Tony getting the best of Mother was a rare occurrence.
‘Let’s go home,’ I said. ‘Little girl, you’ve had a busy day.’
‘I am bushed,’ Mother admitted.
She headed for her Vespa, and I to my Fusion.
Arriving at the house first, I set Sushi down in the foyer, where she suddenly took off, running around the living room, nose sniffing the floor, ears perked, giving out with a low, suggestive growl.
Mother, upon coming in the front door and seeing me frozen in the entryway, asked, ‘What is it?’
‘We’ve had a visitor,’ I said.
This was hardly the first time our home had been burgled. When you go messing in murder, the people responsible for the crime get interested in you. But this was the first time we’d been ‘visited’ in broad daylight.
‘Bold,’ Mother responded, complimenting the audacity of our unknown intruder. ‘I’ll take the high road, dear, and you take the low road.’
At least she didn’t sing it.
As Mother climbed the stairs, I moved slowly through the living room, then the kitchen, followed by the dining room, where I opened drawers and cupboards and closets, looking for anything missing or even just disturbed.
I had just finished searching the library/music room when Mother joined me.
‘Anything?’ I asked her.
‘My jewelry box had been opened and gone through, but everything seems to be there.’
I’d talked her into keeping the good stuff in a safe deposit box at the bank.
‘What about you?’ she asked.
A shake of my head. ‘I wouldn’t have suspected a thing if it weren’t for Sushi.’
‘Our good little bloodhound.’ Mother grunted. ‘Would appear we had a gentleman burglar.’
‘Who didn’t want the police called,’ I surmised. ‘With nothing missing and no sign of forced entry, we can hardly ask for fingerprinting.’
‘Probably used lock picks to get in through the back door,’ Mother observed.
She should know.
I said, ‘The only thing missing is a book from the shelf.’ I pointed to the empty spot. Mother’s favorite mystery novels were there and arranged in a special way that made the missing tooth in the shelf’s smile easy to spot.
‘No, dear, that’s where I kept my copy of the Christie book, before giving it to Skylar.’
‘Oh, right,’ I said, then frowned. ‘Where’s that necklace you bought from him?’
‘In my bag.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘That’s what the burglar was looking for!’
‘And couldn’t find,’ I said, nodding.
‘I’d meant to take it to the jeweler to examine.’
Excitement was building!
I said, ‘Let’s examine it ourselves.’
She retrieved the jewelry, brought it into the dining room, and placed the necklace on the Duncan Phyfe table beneath the Art Nouveau hanging light fixture.
We leaned in and looked.
‘What if,’ Mother said slowly, ‘the stones aren’t really turquoise, but are only painted to look as such?’
I was skeptical. ‘And what? Beneath are diamonds or other precious gems?’
‘Get the paint remover,’ she ordered.
The door to the basement was in the kitchen, and I clomped down the stairs, located the paint-remover can, got a rag, and returned.
Meanwhile, Mother had spread a towel beneath the necklace on the table. I handed her the remover, and she poured some on the cloth. After selecting the largest stone, Mother began to rub.
And rub.
Nothing.
I asked, ‘What if the precious stones are inside the outer layer?’
Mother straightened. ‘The hammer, dear,’ she said dramatically.
We only had one.
In the kitchen was a drawer of tools designated for small household fixes – hammer, screwdrivers (long and short), pliers (slip joint, needle nose), wire cutter, and wrench; plus an assortment of nails, screws, bolts, picture frame hangers, carpet tacks, and unidentified hardware found beneath furniture we thought we ought to keep – the kind of items that seemed to breed when we weren’t looking.
But the hammer wasn’t there.
I returned with the bad news.
‘Where did you use it last?’ Mother asked.
‘I didn’t,’ I said.
‘I always put it back,’ she sniffed.
I arched an eyebrow. ‘Do you now. Care to wager a little bet?’
Mother threw her head back. ‘Name your terms.’
‘The loser makes dinner,’ I said, adding, ‘And cleans up after.’
Mother put a finger to her lips. ‘On second thought, I may have used it in my bedroom to fix a closet shelf.’
Usually, duct tape was her first go-to fixer. Her second was Old School epoxy clue.
‘Be a dear, will you?’ Mother asked. ‘You know how hard the stairs are on my knees.’
When I returned with the hammer, Mother held out a hand as if requesting a scalpel – my memory jumped to Moe of the Three Stooges as a surgeon asking Larry for gibberish medical instruments – with the necklace laid out on the table, awaiting her skilled surgical touch.
WHAM!
The turquoise remained intact.
Her next blow rattled the windows, and the stone broke apart in pieces, revealing …
… nothing.
‘Pulverized,’ I commented.
Mother looked at me sourly. ‘Any other bright ideas?’
‘You asked for the hammer.’
‘You should have stopped me. Now my necklace is ruined! It travels to London and back, safe and sound, and in one moment in Serenity, you destroy it!’
I squinted one eye. ‘Have you had your medicine?’
She squinted one eye. ‘Have you had yours?’
Come to think of it, I had missed this morning’s Prozac.
Mother snapped out of her funk as if she’d thrown an inner switch. ‘Why don’t we work on a suspect list?’
‘OK. Sure.’
She raised a declamatory finger. ‘I have to stay one step ahead of that boyfriend of yours, now that he knows as much as I do.’
‘This isn’t a game, Mother,’ I chided. ‘And, anyway, you’re the one who spilled all your info to him. He didn’t even have to make an effort.’
‘Don’t rub it in.’ Her eyes grew disturbingly large behind the magnified, over-sized glasses. ‘And you don’t think it’s a game to the murderer? A deadly one? To keep from getting caught? Him or her against us?’
She had a point.
In the library, Mother rolled out the ancient school-house blackboard from its spot behind the old upright piano that nobody played, save for a few midnight mice tinkling the ivories.
I took my usual place on its padded bench, Sushi settling by my feet. Meanwhile, Mother planted herself in front of the board, then addressed her classroom of two.
‘For the time being,’ she said, ‘I will dispense with the London demise of Humphrey Westcott, leaving it in the able hands of MI5, and concentrate instead on the highly suspicious deaths of Ruth Hassler and Tiffany Wallace.’
‘Don’t waste your chalk,’ I said with a wave of the hand. ‘It’s obvious Jared killed both of them.’
‘Is it, dear?’
I shrugged. ‘I know you want a complicated mystery to solve brilliantly, and we do have a bunch of players, I grant you. But Jared is it.’
‘Oh, now it’s a game of tag we’re playing, is it?’
I ignored that. ‘Jared obviously wanted his mother-in-law’s money, so he went over to her house, surreptitiously, and let himself in with Tiffany’s key. Then he pushed Ruth down the stairs to make it look like an accident.’
‘How exactly did he manage that, dear?’
‘Oh, there’s lots of ways.’ Ducking that, I shifted on the seat, getting into high gear. ‘Afterward, when Tiffany began giving him grief about spending so much of the inheritance – or perh
aps she’d suspected what he’d done – he got rid of her, too.’
‘You’re long on theory,’ Mother said, chin lifted, ‘and short on detail … but I do agree Jared is our main suspect for both murders.’
Feeling emboldened, I said, ‘So that makes Jared the one who broke into our house!’
‘Does it, darling?’ Mother said, bestowing upon me a small, patient smile, as if dealing with a pupil who’d arrived on the short bus.
She began to pace, like a defense lawyer in a movie in front of a jury. ‘Then tell me, dear, just how Jared could have accomplished that? Didn’t Tony confirm by way of an impartial witness that the aforementioned Mr Wallace was at the tag sale all day? Right up until being contacted about his wife’s unfortunate condition?’
I thought for a moment, though I admit I’d wilted some. ‘Then maybe … Jared had an accomplice?’
‘Are you up-talking, dear? You know how that annoys me.’
‘No. I’m asking a question.’
‘Good. Because your question suggests that, however much we may suspect Jared in this affair, we still have need for a list – but we will set Ruth Hassler’s death aside for now, and concentrate only on Tiffany’s murder.’
She turned toward the board, picked up white chalk from its lip, and began to write.
When Mother was finished, the board looked like this:
MURDER OF TIFFANY WALLACE
I commented, ‘So you’re limiting the suspects only to people who were at the tag sale.’
Mother nodded. ‘Because Tiffany was almost certainly killed by a slow-acting poison administered during that period of time.’
‘Possibly slow acting,’ I corrected, then raised a finger as if testing wind direction (though in the case of a hot wind, it always came from Mother’s direction). ‘We don’t have the autopsy results yet. And what if a fast-acting poison had been waiting for Tiffany in that coffin?’
Mother’s jaw dropped. ‘That hadn’t occurred to me. Good thinking, dear!’
Suddenly I’d been promoted to the top of the class! Of course, my only fellow student was Sushi.
‘But,’ Mother said, ‘how would that poison have been administered? Surely not by mouth!’
‘Something within the coffin that she might inhale?’
Mother was nodding. ‘Possibly. Possibly.’
‘Or she took it herself by mouth. Something she had with her. The lozenge we postulated.’
Her eyebrows had climbed above her glasses. ‘A suicide?’
‘A suicide in that case, yes. We don’t know enough about Tiffany and her private life to determine whether she had a motive to take her own life. But we can’t rule it out.’
Mother began pacing again. ‘Let’s explore the notion that the poison, however it was administered, was waiting in that coffin.’
‘OK.’ I was all for that. I mean, it was my theory.
‘Since Tiffany arrived late to the session,’ Mother said, ‘after the other coffins had already been assigned, by way of participant photos … the one coffin remaining, sans photo, was obviously reserved for the murder victim.’
‘But who would have had access to the coffins before the class?’
Mother thought for a moment. ‘Well, naturally, Tilda herself, who set them up in the crematorium room. And, I suppose, any one of the attendees could have snuck inside the crematorium before going into the meeting room.’
I raised a ‘stop’ palm. ‘You’re forgetting Mr Dunn, who provided the coffins.’
Mother made a face as if smelling spoiled milk. ‘Nonsense. Ned Dunn had no motive for dispatching Tiffany.’
‘How can you say that? How much do you really know about the man? And Tiffany’s life remains largely a mystery.’
Mother put hands on hips. ‘Are you trying to be difficult?’
‘No,’ I replied. ‘But what about this scenario: daughter visits mother, there’s a heated argument, and Tiffany pushes Ruth down the stairs. The police see it as an accident, but Dunn thinks the death looks suspicious. He confronts Tiffany, she offers him a bribe, and, in need of cash for his business, Dunn takes it. Later he regrets having done so – realizing Tiffany has made him an accessory to murder. Then along comes Tilda, asking to use his facility for her “Appreciating Life Through Death” session, and when Dunn realizes Tiffany is attending – maybe even as late as when she walks in the door, presenting the opportunity – he takes advantage of the situation while everyone is in the meeting room.’
‘Taking advantage how?’ Mother asked.
‘Don’t you think a funeral director would have something lying around that could be lethal if injected or inhaled? She might have reclined onto a waiting needle!’
Now Mother was nodding and pacing, pacing and nodding. ‘And Ned had a new metal roof put on the building not so long ago, which couldn’t have come cheap. But … why would he have called Ruth’s death to my attention?’
I shrugged. ‘Guilt? Casting suspicion away from himself, maybe? Or perhaps once Dunn got involved, Tiffany started blackmailing him, and he thought an investigation by you would put a stop to it, or put her behind bars.’
Mother turned toward the board, and wrote: ‘Ned Dunn,’ ‘blackmail,’ and ‘yes,’ in the columns. She looked back at me with new respect. ‘Anyone else?’
‘What about Michael Hughes?’ I asked. ‘He could be the accomplice you posit, which would explain a lie about Jared not ever leaving the tag sale.’
She was shaking her head. ‘He’s an old friend, dear.’
Old friend was code for former paramour.
‘Should that,’ I asked, ‘eliminate him from suspicion?’
‘No,’ she admitted. ‘But I do like the way you used the word “posit.”’
‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘After all, Mr Hughes certainly had the opportunity to poison Tiffany’s coffee. So you’d better add him, too.’
She put chalk to board.
My focus turned to the second name on Mother’s list. ‘Do we think Skylar James was having an affair with Tiffany?’
Mother nodded, then reiterated the incident she’d accidentally witnessed – if anything overheard or seen by a snoop like her could be deemed ‘accidental.’
‘Maybe he was just comforting her,’ I said.
‘First impressions are quite often valid, dear,’ she replied. ‘And my first impression was that there was something between them, underscored by the way they quickly pulled apart upon seeing me.’
‘You mean they acted guilty.’
Mother nodded. ‘And the first words spoken by Tiffany – “It’s not what it looks like” – told me it was exactly what it looked like.’
‘I can’t really picture Skylar being attracted to her.’
‘Perhaps not her, dear – but what about all her recently inherited wealth?’
I frowned. ‘The economy has been pretty hard for antiques dealers. And Angela’s teaching salary would only go so far. But why would Skylar murder his, as you’d put it, “paramour”?’
Mother shrugged rather grandly. ‘Perhaps she called off the affair.’
‘Hmm … A little thin as a murder motive.’
She tried again. ‘Suppose he broke it off, and Tiffany threatened to tell Angela.’
‘Or expose something to Angela that Tiffany knew about Skylar! Some criminal activity he was involved in to prop up his business!’
The room fell silent, save for Sushi’s light snoring – our conversation apparently struck the little dog as boring after the excitement of all that hammering.
Continuing down the suspect list, I said, ‘If the affair was real, and Angela felt threatened by it, then it’s plausible she could have poisoned Tiffany. Maybe not thinking it would kill her – just as a nasty kind of warning.’
‘It is difficult to get the correct dosage,’ Mother said, ‘when attempting to not quite kill someone.’
I frowned. ‘But then – why wouldn’t Angela just confront Jared about the affair, and let
him get Tiffany back in line?’
‘Perhaps she did, and he tried and failed,’ Mother said.
‘Which brings us back to square one: Jared.’ That left one suspect. ‘What is Colette Dumont doing on your list?’
‘The rich and renowned Ms Dumont had no reason to attend such a minor tag sale,’ Mother said rather grandly, ‘unless it was for a nefarious purpose.’
Why did I think Mother just liked having someone of that woman’s standing as a suspect? Someone she admired, and could justify investigating? Class up the list a little.
I asked, ‘Did Colette buy anything?’
‘Well … yes,’ Mother admitted.
‘Which does justify her being there. What purchase did she make?’
She flipped a hand. ‘I don’t really know. Jared had already loaded whatever it was in the trunk of her car. But it could have been just a token buy, just as I had done.’
Which brought us to another key question … what were we going to do with one Snowbaby?
I asked, ‘Anything you might like to add about Colette?’
Mother had a ‘tell’ – when holding something back, her eyes avoided mine. She got downright shifty.
And finally she said, ‘The woman mentioned that she was attending a local auction in the afternoon.’
‘So she could have just been killing time at the tag sale,’ I said, ‘on her way there. Not in attendance to kill Tiffany by slow-acting poison. And whether she attended that sale or not is easy enough to confirm.’ I paused. ‘Did Colette and Tiffany interact?’
‘Very little that I witnessed,’ Mother said. ‘But there could have been more contact before I arrived.’
‘What do you see as Colette’s motive?’ I asked, noting the absence of one.
‘To be determined.’
Mother definitely wanted to class up the suspect list.
‘Colette also had a conversation with Skylar,’ she said, ‘which I was unable to hear.’
‘We should ask him about it,’ I said.
The cozy room fell silent again.
Then Mother lamented, ‘If only I had allowed Tiffany to tell me what she wanted to.’
That was the first I’d heard of that. ‘When? What?’
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