by Joanne Fluke
“The killer,” Michelle breathed.
“Right.”
Norman advanced his camera until the time code read seven twenty-nine. “Okay…let’s start watching.”
Their eyes were glued to the screen for several minutes and then Hannah called out. “There’s the dessert table! But it’s so far away, I can’t tell if the knife is missing.”
“Hold on. I’ll fix that,” Norman said.
Hannah gasped as the shot began to zoom in. “I didn’t know you could do that!”
“It’s the beauty of digital photography.”
There was a brief moment of silence and then all four of them gasped.
“Look!” Michelle was the first to speak. “Norman caught a hand reaching for the knife!”
“Is it Brandi’s hand?” Hannah asked, turning to Andrea. “You notice manicures and things like that.”
“I think so,” Andrea said, but she didn’t look convinced. “It looks like she’s wearing Pearl Blush nail polish, and that’s what Brandi was wearing, but it’s a really popular color right now. And she’s got her hand tipped, so I can’t see if she’s wearing her ring.”
“Michelle?” Hannah turned to her youngest sister.
“I think it’s her, but I couldn’t swear to it.”
Hannah sighed. “Unfortunately, that doesn’t cut it in a murder investigation. The only thing we know for sure is that a woman wearing pink nail polish picked up the knife.”
“But she could have put it back down again,” Andrea said.
“That’s right. She might have picked it up to have a closer look. Let’s see the next shot, Norman. Maybe that’ll tell us more.”
Norman put the next photo up on the screen. It was a second shot very similar to the first, but the time code read two seconds later. He zoomed in and let out a holler. “The knife’s gone, and there’s nobody else even remotely close to the dessert table. Whoever that woman was, she took it.”
“What’s this?” Hannah asked, getting to her feet and pointing at the screen. “Is that her leg, walking away?”
“I don’t know what else it could be.”
“Brandi was wearing silver boots,” Hannah reminded them. “Can you pan down to her calf, Norman?”
“Sorry, no. The lower half of her leg is hidden behind that plant in the foreground. I can zoom in a little more on what I’ve got, but that’s it.”
“There’s a spot on her leg,” Andrea commented, staring intently at the zoom of what they assumed was Brandi’s thigh.
“Let me see if I can enhance it a little more,” Norman offered, fine-tuning some controls on his camera. “How’s that?”
“It’s Brandi!” Michelle shouted, getting so excited she hopped up and down in her seat.
“How do you know that?” Hannah asked. “You have to be certain, Michelle.”
“I am certain. Remember when I told you that I saw her tattoos? Well, that’s the first one she ever got. It’s a tiny little brandy snifter.”
“She’s right. Somebody gave us a set of four just like that for a wedding present, and it’s a distinctive shape.” Andrea turned to Hannah. “Do you want me to write down that Brandi stole the knife at seven forty-two and walked off with it?”
“Absolutely. Let’s see what you’ve got next, Norman. And let’s keep a sharp eye out for Brandi going into the kitchen.”
“This could do it,” Norman said, as he put up the next shot. “It’s a shot of Edna and her workers by the Christmas tree, but someone’s going through the kitchen door in the background.”
Hannah held her breath as Norman zoomed in and she let it out in a whoop. “It’s Brandi, all right! Now all we need to do is find a shot of someone following her.”
The next few shots yielded nothing, but three minutes later, in the background of a shot Norman had taken of a table of diners, the kitchen door was partially open.
“Hold on…I’ll zoom in,” Norman said, and then he sighed. “It’s a woman, but she’s almost completely blocked by the foreground. The only thing I can tell for sure is that she’s wearing a black skirt.”
Andrea gave a little gasp of excitement. “But that’s enough! We solved another one, Hannah! All we have to do is look for a woman wearing a black skirt and we’ll have Brandi’s killer!”
“Not necessarily. The woman in the black skirt could have some perfectly reasonable reason for going into the kitchen. For all we know, she went in, washed her hands, and came right back out again.”
“So it all depends on how long she was gone,” Michelle said, looking thoughtful. “How long does it take to kill someone?”
Hannah shrugged. “She’d have to walk through the kitchen, go through the pantry, open the outside door, and follow Brandi all the way out to Martin’s car. That would take a couple of minutes. And then it would take another couple of minutes to stab her. This is just a ballpark figure, but I’d say that if she’s gone for more than five minutes, she’s definitely a suspect.”
“She’s definitely a suspect,” Norman said, and all three Swensen sisters turned to look at him. “While you were speculating, I’ve been running through the photos on the internal camera screen. It’s a lot faster that way. I’ve gone through five minutes and she hasn’t come out of the kitchen yet. Unfortunately, I don’t have anything after five minutes.”
“Why not?” Hannah asked.
“I moved on to take pictures of the jazz ensemble. And then I took a couple of the Plotniks in front of the Christmas tree. After that, I moved upstairs to do some photos of the miniature Christmas village. I’m really sorry, Hannah, but I don’t have anything in that area again until after you found Brandi’s body.”
“There’s no need to feel sorry. You gave us the only lead we’ve got.” Hannah turned to smile at him. “You’re a great photographer, Norman.”
“Thanks. So what do we do next?”
“We look at it logically. Either the woman in the black skirt is the killer, or she’s a material witness. If she didn’t stab Brandi, she knows who did because the killer must have passed right by her in the kitchen. The upshot is, we need to talk to her. And the caution is, we have to be careful because we don’t know if she’s Brandi’s killer, or not.”
“Makes sense,” Michelle said, nodding quickly. “What do you want us to do?”
“Just observe for right now. We need to canvass the whole community center and make a list of every woman who’s wearing a black skirt or dress.”
“That shouldn’t take long if we split up,” Norman said, pulling a notebook from his camera bag. “I’ve got a couple of extra pens, if anyone needs them. They’re leftover Rhodes Dental Clinic giveaways from last Christmas.”
Michelle raised her hand. “I need one. My roommate gave me five dollars for the last one you gave me. She said she’d never seen a pen shaped like a toothbrush before and she just had to have it.”
“Maybe I should give up dentistry and manufacture pens for a living,” Norman quipped. “Where do you want me to start, Hannah?”
“Will you take the south end of the banquet room and work your way to the center? That way Michelle can start on the north end and meet you halfway.”
Andrea began to frown. “How about me? You want me to help, don’t you?”
“Of course I do. I need someone to check every room up here and that’ll give you a chance to see Tracey. And don’t forget the high school kids who came up here to watch movies in the library and the Senior Center. Let’s just make lists for now. We won’t ask anybody any questions quite yet. We can meet in the lobby in twenty minutes to compare notes.”
“What are you going to do, Hannah?” Michelle asked.
“I’ll canvass the kitchen, the ladies’ room, the cloakroom, and the dance floor. But first, I’m going to talk to Mike and tell him about the lady in the black skirt. It’s only fair. And I’ll let him know that we’re just doing the legwork and we’ll leave the actual questioning up to him.”
“And you re
ally think he’ll believe you?” Norman did his best to maintain a straight face and failed.
“Of course he’ll believe me. It’s the truth. It’s just as I told Michelle and Andrea earlier. It’s a different situation, this time around. Mike’s shorthanded, and I’m going to give him all the help I can.”
The door to the room Mike was using as a temporary office was closed, and Hannah stood there, frowning. She didn’t want to interrupt, but the information she had could lead to the capture of Brandi’s killer. Mike might be angry at the interruption, but he’d be grateful just as soon as she told him why she needed to talk to him.
Hannah knocked and put a welcoming smile on her face. Mike would be startled to see her, but he was bound to be pleased once she’d had her say. She shifted from foot to foot, waiting for the sound of the latch clicking open, but the door remained closed.
“Come on, Mike,” Hannah muttered, knocking again, a little harder this time. Again, she waited, her smile in place, but no one answered the door.
It was possible Mike had left. He could be in another part of the community center, checking up on a lead. Perhaps she should open the door. If Mike wasn’t there, she’d leave him a note telling him she had urgent information for him.
Hannah turned the knob and eased open the door. Mike was there, and he was in the middle of an interview. If the scowl on his face was any indication, he wasn’t at all happy about being interrupted.
“I’m busy here, Hannah,” Mike said, waving her away.
“I can see that. I’m really sorry to interrupt, but I have to talk to you right away. So if you could just step outside in the hall, it’ll only take a second or two.”
“No.”
“No, it’ll take longer than a second or two? Or no, you won’t come out in the hall?”
“No to both. I’m in the middle of an interview here. I’ll talk to you, later, Hannah.”
“But you don’t understand. I came here to help you. This is really important, Mike!”
“I said later, Hannah. Please don’t interfere. I’m trying to run an official investigation, and I don’t have time to talk to you now. Just shut the door and let me get on with my job, okay?”
Hannah shut the door, perhaps just a wee bit harder than was necessary. She’d given Mike his chance, and she thought she’d been extremely polite about it. And now she didn’t have to feel the least bit guilty when she caught Brandi’s killer and did his job for him.
Chapter Eighteen
Hannah was still fuming as she went down the stairs. As always in times of great stress, she headed straight for the kitchen. Not only would it make her feel better to be in the room at the community center she liked best, but she could check out the ladies who were helping in the kitchen at the same time.
Edna’s after-dinner helpers were working to clean up the kitchen, wash the serving bowls, and store the leftover food until it could be taken to Reverend Strandberg’s soup kitchen in the basement of the Bible Church and the Lake Eden Convalescent Home. All it took was one glance to see that no one was wearing black.
The dance floor was next. Hannah found a table near the edge of the area that had been set aside for dancing and sat there watching the couples as they danced. The light was fairly dim and she had a few anxious moments when she spotted Cheryl Coombs in what she thought was a black skirt, but before she could even begin to wonder what possible motive Cheryl could have for killing Martin’s new wife, Cheryl’s partner danced her closer and Hannah realized that her skirt was dark green.
The cloakroom was next. Hannah went into the long, narrow room and flicked on the overhead light. There was a startled gasp and she turned to see the high school couple she’d interrupted. The girl blushed as she smoothed her hair and the boy gulped. “Sorry, Miss Swensen. We were just…uh…”
“It’s okay. I don’t want to know,” Hannah said, interrupting his effort to put a spin on what had obviously been a romantic moment. “Shouldn’t you be dancing, or something?”
“That’s a great idea. ’Bye, Miss Swensen,” the girl said, grabbing her boyfriend’s hand and pulling him out of the cloakroom before things could get even more awkward.
Hannah grinned as she watched them hurry out the door. The girl was wearing blue, and they’d obviously been the only ones here. She was about to leave to check the ladies’ room when she spotted a small puddle of water on the floor next to a tote bag, the kind women used to carry their shoes when they were wearing their boots.
Her curiosity aroused, Hannah unzipped the bag and examined the shoes. They were a pair of standard black pumps with a small heel, the kind many women wore for dress. There was nothing unusual about the shoes themselves, except for the fact that they were soaked. Hannah picked up a pair of boots placed under a coat on the next hook. They were dry. She checked another pair and her suspicions were confirmed. The woman who’d worn the wet shoes had been outside recently. But why would someone go outside in dress shoes when they had their boots with them? Hannah figured that the lady in question must have been in too much of a hurry to switch to her boots.
It was a second bit of information, and Hannah intended to take full advantage of it. All she had to do was look for a woman in a black skirt, or dress, who was wearing boots. There couldn’t be that many of them.
Hannah headed off to the ladies’ room to do some uncharacteristic primping while she checked out the other women who were there. Unfortunately, since her brush was in her purse, and her purse was in a drawer in the kitchen, her primping was limited to running her fingers through her hair. She couldn’t even freshen her makeup, since all she was wearing was lipstick, and the Pretty Girl lipstick that Luanne had sold her before she’d gone to work at Granny’s Attic was still sitting on Hannah’s dresser at home.
Luckily, it didn’t take long to check out the occupants of the ladies’ room. Hannah said hello to Charlotte Roscoe and Sally Laughlin, in red and light blue respectively. Then Carrie, wearing winter white, came in and Hannah greeted her, too. She was about to leave when she noticed a pair of feet wearing boots in one of the stalls.
“I just wanted to tell you that Norman’s doing a great job with the photographs,” Hannah said to Carrie, wishing that she had inherited the gift of making polite chitchat.
“Of course he is. Norman’s wonderful at whatever he does.”
“True,” Hannah was quick to agree. “Anyway, the reason I mentioned it is that if Savory Press uses any of Norman’s photos in the book, he’ll get credit as a photographer.”
“I’m sure he’ll like that,” Carrie said, pulling Hannah over to a corner. “What’s the matter? Why are you staring at that stall?”
Hannah sighed. She’d obviously been obvious. “I need to know if that lady’s wearing a black skirt.”
“Why?”
“A man sent me in to check on his date. I don’t know her, but he said she was wearing a black skirt.”
“Your mother’s right. You don’t have a deceitful bone in your body.”
“What?”
“Tell the truth, Hannah. You made up that whole story about a man and his date, didn’t you?”
“Oh. Well…”
“Never mind. I’m sure you have a good reason for wanting to know. Hold on for a minute and I’ll find out for you.”
Hannah held on. What else could she do? And a minute or two later, Carrie was back.
“Striped skirt, silver and blue,” Carrie announced in a sibilant whisper. “Is that all you wanted to know?”
“That’s it. Thanks, Carrie.” Hannah turned and headed for the door.
“I’ve got a question for you, Hannah.”
Hannah prepared herself mentally to lie again if it was necessary. “What is it?”
“I want to know what you think of Winthrop.”
“Oh. Well…I only met him briefly…” Hannah stalled while she tried to think of something innocuous to say “…but I did think he made a very strong first impression.”
&nbs
p; That seemed to satisfy Carrie, and Hannah managed to escape. As she entered the banquet room again, she glanced at her watch. She had five minutes before she could meet her sisters and Norman in the lobby and give them the new information she’d learned. That was just time enough for a fresh cup of coffee.
As Hannah headed for the kitchen, she noticed that Babs Dubinski was sitting alone. Babs looked glum, and Hannah certainly couldn’t blame her. This whole week had been a series of shocks for her. First there was Martin’s unexpected marriage. And then there was his choice of wife, a Las Vegas dancer. There was the money Martin had spent on Brandi, money that should have gone to his sons. Now Brandi was dead, and that was another big shock, even though Babs hadn’t liked her.
Hannah gave a little wave as she neared the table where Babs was sitting. “Hi, Babs. I’m just going to get some fresh coffee. Do you want me to bring you some?”
“That would be nice.” Babs reached out to hand Hannah her empty cup. “No sense dirtying another.”
Hannah took the cup, and that’s when she noticed that Babs had teamed her dark red silk blouse with a black skirt. She was so startled, she almost dropped the cup and that gave her an excellent idea.
“Uh-oh!” Hannah said, and she dropped the cup deliberately. “Good thing it was empty. Hold on a second. I’ll trash it and get you a new one.”
Hannah moved to retrieve the cup, hoping that Babs wouldn’t guess it had been an excuse to bend over to check her footwear. She glanced at Babs’s feet and barely managed to stifle a gasp. Boots! Babs was wearing boots with her black skirt!
If you see someone in a black skirt, just write down the name and don’t ask any questions, Hannah’s own advice floated through her mind. Be really careful. We don’t know if we’re dealing with a material witness or with Brandi’s killer.
Hannah straightened up to stare at Babs for a minute, and then she plunked down in a chair, all set to ignore her own advice. She couldn’t imagine Babs as a killer, but the circumstantial evidence was mounting up. There was no way Hannah could wait to talk to her sisters and Norman. She had to strike while the iron was hot.