I stood up and inched my way toward the door, the kind of maneuver intended to move the two of them out of the office. I needed to think.
It worked, though Dani gave me a dirty look.
Alone in my office, I laid the situation out, from smallest problem to biggest.
Troy had run a prank war with Cadence last year, which meant he could easily have armed his boys to do the bra trick. If the bra trick had happened before the fish, the fish could have been something the boys did on their own, without his help. Though I wasn’t convinced ruining the girls' expensive under stuff was Troy’s style.
Then again, maybe he had told them stories of the prank war, and that had inspired them to create their own work. That was a reasonable guess. I liked it better than a saboteur out to actively destroy the almost forgotten Julbord.
Then there was Gretchen. She had seen a nurse, which was good. But she needed some more careful handling than that. She needed someone with training in family counseling to help her and her husband, if possible. They might be children, in reality, but they had made vows and were definitely a family.
I was the second most qualified person on campus to handle this, but I really wanted to pass it off to Megan. And I would. I had undermined Dani’s attempts to get the two of them together, so even if it meant babysitting the Hoffen kids myself, I would create an opportunity for Megan and Gretchen to talk.
And finally, the murder. Dani had found the biggest clue, though one the police were already aware of. Stina had gotten Cadence a lawyer, though if this person was going to defend a guilty party or an innocent one was unknown to me.
The murder weapon hadn’t been found, but I may have identified it. As far as I could tell, I was failing in Dr. Hoffen’s commission to me. I needed to solve this fast to save the school from unwanted bad press.
The girls were all back, but if I was quiet and careful, I might be able to search their rooms. A staff-search for contraband was perfectly legitimate. The Swedish police may or may not need a warrant for something like that, but I didn’t. The students all signed the school's morals contract agreeing to it.
I cracked my knuckles. The right to do it was one thing. The will to do it was another. I stared out the window. Stina stood next to a lamppost near the huset, talking to Troy. They stood closer than seemed normal, like one or both of them was whispering. The lamp was lit, and the sun was setting. I realized for the first time that I had skipped lunch. No wonder everything seemed harder than it ought to. An officer was approaching Stina and Troy from behind, but I suspected they were aware of it.
I waited until the officer had joined the conversation then left my office.
The girls’ dorm was cold. I had forgotten to stoke the fires, and it looked like neither Xavier nor Troy had picked up my slack.
I ignored the cold, since time was short, and went into the first dorm room, feeling like a cross between a student afraid of getting caught where he wasn’t supposed to be and the kind of old person who ruined everyone else’s fun.
I flipped open the Bible sitting on the bedside table. It was inscribed to Allison Kent, who had gone home for Christmas. So had all of her roommates. I wished she had wanted to bring her bible with her.
I stepped back into the hall. I was at a disadvantage on this search, since I had no idea which rooms Cadence, Bel, Gretchen, and Dani stayed in.
Cadence, Gretchen, Bel and Dani.
I leaned against the wall. They were the only three girls left for break. So…I was here to find evidence that one of them was a murderer? One was the police’s number one suspect. One was a pregnant teenager. One had just gotten here the week before and had never even met Rolf. And the other was Dani. My girl. My partner in crime fighting.
I prayed one of those silent, wordless prayers, trusting the Holy Spirit to put all the question marks in my mind into words. Then I moved down the hall, poking my nose in until I came to a room with a red sweater slung across the desk chair. I was pretty sure it was a sweater I had seen Bel in before.
I entered and shut the door behind me as quietly as I could. I started at the desk, looking for something to confirm the occupant. I flipped open a paperback copy of Mere Christianity. Bel’s name was printed inside the cover. Isobel Hawthorn. All upright lines and curvy vowels. The handwriting of a child.
I pulled open a desk drawer and rummaged through the contents. She had several little silver pouches labeled “K2” I picked one up and turned it over in my hands. The small print on K2 said “spice.” I might be a homeschooled kid from the suburbs, but I knew what spice was. I wiped my fingerprints off the package with my sleeve and slipped it back into the drawer.
As far as I knew, synthetic marijuana was not illegal in Sweden, but it definitely counted as contraband on this campus.
I wanted to immediately blame Rolf for bringing it to her, except it was far more logical that she had brought it with her from somewhere along her path to Sweden.
I poked through the rest of her drawers, but there was nothing nearly as interesting as the spice.
I left her room and opened doors on the main floor, looking for Gretchen’s room when I saw Dr. Hoffen out the window. He furrowed his brows and leaned forward, like he wasn’t sure what he was seeing. Then he gestured for me to come out.
It was then that I remembered I was a volunteer, and not staff, and that room checks for contraband were to be done by staff at Dr. Hoffen’s direction.
Of course, he had directed me to find the killer.
I took a deep breath and went outside, hoping for the best.
“Isaac, I’m glad I found you. The police think they found the murder weapon.”
“The missing splitting maul?”
He shook his head slowly. “No.” He narrowed his eyes, “In the woods behind the dorm they found a big block of green ice.”
I gulped. “What was frozen in it?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “My Bluetooth headset.”
“But why do they think it is the murder weapon?”
We walked toward the huset while we talked. Through the front windows I could see three officers seated at a dining room table. “A huge chunk of one corner was broken away, but the block doesn’t show any signs of having melted. The broken part was nowhere near the main block, and there was a slight discoloration on the carpet near the body that indicated something with dye in it may have melted.”
“But the carpet is dark brown, how can they know it was green melted ice?”
“I asked them the same thing, but they didn’t tell me.”
I considered the situation quietly for a moment. “Is there someone around who would know how long that stain had been there?”
Dr. Hoffen paused at the steps to the school. “I have a strong urge to protect the students as well, but remember, just because one of our kids probably made this iceblock, doesn’t mean they were the ones that used it.”
I wasn’t sure that I believed him. After all, the people who made it, and presumably also hid it, would be the most likely people to know where it was so they could use it as a weapon.
And with three splitting mauls right behind the school, and a shed full of things like crowbars even closer to the dorm, the iceblock would have had to have been used by someone who knew about it in the first place.
We joined the police at one of the tables in the dining room.
“Tack for joining us.” The speaker was the polisinspektör who had run the interviews with us all when Rolf was first discovered. “We have reason to believe that the iceblock we found in the woods may have been the murder weapon. We also have reason to believe this block was part of a bigger vandalism scheme.”
Dr. Hoffen nodded, his face ashy.
“We would like to have any information you have on who you think is involved.” The polisinspektör folded his hands in front of him. He didn’t smile, but his face wasn’t harsh. He looked tired if anything.
“We haven’t pinned down the culprit yet.” Dr. Hof
fen said.
I nodded in agreement.
“But do you have any ideas?”
“Not yet.”
I fidgeted in my seat. Did we have ideas or didn’t we? “We believe the two items of vandalism that we found were most likely done before break, so it could have been anyone at the school, and not necessarily someone who is still here.”
“Ah.” He made a note on his spiral notebook. “Dr. Hoffen, when did your Bluetooth headset go missing?”
Dr. Hoffen closed his eyes. “The day before the murder.”
“So after break had already commenced.” The polisinspektör stated it as a fact.
“Yes.”
“So we can now assume that the vandalism was all done by someone currently on campus. I want to gather everyone together, here in the dining room.” The polisinspektör stood up.
“Isaac, you can gather people from the grounds. I’ll check the buildings.” Dr. Hoffen stood and pushed his chair in. His color hadn’t improved, and I thought he looked like he was ready to pass out.
“Yes, of course.”
“Tack.” The polisinspektör pocketed his notebook. “When everyone is here, I would like you to lead a conversation that will help people to open up. I do not want the innocent people to feel threatened at all. I want us all to work together to get to the bottom of this.”
Dr. Hoffen looked to me, his eyes wide and his thin lips pressed together.
It looked like I’d be playing Poirot with all of the suspects gathered together in one room.
I exhaled then went outside, hoping that it would take a long time to gather everyone together.
TWENTY-TWO
Dani Honeywell
The radiators must have been working overtime in the dining room. At least I was sweating.
I was under the impression that the police wanted us relaxed and casual, but I was on the edge of my seat. Everyone around me looked pretty awkward as well.
Isaac sat on the table like this was a sort of easygoing chat we were all about to have.
He smiled, but his eyes were scared. “Hey guys.”
I laced my fingers together and prayed for him.
“So, we found the bras.”
I looked around, first at Garret, who was picking his fingernails, but also looked pretty ashen, then at Si, who was beet red, his shaggy hair hanging in his eyes like he wanted to hide.
Isaac looked straight at Troy. “I hear it has been kind of a tradition to have a boys versus girls prank war, but, as you can well tell, this is not a good time for it. There is a serious murder investigation happening, and we need whoever did the bra raid to just admit it so we can move on.”
Bel stared at her brother like she was afraid to look at anyone else. He did not return her look.
Despite our diminished Christmas break numbers, there were too many people in the room for me to keep track of, and my eyes kept returning to the kiss-stealing Isaac Daniels. Regardless of what felt like a kind of make-up scene earlier, I was still mad or hurt or maybe the murder was getting to me. Or maybe all of it together was too much for me. I don’t know. But though I felt sympathetic to the difficulty this moment was for him, I also still wanted to kick him, or something.
I sighed.
The policeman sitting near Isaac looked at me, his blue eyes cold.
“Let’s make this easy, okay? With the saft, the salmon, and the bras, we can’t pretend there isn’t a bigger prank thing going on, but we are choosing to forgo any of our normal discipline just to get a clear picture of what’s been going on around the campus.” Isaac coughed a little into his fist. Then waited.
“Why?” Bel’s voice broke the awkward silence.
“Because…” He trailed off and shrugged, “Because we also found Hoffen’s Bluetooth, and…um…the pranks are really more like vandalism, and we need them to stop.”
“But why aren’t you going to discipline the culprits? Bel persisted. “Isn’t the whole point of this place to make us better through misery? Shouldn’t we be punished when we do something rotten? To teach us a lesson?”
“That’s not the point of Tillgiven.” Megan spoke up. She sat behind me. I turned and saw her cradling a wiggly three year old—her middle child and only daughter. “This really isn’t the time to try to pick a fight.”
Johanna, Nick, and Nea were sitting at a table together, to the left of Isaac. Johanna spoke up. “We have a very important dinner in less than a week to celebrate Christ’s birth, the anniversary of the school, and to represent Christ in our very secular country. We don’t have time for these games. Please, if you are the one who did it, we just need to know.”
“Why should anyone speak up about anything in the middle of a murder investigation?” Bel stood up, her shoulders trembling. “Why should anyone admit anything without a lawyer? You’re just trying to trap us, and we don’t have to talk.”
“Sit down, Bel.” Garret’s voice was low and quiet. “And shut up.”
“Not cool, Garret.” Si shook his hair out of his eyes. “I’ll confess. I did it.”
Isaac turned his eyes to Si and looked him up and down. “What exactly did you do?”
Si took a deep breath, his face still brilliantly red. “The first thing I did was buy thirteen or fourteen bottles of pear cider.”
Pear cider, while delicious, had a low alcohol content, making it the favorite “soft drink” on campus. It wasn’t technically forbidden, being a normal Swedish refreshment, but one was not supposed to try to get drunk on it on purpose.
“Maybe fifteen, in fact. I don’t remember. Then, I shared them. We drank them all around midnight and found ourselves in the mood for something fun. That’s when we Jell-O’d the fish. It seemed very funny after several bottles of cider. Obviously it wasn’t. I didn’t speak up earlier because…well, why would I?”
“And the bras?” Isaac asked.
“Actually, that wasn’t me. That was done right before break, and meant to annoy the girls while they were packing to leave. I think they took one from every student. Anyway, the green food coloring was an idiot misstep, and I will leave it to you to guess the idiot who made that choice. Because of the cider, I thought it would be funny to do the same thing to the fish, except all I had was the Jell-O, so there you go.”
Dr. Hoffen responded before Isaac could. “But who did you share the cider with?”
“It’s one thing to rat myself out, Hoff.” Si shrugged. “I’ll let everyone else rely on their own conscience.”
“What about the Bluetooth?” This time the polisinspektör asked. He leaned forward, his body language as menacing as possible, though his face seemed under control.
“Don’t answer that!” Bel shouted. She gripped the edge of the table and wavered in her place.
Was she going to faint? Her face was white, her body trembled rather than shook, and her eyes were red…bloodshot. I hadn’t paid a lot of attention to her eating habits, but once or twice I had noticed her scrape full plates into the trash.
Si grabbed her by the elbow and led her to a chair. “Chill, Bel.”
She shook him off but sat down. “They think the block of ice with the Bluetooth in it was the murder weapon. No one say anything else without a lawyer.”
“Ice? That’s ridiculous.” Cadence spoke for the first time. “Ice isn’t hard enough to break a skull”
The polisinspektör held his hand up towards Cadence in a not-too-threatening way. “No one said the victim’s skull had been broken.”
“Oh! But I thought…” Cadence looked from the police to Isaac and then to me. “I’m sorry.” She retreated to the back of her chair.
“It is understandable that everyone’s emotions are high. We just have questions about the ice, and we can’t get answers if we don’t know who made it. We are not suggesting that the person who made it used it as a weapon.”
“Yes, they are.” Bel said. “They want to know who made it, where it was hidden, and that stuff. If they find out that it was hi
dden somewhere where no one could have found it on accident, then they will say the person who hid it is the killer. Seriously, no one talk.”
“Bel, relax. It’s not like that.” I spoke up for the first time. “Unless the person who made it was the killer, in which case we need to know. This isn’t a small deal.”
“I need air.” Bel got up again and walked out of the dining room. No one stopped her.
“I took the Bluetooth. I’m sorry.” Garret looked straight at the polisinspektör. “They aren’t very expensive. I mean, they come with phones for free and stuff, so I thought it would be funny and kind of harmless. In fact,” Garret pulled a cellophane package out of his pocket. “I have the same one, that I’ve never used, and I was going to give it to Dr. Hoffen to replace his. I wouldn’t have wrecked something that couldn’t be replaced.” He maintained a sufficiently abashed tone while still sounding in control. I wondered if he was faking the remorse or faking the appearance of control.
“Tack.” The polisinspektör took the offered Bluetooth. “And did you also make the frozen block of ice?”
Garret chewed on his bottom lip for a moment. “Yes.”
“Did you do it alone?”
“No.” Garret kept his eyes trained on the inspector.
Troy sighed. “Whoever worked with him, please just say so.”
Gretchen raised her hand. “I did it.”
“Gretch…” Si’s voice held a warning.
“No, I really did. I’ve been really down lately, and Garret said he had an idea that would make me laugh. He brought me the Bluetooth, then we got one of my cleaning caddies and filled it with water and food coloring.”
“But why?” Isaac asked.
Gretchen shrugged, her pale cheeks flushing faintly. “We hid the bucket in a bank of snow that had piled up behind the boys' dorm. The thing that was supposed to make it funny was that he was going to slip it onto the Julbord table as a decoration. We fixed it up while I was cleaning the dorm and hid it the same time. We did it two days before the big storm, but I don’t know when he took the headset.”
Dark and Stormy Page 13
