The Magic of Murder

by Susan Lynn Solomon

  I turned back to Marge. “The police will have Sean soon. When they get him, they’ll turn him over to the DEA. He’ll spend a lot of years in jail. But you don’t want that, do you?”

  Jennifer and Rebecca came back into the room. Rebecca took the chair next to Roger. Jen sat on the couch on the other side of her mother. The bruises on her face had lightened a bit. This wasn’t the time, though, to wonder how Rebecca’s potion accomplished that.

  “I was just saying,” I told Jennifer, “the police will have Sean soon. You’ll never have to worry about him hitting you again.”

  Her smile was small and sad. It’s strange how a woman who’s so badly mistreated, could still love the man who hurt her. The story I’d begun to write just before I learned of my heritage—the one about a maltreated woman who flees into a northern swamp? At last I understood what the story was truly about. But again, this wasn’t the time to consider how my fictional plot would play out. At the moment I had to write the end to a different, real life drama.

  “Sean’s a miserable human being,” I told Jennifer, “and you’re better off without him.”

  I looked into Marge’s eyes. “Yes, he’s a poor excuse for a man—a drug dealer, a wife beater. But like Kevin Reinhart, he hasn’t got the stomach for murder.”

  Her hand tightened on the amulet.

  I shifted on the couch to look at Roger. “You see, everything is connected.”

  “I know it is,” he said. “Sean Ryan—”

  I stopped him. “Yes, Sean was in the middle of it all. But he wasn’t the beginning or the end. This story actually started with Jimmy. I’m right, aren’t I, Marge?”

  She looked out the window.

  “Roger, I’m afraid your friend and partner wasn’t the good guy you wanted him to be. Maybe he was when you served in the army together, maybe he still was those first years on the Falls police force. But, at the end—” I touched his wrist. “I’m sorry.”

  Marge Osborn tried to rise from her couch. I held onto her arm. “You and Jimmy weren’t close anymore. He was having an affair. That’s what started it. He wanted to be with another woman, to run off with her and leave you behind.” To Roger, I said, “The Mexican vacation Jimmy told you he was planning? It wasn’t Marge he wanted to take with him. When he found out about Sean and the drugs, he realized he had an opportunity to grab some quick money, and use it to disappear with his new love.”

  “Mother?” Jennifer said.

  “No!” Marge shouted. “How dare you say such a thing.”

  Her angry reaction was exactly what I waited for. It told me I was right about the rest of what I suspected.

  “I said it because it’s true. After you’d given Jimmy your life, made your desires secondary to his happiness, he was about to leave you with nothing. Marge, Jimmy betrayed you.”

  “He didn’t! Not ever!”

  “Careful, Marge,” I said. “The amulet you’re holding—in it is a mixture of herbs that require total truthfulness. It’ll crumble under the weight of lies.”

  Elvira jumped from the mantel. With her rear legs on the floor, she stretched up onto Marge’s lap, and fixed pink eyes on her.

  “You were afraid to be seen driving the Corvette,” I continued, “and everyone would know who was in the rattle-trap Jimmy drove to work. So you borrowed Sean’s car the night you went to the Woodwards’ house. You figured if anyone saw it there, Sean would get blamed—just the way you want him blamed for killing Jimmy.” I glanced at Jennifer. “Your mother knew what Sean has been doing to you. You’d be safe if he was framed for the murders.”

  Marge’s hand clenched into a fist. The thin thread binding the amulet tore loose and the dried herbs poured out.

  “Mom, what have you done?” Jennifer cried.

  ***

  The next afternoon we were at my house. Roger relaxed on the sofa. I reclaimed my overstuffed wingback chair next to the bookcases. Contentedly snuggled on my lap, Elvira snored. The mini-blinds on the French doors were raised, and I looked out over my backyard to the trees lining the Niagara River. The foul weather broke when a gentle breeze from the south nudged the cloud cover northward. The sun brought the first buds to the azaleas around my patio. It felt as though spring, that coy mistress, had at last decided to unpack her bags and stay awhile.

  After rattling around in my kitchen, Rebecca carried three mugs of tea into the living room. Roger laughed when she handed one to him.

  “Should I be afraid of what you put in this?” he asked.

  I considered the woman who in just a few months had become my very dear friend. “Should he?”

  Her face took on the most innocent expression I have ever seen. “Why, my dears,” she said, “whatever do you mean?”

  We all laughed and sipped our tea.

  After a few minutes, Roger yawned and rested his head on the back of the sofa. Careful not to jostle the ancient book in which Sarah Goode had written both her mystical recipes and secret thoughts, he rested his size fourteen feet, crossed at the ankles, on the coffee table.

  “Marge made a full confession,” he said. “She claimed she lost control of her emotions when Jimmy showed up with the Corvette. She’d suspected something was up for months. Then, when he came home with the car—to get the cash to buy it, he had to be into something dirty. When she realized that, she knew his next steps would be out the door. It drove her nuts, she said.”

  “Good description,” Rebecca said.

  Again Roger yawned. “Yeah, I figure she’ll go with an insanity plea. But how crazy could she be if she planned it all out so Ryan would take the blame? And you were right, Emlyn—she didn’t want him caught. In fact, she phoned him right after I called to tell her I was looking for him. Put the wind up his skirt—that’s why the bastard took off for Canada.”

  A sad smile flitted across my lips. “Still, I understand how Marge felt. Giving your whole being over to a man is certainly not a sane thing to do.”

  Roger raised his head. “Do you really believe that?”

  I shrugged.

  Rebecca stared into her mug of tea. “Of course, the way you feel might change.”

  I glared at her then looked suspiciously at the liquid in my mug.

  “Yet,” Roger said, “when Reinhart started fooling around with other women, you didn’t grab a gun and go after him.”

  I sighed and carefully laid my mug on the side table. “I didn’t have to shoot Kevin. The way he was, sooner or later he was bound to shoot himself. Which, when you think about it, is exactly what he did.” I looked at Sarah’s book, wondering whether the hex I’d thrown at my ex actually caused his downfall—Roger would certainly insist he’d fallen without anyone having to shove him.

  “Where will witness protection send Kevin?” I asked. “The outback of Alaska, I hope.”

  Rebecca looked at the altar still set up on the end table near the French doors. “I know a way we can make sure he winds up there.”

  Roger shook his head with vehemence. “Thank you, no. We’ve had enough hoodoo around here for a while.” He also turned his eyes to the altar. “Still, I’d like to know how you figured out Marge was the killer—and please, don’t tell me you did it with magic.”

  “But, Roger, it was,” I said, and raised three fingers as a sign of the truth.

  He groaned.

  I laughed. “Okay, it was only partly the magic. The rest—” I picked up Sarah’s book. “My great, great, great, great—”

  “Yeah, yeah. I know who she was,” he said and took a sip of his tea. “You gonna tell me she whispered the answer to you while you slept?”

  I smiled back at him. “Well, in a way she did.”

  For a second, I thought about telling him I’d seen Sarah in the snow outside my window, and she warned me about betrayal. I thought better of it.

  “The answer was in this book,” I said. “Once I read what Sarah wrote about how her husband believed her betrayal could only be avenged by the death of both Sarah a
nd her lover, everything fell into place.”

  All at once, I knew what Agatha Christie’s Jane Marple felt when she explained how she knew who murdered whom and why. Except, of course, Miss Marple knitted while she dissected the clues. I never learned to knit. I glanced at my grandmother’s afghan and the designs she sewed into it. Someday I’ll figure out what Grandma wanted those runes to tell me, I thought.

  Roger pulled my mind back when he asked, “What fell into place?”

  “Excuse me?” I had been drifting a bit lately. I would have to watch that.

  “He asked what fell into place,” Rebecca said.

  “Oh, yes. And by the way, Roger, you were right.”

  “How so?”

  “A lot of the patches on this quilt pictured things I’d seen but didn’t think anything of at the time. For example, at the Woodwards’ backyard barbeques Jimmy always rushed to help Amy carry plates from the kitchen. And once or twice I saw him look at her the way that—”

  “The way Roger looks at you?” Rebecca said.

  I felt a blush rise so high, it must have been impossible to distinguish my face from my red hair. “Hey, we’re neighbors and friends. That’s all,” I insisted

  Elvira’s head came up. Her pink eyes stared at me.

  I shoved her head down. “Don’t you start with me, too,” I told her. I turned to Roger. “And you—say something!”

  “Uh-uh, I’m not getting into a debate with a woman who might turn me into something unnatural.”

  I snorted.

  “So, you saw Jimmy flirt with Amy Woodward?”

  Smart man. He also wanted to keep the conversation away from him and me.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Then, after the funeral, I saw there were no pictures of Jimmy at his house.” During my divination spell, I saw Marge put his off-duty pistol into a wall safe in their second bedroom. But I wasn’t about to mention that, either. “I think Marge noticed how I studied those pictures and worried I might suspect something.”

  “So that’s why she tried to kill you with those firebombs,” Rebecca said.

  I shook my head. “If she really wanted to kill me, she would have used the gun. She could have done it any time. She’s my childhood friend, so I would have let her get close enough. No, I think she just wanted to frighten me so I’d stop snooping. Marge isn’t a sociopath. She’s just a woman who’s been badly hurt.”

  “And the drugs?” Roger said.

  He obviously knew the answer, but wanted me to have this moment.

  “The drugs were what started everything. When Jen told her father what she suspected, he didn’t go out to investigate Sean. He decided it would be a source of quick and easy money—the money he needed to disappear to Mexico with Amy.”

  “How did you tumble to the fact that Amy would leave Woody for Jimmy?” Roger asked.

  “Something she said to me at the funeral made me think she no longer loved her husband. And then the way she cried like she, not Marge, was the new widow—”

  “What about the drug operation out of the barn in the alley?” Rebecca asked. It seemed that piece of our adventure fascinated my friend more than the Osborn/Woodward love story.

  “Yeah. Of everything, the drug connection was truly a coincidence. We stumbled on the barn by accident. But if you think about it, the tapestry of lies and deceit wouldn’t have unraveled if those guys hadn’t thought we were watching them.” Or if I hadn’t had a vision of Marge shooting Amy in that alley, I thought.

  Roger sat back and smiled.

  I picked up my mug. Watching him over the brim, I brought it to my lips. With each sip, the idea of Detective Frey becoming more than a friend didn’t seem like such a bad idea—

  I stopped in the middle of the thought and stared into the mug. I really needed to find out what Rebecca put in this tea.

  Afterward

  I’ve spoken of my abhorrence of things left dangling at the end of a story. Such unfinished business bothers me to the point at which I can’t sleep at night. Because I can’t write when I’m overtired, and since writing is a need, not a choice, these dangling ends have to be properly braided.

  Amy Woodward’s funeral took place the week after Marge Osborn was arrested. Again, most of the Niagara Falls Police Force was in attendance. Roger and I had dinner with Woody afterward. He took us to the Red Coach Inn, a rather fancy restaurant overlooking Goat Island and the falls. He was grateful, he said, that Roger hadn’t obeyed his order to stay out of the Osborn case.

  “If you’d listened to me for once, I would have been on trial instead of Marge,” he told us over desert.

  Roger didn’t mention the role I played in finding the real killer. I’m glad he didn’t. I suspect my life will be a good deal quieter if my part remains a secret only Rebecca, he and I share. Of course, Elvira also knows about it, but I’m sure she won’t tell anyone.

  While we walked to our cars after dinner, Woody told us, “I meant what I said.”

  “What’s that?” Roger asked.

  “When you found me with Amy’s body, I told you it’s my fault she’s dead. Well, it is.”

  “How can you say such a thing?” I said. “You were great to her, gave her anything she could have wanted.”

  He shook his head. “I only gave her things. What she wanted was my time, my attention.” He opened the door to his car and leaned on the roof. “First the marines, then the department—I didn’t leave much time for her.”

  “I know what you mean, Woody,” Roger said. “Judy left me for the same reason. But I’ll tell you something—” he glanced at me “—I won’t make that mistake a second time.”

  I decided not to ask what was on his mind.

  Woody sighed. “I don’t see how you can avoid it. But listen to me, you’ve gotta try. That’s what I’m gonna do.”

  “What are you going to do?” I asked.

  He graced me with a smile. “After all the trouble these past weeks—and mostly after losing my wife—I need some time away from the job. Gotta see something of life before it’s over and I’ve got nothing to show for it.”

  “You’re not hanging it up, Woody?” Roger sounded distraught over the possibility.

  “Nah, nothing as final as that. But I want to get away from here for awhile, get my bearings again. That’ll make Pete Reynolds Acting Chief for the next couple of months. Think you can work with him?”

  “I’d rather be working for you,” Roger said. “But, sure, no problem, I’ll work for Pete.

  “Good.” Woody held out his hand and shook Roger’s. “In that case, congratulations Acting Deputy Chief of Detectives.”

  I don’t know how to describe the stunned expression that spread across my friend’s face.

  ***

  As to the rest, as Roger predicted, Sean Ryan was stopped at the border, and turned over to the DEA. His trial is scheduled to begin in September. I spoke with Jennifer a few weeks ago. She told me she’ll be front and center in the court to support him. “Sean’s changed since he’s been in jail,” she said.

  What is it people say about love’s eyesight?

  I’m glad my vision is clearer.

  I don’t know where Witness Protection sent Kevin, and have no desire to find out. Roger believes I’ll hear from him sooner or later. I might ask Rebecca whether I will, perhaps have her do a tarot reading for me—

  No. On second thought, I’d rather be surprised by where my path might lead.

  About the author

  Formerly a Manhattan entertainment attorney and a contributing editor to the quarterly art magazine SunStorm Fine Arts, Susan Lynn Solomon now lives in Niagara Falls, New York, where she is in charge of legal and financial affairs for a management consulting firm.

  After moving to Niagara Falls she became a member of the Just Buffalo Literary Center’s Writers Critique Group, and turned her attention to writing fiction. Since 2009, a number of her short stories have appeared in literary journals, including, Abigail Bender (awarded an Honor
able Mention in a Writer’s Journal short romance competition), Witches Gumbo, Ginger Man, The Memory Tree, Elvira, Second Hand, Sabbath (nominated for 2013 Best of the Net by the editor of Prick of the Spindle), and Kaddish.

  Her latest short stories are, Yesterday’s Wings, about a woman searching for the courage of her past, which appears in the October 2015 edition of, Imitation Fruit; and Captive Soul, which is included in Solstice Publishing’s Halloween anthology, Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep.

  The Magic of Murder is Susan Lynn Solomon’s first published novel.

  Acknowledgements:

  It has often been said that writing is a lonely profession. I have found this not always to be the case. My writing has been enlivened by a wonderful and talented group of people. In this regard, I wish to acknowledge Solstice Publishing’s Mel Massey, my Editor-in Chief, who believed in this story, and the marvelous editor, Fred Crook, who found and graciously corrected so many mistakes. I also need to acknowledge those who helped shape my writing: the Edgar Award winning author, Gary Earl Ross, moderator of the Just Buffalo Literary Center’s Writer’s Critique Group, who challenged me to write a murder mystery, then helped edit the story (and pounded into my head that a rifle is not merely referred to as a gun). I must also acknowledge the talented writers who are members of this group, and its former moderator, Jerome Gentes, all of whom helped shape my sense of metaphor and make my stories cohesive. Finally, I acknowledge Victor Forbes, editor of SunStorm Fine Arts, who allowed me the freedom to write creatively.