Crime & Punctuation

by Kaitlyn Dunnett

  My first cautious sip told me I’d been right. The coffee had been enhanced with a jigger of whiskey. I’m not much of a drinker, but in these circumstances I was grateful for the nip. I’d downed more than half of the drink when I sensed a presence beside me. I looked up to find Joe Ramirez awkwardly shifting his weight from foot to foot.

  “Would you mind if I joined you, Mrs. Lincoln?”

  “Not at all.” At first I assumed he was asking because all the other tables were full, but a surreptitious glance around Harriet’s told me that wasn’t the case. There were more people than usual in the café, but a table by the window was free. Curious, and well aware that Ramirez was one of Ronnie’s biggest supporters, I smiled at him and waved him toward the chair opposite me.

  He plopped himself down and picked up a menu. When we’d both ordered soup and sandwiches, I sent him a speculative look.

  “What do you think of today’s news?”

  “Mrs. North is being railroaded. No question in my mind.”

  “Detective Hazlett must have found something pretty damning. He’s not the type to go off half cocked.”

  “Mrs. North didn’t do it,” Ramirez said in a low voice.

  “I don’t think she did, either.”

  “Maybe you can help her.”

  “Me? How?”

  “Figure out what really happened. She talked you up to her housekeeper, you know. Ann repeated some of what she said to me.”

  “Ronnie said something positive about me?” I was astonished.

  Ramirez nodded. His expression was solemn, but a spark of amusement lurked in his dark eyes. “Come to think of it, it might have been more like a complaint. She told Ann that you were good at solving puzzles. Back when you two were in high school, you were the one who was the fastest at figuring out the word problems in math class and diagramming sentences in English. Apparently you were a whiz at algebra, too.”

  I made a face. “I hated math. I just happen to have a good memory and the ability to spot patterns. No big deal.”

  “It was to Mrs. North. She told Ann that she had to struggle to keep up with you.” He chuckled. “Sounds to me like you two were rivals back in the day.”

  I was surprised to hear that Ronnie had seen me as competition. I’d always thought she looked on me as a lesser being. She’d certainly made enough derisive comments about me, picking on my clothes, my hairstyle, and any other shortcomings she could identify. I was still mulling over this new insight when our food arrived. By then the crowd had thinned out some.

  After a few bites, Ramirez renewed his effort to get me on board the “free Ronnie” train. “You told me you and Mrs. Uberman were trying to dig up dirt on Greg Onslow. If anyone killed Tiffany Scott, he did. Have you found anything to point the cops in his direction?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing criminal, just unethical, but you already know he’s a sleazeball.”

  As I took a bite of my roast beef on a kaiser roll and chewed, I realized that there was something Joe Ramirez did not know. I’d never told him about Tiffany’s novel or her research files. While we ate, I quietly filled him in on the essential details.

  “On the surface, those files have nothing to do with Greg Onslow, but I’m certain she based characters on him and Van Heusen. Why would she do that unless both of them are more than just run-of-the-mill swindlers?”

  He didn’t look any more convinced than Detective Hazlett had.

  Having finished eating, I stacked my soup bowl on top of my sandwich plate and shoved both to one side so I could put my elbows on the table and lean closer to Ramirez. I was conscious of the other café patrons nearby, but none of them seemed to be interested in our conversation, and Sonya and her cronies had already left.

  “No matter what Ronnie may have said about my problem-solving abilities, no matter how smart Ann thinks I am, the fact remains that the police had enough evidence to make an arrest, and it isn’t Onslow who’s sitting in jail right now.”

  “Are you saying you’ve changed your mind? You think Mrs. North is guilty?”

  “I’m saying we don’t know all the facts, and we could be wrong about her. I’ve heard it said often enough that anyone can kill given the right circumstances. I’m afraid we need to consider the possibility that the police are right, and she did murder Tiffany.”

  “No way would she harm a hair on that girl’s head.”

  “They had an argument on the morning of the day she died.”

  “Who doesn’t fight with their relatives once in a while?”

  He had a point, but someone had to play devil’s advocate. “What if Tiffany backed out of her promise to help oppose Wonderful World? I keep thinking of that will Onslow produced. Who’s to say it isn’t the real one?”

  “Nothing would have made Mrs. North murder her own granddaughter. Besides, Tiffany would never have written a will in favor of that crook she married. Once she figured out what he was up to, she and Mrs. North had only one goal, to stop him.”

  “When?”

  “When what?”

  “When did Tiffany switch her allegiance? I met her a few days before she died, and I did not get the impression that she and her husband were on the outs.”

  “It was recent,” Ramirez admitted, “but there’s no question about how she felt. Like I told you the other day, she discovered proof that he was a crook. That’s what made her turn against him.”

  “Proof she didn’t share with anyone.”

  “Right.” He stared morosely into his empty soup bowl. “What I can’t figure out is why she stayed with him as long as she did. She was a smart girl. She should have caught on a lot sooner than she did.”

  “Maybe she was in love with him,” I suggested. “Or she’d liked being married to a rich, powerful man. Some women value those attributes enough to turn a blind eye to what they don’t want to see.”

  Ramirez didn’t look pleased by my suggestions. I wasn’t happy about them, either, especially when I considered Tiffany’s novel. She had not written that book overnight. At a guess, she’d spent at least a year on it, and if she modeled her villains after her husband and his flunky, then she knew full well what kind of businessmen they were.

  Why, then, had she stayed with him?

  I found a likely answer in Onslow’s temper. I’d witnessed it for myself in his clash with Ramirez at the cemetery. It wasn’t much of a leap to conclude that Tiffany might have been afraid to leave him.

  “I’ve told you about Tiffany’s novel,” I said aloud. “What I haven’t told you is that someone broke into my house early Saturday morning and stole my laptop.” I explained my reasons for thinking Onslow was behind the theft. “Who else would want to make certain that all the copies of the novel and the notes for it disappeared?”

  “You think he recognized himself in her story?”

  “Maybe, although I’ve read that most people that writers use as models for their characters never spot the similarities between themselves and the fictional versions. It could be that Onslow saw something I missed in the research files, but if Tiffany’s proof was on that thumb drive, it was well hidden.”

  “Huh,” he said, frowning.

  “What?”

  He shook his head but he looked shaken. “It’s this business of Tiffany writing a novel. That means she was making stuff up, right?”

  I nodded.

  “That’s an awful lot like lying.”

  “So it is. What are you getting at?”

  “That quarrel you say Mrs. North had with her granddaughter—what if it was because she found out Tiffany had been deceiving her? I hate to say it, and I’m not sure I believe it, but what if she’d been working with her husband all along and was trying to con her grandmother into making some concession that would make it easier for them to build the theme park?”

  We stared at each other across the table, neither of us liking the conclusion to which this reasoning led. Faced with such a heinous betrayal by her own kin, Ronnie could
have been driven to murder.

  Chapter 33

  When I left the restaurant I headed north along Main Street, taking the shortest route home. I’d spent far longer than I’d intended over lunch. There was still a steep hill to climb, but it was the one that led straight to my house. When I was a kid, this route—the Alley—was a handy shortcut to and from school. It was also the quickest way to get to the grocery store.

  Somewhat to my surprise, that store was still in business, although it had changed names and hands any number of times. I remembered it best as an A & P. I’m not sure there are any of those left anymore.

  Once I’d huffed and puffed my way up the lower section of the Alley, where I’d almost come to grief on a sled one winter, the grade leveled off a little. I was still climbing, but walking took less effort. Preoccupied with Ronnie’s arrest and its implications, I paid no attention to my surroundings until the low growl of a car engine and the crunch of tires on the loose gravel at the side of the paved section penetrated my consciousness.

  The vehicle sounded alarmingly close. I glanced over my shoulder and my heart leapt into my throat. The bumper of a full-size SUV was less than a foot behind me. Pulse racing, I jumped smartly to one side, fearing that, in another second, it would run right over me.

  Once off the tarmac, I stumbled through high grass as I turned to give the driver a piece of my mind. One glimpse of his face drove all thought of yelling at him right out of my mind. I recognized the enormous hands grasping the steering wheel and the hard eyes boring into me as the nostrils beneath flared. That resemblance to a bull about to charge confirmed his identity. It was Paul Klein, the security guard who’d hassled me for taking pictures at Chestnut Lake.

  I knew I was in serious trouble when he veered in my direction. The truck followed me into the field.

  Cue the theme from Jaws and substitute a dark blue SUV for the shark. I had no idea why Klein was trying to run me down, but his intent was crystal clear. I zigged. He zagged. In desperation, I looked around for a place to take shelter. I didn’t think I could outrun the truck long enough to reach the safety of my house.

  Still bobbing and weaving, desperate to put some distance between myself and the metal monster behind me, I cut across the grassy area we’d used as a playground when I was a kid. There was a house on the far side. When I was young, I spent a lot of time with the children who lived there. We’d scare ourselves silly playing a game we invented in which every car that drove along Wedemeyer Terrace at dusk with its lights turned on was a monster. We’d shriek and hide behind parked vehicles until the danger was past. The reality version on my tail wasn’t nearly as entertaining. I was panting with exertion, and perspiring freely, and my legs felt as if they might give out on me at any moment.

  With my last reserves of strength, I headed for the Edgar house. Back in the day, there was a sort of tunnel where we’d played another of our games. Intertwined branches over our heads had shielded us from the outside world. I had no idea if it still existed, but I prayed that it did. So far, I’d avoided being hit by the SUV less by my agility than because the same ruts that kept trying to trip me up were also making the truck veer off course.

  I glanced over my shoulder and felt a jolt of panic. Klein was steering straight at me. I dove for the entrance I remembered, positive I could feel the heat of his engine scorching my back.

  Even at eight years of age, I’d had to stoop to walk under the boughs. Squirming in beneath them at sixty-eight required executing an ignominious belly flop. As soon as I landed, I started to crawl like a soldier under fire. My heart was pounding so loudly that I could no longer hear if I was being pursued.

  The ground was hard packed and cold. Twigs caught at my clothes and hair, but I kept going, praying all the while that the idiot behind the wheel wouldn’t decide to plow into the barrier of branches to get at me.

  It didn’t take long to reach the other end, although it seemed an eternity. I popped out next to a very familiar tree. It was much bigger now, but those limbs were the ones on which we’d perched to pretend we were birds sitting on our nests.

  Off to my left, I heard Klein gun the engine of the SUV. A moment later, tires squealed as they hit the hard surface of the Alley and the vehicle sped away. I lay there panting, only dimly aware that a woman had come out of what had once been the Edgar house. It startled me when she spoke.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’ll live.”

  I rolled over and sat up, knowing I must look a sight. I was glad I hadn’t bothered with a purse for the short walk to Harriet’s. I’d have lost anything that wasn’t attached during my mad flight. As it was, my keys, cell phone, and a little cash were safely tucked into the pockets of my jeans.

  I looked down at the cowl-neck sweater I’d put on over a long-sleeved cotton tee. It had once been a lovely shade of pale green. Now it was covered in dirt, leaves, and twigs and ripped in at least a dozen places.

  “Mikki?” the woman said. “Mikki Greenleigh?”

  Surprised to hear her address me by my maiden name, I stared at her. She was about my age, so I’d probably known her years ago, but I had no notion who she was.

  “I’d heard you bought your old house,” she said, and then helpfully added, “It’s me—Cheryl Edgar. Well, Cheryl Soretto now.”

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake!” I used a handy branch to haul myself upright.

  Cheryl was one of the seven Edgar children. All but the eldest had been younger than me, but I’d played with all of them when I was small. Cheryl had been the next to youngest. When I was a little older, and had outgrown such pastimes, she had continued to stop by the house to ask if I could “come out and play.” I’d ignored her and left it to my mother to gently turn her away. I felt a little guilty about that now. I’d abandoned old friends for new. And then, a little later, I’d discovered boys.

  “What happened to you?” Cheryl looked me over with a critical eye, but her lips twitched as if she was trying not to laugh.

  “Long story. I owe you an apology,” I added in a rush.

  “For what?”

  “For not telling you in person that I’d gotten too old for ‘Birds’ and ‘Monsters’ and all our other games.”

  She laughed. “We’re all a lot older now. And you’re bleeding. Do you want to come inside and get cleaned up or go home to do it?”

  I looked down at my hands, which had taken the brunt of the abuse not borne by my sweater. Now that the adrenaline rush was wearing off, my knees stung and my back and shoulders were none too happy with me. “I think I need to sit down.”

  The interior of the Edgar house looked very different from the way I remembered it. I don’t know why that surprised me. It had been close to sixty years since I’d last been invited inside. Cheryl had changed, too. Hair that had once been golden brown was now a gorgeous silvery gray.

  While she fussed over my minor injuries and got me a glass of water, Cheryl chattered on about how she’d stayed on in the family home after the rest of her siblings moved away. She’d married, had a brood of children of her own, and been widowed about a year before I was.

  I drank the water, submitted to her ministrations, and stayed largely silent.

  “There, that should do it.” She closed the first aid kit and placed it on the end table.

  We were in her living room, near the front window. Just as I looked out, I saw a familiar vehicle cruise by—a dark blue SUV. I couldn’t see the driver, but a chill ran through me. It had to be Paul Klein. Was he looking for me? Would he come after me again?

  Following the direction of my gaze and seeing the shudder, Cheryl compressed her lips, put her hands on her hips, and fixed me with a look that brooked no denial and made me wonder if she’d gone into teaching, too. “Spill.”

  “That SUV tried to run me down.”

  “In the Alley?”

  I nodded. “When did they make it a through street?”

  “It isn’t, although some people treat it th
at way. They put barriers up during recess, just to be on the safe side, since the children from the Catholic school play on the tarmac. Why was someone trying to kill you?”

  “That’s a good question.” I fumbled in my pocket to retrieve my cell phone, relieved that it did not appear to have been damaged when it, and I, had been merrily bouncing along on the ground. “Excuse me a moment, Cheryl,” I said with extreme politeness. “I need to call the police.”

  Chapter 34

  Once again it was Ellen Blume who responded to my complaint, meeting me at my house some twenty minutes after I phoned the police station. Seated on the loveseat in my living room, she took my statement without comment, but there was something in her manner that suggested she had her doubts about my reliability as a witness.

  “How is it that you recognized the driver?” she asked. “Do you two have a history?”

  “Not much of one. I only met him once, when he was working as a security guard at Chestnut Mountain.”

  From my chair, arranged at a right angle to her perch, I watched her face, all the while continuing to stroke Calpurnia’s soft fur. A cat in the lap is the best medicine on earth for jangled nerves.

  “And this previous encounter? When was that?”

  “Last month. Mr. Klein caught me trespassing on Mongaup Valley Ventures land and escorted me back to my car.”

  She lifted a questioning eyebrow at me, sensing there was more to the story than I was telling her. When I didn’t elaborate, she prompted me with another question. “Is that the place where they’re going to build a theme park?”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “And you didn’t encounter this man again after that incident?”

  “Not . . . directly.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that I’ve seen him a couple of times, and now that I think about it, there could be a reason for that.” I frowned, trying to remember just when and where I had noticed Paul Klein lurking. “If he doesn’t have kids in the Catholic school, then he was watching my house the other day when he was parked across the street. And I think he might have followed me to Harriet’s on another day, although I suppose that could have been a coincidence. I have no idea what kind of hours he works.”