The Glass House

by Nancy Lynn Jarvis

  Pat remembered Kandi’s story about her husband, George Crusher, having a locker above her in high school. George was her husband. Samuel and Cindi—spelling names with an i rather than a y seemed to be a family thing with the Crushers, as was including their mother’s maiden name—Mann—in children’s names. Henry David Crusher’s name was followed by the triangle with an exclamation point that indicated he was deceased. He was probably Kandi’s father. And Maryanne Penelope Mann Crusher Frieberg would be her remarried mother who produced a son with her second husband. That would make Peter Mann Frieberg, whose information was also preceded by a triangle with an exclamation point, Kandi’s half-brother.

  His was the name Pat recalled seeing somewhere. She grabbed Garryn Monteith’s file and looked at his legal section. Peter Mann Frieberg was listed as both a litigant and a business associate.

  Six years ago Peter Frieberg had sued Garryn Monteith for $156,000, but the case had been dismissed. She wanted to find out what the suit was about and why it had failed.

  Probably because she liked her, Pat found it hard to make Kandi a murder suspect. A six-year-old alleged debt between Garryn Monteith and Kandi’s half-brother couldn’t be a motive for murder, could it? Hardly. And yet, in her work for local attorneys, she’d seen cases when people were killed because of less money than that. Her logical mind told her not to believe in someone’s innocence just because she liked them.

  There was something else Pat hadn’t pursued with Kandi: she remembered Kandi had said something about Lillian Wentner being someone else Garryn Monteith used when it was convenient. She wanted to know more about that, too.

  Looking at Lillian’s contacts list, she saw that Kandi lived on the coast about fifteen miles south of San Francisco in the community of Pacifica, a mere hour’s drive up Highway 1 from Santa Cruz.

  She and Kandi had established some rapport during the class. She could contact Kandi, share the latest gossip about Joe’s arrest, ask her to expand what she said about Garryn and Lillian, and do all of that without raising suspicion that she was investigating Kandi because of the connection between Peter Frieberg and Garryn Monteith. All she needed was a good reason to be passing through Pacifica so she’d have an innocent excuse for a visit.

  Pat looked at Dot who was in her usual position by the Wimsey chair and smiled slyly. She entered “Dalmatian breeders Bay Area” in her computer and hoped for a suitable outcome. She was rewarded with exactly what she wanted—something better than she hoped, actually—when she saw there was a Dalmatian breeder in Pacifica.

  “Dot, how would you like to go visit a breeder? Maybe meet a nice guy dog with the idea in mind that you want to become a mommy?”

  Dot perked up at the sound of her name and began wagging her tail vigorously. She followed Pat’s words so closely that it was hard to think she didn’t understand them.

  “We won’t tell Kandi that you’ve been spayed. We’ll keep that just between us girls.”

  Pat pulled up the website for Gallard’s Hot 2 Spot Dalmatians and familiarized herself with it enough that her interest in the breeder could sound genuine if Kandi questioned her about it.

  Kandi’s phone number was on the contact sheet Lillian had given her. The phone rang five times after she dialed before it went to answering mode. She hurriedly came up with something to say that would entice Kandi to return her call, but as it turned out, she didn’t need to use it. All she got out was, “Hi Kandi. This is Pat Pirard from the glass class,” when a live female voice said, “Pat,” enthusiastically.

  “Kandi?”

  “Yes. I was here, but screening. This week’s robocalls are all about knee braces, and I’m sick to death of them. I hope if they keep getting an answering machine, they’ll give up and leave me alone.” She laughed lightly after her explanation. “What’s up?”

  “Have you heard about Joe Wentner?

  “No. Should I know something about him?” Pat detected a hint of excitement in Kandi’s voice. Good gossip was definitely a currency Kandi accepted.

  “He’s been arrested and charged with murdering Garryn Monteith.”

  Pat heard a sharp inhalation of air, clear even over the phone. “That’s ridiculous. We all saw Garryn die; he had a heart attack.”

  “That’s what everyone thought until they did an autopsy on him. It turns out he was murdered.”

  “Well, I did think it was unlikely that he had a heart attack, considering that he didn’t have a heart, but murder? And Joe? He’s such a nice man. Do you think he could have killed Garryn?”

  “I’ll tell you all about it if you’ll meet me for lunch. I’ve been putting off spaying my Dalmatian, Dot. I read somewhere it’s a good thing to let females have a litter of pups before they are spayed, and I think she’s getting ready to come into season soon, so I want to find her a suitable stud. There’s a breeder in Pacifica who has a dog that sounds perfect. Dot and I are going to take a ride up the coast and see what she thinks of him. We could meet somewhere and have lunch.”

  “Pacifica isn’t particularly dog friendly and I love dogs. Why don’t you and Dot come to my house for lunch? Her temperament is good, isn’t it? She wouldn’t menace my Chihuahua, would she?”

  “Dot lives with a cat. Need I say more?”

  Kandi snorted her amusement. “How about the day after tomorrow?”

  ※※※※※※※※※※※

  Kandi’s house was back far enough from the coast and high enough in the hills that swept away from the ocean that it sat above Pacifica’s shrouding fog. On a clear day it would have offered an ocean view, but today sun was all it could boast.

  Pat parked and confirmed the blue house with crisp white trim was the one she sought. She snapped Dot’s collar onto her leash and got out of the car. Dot followed her in a bound over the driver’s seat and out the door.

  As they started to the house’s entry door, it opened and Kandi met them at the front lawn. She dropped to her knees and hugged Dot. “Aren’t you a beauty? Aren’t you a good dog?” she crooned.

  Dot fell in love with Kandi instantly. Her tail, too expressive for a simple side to side wag, worked like a propeller. Pat put great store in her dog’s opinion of people. Kandi got the Dot Seal of Approval; Pat felt sure that she couldn’t be a murderer.

  “Come in, come in, both of you,” Kandi invited as she got up. She didn’t hug Pat.

  A quivering Chihuahua with a heavily gray muzzle greeted them as soon as they stepped inside. “Dot, meet Cheetah. Cheetah, this is Dot, and her person, Pat. No barking or growling. They’re friends.”

  Kandi slid open a back door to the garden and Cheetah led Dot outside amid doggie get-to-know-you sniffing. “They can play while we have lunch and talk.”

  They climbed the short flight of stairs from the entry to the entertaining portion of the split-level house where Kandi had sandwiches, fruit salad, and cookies laid out for lunch.

  “I’m no master de la cuisine like Joe,” Kandi blended Spanish and French as she described her cooking abilities, “but I do make a good avocado and cheese sandwich. And speaking of Joe, what’s going on? You said he was arrested.”

  “He was. He’s out on bail and I’ve been hired by his attorney to try and absolve him of murder.” Pat produced one of her newly minted PIP Inc. cards and handed it to Kandi.”

  “Get out! You’re a private investigator?”

  “New private investigator. This is my first case.”

  “I’ve always thought it would be fun to be a private investigator,” Kandi grinned. “Let me know how it goes, will you? But what about Joe? Why do they think he killed Garryn Monteith? Did Lillian and Garryn’s same-time-next-year arrangement finally get to him?”

  Pat got Kandi’s reference, but she looked puzzled and tilted her head to encourage more of an explanation. “What kind of arrangement is that?”

  “Remember the Alan Alda movie, Same Time Next Year, where this couple were both happily married to other people, but got together onc
e a year for a couple of days in Mendocino for a little…” Kandi pointed her index fingers upward and swirled them as she raised her eyebrows “…um-mum. Well, Lillian and Garryn…”

  “Nooo.” Pat drew out the word for a gossipy and dramatic effect. “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely. My brother was in business with Garryn for years. Garryn would come back from Santa Cruz and, well, let’s just say he wasn’t into the gentlemanly don’t-kiss-and-tell rule.”

  “And you think Joe knew about it?” Pat continued in her best scandalized tone.

  “Duh; he must have. Joe doesn’t seem like an oblivious dummy to me. Imagine putting up with that year after year. I sure couldn’t have put up with it if George was getting some on the side on a regular basis. You didn’t say how Garryn was killed. How did he die?”

  “Cyanide poisoning,” Pat said matter-of-factly.

  “So the police think Joe had finally had enough and slipped cyanide into Garryn’s food?”

  “That’s what they thought, but now it looks like he inhaled cyanide when he opened the kiln door.”

  “There’s not enough cyanide in the Super Glue we used to hold our pieces in place before firing to hurt anyone.”

  Pat was startled that Kandi knew about cyanide in Super Glue, but hoped her surprise hadn’t been obvious. “No there’s not, but if several tubes of Super Glue were in the kiln, there would be enough cyanide in them to prove lethal, at least for the person who opened the kiln.”

  Kandi sucked in her cheeks in momentary contemplation. “Cool. Couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy. He hurt a lot of people in his career climb, or should I say his claw to the top.” She took a decisive bite of her sandwich.

  “You said your brother worked for Garryn…”

  “He didn’t ‘work for Garryn.’ They were business partners. They started their glass company in California back in the day and were doing okay—no spectacular success, though—until Garryn ‘forgot’ to pay state taxes and the IRS. Peter had given Garryn his share of the money owed, too. The IRS came after them, and my brother wound up paying back taxes and fines to get them out of trouble.”

  “If Garryn was the one who messed up, why didn’t your brother make him pay the taxes and fines?”

  “Garryn? The great artist? He convinced my brother that he couldn’t understand complicated things like filing a proper tax return. He said if Peter would take care of the IRS, he’d pay him back and pay the California taxes, which were a lot less.

  “My brother, trusting idiot, agreed. I don’t think the California taxes got paid completely, because the next thing my brother knew, Garryn said they should move their company to Florida. In a hurry. My brother went along again. At least Garryn must have paid something, because the state never came after Peter. Or maybe it was the move that saved them.” Kandi shrugged her shoulders.

  “Why do I think Garryn never repaid your brother?” Pat asked.

  “Because you are a skilled private investigator,” Kandi laughed. “No, he never did. He borrowed more money from Peter, and my brother often was working for free to help them stay in business. Then Garryn got a commission from some rich guy in Dubai and became the darling of the high-roller crowd. That’s when he severed all ties with my brother and moved ‘his’ company to New York.”

  “So Garryn never repaid your brother what he owed him?”

  “Oh, he gave him ten grand, but he was into Peter for a lot more than that. My brother sued him, but he didn’t win. Then my baby brother, nice guy, no balls, sucked it up and let it go. He passed away a couple of years ago, so Garryn got away with stealing from him. I should have let it go, too, but it ate at me. That’s why I took the class. I was really looking forward to making Garryn look foolish, but I didn’t even get to do that.”

  “What a terrible thing to do to a partner and friend.” Pat didn’t have to muster any fake outrage for her statement.

  “He treated my brother bad, but he did worse things to other people. He stole his stem-attachment method from another guy he knew.”

  “The stem system is a big deal, isn’t it?”

  “It is. It’s Garryn’s bread-and-butter teaser to fill classes, but I gather from my brother that it’s what enables—enabled,” Kandi smiled as she corrected herself, “Garryn to build the giant glass flowers that became his trademark and led to his success.

  “My brother said some other guy who partnered with Garryn before he did was the real inventor of Garryn’s super system. Evidently he was excited about what he developed and showed it to Garryn. Garryn convinced the poor guy that he should patent his system, offered to help him fill out the paperwork to do it, and said he’d turn everything in to the patent office. He did, all right, but not until after he substituted his name as inventor. Nice, huh? If I was the poor schmuck who got cheated out of my patent, I would have killed him.”

  Dot busied herself with licking her fur to remove the green grass stains that covered her after her romp in Kandi’s backyard. From her appearance, it looked like Cheetah was the alpha dog in their play time and Dot had spent a lot of time submissively on her back on the lawn.

  It was good that Dot was occupied as they drove back to Santa Cruz. Pat was so deep in thought about what Kandi told her during lunch that she was barely concentrating on driving, and she had no focus left over for her dog.

  Kandi was open about what happened to her brother and never mentioned him inciting revenge. Those facts argued against Kandi being Garryn Monteith’s killer. But Kandi knew about cyanide in Super Glue. There was no aha moment for her; she knew. If her motive was weak, her opportunity wasn’t. Kandi could easily have come prepared with what she needed to kill and a plan about how to do it ready for execution. Since Pat wanted Kandi to be innocent, that was worrisome.

  Even more troubling was what Kandi said about Lillian and Garryn’s regular get-togethers. If Joe knew about their biannual assignations, a jury might be persuaded his years of tolerance meant he had given his blessing to the arrangement and had no motive for murder. But suppose, like Kandi speculated, he’d finally had enough, finally snapped. Worse still, suppose he hadn’t known about their ongoing flings. If he just found out about them…she didn’t want to think about what that meant.

  Pat arrived home with a clean white dog to see a postal truck turning right at the end of her block, its driver having finished his deliveries on her street. She pulled her car into her garage and returned to the curb to open her mailbox. A packet with a Maryland return address was stuffed inside. Pat opened it as she walked to her front door with a leashless Dot following her.

  She tossed her other mail on the coffee table, flopped on her sofa, and pulled the contents out of the packet. There were notes from the family about Leonardo Grinardi—nothing enlightening, just the usual about how much he was loved and respected used to create a newspaper obituary—and the death certificate.

  Cause of death was listed as Acute overdose of self- administered Pentobarbital. That made it clear Leonardo Grinardi had taken his own life. In the next section, where underlying conditions were listed, was the phrase amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. He had ALS, Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

  While such information didn’t mean Angela Grinardi was no longer a suspect, it removed the strong motive to kill that she would have had if her husband ended his life because he was, for example, depressed at not being recognized for his singular invention or some other reason related to Garryn Monteith.

  So Angela moved down her suspects list and Kandi and Joe moved up a notch.

  Pat decided another consultation with Mark Bellows was warranted. She went to her closet and searched for an outfit that was even more seductive than her green dress. When she had selected a soft blue cashmere sweater with a boat neck that let it fall off a shoulder if she wanted it to, she called him.

  “My suspects list is firming up, but I don’t like where it’s heading, and I don’t think you will, either.”

  Pat sat in Mark Bellows�
��s plush law office to deliver her update. She was dressed in a bright yellow skirt and similarly colored stilettos, a sensible if slightly flirty peplum jacket, and a leopard-print scarf that matched her briefcase and was loosely tied around her neck.

  The meeting was already a disappointment—there was no cashmere sweater, no dinner and drinks—and it was destined to get worse as she delivered bad news.

  “Tell me straight. It’s only a matter of time before the District Attorney discovers the basic facts, too. I need your interpretation of them if I’m going to help my client.”

  Pat didn’t have to open her briefcase and retrieve notes; she already knew what she was going to say.

  “Angela Grinardi’s late husband was the inventor of Garryn Monteith’s glass attachment system. Monteith tricked him and stole the patent. Leonardo Grinardi committed suicide about a year ago, leaving his family asking for contributions to his daughter’s college expenses, so I would say not terribly well off.”

  “I thought you said I wasn’t going to like your results? With what you’ve just told me, I could build a narrative for reasonable doubt.”

  “He had ALS.”

  “Oh.”

  Pat nodded sympathetically.

  “Garryn Monteith may have been a scoundrel and a thief, but what he did to Leonardo Grinardi and his family happened years ago. I think Angela wanted to cause a stir and embarrass Garryn in front of his class, but you’d have a hard time convincing a jury she was seeking revenge and might be a murderer.”

  “Okay,” Mark sighed. “We won’t pursue that route anymore. What about our local Suzanne Cummings?”

  “She’s obsessive, malicious, and in my opinion, nuts.”

  Mark Bellows leaned back in his leather executive chair with a quizzical look on his face. “She sounds perfect. Tell me more.”