking as we walked. “Like the fact that the structure wasn’t properly maintained some decades ago, and as a result, there has been some water and other damage. In fact, some of the glass panes in the domes have fallen in the past. That’s why there was that netting bordering the inside perimeter.”

  I hadn’t noticed any netting. I’d been too focused on my synesthetic reactions.

  “The Domes probably have only about ten years of life left in them,” Mal went on. “So there is this group called Friends of The Domes that’s working to raise funds for a future rebuild.”

  “Interesting,” I said, not sounding all that interested. But his next words definitely got my attention.

  “And it just so happens that the Collier family is a big supporter and contributor.”

  I shot him a look. “Meaning Suzanne might have easy access to the place.” Mal nodded. “You know, if we’re right about Suzanne, and we somehow manage to convince the police of that, there are going to be a lot of causes, people, and organizations that will be ticked off at us for eliminating one of their chief financial sources.”

  “Hopefully, the family will continue the support.”

  On that thought, we continued our way back to the car. Once inside, Mal took off his winter gloves and donned a pair of latex ones instead. Once he had the new gloves on, he removed the tin from his pocket. Dirt still clung to the outside of it, meaning Mal’s pocket also contained some dirt. At this point, I was tired of waiting to read the letters and felt certain there would be little or no trace evidence worth collecting. Still, Mal couldn’t let go of his occupational training completely, so he had brought along some plain, brown butcher paper to lay beneath the tin when we opened it. He did so now, spreading it out on his lap with one hand while he held the tin in the other. As soon as the paper was in place, he looked at me, removed the outer plastic wrap, and opened the tin.

  Tiny bits of dirt fell onto the brown paper as he revealed a small, folded piece of paper wrapped in plastic and nestled inside the tin. Mal removed it, and after examining it carefully, he found an edge on the plastic covering and began to remove it. Once he had it unwrapped, he set the plastic down on the butcher paper in a different section from the outer wrap and carefully unfolded the note that had been inside.

  It was the same type of paper used in all the other notes. And once again, the letter was written in calligraphic form, though I noticed the lines weren’t quite as clean as they had been in other letters. The message this time was short, terse, and to the point.

  Ms. Dalton,

  You have violated the rules of our game. There will be a price to pay.

  I warned you,

  An ex-fan

  I stared at the letter in disbelief, dread washing over me. I looked at Mal. “The newspaper article,” I said. “Given the timing and the dates on the previous note, this one must’ve been changed. The clue to come to The Domes was obtained before the article appeared. I’m guessing something different was hidden in that tin before that newspaper article appeared, and then it was swapped out.”

  Mal nodded, his expression worried. “I have a bad feeling about this,” he said. “I think things are about to get a lot more dangerous.”

  I felt dread with his words, but it was no more dread than I’d been feeling all along. “Two people have been murdered already,” I said. “How much more dangerous can it get?”

  Mal didn’t answer right away. He just stared at me with a sympathetic expression overlying his look of concern. Finally, he said, “Sadly, I think it can get a lot more dangerous. And I’d be willing to bet that you are the next person on the hit list.”

  He looked away from me and out the windows of his car, scanning the area around us. A chill shook me, and I was unsure if it was the cold or the situation that had triggered it. Feeling paranoid, I too looked out the windows, scanning the faces of the few people we could see.

  Mal folded the letter back up, rewrapped the plastic around it, and put it back inside the tin. He then folded the tin up inside the butcher paper along with the outer wrap, taking care to make sure all the dirt and anything else that might have dropped from it was contained inside the paper. He then handed it to me, and I placed it inside a plastic evidence bag we had also brought along. I didn’t seal the bag closed—
it would never be usable as legitimate evidence—and stuffed it in my clean coat pocket.

  Mal started the car’s engine, shifted into reverse, and backed out of our parking space. “We need to get you back to the bar,” he said, “and until we get to the bottom of this thing, you’re going to stay there. So am I. I’m not leaving you alone anymore.”

  I didn’t object. To be honest, the idea of having Mal around all the time appealed to me on several levels. Then he complicated things.

  “You should call Duncan and let him know what’s going on. I imagine he’ll want to be staying with you, too.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” I said. “I’ll be fine.” I said this with more conviction than I felt. But in addition to the fear and anxiety rumbling through me, I also felt a strong surge of anger—anger at Suzanne Collier and whoever else was working with her. I was tired of feeling like a puppet in someone else’s twisted little show, and I needed to put an end to it.

  Mal, wisely, said nothing more during our drive back to the bar. He was lucky enough to find a parking place right out front as another car was leaving.

  “Don’t move,” he said as he turned off the engine and undid his seat belt. He got out on his side, came around to mine, and opened my door. As I got out, he hovered over me, practically draping his body over mine. He shut the car door and kept me close, one arm draped around my shoulders, as we walked to the bar. I unlocked the door and stepped inside, locking it again behind me.

  Mal looked at me with a troubled expression.

  “This thing has gotten out of hand,” he said. “Given that the letter writer thinks you’re working with the police, there’s no reason not to do so. I not only think we need to tell Duncan what’s going on, regardless of what’s happened between the two of you, I also think it’s time to bring the full force of the police in on this case.”