Grave Errors

by Carol J. Perry

  He may be trying to find me alone so he can harm me somehow. Why? Does he think I know something about Emily’s murder? If it was a murder? What do I know about it? I think it has something to do with the soil sample she took with Billy’s brother.

  What if he isn’t trying to harm me? Why else would he follow me? Idea: Is he trying to protect me? From who? What? Was James Dowgin trying to harm me? Is that why he’s dead? Would his own brother kill him to protect me? Probably not. Then who wanted James dead? Why? Does Billy know who might have killed his brother? Does that mean he’s in danger too? Were both of the Dowgins trying to protect me, not harm me?

  Wow! New concept! I need to tell Pete about this.

  I closed the book, returned it to my purse and looked around the room. My students were still reading. The TV screen was blank. I swung around in my swivel chair the way I used to when I was a kid—forgetting for the moment that a half-circle turn would bring me face to face with the giant black shoe.

  Swirling colors. Twinkling lights. Darkness. Then a form drew closer. A woman. I didn’t recognize her. She was pretty in a girl-next-door sort of way, with short brown shoulder-length hair, wide-set eyes and a sweet smile. She seemed to look directly at me, then put her finger to her lips. She winked, cupped her hand and put her ear to a wall.

  Listening.

  CHAPTER 33

  The vision faded away. The shoe was just a big, out-of-style shoe once again. I swung my chair around to its front-facing position just in time to greet the three returning from their interviews. I raised one hand in welcome, attempted a smile and tried to erase the lingering image of the listening woman.

  Not too long ago seeing a scene like that in an inanimate object would have made me run screaming from the room. But somehow it had become a matter of course, something I’d learned to accept—but still something I dreaded. Now, within just a few seconds of a vision, I could face a room full of students with a smile and pretend there was nothing strange going on at all.

  I’m afraid I’m getting pretty good at it.

  There was no point in trying to dissuade the students from discussing their interviews with one another. And to be honest, I was as curious as the others.

  Therese resumed her seat behind the news desk. “I thought the cop would only want to talk about the body in the cemetery. I wonder why he asked me about those Shores people. Happy and Trudy. I barely know them. Did they ask any of the rest of you guys about them?”

  Dorothy closed her textbook. “Officer Costa asked me about them too. In fact, he asked me the same questions over and over as if he thought I’d give a different answer.”

  “What did he want to know?” Hilda asked. “I only knew them because my parents bought a house from them once.”

  Dorothy frowned, then answered. “He kept asking me if Emily seemed to be afraid of either one of them. If she’d had any arguments or anything. I told him she seemed to be fond of them both. They liked her. She liked them.”

  That was the impression I’d had too. I could understand the question though. Emily had been at a party at the Shoreses’ the night she died.

  “He mentioned them to me too,” Shannon said, “but mostly he wanted to talk about Dakota and if Dakota had ever talked to me about Emily or about that James Dowgin guy.”

  “Had he?” Ray asked.

  “Yeah. A little. I told him what I could remember.”

  “Like what?” Roger had closed his textbook too.

  Shannon looked from one twin to the other. “Dakota really felt bad about Dorothy’s sister dying like that. She was nice to him. Used to let him paint on her balcony sometimes. But he didn’t really know the Dowgin guy. Only saw him a couple of times with Emily. Never got introduced to him or anything.”

  “What did they want to know from you two? Ray? Roger?” Therese fixed Roger with a blue-eyed stare. “Come on. You can tell us. We’re all in this together.”

  Roger looked at his brother and shrugged. “I guess it’d be okay. See, we not only found the body.” He nodded in my direction. “I mean Lee actually found it but she didn’t know what—or who—she’d found. Then we were the ones who caught up with Billy Dowgin at the game.”

  “Or he caught up with us,” Ray pointed out. “Still don’t know which.”

  “Did they ask you about the Shoreses?” I asked.

  “Not me,” Roger said. “You, Ray?”

  “Nope.”

  “Hey,” Dorothy’s usual soft tones were replaced by louder, more urgent words. “Did any of you get the idea that they’re actually looking into my sister’s murder?”

  “They didn’t exactly call it murder,” Hilda said, “but yeah, her name was mentioned and that’s where all the questions about the Shores couple were coming from I think.”

  “Uh-oh.” Therese pointed toward the mezzanine entrance and stage whispered, “Here comes Detective Mondello. Better change the subject.”

  I looked to where she pointed. So did all the others, as Pete strode toward us. He acknowledged the class, using his cop voice. Cop face too. “Thank you all for your cooperation. I’m going to borrow your teacher for a short time.” He approached my desk. “Mr. Pennington says he’ll sub for you if you like. Shouldn’t take too long. Just a few questions.”

  I stood. “No need for a sub.” I picked up the textbook we’d used and faced the students. “Okay, everybody, make a list of the useful strategies you learned from the chapter and apply them to the project. Remember our low budget.”

  Following Pete, I left the classroom and climbed the stairway to the second floor. “Mr. P. said we could use his office,” he said, sounding like himself again. “More private.”

  “Okay,” I said as we approached Mr. Pennington’s open door. “I’ve been thinking about the Dowgin brothers. Quite a lot.”

  “Not surprising,” he said. “Want to talk about it?” We entered the office and Pete closed the door behind us. He sat in Mr. Pennington’s chair behind the huge oak desk that had once belonged to Oliver Wendell Trumbull. I sat facing him.

  “It’s kind of a theory I thought up.” I spoke hesitantly, searching for the right words. “I’ve been thinking that maybe we have the brothers all wrong. Maybe James Dowgin’s note was meant to warn me, not threaten me. Maybe Billy Dowgin is watching, following me to protect me, not to harm me. What do you think?”

  His expression was doubtful, but he nodded and said, “Worth thinking about. I’ll run it by the chief. But for now, I’d like to ask you about the connections between Emily Alden and the Shores couple. Happy and Trudy.”

  I would have liked to talk about my theory instead, but hey. He’s the cop. Not me.

  “I’ll tell you what I can but I don’t know what I can add to what you’ve already learned.”

  “Sometimes we know things we don’t know we know.” He’s told me that before . . . and he’s always been right about it. Pete pulled the ever-present notebook from his inside jacket pocket.

  “You told me that you’d called the Shoreses’ office about James Dowgin once.”

  “Right. I was looking for information about him for Dorothy.”

  “What did you learn?”

  “Nothing, really,” I said. “They had a rehearsed line about him. I guess anyone who asked got the same story.”

  “What did they say? Can you remember?”

  “I think so. It was something like ‘there is no agent here by that name. May I connect you with another of our happy agents?’”

  Pete wrote in his notebook, then looked up. “That’s it?”

  “Afraid so. That’s it.”

  “Did you ever see James Dowgin yourself? I mean before you found his body? Think carefully.”

  “Of course not. I would have told you if I had.” I couldn’t keep the little edge of annoyance from my voice.

  “Maybe not in the Shoreses’ office or here at the Tabby. Think outside the box.”

  “No. I’d never seen him before . . . wait a minute. Outsi
de the box. Boxes. Shoe boxes!” I halfway stood up, then sat again. “I didn’t really see him. I mean it wasn’t really him. I didn’t recognize him then but I’m sure it was him!”

  Pete put down his pencil and spread his hands apart in a helpless gesture. “Could you make that a little clearer?”

  “It was the pitchman. The shoe salesman. In the mirror. I mean in the vision. The shoes were in boxes.”

  “You told me about the shoe vision. I didn’t know there was a man in the vision.”

  “It didn’t mean anything at the time. But it was James Dowgin.” The thought made me happy. “See? You were right again. I knew something I didn’t know I knew.”

  “Good.” He’d picked up his pencil again. “Any more visions I should know about? Even ones that didn’t mean anything at the time?”

  “There was one in the giant shoe today,” I told him. “It was a young woman. I didn’t recognize her. She was listening to something through a wall. She did this.” I cupped my ear with one hand and put a finger to my lips with the other.

  “I see. Want to try some more word association? Since the word boxes reminded you of something, how about the word wall? Ring any bells?”

  I squeezed my eyes shut, thinking about walls.

  Walls. A wall. The Berlin wall. The wall on the southern border. The Great Wall of China. The walls in my house.

  Ding! Something rang a bell. I opened my eyes.

  “It’s the wall in Dorothy’s apartment. Emily’s bedroom wall. Dorothy said the walls in that place are so thin you could hear a mouse—um—break wind in the apartment next door.” I thought about the woman in the vision. “Maybe the vision girl is Emily,” I said, excited. “I saw her in the mirror when she was dead in the bathtub, but her hair covered part of her face. I’ve never seen a picture of her. Have you?”

  “Only the autopsy pictures,” he said. “I’m sure you don’t want to see those. Her face was blotchy and swollen. Not at all as she must have looked when she was alive.”

  “Dorothy must have some. I never thought to ask and I didn’t notice any photos at all when I was in the apartment. Has Emily’s phone arrived in the mail yet? There’ll be pictures on that I suppose.”

  “We’ve asked the building super, Berman, to watch for it in case somebody has to sign for the package and Dorothy isn’t there.” He wrote something in his notebook, then looked up. “I noticed that about the apartment too. Neat and clean but no personal stuff around at all.” He smiled. “Not like your place.”

  “I know,” I admitted. “I like all my stuff. But some people don’t like clutter. Minimalists, they call them. Emily must have been like that, and I guess Dorothy’s place in Alaska has only the basics for survival. But she must have pictures of her sister. I’ll ask when I get back to class. I’ll bet the listening girl is Emily.”

  “Maybe.” Pete concentrated on his notes, not looking at me. I know he’s uncomfortable with my visions. I am too, but they’ve provided answers, solutions sometimes, to cases he’s worked on. “Thin walls between the apartments, you say?”

  “That’s what Dorothy told me. She says the neighbors are reasonably quiet though, except for some country music once in a while.”

  He smiled at that, because it’s his favorite music too. “Nice neighbors. We questioned them, but they didn’t live there when Emily died. Berman says the place had been vacant for quite a while.”

  “Did he tell you he used to set up his painting easel on that balcony? For the light, you know.”

  “No, he didn’t. The balcony of the apartment next door?”

  “Yep. And after it was rented, he used Emily’s balcony.”

  Pete put down his pencil and looked at me. Cop face. Cop voice too. “Why didn’t anybody tell me that?”

  “I don’t know. I guess you didn’t ask. Is it important?”

  “Maybe.” He picked up the pencil. “Anything else?”

  “Dorothy says he kind of hinted around that he’d like to use her balcony too.” I thought about the narrow windows in the basement. “It must be really dark in his place. Artists need light.”

  “Don’t tell me she lets him.” There was annoyance in Pete’s voice.

  “No. But Emily did, Pete.” My voice rose. “And she let him use his pass key to come into the apartment when she wasn’t there!”

  He wrote quickly, closed his notebook, leaned back in the chair and tapped his fingers on the book cover for a long, quiet moment. “All right. I’ll walk you back to your classroom now. And thanks.” His voice softened. “This has been helpful.” He stood, came around the desk as I got out of my chair, bent and kissed my cheek. “See you tonight? I’ll bring Chinese.”

  “Deal,” I said, opening the office door. “Would you bring a little extra in case Aunt Ibby joins us? She loves that crab Rangoon.”

  “I will,” he promised. “I may be a little late. Going to stop by and have another visit with your artist friend. By the way, Chief Whaley has released your camera. I can stop by the evidence room and pick it up for you.”

  I thought about that for a minute. Thought about where it had been. “Don’t bother ,” I said. “I don’t think I want it back after all.”

  CHAPTER 34

  I hadn’t had a chance to call Aunt Ibby to catch her up on all that had happened on this very strange day, and I knew she’d be waiting anxiously for me to come home. I pulled my car into the garage next to the Buick and hurried across the yard to the back door. O’Ryan purred a happy welcome as I fumbled for my keys. I took a quick glance toward the neighbor’s fence. No Frankie.

  Aunt Ibby’s kitchen door was already open when I stepped into the back hall, and she stood waiting for me in the doorway. “Maralee, you come right in here. Tell me every little thing! I saw the video on television. They even gave credit to your class. You must be so proud of them!” She took my hand and pulled me into the warm, welcoming room. “Coffee’s on. Sit down.”

  I sat, and attempted to tell her every little thing, beginning with the surprising identity of the corpse. When I was done, I decided to run my new theory about the Dowgin brothers trying to warn me of danger by her. I wound up with my vision of the listening girl.

  “That’s a lot to absorb,” she said. “A lot to think about.”

  “I know. We can talk about it some more later.” I stood, picked up my purse and prepared to go upstairs. “Pete’s coming over with Chinese for dinner and you’re invited,” I told her.

  “Thank you dear. I’m in the middle of working on a pie, so you can start without me. Save me some left-overs though, and I’ll bring dessert. I have another book about soil I want to show to Pete. I’ll bring that along too.”

  As promised, Pete arrived—just a little bit later than usual—bearing the familiar brown paper shopping bag emblazoned with a fierce red dragon. O’Ryan, as usual, had accompanied him up the back stairs and stood next to me, watching as I placed each enticing, slant-sided, wire-handled box on the counter.

  “Smells great,” I said.

  “So do you.” Pete pulled me close for the kind of kiss that could delay dinner. O’Ryan intruded on that idea by pushing his big fuzzy head between us and uttering a plaintive “Meeaow!”

  I had to laugh. “I think he smells the crab Rangoon.”

  “All right O’Ryan. There’s some shrimp Kung pao in there too,” Pete said. “Be a good boy and maybe you can have a little bite.”

  I set the Lucite kitchen table with plates, wineglasses and chop sticks, but left the food in their neat little boxes with the red pagodas on the sides, and the sauces in those tiny clear plastic envelopes just because I love the way they look. The fortune cookies, however, always go into an antique, blue-and-white, lotus-patterned bowl. Call me crazy.

  I turned the radio on to the soft rock station, Pete poured the wine—a pleasant chardonnay—the cat positioned himself under the table and we clicked our glasses together in a silent toast.

  “Well,” I said, “aren’t you go
ing to tell me?”

  “Tell you what?” he said with that innocent look he does so well.

  “You talked with the artist? Dakota Berman?”

  “I did.”

  “And?”

  He hesitated. “I’ll tell you what I can, Lee.” He unwrapped the chopsticks and handed me a pair. “Egg roll?”

  “Yes, please. I understand. Police business.”

  “It is, but it’s your business too. Berman readily admitted that he sometimes used his pass key to enter Emily Alden’s apartment. That she’d given him permission to use her balcony to take advantage of the light there for his painting.”

  “And that he’d used the balcony next door when that apartment was vacant?” I opened the chicken fried rice box, helped myself, then passed it to him.

  “Yes. He was perfectly open about it. Didn’t seem to see anything wrong with it.”

  “I suppose there isn’t anything wrong with it,” I said, “as long as he had permission.”

  “Right. I asked him about his—um—relationship with Emily. He called her Miss Alden. Claims it was a tenant-super relationship. Her rent was always paid ahead of time. She never complained about anything. He was careful to lock up after he left her place and to be sure to leave the balcony just the way he found it. Sometimes, if the plants looked as though they needed watering, he’d take care of that.”

  Pete stopped speaking, speared a plump shrimp from the Kung pao and slipped it to O’Ryan.

  “That’s it?” I said.

  “Pretty much. Oh, I spoke to the chief about your theory that the Dowgin brothers might have been trying to warn you, not threaten you.”

  “I’ve been wondering about that. What did he say?” I sampled the Moo Shoo chicken, then wrapped it in a soft pancake. “This is good. Try one.”

  “After the chief talked to Billy Dowgin, he came to the same conclusion you did. The poor guy had no idea that it was his brother we’d found dead in the cemetery. Chief said he cried like a baby when they told him.” Pete helped himself to the Moo Shoo. “I don’t know everything that was said between the chief and Billy Dowgin, but apparently James was worried that someone might come after you the way he figured they’d done to Emily. He believed somebody had made an attempt on his life in Florida—that’s why he’d faked his own death down there. Billy claims that’s why his brother sent that note—to try to scare you away from learning what actually happened to Emily.”