“No, Dad, Alex is fine, and so is the baby,” Sean said. I could hear the barely suppressed irritation in his voice. “I’m afraid I have shocking news. Oscar Reilly was killed sometime last night, and I’m about to head to the county jail to meet Melba. They’ve taken her in for questioning.”
FIFTEEN
Oh, no, not another murder. I felt sick. Then the last part of what Sean said sank in. “Melba! Why have they taken her in for questioning?”
“That’s what I’m going to find out.” Sean sounded grumpy, whether with me or the early call to the jail, I didn’t know.
“Sorry, of course,” I said. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Not at the moment,” Sean said. “If they don’t hold her, I will bring her to your house. I know she’ll want to see you and talk to you about it. I wanted you to be prepared.” He broke off. “Look, Dad, I’m pulling up to the jail. I’ll call as soon as I can.” He ended the call.
I wished I could break him of talking on his cell phone while he drove, but at least he wasn’t doing it on a freeway in Houston anymore. I had nightmares about him and Laura talking and driving when we lived there.
My rambling thoughts focused on Melba. Other than the fact that she had been Reilly’s administrative assistant, at least until yesterday afternoon, why did they take her in?
An appalling thought popped into my head.
They would take her in if they found some kind of evidence at the scene that suggested she was present.
I refused to believe that my dear friend from childhood had killed Reilly, no matter the provocation. They couldn’t arrest her, surely. There couldn’t be sufficient evidence.
I realized I had no idea how—or where—he was killed. Frustrated by my lack of knowledge and my inability to do anything constructive to help Melba, I felt like pulling my hair. Poor Diesel picked up on my tension, and talking to him and reassuring him calmed me down as well.
“Our friend Melba’s in trouble,” I said. “But we’ll help her, won’t we?”
He recognized Melba’s name and meowed in response.
I yawned again. I was tired. I didn’t know exactly when I’d fallen asleep last night, but I had read until pretty late. The last time I remembered looking at the clock, it was nearly one.
“Come on, boy, let’s wash our faces and then get downstairs for some caffeine. I have a feeling I’m going to need a few gallons of it this morning.”
On the way downstairs I recalled my meeting with Penny Sisson. I hadn’t remembered it in time to tell Sean I would be out of the house for a while this morning.
As my foot hit the bottom step, I realized that the meeting would have to be put on hold. With Reilly’s murder, everything changed. Perhaps I wouldn’t lose my job after all.
I chided myself for my lack of compassion while I filled the coffeemaker with water. A man was dead, and by foul means, and here I was thinking about myself.
A little voice reminded me how much I loathed the dead man, and that false piety over his death was hypocritical. Then I decided I still wasn’t awake enough for these kinds of philosophical discussions with myself. I put coffee in the basket and hit the button.
The back door opened, and Azalea walked in. “Good morning, Mr. Charlie. You’re up early today.” Hearing a loud meow, she looked around to see the cat approaching from the direction of the utility room. “Good morning to you, too, Mr. Cat.”
I returned her greeting and then explained why Diesel and I were downstairs before our usual seven or seven thirty. Occasionally eight.
“Lord have mercy, Mr. Charlie.” Azalea shook her head. “I reckon you’re going to be involved in another murder. You and my daughter.”
Azalea’s daughter, Kanesha Berry, was chief deputy in the Athena County Sheriff’s Department, and their principal homicide investigator. The city had too small a police force to run a homicide investigation, and the sheriff’s department stepped in for murder cases. If necessary, they might call in the state cops, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation.
If the murder occurred on campus, though, the campus police would be involved as well. Talk about complications. Thankfully for me, I didn’t have to worry about jurisdiction issues.
Kanesha was a tough, experienced, and smart investigator. I knew I could trust her not to take the easy route and try to railroad Melba if the evidence wasn’t convincing. Whatever it is, I thought, it has to be circumstantial, and hopefully Melba will be able to explain it easily.
“Poor Miss Melba.” Azalea pulled an apron from her capacious bag and put it on. She stowed the bag on top of the refrigerator. She had learned early on not to leave it in a more accessible spot if she didn’t want a cat trying to climb into it. “With Mr. Sean there being her lawyer, she’ll be okay. He’s not going to let anything bad happen to her.”
“No, he won’t,” I said, feeling a swell of pride for my capable son. I put my earlier thoughts about her daughter into words. “Kanesha isn’t going to prefer charges if the evidence isn’t there.”
“No, she won’t.” Azalea and her daughter often butted heads. They were too much alike not to, but you could never get either of them to recognize that fact. Nevertheless, I knew Azalea was fiercely proud of her daughter and her accomplishments. Azalea and her late husband had worked hard to make sure Kanesha had the education and the opportunities they hadn’t had, and she had fulfilled their dreams for her.
Except that she wasn’t married and hadn’t provided any grandchildren. That was a touchy subject, as I knew all too well.
My mind kept flitting all over the place this morning. I needed that caffeine more than I realized. I checked the machine, and it had finished gurgling. I poured myself a cup, added cream and sugar, and had that first heavenly sip. I fancied I could feel my brain start to settle down and focus already.
“Now, you sit on down there.” Azalea nodded toward the table. “I’ll get breakfast on right now. You okay to wait for biscuits, or you want toast with your eggs and bacon instead?”
I was torn. I occasionally had dreams about Azalea’s biscuits—light, fluffy, dripping with butter and her homemade muscadine jelly. I thought about my too-tight pants and decided dry toast was the better option.
“A couple of scrambled eggs, please,” I said, “and three pieces of dry toast. No bacon.”
Azalea harrumphed. “Not much of a breakfast to set you up for the day.” She shook head. “But if that’s what you want, all right then.”
I started to say it wasn’t really what I wanted, but if I did, I’d be eating eggs, biscuits, and bacon this morning. I weakened slightly, however. “Maybe biscuits tomorrow instead.”
Azalea nodded and turned to preparations for my breakfast. I drank more coffee before I fed Diesel his morning wet food. Then I went out to retrieve the newspaper.
I found it hard to concentrate on the paper. There was no mention of Reilly’s murder. The news would have broken too late, but there would be plenty of coverage tomorrow. I wouldn’t have to wait that long, though, for details, thanks to Sean. That thought set me to worrying about Melba again, but Azalea soon distracted me with my breakfast.
I thanked her and tucked into my meal. Diesel had watched Azalea’s preparations carefully. He was disappointed not to smell bacon, I knew. Azalea usually slipped him a few bites when she thought I wasn’t looking.
After breakfast I went back upstairs to shower. I took the cell phone into the bathroom with me and set it on top of the toilet tank. That way I would hear it if Sean or anyone else called.
My shower went uninterrupted, except for an inquisitive feline head that poked around the shower curtain a couple of times. Both times Diesel meowed loudly, as if to ask why I was taking so long. “Silly kitty,” I told him.
By the time I’d finished dressing, the bedside clock read seven forty-five. I decided I would call Penny Sisson at
home at eight. If our meeting was no longer necessary, there was no point in my going over to the campus. Besides, I needed to wait at home for Sean and Melba. If the layoff plan wasn’t affected by Reilly’s death, I would arrange to go later in the day to clear out my office.
With those arrangements settled—in my mind, at least—I went back downstairs to the den, where I booted up my laptop to check my e-mail. Diesel left me and headed for the kitchen, no doubt to try to con Azalea out of a treat or two.
I logged into my work e-mail first—at least my account had not been disabled, so that was a good sign. As I expected, there was an announcement from Forrest Wyatt’s office about the tragedy that had occurred on campus last night.
The message revealed that the library was the scene of Reilly’s murder, and that surprised me. No further information was offered, and I wondered where in the library the crime had taken place. The library was closed today, until the officials investigating the crime had finished with the scene.
In the old days, before the advent of the electronic journals and databases, the closing would have been a major disruption for everyone. Now that so many faculty members and students could access what they needed from their homes and offices, the most significant inconvenience would be to those who came to the library for a quiet place to study.
I thought about calling Helen Louise to share the news with her, but I knew she was too busy to have time to chat on the phone with me. Instead, I focused on reading the rest of my e-mail.
There were two requests for reference assistance with regard to materials in the archive, and another from a person who wanted to examine a copy of an early medical textbook that had belonged to one of Athena’s doctors in the 1830s. I thought about how to reply to them and came up with a cautiously worded message that stated the archives and rare books were temporarily unavailable due to unforeseen circumstances. I couldn’t offer a definite time frame for availability, and I concluded by saying that I would be in touch as soon as I had more information.
The final new message in my in-box was from Delbert Winston. I did not know him that well, although he did occasionally forward e-mail inquiries from alumni and others who had books they wanted to donate, if the books were of sufficient age to be of value to the rare book collection. We would chat briefly at library meetings, but I really knew little about the man.
Here, though, in my in-box was a message from him saying that he needed to discuss a personal matter with me. Urgently was the word he used. Discuss urgently. He gave me his cell number and asked me to call whenever I received his e-mail.
I checked the date and time on the message and noted that he had sent it shortly before five this morning.
Was this urgent matter of his connected to Reilly’s murder?
I pulled out my phone and punched in his number.
To my aggravation the call went to voice mail immediately. After the beep I told him I’d received his message and gave him my cell number. I concluded with, “Call me at your earliest opportunity.”
I checked the time on my phone. Seven minutes past eight. I retrieved a copy of the local phone book from my desk and looked up Penny Sisson’s home number.
She answered on the second ring.
“Morning, Penny.”
She didn’t give me time to say anything. “Charlie, have you heard the news about the murder?” I managed a yes before she hurried on. “Isn’t this horrible? What if we have a deranged killer wandering the campus? I am not going into the office today. Will that upset your plans?”
“No, not at all,” I said. “In fact, I really need to stay home.” I couldn’t explain why. I wasn’t going to be sharing Melba’s business with anyone outside the immediate family.
“Thank you,” she said. “I just don’t think I can face the office today. I’m going to have nightmares because it was such a brutal murder. He wasn’t a nice man, but to die like that. It’s horrible to contemplate.”
“Do you know how he died?” I asked.
“You mean you haven’t heard?” Penny said, her surprise obvious in her voice. “Oh, Charlie, it was horrendous. The poor student worker who found him had to be taken to the emergency room, she was so upset. She apparently has panic attacks, and finding Reilly like that caused a bad one.”
“Finding him like what?”
“Crushed to death in the compact shelving in the basement,” Penny replied. “Horrible, just horrible.”
SIXTEEN
I was so shocked I almost dropped the phone. What a gruesome way to die. Poor Reilly. I felt sick at my stomach and did my best to keep an image from forming in my mind. No wonder the poor student worker was so upset.
“Charlie, are you still there?” Penny’s anxious tone brought my brain back into focus.
“Yes, I’m here,” I said. “You’re right, it is horrible. What on earth was he doing in the basement of the library at that time of night? Does anybody know?”
“No, I haven’t heard any other details,” Penny said. “The whole thing is truly bizarre. Whoever did it must have hated him terribly to kill him like that.”
“Yes, they sure did,” I said. “I’d better get off the line now, Penny. I’m expecting another call. You’ll let me know when I need to come to your office.”
Penny assured me she would be in touch as soon as she had further news about my status at the library, and I bade her good-bye. I set the phone down, and I saw my hand shake. I couldn’t help thinking about Reilly’s manner of death. I had loathed the man, certainly, but I wouldn’t have wished him so brutal an end.
Hatred.
Melba couldn’t have done it, I knew with absolute certainty. She might have hated Reilly, but she was not cruel. His death was cruel.
Porter Stanley hated his former brother-in-law, I had little doubt. He seemed a far more likely candidate to have executed Reilly in such a gruesome fashion. Kanesha had better move quickly, though, before Stanley disappeared. Perhaps I ought to call her.
I reached for the phone, and it rang as I touched it. Startled, I almost dropped it. I looked at the caller ID. The number looked vaguely familiar, but I didn’t know to whom it belonged.
“Is this Charlie?” the caller said. “This is Delbert Winston.”
“Yes, Delbert, this is Charlie,” I said. I had forgotten about him. “I called right after I read your e-mail, but you weren’t available at the time.”
“Sorry about that,” he replied. “I really appreciate you calling back so quickly. I guess you’ve heard that the jerk is dead.” He sounded happy about it.
“Yes, I heard,” I said. “I also heard that he died in a particularly horrible way. Even he didn’t deserve that.”
“I’m not going to argue with you about it,” Delbert said. “I don’t think you know how nasty he really was. Frankly, I’m surprised somebody didn’t take him out years ago. He was twisted.”
The distaste in his tone was obvious, and I had to admit to being curious about this strong reaction to the man. Delbert obviously hated Oscar Reilly. Could he be the killer? I had better be cautious in talking to him and not put him off. I might be able to extract useful information from him, information that could help Melba.
“He was not a pleasant man,” I said. “He seemed to cause turmoil around him.”
“He did, in spades,” Delbert said heatedly. “I can’t figure out why the hell anybody thought he’d be the right person to run the library while they look for a permanent director.”
I wondered how much the high-level library staff, like Delbert, Lisa, and Cassandra, knew about the budget crisis Peter Vanderkeller left behind when he decamped. I didn’t want to say anything out of turn, because if they didn’t know about it, I didn’t want it known that I was the one who told them.
“I suppose it had something to do with his financial background,” I said. “Maybe President Wyatt wante
d someone with a firm hand on the budget.” I thought that was suitably diplomatic enough and didn’t give anything away.
Delbert laughed, a short, sharp sound. “So you’ve heard about the mess good ole Petey left us. I can’t believe how idiotic he was. Surely the man had better sense. But I guess he didn’t.”
“At least he didn’t embezzle it,” I said. “It was careless of him to overcommit the budget that way, but I’m sure he had the best intentions.”
“He probably did. We all want to make sure the students and faculty have access to the resources they need,” Delbert said in tones of great patience. “But at the end of the day, we have only so much money, and we can’t spend what we don’t have.”
“No, I understand that, but the president is going to have to get it sorted out, not us.” I decided it was time we got to the point of why he wanted to talk to me. “What is this urgent personal matter you want to discuss with me?”
“Oh, yeah, that.” Delbert paused, long enough that I thought I would have to prompt him again. Then he spoke. “You’ve been involved in murders before, haven’t you? I mean, I’ve heard about you helping the sheriff’s department a few times.”
“Yes, I have helped a bit,” I said. I had a bad feeling about this.
“That’s good,” he replied. “I mean, that you’ve got experience. I need help from somebody who knows how to deal with the cops.”
“Why?” I asked. “Do you have information about the murder? If that’s the case, the best thing you can do is call the sheriff’s department and tell them what you know. Or if you don’t feel comfortable talking to them, call Martin Ford. He’s a good guy, and you can talk to him.”
“It’s more complicated than that,” Delbert said. “Look, this is how it went down. Before I heard about the budget crap, Reilly came to me the first week he was put in charge. He’s talking to me about the acquisitions budget, as well as my cataloging budget, asking me all sorts of questions, trying to figure out the process of ordering and paying for resources. I guess because he didn’t want to deal with that witch Cassandra. I explained everything as patiently as I could, and he went away.” He paused for a long breath. “Then, he comes back a week later, and all of a sudden he’s wanting to look at invoices, purchase orders, spreadsheets—all kinds of documentation. So I give him what he asks for, even stuff he should have gotten from Cassandra. He goes away. Then a few days later he’s back again, like some damn dog with a bone. This time, though, he tells me he thinks I’ve been fiddling with the books and that I must have embezzled like a hundred grand out of the acquisitions budget. All because I’m the selector for the history and art history departments, and they have endowed funds that I manage. Cassandra can’t stand it because she can’t tell me what to do with the money.”
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