“O’Reilly was with you, eh?” Sutton rose and motioned to one of the uniformed gardaí. “I’ll catch him at the station and see what he has to say about this.” He scribbled in his notebook and added, “And remind him he’s cold case, not homicide,” in a voice so low Gethsemane wasn’t sure she’d really heard it.
She resisted the impulse to tell Inspector Sutton that Niall couldn’t give him any more than she had. At least he wasn’t asking where Frankie was. Sutton stepped aside to whisper to the uniformed garda. Mrs. Heaney crept away from the birdbath to eavesdrop. Unnoticed, Gethsemane slipped her phone from her bag and snapped a picture of the bouquet.
Sutton turned as she slipped the phone back into her bag. She answered his raised eyebrow. “A text from my, um, dinner date, wondering where I am. May I go?”
The inspector looked at his watch, then at the coroner’s assistant, who made her way toward him. “Go on,” he said to Gethsemane. “I know where to find you. I’ll expect a formal statement tomorrow.”
“I know where to find you. I’ll come to the station.” That would give her time to find Frankie and find out more about the Flower Shop Killer and maybe uncover a clue leading to Frankie’s admirer. Or stalker. If the mystery woman had stabbed Jacobi and left the flowers as a signature, she had definitely graduated from admirer to stalker. Had she caught up to Frankie? Had Frankie caught her in the act of killing Jacobi? Had she kidnapped Frankie? Or worse? Gethsemane went for her bike before the inspector could change his mind. She detoured through the Erasmus Hall parking lot on her way to the main road. Frankie’s car wasn’t there. She told the Tchaikovsky playing in her head to shut up and forced herself to think of anything other than flowers and missing math teachers all the way back to Carrick Point.
“Eamon!” Gethsemane burst into the cottage. “Eamon, where are you?” She looked into the music room. No auras, no disembodied voices, no leather-and-soap smell to signal the composer’s ghost’s imminent appearance. She ran to the study. “Eamon!”
A scrapbook flew from a shelf and landed on her foot.
“Stop shoutin’.” A blast of men’s cologne, with prominent leather, pepper, and hay notes, hit her nose. “I’m not deaf.” Eamon materialized near the bookshelf. “And there’s your Flower Shop Killer.” He pointed at the scrapbook. It levitated from Gethsemane’s foot to her hand.
Puzzlement, and a throb in her toes where the book had landed, derailed her initial thoughts. She stared at the faded pink cover of the old, post-bound album, thick with newspaper clippings, their yellowed edges curled beyond the borders of the album’s pages. “What’s this?” She opened the book to the first article, headlined, “Six Women Disappear from Dublin Hotel.”
“Orla’s sister was a true crime fanatic. She collected all sorts of macabre clippings, must’ve filled a couple dozen albums like that one. I found ’em in some boxes up at the lighthouse.”
“Why were Orla’s sister’s books in your lighthouse?”
“She eloped with a man her parents couldn’t stand. Ran off to Canada with him. Her parents planned to chuck all her belongings in the bin, but Orla brought them here. Just in case her sister ever sent for them. Which she didn’t. Which doesn’t matter.” Eamon glowed an impatient turquoise and pointed at the book again.
Gethsemane held it tighter as it fluttered open. Pages flipped to an article from the Dispatch pasted about a third of the way in. She read aloud, “Local couple found dead in home. Early on the morning of May ninth, Liam and Radha Coyne were discovered deceased in the parlor of their home by a neighbor, who declined to give her name. The neighbor became concerned when Mrs. Coyne did not keep an appointment with her to go shopping in Cork. The gardaí have not released an official statement but a source, speaking on condition of anonymity, at the coroner’s office estimates the Coynes had been dead for about eight hours before they were discovered, and foul play is suspected.”
Pages flipped and she continued reading. “Authorities have now revealed details of the Coynes’s murders. Both victims were stabbed in the back—” She paused.
“What’s wrong?” Eamon asked.
“N-nothing.”
“Liar. I can see your aura as well as you can see mine. But I’ll leave it for the moment. Keep reading.”
Her mouth felt dry. She swallowed and read. “Stabbed in the back. Assorted flowers lay strewn around the bodies and a floral bouquet stood in a vase near Mr. Coyne’s feet.” She slammed the album shut.
“There’s one more article.” Eamon pointed. The book leapt from Gethsemane’s hands and hovered in the air. It opened to another page.
Gethsemane stepped closer and read. “Local florist, Mrs. Rosemary Finney, said a lad, about twelve, came into the shop on several occasions to pick up the flowers. He paid cash. Gardaí interviewed the lad who said a veiled woman gave him money to get the flowers from the florist and deliver them to the Coyne residence. The woman never told the lad her name nor was he able to provide a description. Gardaí have no other leads. Anyone with information, please contact…” She broke off and sank onto the sofa. “I think Frankie’s in trouble. Serious trouble. What are we going to do?”
Seven
Eamon vanished then reappeared next to her on the sofa. “Aren’t you getting carried away over a few old newspaper clippings? That’s not like you.”
“Roderick Jacobi’s dead. Murdered in Frankie’s rose garden. Stabbed in the back with a bouquet from Buds of May lying nearby. And Frankie’s missing. He’s not home, his car’s not in the parking lot, he hasn’t been seen since the photo shoot, and he isn’t answering texts.”
“I take back what I said about ‘carried away.’ Your landing in the middle of a murder mystery is typical you. Rugadh—”
She held up a hand. “Don’t start spouting Gale-gee at me.”
“Do me a favor. Call it Irish. Your pronunciation’s as bad as your brogue.”
“Gale-gee, Gaeilge, Irish, whatever. I don’t care. I just—” She stood and ran a hand through her hair as she paced near the windows. “How are we going to find Frankie? What if…?” She couldn’t say it. She couldn’t think it.
Eamon disappeared from the sofa and rematerialized in the way of her pacing. She walked through him. The electric jolt of the full body contact forced her to stop and catch her breath.
“Deep breath, that’s right,” Eamon said. “Now, recite some batting averages.”
“I don’t need to recite batting averages,” she said, rejecting the suggestion she resort to her ritual of reciting Negro League baseball statistics to regain calm and focus.
“You need to do something other than panic. Put your beautiful brain to work and come up with a plan. Panicking won’t help Frankie.”
“I am not panicking.” She added a silent, Josh Gibson, 1930, three thirty-eight, 1931, two eighty-eight, 1922, three twenty-six. “But you’re right, we do need a plan.”
“Would that be the royal ‘we’?”
“No, that would be the you and me ‘we.’ I don’t know what we’re going to do yet, but you’re going to help do it.”
“I’m a ghost, lacking a corporeal body. How can I help?”
She threw her hands in the air. “I don’t know. How about as usual, by making snarky remarks and aggravating me to the point of forcing me to act just to prove you wrong?”
Eamon bristled umber. “I do not aggravate you.”
Gethsemane’s argument devolved into laughter. “You do aggravate me but only because you bring up valid points and rein me in when I’m about to rush into some ill-conceived scheme. And don’t sulk. Umber is not a becoming color for you. And don’t give me that ‘I’m just a ghost, what can I do?’ nonsense. Six months ago, you saved half the village.”
The umber faded and a dimpled smile took control of Eamon’s lips. “What are you—we—going to do?”
“First, find Frankie.
”
“Call the guards. Finding missing people connected to murder investigations is what they’re paid for, rightly or not.”
“Call the gardaí and tell them I think my friend, who, by the way, hated the murder victim and owned the murder weapon, may have been kidnapped by his secret admirer because she brought him flowers and I read a decades-old newspaper article that mentioned a couple being stabbed in the back and some flowers being left behind and concluded from that there must be a copycat killer on the loose?” She snorted. “If they didn’t hang up on me right away, they’d thank me for offering up Frankie as a murder suspect and then they’d hang up on me. No, I take that back. They wouldn’t thank me. Guards cringe when they hear my name. Seriously. Inspector Sutton actually cringed. And swore.”
Eamon made a rude gesture. “That’s to Inspector Sutton. But you’ve got to come up with something better than pedaling your bike ’round the village yelling, ‘Frankie, Frankie Grennan.’”
She smacked her forehead. “Duh. Niall. He’s Frankie’s friend, too, and he doesn’t cringe when I call; he only slightly frowns. He listens to me. Most of the time.”
“He works cold cases, not homicide or missing persons.”
“He’s still law enforcement. And if someone—Frankie—was in imminent danger—” There, she’d said it out loud. “—it would be all hands on deck, never mind your usual duty station. Right?” She headed for the entryway where she’d left her bag with her phone.
“What can I do while you’re marshaling forces?” Eamon called after her.
“Don’t ’spose you can pop over to the flower shop and ask Alexandra Sexton who picked up the second bouquet?”
“I don’t ‘pop,’ I translocate. But no, I can’t. Ask her, I mean. Sorry. She can’t see or hear me. However, I could go over to the Rabbit…” He vanished.
Gethsemane stared at the spot where he’d been. “Eamon?”
He reappeared. “Miss me?”
“Why do you do that?”
“Because I can. Being a ghost has some advantages. And he’s not there.”
“Who’s not where?”
“Grennan’s not at the pub. Cop on. In case, O’Reilly asks if you checked.”
She stuck out her tongue and dialed. O’Reilly answered on the third ring.
“Don’t hang up on me,” she said.
“Don’t hang up—” A pause. When Niall’s baritone returned to the line, suspicion coated every word. “Sissy, what have you done?”
She hated that nickname. Granted, Gethsemane was a mouthful, but “Sissy” was a ridiculous nickname for a grown woman. Someday, she might forgive her brother-in-law for using it outside the confines of family. She also hated the presumption she’d made trouble. “I haven’t done anything.” She took a breath and fought the annoyance rising in her throat. “I need you—I can’t find Frankie.”
Another pause. Niall’s voice came back minus the accusatory tone. “Where have you looked?”
“Erasmus Hall.” She glanced at Eamon hovering nearby. “And the pub.”
“You tried calling?”
“I texted. He didn’t answer.”
Niall swore.
“You’re not telling me I’m overreacting or not the full shilling or stirring up trouble. Which worries me. You know about Roderick Jacobi?”
“I know. I also know Frankie’s the number one suspect.”
“Suspect? Not, um, victim?”
Eamon whispered, “He doesn’t know about the Flower Shop Killer.”
“You don’t have to whisper. Niall can’t hear you.”
“Who’s that you’re talking to?” Niall asked.
“But he can hear you,” Eamon reminded her.
“Um, no one,” she said to Niall. “Myself. Why’s Frankie a suspect?”
“A Dispatch photographer reported witnessing Frankie eat Jacobi’s head off at the photoshoot.”
“Must have happened after I left.”
“According to the photographer, they almost came to blows.”
“Did Inspector Sutton tell you about the flowers?”
“The bouquet you found by the birdbath? Yeah, I heard about them.”
“You don’t think that’s significant, given the bouquet left on his car this morning?”
“His secret admirer was in the area but—”
“She could have killed Jacobi and kidnapped Frankie.”
“Kidnapped. Now I think you’re sounding a bit out there. Unless…What haven’t you told me?”
She recounted the details of the Flower Shop Killer.
Niall sighed. Gethsemane imagined him massaging his temples. “If anyone other than you tried to sell me on a connection between an unsolved double homicide in the sixties and a murder this afternoon, I’d tell them—never mind. Half the department’s on the lookout for Frankie. If he’s in or around the village, one of the uniforms will find him. I’ll head down to the evidence room and dig through the files on this flower shop business, see if I can find a clue as to where a copycat might have taken a victim away from the village.”
“Thank you. While you’re doing that, I’ll—”
“Stay put?” Niall’s tone sounded hopeful.
“Try Frankie again.”
“Let me know if you hear from him.” Niall rang off.
“We both know you’re going to do more than try Frankie again,” Eamon said after the call ended.
“I’m also going to speak to Alexandra Sexton. If the gardaí have focused on Frankie’s relationship with Jacobi as a motive for murder, they probably haven’t given much thought to those flowers yet. Maybe I can find out who claimed them from the shop before Ms. Sexton realizes she should be talking to law enforcement instead of me.”
“There’s the snoop I’ve come to love.”
“Why does everyone keep calling me snoop?”
“You prefer Sissy?”
“You know I hate that name. How about calling me an amateur investigator?”
“Too stuffy. Miss Marple-ish. You’re more Nancy Drew.”
She rolled her eyes and sent Frankie a text: Where are you? Urgent. 911.
Eamon read over her shoulder. “Wrong country.”
“What? Damn.” She resent the text: 999.
Seconds later, the opening notes of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony alerted her to an incoming text: Where’s the fire?
“Frankie!” She dialed his number. “Where the hell are you?” she asked before he could speak. “I texted you over an hour ago. Why didn’t you answer me? Where’ve you been? Are you okay? Are you safe?”
“You texted me fifteen seconds ago and I answered you right away. Are you all right?” he asked. “Stranded on a cliff with a sprained ankle? Fallen down a well? Being held hostage by an ax murderer? Strike that last suggestion. Knowing you, that’s entirely possible. You’re not are you? Being held hostage? And if you’re not, would you mind telling me what you’re on about? My mother didn’t make this much fuss over my whereabouts when I was ten.”
“Francis William Rowan Grennan, be happy you’re not in arm’s reach because I’m not sure if I’d hug you or slug you.”
“Did someone slug you? Have you got another head injury? Because you’re not making much sense.”
Eamon tapped his finger through her shoulder, sending a shock down her arm. “He doesn’t know about Jacobi.”
“Which means he wasn’t on campus when the murder occurred,” she said. “Which proves he didn’t do it. Not that I thought he did.”
Frankie’s voice came over the phone. “Who are you talking to? What murder? Please make sense.”
Gethsemane explained. “Roderick Jacobi was found dead in your rose garden with your hedge shears sticking out of his back. A bouquet of flowers similar to the one left on your car this morning was found n
ear his body. So, naturally, I deduced your secret admirer was a homicidal stalker who’d been inspired by the still-unsolved crimes of the Flower Shop Killer to murder your rival and kidnap you.”
Silence. Then, “How many shots of Waddell and Dobb have you had so far?”
“I’m serious, Frankie, and I’m sober. I thought you were dead or chained up in some dank basement or something.”
“I’m fine. You mean it about Jacobi? He’s dead? In my garden?”
“Quite dead. Right in front of the ‘Sandra Sechrest’. And, Frankie?”
“Yeah?”
“Since you’re not a victim, you’re the prime suspect. That loser photographer told the guards you and Jacobi had a fight this morning. They’re on the lookout for you.”
“Shite.”
“Can you tell me where you are?” She hesitated. “What’s her name?”
“What’s her—Wait, you think I—Jaysus, Sissy.” Frankie laughed. “I supposed I should take that as a compliment.”
Three “Sissys” in under an hour. Had to be a record. “If you’re not on a date, where are you? Where’ve you been all this time? On walkabout?”
“In my garden.”
“No, you haven’t.”
“Not at Erasmus Hall. My secret garden.”
“Secret garden?” She’d fallen into a Frances Hodgson Burnett story. “At Our Lady?”
“The church garden’s hardly secret. I’m up at Carnock.”
“Golgotha?” Gethsemane shuddered. The grim nickname suited the dismal outcropping south of the village. “There’s no garden there. Just overgrown brush and the burned out remains of St. D’s.” St. Dymphna’s, the abandoned insane asylum, perched on Carnock. Her head throbbed with the memory of the attack she’d endured in the hospital’s basement.
“Brush, remains, and a wee plot I cultivated where the hospital’s garden used to be. I found a few rosebushes that had reverted to rootstock. Turns out, the rootstock roses were a rare heirloom variety. I decided to try my luck, see what I could do with them. They’re quite lovely.”
FATALITY IN F Page 6