Skating on Thin Ice

by Jessica Fletcher

  “Who, Eldridge?”

  “Those real estate people.”

  “You mean Eve Simpson?”

  “Her and her greedy boyfriend. Thinks if she reminds me of the string of accidents been happening here, I’ll throw up my hands and chuck it all. Like I haven’t hit a skid of bad luck before. Underestimate me. They all do. I see what’s happening here.”

  “I’m glad to hear you say that, Eldridge, because—”

  “Course, I never had anyone die here before,” he said, interrupting me. “But he was hanging around in an unauthorized area, now, wasn’t he? The foolish tourist. I told Jeremy to find a lock for that grate. Doesn’t have to be anything special. We must have dozens of them in some drawer that we pulled off the old lockers. Don’t need to use the pit anyway. Just plow the stuff out into the parking lot is the way I’d do it.”

  “Then why don’t you do it?”

  “We’re too close to the reservoir is why. Town decided the ice from the rinks might flow downhill and pollute the water, so we had to connect to county sewers. Cost me a pretty penny. But what choice do we have now with the cops locking up the garage?” He chuckled. “There’s so much snow out in the parking lot, the town’ll never know if we add to it.”

  “Eldridge, were you here anytime on Friday?”

  “Thought you might get around to asking that. Friday is the day I visit my wife’s cousin in the Waterview nursing home, outside Portland.” He stared off, thinking quietly for a moment. “Bella was real close to her cousin Phoebe and asked me to look after her. I’ve been as faithful to her as I was to my Bella. Never miss a Friday. Bring her a coupla Charlene Sassi’s almond pastries. She likes that.”

  “What do you think will happen to the figure skating program without your star attraction?”

  “Not up to me. That’s Devlin’s problem. He’ll have to get another pair in here or maybe play it safe and coach singles instead. But I’ll wait to install all those fancy fripperies he wants, see if he can still make a go of the program.”

  “Have you spoken with him about it?”

  “Haven’t even seen the man since last week. Not my favorite fellow; that’s for certain.”

  “How did you happen to find him?”

  “He came on Allen’s recommendation. He wanted him. Wanted to get his daughter out of San Francisco. Some trouble there.”

  “How did Mr. Allen find you?”

  “I advertised. Put the word out in one of those skating logs or whatchacallit—Jeremy did that for me. Said that we had ice and wanted to expand the program. Allen calls me up and we made a deal.”

  “Is he your partner in the rink now?”

  “We’re talking.” A little smile played around his lips. “We’ll see how it goes. I might get ready to retire some day. Didn’t tell that to Eve Simpson, though. Don’t want to get her hopes up.”

  By the time I got downstairs again, Lyla had left. “She got hit with a puck, you know,” Marisa said. “Those things are hard as rocks. She fixed her hair so you can’t see the bruise, but she started looking peak-ed, turned a bit green, and said she had to go home. Mr. Devlin drove her.”

  “Is he coming back after he takes her home?”

  “Didn’t say.”

  A woman carrying a big flower arrangement approached the desk. “These are in memory of Alexei Olshansky,” she said. “Can I leave them here?”

  Marisa looked at me as if to say, I told you so. “We have two baskets here already,” she said to the woman. “Wouldn’t you rather enjoy those flowers at home where they’ll remind you of him?”

  “I can’t. My husband will start asking questions. Please let me leave them here.” She started to tear up.

  “Sure, sure,” Marisa said. “Just push over that basket to the right.”

  After the woman had left, Marisa confided to me, “You should see Lyla’s office. Her desk is covered with flowers.”

  I wanted to ask Marisa some questions, but the phone rang and I could tell by her end of the conversation that she was going to be talking for a while. I buttoned up my jacket, pulled on my gloves, and walked outside to look at the makeshift memorial that was filling the space at the foot of the stairs into the building. Several people took pictures of those admiring the flowers, most of which had been pushed into the snow that had piled up when the front stoop was shoveled clear. Some of the mourners had poked holes in the snow so the flowers stood up as if they were in individual vases, making the area look like a florist’s display. Ribbons around the stems fluttered in the breeze, and there were condolence cards either pressed into the snow next to the flowers or scattered at the base of the pile.

  One flower caught my eye. It had been sprayed with black paint, as had the back of the note that was attached to it, a note that looked like it had been torn out of a store’s order pad. I plucked it from the flower and turned it over. The message was written in black crayon:Happy you’re dead, you Commie creep.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “What do you think, Mrs. F.? Looks like the same writer to me,” Mort said when I’d delivered both the note, and the flower it had been wrapped around, to the sheriff ’s office.

  “I agree,” I said, “and both notes are written in black crayon on the same type of paper.”

  Mort slipped the new note into yet another evidence bag and clipped it to the one containing the message we’d found among the fan letters in Alexei’s apartment. “I think it might be time to find out if there are any fingerprints, other than ours, on those papers,” he said.

  I knew that any prints the lab came up with would be run through Maine’s Bureau of Identification. If no match was found, they could be sent to the FBI’s Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System, or IAFIS. Of course, if the writer of these two notes had never committed a crime, or had his or her fingerprints taken for any other reason, IAFIS wouldn’t be of any help.

  “We’re probably talking about a guy here, don’t you think?” Mort asked.

  “It seems reasonable, but I wouldn’t rule anything out just yet,” I said. “A handwriting analyst could give us a better idea.”

  “A handwriting analyst would be perfect,” he said, “but that service will have to be provided by the state police, or maybe the Feds. I don’t have the resources to bring in experts.”

  “Can you put in a request to one of those agencies for a handwriting expert?”

  “Sure, but it’ll take a while. In the meantime I’ve got to keep the investigation moving.”

  “With good, old-fashioned legwork?”

  “Right.”

  “It’s been successful before,” I said, smiling. “Have you interviewed Irina Bednikova yet?”

  “Was about to go out to Blueberry Hill Inn before you stopped by.”

  “Do you mind if I tag along?”

  “I don’t,” Mort said, “but I don’t know how she’ll react. After all, it’s an official call.”

  “I’ll understand if you don’t want me there, but I’ve met her before. She might be more forthcoming with a familiar face nearby.”

  Mort weighed my argument. “She might. Sure. Let’s go.”

  The snow on the front lawn of the Blueberry Hill Inn had been trampled into slush by reporters and photographers, spoiling the usually picturesque scene the old Victorian home presented. Although the first wave of press excitement had subsided, there still were several people camped out in vans across the street waiting to capture a comment or candid picture of the three Russians who were staying there.

  “Hey, Sheriff Metzger, what’s happening?” a reporter from a Bangor TV station yelled out as Mort and I exited his car.

  A couple of other members of the media suddenly surrounded us. Mort tried to wave them off, but they were persistent. He held up his hand and said, “I don’t have any statement to make at this time. When I have something to report, I’ll hold a news conference.”

  “What’s Mrs. Fletcher doing here with you?” a reporter asked.
/>   “She’s been involved with this from the beginning and has been very helpful. That’s all I have to say for now. Excuse us.”

  Jill and Craig Thomas came through the front door as we stepped up onto the porch. “Happy you’re here, Sheriff,” Craig said. “These media vultures are driving us crazy.”

  “They’re relentless,” said Jill.

  “I don’t envy you,” I said as Craig and Jill led us into their home, which also functioned as one of Cabot Cove’s nicest inns.

  “We’re here to talk to Ms. Bednikova,” Mort said.

  “So you said when you called,” Craig acknowledged. “We told her you were coming. She didn’t seem happy about it, but I’m sure she realizes that she doesn’t have a choice.”

  A man appeared from the kitchen. He was short and slender and wore a brown tweed jacket and a pale green shirt over a brown turtleneck.

  “This is Professor Simmons,” Craig said. “One of the Russian TV crews has hired him as a translator. He’s staying with us.”

  We shook the professor’s hand and asked if he would be willing to serve the same function for us. While Irina spoke some English, emotions might overwhelm her and make it more difficult for her to express herself. Allowing her to answer questions in her native language would help Mort’s interview go more smoothly. Not only that, but it might keep Irina from falling back on her limited English to avoid answering those difficult questions that she may have thought were too personal or cast her in a bad light.

  “I’m happy to be of service,” the professor said pleasantly. “I’ll do anything I can to help. Dreadful what happened to Mr. Olshansky. I understand he was a wonderful figure skater with a great future.”

  “He was a very talented athlete,” I said. “It’s always heartbreaking when a young person’s life is prematurely cut short.”

  “I’ll go get Irina,” Jill said and disappeared up the stairs.

  I wondered if Ms. Bednikova would be accompanied by her two bodyguards. She never seemed to go anywhere without them. I didn’t have to wait long to find out. They came lumbering down the stairs followed by their ward, who was dressed in a close-fitting silver metallic pants suit. She descended the stairs like a movie star in an old Busby Berkeley musical motion picture, her dog, Pravda, wearing a matching doggie coat, nestled in her arms.

  “Good afternoon,” Mort said.

  “Good afternoon,” she responded in a voice dripping with tragedy. She held Pravda with one arm as she dabbed at the corner of one eye with a hankie in her free hand, although I didn’t see any trace of tears.

  “This is Mrs. Fletcher,” Mort said. “She’s working with me on the investigation of Mr. Olshansky’s death.”

  “We’ve met,” I said.

  Irina looked as though she was about to collapse at the mention of Alexei’s name, and sagged against her brother, Maxim. I wondered whether the second guard was also a relative.

  “I know this must be tough on you, ma’am, but I have to ask you some questions,” Mort said.

  “Why don’t we all go in the living room,” Jill suggested. “You’ll be more comfortable there.”

  I have to admit that the presence of the two large Russian men was unsettling. While they were humorless, their broad faces set in a perpetual scowl, they appeared to be making an attempt to fit in with their surroundings. They were dressed in American sports clothes. Each wore a long-sleeved polo shirt, their broad shoulders straining the seams. Their slacks were khaki, and on their feet were the kind of caramel-colored hiking boots I knew were popular with the students at Cabot Cove High School. Irina sat demurely in the center of a green and yellow floral-pattern couch, the men flanking her. She seemed almost lost in the midst of their bulk. Mort and I took chairs across a burlwood coffee table that Craig had created from a tree that had fallen on his property during a storm. Professor Simmons stood at the end of the couch ready to provide translations should the need arise.

  Mort held a clipboard on his lap and wrote down each of their names. The second bodyguard was called Boris Abelev. He handed Mort a business card. I looked over to see what it said, but it was written in Cyrillic script, the Russian alphabet. Mort tucked it in his pocket.

  “I suppose we should start with some basics,” the sheriff said. “I need to know the whereabouts of all three of you on the Friday that Mr. Olshansky died.”

  Irina looked left and right at her protectors, her wide eyes and raised eyebrows indicating that she didn’t understand the question.

  “Where were you the day he died?” Mort put it more simply.

  The professor translated for her.

  “What day this was?” she asked in her thick Russian accent.

  “Last Friday,” Mort said.

  She wrinkled her face as though trying to remember. Finally, she said, “I was here this day. No, I shop, too. I buy things for Irina.” She held out a hand and admired her long fingernails, which had little flowers painted on them.

  “What about later in the day?” Mort continued. “Say, between four in the afternoon and eight that evening?”

  Again, her expression was exaggerated.

  I turned to Craig Thomas. “Do you recall whether Ms. Bednikova was here during those hours last Friday?” I asked.

  Craig shook his head. “Jill and I were in and out all day last Friday. I’m afraid I have no idea what Ms. Bednikova was doing.”

  Irina’s brother spoke up. “Irina with us all day,” Maxim said in what sounded more like a growl.

  Mort ignored him and asked Irina, “Did you spend time with Mr. Olshansky on Friday?”

  Again, the question was translated for her.

  “Nyet,” she said firmly. “I try to see him but no find him. He is like little child in hiding game.” She sniffled and dabbed at her eyes again with her hankie, then waved her hands in front of her face. “Now he is no more, my poor Alexei Nicolayevich Olshansky.”

  There was a pause while Irina composed herself; her tears didn’t strike me as being especially genuine. After a few seconds had passed, I asked, “Would you please tell the sheriff why you came to Cabot Cove, Ms. Bednikova?”

  Simmons translated.

  “I come—I come to bring Alexei home to Russia where he belong. Why he did come to skate with American girl, who is not as good as Irina? He leaves alone his mother in Russia. She cries all the time to have him come home. He is Russian, not American. Russian skaters, we are the best in the world, I tell him before he go. Now he will come home as dead man.”

  “But we know you were at the ice rink on Friday evening,” Mort said. “There are witnesses. Are you telling me you didn’t see Olshansky anytime on Friday?”

  Simmons’s translation inspired a stream of infuriated Russian. “She says she hasn’t seen Olshansky once since she arrived. She has been hunting for him without success.”

  “Ask these guys if the same is true for them.”

  “Da!” Maxim said, not waiting for the question in Russian. Boris simply nodded.

  “We are together always,” Irina added, throwing her hands up dramatically.

  As Mort’s questioning progressed, I silently grappled with a memory that slipped from my grasp. It was something I needed to follow up on. It had been nagging at me all day. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. It was there; yet it wasn’t. Finally, it came to me just as Mort was preparing to wind down the session. It was a snippet of conversation that I’d overheard the previous week between Alexei and his coach. Devlin had referred to a scandal that involved Alexei back in Russia. But it was what Alexei had said in response that niggled at me, that the same could possibly be said about Devlin. What had he meant by that? Was there something in Devlin’s background that he didn’t want known? Could it have had a bearing on Alexei’s death?

  How much did anyone know about Brian Devlin aside from his reputation in the figure skating world? There had been nothing written about him since arriving in Cabot Cove that touched upon his personal life. He had mentioned
during his talk to the chamber of commerce that he had been an army brat and had ended up at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada. I also knew from the little I’d heard that he’d spent much of his professional career at a famous skating center in Hackensack, New Jersey. And word was that he never married.

  Another fragment of thought came, went, and then returned. The newspaper clipping found in Alexei’s apartment was about the death of a man in Colorado Springs. Why had Alexei elected to keep that particular clipping? We knew Alexei had spent time in Colorado Springs as a young boy. Another clipping we’d discovered in his apartment had shown him as a ten-year-old in the Broadmoor Skating Club’s winter ice show.

  Colorado Springs is another famous skating center. Was there a connection between Alexei and Devlin going back to Colorado Springs? It would be interesting to find out that they’d known each other before Mr. Allen had paid to bring Alexei to the states. I didn’t know if it was so, but I intended to do some digging into the possibility of a linkage between those items at my first opportunity.

  “Well, I don’t have any more questions for these folks, Mrs. F.,” Mort said. “What about you?”

  “Irina, you told Evelyn Phillips that Alexei had a cousin in the United States whom he’d visited as a boy,” I said.

  “Do I know this Evelyn Phillips?”

  “The newspaper editor, Mrs. Phillips. At the rink, last week.”

  “That is right,” she said after the professor had translated my question. “He come here to States when little boy. He learn English here, but now—but now he speak no more English. He speak no Russian. He speak no nothing no more. My poor Alyoshenka. My poor Dasha.” She threw herself on Boris and wept. This time the tears were real.

  “Who is she talking about?” Mort asked Simmons.

  “Alyoshenka is a Russian nickname for Alexei,” the translator replied. “Dasha is a girl’s nickname. I don’t know who that is.”