Color Me Murder

by Krista Davis

  I hoped she wasn’t lying about not breaking the law. “Tell me the truth,” I said. “Were you involved in the murder of Delbert Woodley?”

  “Ugh. I loathed that snake. I suppose you know he stole some of my books and passed them off as his own, otherwise you wouldn’t be asking. He was a miserable louse, who will probably show up in one of my books one day under another name, but I didn’t kill him. I wouldn’t dream of doing time in prison for ridding the world of that vermin. He wasn’t worth losing my life and freedom over.”

  I believed her.

  “Please, Florrie. I have to figure out how to emerge from this mess unscathed. Promise me that you won’t breathe a word to anyone.”

  I nodded. “I promise.”

  Her fingers relaxed, but her eyes were trained on mine like she was trying to tell if I was being honest.

  “Are you okay here by yourself?” I asked. “I don’t know which electrician the professor uses. I’ll have to run over to the mansion to see if I can find a phone number.”

  “Used to be Alan Pettigrew. You’ll find his number in the Rolodex on Maxwell’s desk in the library.”

  Out of an abundance of caution, I fetched Peaches’s carrier, lifted her off Jacquie’s lap, and put her inside, apologizing for having to lock her up. “It’s for your own safety.”

  Frodo still wore his leash. I picked the end up off the floor. “I’ll be right back,” I said to Jacquie.

  She reached out and grasped my hand. “Florrie, I know this is all bizarre, but I’m not here. Do you understand? Please don’t tell anyone. Not even the guard. I’m trusting you, sweetheart. If they find me, they’ll kill me, and it will look like an accident.”

  It struck me that she wasn’t being melodramatic. She meant what she had said.

  Locking the door behind me, I hurried across the pavement to the mansion. The guard and a nurse I had never met before were eating pizza in the kitchen.

  I greeted them briefly and made a beeline to the library. Amazingly, exactly as Jacquie predicted, I found Alan Pettigrew’s number in Maxwell’s Rolodex under electrician.

  It was closing on eleven o’clock at night. I wondered if Alan took calls this late. Using the phone on the desk, I called him.

  A man answered in a booming voice. “Maxwell! I thought you were in the slammer!”

  He obviously had caller ID. “I’m afraid the professor is still in jail. This is Florrie Fox, his assistant.”

  “That’s too bad. I wish they would let him go.”

  “I hope you don’t mind me calling so late. It seems we have a dangerous situation.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  “I’m told the refrigerator is somehow electrified. It shocked a guest.”

  “Sounds like a short. I’ll be there in half an hour.”

  “Thank you! That’s wonderful.”

  Stopping by the kitchen on my way out, I informed the guard that we were expecting an Alan Pettigrew.

  He nodded calmly and continued eating, which didn’t do much to build my confidence in the fellow. But I thought I’d better get back to Jacquie. She was in no shape to be alone.

  I unlocked the door and stepped inside. I took care to throw the bolt on the door, but when I turned around, there was no sign of Jacquie.

  Chapter 23

  Treading lightly, I approached the sofa. What if she had died? My heart pounded as I neared. But Jacquie wasn’t on the sofa or the floor.

  I let Frodo off his leash. Turning slowly in a complete circle, I scanned the room. There was no sign of her. None! The only key that she had been there was poor Peaches, crouched in her carrier.

  I couldn’t help wondering if the refrigerator really had a short. It was vaguely tempting to touch it to find out, but something had certainly knocked Jacquie for a loop. And Alan was on the way. I would know soon enough without taking the risk of touching it.

  I opened a French door and ventured into the garden. It was dark as pitch in the corners. If Jacquie were out there, I couldn’t tell. But she wasn’t in any of the logical places, like at the dining table, or in a chaise lounge. I checked the gate, but the bolt held the door securely closed. She couldn’t have left that way because the bolt could only be closed from the inside.

  I returned to the carriage house, closed the door behind me, and made sure it was locked. I stood quietly and listened. I heard nothing but the ticking of my clocks.

  With my cell phone securely in hand, I grabbed the heavy fireplace poker and tiptoed up the stairs slowly. Frodo didn’t appreciate my caution and sprang ahead. The lights were off, so I flicked them on as I went.

  When I reached the top, I felt an utter fool. There was no one in the bedroom, under the bed, in the closet, in the bathroom, or behind the shower curtain.

  I perched on the side of the bed. It couldn’t have been a dream. I was still dressed in the clothes I had worn to work. It was like a locked door mystery. Except it wasn’t. Jacquie could easily have left by the front door of the carriage house. But I had unlocked it when I returned, hadn’t I? Maybe I had thought it was locked, but it wasn’t?

  If she left by the front door, then she might not have made it very far in her weakened condition.

  I scrambled down the stairs, still looking around in case she had collapsed somewhere. I grabbed my flashlight and was out the door with Frodo on his leash again. This time, I took great care to be sure the door was locked.

  Flashlight on, I hurried out to the street. The streetlights were bright enough to see if a person were lying on the sidewalk. Still, I walked along, shining the beam in the bushes and gardens close to the sidewalk. After a couple of blocks, I crossed the street and repeated my search on the other side, going past the mansion in the other direction for another two blocks.

  I was officially certifiable. I had lost my mind. Jacquie was missing, but there wasn’t a reason in the world that she would have turned up in my kitchen. How could she have gotten in? Why would she have even tried?

  The short. The short would be my test. If there were a short in the refrigerator, then I would know she had been there. That was logical. I wouldn’t have known about it any other way. If the refrigerator had nothing wrong with it, then well, I was hallucinating or dreaming or something.

  Feeling a hair apprehensive because either way something was very wrong, I strolled back to the carriage house just as a truck pulled into the driveway.

  A tall, slender man stepped out. “Are you Florrie?”

  I held out my hand and shook his. “Thank you so much for coming at this late hour.”

  “Not a problem. Technically I’m retired, but I have a few old clients who call me now and then. Gets me out of the house. Where’s this refrigerator?”

  I unlocked the door and showed him in.

  “I always liked this place with the beams and all those French doors. Don’t find gems like this in town too much anymore.” He walked over to the tiny broom closet and opened an electrical box. “It didn’t flip the circuit breaker like it should have if there was a short.” He reached inside, and I heard a click, which I presumed was the breaker.

  “You’ve been to the carriage house before?”

  He smiled at me. “Honey, I wired this whole building back when it was built. There’s not a thing I don’t know about it.”

  As he pulled out the refrigerator to look at it, I realized that I wouldn’t have known his name if Jacquie hadn’t told me. I would have found it in the Rolodex, but I had known it before I went to the mansion. That was proof of her presence.

  “So you knew Jacquie,” I said.

  “Lovely woman. My favorite of all Maxwell’s wives.” He looked over at me and winked. “I think she was Maxwell’s favorite, too. It’s a real shame that they parted. Didn’t like the third wife one bit. For all his money and advantages in life, Maxwell was always very down to earth. Never has put on airs or acted superior like some wealthy people do. I sure hope somebody figures out who murdered his nephew. One thin
g’s for sure—it wasn’t Maxwell.”

  He grew quiet for a moment. “How’s your friend?”

  “I think she’ll be okay.” It wasn’t a lie. I hoped she would be fine.

  “She’s very lucky. This could have killed her.”

  “How can something like that happen?”

  “Looks like somebody crossed the wires. Either someone didn’t have a clue what he was doing or”—his eyes met mine—“someone did it on purpose.”

  “I open that refrigerator all the time!”

  He nodded. “It’s perfectly safe now. You don’t have to worry.”

  I hesitated to ask, but I had to know the truth. “Just to be clear, the crossed wires were probably like that for a long time? But the shock only kicked in now?”

  Alan looked me straight in the eyes. “When is the last time you opened the refrigerator?”

  “Early this morning.”

  “Have any workmen come in today?”

  “No. This is beginning to sound like some kind of intentional hit.”

  His eyes flicked toward the fridge. “I’d guess that someone rigged the wires between the time you opened the door this morning and the time your friend touched the door tonight.”

  Chapter 24

  I shivered at the thought. Someone had gained access to the carriage house during my absence. Actually, two people had—Jacquie and this unknown person who crossed the wires. But no one could have known she would be sneaking in for food. She had known about the security guard, so she must have been watching and waiting for him to leave.

  The person who intentionally caused a short in the refrigerator must have planned ahead. Whoever it was couldn’t have known Jacquie would be the one who opened the door.

  My pulse raced. That dangerous door was meant for me.

  “Should you check the other appliances and the ones in the mansion?”

  “Might be a good idea.”

  He handed me a laminated card. “This was behind the refrigerator. Probably a previous tenant.”

  I recognized the face on the card immediately—Emily Branscom, the local author and historian. It was a gym membership card, dated this year. I thanked him and tried to hide my surprise.

  Had Emily lived here? Perhaps she had been a guest and had dropped it. What had Zsazsa said about her? She was having an affair. An affair so discreet that no one knew the identity of her lover. I had a feeling I knew who he was now. Maxwell.

  I fetched my purse and located the phone number Jonquille had given me.

  Despite the late hour, he sounded wide awake when he answered the phone. He had wanted concrete evidence, and I had it. “Something suspicious has happened here. Could you come over? There’s someone I’d like you to talk to.”

  “Are you at the store?”

  “No. I’m at home, in the carriage house.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  While I waited for him, I debated what to say. I had already told Alan that a friend was here. I couldn’t backtrack on that. Jonquille might push me on it. Should I tell him it was Jacquie Liebhaber? She had said she was counting on me and that it was a matter of life or death.

  I had a desire to keep her secret. Even though I didn’t know her, I had read her books and felt a kinship to her. Like she was a friend. It was entirely irrational. Authors were just like everyone else, and it was possible that she was peculiar. Could she be carrying out some kind of personal drama? She hadn’t given me that impression. No one could fake that kind of fear. Could they?

  Or maybe I felt I owed her an allegiance because she had been married to Maxwell. That made no sense, either. Delbert had been his nephew, and I had no allegiance to him whatsoever.

  True to his word, Jonquille arrived in fifteen minutes. I introduced him to Alan, who explained what he had found.

  Jonquille gazed around. “Where’s your friend?”

  “She left.”

  He turned his attention to Alan. “There’s no possibility that the wires were crossed months ago and it only now became dangerous?”

  “This wasn’t some frayed wire that was rubbing on something and getting progressively worse. This was cross-wired,” said Alan. “It had to have been done recently.”

  “Now do you believe that the burglary of the mansion was connected to Delbert’s death?” I asked Jonquille.

  Jonquille took a deep breath. “Who would want to kill you?”

  I stared at him with annoyance. “No one!” But my heart still raced, and a wave of queasiness washed over me.

  “Where was the guard? I’d like to speak with him or her. Will you be okay here with Alan?” he asked.

  “Maybe I should go with you.”

  We walked over to the mansion. I didn’t need to use my key because the back door was unlocked.

  Jonquille wiped an impatient hand over his brow and shook his head. He marched into the kitchen and very politely spoke with the nurse and the guard, asking what time they went on duty. Both of them had been there since seven p.m.

  I knew for a fact that the guard had been lounging comfortably in the kitchen since I came over to call Alan. Had I been braver, I would have pointed that out. But it turned out that I didn’t need to.

  Jonquille asked, “Which one of you ordered the pizza?”

  Each of them pointed at the other.

  “Oldest trick in the book,” said Jonquille. He lifted the box top and read the name on it. Pizza Man.

  The guard seemed nervous. “Listen, I need this job. So I messed up. I thought—”

  Jonquille interrupted him. “No you didn’t. You didn’t think at all. You’re lucky no one was killed.”

  While Jonquille called his buddy at the security company for a replacement, I slinked back to Mr. DuBois’s room to look in on him.

  I cracked the door to a dark room.

  DuBois screamed. “Help me. Someone help me!”

  I flicked on the light. He was sitting up in bed holding the covers in his hands pulled up to his chin.

  “It’s just Florrie, Mr. DuBois.” I strode to his side. “What are you so afraid of?”

  “It’s his meds. Happens to old folks,” said the nurse from the doorway. “Nothing to worry about.”

  I reached out for Mr. DuBois’s hand and clutched it in mine. “Would you prefer to sleep with a night-light? Would you feel safer?”

  Some of the fear in his eyes melted away.

  “What if I read to you for a while?” I switched on a light and checked out titles on his bookshelves. How about a Jacquie Liebhaber book?”

  Jonquille looked in on us as I settled into a chair next to the bed, opened the book, and read.

  I never dreamt that I might find myself on the wrong side of the law. Up to that moment, I had always done the right thing. Had been a devoted wife and doting mother. But I hadn’t met evil. Hadn’t understood that sometimes, the only way to save oneself was to eliminate the Earl of Darkness.

  Wearing black clothes and a dark scarf covering my copper curls, I pulled the oven forward and crossed the wires....

  Jonquille seized the book from my hands. He scanned the first few pages. “This is like a blueprint for what happened at the carriage house!”

  It was worse than that because the woman who had written it was the one who had been injured. Unless it had all been a hoax. It couldn’t have been, though, because Alan confirmed that the wires were crossed. What had she said? They would kill her and make it look like an accident. I was torn about whether to tell Jonquille about Jacquie’s visit.

  She needed help. But there wasn’t anything Jonquille could do for her now that she had left. And knowing that she had been here wouldn’t change anything, either. I had promised her, and for the time being at any rate, I couldn’t see the benefit in spilling her secret. For all I knew, it could somehow make matters worse for her.

  When we returned to the carriage house, Alan had finished methodically checking the wiring of the major appliances.

  “You’re
sure we’re safe now?” I asked.

  “Positive. Everything else was perfect. It was just the refrigerator that was wired wrong.”

  I let Peaches out of her carrier. If Jonquille hadn’t been with me, I would have been tempted to go over to the mansion to do some snooping. Something was going on that I didn’t understand. Maybe I could find a clue there.

  When Alan left, Jonquille said, “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to sleep on your sofa tonight. They’re sending a different guard out, but I would feel better if I were here with you.”

  My head reeled. Okay, so he had the most amazing blue eyes in the world. He was still something of a stranger to me. On the other hand, I would probably sleep better if I knew he was downstairs. It was very late. I could still drive out to my parents’ house but they were surely sound asleep by now, and it would wake them if I arrived.

  Jonquille tilted his head. “You’re not saying anything.”

  I took a deep breath. “I’m not used to things like this happening to me. It’s all a little strange. I’m used to being a bit of a bore.”

  Jonquille laughed aloud. “Florrie Fox, you are anything but a bore.”

  “Could I offer you a glass of wine?”

  “Ordinarily I would say yes. However, I’d prefer to be on the ball tonight. Just in case. Don’t look so worried! I don’t think anything will happen. But I’d rather err on the side of caution. How about a soda or some water?”

  I poured sparkling blackberry juice into glasses for both of us. We settled in the great room, with Frodo at my feet, and Peaches prowling.

  “I don’t really know anything about you,” I said. “Did you grow up around here?”

  “I’m from Paris.”

  I blinked at him.

  “Paris, Virginia.” He smiled. “That never gets old. It’s a tiny place not too far outside DC. My mom is an artist and my dad is a chef who has a restaurant out that way. They live on a pretend farm with unruly goats, chickens that lay eggs with yolks the color of orange marigolds, a couple of rescued cows and horses, five cats, and a one-eyed dog named Jack. I have two brothers and two sisters, and that’s about it.”