A Birder's Guide to Murder

by J. R. Ripley

  The phone rattled and Phoebe motioned for me to hold for a second while she answered. She frowned with the receiver to her ear. “I told you the end of the week.” Silence. “Yes, well, you will simply have to wait until then. Promise.” She hung up and smiled at me. “Where were we?”

  I pressed my knees together. “You were about to tell me who might have wanted to see JJ Fuller dead.”

  “Was I?” Phoebe picked up a pencil and beat out a pattern on her desktop. “Take your pick. There’s his wife, of course. The shrew.”

  “You mentioned he was getting a divorce? Is it acrimonious?”

  “I couldn’t say.”

  “Do you think JJ could have been seeing another woman?”

  “Amy, there is always another woman.”

  “Care to elaborate?”

  “No.” Phoebe stood. “I really should be going.” Phoebe wiggled her butt as she moved, looking much like her namesake, the phoebe, which was known for its tail flicking behavior.

  “Before you go, is there anyone else you can think of in attendance who might have wanted JJ dead?”

  “JJ was a man of grand ambitions, Amy. He ruffled the feathers of more than one man—and woman—over the course of his career.”

  Phoebe paused in the doorway. “Then again, perhaps it is for the best that JJ is dead.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because Ilsa’s announcement tonight would have absolutely killed him.”

  9

  After a stop at the hotel, Derek and I returned to the Expo Center alone. Floyd and Karl had opted out, claiming they were too tired. I made them promise to stay out of trouble.

  And gambling casinos.

  “That’s JJ Fuller’s widow,” I indicated as we shouldered our way through the crowd toward the main hall where Ilsa Skoglund was now set to speak in place of JJ Fuller.

  “Let’s go pay our condolences,” I suggested. It would be a good excuse to see if Lorna Fuller could provide any insight as to who really murdered her husband.

  Derek brushed his lips over my cheek. “You do that. I see one of the onsite security guys. Karl struck out earlier but I’d like to see if he remembers seeing or hearing anything or anyone else this morning that might shed some light on things. Maybe we can get Esther released.”

  “Is that really a good idea?” I half joked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Maybe Esther is better off in police custody until this whole thing gets sorted out.”

  “Do you think somebody might be out to harm her next?”

  “No, I think being behind bars will keep her out of mischief.”

  “Trust me, being led away by the police on suspicion of murder will have set her straight.”

  “If only I could believe that.”

  Derek disappeared into the throng. I scanned the moving crowd until my eyes alit on Lorna Fuller several yards away, nodding as passersby whispered their sympathies. Her face was pale.

  I pushed my way through. “Excuse me, Mrs. Fuller.”

  “Yes?” Lorna Fuller said wearily. Her mascara was smeared and her lavender lipstick poorly applied.

  “I’m Amy Simms.”

  She looked me up and down with a pair of very judgmental blue eyes. “Another of JJ’s little conquests?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Another bird in a gilded cage?”

  “No, I never actually knew your husband. Not personally. In fact, I only met him yesterday.”

  Lorna Fuller pressed her pinkie against the corner of her mouth. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize. It has been a difficult couple of days.”

  “I can imagine.”

  “A difficult week really.” She sniffed.

  “Oh?”

  “It’s the traveling. JJ loves—loved it. Myself, I’d rather stay home.” Her lip moved down. “However, I thought it best to come this time.” Something danced across her eyes as she added, “Make sure JJ was taken care of.”

  “I suppose that what with all the birding your husband must have been away from home a great deal.”

  “I told him time and time again that there were plenty of birds to be seen at home. Why, the golf course in our neighborhood is simply filled with the things.”

  “I see.” I had a feeling JJ Fuller was a seeker of far more adventure than mere golf course birding. Derek, on the other hand, would have loved it.

  “Just last week he was in some forsaken corner of the world in the middle of nowhere.”

  I pictured exotic locations like Spain or Portugal or maybe Patagonia. “It must be nice to have the opportunity to explore the world.”

  “The Pearl River, that was it.” Lorna’s eyes glazed over. “Near the Louisiana border with Mississippi. I assumed it was all a lie and that he was going to New Orleans, probably to meet up with some floozy.”

  “I’ve heard there is a lot of excellent birding in that part of the country,” I said in defense of her now dead husband. Why, I didn’t know.

  “JJ telephoned me. He was quite excited. He said he couldn’t wait to tell me all about his trip. He said he couldn’t wait to share with everyone.”

  “You mean at the Expo?”

  “I guess. I told him he should just tweet it like everybody else seems to do these days.” Lorna rolled her eyes. “JJ liked to make as big a splash as he possibly could.”

  I refrained from saying what I was thinking, which was that JJ Fuller had made the biggest splash of his career at the American Birding Expo. One he would never top. Unless he returned from the dead—which apparently was not impossible. After all, Marty had managed it.

  “What was it that he was so excited about?”

  “He wouldn’t tell me. That’s how my husband was. Always making big secrets out of little ones.” She chuckled. “He probably found a dodo bird feather or something.”

  I was pretty sure there was no such things in existence.

  Derek was waving his arm to get my attention.

  “If you don’t mind me asking, do you have any idea who might have wanted your husband dead?”

  Lorna Fuller’s manicured eyebrows rose but her forehead remained smooth as glass. “In fact, I do mind, Ms. Simms. I mind very much. Excuse me.”

  “You’re not staying to hear Ilsa Skoglund?”

  “Not a chance.” Mrs. Fuller swayed on her feet. “That should have been me up there.” I smelled alcohol on her breath.

  “Really?” I couldn’t imagine that JJ’s wife would have had many kind words to say about her dearly departed husband if rumors of the divorce were true. Not to mention the vicious swing I’d seen her take at him mere hours before his demise.

  “My husband may not have been perfect but he deserves a proper eulogy, not this circus.”

  “Of course.” I nodded solemnly.

  Lorna scowled at me. “Please, you’re just like the rest of them.”

  “What do you mean?” I pushed away from the door as the remaining stragglers filed passed us to get into the room where Ilsa Skoglund would soon be speaking.

  “Do you think I haven’t heard the whispers? The rumors?”

  My blood grew cold. “I’m not sure I—”

  “JJ might not have been a perfect man or an ideal husband.” She sipped the remains of her wine. “But I loved him. He did not deserve to be murdered.”

  “I saw you arguing with your husband yesterday morning, Lorna.”

  JJ’s widow smiled. “I hit him, didn’t I?”

  “That you did.”

  She shrugged. “We had our ups and downs. That doesn’t mean that I wanted him dead.”

  “Someone did.”

  “I heard the police have taken a suspect into custody. Some old woman. Can you imagine?”

  “No, I can’t. I heard JJ tell Phoebe to
stay away from you. Why?”

  “You must have heard wrong. You want to know who killed him, Ms. Simms?” I nodded, and she continued. “Let me tell you. If it wasn’t the woman in custody and it wasn’t one of his little birdies who’d gotten angry because he’d dumped her and moved on to another, then it was Skoggie.”

  “Skoggie? Do you mean Ilsa Skoglund?”

  “The two loathed one another.”

  “Why?” Shipman had told me pretty much the same thing.

  “They were competitive to a fault. Both preferred the spotlight on themselves. Neither was happy when the light of the birding world fell on the other.”

  “And now your husband, JJ, is dead…”

  “And the spotlight falls only on Skoggie.” With those final and potentially significant words, Lorna Fuller tottered off, disappearing out the entrance and into the darkness.

  By the time Derek and I entered the hall, Ilsa Skoglund was standing behind the lectern.

  “Did we miss anything?” I asked Shipman as we squeezed in beside him.

  “No. Ilsa is only warming up.”

  The younger man to his left in a matching slate polo shirt bearing the Ornitho Optics logo giggled.

  “Not so loud, Travis.” Irving Shipman tugged at his associate’s arm. “This is my replacement, Travis Stevens.”

  Travis had short dark hair and a prominent nose. I found something about him a little off-putting. Maybe it was the fact that he was skinnier than me.

  “Replacement?”

  “I’m retiring shortly.”

  “Irv’s showing me the ropes,” Travis added.

  The force of angry eyes prompted us to shut our yaps and return our attention to the speaker.

  “JJ was a rock star,” Ilsa boomed. “A true star in the cosmos of birding.”

  “Oh, brother,” a svelte young woman near the edge of the podium whispered rather too loudly.

  “Who is that?” I muttered.

  “Nikki Nilsson. JJ’s assistant.”

  “I hadn’t noticed her before.” Nikki Nilsson was a knockout. Half JJ’s age but from what I’d learned so far, JJ did not discriminate on the basis of age.

  “Nikki arrived today.” Shipman tugged at the lanyard around his neck. “She flew up from Miami.”

  I inched forward. “I think I’ll go introduce myself.”

  “What for?” Derek asked.

  “Shame on you!” Nikki Nilsson tilted her head toward Ilsa in anger. “You are a fraud!”

  Anonymous voices shouted her down.

  Ilsa’s fingers turned white as she gripped the edge of the lectern. “We are all going to miss dear, sweet, brilliant JJ,” she said, defiantly staring down at the distraught former assistant.

  A security guard led Nikki away. I pushed after them but by the time I pushed through the crowd, she and the guard had disappeared.

  “And that is why it is with mixed emotions that I announce to you all the discovery of a lifetime.” Ilsa turned to the side of the podium. “Phoebe, if you would, please.”

  Seated at a table on the right side of the stage, Phoebe punched some keys on her laptop. The big white screen behind Ilsa came alive.

  The crowd gasped.

  “What’s going on?” Derek appeared at my side.

  “I’m not sure.” The photograph on the screen was blurry and dark. It showed a bird of some sort on the branch of a thick tree.

  “Yes,” Ilsa said. “The elusive and long-thought dead ivory-billed woodpecker, ladies and gentlemen.” She nodded to Phoebe who showed two more pictures, each clearer than the previous.

  I jolted.

  “What is it?” Derek asked.

  “Could it be? Are those really shots of an ivory-billed woodpecker?”

  “I don’t see what the big deal is. We see woodpeckers all the time.”

  “Yes, but not the ivory-billed woodpecker. It’s been thought that the bird is extinct.”

  “It looks like Ms. Skoglund has proven that theory wrong.”

  “Yes. And she’s fifty thousand dollars richer for it.”

  Derek let loose a low whistle. “How do you figure?”

  I explained about the reward being offered.

  “Maybe I haven’t been taking bird-watching seriously enough.”

  “You’ll get no argument from me over that.” I pulled at Derek’s arm. “Come on. I’ve seen and heard enough.”

  “Did you learn anything from security?” I asked as Derek steered the van back to the Eagle Inn.

  “Nope.”

  “So nobody saw or heard anything unusual.” My hands fiddled with the A/C vent, blowing warm air my way.

  “Not until Esther found JJ Fuller’s body in that bathroom.” Derek pulled into the parking garage. “Say, you don’t suppose for even one minute that Esther actually…”

  “Actually what?”

  “You know.” Derek ran a finger along his neck.

  “Not for even one second.”

  Derek parked and we started down the dark street toward the inn. I locked my arm through his.

  “What about this spy business?” Derek asked.

  “What about it?” I had shared a bit with Derek what little Esther had shared with me about her past.

  “Do you believe our Esther was actually a spy?”

  We marched on as I considered the question. It was a question I had been asking myself over and over. I still had no good answer. “No. I don’t think so.” I stopped on the sidewalk forcing passersby to skirt around us. “How could she be? It’s impossible, right?”

  “What’s that line about believing six impossible things before breakfast?”

  “That’s something the queen says to Alice in Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There.”

  “Think about it, Amy,” Derek said, pulling me along once more. “You are always saying how mysterious Esther is.”

  “And annoying. And pushy.”

  “Yeah, that too.”

  I forced Derek to a halt once more. “But a spy? Really?”

  “What do you really know about her?”

  “Well, I—”

  Derek cut me off. “Face it. You say it yourself. You don’t know anything about her past. She lives in the same house as you and you don’t even know for sure if she has a cat.”

  “I suppose but—”

  “Maybe she was like a Mata Hari.” Derek wriggled his brow in reference to the notorious WWI courtesan and reputed German spy.

  “This Mata Hari needs a drink.” I angled into a noisy brewpub on Market Street.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Derek didn’t put up any resistance.

  A jazz trio wailed away on a squat raised stage in the front window. We found a tiny table near the bar and sat.

  “If Esther was a spy,” I said once our beers arrived, “how did she end up in Ruby Lake?”

  “She’s no spring chicken. Her sister lives in Ruby Lake. She probably retired there. Maybe Ruby Lake is where old spies go to end their years. Maybe Floyd and Karl are ex-spies too. Maybe—”

  “Maybe you’ve had too much to drink.” I pushed my mug across the table. “A spy, huh?”

  “Stranger things have been known to be true.”

  “I can’t picture Esther as a spy or a coldblooded killer.”

  Derek took a long drink before answering. “Maybe it wasn’t so coldblooded.”

  “Now what do you mean?”

  Derek leaned his elbows on the table. “What if JJ Fuller was a spy too?”

  I narrowed my eyes at him.

  “And what if Esther was sent to, you know, eliminate him?”

  I held my breath. “Derek, you don’t think—”

  He broke out in a deep laugh and tossed back his beer. “Of course not, Amy. I’m only
teasing.”

  But was he teasing?

  And could there be any truth to his theory?

  Six impossible things before breakfast. An extinct bird had come back from the dead.

  Was Esther a professional assassin?

  10

  The next morning, we met in the lobby of the inn.

  Derek handed me a large cup of coffee. He raised another to his lips and sipped tentatively as the steam spilled from the tiny hole in the lid.

  “Thanks. This is just what I need.” The coffee was strong and bitter.

  I could see trouble written on his face. “What’s wrong?”

  “Floyd and Karl never got back last night.” Derek rubbed his free hand over his cheek. He wore a pair of nice-fitting blue jeans, hiking shoes and the heather gray Birds & Bees sweatshirt I had gifted him. He smelled of fresh lime. The ends of his hair were damp.

  “You’re joking?”

  “I wish I was.”

  “And they didn’t call?”

  “Nope. I tried both of their cells. Floyd and Karl are incommunicado. I hope nothing has happened to them.”

  “I’m sure they are fine.” I yanked up the zipper of my jacket. According to the local weather forecast, it was going to be a chilly forty degrees. “Something is going to happen to those two when I get a hold of them.”

  I took a moment to consider what two crazy old men would do in Philadelphia. It didn’t take me long to reach a likely conclusion. “I bet they spent the night gambling.”

  “Probably.” Derek wasn’t convinced. “Do you want to wait here while I go fetch the van?” He started for the door. It was five-thirty. There was no doorman in sight. The front desk was unattended.

  “I’ll walk with you.” I grabbed his arm. “I could use the fresh air. Besides, I have a feeling you are not telling me everything.”

  We marched up the dark quiet street for several minutes before Derek replied. “There is one little thing.”

  “So spill it, already.” My breath came out in a cloud of vapor mingling with the steam from my coffee.

  “Esther’s out.”

  “Esther’s out.” I paused outside the parking deck. “You mean out of jail?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then why don’t you sound happy about it? That’s good news, right?”