"Oh." What a relief. A thousand terrible thoughts had bombarded my mind.
"I'm hoping you'll grant me a favor," he said softly.
"Oh, yes. Of course. What do you need?"
"I know it's a huge imposition, my dear, but I'm wondering if you might consider making the trip to the indictment with Harry tomorrow. He isn't in very good shape, and if things don't go as planned, I'm afraid he might need—"
I interrupted him. Since I was knee-high to a ladybug, Grandmama Ida had drilled into my head that the spoken word was a powerful weapon and that putting it out into the universe could make it manifest. I wasn't going to let Fabrizio temp fate like that.
"It's going to come good, Fabrizio," I said, my heart and soul full of hope and prayer that what I was saying was true. "The arraignment will result in them setting you free. I just know it."
He didn't speak for a moment, and when he did, his voice was flat. "Will you come with him?"
My heart broke in two. "Of course I will."
* * *
I went out to the boathouse where Odeo was working and borrowed the keys to one of the resort golf carts guests and employees used to get around the considerable acreage of the resort. I hadn't ever driven one before, but how hard could it be—especially after the crash course Odeo gave me.
Harry Villars lived on the resort grounds a ways off from the main building in what had once been the plantation office where the owner and his accountant met to review the personal, plantation, and household books.
The path to it was paved and smooth and provided no hazards unless you counted the half-dozen or so costumed women from the Covenant of Tara, a Wiccan group who gathered yearly at the resort to honor their namesake goddess, Tara, the mother goddess of unquenchable hunger that propels all life—take that, Alex Trebek. They spent their five-day retreat moseying around the grounds and sitting on the veranda eating and drinking, all day, all the time—unquenchable being the key word here. Good thing the ladies hung out in those loose, flowing robes.
They were a colorful, eclectic group, and I couldn't help but watch as they approached. I veered off to the right so they could pass, and before I knew it, the cart bumped up onto the rise of a small berm. And Jiminy Christmas! The center of gravity shifted, the right two wheels went up in the air, and I was doing a stunt worthy of a James Bond flick. I steered what little I could to keep from going completely over. The pavement was way too close to my face. The Wiccans began to gurgle and shriek, and just as I thought I was going to lose it, three of the courageous witches ran over and leveraged their weight against the cart, bringing it (and, more importantly, me!) safely down onto all four wheels. I lifted my foot off the accelerator, snapped down the brake, and jumped out to embrace them.
"Ohmigod. Thank you so much."
The women literally purred, blessed my future with "white light and smooth pavements," and went their way.
Whew. Their spell must have worked, because I made it on over to la petite maison without further incident.
Harry and Fabrizio's place was a smaller version of the main building, only of red brick construction instead of lumber. La petite maison was in the Georgian style with four Roman columns spaced across the front. A red door with white trim led the way into the one-story house.
I'd only been there once before for Harry's famous Christmas party. The medium-sized house had filled to the brim with what must have been two hundred people of all sizes, shapes, ethnicities, and economic classes. Harry was well-known as a Renaissance man with little or no prejudices unless you counted rudeness or mean-spiritedness.
His place reflected his genteel upbringing and impeccable style. Dark wood floors blanketed with Persian rugs, rich jewel tones on the walls, chandeliers from another era—a comfortable sense of home and manor.
Grandmama Ida would have drooled over the wall-to-wall antique furnishings and tchotchkes. Her traditional double-shotgun house was built in the 1920s. There was no room or money for the accumulation of things. But she did love her some of that old Southern stuff.
"My dear." Harry opened the door and stood back, obviously surprised to see me. "Won't you please come in?"
He looked bad, real bad. Unshaven, hair tousled, eyes sunken and despaired. I knew he was in big-time trouble when I noticed he was wearing, oh lord, sweatpants. But no matter how exhausted, worried, or sad he was, Harry Villars was a gracious host.
"May I get you something, Miss Hamilton? Peach-flavored iced tea? Iced latte?"
"Oh, Mr. Villars, thank you, but I'm fine. I came to ask you a favor."
"Of course, let's sit down." He led me from the lovely, light-infused foyer to a darker, but just as cozy, parlor where a lovely late nineteenth-century Haake upright piano grounded the room on one side, and a traditional marble-manteled fireplace anchored the other.
The piano top hosted dozens of photographs of Harry, Fabrizio, Harry and Fabrizio together, as well as other people I didn't recognize but who held a strong resemblance to Harry, so I figured they were members of his family.
We sat on a tufted leather sofa with gorgeous scrolled arms.
Harry wrung his hands and looked around the room, obviously distracted. "Are you sure I can't offer you some libation?"
"No, Harry." Best get down to it. "I came about tomorrow morning. I was hoping you wouldn't mind if I tagged along with you, you know, to the arraignment proceedings? I want to be there for him, but I just don't think I can do it alone."
I had thought about what I wanted to say to him as I walked all the way from the main building to the boathouse for the cart. I didn't want it to appear as if I was doing this because I thought he was too wimpy to handle it. And even though Fabrizio had alluded to that very thing, I had to admit going with Harry would provide me some comfort too. That is, if things went badly.
Something flickered in his eyes. Relief? Gratitude? He gently laid his hand on mine. "Why, Miss Hamilton, you don't even have to ask. It would be my pleasure to accompany you to court tomorrow."
I patted his hand with my free one. "Thank you, Mr.—"
"Harry, please."
"Thank you, Harry. I've just been so worried about Fabrizio. Having someone else there who cares about him…"
"And we both do, don't we, Miss Hamilton? Care about Fabrizio, that is."
"Yes," I said. "But I still have high hopes that we can get Fabrizio a get out of jail free card before he's formally charged."
His eyes lit up, and he smoothed his moustache, the first I'd seen of the old Harry. "Have you been successful in your discovery, Miss Hamilton, you and Mr. Stockton?"
"Well, honestly, no. Not yet. But we're still hopeful."
"Hmm, I see." He stood. "I've only just received new information from the private sleuth I hired to look into the background of the Elways and Cecile Powell Elway. I haven't even had a chance to take a look at it." He stood and offered his hand. "Would you care to join me in my study, Miss Hamilton? Who knows? It's quite possible the key to solving this mystery and having our dear Fabrizio released from that horrible place will be included in what I received."
We walked together back through the foyer to his study across from the main parlor. The walls were a rich British racing green with library prints of hunting scenes, a few illustrated maps, a huge oil painting of a brown and white foxhound—all the pieces along the wall were warmly lit by strategically placed brass art lights above each piece. Along one wall an overstuffed sofa and wing chair nestled around a serving chest with a tray of glasses and decanters. On the other side of the room, a custom-made built-in desk from the antebellum era dominated the room. It was positioned so it butted up next to a wall of bookcases and shelves. Two old-fashioned wooden office chairs positioned on either side of the two-sided kneehole told me that this wasn't only Harry's study, it was Fabrizio's study too. These two men cared so much for each other they obviously spent as much time together as they possibly could. They must both be suffering without the other.
&nbs
p; Harry sat in one of the chairs and started to indicate I should sit opposite at what I supposed was Fabrizio's side of the desk, but then he hesitated, stood, and dragged a club chair from a corner. We both sat, and he pulled a large manila envelope from his top drawer, spilling its contents in front of him.
"My personal assistant printed all this out for me just a while ago from the attachment to an e-mail," Harry said. "Let's look at it together, shall we?"
There were copies of newspaper clippings and magazine articles, printouts of Theodore Elway's college transcripts, and articles relating to the history of his family's steel business.
Harry picked up a few sheets and handed them to me, and then he picked up the next one and began to give me a Reader's Digest version. "This is a short report relating to Cecile Elway née Powell of the Philadelphia Powells. She was eight years younger than Theodore and met him at a polo match about eight years after he lost his first wife. The two women could have been sisters, and Theodore was drawn to her right away. Theodore was Cecile's second husband. Her first marriage left her well-connected socially, but unfortunately penniless." Harry stroked his moustache and gave me a c'est la vie sort of look. "It was awfully convenient for her that Theodore was so well-heeled. Wasn't it? But, according to what my detective has learned, she was a good and faithful wife to him up until a year or two prior to his death." He scratched the end of his nose. "And then something happened. Something about…worms?"
I nodded. "Caterpillars. Alien caterpillars. I've heard they're endangered, but that remains to be seen."
He looked positively horrified. "Alien caterpillars? I can't imagine how hideous they must be."
"Oh, Mr. Villars, you have no idea." I had looked them up online several days earlier and recalled their tiny fuzzy green bodies, bulbous green heads, and creepy little faces. I shuddered.
Harry's mouth curled with distaste. "But what do caterpillars have to do with…?"
"It's a long story, Harry, but it's possible their champion, a man named Terrence Montague, could be the murderer. I just haven't been able to find any evidence to prove it yet."
I looked down at the papers Harry had handed to me and shuffled through them. "Oh," I said, "so this is what Theodore Elway looked like."
I was looking at what appeared to be a photo off some society page that had been taken at a charity ball or some such thing. A short man who looked exactly like Super Mario smiled from under a big round nose and huge moustache. Bushy eyebrows nearly obscured beady little eyes. His suit was finely made and looked to be custom, but then the man was so short and stout that anything he wore probably had to be tailored.
The woman who was with him was considerably younger, maybe in her early forties, sweetly plump and fresh-faced with soft, hazel eyes and shoulder-length brunette hair that curled in around her jaw. Theodore had his arm around her waist. She was looking up at Theodore and he down at her. Both looked to be positively crazy about each other. Who was this pretty young woman so in love she had eyes for no one else? She looked oddly familiar to me, but I couldn't place her. Didn't know her. Did I? It was probably just that she reminded me of someone I knew once, or someone I wished I'd known.
"When was this photo taken?" I handed it to Harry.
He flipped it over and read a note inscribed on the back. "Christmas, 1999. Children's Hospital Charity Gala. Theodore Elway and guest."
"Guest?" What the heck kind of detective names someone "guest?"
For the next half hour or so, we poured over the rest of the paperwork Harry's detective had sent, but it was mostly a rehash of what we already knew—except for the identity of Mr. Elway's guest at the 1999 Christmas bash. And for some reason, I couldn't get that off my mind.
Harry and I commiserated on how we were running out of time. Once formal charges were filed against Fabrizio, the Elway entourage would be free to return to Pennsylvania, and the murderer would waltz away like a contestant on Dancing with the Stars. If we were going to bag us a killer, we needed to boogie.
Harry let me take the copy of the photo of Elway and the mystery woman in case it turned out that I really did know her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I returned the golf cart to the boathouse. Odeo wasn't around, so I left the keys and walked back to the main building.
Months ago Jack and Harry had booked Hans Ritter, the world famous magician from Dusseldorf, for the Chamber of Illusion, The Mansion's red room dedicated exclusively to all sorts of trickery and deceit.
Once the word got out, the show sold out so quickly, they decided to book a second midnight show, which also sold out.
Over the last two days, guests had arrived from all over the continent to ooh and aah about the unequalled sleight of hand of Hans Ritter, who hardly ever set foot out of his beloved motherland.
The idea had been all Jack, and the successful promotion of the event and the hotel being filled to capacity constituted a real feather in Jack's cap, and I knew he'd be there to make sure everything was ready to go.
It was awesome he was adapting so well to become exactly what this fish out of water resort needed to find its foothold in such a competitive business. Too bad the timing sucked.
I texted him to meet me outside the theater as soon as he could take a break, and then I texted Cat, who I knew had back-to-back readings all day. Under normal circumstances, I'd have been booked all day too, but seeing as how Harry knew I was doing my darnedest to prove Fabrizio innocent, my schedule had been wiped until Tuesday morning. My tip jar would be pretty anemic by the end of the week, and the restoration fund at St. Antoine's Parish would come up on the short end, but the way I looked at it, this was for a good cause too.
Jack walked out of the Chamber of Illusion at about ten after six. I was sitting at a table in the bar in front of the magicians' theater. It was a gorgeous custom-built oak minibar and backbar just outside the theater. The hope was that while waiting in line for the shows to begin, or during intermission, folks would queue up elbow to elbow along the marble-topped bar for a glass of wine or maybe a mint julep or Irish coffee to bring in a little extra pocket change to pay the pricey magicians Jack and Harry planned to bring to Mystic Isle.
The bar itself was an attraction—elaborately carved bar, backbar, and lighted bridge were oak. A polished brass rail was positioned just right for guests to prop up one foot, Old West–style. A dozen or so café tables were set around. The floors were hardwood, stained rich and dark. The lighting was dim except for directly over the bar, which was lit by canned lights on the bridge.
It was cozy and comfortable. I'd been there before for cocktails at a couple of other shows.
Jack wore—oh my GQ goodness—a tux and black tie with total aplomb, like he was born in one, displaying casual confidence the likes of Clooney. I hadn't changed from my skirt and blouse I'd worn to Harry's and felt a little dowdy in his dazzling presence.
Jack's smile was warm, his gaze warmer. "Mel." My one-syllable nickname sounded so sexy on his lips.
Cat showed up just then, so there wasn't time to bask in the spicy glow of Cap'n Jack's attention. I laid the photo of Theodore on the table, and they both leaned over for a look at it.
I explained the details Harry had given me.
"Hmm," Jack said, looking at it. "So that's Theodore. And who's the woman with him?"
"Well, that's the question, isn't it? I just have this itch that she's important somehow, but I just can't place her."
Cat stood up straight and stretched. "That's the psychic," she said, yawning.
It was like a bulb lit up over my head. Of course. I spun the photo around for a look at the woman's face. Add about forty pounds, a sour expression, a pair of heavy-framed eyeglasses, and chop off the hair—and there she was. Penny Devere, Cecile's psychic and Theodore's…what? From the heat evident in the look passing between them, she was more than his psychic adviser. What had Billy said? That Penny was Theodore's psychic adviser before she provided that service to Cecile? Hmm, Th
eodore and Penny? Who would've thought, and what would you call that, a psychic adviser with benefits?
I took another look. She certainly had changed. The woman in the photo was lovely and sweet and happy. Penny was frumpy and sullen and miserable. And, from all appearances, she was hot to trot for old Theodore "Super Mario" Elway.
"Holy crawdaddies," I said. "Could she? Would she? Did she?"
Cat nodded, her eyes blazing. Jack nodded, his mouth turned up in a half smile.
"Are you guys thinking what I'm thinking?" Cat said.
"If you're thinking there's more to Penny Devere than meets the eye…" Jack began.
And I finished, "Then, yeah. We're thinking exactly what you're thinking."
Jack pulled out a chair and held it for Cat then sat down himself. "So if we're all on the same page, maybe we ought to finish this book together."
* * *
A VIP ticket was delivered to Penny's room at six thirty, plenty of time for her to dress and be ready for the magic show—especially considering the way she dressed. It included a meet-and-greet champagne interlude with Hans himself. It was a very cool offering I might not even have been able to pass up, so we had high hopes Penny would show up for her special evening, which was scheduled to begin at seven thirty.
And, holy Sherlock Holmes, she did, all dolled up—well, sort of, with a sparkly barrette holding back her lifeless hair, pink lipstick you'd have expected to see on a thirteen-year-old, and I think it might have been the same dress she had on in that old photo. Regardless, she was ready-freddy for her magical connection.
Hans was a staunch supporter of anyone and everyone in the magical realm and was more than willing to help us if it meant a get out of jail free card for Fabrizio.
Hans, the Aryan boy wonder, was a tall man with pale skin and a head of blond hair more like a lion's mane than anything else. He met Penny at the stage door, his blue eyes and enormous white teeth flashing brightly. A la Elvis, he wore a black-and-gold leather jumpsuit. It fit so close to his skin it occurred to me his costume was part of his act—you know, get the audience to look anywhere and everywhere but your hands?
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