Haunted House Murder

by Leslie Meier

  “The sons are minors?” Jamie asked.

  “Kieran looks like he’s in high school, Will in middle school,” I answered.

  “Local?”

  “I don’t think so. They seemed like tourists. I’ve never seen them before.”

  “Who else?

  “A mother and daughter. Marge and Elizabeth.”

  “Last names? Never mind. Is the daughter a minor?”

  “I’d put her in her early- to mid-thirties.”

  “So no. Local?”

  “Again, I’ve never seen them.”

  “They looked a little familiar to me,” Gus put in. “I think they might live somewhere in a neighboring town, close enough that I’ve seen them before.”

  “But you don’t know their last name?” Jamie asked him.

  “Didn’t know their first names until thirty seconds ago,” Gus answered.

  Jamie turned to me. “Who else?”

  “Two high school-aged couples. I don’t know first or last names, but I’m pretty sure they’re local.”

  “Dwayne Cox, Jimmy Bartlett, Kelly Brown, Molly Carroll. They all go to Busman’s Harbor High,” Sonny said to Jamie. “Dwayne and Jimmy play on the football team.” It didn’t surprise me Sonny would know this. Friday night high school football was every bit as big a deal in small-town Maine as in any other rural area. Sonny and Chris had played in high school and they both kept up with the team.

  Jamie nodded. “I know who they are.” He made a note. “Is that it?”

  “Clyde Merkin was on the tour,” I answered. “He—”

  “We’re familiar with Mr. Merkin.” Jamie’s tone was bland and professional, but I doubted he’d come across Clyde Merkin while he was involved in some criminal enterprise. More likely Clyde had stopped into the Busman’s Harbor police station to tell them how to run an investigation, or maybe even the department itself.

  “What about the victim?” Jamie asked. “Any of you know where he’s from?”

  “Harley hired him,” I answered. “He was a professional actor who works at the Barnhouse Theater during the season. Other than that, you’d have to ask Harley.”

  At that moment there was the sound of a door opening above. “Officer Dawes!” a male voice shouted. “You down there? There’s a guy up here says you want to talk to him.”

  “Does he have a name?” Jamie called back.

  “It’s Harley Prendergast.”

  * * *

  “Mr. Prendergast.” Jamie stood to greet Harley.

  “Officer.”

  The formality was driven by the circumstances. I was sure they’d called each other as “Harley” and “Jamie,” every time they’d previously met in their lives.

  Jamie pulled over another chair. “Join us.”

  Harley did, creeping past the body and looking green around the gills, though he didn’t come to within twenty feet of it.

  “Why did you leave the scene, Mr. Prendergast?” Jamie asked.

  “I, er, thought you might need information about the people who were on the tour, so I returned in my trolley to my home to retrieve it.” Harley waved a manila folder with some pieces of white printer paper poking out of it.

  In my opinion, Harley had fled out of terror, like every other tour participant, but I kept that to myself.

  Jamie, too, seemed doubtful. “You drove your trolley all the way out to Eastclaw Point?” The Prendergasts lived all the way down one of the two points that sheltered our harbor. From the air, they looked like lobster claws, thus Eastclaw and Westclaw Point. It was a ten-mile journey to the Prendergast house, and the trolley didn’t go above thirty miles an hour. Harley normally left the trolley parked at the Lobsterman’s Wharf Hotel and drove his Hyundai home from there.

  “I was so flummoxed, I forgot to stop and pick up my car,” Harley explained.

  “And what about on the way back? Did you stop and pick up your car then?”

  A flush crept up Harley’s neck. “I didn’t. The trolley is parked with the emergency vehicles in front of the restaurant.”

  Jamie frowned. “And what about the tour members? Did you take them in the trolley when you left here?”

  Harley shook his head. “By the time I got to the street door, they had all run away. I could see some of them in the lights on Main Street.”

  “I’ll leave it to the Major Crimes Unit detectives to question you about what you saw and heard in this room tonight,” Jamie said. “I’m more interested in what you can tell me about the other participants, and most importantly, about the victim.”

  Harley opened the manila folder and straightened the first page of printer paper. “There were eleven people on the tour, in addition to Julia and myself.” He cleared his throat. “Ms. Carla Santiler.”

  “Local or tourist?” Jamie asked.

  “Tourist,” Harley answered.

  “Traveling alone or with companions?”

  “Alone. She was one of two singletons on the tour.”

  “Do you have an address for where she might be staying locally, or a phone number?” Jamie pressed.

  “A cell phone number. Her credit card info included a billing zip code in Saint Petersburg, Florida.”

  “Is that info on there?” Jamie indicated the piece of paper. When Harley nodded, Jamie said, “I’ll need you to give that to me when we’re done.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” Harley replied. “That’s why I printed it.” He cleared his throat. “Next, Joyce Bayer, and her sons, Kieran and Will.”

  “Same questions,” Jamie said. “Tourist or local? Do you know where they’re staying and how to reach them?”

  “Tourist definitely,” Harley answered. “Credit card zip code is Montclair, New Jersey. I didn’t take a phone number, but I have an e-mail address. They walked to the trolley stop, so I’d guess they’re staying right in town.”

  “Thanks. Next?” Jamie said.

  “Marge Handey and her daughter Elizabeth. Marge paid, so I have her info, but not the daughter’s. They live locally, in Brunswick. I have a cell number.”

  Brunswick, a lovely college town, was a forty-minute ride down the coast. So Gus probably had seen Marge and Elizabeth around.

  “Dwayne Cox, Jimmy Bartlett, Kelly Brown, Molly Carroll,” Harley continued.

  Jamie nodded. “Yep. I know them.”

  “And besides Julia and me, one other local. Clyde Merkin.”

  “We’re familiar with Mr. Merkin,” Jamie repeated.

  There was the sound of heavy footsteps coming down the stairs into the front room. The crime scene techs or the medical examiner, maybe both. There was a murmur of voices from the front room and the flash from a camera.

  Jamie, who’d listened momentarily, returned his attention to Harley. “What can you tell me about the victim?”

  “His name is Spencer Jones. I’ve known him for years. He’s been one of the equity actors the Barnhouse Theater hires for the season. He’s taken several of my tours, including the haunted house tour. Naturally, I thought of him when the Halloween tour came up.”

  The Barnhouse Theater was typical of the kind of regional, seasonal little theaters found in resort areas. The theater was an actual former dairy barn that had been refitted. The company squeezed four productions into our short summer, rotating them every three weeks. Typically there was a serious play, a comedic play, a cabaret of some sort, and a big musical to cap off the season. Most of the parts were performed by talented locals and summer people who participated year after year, but three or four “New York actors” came in every summer to play the major roles and teach the kids at the children’s camp, another way the theater made money. I rarely got to see any of the productions, given the Snowden Family Clambake was open every night all summer long.

  “Do you know where Mr. Jones lived when he wasn’t here in Maine?” Jamie asked Harley.

  Harley shook his head. “I had a cell phone number for him. That’s how I called him. I honestly don’t know where he was when
I reached him.”

  “Do you know where he was staying when he was in town this week?” Jamie asked.

  “No.”

  “Do you know where he usually stayed when he came for the summer? Perhaps his landlord has more information about him.”

  “No, sorry. I’d meet him downtown. We’d chat. We exchanged cell phone numbers. That was it.”

  “Do you know how he got to Gus’s tonight? Should we look for a car somewhere nearby?”

  Harley looked at his lap and sighed. “I honestly don’t know.”

  Jamie pushed his chair back. “All right. This was helpful. I’ll see if I can find the other tour members locally and look for contact information for Mr. Spencer. I’m sure the state police will want to speak to each of you when they get here. If you could wait, we would appreciate it.”

  “Do you mind if we all go up to Chris’s and my apartment?” I asked. “It’s more comfortable up there.”

  Jamie glanced through the archway into the front room. “The medical examiner is here. Why don’t you give him some more time to work without you all walking through? I’ll come back soon and give you the all-clear.”

  Chapter Six

  Eventually, Jamie told us we could head up to our apartment. “Please, don’t talk to one another about the events of the evening. The state police will want your individual perspectives.”

  So we waited. And waited. Occasionally, I glanced out the little bathroom window, the only one that looked over the street. There were cop cars, an evidence van and, most incongruously, Harley’s trolley. An official car from the Major Crimes Unit arrived and then left. The medical examiner’s van left.

  Gus fell asleep, his head leaning on the back of the couch, mouth wide open. He opened the restaurant at five every morning, feeding the lobstermen and other early risers. It must have felt like the middle of the night to him. Sonny sat next to Gus, watching a college football game on our old TV, the sound turned off. Harley perched, knee jiggling, at the little table where Chris and I ate our infrequent meals at home. Chris went over and started a game of two-handed gin rummy with him to keep him occupied. I put on a pot of coffee.

  I searched on my laptop for information about Spencer Jones. He seemed to work a regular circuit. New York in the fall, mostly off-Broadway, but with the requisite three appearances on Law & Order, as a criminal, a dad, and a judge, aging through the roles. He worked in regional theaters in Florida in the winter and spring, and then came up to Maine in the summer. There had been a few other guest appearances on TV and some small roles in movies, a few commercials, but as far as I could tell, the movement from Maine to New York to Florida to Maine again had been his pattern for years. Why would anyone have wanted to kill him? It was confounding.

  Finally there was a knock on the door downstairs. “Sergeant Tom Flynn! Can I come up?”

  “Of course.” I went to the top of the stairs, happy Flynn had been assigned to the case. He’d started off a stranger in our little town. He’d almost arrested Chris and he hadn’t understood why his boss had put up with my “help” with a few past murders. But eventually we’d become friends; especially during the time he dated a friend of mine. That hadn’t worked out, but the warm feeling between us remained. I exhaled with relief. We were in good hands.

  Tom came up the stairs and stood in the middle of the apartment’s only room. He had close-cropped brown hair and a body toned by strict diet and hours in the gym. He was in his mid-thirties, a little older than me.

  Chris, Sonny, and Harley stood to greet him. Gus was still out cold.

  “You’re on your own?” I asked. “No Lieutenant Binder?”

  “There’s another apparent homicide in Waterville. You’re stuck with me.” The three Major Crimes Units in Maine, South, North, and Central, where Flynn worked, covered vast territory. He looked at each of us. Well, he looked at Chris, Harley, Sonny, and me, and then he looked at the top of Gus’s head on the back of the couch. “I apologize. I know you’ve been waiting a long time. We had multiple things we had to take care of. If you don’t mind, I’d like to interview each of you, formally and individually, at the station.”

  “Right now?” Harley glanced at his watch. It was after midnight.

  “Yes, please,” Flynn answered. “And Mr. Prendergast, if you could leave your trolley here, we’ll get you a ride home. We’d like to search it.”

  “Of course, of course,” Harley said.

  Chris put a hand on Gus’s shoulder and shook gently. Gus came to with a great deal of snorting. He and Harley accepted a ride to the station with Flynn because it was late and cold and dark. Sonny took his pickup. Chris and I said we’d walk the few blocks. Downstairs in the restaurant the scene was still busy. Before we went out the kitchen door I noticed the remains of the pumpkin bread and cookies on the long table where they’d been served and on plates, partially eaten, on the bistro tables. Someone, thank goodness, had turned off the heat under the cider. Gus would have a fit if that stuff was still there when he showed up in the morning, even if the restaurant couldn’t open.

  It felt good to be outside. Busman’s Harbor’s ugly, brick town-hall-firehouse-police-station was a few short blocks away, and as we walked over the harbor hill, the town was dark and silent. Chris set a brisk pace, but I dawdled a little, holding him back. I thought Flynn would have the sense to interview Gus first and have someone take him home, but I wanted to ensure it.

  As we neared the station, the activity level picked back up again. Though the town hall and the firehouse were dark, lights glowed from inside on the police side of the building and the parking lot was full. When we walked into the station, a uniformed state police officer took our names. “I’ll let the sergeant know you’re here.” As I’d hoped, it looked like Gus was already inside the multipurpose room the state police used when they were in town.

  Gus came out and Jamie volunteered to drive him home, though I knew his shift must be long over. Harley went in next. I fiddled with my phone, looking for early reports of the murder on statewide media, which I didn’t find.

  Sonny went after Harley who came out of the multipurpose room looking exhausted. Jamie was back from running Gus home and drove Harley to his car.

  That left Chris and me alone on the hard bench by the empty receptionist’s desk. I sagged into his muscled chest. It was so comforting and warm. His rhythmic breathing so relaxed me, I would have dozed if Flynn hadn’t come out of his office to get him. Sonny grunted, “G’night,” on his way out the glass front door.

  Finally it was my turn. I went through the door to the multipurpose room as Chris sat down on the hard bench outside to wait for me. As I expected, Flynn very professionally walked me through the whole story. The plan for the haunted house tour, the plan for what was to happen at Gus’s, and my participation as the host on the trolley. “So Mrs. Prendergast canceled at the last minute?”

  “Harley said she had the flu.” I hesitated. “You don’t suspect her, do you?”

  “It’s too early to suspect—or not suspect—anybody.” He asked about the dress rehearsal. Had I spoken to Spencer Jones?

  “Hardly at all.”

  “Hardly?”

  “I can’t remember anything either of us said that was meaningful. I remember being impressed with how he played the death scene. And impressed with his ideas about how to fix the performance after the disastrous rehearsal.”

  Then Flynn led me through the events that night at Gus’s, again asking detailed questions. I was starting to lag. The late hour had finally hit me.

  “Do you own a gun?” Flynn asked.

  “No.”

  “Does Chris own a gun?”

  “A hunting rifle.” The answer would be the same for many of the men in town.

  “Does Chris keep a rifle or any other gun at your apartment?”

  “I assume you asked him that.”

  “I did.”

  “The answer is no. The rifle is locked up in his cabin. Are you done at
the restaurant?”

  Flynn answered my question with a question. “Do you and Chris have somewhere else you can stay tonight? The more we get done, the sooner it gets done, the sooner we’re out of your hair. And Mr. Farnham’s.”

  I imagined Gus had given Flynn a piece of his mind about all the people and fuss at his restaurant. “We can stay at my mom’s. What took you so long to come to question us?”

  “I . . .” Flynn’s brown eyes slid sideways. He was deciding whether to tell me. “I had to do the death notification.”

  “So you found the next of kin? That was quick.”

  “Your friend Officer Dawes found contact information for Mr. Jones’s agent in a database on the Web. We called the agent, who had a home phone number in addition to the cell. When we called that number, a man answered and said Jones’s wife and their two boys were on a vacation in Busman’s Harbor, Maine, staying at the Snuggles Inn.”

  “Joyce Bayer, and Kieran and Will? Those boys saw their father shot!” The idea was horrifying.

  “They did. I was the one who confirmed he was dead. It wasn’t fun, I can tell you that.”

  “Her name is Bayer. I never put it together.” Poor Joyce. Poor boys. Poor Flynn. What a mess.

  “She never took her husband’s name, which is his real name, not a stage name, by the way. Evidently, Ms. Bayer and Mr. Jones have been separated for a long time. The guy who answered the home phone is a live-in boyfriend. She claims them coming here and the victim being here was a coincidence.”

  “But you don’t believe her.”

  “Seems like one heckuva coincidence.”

  * * *

  Chris and I walked back through the silent town to Mom’s house.

  “You were in there for a long time.” Chris kept his voice low.

  “I was on the whole tour, so we had more ground to cover than you did. Did Flynn ask you a lot about the dress rehearsal?”

  In the glow of the street lamp, I saw Chris nod. “Yep.”

  We reached Mom’s house and climbed the stairs onto the front porch. I opened the big, mahogany door, which was never locked, let us into the front hall, and flicked on the light. I locked the door behind us, just for tonight.