The Claudia Hershey Mysteries - Box Set: Three Claudia Hershey Mysteries

by Laura Belgrave

  There was no telling how much evidence Officer Bobby Ridley might have contaminated in his bungling efforts to get in—and out—of the death scene. And what evidence the technicians had carefully bagged and marked suggested little illuminating. Hairs other than those belonging to the victim were plentiful, but then, dozens of people visited Overton’s home for readings. It was likely that one of the hairs belonged to the killer, but just as likely that none did.

  The same held true for fingerprints. Most, of course, belonged to Overton. A few on the base of the telephone, the bedroom dresser and nightstand—and one clear thumb print on the coffee maker in the kitchen—screamed the presence of Tom Markos. That stood to reason. He’d been her lover. He could also have been her killer.

  The desk creaked when Claudia shifted her weight. Markos was no choir boy. The criminal record he’d compiled over the years was clear on that. But he’d kept to himself since drifting into Indian Run eight months earlier and questions about him elicited little more than a shrug. So why then had he vanished? Frowning, Claudia made a mental note to try the fish camp once more before the day was out.

  “. . . and the material we’re going over right now isn’t all that complicated, actually, don’t you agree?”

  Damn. Flynn was asking her something now. Grappling to pick up the thread of the conversation, Claudia nodded affirmatively. Yes, yes, whatever.

  The teacher’s eyes narrowed briefly, but then he smiled and slid off the desk. “Maybe I can illustrate the point better than I can verbalize it,” he said. He walked to the blackboard, picked up a piece of chalk, glanced over his shoulder at Claudia, and began to scribble. An algebraic equation appeared.

  While Flynn nattered on and scribed numbers, Claudia thought about the jack o’lantern. Damn it to hell, Ridley couldn’t have blown the crime scene any better if he’d tried. The dominant footprint in the pulp matched the rookie’s shoe. The print beneath was too indistinguishable for a read. At best, Claudia could hope for pumpkin traces on the killer’s shoe—if he hadn’t tossed it, scoured it—if indeed he was caught.

  And what of the black thread a crime scene tech bagged from the kitchen? It had been snared in a nick in the side of the counter. Did it mean anything? It would have to be matched against all of the clothing in the victim’s closet and hamper.

  Also inventoried were a heavy-duty staple lying on the counter, a tiny screw caught in a dust bunny between the counter and refrigerator, a beer bottle cap beside that, and on the floor by the victim’s feet a blood-soaked cigarette that hadn’t been lit. Overton smoked and Claudia remembered a newly opened pack on the counter. The brand matched that of a stubbed-out cigarette in a bedroom ashtray.

  Elsewhere in the one-bedroom house, the technicians had dutifully catalogued the minutiae of the Reverend Donna Overton’s life. The pattern showed a reasonably tidy housekeeper with a fondness for knickknacks—she seemed to favor miniature animal sculptures—cheap makeup, hard candy, coupon-clipping, and romance novels.

  In the bedroom, a worn comforter with a flower pattern covered the double bed. Two plumped pillows with matching shams decorated the head; a homemade afghan draped over the bottom. The bed hadn’t been slept in that night. The medium’s closet held simple clothing from J Byrons, K-mart, and an outlet store; her medicine chest showed over-the-counter drugs and a dated prescription for an expectorant. Towels, faded but neatly folded, hung smartly over a rack on a wall beside the toilet.

  In a small sun room adjacent to the living room was a folding table with two chairs, a shelf with more knickknacks, and a single bookcase with titles addressing everything from astrology to Zen Buddhism.

  The most expensive possession Overton owned was a 30-inch color console television with stereo sound—hardly a necessity in the small room. But it looked new, and stood like a trophy against one entire wall in the living room. A TV Guide on top of the console lay open to Friday, the day Overton was killed.

  Who are you, Donna Overton, and why would someone want to kill you?

  Claudia had seen a lot of senseless, brutal killing, mostly from gun shots—a clean way to kill, and easy. There were stabbings as well and yes, a few beating deaths. Death by knives and beatings shouted rage. Most were spontaneous. But this, this seemed both controlled, and yet, not.

  A sudden sound jolted Claudia back to the purgatory of algebra. Flynn was clapping chalk dust from his hands, moving back toward her. She stood when he approached, then involuntarily flinched at the blast of vile breath.

  “In Robin’s case,” Flynn was saying, “I’d be happy to tutor her after school—an hour here, an hour there—because I’m quite sure she can still pull her grade up and maybe even finish with a solid C. If you can just convince her to work a little harder.”

  Claudia backed out of range. She smiled tightly. “I’ll try.”

  “Good, good!” Flynn enthused. His hand sought his sideburn. “It can’t be easy, trying to juggle the demands of parenthood and a job such as yours.” He shook his head sympathetically. “This murder—it’s all over the radio and TV—is it anywhere near being resolved?”

  Everyone wanted to know. The murder ranked right up there with the citrus reports. Claudia gave the algebra teacher her stock answer: “The investigation is moving along.”

  Flynn nodded. “I understand it’s very difficult to make an arrest if a suspect isn’t identified within the first twenty-four hours.”

  “We’re working on it.” Claudia began to move off.

  “That poor woman, she seemed so nice.”

  Claudia stopped so abruptly that Flynn bumped against her. “Wait a minute,” she said, “you knew her?”

  “Well, no, not actually. I’d only met her the one time, during the Halloween party.”

  “Back up a minute, Mr. Flynn.” Claudia didn’t hear the sharp edge in her voice, but the mother was gone. The cop was back. “What Halloween party? What are you talking about?”

  Flynn regarded Claudia peculiarly. “Well, the party where she conducted the seance, of course. I can’t believe you don’t know.”

  “I don’t know, Mr. Flynn. I wasn’t aware of any seance or any party.” Claudia called the dead medium’s appointment book to mind. Nothing showed she’d gone anywhere the night she was killed. Nothing. “It would have been nice if someone had brought that to our attention.”

  “I’m sorry. I just assumed the police would’ve been told. It was quite an experience if you go for that sort of thing.” Flynn looked embarrassed. “The fact that I attended a seance . . . well, I hope you don’t take that as a reflection of my professionalism as a teacher. I can assure you that—”

  “I don’t care if you dance naked under a full moon, Mr. Flynn.” Claudia hitched the notebook from her pocket. “What I do care about is no one thinking that the police might be interested in information about the last few hours of Donna Overton’s life. The party—tell me about it.”

  “I . . . well.” Flynn cleared his throat. “Lucille Schuster—she’s an English teacher here—she had a Halloween party, mostly faculty people. Costumes, the whole bit.” Flynn flicked at his sideburns. His eyes looked just past Claudia’s. “There were perhaps a dozen of us there. She—Lucille, that is—surprised us with the seance.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, just that Reverend Overton was presented as a surprise. None of us had known she would be there. Oh, I guess Lucille’s husband did, but he’s a traveling salesman and was still out of town. Anyway, Lucille was tickled with the whole thing. I guess she’d arranged it secretly, thought it would be perfect for a Halloween party. I can’t imagine what she must’ve paid, but it—” Flynn stopped abruptly. “You don’t think the seance had anything to do with it, do you?”

  “What time did Donna Overton leave?”

  “I don’t know, exactly.” Flynn pursed his lips. “Maybe, maybe around eleven? Something like that. It—”

  “Where can I find Lucille Schuster, Mr. Flynn?

  Fly
nn gave Claudia directions to the English teacher’s house. He apologized again for not having said anything to the police, but said he’d assumed they knew. And then, as she clipped away down the hall, he wished her luck with her daughter.

  Chapter 4

  The locals liked to joke that the only reason Little Arrow Lake existed at all was because God had water left over when He was done putting Lake Okeechobee together. Not sure what to do with it, He tossed it over His shoulder like salt for luck and it landed in Indian Run, where it filled some two square miles in the shape of a foot.

  The lake never made it into any Florida tour guides, which was probably just as well since only those intimately familiar with the surrounding geography would ever find it. The lake was more obscured by snarled foliage than a tick on a poodle and its only access was by a twisted series of unmarked, washboard roads. By the time Claudia reached it early Monday evening, her mood was as dark as the soil on her car.

  The hour was drawing onto six, rushing the early November sky on a slide into dusk. But if Tom Markos was here, she wanted to be the one to talk to him. Lucille Schuster would have to wait. Robin would have to wait, too.

  The air was nippy and still, trapping the scent of fish and woods. Claudia got out of her car and inhaled. Six or seven cars and two pick-up trucks were wedged between laurel oaks, but no one was in sight. Fishermen liked to milk every bit of light out of the day and Claudia assumed they were just leaving the lake.

  She picked her way down a sloping dirt path that led to a wood-frame building on stilts. It perched on the edge of the lake as purposefully as a heron, but without the grace. On the far side to the right was a boat ramp. Just beyond that were a number of vessels for rent, skiffs and flat-bottomed bass boats for serious anglers, two canoes for nature lovers. A few fishermen were just tying up.

  Claudia watched for a moment, then took the loose steps that brought her to the doorway of the building. Despite the chill, the door was open. The smell of stale coffee and bait wafted out.

  A few fishermen stood at a counter, poking through a box of lures. Others huddled at a snack bar, trading stories. A plastic globe with two old donuts in it sent Claudia’s stomach on alert, but she ignored it and headed for the sales counter. Eyes followed her.

  An old man behind the counter greeted Claudia with the prerequisite curiosity and suspicion reserved for strangers. He wore a sleeveless fishing vest over a plaid shirt. Colorful lures were clipped to his chest like military ribbons.

  Seeking a bridge across the skepticism she read in his rheumy eyes, Claudia asked off-handedly how the fish were running. She said that from what she understood, late evening was one of the best times to drop a line.

  The old man eyed Claudia dubiously. “If you’re thinkin’ of going out, I can rent you everything you need and get you squared away on a boat. But you’d be wasting your time right now. You only got maybe a half hour of real light left, at best.” He squinted past Claudia. “You by yourself? We don’t have no guides.”

  Claudia smiled. “I’m not here to fish. I wouldn’t know a rod from a reel. I’m just trying to find Tom Markos. I stopped by Saturday and Sunday but I guess I missed him.”

  The old man nodded. “Yeah, Tom, he normally works weekends but he was out with a head cold or something. He’s here today, though, working down by the rentals.” The old man gave Claudia an appraising look. “He don’t get many personal visitors.”

  “Thanks,” said Claudia. “I’ll find him.” She pointed at a lure with a treble hook and a twist of brightly colored feathers. “Nice.”

  The old man shrugged, then leaned toward Claudia confidentially. “Nice lookin’ all right, but it don’t work worth a damn. This one’s just for show.” He winked.

  “Ah,” said Claudia. She looked at the thing again, then impulsively reached for her wallet. “How much is it?” she asked. What might be too shoddy for fishing would be perfect to adorn a Christmas package. Take the hooks off and it could be laced through a bow. Robin might like it.

  “I’ll give it to you for a buck-fifty,” said the old man. He shook his head. “Like I said, though, it ain’t worth a plug nickel.”

  “That’s all right,” said Claudia. “I like the colors.”

  “Women,” said the man. He grunted, his suspicion fading to amusement.

  After counting out a dollar and a half, Claudia watched the man bury the hooks onto a piece of Styrofoam.

  “Ain’t got no bags, Miss,” he explained, “but that oughta keep you from accidentally stickin’ yourself.”

  Claudia thanked the man and slid the lure in her jacket pocket. She angled toward a door on the opposite side of the building. Another set of wobbly stairs greeted her, and she took them cautiously. They stepped off to an elbow-shaped path that led to the boat ramp.

  Markos was an imposing figure, powered by broad shoulders and thick thighs that strained against stone-washed jeans. He was more beard and eyebrows than face, and more hair than head. He knelt inside a boat, fiddling with the engine.

  Claudia watched him work for a moment. “Mr. Markos?” she said, pulling her ID from a jacket pocket.

  When Markos glanced up, Claudia flipped the ID open, revealing the shield inside. “I’m Detective Lieutenant Hershey. I’d like to talk to you for a few minutes.”

  “I know who you are,” Markos said indifferently. He turned back to the engine. “I don’t have time to talk.”

  “This won’t take long.”

  “I get paid for doing what I’m doing right now, Miss. Nobody pays me to make conversation.”

  “I’m here on police business, Mr. Markos.” Claudia watched Markos’ big hands finesse the engine. “You can work while we talk.”

  With a savage pull, Markos started the outboard. He looked at Claudia through dark eyes and shouted above the roar of the engine. “Fine. Get on. I got just enough light to take the boat for a run, see that it’s working right again.”

  Claudia hesitated for a second, then stepped into the vessel, a sixteen-footer with two raised swivel chairs. Her leg shook as she stepped over the bait well and sought firm footing at the bow. With barely enough time to settle herself, the boat lurched forward. She grabbed the edges of her seat on either side. The boat shot across the lake, rendering conversation impossible.

  Gingerly, Claudia freed one hand long enough to pull her jacket closer around her. Wind whipped her face, pushing hair into her eyes and sending a fine mist across her glasses. She looked down as the vessel skimmed the surface. The boat sat lower in the water than she had imagined it would. Water boiled at the sides. She tried not to think about it.

  They moved at a steady clip for ten minutes, whistling past a few anglers on their way in. Claudia was freezing. She tucked her head toward her chest. The air swooped through her jacket collar.

  Suddenly, the boat turned tilted sharply right. Water sluiced over the edge. Claudia caught her breath and planted her feet more firmly. She could swim, but not well. And what she couldn’t do was arm-wrestle an alligator if it came to that. She’d seen one in the distance, gliding low in the water at the edge of the lake.

  But as suddenly as the boat had turned, it shuddered, then stopped. The engine coughed asthmatically. Silence fell over the lake.

  Claudia exhaled silently and wiped her glasses on a sleeve. They smudged instantly. Experimentally, she tried her chair and swiveled so she could face Markos directly. She could see that he’d been watching her.

  “Too much air in the fuel line,” Markos said. He tapped the outboard with a dirty fingernail. “It’s like a kid choking on a chicken bone.”

  They drifted gently in a recess edged by clumps of fringe rush, sword grass and cattails, some of them eight feet tall. Cypress knees jutted irregularly from the water. The cypress trees themselves, towering figures laced with Spanish moss thick as angel hair pasta, screened what little light remained. A crushed beer can announced previous visitors. Something jumped once, a fish, maybe.

  Without
taking his eyes from Claudia’s face, Markos fished a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit up. He didn’t offer the pack to Claudia. “Hope you’re not in a hurry, Miss.”

  “It’s lieutenant, Mr. Markos, and I thought you were.”

  Markos flicked ash into the water. His expression shifted slightly, showing a spark of belligerence. “Not much I can do about it now,” he said. “Need to give the engine a rest.”

  Claudia leaned forward. The boat rocked slightly. “Let’s not play games, Mr. Markos. I’m sure you know why I’m here.”

  Markos took a long drag on his cigarette. “Donna’s dead. I heard it this morning. You’re looking to finger me for it.”

  “I don’t know enough to finger anyone, Mr. Markos. I’m here to learn what I can and—”

  “And you want to know where I was when she was killed,” said Markos. His voice dwarfed the space between them. “You want to know did I do it, don’t you?” With an expert flick of his finger, Markos sent the cigarette spinning into the lake. “I didn’t.”

  Claudia measured the steel in Markos’ eyes. She wondered how far they were from other boaters. Voices carried from a distance, but she couldn’t isolate the source. Still, they were here now. There might not be another opportunity.

  “All right,” she said at length. “Let’s just back into this, Mr. Markos. Where’ve you been spending your time from Friday to today?”

  “Home.”

  “Who can vouch for that?”

  “No one can say I was, and no one can say I wasn’t.”

  “I can say you weren’t there Saturday or Sunday, and you weren’t here either.”

  “I don’t answer my door to strangers.” Markos busied himself by biting on a fingernail. “And if you were asking around for me here, then you already know I was out sick. And anyway, so what? What’s the point? Donna was already dead by then, wasn’t she? That’s what the TV says.”

  “The point, Mr. Markos, is that you’re lying to me.”