Crime & Punctuation

by Kaitlyn Dunnett

  For a moment I was stumped. Why was I taking such a personal interest? I’d barely met Tiffany. I certainly didn’t owe Ronnie any favors. I hated to think I’d only gotten involved because I was nosy. Then I once again pictured Alan Van Heusen looming over me in my own dining room.

  “I don’t like bullies. And I think the cops are barking up the wrong tree.”

  Darlene frowned. “Can you elaborate a little on that?”

  I’d told her already about the visit from Van Heusen and the interest everyone had expressed in the mysterious something they’d all thought Tiffany had left with me. Darlene also knew about my discovery of the thumb drive and, in general, what it contained. When I’d recapped all that, especially my conclusion that thinly disguised versions of both Onslow and Van Heusen appeared as characters in Tiffany’s novel, I added the new bits.

  “Tiffany was at odds with her husband over Wonderful World. She left her shares in Mongaup Valley Ventures to Ronnie, although Onslow is contesting the will. Then yesterday, I found out that Tiffany and Ronnie quarreled on the day Tiffany died, which is why the cops now think that Ronnie might have been the one who killed her.”

  “Whoa! Who said anything about killing? I thought Tiffany’s death was an accident.”

  “That’s what everyone thought, but it seems Detective Hazlett didn’t close the case after all.”

  “Wow.”

  “Indeed. There’s something else, too, although I’m not sure how it fits in. Ronnie has been seeing Alan Van Heusen.”

  “Seeing?”

  “Socially. Ann Ellerby—you remember Ann?—told me that Van Heusen has been a frequent caller at Ronnie’s house. I’ve no idea what he’s really up to, but according to Ann, he’s been acting like he’s courting her.”

  “Isn’t he a little young for her?”

  I gaped at her. “Really? That’s your take on this? Darlene, it’s got to be a con, or maybe Onslow ordered him to butter her up to undercut her opposition to Wonderful World.”

  “I’m surprised you care. Ronnie was awful to you in high school. Come to think of it, I’m not sure I’d put it past her to have murdered someone.”

  “Not her own granddaughter. Besides, back in the day her weapon of choice was always the well-aimed taunt. Words hurt, but they aren’t usually fatal. I don’t believe Ronnie killed Tiffany. In fact, from what she said to me, she actually thought Tiffany might have committed suicide.”

  “Whoa. Hold on. When did you talk to Ronnie?”

  I filled her in on our encounters and then repeated my suspicion that Onslow, or maybe Van Heusen, might have murdered Tiffany to keep her from ruining whatever scam they were running with Wonderful World.

  “I suppose Onslow could have drowned his wife to protect his business dealings,” Darlene said, but she sounded doubtful. “He’s a creep and a crook, but that’s a long way from being a cold-blooded killer.”

  “Anyone can kill, given enough provocation.”

  She shook her head. “No. I don’t buy it. I don’t think he’d want to get his hands dirty. He’d delegate.”

  “To Van Heusen?”

  “More than likely.”

  “If they entered a conspiracy to commit murder, then they’re both guilty.”

  A wry smile played at the corners of Darlene’s mouth. “I like that scenario, but we have no proof that it’s true.”

  “Then your next task is to find out more about the flunky.”

  “Petty revenge. I love it.”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” I objected, although of course I did.

  “You just want to bring Van Heusen down as payback for scaring you and stepping on Calpurnia’s tail.”

  I made a face at her but took it as a good sign that she was able to apply a bit of dark humor to the situation. “Maybe so,” I admitted, “but I’ll tell you one thing. Something is definitely off-kilter with the Wonderful World project, and your experience with Onslow and the tannery suggests that the outcome is not going to be good for Lenape Hollow. We may not turn up anything to advance the homicide investigation, but I’d say we have as good a chance as anyone of uncovering proof that the men running Mongaup Valley Ventures are as crooked and twisty as Storm King Highway.”

  Darlene gave a snort of laughter at the comparison. Pasting her best effort at an evil grin on her face, she rubbed her hands together in anticipation. Neither of us voiced the sobering thought that must have occurred to us both—that when Tiffany had found that proof, she’d ended up dead.

  Chapter 29

  With Darlene sleuthing online, I made an attempt to do a little detecting in the non-cyber world. Ronnie, however, refused to talk to me. She’d left orders with Ann not to let me in.

  When I left the North house, I drove to Wonderful World. I’m not certain why. I certainly wasn’t going to risk trespassing charges or another encounter with Onslow’s goon, Paul Klein. I guess I just wanted to remind myself that it was a real place, and to eyeball how close it was to Ronnie’s house. That proximity must have doubled the annoyance factor for her. Bad enough her grandson-in-law wanted to build a theme park, but the fact that he intended to put it right next door to her home had to be galling in the extreme.

  When I got back into the car, I noticed I was getting low on gas, so I drove downtown and pulled into the gas station across the street from our old school. I could still remember a time before it was built. There had been an old abandoned house on the lot. Feeling very brave, I’d crept inside with a couple of friends—I can’t remember which ones after all this time—and spent an hour or so wandering through the empty rooms. That was the height of daring for my eight-year-old self.

  The current incarnation was at least twice as large as the gas station I remembered from the 1960s. Back then, I’d often stopped in on my way to school to buy chewing gum or candy. I don’t imagine my parents knew about that.

  The rack of goodies had been kept in a tiny office that also contained a desk and a cash register. There had been an adjacent two-bay garage where the owner did minor repairs. In those days, most people paid for their gas with cash. Credit was a local matter, extended on a person-to-person basis.

  There were three pumps available, all of them self-service. I got out of my car and stared at the screen in front of me. Intellectually, I know that buying gas with a credit card is a simple process, but I’m one of those people who always inserts the card upside down first and then backward. Third time’s the charm.

  Embarrassing as that is, it’s nothing compared to my clumsy attempts to stick the nozzle into the gas tank, and that’s assuming I can get the gas cap unscrewed in the first place. I consider my efforts a success, however, if I don’t end up sloshing gasoline on my clothing. Back in Maine, there are still plenty of places that offer “full service.” They pump your gas for you, wash your windshield and rear window, and take cash in payment. Boy, do I miss that.

  I was still glowering at the slot where the credit card was supposed to go and muttering under my breath when someone came up beside me.

  “Good morning,” Joe Ramirez said. “Problem?”

  “Only with my being fumble-fingered and old-fashioned. I hate having to pump my own gas.”

  He grinned. “Maybe you should have bought a place in New Jersey.”

  I stared at him with a blank look on my face. I’d heard what he said, but it didn’t make any sense.

  He relieved me of my credit card, inserted it correctly, and worked whatever magic was necessary to get the system to accept it. “In New Jersey, by law, customers aren’t allowed to pump their own gas. You have to have the gas station attendant do it for you.” After returning my card, he reached for the nozzle. “Allow me.”

  “Thank you. You’re a lifesaver.”

  He shrugged. “Naw. I’d just hate to have a customer go away mad. This is my place.”

  “Oh, I see.” I didn’t know whether to be embarrassed or doubly grateful. The latter was easier. “So, tell me, since no one else
in town seems willing to pump gas for little old ladies like me—”

  He smirked at my self-identification, making me like him even more.

  “How do people with disabilities manage?” I finished.

  I was thinking of Darlene. With her arthritis, she’d have more trouble than I did with the whole process.

  “My employees are always glad to assist,” Ramirez assured me. “All you need to do is go inside and ask for help.”

  A glance through the windows at the front of Joe’s business showed me what amounted to a convenience store. Rows and rows of goodies were available for purchase, everything from potato chips to toilet paper.

  “What if getting in and out of the car is a hassle?”

  His smile broadened as he gave a couple of final squeezes to make sure my tank was full and extracted the nozzle. “If you sit here by the pump long enough, I’m sure someone will be curious enough to come out.”

  My receipt popped out, and he handed it to me.

  “I appreciate this,” I told him.

  “No problem. We like happy customers.” He started to turn away.

  “For what it’s worth, Darlene Uberman and I have started digging into Greg Onslow’s and Alan Van Heusen’s past business practices. We’re hoping to come up with something that will stand up in court.”

  I expected praise. I got a frown. “You be careful,” he warned before he continued on into the store. “Either one of them would make a bad enemy.”

  Chapter 30

  On Friday, Mike asked me to have lunch with him. My first thought was that it wouldn’t hurt to have a lawyer on standby, and Mike was the perfect candidate. There was certainly no love lost between him and Onslow, and as Ronnie’s attorney, surely he’d be interested in any evidence that would help get his client off the hook.

  I slid into the passenger seat of his car prepared to launch into a lengthy account of what Darlene and I had been up to, but he barely gave me time to say hello before he took charge of the conversation. During the twenty-minute drive to the restaurant he’d chosen, Mike talked nonstop, mostly about what great food they served there.

  I wondered why he was trying so hard to impress me, but after the first mile or so I was content to let him ramble. Belatedly, I remembered that he’d warned me against snooping. He might not be as happy as I’d hoped to hear that I’d ignored that advice.

  When we were seated and the waitress had taken our orders, I started to speak. The words caught in my throat when I noticed the way Mike was staring at me. The troubled expression on his face did not bode well.

  “Something bothering you?” I asked.

  “It’s that thumb drive you found.”

  Too late, I recalled that there was something else Mike didn’t know. Despite the promise I’d made to him, I had given Tiffany’s thumb drive to Detective Hazlett. That I’d tried to phone Mike first and couldn’t reach him was no excuse. I could have waited until we could go to the police station together. Since I hadn’t, the least I could have done was to confess as soon as I was able to reach him.

  That ship had sailed. Attempting to sound innocent, I asked, “Do you think there’s something on there that will clear Ronnie of suspicion?”

  “My concern has nothing to do with Ronnie.”

  “Then what? You obviously have something weighing on your mind.” When he didn’t answer me right away, I drew a deep breath. “Either Greg Onslow or Alan Van Heusen killed Tiffany. I’m more certain of it with every passing day.”

  His whole body tensed. “Proof?”

  “If I had any, I’d have taken it to the police, but there are plenty of hints in Tiffany’s novel. She barely disguises either of them, and the characters based on them are crooks. The one who is clearly Van Heusen is a hit man.”

  “In fiction,” Mike reminded me.

  “The thumb drive also contains research files, one or more of which might yet prove to be evidence of wrongdoing.”

  I would have said more. I certainly intended to confess that Detective Hazlett already had possession of the original, but the expression of distress on Mike’s face stopped me cold. Instead, I closed my mouth, frowning. What on earth did he find so troubling about that statement?

  The answer came to me in a rush, causing me to make a small sound of distress. Of course he was concerned about the possibility of the police reading those files. He must think Tiffany had identified his father as a murderer. I made my voice as gentle as I could.

  “I don’t think anyone will make the connection. It’s only because I know you and some of your family background that I did.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”

  Although he was trying to sound clueless, I was convinced that he knew exactly what I meant. I explained anyway, telling him about the clue in the Oxford comma and the details in Tiffany’s files that had led me to believe that he was the anonymous source of Tiffany’s account of the copycat crime.

  “I can understand why you don’t want your father’s story made public,” I added. “Obviously Tiffany didn’t intend to tell anyone about it. Neither do I. You have my word.”

  The arrival of our meal gave Mike an opportunity to process what I’d told him. By the time the waitress left us alone again, he’d regrouped. He sent me a rueful smile. “I’ll hold you to that promise.”

  “Cross my heart and hope to die.” The childhood oath and the gesture that went with it came easily, but the laughter that followed had a hollow sound. “But, Mike, if you didn’t want anyone to know the truth, why did you share the story with Tiffany?”

  “I didn’t. Well, not intentionally. My second wife was friendly with her mother, and of course I knew her father, so Tiffany was at our house a lot when she was a kid. She was interested in true crime even then.” He shook his head. “I’ll never understand how such a well-brought-up young girl came to be so fascinated by the stories of a bunch of low-class mobsters, but she was. One day when she was at the house she was going on about this one murder—the one I had reason to know something about—and before I knew what I was saying I told her that the police got it wrong. I stopped before I said too much, but she was always a sharp kid, and she was relentless. Every time she saw me after that, she tried to worm more details out of me. In the end, bit by bit, she had the whole story. I thought I’d been clever about it. I said I knew the truth because the man’s son was a client of mine, but she guessed early on that I was talking about my own father.”

  “How did you hear the story?” I asked. “I mean, you never knew him. I remember that much. You used to say that he died when you were still in diapers.”

  “My mother told me how he used to boast about getting away with murder. Can you believe that? To prove what a big man he was, he gave her all the details. She was appalled, of course.”

  So appalled that she’d shared the story with her only child? People are strange. And I still didn’t understand why Mike had told even part of that ghastly tale to a young girl, no matter how macabre her interests.

  “How much is on the thumb drive?” Mike asked.

  “Not your name. Or his. Tiffany’s notes reflect the way she gathered the information—separate pieces that she was later able to put together to make a whole. She was thorough in her research once you gave her enough to go on, but she must have realized you wouldn’t want the story to spread any farther. She didn’t use a copycat killing in her novel.”

  Looking relieved, Mike forked up a generous portion of the lasagna he’d ordered. I tucked into my coquilles St. Jacques. The wonderful smells wafting up from the food had been tempting even while the topic of conversation had threatened to rob me of my appetite. We ate in silence for a few minutes before he spoke again.

  “You can understand why I was reluctant to let the police see the contents of Tiffany’s thumb drive. If she’d named names, they might have thought I had a reason to silence her.”

  “Don’t even joke about it.”

  “I’m not
kidding. It would seem logical to them that someone in my situation could be desperate to keep Tiffany quiet.”

  Unwilling to admit to that brief moment of doubt I’d had when I’d first suspected that Mike was Tiffany’s source, I sent him a bright smile and spoke in a bracing tone of voice. “You would never kill anyone.”

  “Of course not, but I’m glad all the same that I have an alibi for the time of Tiffany’s death.”

  I mimed wiping sweat from my brow, but I was dead serious when I said, “I’m very happy to hear it.” After a moment’s hesitation, I added, “I gather they’ve been investigating Tiffany’s death as a homicide all along.”

  “It looks that way. Something appears to have cropped up as a result of the autopsy, something that makes Ronnie a person of interest to them.”

  “Aren’t they looking at anyone else?”

  “I imagine they are, but they don’t confide in me.”

  “They need to do more to investigate both Onslow and Van Heusen, and there could be information to help with that on the thumb drive.”

  Mike’s fist slammed down on the tabletop, startling me and drawing the attention of other restaurant patrons. A dark red stain crept up his neck and into his face as he hissed at me. “Will you stop obsessing about that damned thumb drive?”

  “Sorry.”

  He held up a hand. “No. I’m the one who should apologize. I overreacted. Tell you what—let’s drop this subject entirely and simply enjoy the rest of our meal. Okay?”

  “Sounds like a plan,” I agreed, relieved that I wouldn’t have to admit that I’d already given Tiffany’s files to the police. I suppose I needed the respite from talk about murder and other crimes as much as he did.

  Chapter 31

  When renovations began on my house, I gave myself permission to sleep as late as I wanted to on weekends. Saturday and Sunday were the only two days I could be certain that no workmen would show up first thing in the morning.