I checked in at the reception desk and took a seat. I’d barely had time to gather my thoughts before Detective Young appeared. His greeting was quite cordial. As I followed him to his office, I hoped that would set the tone for our conversation to come.
The previous time I’d come to discuss a case with the detective, I’d already knit together all the loose ends. This time, although I was sure the core of my narrative was sound, some of my reasoning was a little frayed around the edges. And there were loose threads dangling everywhere.
Maybe he could help with that, I thought hopefully.
Detective Young had left a straight-backed chair positioned in front of his desk. I took a seat without waiting to be asked. He closed the door and walked around behind his desk.
“I assume you’re here about Harriet Bloom,” he said.
“Yes. She didn’t kill Ralph Penders.”
“You still sound very sure of that.”
“With good reason,” I replied firmly.
I took off my jacket and hung it over the back of my chair. Like I was getting comfortable. Like I planned to be there awhile. I wasn’t surprised that Young noted the move. I suspected he didn’t miss much.
He folded his hands together on his blotter and gave me his full attention. “Tell me why.”
“I know Harriet. She’s not the kind of person who would kill someone. And she’s not an idiot. If Harriet had poisoned Ralph, she certainly wouldn’t have left evidence sitting around that pointed in her direction.”
Detective Young nodded.
I took that as an invitation to continue. “Even more important, she had no motive. Harriet had absolutely nothing to gain from Ralph’s death.”
“I gather the man was a nuisance around the neighborhood.”
“Okay. But that gives everyone on her block the same motive. Plus, Harriet has a full-time job, so she’s usually not home during the day. I could argue that since she’s seldom there, she was less bothered by Ralph’s behavior than most of her neighbors were.”
The detective pursed his lips. He was thinking. I hoped that was a good sign.
“Also,” I said. “Harriet didn’t have the means to do it.”
“She has admitted to baking the marshmallow puffs herself. And to delivering them to Ralph Penders.”
“The puffs didn’t kill him,” I shot back. “The cyanide did. Harriet’s a school administrator, where would she get cyanide?”
“You’d be amazed what can be found on the Internet these days,” Detective Young said mildly.
I started to argue. He shook his head. I shut up.
“As it happens,” he said. “I agree with almost everything you’ve said.”
I stared at him. “Then why is Harriet still under investigation?”
“Principally because her attorney, Reginald Gordon, has blocked our access to Ms. Bloom. He’s also restricted the availability of other household members. So we haven’t been as successful at gathering information as we would have liked.”
“What other household members?” I asked.
“Her sister, Bernadette Bloom, who assisted in the baking of the marshmallow puffs.” He looked down and consulted his notes. “And a man named Hugh Grainger, who was at the Blooms’ house when the delivery was made.”
“Hugh is Bernadette’s boyfriend,” I said.
“So I was told. None of the three have been willing to speak with us, per Mr. Gordon’s advice. So they remain persons of interest, and the investigation is ongoing.”
“You must have other suspects,” I pressed.
“That’s not information I’m willing to divulge. But I know you, Ms. Travis. You wouldn’t have come here simply to defend Ms. Bloom, especially not on such flimsy grounds as those you’ve offered. I suspect you have an alternate suspect you’d like me to consider.”
“I do,” I told him. “Madison Penders.”
“Ralph Penders’s daughter.”
“Yes. As I’m sure you know, he was suffering from dementia.”
Detective Young nodded.
“There wasn’t enough money for him to be taken care of properly. Not in a nursing home, or with home care visits. As a result, Ralph was living on his own. Madison was supposed to be stopping in daily to see to his needs, but her visits had become less and less frequent. She was resentful of the demands he was making on her time.”
“He was her father,” Young said simply.
“Yes, but he was no longer the father she’d known and loved. That man had disappeared into a fog of lost memories. Instead, Madison was left tending to a belligerent old man, whom she felt she barely knew. And she hated it.”
“She told you that?”
“Perhaps not in those exact words, but yes. And there’s something else,” I added.
“Go on.”
“When I was talking to Bernadette a few days ago, she mentioned that she and Harriet had grown up in the house they live in. And that was good because they never could afford to buy it now. You know what property values are like in Greenwich.”
“Of course.”
“Ralph Penders had owned his home for more than twenty years. It’s probably worth double what he paid for it. Even if the house was mortgaged, his heir would still collect a significant sum of money when it was sold.” I looked at him across the desk. “I assume the family home was left to Madison?”
“It was,” Young confirmed.
“Is she his only heir?”
“Aside from a few minor bequests to charity, yes.” The detective paused to consider. “You believe that Madison Penders would be more capable of committing murder than Harriet Bloom would?”
“I think she had better reasons to,” I told him. “And I don’t think Madison would have thought of his death as murder. Actually, she called it a mercy.”
“You make a compelling case for us to look into her further,” Detective Young said.
“I do?” I sat up straighter in my chair. That had to be a good thing.
“There’s just one problem.”
Oh. I slumped back down. Why was there always a problem?
“On Friday evening, a week ago today, Ms. Bloom baked the batch of marshmallow puffs that Ralph Penders received. They were delivered to his home Saturday morning. He died that afternoon.”
“Yes,” I said. “So? Have you asked Madison where she was last weekend?”
“We have,” he confirmed. “Ms. Penders was at a bachelorette party for a close friend. The party took place in Las Vegas, and five other women are willing to testify that she was there with them all weekend.”
“Dammit,” I said under my breath.
“My feelings precisely.”
“Maybe someone helped her,” I said. I wasn’t willing to give up just yet. “Who else had access to Ralph’s house?”
“The entire neighborhood, not to mention anyone else who happened to be passing by,” Young replied with a frown. “I gather Mr. Penders wasn’t vigilant about locking his doors.”
Another dammit felt called for. Instead, I said, “So what do we do now?”
The detective stopped just short of rolling his eyes. “Now I continue my investigation, and you go home and prepare to enjoy your Halloween.”
Faith was delighted to see me when I got back to the car. She dropped the rawhide bone and launched herself into my arms. Good thing the open door was behind me, because she nearly knocked me over.
“That didn’t help at all,” I told her.
Faith didn’t care. She was just happy I’d returned.
Thank God for dogs, I thought.
Chapter Fifteen
Detective Young had shot down my best theory pretty spectacularly. As he’d said, there was nothing for me to do now but go home and get ready for Halloween. The Howard Academy party was just a few hours away. And I still had a costume to make.
Sam knew I’d been crazy busy all week. I hadn’t even questioned why he’d volunteered to pick up Kev at school earlier. If I was real
ly lucky, maybe he had a plan.
If not, I was hoping that a black turtleneck, a pair of jeans, and an iPhone would do the trick.
Faith and I walked into the house and didn’t get mobbed by Standard Poodles. That was different. The rooms around us were quiet and still.
Faith and I looked at each other. Then her ears pricked. Her nose pointed toward the kitchen and off she went. All I had to do was follow.
The kitchen was empty too. Then I realized I was wrong about where the Standard Poodle was heading. Faith stopped beside the back door, dancing eagerly on her toes. She couldn’t figure out what was taking me so long to get it.
Of course. Everybody was outside.
As soon as I opened the door, I could hear the shrieks of laughter too. Tar and Augie were racing around the perimeter of the big, fenced-in yard. Eve and Raven were running in pursuit.
Kevin and Bud were out in the grass, wrestling over something that both were holding on to. When Bud suddenly let go, Kev flew backward and landed on his butt. That was Bud’s cue to pounce on top of him. More shrieking ensued.
Sam was standing on the deck, watching the mayhem unfold. Even from the back, he looked good.
I walked up behind him and slipped my arms around his waist. Sam covered my hands with his own and pulled me closer. Maybe Faith’s and my arrival hadn’t been as stealthy as I’d thought.
“What’s going on?” I stood on my toes to peer over Sam’s shoulder.
“Kev’s giving his Halloween costume a trial run.”
Abruptly Kevin rolled away from Bud and jumped up. He came running toward us. “Ahoy, mateys!” he cried.
He had on a striped, long-sleeved T-shirt and black pants. The red sash around his waist looked like something from the bottom of my scarf drawer. A homemade eye patch covered one of Kev’s eyes. And he was gleefully brandishing a rubber sword.
So that was what he and Bud had been tussling over. No wonder Kev had wanted it back. What five-year-old boy wouldn’t want to have a pirate’s cutlass to slash through the air? The costume was perfect.
“I love you,” I whispered in Sam’s ear.
“I know,” he replied.
I punched him in the shoulder.
“What?” Sam was all innocence. “Would it have been better if I’d said, ‘You should’?”
“Not much,” I agreed. “Good work with the costume.”
“Time was passing,” he mentioned. “Someone had to do something.”
A sassy retort rose to mind, but I tamped it back down. Frankly, I was just happy he’d noticed.
When Davey’s bus dropped him off an hour later, Kev was still wearing his costume. Davey made an appropriately large fuss over it. Then the two of them went out to play pirates in the tree house.
“Don’t let Kev make Bud walk the plank,” I warned Davey.
“Give me some credit. I’m almost an adult.”
He couldn’t even drive yet. That wasn’t almost an adult to me.
Still, it was old enough that Davey hadn’t been pressed into accompanying us to the HA Halloween party. Instead he’d be spending his Friday evening with friends, no costumes involved. The following night, he and I would stay home to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters, while Sam squired Kevin around the neighborhood.
* * *
“I can’t believe I let you rope me into wearing matching costumes,” Sam grumbled later that evening as we were getting ready to go.
“I think you look great,” I said with a grin. “The black mustache looks a little funny with your blond hair, but other than that . . .”
Sam and I were going to the party dressed as Gomez and Morticia Addams. I was wearing a slinky black dress with a push-up bra and a long black wig. Sam had on a striped suit and a bow tie. He was carrying a prop cigar.
The costumes had been easy to put together, plus they’d keep us warm on the brisk October night. I knew Cheryl was dressing up as Wonder Woman. I figured she’d probably regret that later.
Halloween was a hugely popular holiday at Howard Academy. Children, parents, and teachers were all invited to the party, and costumes put everyone in a festive mood. There were booths where kids could bob for apples, bowl with pumpkins, and turn their parents into mummies with a toilet paper wrap. The highlight of the event was an exuberant costume parade. Everyone was invited to take part, and winners were declared in numerous categories.
We arrived at Howard Academy a little early, but when we turned in the long driveway, there were already cars ahead of us heading up the hill to the school. The mansion was ablaze with lights, illuminating an approach that was now lined with fake gravestones and leering skeletons. Long strands of cotton batting hung from the tree branches like cobwebs, fluttering eerily in the evening breeze. Kev stared out the car window with his mouth open.
The decorations were wonderful, and the old mansion looked suitably spooky. Harriet and Cheryl must have been busy all afternoon.
I directed Sam around the back of the new building. Mr. Hanover would be greeting guests at the mansion’s front door, but if we parked in the rear, we could go directly to the auditorium where the party was being held.
“I feel like an idiot,” Sam muttered as we got out of the SUV.
“It’s Halloween,” I told him. “You’re supposed to look silly.”
He gazed around the parking lot. In the semidarkness, it was hard to tell what other people were wearing. I’d attended the holiday party many times before. But this was Kevin’s first year as a student at Howard Academy, so it was Sam’s first appearance.
“Are you sure that parents are supposed to get dressed up too?”
“Positive. Last year, one father came as Julius Caesar and his wife was Cleopatra. They came rolling in on a motorized sedan chair.”
“You’re kidding.” He stared at me.
“I wish. Another man came as bacon. His wife was a fried egg.”
Sam laughed in spite of himself. “That’s terrible.”
“I know, it was. But see? You’ll be fine. Compared to that, you look almost normal.”
Kevin had stepped away from the car. He was slashing at a nearby bush with his rubber cutlass. His eye patch was on crooked. It probably wouldn’t last the night, but I reached down and fixed it anyway.
Sam leaned over to peer in the SUV’s side mirror. “I look like Groucho Marx.”
“Not when you’re standing next to me,” I pointed out. “Then people will get it.”
“You make a beautiful Morticia.” Sam grinned. “I like the wig.” His gaze dropped to my chest. “And whatever you put on underneath that dress.”
“Hold that thought,” I told him as I grabbed Kev’s hand. “First we have a party to attend.”
The school auditorium had been transformed. It no longer looked like a bright, spacious meeting place. Instead, dim lighting now made the large room feel surprisingly close. Bats and spiders hung from the ceiling. A decrepit-looking haunted house sagged against some folded bleachers. Skeletons danced on the empty stage. An invisible projector sent ghostly images flying over the walls. Carved pumpkins, lit with flickering candles, decorated most surfaces. As we walked past an innocent-looking screen, a witch popped out from behind it and greeted us with a mad cackle.
Kev’s small hand trembled within mine. He cradled his sword close to his side. I stopped walking and squatted down to look him in the eye.
“You doing okay, buddy?”
He nodded.
“You know this is all just make-believe, right?”
Another nod.
“It’s supposed to be spooky, but not really scary,” I told him. “Nothing here can hurt you. Dad and I would never let anything bad happen.”
Kevin lifted his other hand in a show of bravado. “And I have my cutlass!”
“If you see any real ghosts, you have my permission to knock them down,” Sam said, joining the conversation.
“Aye, aye, Captain!” Kev cried. Just that quickly, he was feeling better.
His gaze lit on a booth where kids from his class were tossing beanbags into a barrel painted to look like a giant pumpkin. His hand dropped mine, then grabbed Sam’s. He gestured with his sword. “Can we go play too?”
“Sure, that’s why we’re here,” Sam replied, then turned to me. “Why don’t you go mingle and do teacher stuff. We’ll catch up with you later.”
“Sounds good. There are plenty of refreshments if you guys get hungry or thirsty.”
“Don’t worry about us,” Sam said. Kev was already tugging him away. “We’ll find our way around.”
I set out to find Cheryl and Harriet. Even though the party was in progress, I knew there would still be things that needed to be done. Maybe I could help.
I saw the two women conferring with each other near the food tables. That was handy. On my way past, I paused to peruse the offerings. There was plenty of real food, but it was the desserts that drew my attention.
There were cookies shaped and iced to look like pumpkins and black cats. The cupcakes were topped with decorative spiderwebs. And the punch came in two colors: deep purple and orange. Despite those options, the table still looked as though it was missing something. And it was. A tray of Harriet’s delicious marshmallow puffs.
Cheryl lifted a hand and waved me over. I grabbed a cookie and went to join them. Harriet was resplendent in an elaborate witch’s costume that would have passed muster in a production of Wicked. Wearing high boots and a long cape, Cheryl made a terrific Wonder Woman. A gold diadem on her forehead was the crowning touch.
Cheryl looked me up and down. “Morticia Addams, right?”
“Yes, and my husband, Sam, is Gomez. So whatever you do, don’t ask him if he’s supposed to be Groucho Marx.”
We laughed together.
“Did Bernadette come with you?” I asked Harriet.
“No, I told her family members were welcome, but Bernie opted for a quiet night at home.” She gazed around the crowded room. “And considering the crush this is turning into, I don’t blame her one bit.”
“This place looks amazing,” I said. “Kids are lined up at all the game booths, and everything on the buffet table is totally tempting. I have no idea how you’re making those skeletons dance, but I absolutely love it. It’s a good thing I bowed out when I did, because the two of you have done a terrific job.”
Howloween Murder Page 11
