“We’re just waiting for the director,” Samantha said, addressing everyone. “I spoke to Peter early this morning. He said that he was going to check with the police about the theater and then would be right over.”
“He’s late,” Hugh said.
“Can we make a decision without him?” asked Cosmo. “I, for one feel – that we must go on with the show!”
“I think Stephen would have wanted that,” Melinda agreed. “He was so happy to finally have a work of his performed.”
“We really should wait for Peter,” Samantha said. “With a decision as big as this, we should have the director involved.”
“And if he’s talking to the police, he might be able to tell you whether you even have a decision to make,” Eddie said. “The theater is a crime scene now, isn’t it?”
“We don’t need that stage to perform,” Cosmo protested. “We could do the show anywhere. Even on this table.”
“After all the hours spent building that set?” Samantha challenged.
“We probably should wait to hear from the police,” Lydia said. “They’ll need the area roped off until they are certain that there is nothing else that they could learn from the crime scene.”
“It’s refreshing to hear you directing others toward the police,” Leo said, walking closer to the group with Detective Grey by his side. “Though, I’m not sure I understand why you are here.”
“Moral support,” Kelsey said, though she was still doing her share of supporting because Brooke had not ceased her sobbing hug.
“Officer, do you have any news for us?” Cosmo asked. “Have you caught the ruffian who did this to our man of the pen? May we return to our stage?”
“We’re still investigating what happened to Stephen Mills,” Leo reported. “But that’s why we’re here. We heard that everyone from the show was gathering here. We’d like to ask you all some questions.”
“Did the director tell you that everyone was here?” asked Lydia.
“No,” said Leo. “One of our officers came here to pick up breakfast and saw that the actors were beginning to accumulate.”
“We’d like to speak to each of you in turn,” Detective Grey said, addressing the room. “It’s important that you tell us everything that you can about the victim.”
“And we can tell you everything that we can about the murderer,” said Cosmo. “As a twenty year veteran of this stage, I know all about the phantom.”
“We’d also appreciate any plausible suspects,” Detective Grey said, unamused.
Leo grabbed Lydia by the arm and pulled her to the side.
“I know that you want to help your friend, but I need you to promise me that you’re not going to get involved in this case,” he said. “We might have a very disturbed individual on our hands who really thinks he is a phantom. I don’t want you to get hurt. I’m serious this time.”
“Leo…”
“No, buts. Promise me that you won’t try and solve this murder,” he said, glaring at her.
She returned the stare for a while, but finally backed down. She remembered how many close calls she had in the past and wasn’t anxious to repeat the experience.
“Fine. I won’t try and solve this murder,” Lydia said. “But I am going to keep an eye on Kelsey and Jeff.”
“Compromise reached.”
“Do you need me to stay?” Lydia asked.
“No,” he said quickly. “I’d rather you weren’t here. And I suppose we already have a statement from Kelsey so she can leave as well.”
Lydia nodded. She returned to Kelsey and gently pulled the sorrowful Brooke off of her. Then, she wished Jeff luck, and she and Kelsey walked outside.
“We didn’t decide anything about the show,” Kelsey said sadly. “But I have a feeling that it’s not going to move forward until this case is solved.”
Lydia gritted her teeth. It was going to be very difficult to keep her promise to Leo.
7
Searching for the Director
“What should we do now?” Kelsey asked.
She and Lydia were still outside the breakfast place. They hadn’t moved far because Lydia wasn’t sure what they should do next. What would be the most comforting thing for Kelsey? Should they return to the taffy shop? Should she try and find some kittens for her to cuddle?
Lydia was saved having to come up with an immediate answer because they were joined by Samantha, the stage manager.
“Did the police finish with you that quickly?” asked Lydia.
“No, but they let me come outside to place a call,” Samantha said. “I haven’t heard anything from Peter lately, and I want to know where he is. Those detectives want to talk to him too. And I don’t blame them. I can barely believe that Stephen is dead – but if you add the phantom element too, it seems impossible.”
“I always thought that they were just silly stories,” Kelsey said.
“As did I,” Samantha agreed. “I never really thought that if I broke a prop that a shark-man would come out and attack – or whatever version of the story you believe. I should call Peter now, though.”
Samantha took out her cell phone and dialed, but it was clear that she didn’t get an answer. She frowned.
“He’s not picking up?” asked Kelsey.
“No. And that’s not like him,” Samantha said as some worry crept into her voice. “He always answers my calls.”
“You said that you spoke to him this morning?” asked Lydia. “What exactly did he say?”
“He said that he wanted for me to arrange a meeting with the cast and crew to discuss Stephen and the show. He said that he was about to leave to go to the police station to try and determine what was going on. I placed all my calls. I told Kelsey that she didn’t need to come if she didn’t feel up to it, but asked her to tell Jeff about the meeting. I updated Peter about this via text but didn’t get a response. I got dressed and left to come here. I just had that slight delay when the tile on my step moved, and I fell. I landed on my shrubbery and some seashells. No. I haven’t heard from Peter since that call.”
Samantha started to wring her hands together, but it hurt her injured hand, and she stopped. She looked very anxious.
“Maybe we can find Peter while you talk to the police,” Kelsey suggested.
“Yes. We’d be happy to,” Lydia said with a nod.
Samantha smiled gratefully. “Thank you. That would make me feel better.”
Kelsey and Lydia walked away with renewed purpose. Lydia liked this plan because she was now worried about the director too, and she felt like she should be doing something to remedy this whole situation. Also, she technically wasn’t breaking her promise to Leo. She wasn’t investigating the murder. She was investigating a missing director.
* * *
Lydia and Kelsey headed to Peter Welles’s house. Kelsey had been involved in the show he directed last summer, and he had thrown a cast party there afterward. They walked up to his front door, but the house looked empty. There were no lights on, and there was no car in the slanted driveway.
“If he’s not here, I’m not sure where we should look next,” Kelsey admitted.
“Maybe one of his neighbors knows where he went,” Lydia suggested. “Maybe he was going to make a stop before he went to see the police.”
Kelsey didn’t look convinced, and Lydia wasn’t so sure herself. She was starting to worry that something had happened to the man, but she didn’t want to admit that to Kelsey until she needed to, so she put on a smile and walked toward the neighbor across the street.
A man with a large hat was examining a large dent in the tree in his yard. Lydia frowned as she noticed marks in the grass on his lawn too. They might have been tire treads.
“Are you looking for Peter?” the man asked as they approached.
“That’s right,” Lydia said. “He didn’t show up to a meeting this morning.”
The man nodded. “I guess they did keep him at the hospital.”
“The hospital?” Kelsey asked with a gasp.
“I guess there was something wrong with his car because he was always a safe driver from what I could see,” the man explained. “But he crashed into my tree this morning. He’s lucky that he wasn’t going very fast or he might have been seriously hurt. But he did think that he hit his head. I called for an ambulance. You can’t take a chance with a head injury. And it looks like they did take him to the hospital.”
“Could we visit him?” Kelsey asked.
Lydia nodded. “We can go in a minute. But I have to ask what happened to the car.”
“I had it towed to a local garage,” said the neighbor. “I didn’t want it on my lawn, and I figured Peter would want it to get fixed. I don’t think the damage was too bad. But you know what was funny about the car? I think there were seashells falling off it. I’ve been finding them in my lawn. But that’s minor. Like I said, it was a good thing that Peter wasn’t moving too quickly. He might have been killed.”
“Killed?” Kelsey repeated. “Just like Stephen was?”
Lydia mind was also racing. Perhaps this was how the note’s question of who was next was being answered. Perhaps Peter had also been an intended victim of the killer. Another question was: was the killer finished? Since Peter had survived this car accident, would the killer come after him again and make sure that the murder was accomplished? Would the killer go after other people in the show as well? What was the killer hoping to accomplish? Or, was Lydia getting ahead of herself? Had this merely been a car accident at an inopportune time?
She would need to gather more evidence in order to answer these questions. She and Kelsey thanked the neighbor for the information and hurried to the hospital. They were quiet as drove along, both lost in their own thoughts. Lydia tried not to dwell on the possibility that Kelsey was in danger and that by getting involved in the matter, she was driving into danger as well.
8
The Hospital Visit
Lydia and Kelsey walked toward the room that they were directed toward at the hospital. Lydia wasn’t a huge fan of the place, after having spent much time there when her uncle had become ill and heard results from tests that were the opposite of what they wanted to hear.
She had also spent a short time at the hospital after she had nearly been drowned by a killer soon after she opened her taffy shop. She knew that she should be grateful that the doctors tested her and told her that she should be fine, but she still associated the building with her near-death experience. Now they were going to visit a patient with his own near-death experience too.
They poked their heads into the proper room. The man inside had some bandages on his head and was looking grumpy, but he smiled when he saw them.
“Kelsey! You came to visit me, my dear.”
She rushed to his side, and Lydia followed behind.
“We just heard,” Kelsey explained. “The detectives are talking to everyone else in the cast, so I went looking for you to see why you didn’t come to the meeting. This is my boss and friend, Lydia.”
“I’ve heard a good deal about you,” Peter said. “All positive. And thank you for placing that ad for your taffy shop in the program. If the show doesn’t move forward, I’m sure we can refund you.”
“Don’t worry about that right now,” Lydia said. “I know that there is an awful lot going on at the moment.”
“It’s great to see you and hear your voice,” Kelsey said. “When your neighbor said that you hit your head, I was worried.”
“I’m fine,” the man said, sounding annoyed. “I agreed to their tests simply to confirm it, but they seem intent on keeping me overnight for observation. It’s a terrible inconvenience. There is so much to decide and to figure out. And they told me I couldn’t look at electronic screens for a few hours, so I’ve been without my phone to let everyone know what’s going on.”
“Samantha was trying to reach you,” Kelsey said. “She was getting worried.”
“When you leave, please let everyone know that I am perfectly fine,” Peter said. “If I had known that they would make such a fuss, I wouldn’t have come here. I thought they would run one test and then let me leave. I know my head is all right. I’m more worried about Stephen’s death, the show, and my car.”
“I’m sorry to pry,” Lydia said gently. “But could you tell us a little about your accident?”
“It was the strangest thing,” Peter said. “My brakes just stopped working. I tried to hit them and to no avail. I was going to head to the police station to inquire about the theater, but I never got off my street. I rolled right down the steep incline of my driveway and headed towards my neighbor’s house. If I hadn’t turned the wheel, I would have gone right through his front door. I opted to hit the tree instead. Unfortunately, the momentum did jostle my head, and I hit it.”
“The brakes didn’t work at all?” asked Lydia. “Had you been having any trouble with them prior to today?”
“I wouldn’t have driven if I had been having issues with my brakes,” he said. “What are you getting at? Do you suspect foul play?”
“Possibly,” said Lydia. “I think you should talk to the police and that they should check your brake lines. This might be related to what happened to Stephen Mills.”
“Maybe there is something wrong with my head,” Peter said slowly. “Because that hadn’t occurred to me. And now it seems so obvious. If both of us were targeted, the show would be the link.”
“And it’s possible that Samantha was too,” said Lydia.
“What?” Peter exclaimed, nearly jumping out of bed. “Do you know what a good stage manager is worth? Who dares hurt her?”
“She’s all right,” Lydia said soothingly, coaxing him back under his blanket. “But there was something wrong with the tile on her step, which caused her to fall. That could have been due to sabotage.”
“Poor Samantha. She’s worked on several shows with me, and she’s always so dedicated. And poor Stephen,” Peter said miserably. “Stephen finally had a show going up with us. He’s sent me so many scripts in the past, and most of them were awful. They were all over the place, and the characters’ motivations never really made sense. But he kept working on it, and I told him to try and write from his own experience. I’m not sure if he really did that, but he finally brought me a play with fascinating characters. The Family Hildenbraugh is a great piece. I wanted to show it to the world.”
“Can’t we still?” Kelsey asked.
“I don’t know,” Peter said. “The playwright was killed. The theater is a crime scene. Someone went after my stage manager and me. An audience might be afraid to venture towards us.”
“But what about the phrase: the show must go on?” asked Kelsey.
“I would usually agree with it,” said Peter. “But how can we go on with a phantom against us?”
“I don’t think a supernatural creature is behind these crimes,” Lydia said. “I think a person is responsible.”
“Now my head is beginning to hurt a little,” said Peter. “Because I cannot decide what is worse – to have a ghost against our show or the possibility of having a killer in our midst. Could it be someone involved in the show? I care about them all so much. I simply can’t believe that one of them is a murderer.”
“Perhaps that person is a great actor?” Lydia suggested.
Peter and Kelsey both stared at her and frowned. She knew what was going through their heads. They wanted the cast to be full of talented actors who would be capable of such deception, but who would never act upon it.
“Do you know if Stephen had any enemies?” asked Lydia. “Or is there anyone who might want to hurt you?”
“No. We’re just part of a community theater. It matters a lot to us, but it’s not something worth killing over.”
“Unless we did something to upset the phantom,” Kelsey said quietly.
Peter sighed. “I guess we should tell everyone that the show is canceled. There’s no way we can continue, is th
ere?”
“Sure there is,” said Kelsey. “It might not be the same as what we planned, but if we are determined, we can figure out a way to present the show. And I think we should. Isn’t that what Stephen would have wanted?”
“You’re right,” Peter said. “Stephen would have wanted it. This play was his baby, and he wanted to see it come to life. We’ll find a way. I’m stuck in bed all day. I’ll use the time to figure out an alternate venue. And when I can use my phone, I’ll make some calls to get us some security. We’ll make sure this happens for Stephen!”
Strawberry Kiwi and Slayings Page 4
