Murder Once Removed

by S. C. Perkins

  “Lucy,” she said, not sounding any stronger. “I’m so sorry to be calling you at such an hour, but I caught someone breaking into my house.”

  “Oh my gosh, are you okay?” I swung my legs over to the side of my bed and stood up. “Did they hurt you? Have you called the police?”

  “I’m just fine,” she replied. “I woke up when I heard rustling in the kitchen. He ran out the kitchen door as soon as he heard me.”

  “You’re sure it was a man?”

  “Oh, yes. I only got a glimpse of him as he ran past my garage and triggered the motion-sensor lighting, but he was most definitely a man. I told the police this, too. They came right out and left a few minutes ago.” A touch of excitement colored her voice. “They searched my whole house, guns drawn and everything. They dusted for prints, too, but evidently the perp wore gloves, so he didn’t leave any.”

  While Betty-Anne sounded frail, she wasn’t frightened. In fact, she almost sounded like she’d enjoyed herself.

  “What did he take?” I asked.

  “That’s why I decided to call you right away,” she replied. “The robber took two silver bowls and a nice Tiffany vase from the sideboard in the dining room.”

  “Betty-Anne, I’m so sorry,” I said.

  “Don’t be, shug,” she told me. “Those ugly bowls were given to me by my mother-in-law thirty years ago. I’d been hoping someone would steal them for years. The Tiffany vase was only a very nice copy, too. Worth no more than fifty dollars.”

  “Oh … um … okay,” I replied. I didn’t know where this conversation was going anymore.

  “But then that awful thief also took some of my great-grandpa Jeb’s things, including the box with all his journals. I had them out on the dining room table again because Dr. Dell, your curator friend from the Hamilton Center, was in San Antonio on Saturday and came by to look at the rest of the collection. She loved all of it, Lucy, and I was so thrilled that I’d been showing the photos and journals to various friends and relatives. I finally put the photos away yesterday, but the journals were still out, waiting for the digital-specialist company to come get them for scanning. The thief must have seen the box and thought I was packing my valuables or something.” Her voice went shaky as she added, “The 1849 journal was right on top, too, and now it’s gone.”

  “Oh no.” My stomach did a little dejected swoop. The thief had taken valuable things after all. Valuable to the Hamilton Center, yes, but mostly to the Inscore and Halloran families.

  “Lucy, I can’t tell you how sorry I am,” Betty-Anne said. “I feel like I’ve let everyone down. I shouldn’t have left the box of journals where someone could see them.”

  “No, no, you have absolutely nothing to be sorry about,” I said, “and neither Dr. Dell nor I would ever think to blame you for this. I’m just so glad you’re safe and that this man didn’t hurt you. I couldn’t have lived with myself if he had.”

  “Oh, thank you, shug,” she replied. “But while I’m relieved the thief didn’t get the pictures of San Antonio, the Alamo, or the portraits of the most prominent families of the time, I’m still concerned. Dr. Dell said she was interested in the entire collection, including the journals. Now I don’t know if she’ll want any of it.”

  “Oh, I’m confident she will,” I told her. “In reality, the information about Seth Halloran is only a small piece of the pie. Jeb took all those amazing photos of San Antonio when the city was in its youth. His contribution is of great value to Texas historians regardless of the Halloran angle.”

  Betty-Anne’s tinkling laugh came over the line. “You’ve made me feel much better, Lucy. You’re a dear.”

  I smiled. “But I’m worried about you being at your house alone. Do you have anyone who can stay with you tonight?”

  “My neighbor Dolores is coming over as soon as she gets the rollers out of her hair. We decided neither of us would be able to go back to sleep, so she’s bringing some jellyroll pans and her laptop with some online self-defense videos. We’re going to practice our moves and bake snickerdoodles for our garden club meeting this afternoon.”

  “Until she does, though, do you have a can of bug spray? Such as wasp or roach spray? Or a small fire extinguisher?”

  “I’m out of bug spray. I have the fire extinguisher, though. It’s right here in the kitchen pantry. My daughter bought me one of those little jobs that’s about the size of a bottle of wine.”

  “Okay, great,” I said. “I want you to get it out and keep it near you, ready to operate. If anyone other than Dolores even so much as knocks on your kitchen door, I want you to spray them in the face with the extinguisher. It will blind them temporarily and you can make a break for it.”

  “Then can I hit him on the back of the head with it like they do on television?” she asked eagerly.

  I laughed. “Only if you feel like you need to. Make sure you don’t get any of the chemicals in your eyes, though. You need to be about four or five feet away from your perp if you have to spray them. But be careful. If it gets on your hardwood floors in your hallway, it could be slippery.”

  “Got it,” she said. “Oh, I can see Dolores coming over right now.” She kept me on the phone as she opened the kitchen door and called out, “Do you have those pans in a defensive position, Dolores? If you don’t they’re just for baking cookies, not for smashing into bad guys’ faces.”

  Heaven help the thief if he tried to come back and mess with Betty-Anne Inscore-Cooper again. She was one tough cookie herself.

  * * *

  It was going on nine in the morning and I still wasn’t dressed for the workday. Usually I was at the office by now, but I’d been so concerned about Betty-Anne and the theft that I didn’t go back to sleep until after I’d called back an hour later to check on her. She and Dolores were having a grand time talking, baking up a storm, and practicing using their elbows to jab someone behind them and the heel of their hands to punch someone in the nose.

  “I’m getting pretty good at it,” Betty-Anne had told me. “Would’ve given Dolores a good shot to the kisser last time, too, if she’d bobbed instead of weaved.”

  I’d only really felt better when she told me the police had been patrolling her neighborhood all night.

  “We’ve seen a squad car every half hour or so. Right, Dolores?”

  “Darn tootin’!” Dolores said in the background. “They’re on the lookout for our suspect!”

  “I’m just relieved the thief didn’t get the daguerreotype of Seth Halloran,” I said.

  “I’m so glad you took the original with you, Lucy. I don’t know what I would have done if that awful robber had taken it, too.”

  I told her I planned to see Gus later to deliver some Halloran-family photos I’d had restored and digitized by a photography-expert friend. “When I do, I’ll let him know about the journals.”

  “Oh, dear me,” Betty-Anne said. “Do you think Gus will be angry? I know he wanted to see the original journal. I feel simply terrible about all of this.”

  “Well, I’m sure he’ll be disappointed about not being able to see the original, but he won’t be angry—especially with you. After all, you gave his family the closure they’ve always wanted. I also made copies of every page that had the slightest mention of Seth Halloran, so he’s seen what he needs. And it’s not as if all hope is lost in finding the journals safe and sound again, right?”

  I had heard the relief in Betty-Anne’s voice once more as she’d echoed her elbow-jabbing, snickerdoodle-baking neighbor. “You’re darn tootin’, shug.”

  Now, standing at my closet and admitting to myself that I should dress a little more businesslike than usual to visit Halloran Incorporated, I bypassed my jeans and pulled on an ivory wool pencil skirt that paired nicely with my rose-hued cashmere sweater. With my feet in a pair of pointed-toe heels, thin gold hoops in my ears, and the addition of some lip gloss, I would be duly dressed to impress Gus, Serena, and anyone else I came across.

  Taking in the s
tate of my condo, though, caused me to emit a sigh. My living room and kitchen had taken a cleanliness hit in the past few days. Could I blame it on the ragweed? Or even my meds-and-martinis-induced hangover? Unfortunately, no. I’d just been lazy.

  I wasn’t exactly thrilled with myself about it, either, because I’d recently spent a good bit of time and money hiring a decorator to help me update my one-bedroom place from the hideousness of its original decor. Gone were the burnt-orange walls, dark wood cabinetry, and tan carpet everywhere, replaced with a palette of sophisticated whites and creams for the furniture, cabinetry, and walls, all set against wood floors stained a dark espresso color. A wide, gilt-framed mirror that nearly reached the ceiling was positioned behind my camelback sofa, making my living room seem larger by reflecting both the opposite wall’s built-in bookcases and the trees outside my windows. We’d infused color throughout my condo with accent pieces in celadon green and ice blue, and by a handful of oil paintings I’d collected over the years, all by Texas artists. Certain furnishings, like my sofa and tufted arm chairs, had a ladylike, French vibe to them, but every piece of furniture in my place was welcoming and utterly lounge-worthy. Considering both Walter and Nick (pre-Sasha, natch) had deemed my redecorating efforts “good; not too girlie,” I figured I’d done all right.

  Now, even a couple of messy guys might tell me I needed to clean up a little. I had done a ton of laundry yesterday and I still needed to fold my clean clothes; there was a big pile of them on my sofa as a reminder that I could fold and watch TV at the same time. I also needed to vacuum, and dust, and unload the clean dishes from the dishwasher so I could load the stack of dirty ones piling up in my sink. Then my countertops could use a once-over with some cleaner, as could my stovetop. Lastly, I really should take out the recycling and de-leftover my refrigerator. There were things growing in a couple of takeout boxes that I really didn’t want to look at, smell, or touch.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake, this is gross,” I muttered, looking around for one thing I could do to make the mess more livable until I could seriously clean. I figured the fastest of my chores would be the dishes, so I went for it, but only after I put on the kettle for some tea. While the water came to a boil, I unloaded the dishwasher and loaded it back up from the dirty dishes in the sink. Measuring Assam into the tea infuser, I ate a cup of peach yogurt, and popped in my earbuds to call Winnie Dell.

  She answered immediately, sounding almost as gruff as Gus Halloran usually did. This being the normal way Winnie sounded, I went through basic pleasantries, and told her about Betty-Anne’s theft without beating around the bush. We spent a couple of minutes expressing our mutual outrage at Betty-Anne’s house and safety being violated and then relief Betty-Anne herself wasn’t hurt before Winnie lapsed into a brief silence.

  “Well, hell’s bells,” she said finally.

  “Ditto,” I said. We both sighed, but knew there was no use ranting over the loss of the journals, so we didn’t. Steam began coming out of my tea kettle and, before it started whistling, I turned off the flame. As I poured, a thought that had been poking at my brain all morning unfurled on my tongue like the Assam leaves at the touch of boiling water.

  “Winnie, you don’t suppose the break-in had something to do with my discovering Seth Halloran really was murdered back in 1849, do you? I mean, it sounds preposterous, yes, but I wondered if an Applewhite or Ayers descendant saw Gus’s and my press conference—”

  Winnie snorted. “Don’t take up for that impetuous old goat, Lucy. It was Gus’s press conference and his alone and he takes full responsibility for it—and for you being less than a hundred percent aware of the stakes, too.”

  Though she couldn’t see me, I still felt myself blush at how incredibly unprofessional I’d been that afternoon. It was certainly a lesson learned. “You spoke to him?”

  “Spoke to him? No. I dressed him down but good,” Winnie said, irritation filling her voice. “Lucy, what was that man thinking, holding a press conference, involving you in it, and announcing to the world that Caleb Applewhite was C.A. without having any real proof? I mean, honestly, I could’ve wrung his neck. I told him if he ever pulled such a stunt again, and especially if he included you, the Hamilton Center would never accept a cent more of Halloran money.”

  I couldn’t help but giggle. “Considering how Gus loves having his family’s name as sponsors of some of the center’s exhibits, that’s actually more of a threat than it would be for most people.”

  “True, especially since he often vies with the Applewhite family for top donor,” Winnie said, a note of satisfaction in her voice.

  “The press conference did go viral for a short while, though, and a couple of news stories about it were published,” I said, getting back to my point. “The murder happened way back in 1849, yes, but do you think someone in one of the two families could have wanted to steal the journals? Maybe to try and clear his ancestor’s name as a murderer?”

  Winnie sounded amused, but not disrespectfully so. “I think that would be a long shot, Lucy. As you’re well aware from working with me, I always say history never really stays in the past and what’s happened in the past continues to affect the present. Still, all the reports stated correctly that you’d found nothing in the 1849 journal other than what Gus foolishly announced to the media, and the other journals contained no other mention of the Halloran, Applewhite, or Ayers families.”

  “Except when one family member or another came in to have their portrait taken,” I reminded her. “All three names showed up before and after 1849 in connection with Jeb’s photography business, but each time it was merely a notation, and was more often than not one of the female members of each family.”

  “True,” Winnie said. “I’ll admit it crossed my mind that one of the descendants thought you or Gus were deliberately withholding extra information, so he decided to take the journals to find out. It’s also possible he was hoping to actually steal the photos, but only had time to grab the box of journals before Betty-Anne surprised him. There’s a market for historical photos, even if it’s not a big one. If the thief had gotten all those daguerreotypes, he could make a few hundred to a few thousand, depending on the subject matter and what’s in the background.”

  I mulled this information for a moment before asking, “Would you think me crazy if I told you I wanted to keep looking into the C.A. mystery? And if you don’t think me bananas, I could use your help and that history-loving brain of yours to narrow down my searches.”

  I heard the smile in my former boss’s voice. “Lucy, I thought you’d never ask. I was beginning to think I’d taught you nothing about digging all the way into a genealogical mystery. Do you want to start tonight?”

  “You name the time, and I’ll be there,” I replied.

  “I’ve got a sponsors party this afternoon for our latest exhibit on the photos of the Mexican Revolution. How about you come by after that—say, seven P.M.? I’ll have taken a good look at the Halloran daguerreotype by then. Aya says the photo needs to be adhered to unbuffered archival paper instead of glass and the case’s hinges need fresh pneumatic leather. She’ll be getting to work on that after I check on the photo’s overall condition.”

  Aya Sato was the Hamilton Center’s in-house conservator and restoration specialist. With her, I knew the daguerreotype would be in good hands.

  “Perfect. I’m happy to bring a bottle of that pinot noir you like so much, too,” I said, and then laughed when she said with exaggerated relief, “Oh, I did teach you well.”

  A short, repeating buzzing sound came over the line and Winnie murmured, “Unknown caller … I’m sending it to voicemail.” I heard the tap of a button. “By the way, I don’t think you’ve met the security guard we hired earlier this year. Name’s Homer. He does a great job, but he’s a little hard of hearing, so you’ll have to speak up when you come to the door after hours. In the meantime, you tell Betty-Anne of course I still want Jeb’s photos. The few you brought me are incredible
and there’s a handful of other gems in the rest of the collection I saw last weekend. The 1849 journal would have been some cream cheese frosting on the red velvet cake that is the daguerreotype of Seth Halloran, but we can’t always get everything we want, can we? Luckily you scanned the pages, so the provenance is still intact, and your scans are good enough to use in the exhibit.”

  “You’ve decided to do an exhibit?” The breathless hope in my voice was so obvious, Winnie started to laugh.

  “If I didn’t, I’d be about as smart as Gus Halloran,” she quipped.

  I grinned as the buzzing started up again. “It’s the same unknown caller again,” she said, sounding annoyed. Then she brightened. “I bet it’s Daniel Applewhite. I’m expecting a call from him, and this may be one of his people with an unlisted number. He does that sometimes. I should take this.”

  I was curious as to what she’d be discussing with Senator Applewhite, and I was immediately rewarded when she added, “I think he’s going to ask me to look into the C.A. business and clear his ancestor’s name. It’ll be good to tell him I’m already on the case.”

  “I’m so glad, too. I’m off to give Gus his restored family photos, then,” I said. “I’ll see you tonight.”

  “Looking forward to it,” she replied, and ended the call.

  A smile still on my face and my tea now dark, strong, and in a travel mug, I was ready to head to Gus’s office. I lifted my white wool coat from one of the barstools abutting my kitchen’s tiny, marble-topped island, grabbed the carrier bag full of restored Halloran-family photos from the other barstool, dug my keys out of my tote, and swung open my front door.

  I found a man standing there. Glaring at me, his fist raised.

  SIX

  With a yelp, I slammed my door shut and threw the deadbolt. Which really wasn’t a “me” thing to do. Yesterday, before Betty-Anne’s break-in, I probably would have stood there, stared back at the guy, and asked politely if I could help him.