by Rick Homan
“They must have been. He told me her first name.”
“Did you see her talking to anyone else?”
“She and Edgar were standing over here.” I walked a few steps away from the entrance to the gallery. “A couple of Edgar’s friends were standing here with them. They seemed to all know each other.”
The sheriff had his notebook out. “Do you have the names of these friends?”
My head was spinning from all the new information. “Mel and Rita. Let me check the guest book. If I see them written down, I’ll recognize them.”
I walked over to the lectern and flipped the pages back to yesterday’s entries. “Here they are,” I said. “These two arrived with Edgar and were the first to sign in.”
Adams copied the names “Mel Schreier” and “Rita Cruz” into his notebook. “Does everyone who comes to one of these events sign the guest book?”
“Not necessarily. We invite people to sign in, but it’s not required.”
He ran his finger down the list of names and turned the page. “Looks like about thirty-five names. How many people would you say were here?”
“Maybe a few more. Altogether, about forty.”
“Is there any way I could get a copy of these pages?”
“Sure. I can go upstairs and copy them for you.”
“Before you go, can you give me contact information for the artist?”
I gave Edgar’s phone number to Adams and headed upstairs. As I went, the sadness of the situation weighed on me. A woman had made the journey from Louisville, Kentucky to see friends at an art opening and had been murdered. Now those friends were going to get some very bad news. I hated knowing that Edgar’s moment of success would be stained by this personal loss, and that the joy Mel and Rita had expressed yesterday would be shattered. I couldn’t make this any easier for them. My only comfort came from knowing Adams would handle the matter with his usual competence and authority.
When I returned from making the photocopies, I found the sheriff looking at the Youngstown series. “These are very unusual photographs,” he said.
“They’re actually paintings. The artist assembles images from several photographs onto one canvas and then paints the picture so that it looks like a single photograph.”
Adams nodded. “Impressive.”
“Did you speak to Edgar?”
“I left him a message to call me.”
I handed him the copies.
He studied them for a moment and asked, “Other than Schreier and Cruz, are all these people from the campus?”
“No.” I took the copies back from him, walked to the lectern and wrote a question mark next to the names who were not, so far as I knew, students or faculty at Fuchs.
After glancing again at the list, he said, “So any of these people could have seen Jessica Fabrizio here at the reception and then followed her to her motel?”
“Actually, no. Now that I think of it, she arrived when the reception was mostly over. A lot of people had already left. I went down the hall to the restroom, and when I got back she was here with just a few others. She said she was late because a truck overturned on the highway.”
“Yes, there was one yesterday afternoon,” said Adams. “Do you remember who was here with her?”
“Edgar, Mel Schreier, Rita Cruz, Paul Weinert, and me. Also, Matt Dunkle—he was just leaving the gallery as I came back from the restroom.”
Adams scanned the photocopied list, check-marking the names. “So, it’s possible only these six people saw her here at the gallery yesterday?”
I nodded. “I would even say it’s likely.”
He drew a line through one name. “I’ll take you off my list.”
“Thank you.”
He marked another name. “Rita Cruz also. I’m doing that because of the way Ms. Fabrizio was killed: stunned by a blow to the face and then strangled by someone with large hands. It would have taken considerable strength.”
That sinking feeling came back. I flashed back to shaking hands with Mel when he arrived yesterday. He shook hands so gently, but his hand was large and no doubt powerful. I chased the image from my mind. “Let’s sit down for a moment,” I said as I walked to one of the backless benches in the middle of the room.
Adams joined me. “That leaves Yount, Schreier, Weinert, and Dunkle. You said Schreier is a friend of Yount’s?”
“That’s right.”
“And he’s not from the campus.” He made a note. “What about the others?”
“Paul Weinert is my student intern. Matt Dunkle is a math professor, and he serves on the Gallery Advisory Committee.”
As Adams made notes by their names, his cell phone rang. “Adams, Edwards County Sheriff’s Department . . . Where are you right now, Mr. Yount? . . . Would it be alright if I came by there to speak with you? . . . Alright, I’ll see you then . . . I’ll explain everything when I see you . . . Alright, thank you.”
Adams ended the call.
“You’re going to talk to Edgar?”
“Yes. Thank you for your time, Dr. Noonan.” Adams left the gallery and disappeared down the corridor.
My heart sank as I imagined Edgar learning that his friend being killed.
I knew thinking about it all afternoon, would drive me crazy, so I decided to drive up to a mall near Columbus and play movie roulette, in which I buy a ticket to whichever show is about to start. Usually I end up seeing something I would never have chosen, and sometimes it broadens my horizons. Other times I leave before it’s over. Either way, I figured time spent in the mall plus driving each way would keep my mind busy until I could phone Edgar to find out how his interview with Adams had gone.
Chapter 6
My movie du jour turned out to be a space opera whose story had no point that I could see, although that might have been because my preoccupation with the murder of that unfortunate woman kept me from concentrating. But I watched it all the way through because it had some interesting iconography, some of which I sketched in my pocket-size notebook. I was thinking about writing an article on the blend of ancient and medieval visual motifs in popular culture.
When I got back, I took a deep breath and called Edgar. He answered on the second ring.
“Nicole?”
“Yes, Edgar. Has Sheriff Adams been there?”
“Oh, God! The news about Jess . . . it’s bad, Nicole. It’s really bad.”
“I know the sheriff told me. I’m so sorry.”
“And the sheriff is saying . . . I can’t even believe what he’s saying. It’s insane.”
“Edgar, if you can, just talk to me for a minute. When you introduced us yesterday, it seemed like she knew Mel and Rita too, like you were all friends.”
“That’s right. We were.”
“Was that from when you were at Cleveland Institute of Art?”
“Yeah.”
“So, you’ve known her a long time. I’m so sorry. This must be so hard for you.”
“It’s not just that. We were together.”
I could hear him choking up and sniffing. “You and Jess?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you mean in a relationship?”
“Right.”
“That makes it worse. I am sorry, Edgar.”
“And the sheriff,” he said, much louder, “he’s saying these crazy things. I mean he was asking me all kinds of stuff like he thinks I did it.”
That took my breath away for a moment. “What?”
“But I didn’t. I mean I couldn’t ever . . .”
“Edgar? Where are you right now?”
“My studio.”
“I want to talk to you in person. This is too difficult to do over the phone. I’m going to drive up there so we can talk. Is that okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Will you be alright until I get there?”
“Yeah. I was just about to call Mel and Rita. I don’t want them to hear about it on the news.”
We hung up. I threw on my
hat, coat, scarf, and gloves and ran out to my car.
As I made my second trip of the day up Route 23, gathering clouds darkened the winter twilight. I gripped the steering wheel so hard my knuckles hurt. When I relaxed my fingers, the tension relocated to the center of my forehead. So much for taking the day off to get over the stress of opening an exhibit.
I arrived at Edgar’s studio a little after five. I had visited it once before when Edgar showed me some paintings so we could decide which to include in the exhibit. It was a one-story, flat-roofed, concrete-block building a couple miles outside Circleville. It might have been built as an auto shop or a small factory. The windows were guarded by steel bars and the exterior had a recent coat of white paint.
A line of trees behind the building separated it from a gully with a creek at the bottom. They were young trees. The trunks of the largest were no bigger than my leg. Among them many saplings had sprouted like weeds. Beyond the gully was a cultivated field, which had been tilled and left fallow for the winter.
I parked where the gravel drive widened, several yards from the building. When I knocked on the steel door, Edgar opened it and said, “Come on in. I don’t want to let too much cold air in. It takes this place forever to warm up.”
Inside I paused to hang my coat on a hook by the door.
I had never seen Edgar looking so distraught. He said, “I’m making tea,” and went to the kitchen counter under the window across the room.
While he was busy, I sat in an easy chair by the coffee table. There was also a sofa and another easy chair, all mismatched, probably picked up second-hand. He had this end of the room lit with three floor lamps.
The center of the room, which had his computer station, photography equipment, and work table, was in shadows. All the cabinets and tables were custom-built of ordinary plywood. Everything was labeled: the drawers built into the work table, each shelf in the bookcases, each vertical file on the shelves. Each piece of equipment—computer, projector, enlarger, and so on—had its own plastic slipcover. The top of the work table was completely clear, nothing left out. As I recalled from my previous visit, Edgar did not believe in creative clutter.
At the far end of the room was his painting studio and storage space for canvases. Though the light was dimmest there, I could see the outline of an easel and some stands with flood lights on them.
Edgar brought a tray to the table and sat in the chair facing me. He poured tea for both of us. I added milk and sugar.
“Do you know how she happened to come to the gallery yesterday?” I asked.
“Mel, or Rita, or one of our other friends must have told her it was the opening. I was really surprised to see her. God! I wish she’d stayed home.”
“How did you two meet?”
“Jess was doing her graduate degrees at Case Western Reserve. We met through friends of friends. We’d see each other at parties.”
“And then you were in a relationship?”
Edgar sat back and hugged himself as if he were cold though the room was comfortable. “Yeah. We lived together for a while. Then, when I finished up at the Institute, I got a fellowship to go to Europe for two years, so we broke up.”
“Was that difficult?”
“No. We knew we’d be going in different directions for a while. We talked about getting back together when I came back.”
“But you didn’t?”
“When I got back eight years ago, and got this place, I went up to Cleveland to see some of the old gang. I heard she’d gotten a job in Louisville. We emailed a few times. That was about it.”
“So, when you saw her yesterday, how long had it been since you’d heard from her?”
He leaned his head back and thought for a moment. “Quite a while.”
“A few years?”
“I can check.”
Edgar went to his work table in the middle of the room and switched on a pair of overhead lights. In a bookcase against the wall were two shelves full of notebooks, each with a white label on the spine. He pulled one out, flipped through it, put it back on the shelf, and chose another. He repeated this several times, until he found what he was looking for.
After turning several pages and scanning them, he said, “It was about six years ago. We checked in with each other on how we were doing with our careers. It seemed like we didn’t really have a shot at starting a relationship again.”
He put the journal back in the bookcase and joined me again at the coffee table.
“Edgar, when you introduced me to Jessica yesterday, didn’t I hear you and Mel talking about going to dinner?”
“That’s right. We were going to that Italian place on route 35. Mel and Rita were in one car. They said they’d go there and get us a table. I told Jess I’d drive her there since I know where it is. She went to her motel to park her car, and I stopped back at my motel to pick up some money.
“When I got to her motel, she wasn’t out front so I knocked on her door, but she didn’t answer. I thought maybe she decided to take a shower, so I went back outside and sat in my car for a few minutes. I called her on my cell phone, but she didn’t answer, so I went back in and knocked on her door again. She didn’t come to the door so all I could think was maybe she changed her mind about having dinner with us. I texted her the name and address of the restaurant and went to meet Mel and Rita.
“When the sheriff called me today, he said they found her this morning. The manager of the motel opened the room when she didn’t check out at eleven.”
I had a bad feeling about the scenario Edgar had just described. “So, if the room wasn’t broken into, do they think she opened her door to someone last night?”
“It’s even worse than that, Nicole. She could have been dead already when I was knocking on the door. The sheriff asked me a lot of questions about how I could have done it when I went to pick her up. He was coming down on me really hard.”
I felt bad for him. Hard as it must have been to lose a friend and former lover, it must have been so much worse to also be accused of killing her. “I’m sure he just has to question everyone that way.” It sounded lame even as I said it.
“I could never hurt Jess,” he said with his eyes closed.
“Edgar, I know Sheriff Adams. He’s tough, but he’s fair. He’s not interested in making a quick arrest. He’s going to investigate other people who knew Jessica in Cleveland and in Louisville.”
“I hope you’re right.”
I walked over to Edgar and hugged him. “I’m sorry the news is so bad.”
“Thanks,” he said, but it seemed his mind was elsewhere.
“We have to stay in touch. If you hear anything else, or if the sheriff talks to you again, please call me. I’ll help any way I can.”
He thanked me. I got my coat and let myself out.
Chapter 7
Before driving away from Edgar’s studio, I called Abbie. “Are you home?”
“Yeah. What’s up?”
“Is Sharon with you?”
“No. She went back to Pittsburgh this afternoon.”
“Can I drop by?”
“Sure. Come on over.”
“I’m driving back to campus from Edgar’s studio. I’ll be there in about forty-five minutes.”
“Okay. Take all the time you need. There could be black ice on the roads tonight.”
We hung up and I drove away.
Last year Abbie helped me gain the confidence to get out on the highways. Growing up in San Francisco, I had never learned to drive because I could take buses and trains to everything with an occasional cab ride thrown in. When I visited Fuchs College for an interview, I recognized that one couldn’t live on a rural campus without a car.
After accepting the job, I took driving lessons during the summer and bought a car when I got here. When I started traveling around the area, I found out that most people regard the rules of the road as no more than suggestions. Abbie coached me on short trips so I could learn to anticipate what she ca
lled “bonehead moves.”
Then came my first winter. Last year, at the end of fall semester, a few inches of snow fell one Friday evening. Abbie called and said she would pick me up at six o’clock the next morning. I thought we were going sightseeing, because to me it was amazing to see the world turned white, but instead she took us to the parking lot around a mall. It was empty at that hour.
She put me in the driver’s seat and told me to drive straight ahead and get it up to twenty miles per hour. Then she told me to step on the brake without slowing down. What happened next was like a carnival ride. I was terrified.
“Turn around and do it again,” Abbie told me. “This time take your foot off the gas and count to five before you step on the brake.”
We must have repeated that drill twenty times, each time letting the car slow down a little more before I hit the brake. By the end, I was no longer terrified. I knew what it took to stop a car on slippery pavement. For the rest of that winter, I tried to avoid going out when there was snow on the ground, and, when I did, I was always the slowest driver on the road.
I was glad she had some free time this evening. Learning that a guest at the reception had been murdered and the artist was a suspect had me feeling crazy and confused.
When I got back to Montgomery Avenue on campus, I parked by my Hutch and ran inside to make sure my electric baseboard heaters were set on high and used my own bathroom before walking over to Abbie’s Hutch. Before I could leave, my phone rang.
“Nicole? Who’s this woman who was murdered?”
The nasal whine of Greta Oswald’s voice was unmistakable. The last thing I wanted to do was discuss the matter with the member of the Gallery Advisory Committee who made my life miserable. I bluffed. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”
“I’m reading about it in the news.”
She gave me the name of a local TV station, and I pulled up their website. They had a straight-up crime report about the gruesome scene at the motel.
“Greta, it says right here that she was a professor at the University of Louisville. Why are you calling me about this?”