by Mary Daheim
The cousins continued walking in silence. The sky was now a vault of blue from mountain crest to forest ridge. The afternoon sun was very warm, with the temperature close to eighty. Judith and Renie were huffing and puffing by the time they reached Clarges Court.
“We’re out of shape,” Judith announced as they entered the cooler confines of the condo. “We should think about joining a gym.”
Renie looked horrified. “What? And ruin our reputations? Cut it out, coz. We get plenty of exercise. We run up and down stairs all day, we work in the yard, we dodge our mothers. Besides, where would we find the time?”
Judith acknowledged that Renie had a point. “I still don’t know what to do about the catering sideline,” she said, adjusting the pleated window shades and flopping down on the sofa. “Most of all, I don’t know what to do about Rhys Penreddy.”
“Regarding what?” Renie was in the kitchen, pouring soda pop.
“This new development,” Judith replied. “Let’s say that Kirk is right and Nat really is Boris Ushakoff. Maybe that’s what was in Dagmar’s file. Nat could have stolen it, but I doubt it. Do you remember what Marin Glenn at the real estate office told us?”
Renie handed Judith a glass of soda. “About the break-in at the Kreager condo last winter?”
“Right. I’m wondering if whoever broke in wasn’t doing a little research for the Canadian consortium. The Kreagers didn’t press charges, as you may recall. That’s probably because they were doing their own dirty work on the Canadians.” Judith paused to take a long drink. “But the point is, they have an alarm system. Marin also mentioned something else that’s been eluding me, but I remember it now. In the last couple of days, Tessa complained about a broken window latch. Maybe somebody wanted to make it look like another break-in had occurred. But if there was a second forced entry, wouldn’t the alarm go off? Nobody has reported that it did.” Judith raised her glass to Renie and took another deep drink.
Renie reflected briefly. “So it’s possible that nobody actually broke in, meaning that whoever took the file box had access to both condos.” She ticked the names off on her fingers. “Tessa. Karl. Dagmar. Freddy. Kirk. And Nat, who came looking for Mia yesterday and then returned last night. The field’s wide open. And how did the box end up in Esme MacPherson’s apartment?”
There had to be a logical explanation. Judith was a firm believer in logic. She and Renie had spent so much time the past two days conversing and interrogating that she hadn’t sat down just to think about the case. It was now almost three o’clock on a hot, cloudless afternoon. Judith suggested a swim.
“We can sit by the pool and relax and ruminate,” she told Renie. “We’ve already spent too much—”
“Oh,” Renie interrupted, “it’s awful! I’m cleaned out. It’s a good thing Bill’s in Alaska. When we get home, I’m going to live on what’s in the freezer.”
Judith gave Renie a wry look. “Actually, I was talking about time, not money. We’ve spent both, and don’t have much to show for either one. Shall we don our suits?”
The pool was empty, though Judith figured it was the lull before the predinner storm. Drying off under a big beach umbrella, the cousins sipped their sodas and rested peacefully. Judith tried to ignore the ledger that leaned against her deck chair.
“Dagmar,” Renie murmured after the first ten minutes had passed. “I wonder if she pulled through.”
“I didn’t see anybody over at the Kreagers’ when we came out to the pool.” Judith pushed her sunglasses farther up her nose. Like most native Pacific Northwesterners, she suffered from having eyes like a mole, and couldn’t stand bright sunshine. “Maybe we should call the clinic.”
Another silence ensued. The only sounds were the occasional passing car, the chatter of chipmunks, and the blessedly distant noise of children at play. Judith felt herself dozing off.
“Nat,” said Renie. “Do you suppose the hotel security people caught him?”
Judith stirred, trying to put her brain back to work. “No. If they had, someone would have told Kirk and Karl.”
Bees hummed in the shrubbery that flanked the wrought-iron fence. The hint of a breeze picked up, ruffling the umbrella’s fringe. A Caterpillar tractor rumbled down the street, returning from its labors at the nearby construction site. Judith began to breathe deeply.
“The file,” Renie said, sitting up straight. “Maybe Nat’s was stolen because of what it didn’t say.”
Slowly, Judith’s eyes fluttered open. “Huh? Who didn’t say what?”
Renie eyed her cousin with amusement. “I thought you were going to sit out here and solve the case. You’re sleeping!”
Judith smiled weakly. “As Grandma Grover used to say, ‘I’m just resting my eyes.’”
“Right, and Grandma would be snoring like a sawmill.” Renie smiled, too, at the memory. “What I mean is that if someone wanted to cast false aspersions on Nat Linski, he or she might steal Dagmar’s file because there was nothing in it that would incriminate him.” She paused, waiting for Judith’s comprehension. “Dagmar told us that the only gossip she had about Mia was her calcium deposits. If she doesn’t know any dirt about Nat, who would?”
“Good point.” Judith stroked her chin, temporarily willing to let Renie usurp her sleuthing prerogative on this lazy summer afternoon. “So somebody else who wants to smear Nat—and maybe Mia—dredges up this story about Boris Ushakoff. Who? Why?”
Renie thought hard, her cheek resting on her fist. “The Canadian consortium. They want Ice Dreams to showcase their world-class skaters. They spread a rumor about Nat which they know will anger Kirk Kreager, who has inherited his father’s political views. If Kirk dumps Ice Dreams because Nat was really a vicious secret police chief, the Canadians take over.” Renie lifted both hands in an expressive gesture.
Judith nodded faintly. “Yes—that makes sense. But what’s it got to do with Agnes’s death and the attempted murder of Dagmar?”
Renie’s face showed confusion. “I’ve no idea,” she said bleakly. Judith, however, was wide awake, her mind racing. “I think the Canadians were set up. Somebody is using all this as a cover for…something else.”
Renie turned skeptical. “How can you be sure?”
“I’m not. But I don’t think Big Business works that way.” Judith’s tone was earnest. “There may be some corporate skulduggery at work here, but I don’t see how Agnes’s murder ties in with it. If somebody wanted those files, they didn’t need to kill her. It wasn’t as if she were guarding the metal box with her life. Which leads us to the question of what she did know. What does Dagmar know?”
Staring at her bare feet, Renie considered. “Nothing,” she concluded. “If Agnes was really the driving force behind Chatty Chatsworth, everything was in that metal box. Agnes was organized and meticulous. She wouldn’t trust to her memory. Oh, there are juicy snippets in those files, but worth killing for? I doubt it. Celebrities, including Nat Linski, take legal action first.” Renie paused for Judith’s agreement. “Well?”
“The columns!” Judith practically reeled in her deck chair. “Cold storage and turncoats and all the rest! Dagmar must have been hinting about Nat being Boris! It makes perfect sense. Mia is Cinderella, the ice queen. Or princess,” she amended.
“And somebody called Mia to tell her that Nat was going to be exposed.” Renie also sounded excited, but quickly lost steam. “But if Boris Ushakoff died of vodka overload…”
Judith had picked up the ledger. Renie watched her curiously. “I’ve got bills to pay,” Judith said in apology.
“I thought it was a big menu.” Renie looked disgusted. “I can’t believe you really brought work. The Madge Navarre syndrome. Jeez!”
“Never mind.” Judith extracted the phone bill. “Call me crazy, but…”
“You’re crazy. You’re guilt-ridden. You’re…stupid.” Renie was the soul of distaste. “Vacations are for getting away from it all, for putting work in perspective, for closing the door on
…”
Judith was scanning the phone bill with a far more exacting eye than she had exercised two nights earlier. “It’s here! I should have guessed! Oh, my!”
Renie’s expression was incredulous. “What? Dagmar called an assassin?”
Judith was oblivious of Renie’s sarcasm. She was grinning at the phone bill and shaking her head. “Not exactly. But,” she went on, with a piercing look at her cousin, “somebody from Hillside Manor called Mia Prohowska.”
It took Renie a moment to figure it out. “The Nat-Boris thing?”
Judith nodded. “Maybe. One of my guests called Bugler at ten-nineteen last Thursday, just before Dagmar and the others left. What do you bet that the number on the bill turns out to be the ice rink? That narrows the field, doesn’t it?”
Renie grinned. “Your logic has finally kicked in, huh, coz?”
Judith sighed. “Finally. Now we have to figure out whether it was Dagmar, Agnes, or Freddy. Which of them would gain anything from making the call?”
“If the charge were true,” Renie said slowly, “then it could be blackmail, and I’d bet on Freddy.”
“I agree,” Judith replied. “But I’m inclined to believe Mia’s telling the truth about Nat. For one thing, how could he find time to be a world-class figure-skating coach and head the Lusatian secret police?”
“Good point.” Renie wiggled her bare toes. “But maybe the caller didn’t know the story wasn’t true.”
“So where did it come from?” Judith asked. “Dagmar and Agnes knew nothing about the story. At least,” she added, sounding a little dubious, “Dagmar claims she didn’t. Maybe Agnes did and it was in the file, but she never confided in Dagmar.” Mildly agitated, Judith shook her head. “No, that doesn’t play. Whether Agnes wrote the column or not, she would have told Dagmar everything. Dagmar had to know, because she was the one who met the public. It’s possible that Dagmar lied. I can’t think of anything else she’d mean by ‘deep freeze’ and ‘turncoat.’”
Renie peered at Judith. “If Freddy called Mia, why didn’t he make a blackmail demand?”
Frustrated, Judith tugged at her short, wavy hair. “I don’t know. Maybe he was waiting until they got to Bugler. Then Agnes got killed, and Freddy was scared off. But he wouldn’t contemplate extortion unless he believed that Nat was Boris.”
Though Judith had applied logic, the conundrum remained unresolved. Her brain was going around in circles when three young boys bounded into the pool area, yelling and throwing life preservers at one another. They were followed by a weary-looking woman in her thirties who called for quiet. The boys ignored her and leaped into the pool.
Renie signaled that the cousins should beat a retreat. With a sympathetic smile for the harried mother, Judith stood up, reclaimed her empty glass and towel, then followed Renie back into the courtyard.
Tessa Van Heusen Kreager was strolling down the walk. She saw the cousins and slowed her step.
“Tessa!” Judith made a windmill motion with her arm. “How is Dagmar?”
Tessa continued her unhurried stride. “Upgraded from critical to serious. Is anyone in the pool?”
Tessa’s cavalier attitude made Judith wince. Nobody seemed to care about Dagmar’s condition—including the cousins. Feeling a sharp pang of guilt, she rushed over to meet Tessa at the entrance to the pool.
“We were going to call the clinic,” Judith said in a penitent tone. “I’m glad to hear she’s improving.”
Tessa gave an indifferent shrug of her unblemished shoulders. “So? She won’t make any of her deadlines. I detest authors who fail to meet contractual demands. They put everybody in a bind.”
Renie had joined Judith and Tessa. “Try working with freelance writers,” Renie said, rolling her eyes. “They’re impossible. Change one element of design so that the words don’t quite fit the allotted space, and they go to pieces. If I had my way, I’d eliminate the copy altogether. It just screws up the visuals, which are much more important.”
Tessa shot Renie a hostile glance. “Designers! Artists! The problem with you people isn’t lack of respect for the written word, it’s that most of you are illiterate. That’s why we end up with cover illustrations that have absolutely nothing to do with—”
Judith intervened, stepping between designer and editor. “Excuse me, is Dagmar in intensive care?”
Tessa grew puzzled. “Ah…I’m not sure. I mean, this isn’t a hospital, it’s a clinic. Why do you ask?”
“I was wondering about visitors,” Judith explained. “I still feel guilty about giving Dagmar those pills. I’d like to apologize. Otherwise, she might think I did it on purpose. Poison her, I mean.”
“Did you?” Tessa’s stare was hard and chilly. She tossed her blond curls. “Somebody did, from what we hear.” With another flounce, Tessa walked quickly toward the pool, her espadrille sandals slapping against the concrete.
Judith waited until Tessa had disappeared behind the wrought-iron fence. “Let’s go see Dagmar,” she whispered to Renie.
Renie, however, had an objection. “They won’t let us talk to her. Egad, coz, the woman was almost dead less than two hours ago.”
Judith’s gaze was enigmatic. “I know. And now she’s very much alive, if in serious condition. Doesn’t that pique your curiosity?”
The cousins were driving out of the parking garage when Judith changed her mind. She asked that they make another stop first, at Esme MacPherson’s apartment on the other side of town. For once, Renie didn’t bother to ask why; she was still reeling from Judith’s latest theory, which had been elucidated on their return to the condo.
The cousins found Esme MacPherson in quite a different mood from the previous day’s post-hangover informality. He wore a tan bush jacket and matching slacks with a white ascot as he met his callers at the door. Just behind him, his walking stick rested against two well-worn leather suitcases.
“I say!” Esme exclaimed, recognizing his visitors. “Don’t tell me you’ve been paid!”
“Not yet,” Judith replied, trying to edge over the threshold. She looked pointedly at the luggage. “Are you taking a trip?”
Stepping aside, Esme beamed at Judith. “Very clever! Yes, yes, I’m off on holiday. My plane leaves from Port Royal tonight at ten-thirty.”
The suitcases weren’t the only things that were packed. As Judith and Renie entered the apartment, they noticed several cartons and a large crate. While most of the furnishings remained in place, all of the personal effects, from the suspended sulky to the winning-circle photographs, were gone. It appeared that Esme was taking more than just a change of wardrobe.
Judith asked the first thing that came into her head. “Did you rent this place furnished?”
“Why, yes, so I did. Convenient for a bachelor, don’t you know.” Esme’s gaze lingered lovingly on the liquor cabinet. “Just what the doctor ordered.”
“You’re not coming back.” There was no question in Judith’s tone.
Esme’s eyes roamed the now-bare ceiling. “Excellent point. Bravo. I must attend to some family matters in England. Let’s say that my future digs are uncertain.”
“Do the police know you’re leaving?” she asked.
Esme assumeed a shocked expression. “Are you implying that I’m doing a bunk? I say! Why should the police care if I leave Bugler?”
Renie had sidled over to the liquor cabinet. Deftly, she slid one of the doors open. “Haven’t you been questioned about the stolen metal box?”
Esme smoothed his thinning hair. “Indeed I have. I knew nothing about it. That Penreddy chap left here not more than half an hour ago. Keen sort, for a Welshman.”
Judith had difficulty concealing her surprise. “Did you tell him you were going to England?”
Esme appeared affronted, though he avoided her eyes. “Certainly. I was packing even as he arrived.”
Flummoxed, Judith surveyed the stripped-down apartment. Logic seemed worthless. She sensed that something very important, a fac
tor of which she was ignorant, a part of the case that completely eluded her, was preventing a logical solution. Though the late-afternoon sun streamed brightly through the windows of Esme’s apartment, Judith might as well have been standing in the dark.
“Okay,” she said in an irritated voice, “so when did you find out that the file box was in your liquor cabinet?”
Esme considered. “I didn’t. That is, Freddy showed up at a bloody ungodly hour this morning, complete with a most ghastly dog. Sniff, sniff, bark, bark. Dreadful, and so unrestful. “I let them in, though Freddy insisted he was at the door forever, but what could he expect? It was barely daylight. The wretched dog pranced over to my liquor cabinet, and I panicked. Did the cursed creature desire a dram? No, it did not. Freddy followed, as if he were the trained animal and this ugly little mutt the master. And then—Freddy produced a steel box the likes of which I’d never seen. Curious-making, said I, and went back to bed. Freddy, the dog, and the box departed. Or so I assumed. Good riddance. Good night. Good grief.”
Renie was standing by the liquor cabinet, showing it off as if it were a prize on a TV game show. “You didn’t pack your booze,” she noted.
Esme gave her a cross look. “Of course not. I can’t take liquor into the UK.”
Judith eyed Esme skeptically. “You didn’t really notice that strongbox? Or look inside?”
Esme sighed with impatience. “No, I did not.” A horn honked outside. “Ah!” His thin face brightened. “My taxi. I entrain to Port Royal, and thence to London. Jolly, what?”
Since the police apparently didn’t object, the cousins could hardly deter Esme MacPherson. They stood aside as he began hauling out his boxes and luggage. The taxi driver, a buoyant man of Middle Eastern extraction, came inside to help remove the packing crate. Judith and Renie stood by, feeling helpless and confused.
“Ta-ta,” said Esme, waving from the threshold. “Do be my guest and have yourselves a farewell drink.” He grabbed a pith helmet that had been sitting on a chair. “Oh, lock the door when you leave. Au revoir and all that.”