Shots in the Dark

by Allyson K. Abbott

  “He’s doing well,” I told them. “He came through his surgery fine. He’ll be eating through a straw for a few days and out of commission for a week or two, but he’ll recover. And the nurses told me he’s already sitting up in his bed, typing out an article about the case.”

  “I hope it’s not going to lambaste you again,” Frank said.

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “Cora visited him yesterday, and they had a little chat.”

  Everyone looked over at Cora, curious.

  “It’s true,” she said with an enigmatic smile. “I think Clay Sanders has seen the wisdom of having Mack on his side. I’m not sure the police department or the DA’s office will fare so well, however.”

  “I’m working on that,” Duncan said cryptically.

  With that, I got up to fetch the brothers another round of beers, and Tiny excused himself to go to the men’s room.

  “I have some other news,” Cora said when I returned with the brothers’ beers. “It’s about the letter writer, and it’s important, but before I tell you, I’d like to ask that we let Tiny in on what’s going on. He already knows Duncan is still coming by, and I feel confident he’ll keep mum about anything that we tell him has to stay secret. And besides, he’s pretty busy with work right now and won’t be around much for a while.”

  I frowned, uncertain about bringing anyone else in on the case, and gave a questioning look to the others.

  Joe and Frank both shrugged.

  Mal pursed his lips in thought for a second and then said, “I think we can trust him.”

  I turned to Duncan, my eyebrows raised expectantly.

  “I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head slowly. “I’m not keen on bringing anyone else into it, but I imagine it has to be hard for Cora to keep a secret like that from someone she’s close to. And I agree with Mal. I think Tiny is trustworthy. So I’ll leave it up to you, Mack.”

  I looked over at Cora. “You’re sure he won’t let something slip at some point?”

  “Positive,” Cora said without hesitation. “Tiny might come across as a big, dumb oaf at times, but he’s actually quite intelligent.” She sighed and flashed me an apologetic smile. “And to be honest, he’s already figured out that I’m working on something for you, something that’s very hush-hush. He’s asked me twice already, and I’ve been stalling him, but I think it’s only a matter of time before he figures out some or all of it on his own.”

  “Okay then,” I said. “Let’s bring him in on it.”

  As if on cue, we heard the squeak of the men’s room door opening and Tiny’s heavy, clumping footsteps as he headed back to the table.

  “Tiny,” I said once he had resumed his seat. “There’s something we need to tell you.”

  Over the next ten minutes or so, we brought Tiny up to speed on the letter writer case, including our suspicion that Suzanne Collier might be behind it and why.

  “Cora ordered a bottle of Opium perfume for me, and it came yesterday,” I told him and the brothers, since they didn’t know this part yet, either. “The smell of that perfume is definitely the same smell I picked up on in Gary’s car. That doesn’t prove it was Suzanne who was in there, because I’m sure there are hundreds, maybe thousands of other women in the Milwaukee area who wear that perfume, but it certainly points another finger in her direction.”

  “And I’ve uncovered several more fingers that point that way,” Cora said. “Quite damningly, in fact.” She leaned over and reached into the laptop bag she had brought with her, though in an amazing display of holiday spirit and ardent restraint, she hadn’t taken the machine out since her arrival. She still didn’t take it out. What she removed instead was a notebook. She opened it and then went on, glancing at the items she had written down. “To start with, the Collier family has established a fund that awards several scholarships a year to students at the U of W. Suzanne Collier is the family representative on the board that reviews the applicants’ files and makes the final decision on who gets the money. And it just so happens that both the girl who worked at the zoo and the young man who worked at the Miller plant were recipients.”

  “Of course,” Mal said with a snap of his fingers. “Those scholarship applications would have given her access to their financial information, their names and addresses, their areas of study, their employment . . . all of it. It would have been easy for her to deliver the packages to both of them.”

  “And that’s not all,” Cora said. “Remember the art store you went to for the very first clue?”

  I nodded.

  “The guy who owns it was about to go bankrupt two years ago, but he was able to secure a loan to keep the store afloat. Guess who gave him that loan,” Cora went on.

  “Suzanne Collier?” Joe said, unnecessarily. We’d all made the appropriate leap in logic.

  Cora nodded and then looked at me apologetically. “Do you remember the name of that store?”

  I thought back, and then my eyes widened in amazement. “Oh, my goodness,” I said, slapping myself on the side of my head. “It was Collier Art Supply!”

  Cora nodded. “I don’t know how we all managed to miss that connection. But when I was going back over some notes I had on the case, it suddenly leaped out at me. So I did some digging. It turns out the owner is a distant cousin of some sort to the Collier family.”

  Everyone at the table exchanged sheepish looks of disbelief, all of us stymied by the fact that we hadn’t made the connection sooner.

  “If Suzanne owns that store,” I said, “she’d have unlimited access to the ink that was used in those letters.”

  “Not only that,” Cora said, looking a bit smug. “I had a chat yesterday with one of my clients, a very wealthy lady here in the city who hangs out in many of the same circles that Suzanne does. I had to talk to her about something related to some computer security work my company is doing for her with regard to the printing businesses her family owns, and given what I’d already uncovered about Suzanne, I purposely steered the conversation around to the topic of modern-day printing doing away with certain endearing but old-fashioned skills, like calligraphy. She insisted that the old way of doing things would always linger on. I disagreed and asked her if she knew even one person who does hand calligraphy anymore. I’m sure you can guess whose name she mentioned.”

  “Suzanne’s,” the brothers said in unison.

  “And there’s more still,” Cora said, licking her lips and looking like the cat that had just eaten the canary. “That spice shop at the Public Market? They have several business arrangements with entities in the city, including the one with the university that we know about. That connection, which I’m not sure Suzanne knew about, may well have been a lucky coincidence because it put us on the right track. But the one I’m betting she does know about is the contract the shop has with an upscale restaurant in town called Toby’s.”

  “I’ve heard of it, but I’ve never eaten there,” I said.

  “Neither have I,” Cora said. “It’s a bit pricey for my tastes. But the interesting thing about it is who owns it—the Collier family. Toby Collier is Suzanne’s grandfather. Want to guess who does the books for the place?”

  “Tad?” I said, feeling my heart sink.

  Cora nodded.

  “Oh, God,” I said, squeezing my eyes closed for a moment as the ramifications of this sank in. “Do you think Tad is in on it?”

  Cora cocked her head and made a tentative face. “I don’t know, but my gut tells me no. My gut isn’t proof, however.”

  “He wouldn’t necessarily have to be a part of it,” Frank said. I suspected that he, like me, didn’t want to believe that Tad had been fooling all of us all this time. “If Tad does the books for the restaurant, Suzanne might have access to the spice store’s account info. That’s all she would have needed. Right?” Frank looked at the rest of us with a hopeful expression. There were some tentative nods in the group, but I knew that for now, everyone would be very wary of Tad.


  “Is that everything?” Duncan asked, looking solemn.

  Cora shook her head. “No. I have one more connection. The Collier family owns a series of plots at Forest Home Cemetery. Several of Suzanne’s ancestors are buried there. And those plots are on the hill very near to the Prairie Rest area where Mack found that clue in the willow tree. Plus, we’ve already established Suzanne’s possible connection to the aster and the willow leaf that came in the letter that led Mack there.”

  “What about the casino?” Mal asked. “Any connections there?”

  “Not that I’ve been able to find,” Cora said, shaking her head. “But it’s a public enough place that I’m not sure there needs to be one.”

  There was a period of silence as we all sat, digesting the huge course of information Cora had just fed us.

  It was Duncan who finally broke the silence. “If we’re on the right track and Suzanne Collier is the one behind all of this, it’s not going to be easy to prove. What you’ve told us is very damning, but none of it is evidence that would hold up in court. And given Suzanne Collier’s reputation, and the money and power resources she has at her fingertips, it won’t be easy to convince anyone that she’s behind it. In fact, I find it hard to believe that the woman is twisted enough to actually kill people over this.”

  “Well, there is one more thing,” Cora said a bit cryptically. She reached into her laptop bag again and pulled out a sheet of paper, which she laid in the center of the table. We all leaned forward to look at it.

  “This is a printout of an article from last year from one of those paparazzi-driven gab rags that like to stalk the rich and the famous. It says that Suzanne Collier was observed on three different occasions exiting the office of a shrink who caters to high-society types. It’s not much, but it might suggest that Suzanne has some issues we don’t know about.”

  Cora was right that it wasn’t much, and the entity that had printed the article was well known for circling the truth with their use of innuendo and suggestion.

  After giving us all a few moments to read the brief article, which came with a fuzzy picture that might or might not have been of Suzanne Collier, Cora then threw a wrench into the works.

  “I hate to burst this nice bubble I’ve created for all of you,” she said with a guarded, cautious tone, “but despite all these connections to Suzanne, there is a big problem.”

  Everyone averted their gaze from the article on the table to Cora.

  On cue, Cora reached into her laptop bag yet again and withdrew another piece of paper. She set it atop the first article, and everyone’s attention shifted to it. This one was a printout of a news article from the Journal, and in a large, very clear picture at the top was Suzanne Collier.

  “This is from last week,” Cora explained. “It’s a story about how Suzanne visited some orphanage in Mexico and donated a bunch of money to help feed and clothe the kids there. Look at the date in the article.”

  I scanned the text to find what she was referring to. At first, I didn’t understand the point she was trying to make, but then I made the connection.

  So did Duncan. “She was there when Lewis Carmichael was killed,” he said.

  Cora nodded grimly.

  “So that means she couldn’t have killed him,” I said, leaning back in my seat and sighing with frustration. I felt my hopes go up in smoke like a magician’s flash paper.

  “To be honest, I was thinking she couldn’t have done it, anyway,” Duncan said. I and the others gave him an inquisitive look. “Lewis was stabbed to death,” he explained. “But he was also beaten pretty badly. It would be very difficult for a woman, especially one Suzanne’s size, to do that. Perhaps not impossible, but certainly unlikely. And given this”—he tapped the article on the table—“I’d say it’s safe to assume she didn’t do it.”

  The disappointment everyone felt over this revelation was palpable. And then Mal made it worse.

  “But I imagine Tad could have done it.”

  The pain of that suggestion was like a knife in my back. Judging from the horrified expressions on the faces of everyone else at the table, I wasn’t alone.

  But then Cora took on the role of the cavalry. “Tad couldn’t have done it, either,” she said. “He was here with us, upstairs in the Capone Club room, at the time Lewis was killed.”

  “That’s right!” Joe said, slapping his knee and sounding excited.

  There was a collective sigh of relief around the table, and I could sense a lifting of the oppressive melancholy that hung over the group.

  “Okay,” Duncan said. “So Tad is in the clear, at least in Lewis’s death, but we still have the other issues at hand. And I think Mal may have been on the right track. Suzanne Collier may well be our suspect. In fact, given all the stuff that Cora has dug up, I’m inclined to think she is. But she didn’t do it alone. I think she had an accomplice.”

  This made perfect sense to me. “Of course,” I said. “With her money, it would be easy to hire someone to do her dirty work, or at least some of it.”

  Frank leaned forward, his eyes big. “That would be the smart way to do it,” he said. “Either hire someone or find someone with a motive that meshes with hers. If they split the nastiness between them but connect all the murders with the letters, it gives both parties alibis for at least some of the murders. Kind of like that movie Strangers on a Train.”

  Mal shot Duncan a look. Based on the expression on their faces, I knew they were both thinking the same thing, and whatever it was, it didn’t bode well.

  “What?” I said, staring down the two of them. “What are you two thinking?”

  Neither of them answered at first, but after Mal stared Duncan down for several seconds, I saw Duncan’s shoulders sag. He gave Mal an almost imperceptible nod.

  Mal looked at me, his expression grim. “Duncan and I have discussed these letters and the lack of any usable evidence to go with them. I think we have to consider the possibility that whoever is involved has some solid knowledge of forensics and police procedures. Would Suzanne Collier have that kind of knowledge?”

  Looks were exchanged, and after a few seconds of silence, Cora said, “I don’t know.”

  My thoughts immediately leapt to Duncan’s partner, Jimmy, but that was water I had to tread carefully.

  “Anyone who participates in the Capone Club will have that kind of knowledge,” Mal noted. There were several solemn nods around the table.

  “There’s one thing we’re forgetting,” I said. “I can buy a certain amount of coincidence, but there seems to be enough connections to Suzanne Collier for me to believe she’s involved in some way. If we assume her motive is to disband the Capone Club so Tad doesn’t spend so much time here—a motive that sounds a bit flimsy to me, but we can talk more about that later—then why target Duncan in the letters? Why allow the Capone Club to continue to go on and target me and Duncan?”

  “Well, the two of you are the heart of the Capone Club,” Cora said. “Eliminate the two of you from the mix and the club will likely disband, particularly if several members end up dead.”

  My mind was reeling with the possibilities, and I felt a stab of anger—literally, as it manifested itself as a sharp pain in my side—that our holiday had been tainted with these morbid thoughts.

  “Enough,” I said, determined to shift the mood to a lighter topic. “Let’s table the discussion for now and come back to it at a later date. I want to focus on the holiday. Who wants to give me a hand in the kitchen?”

  An hour later we were all sitting around our pushed-together tables, stuffed, sated, and content.

  “Anyone want coffee?” I asked.

  There were some sleepy-eyed nods from the group, so I got up and went behind the bar to start a pot brewing. Once I got it going, I stood a moment and watched the others laughing, talking, and enjoying themselves, and it made me smile. It was an odd, misfit group of friends I had, this substitute family of mine, and given that I’d always felt like a bit of a m
isfit myself, I found it apropos. Watching them, I prayed that no harm would come to any of them in this cruel game I was forced to play with the letter writer.

  I felt fiercely protective of all of them suddenly, and this imbued me with a new sense of determination. Somehow I had to beat this letter writer. I was going to win this game, no matter what it took. I imagined myself in a horse race, riding a white stallion who was surging ahead from the back of the pack. I saw myself overtake a ghostly image riding a black beast of a horse, which snorted and stomped in anger as I crossed the finish line a nose ahead of it. And then I envisioned my friends, my makeshift family, running to my side and congratulating me, showering me with flowers and a giant first-place ribbon.

  Just like that, I figured out part of the meaning behind the key that was the latest clue.

  “Cora,” I said, painfully aware that I was about to violate my own edict to stay away from the grim topic of the letter writer, “do me a favor and fire up your laptop.”

  She did so as the others all watched, curiosity stamped on their faces. Something in my voice must have told them that the chase was back on.

  “Ready,” Cora said.

  “See what you can find out about the Pabst Mansion and any connections Suzanne Collier might have to it.”

  Cora stared at me curiously for a moment before smiling. “Of course!” she said, starting to tap at her keys.

  The others were staring at me with confusion, so I explained. “That number one sign on the key and the beer on the paper. I think it means Pabst Blue Ribbon.”

  Since both Duncan and Mal were relatively new to the city and might not know the history, Cora summarized her findings even as she kept searching. “The Pabst Mansion served as home to Captain Frederick Pabst—the founder of the Pabst Brewing Company—and his family back at the turn of the twentieth century. The opulent structure later passed into the hands of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, and it served as home to priests and nuns for the next sixty-plus years. Back in the seventies it was nearly demolished, but a historic preservation group stepped up and saved it. After some painstaking restoration, it now stands surrounded by modern-day buildings in downtown Milwaukee and is open to the public for tours.” Cora paused with her typing and looked up at the others. “Their Christmas decorations and tours are quite famous and popular.” She went back to her keyboard and started tapping again, her eyes scanning her screen.