Changing of the Guard Dog

by Lane Stone

  John exhaled a long breath. “Sue, I know you don’t want to hear this again, but you can’t count on your memory for what the hand looked like. Especially since you saw it under water.” He hesitated before he went on. “From the footage it looks like she was alone in the car.”

  “Could whoever it was have been hiding, maybe on the car’s floor?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “The car was too small.”

  “Like in our last case? Remember Rick’s father’s clown car?” I asked.

  “Was not our case.”

  “You’re such a stickler but, fine, my case,” I said. “But mi case is su case. Damn it.” They looked at me like I had really cussed. “We’re not hitting dead ends. We’re hitting brick walls and every single time it’s because of the PSO.” John stared at me but didn’t bother to correct my pronoun again.

  “How is Rick?” Lady Anthea asked. Had she changed the subject because I had criticized her precious classical musicians? He was the owner of Raw-k & Roll. She had met him on her first visit and gotten to know him better during the second when we cleared his father of a murder charge.

  “I’ll see him at Cape Henlopen later this afternoon,” I said as we walked into the hallway.

  “Are you going surfing?” John asked.

  “SUPing.” Though he had yet to join me, he knew that was the acronym for stand up paddle boarding. It was Wednesday and I hadn’t been on the water since Saturday. “Would you mind if Lady Anthea looked at the music score on that USB drive?”

  “Sure, but why?” he asked.

  “We want to be certain that’s the piece the orchestra is rehearsing this week,” she answered.

  “Does it really matter what they’re playing?” John asked.

  The truth was, I had no idea if it mattered, but the fact that Georg Nielsen’s masterpiece—the one that was supposed to catapult him from prodigy conductor to prodigy composer—had two titles bothered me. Was it too much to hope it might be a loose brick?

  I turned to see the bus driver walking in, so we didn’t have to answer.

  Alexander Whittle ambled up to John. He didn’t appear nervous and he was in no hurry to get there.

  “Thank you for coming in,” John said. He spoke to people with true respect. “We’ll go in here.” He opened the door to the interrogation room and Whittle went in.

  We sat around the table and once the recorder was on, John listed our names.

  “Please tell us about your whereabouts and activities this past Saturday night,” he began.

  John had posed the question, but Whittle looked at me when he answered. “I was with my wife, my kids and my in-laws. It was my wife’s birthday party.” He pulled out his phone and swiped the screen. “I’ll show you the photographs of the party.”

  “That won’t be necessary. What time did you get home?” John said.

  I reached for the phone and looked at the photos. “I hope you can come back to Lewes and bring your family. We have a new bowling alley.”

  John cleared his throat.

  “We got home around nine o’clock. Ms. Galligan called me at about ten thirty. She was upset. She said she was in Lewes. I—”

  “What exactly did she say when she called?” John interrupted.

  “Nothing that had to do with these murders,” he said, again addressing me.

  “Can you remember what she said?”

  Whittle answered, but reluctantly. “She said ‘it’s not fair,’ but she never said what wasn’t fair.”

  “Did you ask her?” John asked.

  At first Whittle’s furrowed brow had me thinking he didn’t understand what he was being asked. I put his hesitancy in answering the last few questions together with my images of him when I’d observed him in Cordy’s presence and felt I understood. He held her in such deference that he felt these questions impertinent.

  “And then what happened?”

  “She said she was all right where she was and we hung up.”

  “Where was she?” I asked.

  Whittle shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  “Was she indoors or outside? Could you hear the ocean? Was she in her car?” I asked.

  “No, she was indoors. That’s how it sounded.” That elaboration, that added-on phrase, told me, told all of us, that he was withholding information.

  “She’s famous,” I said slowly. “Could she have a fan who would do something like this? Kill two people?”

  “Two people? Didn’t Nick Knightley kill Maestro Nielson?” he asked.

  “We don’t know yet,” John said. “What happened next?” By that he meant, I know what happened next.

  “She called again the next morning. She was more upset, too upset to drive, so I came to get her and take her to her home.”

  “Where do you live?” John asked, again a question to which he surely already knew the answer.

  “Hyattsville, Maryland,” he said. His hands were clasped on the table and I studied them. Those were not the hands that had held me under water and made me think I was dying. He caught me staring. “I didn’t kill anybody.”

  “I know.” I was whispering, and I hadn’t meant for my voice to come out like that.

  “Thank you for letting Ms. Galligan go,” he said.

  I knew John was going to give me a hard time later for Alexander thanking me for Cordy’s freedom. I smiled and pointed to John. “Thank him.” Then I leaned closer. “You know at some point someone is going to have to, uh, be honest. You’re going to have to stop protecting each other and tell Chief Turner what happened.” I straightened and tried to lighten the mood. “After all, you have a concert coming up.”

  His expression, of wariness and wanting so badly to be understood, didn’t change. “It’s the music.”

  “I don’t understand,” John said.

  “The music has to be protected. Cordy didn’t kill anyone. Please don’t upset her. She makes music.”

  The emphasis he’d placed on makes told me he didn’t mean in the everyday sense. “When she plays the violin?” Lady Anthea asked. “She’s masterful.”

  Alexander Whittle shook his head. “She makes music,” he repeated. “It’s nothing when it’s just the score. That’s just paper.” I wondered if a composer would agree, but that would be a question for Lady Anthea. “When music is heard, it’s created.”

  I pulled out my phone. “Sorry, I have to check this,” I lied. Then I texted Margo Bardot. Alexander Whittle being taken into custody. I pushed my chair back and smiled.

  Chapter 29

  Lady Anthea, Chief Turner and I stood in his office. He was too mad to sit so the two of us stood in the doorway and Lady Anthea stood next to his desk. “You terminated my interview!” he bellowed.

  “I had to,” I said.

  “Why?”

  “Because Cordy will be here in a few minutes,” I answered. Of course, my volume was about half of his. “If I’m going to Cape Henlopen we’re going to have to speed this up. Plus we have tonight’s rehearsal. You can let him go after she leaves.”

  “I can? Gee, thanks. I haven’t made that decision yet. I’m having his location confirmed at the time of each of the phone calls. If they check out, he has an alibi for the time of both murders. I could charge him with obstruction. Or that darling of all prosecutors, conspiracy. Did she tell you she was coming back?”

  I glanced back at Lady Anthea, who was slyly reading something on John’s desk. That would pay him back for not telling us he had known all week that she was the driver of the electric-blue electric car.

  “Not exactly.” I told them about my text. “He’s obsessed with Cordy. He confuses her with her music. It’s like for him the two are the same.”

  Lady Anthea was nodding. “Sue, you’re on to something. You heard him say it, he doesn’t see himself as protecting h
er—he’s protecting the music.”

  “So you’re hoping she’ll charge down here if she thinks he’s being arrested and finally tell us the truth? Okay, not bad,” John admitted, grudgingly.

  Lady Anthea twisted her pearls. “Did you think he was romantically involved with Cordy?”

  “Nah,” I said, then I looked at John. “You’re sure Cordy does not have the strength to hold Georg Nielsen down to drown him?”

  “What do you want me to do? Arm-wrestle her?”

  Lady Anthea cracked up.

  Traitor, the look I shot her practically said. “Why did she place that first call to Mr. Whittle?” I asked, pretending to ignore him. “You would be that upset if you had just killed a man.”

  “What possible motive would she have?” Lady Anthea asked, still protecting the concertmaster.

  “Here she comes. Let’s ask her,” John said, gesturing toward the door. “We’ll talk to her in here.” He walked to meet Cordy and escorted her back to his office, where Lady Anthea and I stood waiting. John sat in his desk chair. Cordy and Lady Anthea took the leather-upholstered guest chairs. I leaned against the wall.

  “Are you here to tell us why you telephoned Mr. Whittle on Saturday night?” Chief Turner asked.

  “I had been drinking. By then, for many hours,” she answered.

  I shook my head and John saw that I wasn’t buying it. He gave me a go-ahead look. So I did. “You spent twelve hours with someone out of—what, professional courtesy?” She tried to say something and I held up my hand. “Let me stop you there. Why do you refer to Nielsen’s composition by a different name than everyone else does?”

  Cordy’s head snapped up to look at me but she didn’t speak. If the look in her eyes was any indication, she was too angry to talk.

  I pressed on. “At the press conference Margo used the title Symphony by the Sea, but at the first rehearsal you called it The Ocean, Our Original Opus. The music was kept a secret before its debut. The score and parts you and the rest of the PSO are using says the title of Nielsen’s piece is Symphony by the Sea.”

  She jumped up from her chair like she was going to charge me but John was standing in front of her, menacing, so fast it seemed he had materialized onto the spot.

  “It was never Georg Nielsen’s composition and it was never called Symphony by the Sea!”

  “How did you know its original title?” I asked.

  “Because I wrote it!”

  Chapter 30

  Someone in that orchestra had finally spoken the truth.

  Cordy took a deep breath. This act of unburdening herself had acted as a balm and her words tumbled out. When she got the sheet music to practice she saw it was her composition. She needed it back. And she needed Georg to admit she was the composer before he performed it, or it would always be seen as his.

  After all the talking, she seemed spent from emotion.

  “You have been carrying around a heavy burden,” Lady Anthea said, kindly.

  Cordy nodded and slumped back down onto the chair.

  “Let’s go over what happened on Saturday night and Sunday morning again,” John said.

  “And then you’ll let Alex go?” she asked.

  “Probably.”

  Cordy hesitated. I saw the look on John’s face and I wanted to tell her that was the best deal she was going to get. “Okay. Like I said, I met Maestro Nielsen in New York and we had brunch. I told him that I knew he was passing my composition off as his and that I wanted him to admit it was mine. He acted like he was considering it, so when he asked me to give him a ride to Lewes I said yes. I even suggested the ferry. He drank a lot in the bar on the way over from Cape May. He still hadn’t committed, so when we got here, and he wanted to sit on the beach and talk, I said I would. I tried to reason with him, telling him his reputation would suffer, too, when I made all this public. He just laughed at me. I got mad and left.”

  “Where did you go?” John asked.

  “My car. I called Alex. I fell asleep and when I woke up, I drove off.”

  “You told Mr. Whittle all this?” he asked.

  “Sure. He was so sweet,” Cordy said, with no idea she’d just outed him as a major liar on her behalf.

  “How did Georg Nielsen get it?” I asked, praying that wasn’t a dumb question. I had no idea how hard or easy it would have been for Nielsen to get his paws on brand-new sheet music.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “He acted like he was about to tell me. Then he passed out or fell asleep or something. Believe me, he was alive when I left him on the beach.” She turned in her chair to face Lady Anthea. “You understand, don’t you? He had to admit it was mine before it was performed. If Nick Knightley hadn’t killed him, maybe he would have!” As she spoke to Lady Anthea, something over my business partner’s shoulder caught her eye and she stopped.

  Alex Whittle was walking through the lobby, led by Officer Statler. I watched the scene play out. I imagined Cordy’s voice traveling in slo-mo to him. He turned and their eyes met. That part I didn’t imagine. He kept walking. Cordy stood and announced, “I drove to the parking lot and slept for a while and in the morning I telephoned Alex and he came for me. That’s all I can tell you.” I assumed by that she meant it was all she was going to tell. That would change once she was arrested.

  She walked to the door and only turned around at John’s baritone voice. “Remember what I said about staying in town.”

  “I do remember. Now I have a rehearsal to get ready for.” She looked at me and then at Lady Anthea. “Neither of you are welcome there.” She marched out as if she thought she was holding all the cards.

  We watched her go and finally I spoke. “I honestly don’t know how to feel about that.”

  “Lady Anthea, you’re probably more torn up, right?” John said with a kind smile.

  If he had suspected her attempted matchmaking, all was forgiven and that made me smile. It also freed up my brain to go back over what Cordy had said. “Assuming she was telling the truth about sleeping in her car, where was she parked? She told that two ways. First that she slept where she was parked, and the second time in the Home Depot parking lot.”

  “I’ll check the cameras, but it wasn’t at the beach. We don’t allow that. If we didn’t patrol, the neighbors would probably report it, anyway.”

  I laughed. “Neighbors like Bess and Roman Harper would, I bet.”

  Lady Anthea hadn’t spoken for a few minutes. Now she exploded. “Oooooh, I want to shake her.” She was fuming.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so mad,” I said.

  “I am angry!” She turned to face John. “Sue and my brother are in danger until we know who Cordy picked up on Sunday morning!”

  “I am doing all I can,” John said to her, but looking at me.

  I nodded to show him I knew he was. He smiled.

  She was pacing back and forth in front of his desk now. “They are supposed to be an orchestra, not a conspiracy.”

  “Sue, I keep thinking about what you said about hitting a brick wall named Potomac Symphony Orchestra. It’s true,” John said. “Any Elvis wisdom?”

  “‘All Shook Up?’”

  “What?” Lady Anthea asked.

  “How does that help?” John asked.

  “We need to shake them up and see if anyone will turn on the others,” I said. “They fight like the proverbial cats and dogs in rehearsal.” Then I remembered John hadn’t been present at any of these brawls and recounted a few of the highlights. “You should see them.”

  “So you’re suggesting we un-orchestrate the orchestra?” Lady Anthea’s raised eyebrow told me she found this interesting.

  “Yes, I am.”

  “When Cordy is in charge she makes them behave,” Lady Anthea said.

  “Can she control them after they get really out of control?”
I wondered.

  “How? You two are banned from tonight’s rehearsal.”

  Lady Anthea and I looked at him. She went back to pacing.

  “We need to do something about that,” I said. “I’ve got it! I know two people who are not banned from the library. Almost, but not quite. I’ll call on Charles Andrews and his new lady. He owes me one for bringing So-Long under control on Tuesday.”

  “And remember the uproar he created on Sunday at the senior drivers’ class?” Lady Anthea said.

  “I cannot think of any two people more qualified, with the obvious exception of ourselves. Let’s go set it up,” she said as we walked out.

  “I’ll give you a couple of days, but then I will arrest Ms. Galligan,” John said.

  “Fair,” I said.

  Lady Anthea glanced back at John. “And Sue, don’t forget we’re taking Albert to dinner tonight.”

  John’s face drooped and he looked at me. Before I followed her out I kissed him. Lips. Hard. Long.

  She and I didn’t talk as we walked to the Jeep, but when we got inside I said, “I really thought you had given up on that pipe dream of yours for your brother and me to get together, but maybe not. Please do.”

  “You would be perfect for him. He told me he thinks you’re beautiful. You would love Frithsden.”

  “But John…” Any of the possible ways for me to finish that sentence needed to be spoken to him first.

  “He’s leaving Lewes,” she said.

  “No, he’s not. He would have told me.”

  “He applied for the position of assistant police chief of San Francisco. He meets the qualifications and has been chosen along with other qualified applicants to come for an in-person interview.” She spoke like she had memorized the lines.

  “Where did you get all that?” I felt numb.

  “I read a letter on his desk.”

  Chapter 31

  “Let’s see, what can Mr. Andrews do to un-orchestrate the orchestra?” Lady Anthea asked.

  “I have an idea.” I had hatched it before she’d dropped the bombshell about John leaving Lewes.