by Josh Lanyon
“Don’t look so worried,” J.X. said. “We’re just going to talk to them. It’s better to handle these things directly.”
“It is?”
“In this case it is. We don’t want anyone having time to brood and maybe coming down to the cabins with a shotgun.”
My expression must have said it all. He reassured quickly, “That’s not going to happen, but it’s best to keep them together and talking till the sheriffs show up. Better for everyone—and safer.”
I was still fretting over the “safer” comment as we reached the lodge entrance. J.X. banged on the door, and after a time, it swung open cautiously. Rita glared out at us.
And maybe the door hadn’t opened cautiously so much as reluctantly, because Rita couldn’t have missed the fact that, whoever the killer was, he was inside the lodge.
“Let’s get everyone together in the meeting room,” J.X. instructed as we stepped inside the lobby.
“Right away, sir,” Rita snarled. “Lord knows I’ve got nothing else to do today.”
“Are you sure about this?” I asked him in an undertone as we followed Rita down the hallway.
“It always works in your books,” he said innocently.
I shot him a narrow-eyed glance. “Well, I can see why you don’t want to try to wrap things up the way you do in your stories. It might be hard to explain fifteen people killed in a shoot-out.”
He laughed, not in the least offended. But then why should he be with everything he wrote hitting the bestseller charts? I didn’t use to be touchy either.
“How long is this meeting supposed to last?” Rita questioned, leading us into the room. A lot of the conference attendees were already there, killing time chatting at the tables placed around the room.
“Hard to say,” J.X. replied. “Can you make sure everyone is down here? Kitchen staff, everyone.”
Rita expelled an affronted breath and stalked out of the room.
J.X. and I waited while the room slowly filled. He leaned against the wall, relaxed and alert while I wandered to and from the windows. Outside, the rain had stopped.
I walked back to J.X. and said quietly, “You’re doing this to keep them together, aren’t you? You’re trying to keep someone from making a break for it. That’s what this is about.”
“Maybe.”
“You don’t really expect me to solve this or anything?”
“Stage fright, Mr. Holmes?”
“No, I don’t have stage fright. I don’t think of this as a play. Or a game.”
“Good, because neither do I.” He added honestly, “And I really am interested in hearing how you figure it all went down. I think you think you know what happened.”
By now the room was filled, and everyone was looking our way. Edgar approached and said, “What’s going on, boys?”
“Kit is going to share his theories on the murders,” J.X. said. “I think everyone is going to find them as interesting as I did.”
Edgar looked taken aback, but he nodded and went over to the fireplace, tossing wood into the grate and then taking a seat on the raised hearth.
I looked around the packed room. Rita and Debbie were standing near the doorway with most of the staff. Rachel and Espie were at a table with the remaining Wheaton & Woodhouse contingent including Mindy and George.
A sea of curious and critical faces turned my way.
J.X. said, “Excuse the disruption to the day’s festivities, folks. Christopher Holmes has been sharing some of his theories about the murders with me, and I think some of you will be very surprised to hear what he has to say.” He nodded to me.
I threw him an ungrateful look. Miss Butterwith always had Inspector Appleby and the redoubtable Mr. Pinkerton on hand for these scenes. Not that I wouldn’t take J.X. over Inspector Appleby and Mr. Pinkerton both, but I was so far out of my comfort zone I could have been lying on a bed of nails.
“Go on, Christopher,” Rachel said. I could practically see the dollar signs in her eyes as she envisioned a new direction for my writing career. True crime stories.
I cleared my throat. “I think in order to understand this crime, we need to examine the character of the first victim, Peaches Sadler.”
“The victim is not—and cannot be—placed on trial,” a voice called out stridently. I recognized a new up-and-coming legal thriller writer.
J.X. said, “We’re not holding a trial.”
“Is it an inquest?” a fresh-faced newbie inquired. She was holding a notebook, under the impression this was now part of the conference’s program.
“Uh…no.” J.X. gave me another of those encouraging nods.
I said, “Okay, so back to Peaches. I never had a chance to meet her, but…” My gaze fell on Debbie’s face, and I changed what I’d been about to say. “I understand that she was the kind of person you either loved or hated.”
“Mostly hated,” Espie put in, and there was an uneasy titter of laughter from the Wheaton & Woodhouse table.
“I don’t know a lot about her background. I know she grew up locally and that she had a wild reputation. I’m not sure if that was something she later felt she needed to live down, but when she moved to New York and sold her first book, she changed her name to Peaches Sadler.”
The legal thriller writer chipped in, “The use of pen names is well-established and—”
“This wasn’t a pen name, though. According to her former agent, she legally changed her name. I don’t know if that was indicative of other problems, but it seems to me that Peaches—or Patty as she was formerly known—had a chip on her shoulder and the sense that other people owed her. Her professional and personal philosophy seems to have been Do unto others before they do you.”
“That’s not true,” Debbie cried. “She was wonderful to me. She was generous and encouraging.”
Rita patted her arm, pacifyingly. Her black gaze drilled into me.
I said, “I think she liked you, Debbie. But generally speaking, she was not very nice to people. She was also not a very good writer, although writing seems to have been her burning ambition. When her first novel didn’t sell, she successfully plagiarized a much more talented author to launch her career.”
Espie’s face was flushed.
“That seems to have been a pattern through her professional life, stealing other people’s work and passing it off as her own. What Peaches was very good at was the personality side of it. She might have been a pill to those closest to her, but she knew how to turn on the charm for readers and booksellers. She was pretty, she could be charming, and she was very smart. Her career flourished. I don’t know about her personal life. Steven Krass obviously knew her pretty well, and he seemed genuinely broken up over her. But there were other people close to her who she betrayed. Betrayed with unnecessary cruelty, which is what I think got her killed.”
J.X. tipped his head to me in that…keep it rolling fashion. His eyes were on the room, watching the faces turned and listening.
“For whatever reason, she liked hurting people,” I said. “She went out of her way to hurt people, and the people who she seemed to have the biggest grudge against were the people who knew her when she was transitioning from Patty to Peaches. I don’t know what that was about, but this weekend she found herself sharing airspace with some of her oldest and most bitter enemies. And being Peaches—or Patty—instead of trying to mend some broken karma, or ignoring those folks, she turned her hand to a little more mischief-making.”
“Meaning what?” George asked warily.
“Well, to start with, trying to seduce you. Seduction was pretty much her default setting, so I don’t think it was about you so much as trying to get at Mindy who probably didn’t try and hide the fact that she thought Peaches was an ignorant and talentless slut.”
“Oh my God,” Mindy exclaimed, looking around. “He’s trying to do the drawing room denouement. I knew this felt familiar.” She was chuckling.
George stood. “If you think I killed that bitc
h, you’re out of your mind.”
“Sit down,” J.X. warned, pushing away from the wall.
Mindy tugged his arm. “Sit down, silly. The guilty party is never one of the first people mentioned.” To me, she said, “Go on, Christopher. This is fascinating. So you do know who did it.”
“I don’t think you killed her, George. I think you’re pretty experienced in the ways of the…heart, and you aren’t about to jeopardize your…” at the last instant I substituted meal ticket for “…happy relationship with Mindy.” I glanced at Mindy. “And Mindy alibied you, which I believe is true because I don’t think Mindy lets you out of her sight long enough to get into trouble.”
Espie hooted with laughter at that one. “What about Mindy? She could have killed Peaches. I heard them arguing that night.”
Mindy gasped indignantly.
I said, “If George wasn’t having an affair with Peaches, and I don’t think he was, then Mindy doesn’t have a real motive. On top of that, we have the nature of the second crime to consider. Peaches was struck with a piece of firewood—probably in this very room—which indicates rage and impulse. But Steven was killed out back with an axe. I can’t see Mindy using an axe to take someone out. But even if that grandmotherly exterior hides the heart of a Lizzie Borden, we come to the problem of moving Peaches’ body. Whoever killed her had to be strong enough to carry or drag her out to one of the vehicles, probably the truck, and then get her from the truck to the shrine in the woods. If you’ve ever tried to move a deadweight, you’ll understand why that eliminates almost everybody here, including me.”
“Maybe Krass and Peaches weren’t killed by the same person,” Rachel suggested.
“I thought of that.”
Mindy said, “What about the man who was in her bedroom the night she was killed?”
“Ah.” I glanced at J.X. He was watching me curiously. “Yes. We had two accounts of this mysterious man belonging to the pair of boots Mindy saw sitting at the foot of Peaches’ bed.” My gaze lowered instinctively to J.X.’s boots. He crossed his ankles casually.
“Of the remaining men here at the lodge, both Edgar and J.X. are physically strong enough to have carried Peaches down to the garage and into the woods. And I think they’re both strong enough—and mentally tough enough—to wield an axe and kill someone. I don’t think either of them are killers by nature, but they’re both the manly man type who’re willing to use violence to protect themselves and the things they value.”
“What makes you think it was a man with Peaches that night?” Espie asked. “She swung both ways.”
“I don’t know that she really swung both ways or whether she occasionally used sexual favors with same-sex partners to get what she wanted.”
“Who was in the room with Peaches that night?” Mindy asked, shooting distrustful looks from Edgar to J.X.
“Oh, that’s easy,” I said. “That was J.X.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Huh?” J.X. said, straightening.
“Yeah, you’re the killer,” I said. “Didn’t you know?”
“What are you talking about?” He was staring at me in bewilderment. So was everyone else.
Rachel said uncertainly, “But…but J.X. was hit over the head and thrown in the cellar.”
“He faked that.”
“I…w-what?” J.X. stammered.
“Sure,” I said.
“How the hell would I do that?”
“You’re a cop. You know all kinds of ways to do stuff.”
He was staring at me as though I’d gone insane. It was very satisfying.
“So what’s my motive?”
“Peaches was your first wife. You married her when you were both attending San Francisco State University. When you tried to divorce her to marry your brother’s girlfriend, she threatened to take half of everything you owned.”
You could have heard a pen drop. In fact, several pens did drop from the hands that had been busily scribbling notes.
I met J.X.’s wide gaze steadily. After a long stunned silence, he said quietly, “You shit.”
I shrugged.
“What happened to this isn’t a play, this isn’t a game?”
“I told you I didn’t want to do this.”
“So you accuse me of murder?”
“You accused me.”
“I didn’t accuse you. I locked you up for your own protection. I should have killed you myself.”
“Ha!”
“What the hell is going on?” Edgar asked grimly, rising. He looked from J.X. to me.
“Kit is trying to be funny,” J.X. said.
“No one’s laughing,” Edgar pointed out.
“No. Sorry.” I looked at him. “And I mean that. I am sorry, Edgar.”
He blinked, then lost color. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means, I can’t prove it, but I’m pretty sure you killed both Peaches and Steven Krass.”
Debbie gave a little scream. Her mother grabbed her, hugging her. Rita’s bleak gaze met mine over her daughter’s blonde head.
I said to her, “And I think if you didn’t know all about it, you suspected it.”
Her lips folded. She held Debbie closer.
The room was dead silent except for Debbie’s hysterical cries. I said to Edgar, “This is what I think happened. I think a long time ago, you and Peaches knew each other very well. I think she came back here, and there was still a certain amount of chemistry between you, and I think you allowed yourself to be seduced.”
And who the hell could blame him married to the unlovely and unpersonable Rita? But while Miss Butterwith could have said that aloud, I could not. Instead I said, “And I think Peaches, with her socio-pathological streak, threatened to go to Rita.” My gaze was drawn again to Debbie sobbing on her mother’s shoulder. “I think maybe Peaches had a particular ace up her sleeve—”
“Don’t,” Edgar said roughly. Rita was shaking her head back and forth over Debbie’s.
I stopped. So I was on the right track. I said, “And I think that knowing how jealous Rita is, you tried to reason with Peaches. But I don’t get the impression that Peaches was a very reasonable person, and at some point you lost control and hit her with a piece of firewood from that basket over there.”
Edgar looked at the basket on the hearth beside him.
“When you saw what you’d done, you carried Peaches down to the truck. Then you either told Rita—”
“Leave Rita out of it.”
“Or you went upstairs yourself and packed up Peaches’ belongings and carried her suitcases down to the truck. You or Rita are about the only two people who could move about the lodge at any hour without anyone questioning it, and naturally you have keys to every room and every cabin and every vehicle.”
He said nothing.
“I think you drove down to the shrine and dumped Peaches. I don’t think you had time for more than that, and I don’t think you had decided what to do yet. For obvious reasons you didn’t want her found on your property.”
Tentative sunlight was gilding the faces of everyone in the room. The storm had finally moved past.
“I think maybe I did hear a truck that night,” one of the pink ladies chimed in.
J.X. said, “And Steven saw what happened?”
I was watching Edgar’s face. “I don’t think so. I think if Krass knew for sure what had happened, he would have spoken up. But I think he knew what Peaches… I think he knew a fair bit of Peaches’ history, and I think he was drawing some natural conclusions. Did he arrange to meet you that night?”
Edgar said nothing. His eyes moved to Debbie and Rita. He looked at me.
I said, “If you tell me what happened, I won’t offer my theory on motive.”
When he spoke, Edgar’s voice was hoarse. “I didn’t arrange to meet him. I waited for him to go to bed that night, but he didn’t. He couldn’t sleep, I guess. He paced in his room for hours and then, finally, when the rain stopped for a
little while, he went outside to smoke. I followed him to the patio, and I…shut him up once and for all.”
There were a number of winces and shivers from our spellbound audience.
“How did you get hold of my earring?”
His eyes met mine unwaveringly. “It was in the folds of her clothing. It must have fallen out of your ear when you bent over her body. It dropped on the truck bed when we lifted her in.” He shrugged. “I didn’t have anything against you, but you’d had a run-in with Krass that night, so I thought I’d use it.”
“Why did you attack J.X.?”
“I was snooping in the cellar,” J.X. said. His eyes met mine. “That much I do remember.”
Edgar nodded reluctantly. “You were snooping everywhere.”
“Why didn’t you kill him?” I asked.
Edgar scrubbed his face wearily. “Because I wasn’t sure we—I—was going to get away with it, and I didn’t want to make things worse for myself. Things were unraveling too fast, and there was no point killing a cop if I was going to be arrested anyway. I thought I’d wait and see what happened. If I could have made someone believe that he’d killed Patty, but…” He looked at me. “You kept insisting on all the reasons he couldn’t have.”
He could have killed me, of course, but that was veering into mass murderer territory, and Edgar wasn’t that kind of a killer, although as frightened and desperate as he was, he must have at least considered it while I was bending over that black pool in the icehouse. A shudder rippled through me as I remembered—
“There’s a plane coming,” George spoke suddenly, pointing at the long picture windows. “Helicopter, I mean.”
We all turned and stared out. Sure enough a sheriff’s copter was hovering over the vineyard, making its slow approach, scanning for a good place to land.
“I don’t think I should say anything more,” Edgar said.
I tended to agree with him.
Everyone was rising, crowding out through the meeting room doors, going to greet the sheriffs. Edgar went to Rita and put his arms around her and Debbie. The three of them stood there in a small huddle, holding tight.
