First Among Equals

by Katherine Hayton

  Marmalade shot her a glance to tell her off for even thinking it, and Marjorie smiled. In the light of day with the sweet scents of baking running through the house, the events of the night before didn’t seem so bad.

  Still, when she took her morning shower, Marjorie locked the bathroom door.

  “Hey, there,” she said to Sweet Callie after putting out the open sign. “Why are you fussing with your collar?”

  She sat the calico kitten on her lap and when the kitten stopped trying to eat her hand, found the buckle had come undone.

  “How on earth did you manage that?” she asked, giving the cat a rub on her tummy and earning four sets of claws in her hand as a reward. “Oh, yes. You’re a fierce warrior cat.”

  Marjorie set the kitten on the floor and investigated the leather collar. There were three fixed loops along the length, to tuck away the strap. The buckle itself had two prongs and the entire structure was specifically designed to be impossible for a kitten to remove.

  “Did you have some help, eh?” she asked Callie while testing out the design. “A friend of the Persian persuasion perhaps?”

  Monkey Business jumped backwards, fur standing on end and eyes wide in disbelief at the accusation.

  “Yeah, I’m talking to you,” Marjorie said with a chuckle. “Don’t play the innocent with me.”

  The tag on the collar was caught up and she freed it with the dextrous application of fingernail power. A corner of one nail snagged under the edge and accidentally popped the back off.

  Marjorie had seen tags like it before. A doting owner could put a photograph or a small card with contact details in there, similar to a locket.

  Nestling inside of Sweet Callie’s tag was a microSD card.

  “Holy moly,” she whispered to the kitten. “What did Angelica store on here?”

  Chapter Eight

  Marjorie hauled out her laptop but none of the slots along the side seemed the right size to fit the tiny card. About to go on a hunt in her everything-vaguely-computer-related-cords-and-more-bag, she had to put aside the task to greet the first customers of the day.

  “It’s probably just your name, age, and serial number,” she muttered to Sweet Callie who was far more sprightly than other days. “And if you’re happier with the chokehold off, then don’t worry about me putting it back on you.”

  The kitten jumped away to join in a game involving a raft of cotton balls, and Marjorie set the tiny card in the coin partition of her wallet to keep it safe.

  “Have you heard?” Esme shouted, running into the café just after lunch. “They’ve arrested someone for Angelica’s murder.”

  “Thank goodness.” Marjorie felt a knot in her chest loosen at the news. “Who was it?”

  “Leah Parish.”

  Blood whooshed through Marjorie’s ears with such force she didn’t hear the rest of Esme’s sentence. The excitement on her friend’s face made her legs feel loose and floppy and she crashed into a chair.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Just surprised, is all,” she answered, flapping a hand at Esme as she made a fuss. “Don’t hover. I’ll be fine in a second.”

  “You’re probably still in shock from the intruder last night. What you should do is come down the back for a free massage.”

  “Speaking of which,” Marjorie said with a jerk of her head to the window, “isn’t that one of your clients?”

  Esme jumped up as though she’d been caught doing something naughty and rushed outside, twiddling her fingers in a wave as she reached the man.

  “Is this kitten wired right?” a woman asked, a delighted smile on her face as Monkey Business pulled an appalled face. “Every time I talk to him, he puts on the most dramatic expressions.”

  “That’s Monkey’s specialty,” Marjorie said, ignoring the twinge as the patron gave the kitten a pat. “Overacting. If there was a drama school for cats, I’m sure he’d ace every class.”

  “And he looks like a giant fluffy cushion,” the young woman said with a giggle as Monkey Business flopped on his stomach, legs splayed out on all sides. “I could come here and play with him every day!”

  “You know the kittens are up for adoption?” Marjorie said, pointing to the sign on the back of the menu and trying not to cry. “If this wee fellow has really impressed you with his charms, I can start you on the road to a more permanent arrangement.”

  “Yeah, maybe.” The woman picked up the menu but flipped it to read the specials on offer. “In the meantime, I’ll take another cup of hibiscus and orange tea and a scone.”

  Marjorie prepped the order, serving up just as Regina popped her head in through the door. “I hope you’re not too busy to take me around the damage.”

  “Not at all.” Marjorie took off her apron and popped it in the hamper, ignoring the wide-eyed stare of her only customer. She wasn’t about to explain the police presence in the middle of the day. “Come on up.”

  She led the way upstairs to the room with the broken window. “I wasn’t expecting it to be you.”

  “Neither was I, but we had a break in Angelica Carmel’s murder case, so the station’s freed up a little.”

  “I heard you’d arrested Leah Parish.”

  Regina gave her a sideways glance before concentrating on the task in front of her. “I’m sure most people in town have.”

  “Do you really think she killed Angelica? It seems so out of character.”

  But Regina just gave a noncommittal hum. After examining the edge of the window, she pulled out a small knife and bag. “It looks like your intruder cut themselves on the shard of glass, here,” she said, carving a few pieces of the window frame into the bag and sealing it shut.

  “Does that mean you’ll be able to match the DNA?”

  “Only if they’ve given us a sample before.” Regina pulled out a brush and powdered down the surface of the window and then the handle of the door. “You haven’t touched these or wiped them down?”

  “No. I left it all alone just like you instructed.”

  Regina nodded but Marjorie could feel her disappointment. She threw out a guess. “They were wearing gloves?”

  “It looks that way.” Regina sighed and wiped down her forehead with the back of her wrist. “Probably latex or similar since they bled straight through them but enough to stop me getting prints. I guess this room doesn’t get used often by you either.”

  “Nope. It’s spare. That’s why there’s junk piled everywhere.” Marjorie leaned forward to peer out the window. The gravel beneath was still disturbed in the pattern of the burglar’s landing. “It’s not a large gap though. Whoever went through here must’ve been a lot smaller than me.”

  “Most burglaries are committed by teenagers unless they’re a professional job to clean out the entire house, and I don’t think that’s what we’re dealing with here.”

  “They struck it lucky,” Marjorie said with a sigh. “I only go out at night once or twice a month, but they hit on a day I did.”

  “We’ve had a few break-ins at empty rentals around the town,” Regina admitted. “If this was the same group, then they probably just try on any place without any lights showing at night.”

  “Perhaps there’ll be something more incriminating on the shards of glass outside,” Marjorie said, standing back to let Regina exit the room ahead of her. “They might’ve snagged a piece of fabric.”

  “I’ll check them before I leave,” Regina said. “At least you can call the glaziers to repair the damage now.”

  “Mm. I was thinking more of a piece of cardboard for the time being.”

  Regina’s raised eyebrows told her exactly what she thought of that idea.

  “I found something,” Marjorie said as they went down the stairs, single file. “There was an SD card hidden in Angelica’s kitten’s collar. If you have a reader, we could check it out.”

  “On the kitten?” Regina looked over her shoulder, her mouth twisting. “Wouldn’t it just be her vet records or something
?”

  “Probably.” Marjorie held up her hands. “I’m just letting you know.” She stopped just before the bottom stair, checking the customer was still engaged with Monkey Business so she wouldn’t pay attention to anything else.

  In a lower pitch, she continued, “I’ve also heard Candace Butler was searching for the kitten and worried when she couldn’t find it.”

  Regina snorted. “That’s the first I’ve heard of it. When I queried her husband about taking the pet on board, he gave me very short shrift. If she genuinely wanted to find the kitten, it wouldn’t take more than a phone call.”

  Marjorie breathed easier with the confirmation. She would have hated to adopt the kitten out to a new forever home when it already had one waiting. Then she remembered who’d been interested in the calico kitten and sighed.

  Leah Parish wouldn’t visit Sweet Callie again for a long time.

  “Can’t you play the card on your laptop?” Regina asked and it took Marjorie a few seconds before she connected with her earlier comment.

  “I tried but the slots are all too large.” She pinched her fingers together. “It’s only about this big.”

  “How about your phone? A lot of them have spaces to expand their memory.”

  Marjorie’s eyes lit up as she pulled the mobile from her pocket. “Not a bad idea, Miss Policewoman. Sergeant Matthewson should definitely keep you on.”

  There was a tiny ridge along the side of the smooth casing which Marjorie hooked a fingernail into and pulled out a tray. “This looks the right size,” she said, fumbling the tiny card out of her purse. “I can’t imagine how I’m going to stay in touch with anyone in a few years if they keep making these things smaller,” she grumbled, squinting and holding the phone half a metre out to focus better.

  “Or you could shell out the money for an optometrist visit,” Regina said with an amused snort. “It won’t set you back that much.”

  “It’s the principle.” Marjorie slid the tray back in and watched the screen for further instructions. “Not everyone can be nimble.”

  She glanced up, expecting the namesake kitten to be bounding up to her and experienced a moment of disconnect when he wasn’t there. But the Armisteads had taken him away to his forever home. An event to celebrate even if it caused her a few pangs.

  “It’s not happy,” Marjorie said with a humph of displeasure. “The phone says the file’s unreadable. It must be corrupted or something.” She turned the screen towards Regina.

  “We have tech guys we could send it to,” the officer said, taking the phone out and repeating the installation process to no avail. “Although, my boss mightn’t approve the testing if we can’t show how it would impact the case.”

  “You could tell him somebody tried to break into my house to get whatever’s on that card,” Marjorie said. “Would that work?”

  Regina shrugged. “Is that really what you think they were after?”

  Marjorie had said the words in jest but now she tipped her head to one side and studied the irritating phone message. “I don’t know but it’s a weird coincidence that they were upstairs instead of trying to get into my cash register. Stranger still that the only thing I can find disturbed in the house is the window they escaped from and the buckle on Sweet Callie’s collar.”

  But the officer didn’t appear convinced. “Just because you noticed it at the same time doesn’t mean the events are connected. How long could the collar have been loose?”

  Marjorie thought back to when the kitten had arrived. She hadn’t checked the collar at all, apart from sliding her finger under it to ensure it wasn’t too tight. “You’re probably right.”

  “Anyway, if it’s important, we’ll connect it through our interviews. We’ll spend a lot of time with Leah Parish today.”

  “I still don’t understand what motive she had to hurt Angelica.”

  Regina shifted her feet on the spot. “They had a very public argument.”

  “Oh, I know that.” Marjorie flapped her hand. “It’s all over town but she went back and apologised later. Even gave her some honey.”

  The officer’s face went still. “How do you know that?”

  “She told me. Leah made her delivery yesterday and she said she’d felt awful about making such a scene and had gone back to apologise.”

  “Thanks.” Regina opened her mouth to say more, then turned and strode to the exit. “I’ll keep you posted on anything to do with the burglary.”

  As Marjorie waved goodbye, she thought of someone who could help with the SD card. She dialled Braden’s number, unable to stop a smile spreading across her face.

  He was eager to assist and arrived twenty minutes after her phone call. The café’s sole customer was long gone and with only a half-hour to closing time, Marjorie pulled in the sign.

  “This is the payoff for waking up early,” she pointed out. “If I didn’t start until later, I’d have to keep my doors open until midnight.”

  “On the other hand,” Braden said, stifling a yawn, “you’re the first customer of my day so it doesn’t matter if I opened earlier or not. The answering machine and email don’t care what time I open when there’re no messages left.”

  “Poor baby. What’ll this cost me?”

  “Only an afternoon tea. Do you have any chocolate muffins? They’re my favourite.”

  Marjorie double-checked her cabinet, though she knew the answer already. “I don’t right now but if your work’s going to take at least half an hour, I can have a fresh batch ready and waiting when you finish.”

  “Deal.” Braden gave a slow smile that made her stomach flip over. “My mother always said never to barter away my talent, so I suppose this is the start of a slide into depravity.”

  “Oh, yes. The road to hell is paved with baked goods.”

  Marmalade was most intrigued with the unexpected bonus baking and kept winding around her legs while she worked. “If you’re trying to kill me, there won’t be any more dropped titbits to feast on,” Marjorie warned him when she came close to tripping.

  With the afternoon sun streaming in through the kitchen window and the kittens slumbering, with an occasional burst of leg action breaking through their dreams, the experience differed vastly from her early morning endeavours. Then, she worked in the dark with only a sliver of changeable light on the horizon to herald the coming day.

  “I should bake in the afternoon more often,” she told the ginger Maine coon kitten as he insisted on keeping her company while she pulled open the oven door. “Except there’s usually just me to cook for and I’m heading for house size as it is.”

  “Oh, good,” Braden called out from the doorway. “I wondered if you were a crazy old cat lady, but this conversation proves it.”

  “Hey, less of the old.”

  “More of the crazy?”

  Marjorie burst out laughing, then tossed a hot muffin to him. The dance as he tried to keep the cake from burning was enough reprimand. “Does this mean you finished?”

  “The computer is still dredging its way through the whole card, but it doesn’t need me to babysit it any longer.”

  “So you’re getting something off it?”

  Braden took a big bite of his muffin and shrugged. “Yeah. We won’t be able to tell if it’ll be any better until it’s finished. The whole thing was taken up with just one file.”

  “Regina thought it might be vet records or something like that.”

  “Is she the police officer?” When Marjorie nodded, Braden finished the muffin and licked his fingers. “It’s bigger than a text file. If it is some kind of record, Angelica put it into an image file or something similar.”

  After placing the remaining muffins on a large plate, they went downstairs, and Braden checked the computer’s progress. The kittens were waking up, trotting up and down the stairs in search of adventure before their prime hunting time of twilight began.

  “Here we go,” Braden called out. “I’ll cue it up.”

  Ma
rjorie pressed close to his shoulder as he pressed play. Angelica filled up the screen of his laptop, her stern features peering in distrust at something out of shot.

  “My name is Angelica Anders Carmel,” the lady recited, bobbing her head up and down as though confirming it to herself. “If you’re watching this video, then I’ve been murdered, and the name of my killer is Shaun Hayes.”

  Chapter Nine

  “But how can you ignore this?” Marjorie cried out in frustration. Sergeant Matthewson had listened to their story, viewed the recording, but seemed unconvinced by any of it. “Angelica states clearly who she thinks killed her.”

  “Thank you for bringing this in,” the sergeant said, his face unreadable. “As I’ve already said, I’ll add it to the evidence file.”

  “You need to arrest this man and throw him in jail.” Marjorie rapped her knuckles on the table. “Right now. Before he kills anybody else.”

  “As I said—”

  “And why aren’t you setting poor Leah free? This recording vindicates her.”

  Sergeant Matthewson ran a hand through his hair, releasing a flutter of dry flakes to sail through the air. Deep circles ran underneath his eyes and a coffee tremor shook his arm.

  If the circumstances had been any different, Marjorie would have sympathised. When she’d arrived at the station, breathless, it had been with the expectation she’d play the recording and the police would spring into action. Instead, the video elicited nothing beyond mild curiosity, and no one appeared interested in doing anything.

  “Obviously, this developer was unhappy when she pulled out of the deal,” Marjorie explained, thinking she must have left out a piece of the puzzle somewhere for the officer not to follow. “And Angelica would only have made the video if she thought there was a genuine threat to her life.”

  “We can’t know what Ms Carmel thought when she made the recording,” Sergeant Matthewson said in his infuriatingly calm voice. “It’s days old, if not weeks, and a lot has changed.”

  “Yeah. Her dead body turned up.”

  “We have hard evidence against the suspect currently in custody,” the sergeant continued without a pause. “Far more compelling than the suspicions Ms Carmel harboured before she died.”