A Little Class on Murder

by Carolyn G. Hart

  For once, the great detective (in his own mind, she was certain) looked to her for an explanation.

  Annie enjoyed it, quite as much as Captain Hastings would have on the rare occasion when he felt that he was informing Poirot and not the other way around. “This is all business-as-usual stuff. You can bet Norden didn’t compose that boring little invitation for everybody to come to the Advertising Club banquet after Tuesday’s Crier came out. He was distraught about Charlotte Porter, trying to get in touch with her. Then he found her dead on Wednesday. Same thing with Burke. Those memos had to’ve been written before the Tuesday Crier came out.”

  Max’s ears were just a trifle pink. It was, of course, obvious when you thought about it.

  Annie smiled kindly.

  Max let the papers fall back into place.

  A mimeographed sheet of faculty and staff addresses and phone numbers lay in the center of the desk. There was a check by every name. It even included Annie’s number.

  “I’ll bet this was Emily’s list when she called to tell everyone about the emergency faculty meeting that Burke had called Wednesday,” Max reasoned.

  Annie held out her hand for his pencils and used them to pull open the shallow center desk drawer.

  Paper clips. Rubber bands. Fifteen or so pens and pencils. Tissues. Lipstick (Sensuous Coral). A comb with several broken teeth. A half-full package of Rolaids. An economy-size package of Hershey’s Kisses, with four or five left. Juicy Fruit gum. An unopened Baby Ruth. Four Harlequin and three Silhouette paperback romances with brightly colored covers of couples entwined in anatomically impossible positions. A loosely wrapped stick of black licorice. The crumpled remains of a Twinkies package.

  Max shook his head.

  “Don’t worry. They won’t reach out and grab you,” Annie assured him.

  The two full-size side drawers contained files with information handouts for students on major requirements, course syllabi, and job listings. Annie found a folder which held copies of the list of faculty and staff addresses. She fished one out and tucked it in her purse.

  They could move now without the aid of the flashlight. Although it was a gray day, enough light glimmered through the ceiling-tall windows to dimly illuminate the rooms.

  They looked over the filing cabinets, but everything appeared in order, then stepped into the small room between the first office and Burke’s: Max grabbed her arm and pointed.

  Annie looked to her left.

  “That door’s open! That’s the closet where the confidential files are kept. And it’s supposed to be locked at all times!”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Absolutely. I told you how Emily took me on a tour of the filing systems. That’s the closet, all right. Think back. Was it open yesterday, when you found Burke?”

  But she hadn’t looked in that direction. She’d seen the smear of blood on the floor near the swinging gate and she’d turned and followed the trail to Burke’s office.

  “I don’t know,” she said slowly. “But can’t we almost count on it? Nothing’s been changed since the murder. The police have left everything as is. Max, what do you think it means?”

  “A lot. For one thing,” and there was a touch of awe in his voice, “it means Mother’s idea about someone hiding until Burke was alone may not be so far out.”

  “I don’t quite follow that.”

  Max pulled his notebook from his pocket and flipped through several pages. “Okay, here we have the list of people Burke intended to see.”

  Annie flicked on the flash and looked at the appointment list: Brad Kelly, Malcolm Moss, Sue Tarrant, Victor Garrison, Kurt Diggs, Josh Norden, Frank Crandall.

  “We know that he was alive at least to the point where Crandall saw him,” Max asserted.

  “According to Crandall,” Annie reminded.

  “The important thing about that open door to the files is that it indicates someone with a key was in here yesterday morning and that person could have hidden and waited until Burke had finished with his appointments,” Max proposed. “That really throws it wide open. It means that none of the earlier visitors can be dismissed from consideration.”

  Annie felt a prickle down her back. Dammit, how had Laurel come up with that idea?

  Because, quite simply, she was determined that Georgia and Crandall were innocent.

  “A key,” Max muttered. “The door in Burke’s office.” He loped across the room and into the chairman’s office. “Sure. Look. A smear of blood on the handle of the hall door. The murderer must have left that way and if he did, he had to have a key.”

  Annie hated to discourage Max’s foray into detection. But—“The murderer could have knocked on the door.” He looked at her blankly.

  She nodded impatiently. “Why not? What if Brad Kelly or Emily Everett knocked on the door and Burke let them in? Maybe the door was left ajar. Either one could have beaned him and gone out that way again.”

  Max wasn’t impressed. “Why come in that door? They were both in the Crier office. Why not just go across the hall?”

  “I don’t know,” she replied irritably. “I’m just pointing out that the killer didn’t have to have a key to get in and out of the door from Burke’s office into the cross hall.”

  “But obviously the killer had a key. Why else is the confidential file closet open?”

  Annie opened her mouth.

  “All right, all right,” he said quickly to forestall her. “We don’t know that the killer opened the file closet. But it sure seems perfectly reasonable to me.”

  Annie realized that her spouse was more than a little huffy. “Even if we don’t know for certain about the door or whether it was the killer who opened the closet, we have at least established that someone could have hidden and waited until Crandall left, then killed Burke.” She scowled, concentrating fiercely. “Okay, if Crandall left and the murderer popped out of the file closet and clobbered Burke, the murderer either did escape into the cross hall from Burke’s office or heard Georgia coming and hid again until she left.”

  They both turned and looked toward the closet.

  It was possible.

  Annie paced to the window, glancing at the open area on the sill where the bent iron bar had rested. All right. The visitor is talking to Burke and decides—why?—that Burke must die. That moment. Without delay. There is the bar. She looked at the coat rack. And there was the spot where the raincoat had hung. It must have been decided upon so quickly and the visitor moved so fast, too fast for Burke to comprehend his danger and cry out.

  Quick. Reach up. Yank down the coat. Slip it on, backward. Grab up the bar in a hand protected by the sleeve. Whirl around. Lift the weapon and strike.

  There must have been an instant’s awareness by Burke. Perhaps it began as puzzlement, then exploded into horror and pain. Then nothingness.

  “Here’s why Emily didn’t have anything current,” Max said triumphantly. “Burke had an ‘Out’ box. Probably other faculty brought stuff and dropped it into her ‘In’ box, but since he was chair, he had an ‘Out’ box that she cleared.”

  Annie pulled her mind away from the horrible picture she had imagined.

  “And you’re right, Annie. This is all stuff he’d done after Tuesday. A letter to the college president, outlining Burke’s hope that the trustees would reconsider the independent position of the student newspaper, asking that it be brought up at the next meeting and a new policy be put into effect by next fall.”

  “That wouldn’t affect Brad Kelly,” Annie said. “His term would be up by then.”

  Max flipped open a green folder on top of the ‘Out’ box. “Look, here’s Kelly’s student folder. It has a note from Burke to refile it.”

  “Burke must have checked it before he called the college legal counsel. Remember, when we came in yesterday morning he was on the phone, trying to figure out a way to dump Kelly. I don’t suppose he found anything in his file that would help.”

  Max bent closer to th
e folder. “Doesn’t look like it. Good grades. Very good. No record of any rules violations. In good standing.” He used a pencil, flipped the top page. “Oh, wow. I’ll say he’s in good standing. He’s been awarded a Fulbright.”

  “That must have made Burke gnash his teeth.” Annie looked at Burke’s ‘In’ box. “So Burke put Kelly’s folder up there. He was finished with it and ready to talk to the faculty members. He wanted to know who had leaked the confidential information to Kelly.”

  Max rubbed thoughtfully at his chin. “Do you suppose somebody gave himself away, that something was said in those conversations that tipped Burke off? And that’s why the murder had to happen so quickly, without any preparation?”

  They stared at the desk, but if it held any secrets to Burke’s murder, they didn’t divine them.

  The not-too-far-distant chimes of St. Edward’s sounded the hour.

  Max was reluctant to depart. In fact, he kept them in the building for another few minutes as he timed how long it would take to sprint from Burke’s office door to the end of the main hall and up the stairs to the faculty wing.

  “Forty-eight seconds,” he panted, after several tries.

  But Annie’s mind was already set on their next task. They had come and they had looked, as Miss Dora exhorted them. They had proved tenable Laurel’s defense of the lovers. Now it was time to delve into the characters of the victims, à la Henny (a/k/a Ariadne Oliver, Miss Marple, et al).

  14

  The cavernous old hall hadn’t been painted in years, but it was sparkling clean and the shiny leaves of the rubber tree in a brass planter glistened from a recent sprinkle. The house smelled of polished floors, potpourri, the warm aroma of baking, and age. It was post-Revolutionary but old, nonetheless, and built in the familiar manner: a high foundation of tabby covered with stucco, two stories, with piazzas extending from the front around two sides. A bronze marker on the iron gate gave its history: Brooker House, built in 1817 by a plantation family at the flowering of a fortune based on Santee cotton and long before the tragic war which would bring ruin to Chastain and to South Carolina.

  Their hostess, a trim middle-aged woman in gray fleece sweatpants, a worn Chastain T-shirt, Nikes, and a calico sweatband, led the way into the front parlor which had gilded cornice ceilings, a fine Adam mantel, ferns in hanging baskets, and shabby wicker furniture with brown and yellow cushions. She waved them to a seat on a comfortable brown wicker couch. “Would you like some coffee?”

  “We don’t want to impose,” Annie said quickly. “It’s so early. You’re very kind to agree to talk to us at all.”

  Peggy Simpson pulled off her sweatband and shook out her short brown hair. “I suppose,” she said abruptly, “it’s because I feel guilty. Of all the kids who’ve lived here, I guess I saw less of Emily than anyone.” She had a frank, no-nonsense gaze. “Not that I’m supposed to be a counselor or anything like that. I’m just a landlady, listed by the college as approved. That means I don’t have roaches and there are plenty of fire exits.” A wry smile. “When you have a three-quarter piazza, you’ve got plenty of fire exits.”

  She looked at them with suddenly pain-filled eyes. “A boardinghouse. I never thought I’d run a boardinghouse.” She glanced at the mantel and its jumble of pictures. “But there aren’t many options open to a widow with six kids who wanted to be at home to see them grow up. And a lot of it’s been fun. My youngest is at Chastain now, and the house is full of kids going to school here. Most college students live in dorms or apartments, but there are still a bunch who can’t afford that and someplace like this is the answer.”

  “It looks like a swell answer,” Max said quickly.

  Peggy Simpson flashed him a grateful smile. “Not bad. Almost like home, too, for the ones who find it tough to be away for the first time.”

  “Did Emily?” Annie asked.

  “Emily.” A sudden frown. “Emily was—” She looked at them inquiringly. “Did you know her?”

  “Not really,” Max explained. “We’d both met her. That’s all.”

  “But you’d seen her.” Outrage glistened in Peggy’s eyes. “Why does appearance have to count for so much? Why? Why can’t we see the miracle of life and be glad and not demand so much?” She shook her head impatiently. “But I know the answers, as well as you. There’s something in us that loves beauty. That would be all right, but do we have to penalize the ugly?” She bit her lip. “That’s the truth, you know. Poor Emily was ugly. She was not only fat—so fat that she had to stop at least a couple of times when she climbed the stairs—well, you’ve seen her. She was ugly, with greasy, stringy hair and a bad complexion and watery little eyes almost hidden by folds of fat.” Peggy Simpson tightened her hand into a small fist and struck the arm of her chair. “Dammit, that’s what I remember. And I didn’t really try with Emily. Maybe I thought it was too late. Kids have to have love, you know. Right from the start. They have to believe that somebody thinks they’re great, just the way they are, scrawny or nearsighted or clumsy or shy. Or fat.” A tear glistened in her eye. She brushed it away. “And I’m not even crying for Emily. I guess I’m crying for all the kids out there that nobody ever loved. And believe me, nobody ever loved Emily. She was self-pitying, self-centered, grumpy, sarcastic, jealous, mean-spirited, spiteful, everything you don’t want to be around. And yet—” Mrs. Simpson’s eyes widened in remembered surprise “—it just about killed her when that stuff came out about her professor. And I realized I hadn’t given Emily any benefit of the doubt. Emily could care about other people too, despite how she acted. She didn’t come down for dinner Tuesday night. You can imagine how unusual that was! Never happened before. I went up to her room and knocked. She finally came to the door and her face was all red and puffy from crying. I asked if I could help and she said no, that nobody could help, that it was awful, that all this ugly stuff had come out about Mrs. Porter and Mrs. Porter had been nicer to her than anyone ever had. I told her it wouldn’t help for her to make herself sick crying about it, that the nicest thing she could do would be to tell Mrs. Porter that she cared, that she supported her.”

  “I didn’t realize Emily felt that close to Mrs. Porter,” Annie said.

  “The suicide must have really shaken her,” Max surmised.

  Peggy pressed her fingertips briefly against her temples. “She was distraught when she came home Wednesday afternoon, there’s no other word for it. And I feel dreadful. I should have been more understanding. But her room is—was—just above mine. All night long, she paced, up and down, up and down, and the floor creaked. You can imagine. She was so heavy. I went up there once and banged on the door and told her, for God’s sake, to stop making all that noise. But she wouldn’t come to the door.” She swallowed jerkily. “I never saw her again. She didn’t come down for breakfast Thursday morning, but I was still furious with her. After I’d finished the morning dishes, I worked in the garden, then went on errands. When I came back, just before noon, she was gone.”

  “So you don’t know what time she left the house Thursday morning?” Annie asked.

  “No.” The landlady looked at her anxiously. “Do you think it matters?”

  “It might.” Annie wasn’t sure of it. But the more they knew, the more likely they were finally to pull the thread that would unravel the whole. “Do you suppose any of the other students would know?”

  Peggy looked toward the stairs and figured aloud. “Let’s see. Paul has a nine o’clock. Mary, too. Johnny goes to work at seven. Chris has a ten o’clock. Edwina works in the mornings and has all afternoon classes.” She turned back toward Annie and Max. “I don’t think so. I don’t think anyone would have been here to see Emily leave. But, if you’d like, I’ll ask them.”

  They made their thanks and were at the front door when Max asked abruptly, “Do you suppose we could see her room?”

  Peggy looked uncertain.

  “We won’t bother anything,” he said quickly.

  She hesitated for an inst
ant longer, then shrugged. “It can’t hurt anything. She didn’t have any family. She grew up in an orphanage not too far from here.” Turning, she led them upstairs, talking as they climbed. “That’s why she was older than most of the students. She’d worked her way through school, all on her own. She was almost twenty-five and would have been a senior next year. So there isn’t anyone to come and get her things. I thought I would ask the police what to do. If it’s all right, I’ll give whatever’s usable to the Salvation Army.”

  Emily’s was a small room at the very back of the second floor. Mrs. Simpson unlocked the door, turned on the light, and stood aside for them to enter. She remained in the hall. “I don’t think I want to come in. Not right now. You won’t touch anything, will you?”

  “We won’t,” Max said reassuringly.

  The room smelled like chocolate, doughnuts, and licorice. There were food containers everywhere, everything from pizza to wonton soup cartons.

  “She didn’t need to go down for dinner,” Annie commented to Max.

  “Do you suppose it was always this messy?”

  “Probably,” Annie said. “It looks like it’s been this way for a long time.”

  Magazines and paperbacks littered the floor and the two chairs. Copies of Cosmopolitan and Redbook. Stacks of romance novels. Huge caftan-style cotton dresses were draped over chair backs, flung carelessly on the floor.

  Careful not to step on anything, Max prowled the circumference of the room, looked under the bed, peeked into the wardrobe, checked beneath it, stood on tiptoe to scan its top.

  Annie watched him curiously, then surveyed the room and its contents carefully. What was Max looking for? What was there to see but evidences of uncontrolled gluttony, sloth, and loneliness?

  She waited until they had made their good-byes and were almost to the car before she asked. “What were you looking for?”

  He looked at her soberly. “Any traces of gunpowder.”

  Annie stopped short, stared at him.

  He opened the car door for her. “I didn’t find any.”