by Alan Cook
“The murderer did. I'm not saying who that was, but I have some ideas.”
I suddenly decided I didn't want to be a detective. I had once heard someone say that you shouldn't ask a question if you didn't want to hear the answer. This was such a time. But somehow I heard myself saying, “As an attorney, I know you wouldn't conceal evidence. If you know something, you should tell it.”
“It's not hard to figure out. The casserole was put together in Harriet's apartment. The other people there were the members of the committee: Ellen, Dora and me, but Harriet did most of the work on the casserole. Just because none of us saw her put the crab in means nothing. She carried the casserole over to the recreation room and we left her apartment before she did. She could have had the crab meat sitting in her refrigerator, ready to dump in.”
“Why would Harriet want to kill Gerald?”
“Because Gerald liked me better than he liked her.”
“Why didn't she try to kill you?”
“I don't know. I guess I can thank my lucky stars she didn't. But I aim to keep an eye on her.”
“Have you told anybody else your suspicions?”
“You mean the police? I don't have any evidence that would stand up in court. Harriet won't be the first murderer to go free.”
“Did you know that Gerald was allergic to shellfish?”
“No, he never told me.”
“Then why do you think he told Harriet?”
Ida shrugged.
I had an urge to ask Ida if she and Gerald had slept together, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. Ida pulled the little dog away from where it still eyed King malevolently, and walked on. I stood for a moment, in a daze. I liked Harriet better than Ida. I preferred that Ida be the murderer, possibly because I didn't like her dog. This wasn't coming out right. Reality wasn't always convenient. Maybe I should drop the whole thing.
***
I wanted to find the answer to one more question before I went back to my normal life. At a decent hour, after most people were up, I called Wesley Phipps, the president of the bridge club, and asked him who kept the cards we played with. After finding out that he kept them I made an appointment to go over to his apartment.
Wesley and his wife, Angie, had a two-bedroom apartment that was larger than my one-bedroom model. Angie had some degenerative disease and was confined to a wheelchair, but the apartment was spotless. She treated me like a formal visitor, seating me on the sofa and having Wesley serve me coffee and little cookies on the coffee table. I can make a pig of myself with sweets, so I took two cookies and then didn't look at the plate again.
Wesley, in addition to being president of the bridge club, was also president of the residents' association. He was balding, red-faced and overweight, which was not typical of Silver Acres residents. But he doted on Angie and took good care of her. Without his help, she would have to live in the building that provided skilled nursing care.
I chatted with Angie and Wesley for a few minutes. I am not big on small talk and began to get antsy so I produced the 13 diamonds I had taken from Gerald's memorial and asked Wesley, “Did you pick up the rest of this deck, by any chance?”
“Why yes,” he said, leaving the room and coming back with a box of cards. “I took all the cards and score-pads after the commotion about Gerald died down, just like I always do.”
“That was a terrible tragedy,” interjected Angie, who was not a member of the bridge club. “It must have been awfully hard to watch.”
I murmured something and Wesley said, “I saw you pick up Gerald's hand and I was going to ask you for his cards, but then I saw the 13 diamonds and realized their significance. And when I saw them on his memorial I thought it was appropriate. For a bridge player to die with a perfect hand, that is the ultimate. I will always envy Gerald.”
“Just don't imitate him,” Angie said.
“May I see the other cards?” I asked. Wesley handed me the box. It was one of those standard playing card boxes that had the geometric design of the backs of the cards reproduced on the box. I compared the design on the box to that on one of the 13 diamonds. It was close but not quite the same. I compared more cards from Gerald's hand with the box. Same result. I pulled the rest of the deck out of the box. Those cards had the same design on their backs as did the diamonds, so together they made up a complete deck.
Is this the box these cards originally came in?” I asked.
Yes. I buy all the cards and keep track of them all.”
He was one of those fastidious people and I was sure he did.
“Look at this.” I showed Wesley the differences between the backs of the cards and the design on the box.
He said, “I can’t understand it. All the decks are the same. I bought them all at the same time.”
He lumbered into the other room and returned with several more decks.
We inspected those decks. Their designs matched their boxes, which matched the box that contained Gerald's deck. Only the design on the cards that had produced Gerald's perfect hand was different from that of any of the other decks or boxes.
Wesley kept saying, “I can't understand it,” as we became convinced of the difference.
“What if this deck has been switched with the original deck?” I asked him.
“But who would do a thing like that?” Wesley asked, his face becoming almost purple. “And how?”
“Who? The person who wanted Gerald...to get a hand of 13 diamonds.” I had almost used the word “murdered.” “How—or when—I’m not sure.”
“But...but,” he sputtered, “do you mean it was all a joke? That the hand wasn't real?”
“It looks that way.”
“But I don't think that's funny. Especially, in view of the consequences.”
“No, it isn't funny. However, I think we, the bridge club, should do something as a sort of permanent memorial to Gerald. What if we had the 13 diamonds framed and hung in the recreation room?”
“Well...I don't know,” said Wesley.
“We don't have to tell anyone else that the hand isn't real. Then only we and the perpetrator will know.”
“Who do you think did it?”
“One of the three women at Gerald's table, most likely, but what does it matter? It's over and done with now. It was just a joke.”
“I'll bring it up at the bridge club this afternoon,” Wesley said. “We'll take a vote on it.”
“And would you save the rest of the deck, along with the original box? Just in case there is ever any question regarding the legitimacy of Gerald's hand.” I knew that if it was ever needed, Wesley's testimony at a trial would be believed.
***
The bridge club did not eat lunch before play started. The lunch committee had been disbanded by common consent. Instead, Wesley conducted a short business meeting. The members voted to have the 13 diamonds framed as a permanent memorial to Gerald. We also had a minute of silence in his memory.
Then we played bridge, as usual. We played shuffle-and-deal instead of duplicate bridge because some of the members didn't want the cutthroat competition that duplicate engenders. I noticed that Ida and Ellen were still partners. Harriet, whose partner had usually been Gerald, was playing with a woman whose name I didn't remember.
Our custom was to have each partnership play a certain number of hands against every other partnership. When Ida and Harriet played at the same table I watched them from my table out of the corner of my eye, but I didn't see any sign of bad feeling between them. They were good actors.
When serious bridge players get together, they are models of complete concentration and even the ones who said they didn't like to play competitively got into the spirit of the game. I bet that most of the people there forgot about Gerald as the afternoon progressed and they bid and played their hands. By the end of the afternoon, activity at the bridge club had returned to normal.
CHAPTER 7
It was too hot to play croquet, but Thursday afternoon was the on
ly time all members of the foursome were available simultaneously, perhaps for weeks. I wore a large straw hat and put sun block on my exposed arms. My light skin doesn't take kindly to too much sunlight.
I drew the line at wearing shorts to beat the heat. I was not about to put my varicose veins on display outdoors, without stockings. It was bad enough that I had to do it in the pool.
My partner was a married man named Jesse; his wife didn't play croquet. Jesse was tall and thin and moved slowly, but his hands were amazingly steady for his age, which was on the north side of 80. He played the same kind of game—steady and conservative. I played a more wide-open game than he did, taking the high-risk shots, but together we made a good team and we had won the tournament the year before.
Ellen Tooner had a female partner. I didn't know how good they were, but I had always pictured Ellen as being well coordinated because of the deft way she shuffled the cards when she played bridge, so I warned Jesse against being over-confident. Ellen was dressed neatly and conservatively with a short-sleeved blouse and long shorts. I noticed, enviously, that she didn't appear to have any varicose veins.
Ellen went first and sailed her ball through the first two wickets with a standard between-the-legs shot. Going for the side wicket, she pulled her approach shot off the mark, but she got fairly close on her last shot.
This flat surface with the manicured lawn was heaven compared to the bumpy and irregular backyard croquet courts I had played on before. Standard procedure when I was a child and going for the side wicket had been to blast the ball into the flower bed. When I brought the ball a mallet's-head in from the tulips, with luck it would be right in front of the wicket. In the present case, I hit my ball cleanly through the first two wickets and used my next
two shots to hit Ellen's ball.
“Sorry,” I said as I placed my ball a mallet's-head length from hers. When I play I take no prisoners. My own son won’t play with me.
She shrugged, feigning nonchalance. Up close she looked younger than many of the other residents of Silver Acres. Her hair was still a reddish-brown color, but I'm sure she dyed it. She was still good looking in a well-preserved sort of way.
“Did Carol Grant talk to you about Gerald?” I asked her as I uncharacteristically tapped my ball to stop in front of the wicket instead of trying to hit it through.
She nodded and said, “You too, eh? She asked me if I knew about Gerald's allergy to shellfish. How could I? We played bridge together but we weren't close friends.”
I hit my ball through the wicket. “Same here. I take it that you weren't the one who put the shellfish in the casserole.”
“Of course not. Why would I do a sneaky thing like that?”
I knocked my ball toward the center wicket. Before following it I said, “Do you think the shellfish was put in at Harriet's apartment?”
“It could have been. Harriet stayed behind for a few minutes after we left, then brought the casserole. Maybe she knew about Gerald's...problem.” She asked, breathlessly, “Do you think Harriet had it in for him?”
Ellen's partner walked toward us, following her ball, so I went to mine. I wasn't learning much.
Ellen languished at the first wicket as we all used her ball for target practice to gain extra shots and then went on. I didn't get another chance to talk to her since I continued to hold the lead. I finished first, but instead of hitting the stake I stayed in the game to help my partner, who didn't really need my help; he was well ahead of Ellen.
She was dying at the far end of the court, all alone. I was surprised, but everybody had bad days once in a while, even me. I knocked my ball in her direction so I could have another word with her.
“I hope you're here to help me,” she said with a little smile, “because this ball doesn't like me.” Her words were light, but her body language showed stress. Her poor performance was getting to her. I suspected that she was not a good loser.
“Of course,” I lied. After a pause I continued, “One thing that is ironic is that Gerald should get the best hand of his life just as it ended.”
“Yes. Thirteen diamonds. A dream hand. But everybody gets lucky once in a while.”
“But not usually that lucky.”
“No. But I saw a hand like that once before.”
“No kidding. Was it legitimate?” That slipped out.
“Yes, I'm sure it was. But it was a long time ago.”
***
“All right, Tess, I'm going to tell you what I've found out and you're going to tell me whether Gerald was murdered or not.” I paced the floor of my living room while Tess sat comfortably on the couch, saving her feet. I can't sit still for long periods of time like old people are supposed to. I still have too much nervous energy.
“I'm ready,” Tess said. “I even brought a pad so I could write all this stuff down.” She flourished a yellow pad. “But I hope we end up proving that a murder wasn't committed.”
Good old Tess. She was very organized, unlike me. I had everything in my head, and my head was starting to betray me. I said, “Let's start with Gerald.”
“That's a good place to start.” She wrote the word Gerald and underlined it.
“Gerald had a deadly allergy to shellfish so he was very careful about what he ate. He also had a mild heart condition, but probably no worse than half the residents here.”
Tess made a couple of notes.
“Before the lunch was served, Gerald asked Harriet what the casserole contained and she told him, to the best of her knowledge—or what she claims was the best of her knowledge.”
“Harriet is such a nice lady; I don't see how she could have killed anybody.”
“We're not making judgments now; we're just stating the facts as we know them.” I spoke somewhat irritably because I agreed with Tess and knew that my feelings also clouded my objectivity. I decided not to tell her that Ida had accused Harriet. “Gerald ate some of the casserole. Immediately afterward, the first bridge hand was dealt. Do we know who dealt the hand?”
“Why is that important?”
I hadn't told Tess what I had found out about the cards, hoping to keep that information confined to as few people as possible, but if she was going to help me she needed to know. “Because it was a phony deal.”
“What? How can you say that?”
I told her.
“The one time I ever see a perfect hand and it's not real. That means I'll never get one.”
“Probably not. So we come back to the question of who dealt the hand. That may be important. I should have asked the people I talked to.”
“It's not too late to find out,” Tess said, reaching for my phone. She punched in a number.
“Who are you calling?”
“Harriet.”
“Ask her where everybody was sitting. I don't remember.”
Tess had a short phone conversation, during which she murmured, “Is that a fact?” at one point, but her face didn't give anything away.
After she hung up she started writing. I said, “Well?”
She looked up, smugly. “Gerald dealt the hand, himself. Harriet was his partner. Ida sat to his left. Ellen sat to his right.”
“Interesting.”
“Does that mean that Gerald intentionally dealt himself the 13 diamonds?”
“Not necessarily.” But I didn't have any better explanation at the moment. “Anyway, Gerald dealt the hand and barely had time to look at his cards when he started choking.”
“Dora tried to help him and you called the clinic.”
“And 911. But nothing could be done to save him. So much for Gerald.”
“So much for Gerald. Is that what detectives say about the victims?” Tess made a face.
“I guess they have strong stomachs. To move on, the three women at his table plus Dora were involved to some extent in putting together the casserole at Harriet's apartment. The recipe called for tuna, not shellfish. Nobody will admit to putting in the shellfish and nobody saw it done.”
“Harriet had the best opportunity—although I still can't picture her as a murderer—because it was her apartment, and because she was alone when she carried the dish to the recreation room.”
“Right, but let's say it wasn't Harriet. Then most likely the shellfish was put into the dish after it got to the recreation room.” I said this partly to ease Tess' mind about her friend.
“Which means that any of the other three could have done it, if they had a minute, undisturbed.”
“But when could they have gotten that minute? After the fire alarm went off!” I exclaimed. “Remember? It happened just as we were about to eat lunch. Everybody had to evacuate the building. We were outside for maybe five minutes.”
“So somebody could have snuck back in before the others.”
“Right. Or just stayed in the room. I didn't count noses, so I don't know whether anybody was missing.”
“Me either,” Tess said. “But that relieves my mind. It means that Harriet isn't the only possible suspect.”
“In fact,” I said, “it means that anybody in the bridge club could have done it.”
“Or anybody at Silver Acres.”
I laughed. “Now we have too many suspects.”
“Then we have to figure out who had a motive,” Tess said.
“We have potential motives for Harriet and Ida—jealousy. I don't know of any motives for anybody else.” We pondered in silence for a while. Then I said, “I'm willing to bet that whoever switched the decks is the killer.”
“Unless Gerald did it, himself, as a joke.”
“Now we have to investigate his sense of humor. But, assuming he didn't deal himself 13 diamonds on purpose, the two who had the best opportunity to switch the decks are Ida and Ellen, because they sat on either side of him.”
“But not Harriet,” Tess said. “Good.”
“The switched cards looked new. Maybe we should check for fingerprints on the 13 diamonds.”
“At a minimum, there would be Gerald's and yours—and the murderer's.”
“And Wesley's. Darn. I took them to the art gallery to be framed, so there are several more sets on them by now.”
