by V. M. Burns
I copied down the name of the book and went to the back to tackle the Espresso beast. Despite the detailed instructions, I wasn’t confident in using the machine. I passed Emma on my way to the back and must have grumbled.
She laughed. “Based on the look on your face, I’d say you were heading back to the Espresso machine.”
I nodded. “Sorry.”
“Would you like me to print the book for you?”
“Seriously?”
“I don’t mind.”
I handed her the paper. “Bless you.”
She went to the back.
I noticed the cookie plate was empty and grabbed it and went upstairs to bake a couple dozen more cookies.
The rest of the day went by in a blur. I was grateful for Emma’s and Jillian’s help. When the last customer left, we locked the door and flopped down onto chairs.
“I’m worn out,” Nana Jo said. “This had to be the busiest day ever.”
I groaned. “I don’t know what we would have done without you two. I can’t believe you both stayed all day.” I looked at both of them. “I want to thank you and I definitely intend to pay you for all of your hard work.” I started to rise, but they waved me back down.
“Please, don’t get up. We both enjoyed it,” Jillian said.
“I totally enjoyed it. I wish I wasn’t going home for Thanksgiving break. I’d stay and help out,” Emma said.
“Well, this is home for me, so I’m staying and I’m helping,” Jillian said.
“You have to let me pay you. It’s only fair.”
“You let us have our book club here. You helped us get started and you gave everybody a 25 percent discount on the books.” Jillian ticked off each item on her fingers.
“Plus, you gave us cookies,” Emma added.
“I do that for everyone. Well, not the discounts, but you’re college students.”
“Why don’t you let us buy you dinner?” Nana Jo said.
The girls looked at their watches and nodded.
“That sounds good. We never turn down free food,” Emma said.
“Where are we meeting tonight?” I asked Nana Jo.
She pulled out her cell phone. “I’m texting everyone to meet at Frank’s place.”
I pulled out my cell to make sure he would be able to accommodate us. His response was immediate and made me smile.
“What are you grinning like a Cheshire cat for over there?” Nana Jo asked.
“Frank said give him five minutes to throw the mayor out and he’d have seating for us.”
We hoisted ourselves up and prepared to leave. The worse part about sitting down when you were really tired was getting up again. However, we made it. I looked at the stairs I’d climbed at least a dozen times today and balked. I considered asking one of the younger girls if they’d run up and let the dogs out but changed my mind when I remembered where I was going. Instead, I climbed the stairs, got the dogs, and let them out, then freshened up and fixed my hair and makeup. Dating was a pain in the butt. Since I was in the bathroom, I took a couple of ibuprofen and then headed downstairs.
North Harbor Café was bustling too. In fact, there was a line at the door when we arrived. However, the hostess recognized me and immediately directed us to the back of the restaurant and upstairs. Unlike my building, the upstairs of North Harbor Café had not been converted into living space. Instead, it was set up for additional seating. Frank hadn’t opened the upstairs yet but apparently was making an exception for us.
There was another bar upstairs. Several tables had been pulled together and there were tablecloths, silverware, and glasses set up. One of the waitresses waited at the top of the stairs and took drink orders. After we were seated, Frank popped up to check on us.
He brought two large carafes of lemon water and placed them on the table. He stopped behind my chair and whispered in my ear, “Is this okay?”
“Perfect. Thank you.” I smiled. “I think I owe you one.”
He smiled. “I’ll add it to your tab.” He looked serious for a moment. “I haven’t had time to fill your previous request, but I should have something by Monday. Is that okay?”
I nodded. I knew he was busy and I was grateful.
The rest of the crew arrived, and we enjoyed a few drinks and let the waitress take our orders. We toasted the victorious MISU Tigers in their undefeated season and spent some time speculating about bowl games. When Nana Jo pulled her iPad out, it was time to get down to business.
Emma and Jillian hadn’t been involved in this investigation, so we took a few minutes to fill them in on Maria’s and Magnus’s murders. Both girls had helped come up with useful evidence when Dawson was accused of murder and hopefully a new perspective might be just what we needed.
When we finished explanations, Nana Jo looked around. “Who wants to go first?”
Since I had so little information to share, I volunteered. I told the group about my encounter with Gaston and Denise. It probably wasn’t significant to the murders, but it was all I had. “I’ve asked one of my sources to look into Denise Bennett’s background and any connections to Maria.”
Irma raised her hand to go next. “I had a heart to heart with Horace last night and he still wouldn’t talk about his time in prison.” She coughed. “When I told him I already knew, he got upset at first. He claimed he was completely innocent.”
“That’s what they all say,” Freddie and Judge Miller said together.
“Well, he claimed he was an innocent pawn in the entire thing.” She coughed and took a long drink and requested another from the waitress. “He said one of the backers had some underworld connections.”
“Underworld? Sounds like he made a deal with the devil,” Ruby Mae said.
“He said one of his shows fell on hard times. He needed backing and allowed himself to get taken in by some hooligan with a lot of money and”—she used air quotes—“ ‘underworld’ connections.”
“Did he give you a name?” I asked.
She rummaged in her purse and pulled out an envelope. “Borrelli.” She coughed and then took a drink from the glass the waitress placed in front of her.
“Anything else?” Nana Jo looked up from her iPad.
Irma shook her head. “Not really. He basically confirmed what the judge already told us. He went to a low security prison in upstate New York and when he got out, he moved here.”
Nana Jo stared off into space and tapped her fingers on the desk.
“What’re you thinking, Josephine?” Freddie asked.
She looked around. “Well, I asked Elliot to look up everyone: Denise Bennett, Horace, Gaston, and Magnus.”
Freddie snorted when she mentioned Elliot, but she ignored him.
“He couldn’t find anything on Denise Bennett, but Horace was Jewish.” She paused dramatically.
I waited. Everyone looked as confused as I felt.
Nana Jo continued, “Don’t you get it? They were Polish.” She read through her notes. “His mother and grandparents died in Auschwitz. His father was in the French resistance but was killed by the Luftwaffe.”
“How old was he?” I asked, even though I wasn’t sure it mattered.
“Less than one,” she said. “Don’t you get it? He might have felt some animosity toward Magnus if he knew who he was.”
Freddie sat up in his seat. “He was on the tape.”
“What?” we asked.
“The surveillance tape I watched with Larry, the security guard. Horace was at the front desk the day Magnus’s prescriptions were delivered. He was standing there talking to Denise Bennett.”
“If he knew Magnus had a prescription delivered, he could have decided that would be a good opportunity to get his revenge,” Judge Miller chimed in.
“Sam, do you still have that timeline you got from Stinky Pitt?” Nana Jo asked.
I looked through my purse and pulled out the timeline. “He was seen by the Nosy Neighbor entering the apartment at seven.”
F
reddie held up a hand. “But wait, Horace didn’t just stand there when the prescription was delivered.” He was silent a moment. “Denise Bennett signed for the prescription and took it into her office. Then Horace went into the office and talked to her. Later, he came out and if I’m not mistaken, he was carrying the prescription.”
“What?” I asked.
“I’m almost sure of it. I’ll need to look over the tape again to be sure, but I’m almost certain he left with the prescription.”
“So he could have put the cyanide pill in the medicine bottle before he took it to Magnus’s room,” Judge Miller said.
“Motive, opportunity, and means.” Freddie nodded.
“But why would he kill Maria?” I asked.
“Because she was blackmailing him.” Nana Jo looked at me as though I was a bit daft.
“I know, but all she wanted was the lead in the Senior Follies and he gave it to her.” I tried to wrap my brain around the idea of Horace as a killer.
“Blackmailers never stop,” Judge Miller said.
Freddie nodded. “Especially after the first success. She did it once and it worked. What’s to stop her from trying again and again and again?” He shook his head. “They never learn. That’s how we catch ’em. They get greedy. If they stopped after the first time, they’d probably get away scot free. But, if it worked once, they keep going back until they get caught.”
“Or dead,” Nana Jo added.
We talked about Horace and the longer we talked, the more the evidence seemed to fit.
The waitress brought our food and we paused long enough to enjoy our meals. When we finished eating, we ordered coffee and continued our discussions.
Ruby Mae pulled out her knitting while she talked. “I spent the afternoon trapped with Sara Jane Howard.” She frowned. “That woman is the biggest gossip I’ve ever met. If someone at Shady Acres sneezes, she can tell you the time, date, and type of tissue they used to clean their nose.” She looked at the stitches on the section she just knitted and muttered under her breath. “She watches everyone that comes and goes on her floor and out through the window. She did say she thought Horace and Maria were more than friendly. In fact, she said Maria was more than friendly with a number of men.”
Irma crossed her arms. “Well, that dirty little—”
“Irma!”
She coughed and then pulled her flask from her purse and took a swig.
Dorothy had endured another torturous day in Miss Bennett’s art class as they worked on the set for the Follies. Her only contribution was to comment that a reporter from the North Harbor Gazette had stopped by during their class. He wanted to do an article on Shady Acres and their award-winning chef. When the photographer took a picture, she came unglued and started screeching like a banshee. She threatened to sue the paper if they printed any pictures without her consent.
“I wonder why?” I asked. “The way she talked last night, the board was excited for the marketing.”
Jillian timidly raised a hand when no one commented. “Maybe she didn’t want them to dig too deep into Gaston’s past.”
“It sure wouldn’t look good if someone recognized him from prison,” Emma said.
No one else had any contributions, so we discussed next steps. Tomorrow was Sunday, so we decided even God rested on the Sabbath, and we would too. However, we would meet on Monday and hopefully have something to present to Detective Pitt.
The Senior Follies’ opening night was coming up. Nana Jo had rehearsal tomorrow and I was spending time with my mom. Hopefully, Frank would be able to get in touch with his contact soon. Thanksgiving was fast approaching and, unless I tied up the loose ends and presented a killer to Detective Pitt in the next couple of days, he might arrest my grandmother. The pressure of finding the killer weighed on my mind. I barely heard a word anyone said the rest of the evening as I sifted through all of the information we’d discovered. I didn’t want to believe Horace Evans was the killer. I liked Horace.
We walked back to the store and I offered to drive Jillian and Emma back to campus. They’d taken the bus earlier and I didn’t feel good about them taking the bus at night. The drive gave me an opportunity to think. I used to drive whenever I was upset, confused, or just needed to think. US-31 went from Holland, Michigan, to Indianapolis, Indiana. In River Bend there was a bypass that went around the city. The speed limit was seventy and I could get on in North Harbor and drive south for as long as it took to clear my head. Usually, that happened before I reached the Indiana border, but for exceptionally tough problems, I had been known to drive to the south side of River Bend before turning around and driving back.
Tonight’s drive didn’t take me quite that far, but I enjoyed the solitude. I’d recently bought a new car. Well, new to me anyway, and I still enjoyed having a car that was quiet and where I didn’t feel every bump in the road.
Nana Jo promised to make sure Snickers’s and Oreo’s needs were met. Thankfully, that didn’t involve much more than food, water, and access to the outside. When I got home, the lights were out and they were in bed. Oreo barked when I approached the bedroom door, but Snickers barely moved.
I got ready for bed, but my mind still wouldn’t settle. During the drive, I came to a conclusion. I accepted the fact Horace was the killer. He had motive, means, and opportunity. I think I knew how he’d killed Magnus, but Maria’s murder was still a puzzle. I needed to figure out how he’d killed her. Once I knew that, I could go to Detective Pitt with my conclusions. Like Jeopardy, the drive gave me the question, but I still needed the answer. I hoped Nana Jo was right about my subconscious mind figuring things out through my writing. I opened my laptop and tried to settle my conscious mind to give my subconscious a chance to work.
By the time James returned with Detective Inspector Covington, Sergeant Turnbull had also returned with his boss, Inspector Simon Woodson. When Inspector Woodson discovered Scotland Yard on the scene, he turned red and looked as though he would explode.
“This here’s my patch and no ruddy Scotland Yard whippersnapper, still wet behind the ears, is gonna come down and tell me how to do my job.” Inspector Woodson was short, fat, and bald and when he yelled, his voice went up a couple of octaves and his face turned red.
Detective Inspector Peter Covington was young, tall, lean, and gangly, with a head full of curly brown hair. He looked like a fresh-faced kid in comparison to the inspector. However, the mild-mannered detective had a boiling point and Inspector Woodson had found it.
Detective Inspector Covington pulled himself up to his full height, which made him appear to be two feet taller than Inspector Woodson. He removed his hat and got in the inspector’s face. “I’ve investigated and solved more than fifty murders. How many have you solved?”
Woodson sputtered. His face turned from red to purple. “You . . . You . . . I’ll have your badge. I’ll—”
“If you use your head for more than just a hat rack, you’ll sit down and listen.” Winston’s voice bounced around the rafters of the vaulted ceiling and the wooden floors. He entered the large room and marched over to his desk and sat down.
Rufus and Tango followed. Rufus sat on the rug under the desk. Tango hopped up into the windowsill and groomed himself.
Inspector Woodson removed his hat and smoothed down the few strands of hair that remained. “I’m very sorry for losing my temper like that, Mr. Churchill, sir.” He glared at the Scotland Yard detective and gripped his hat so tightly he crushed the brim.
“Sit down,” Winston ordered.
Inspector Woodson nodded and quickly plopped down on the edge of the nearest chair. Unfortunately, the chair nearest to him was not close to Winston. He looked around, unsure of whether he should scoot his chair closer or remain where he was.
“You too.” Winston glared at Detective Inspector Covington.
Covington took a few moments to find a comfortable chair closer to Winston and a seat of power. He sat down and waited.
Lord William had
followed Winston into the study and was seated on a sofa near the bookshelf. He filled his pipe and sat quietly.
James leaned against a bookshelf. He watched the drama through a smoke-filled haze.
Winston turned to look at Detective Inspector Covington. “You must be the Scotland Yard detective Lord William was telling me about.”
Detective Inspector Covington nodded. “Yes, sir.”
Winston nodded. “Thank you for coming so quickly. I’m sure”—he turned and stared at Inspector Woodson—“our local police, while a fine group of men, recognize this is a very sensitive matter. I have no doubt that, when given a moment to reflect, they will appreciate the offer of assistance.”
Inspector Woodson choked and sputtered and looked at everything except Mr. Churchill. Eventually, he sighed and nodded.
“Thank you, Inspector. I’m glad you were able to see the importance of utilizing all resources at your disposal to ensure victory by asking Scotland Yard for assistance.” He smiled. “After all, things like murder don’t happen in Westerham. You run a very well-regulated ship down here.” He chuckled. “It takes keen insight to recognize this murder is probably going to be a London affair.” Like the Pied Piper led children with his pipe, Winston led men with his words. He wove words together into a beautifully lyrical cadence which lulled the strongest men into relaxed positions of comfort where they were most vulnerable. He used that gift to convince the unwitting Kent policeman not only that he wanted Scotland Yard to investigate the murder but that contacting Scotland Yard had been his idea the entire time.
As Winston spoke, Inspector Woodson’s face underwent a series of rapid changes. From an initial look of contained rage, it softened to one of humility and pride. Woodson leaned back and smiled. “Well, of course, you’re right. The girl came from London and, while I don’t like to brag, we’ve certainly never had any murders in this neck of the weald.” He laughed at his play on words, using the old English term to describe the Kent countryside. “You’re right, sir, this is most likely a London matter and the killer will most certainly be a Londoner.” He smiled.