EQMM, September-October 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Olson sighed. “You're right. This is her farewell trip. She decided to see Italy one last time rather than do another round of chemo and radiation. She didn't want anyone else to know and made me promise that I wouldn't treat her any differently from the rest. But I swear to God, I wanted to knock Hugh Jensen into the middle of next week when he made her miss seeing that Tiepolo ceiling in Venice."

  "I imagine Alexa wanted to herself,” Sigrid said and sat back to watch the wheels begin to turn.

  "No,” he said at last. “Darryl was a small man but Alexa's a smaller woman. She couldn't have carried him up those stairs."

  "But Sabra Lyle could. If Hugh was a threat to her marriage..."

  "Sabra's divorced. Gene's the married one. He sells an occasional picture, but the only way he can afford to paint full time is because of his wife's money."

  "I thought Sabra was a successful landscape designer."

  "She is. That doesn't mean she wants to support him.” He gave a wry smile. “So you're not infallible, after all."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Sabra's toured with me before. Gallins is merely this tour's flavor of the month. There was someone different last year, there'll be someone different next year. Adds a little spice to her vacations. You look shocked."

  Amused, Sigrid shook her head. “No. Surprised maybe, but not shocked. All the same, Gallins does have a grudge against Hugh for blackballing him with a museum, right?"

  "A grudge, yes. But enough to kill? I don't think so."

  "What about Taylor Williams? He have any run-ins with Hugh?"

  "No more than any of the others. Hugh may have made some slighting remarks about how lightweight coffee-table books can be, but that's all I've heard.” He stood up wearily. “I have to make some more phone calls. The others are having lunch downstairs if you want to join them."

  "Thanks,” she said, “but I'm not hungry."

  She watched him disappear down the sunlit stone staircase, then sat and thought about all the things she had seen, all she had heard, and all she had been told. Olson said he had given Hugh two sleeping pills. Assuming Hugh actually took them, anyone could have killed Darryl without waking his cousin.

  She looked at her watch. Italian time was five or six hours ahead of New York so her attorney would not be at the office this early, but her e-mail would be waiting when he arrived.

  * * * *

  As afternoon shadows deepened across the ancient stone courtyard, Inspector Giordano called them together again. “We have now questioned everyone in the castle,” he told them in his incongruous English accent.

  Nervous glances were exchanged and a querulous Hugh Jensen broke the silence. “My God, man! Don't play Hercule Poirot with us. If you know who killed Darryl, spit it out!"

  "Mrs. Hayne,” Giordano said gently. “Is there anything you want to tell me?"

  Alexa Hayne's eyes were frightened. “N-No, I don't think so."

  "Two young Australian women were in the lower garden last evening. They saw you and Mr. Darryl Jensen."

  "Oh,” she said in a small voice. “Very well, Inspector. Yes, I helped Darryl put Hugh's mask on that statue."

  "What?” said Hugh.

  "It was a joke, Hugh. He said you were acting just like those selfish men who wouldn't let the goddess drink—muddying the trip like they were muddying the water. He couldn't understand why you were behaving so badly."

  Jensen started to speak, then clamped his mouth shut and sat back, shaking his head.

  "Mr. Jensen, do any of these people benefit by your death?"

  "Benefit?” he asked bitterly. “Other than getting rid of the person who seems to have wrecked this tour? I can't believe Darryl hated me that much."

  "He didn't hate you,” Alexa said. “He just thought you were too full of yourself and he wanted to tease you a little."

  "You and your cousin,” said Giordano. “You say that you both had trusts from your grandmother. Who inherits if you die?"

  "As I told you this morning, the Reedy Foundation gets it. Same for Darryl. After our deaths, the trusts dissolve and the principal returns to the foundation.” He glared at the others. “No, Inspector. Whoever wants me dead, it's not for my money."

  "No? What about your cousin's money?” After the long hot June day, Giordano's brown suit was a mass of untidy wrinkles. He drank from a liter-sized bottle of cold water, then unfolded a sheet of typescript. “Miss Harald received this message from her attorney. According to his discreet inquiries, the terms of your grandmother's trust are not quite as you would have me believe."

  "What?” He glared at both of them. “I don't know what you're talking about. The terms are exactly as I told you."

  "After your deaths, the principal does indeed revert to the foundation,” Giordano said. “Both your deaths. Whoever survives gets the interest from both trusts until his death. With him gone—"

  As Giordano's words sank in, Hugh bristled indignantly. "Me? You're accusing me? You're crazy! We were like brothers.” His angry denials dwindled into sudden sobs. “Brothers,” he whimpered.

  "Jacob and Esau were brothers, yet Jacob stole Esau's inheritance,” Giordano said implacably. “You had the motive. You had the opportunity.” He stood up and towered over the small man. “I must ask you to come with us, Mr. Jensen."

  Protesting his innocence, Hugh Jensen was led away. While the others dispersed in stunned dismay, Jim Olson left to call the American consulate in Florence and Sigrid walked across the courtyard with Inspector Giordano. At the castle's gate, he paused to thank her for her help.

  "You would have reached the same conclusion without me,” Sigrid said.

  "Probably,” he agreed complacently. “His was the only real motive. He was the one who conveniently gave you a tour of the apartment and then made his cousin change bedrooms. He stole the key earlier and he had the whole night to set that stage."

  "Why now, though?” she wondered aloud.

  "Who knows the logic of a killer? I myself think that he began to plan this murder when Darryl bought that cheap mask in Venice. It could have been the final straw in a camel-load of resentment."

  "The zanni?"

  He nodded. “From the Commedia dell'arte. Everyone says Darryl Jensen had a trickster sense of humor. Maybe that mask was a way of telling his cousin that he might be the subordinate clown, but that he—Hugh Jensen—was the greater clown and bigger fool.” Inspector Giordano took her hand. “So! La commedia é finita," he said; and even though she did not speak Italian, Sigrid needed no translation.

  * * * *

  Swallows and bats swooped and soared together in the cool evening air as twilight settled across the beautiful Tuscan landscape and the first bright stars pricked through the dark blue sky overhead. The others had gone downstairs to the castle's outdoor restaurant, but Elliott and Sigrid remained seated with their wine at one of the terrace tables to keep Jim Olson company.

  "Poor Darryl,” Olson said again. It had been a long tiring day and he looked almost haggard with fatigue. “Will Hugh be convicted, do you think?"

  Sigrid turned the stem of her wineglass in her slender fingers. “Realistically?” she said at last. “I seriously doubt it. The evidence is all circumstantial and the Reedy Foundation will surely come to his rescue with extradition papers and clever attorneys."

  "So he not only gets off,” Olson said bleakly, “he gets to profit by Darryl's death."

  "He may get off in court,” Sigrid said, turning her wineglass more slowly now, “but I imagine public opinion will find him guilty."

  "She's right,” said Elliott. “He'll be asked to resign from all the boards he sits on now, and decent people will shun him. So don't worry, Jim. He'll be punished for his sins."

  Sigrid carefully set her glass atop the wrought-iron table. “Unless, of course, you decide to confess."

  Both men stared at her.

  "He's stayed here before, Elliott. He knows where the key is kept and how the office is often l
eft unattended. He knew where to place the body that he thought was Hugh's before he realized he'd killed the wrong cousin."

  Elliott's protest died in his throat when he saw the guilt and shame on his friend's face. “You, Jim? Why?"

  "The woman you asked about last night,” Sigrid told him. “The suicide."

  "Lynn Palmour?” Elliott was shocked. “Was it Jensen that blocked her one-man show?"

  "At a time when she was still shattered by her brother's death.” Olson's voice was heavy with grief. “Then he told her he'd get it reinstated if she'd have sex with him. She was like the daughter I never had and that bastard killed her, Elliott. He killed that sweet kid as surely as if he'd given her the overdose himself. I could say he killed Darryl, too, making him change bedrooms like that, but....” He buried his head in his hands. “God help me."

  Distressed, Elliott turned to Sigrid.

  She pushed back her chair and stood up. Without a confession, there was no more evidence against Olson than there was against Jensen. Less, even. And as Inspector Giordano had reminded her, she had no official standing here.

  "Sigrid?"

  She took a deep breath and shook her head. “I'm not a cop anymore, remember? Whatever happens is up to him,” she said. “Not me."

  (c)2008 by Margaret Maron

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Fiction: THE BOY WHO CRIED WOLFE by Loren D. Estleman

  Mystery without murder features in Loren D. Estleman's Claudius Lyon series. Lyon's first outing (EQMM June 2008) involved apparent fraud in the literary world; this time out he takes a case for a boy in search of his father. But Mr. Estleman has another side. His new hard-boiled thriller, Gas City, got starred reviews from PW, Booklist, and Kirkus, and Entertainment Weekly said: “He's been called the heir to Chandler—and it's easy to see why."

  The bomb dropped while I was card-indexing Claudius Lyon's latest contribution to horticultural science, a hybrid tomato plant that comprised all the disadvantages of a beefsteak and none of the advantages of a roma, and Lyon, foundering up to his chins, as usual, behind his preposterously enormous desk, was pretending to read The Portable Schopenhauer. It was actually Carolyn Keene's The Clue of the Dancing Puppet inside the drab dust jacket, and he'd read it twice before in my tenure.

  "Arnie,” he said, “how long have you been working for me?"

  I scowled at my typewriter, an IBM Selectric so sensitive it anticipates my mistakes and makes them for me. “Three years, two months, fifteen days, eleven minutes, and twenty-nine seconds."

  "How much do you estimate you've embezzled from me during that period?"

  My fingers slipped. A Gordian knot of keys thudded against the card on the platen.

  He looked up from his book with his Gerber-baby smile. “I am a genius, but not an absent-minded one. I call my bank from time to time and occasionally balance my checkbook. When you deposit the royalties from NASA on my father's pressure-cooker gasket patent, you round down the amount and palm the rest. Absent a tedious study of the actual figures, I can arrive at a reasonable estimate by multiplying your time in my employ by the average sum pilfered. The product would support a modest harem."

  "Well, it was a lark while it flew,” I said finally. “Is it federal or local? I hear they put out a spread in the U.S. prisons. Anything beats mac-and-cheese Wednesday in Sing Sing."

  "There's no need for bravado. I don't intend to pursue charges. With whom would I replace you? There is only one Arnie Woodbine, and Archie Goodwin is permanently off the market. I must make the best of my knockoff. Dock yourself ten dollars a week until the account is even."

  "But that'll take—"

  "Six years, one month, twelve days, five hours, and thirty-two minutes. Consider it a long-term contract, which you'd be wise not to break.” He returned to his reading.

  In case anything about the foregoing seems familiar—not counting the larceny—now is a good time to point out that “Claudius Lyon” is an invention. The man who uses the name has remodeled his life to conform to his hero's, Nero Wolfe of Manhattan, who raises orchids, employs a world-class chef, and solves mysteries brought to him by baffled clients. Lyon's own limitations have forced compromises: He grows tomatoes, eats kosher most of the time because that's all his chef Gus knows how to cook, and depends upon me, the poor man's Archie Goodwin (Wolfe's legman and hectoring angel), for mundane errands.

  He's as fat as Wolfe but much shorter, and when he climbs into the big chair behind his desk he looks like Tweedledum with his legs swinging free. Not having any prior experience with geniuses, I don't know if he is one, but he's a damn clever little butterball who hasn't forgotten a thing he's learned from the thousands of whodunits he's read. I've seen him take more than his share of pratfalls, but I've never seen him stumped.

  Well, I had nothing better to do for the next six years, one month, etc., and I'd been to prison and found it not up to my standards, so I didn't complain about the pay cut; instead I worked out an arrangement with Gus to buy generic lox and split the price difference. Lyon hasn't Wolfe's palate and wouldn't know the gourmet brand from Karl's Kut-Rate Kippers. It was a stingy little scam compared to the one I'd had going, even when I extended it to include gristly corned beef and day-old bagels, but it would do until something better came along. If you're the type who can live life on the level without gnawing your nails down to the knuckle, congratulations, and keep it to yourself. Without a dash of pepper the stew's just too flat.

  The reason for all this chatter is, it explains how the principal resident of the townhouse at 700 Avenue J, Flatbush, put his chubby little gray cells to work on the problem of William Thew.

  Gus's main motivator in our conspiracy was the convenience of not having to take the crosstown bus to the snooty little market that sold the best kosher in the five boroughs; the cheap stuff was available on the corner, and it delivered. I happened to answer the doorbell the day the pushy delivery boy showed up lugging a paper sack bigger than he was. I had to part a bunch of celery to see his pinched little face under the obligatory backward baseball cap.

  "Here, kid.” I traded him a buck for the sack.

  "My name's Jasper, not kid. Jasper Hull."

  "The hell you say. You got that from an eighty-six-year-old man's obituary in the Daily News."

  "It's Jasper just the same. I want to see Lyon."

  "What's the matter, I don't tip big enough?"

  "I got a case for him. He's a detective, ain't he? That's what it says in the Yellow Pages."

  "It doesn't either. I wrote the ad. It says he provides answers to questions."

  "If I got it that way I'd've took my tip and went. I seen all the fortunetellers I want to. They charge you up front and tell you a lot of bogus stuff that could mean anything."

  "'Satisfaction guaranteed.’ The ad says that too."

  "Okay. Here.” He held up the buck I'd given him.

  "What's that for?"

  "It's a what-do-you-call-it, a retainer."

  I grinned. “Nice try, kid. Tell Captain Stoddard he's in violation of the child labor laws.” I started to push the door shut, but damn if he didn't insert his wiry little body into the space. It was either squash him or stop. I considered the point and decided against squashing. It's hell on the finish.

  I said, “You'd think Fraud would have enough to keep it busy in a town this size without setting traps for one little fat guy with schizophrenic tendencies, but a month doesn't go by without the cop in charge trying to trick Lyon into accepting payment and busting him for practicing private investigation without a license. Recruiting a kid's bad enough; a dollar's an insult to his intelligence. A fiver's plenty cute given the inflationary index. I'm surprised Stoddard didn't knock out a front tooth and give you a scruffy mutt from the pound."

  "How good can he be if he don't charge?"

  "So good he doesn't need your dirty buck."

  "A minute ago it was your dirty buck.” He stuck it in his jeans pocket. “I don't like
cops, either. They say they're there to help, but all they do is write stuff down and shove it in a drawer. The detective agencies I tried won't listen to nobody but an adult. I seen Lyon's name in the listing, and when this order came in where I work, I thought I'd take another shot."

  "Shot at what?"

  "Finding my father."

  "Wipe your feet, kid.” I opened the door wide.

  * * * *

  Lyon squeaked bloody murder when I told him I'd parked a ten-year-old boy in the front room. To begin with, he doesn't trust any creature his own size, and as for childhood, he thinks it's a conspiracy to break valuable objects and make doorknobs sticky, which is a favorite phobia of his. He'd just come down from the plant room and hugged to his chest the specimen of the day in its fragile clay pot. “Get rid of him and spray Lysol on anything he might have touched. Children are the main carriers of most of the diseases on this planet."

  "Just this morning you were whining about having nothing to do. Now you want to shoo away work."

  "I'm not a missing-persons bureau. Why should I be made to suffer because some preadolescent was careless enough to misplace his sire?"

  "You don't know suffering. Try sitting around listening to you sigh and moan and cheat on crossword puzzles."

  "I never cheat. Whoever designs them needs a refresher course in basic vocabulary. ‘Impact’ as a verb. Phooey!"

  "I'll bring the kid in. You want me to put down papers?"

  "Remain standing, and be prepared to hurl yourself between us the moment he starts to sneeze."

  * * * *

  Jasper Hull turned the big globe with a palm in passing; Lyon sucked in air through his nostrils. The kid stopped in front of the desk.

  "You're fat."

  "And you have no pubic hair. Please remove your cap. The room is heated sufficiently and the roof doesn't leak."

  He uncovered a shock of red hair and hopped up onto the orange leather chair. “My mother's dead. I live with my aunt. She don't know I'm here. She says if my father was worth looking for he wouldn't have to be looked for."