Murder on Old Main Street (Kate Lawrence Mysteries)

by Judith Ivie

  As I expected, Emma was enchanted by my discovery and insisted on taking advantage of our opportunity to locate the other end of the conduit. I remained in the reading room and recited the lyrics of Tom Lehrer’s deliciously satirical song, “Oedipus Rex,” into my end of the tube while Emma scurried into the lobby to hear what she could hear. “There once was a man named Oedipus Rex. You may have heard about his odd complex. His name appears in Freud’s index ‘cause he … loved his mother. The neighbors used to say quite a bit that as a monarch, he was most unfit. Still and all, they had to admit that he … loved his mother.”

  I distinctly heard Emma’s groan. “Okay, stop, stop!” I stopped and listened as she tapped her way along the wall behind Jenny’s desk.

  “I can hear you, but I can’t tell where you are yet.”

  Then I heard a strange scraping sound. “What are you doing now?”

  “Hellooooo, ‘Cita!” Emma’s merry voice floated into the reading room loudly enough to make me jump. “I’m speaking to you from directly behind Mr. Watercolors’ awful portrait. He really was a piece of work, wasn’t he?”

  I ran out of the reading room to join her. It was true. By tilting the gilt-framed portrait slightly, Emma had revealed the other end of the conduit. It wasn’t covered. The edge of the frame held the bulk of the portrait sufficiently away from its mouth to allow ambient sound to enter easily. No wonder I had been able to hear Jenny on the phone. It was good to have that little mystery solved, at least. Now we had to get serious about our mission before somebody walked in and caught us.

  As it happened, Millie had left her office door not only unlocked but open, which didn’t strike me as a good idea until we attempted to pull open the drawers of her desk and file cabinet. All were securely locked. Although the trees and hedge that ran along a chain link fence at the back of the property shielded us from the direct view of neighbors across the back alley, I felt exposed standing in the lighted office in front of Millie’s unshaded window, which had been left open an inch to air out for the weekend. I just wanted to find whatever basic information about Millie there was to be found and then beat it for home, where Armando was waiting for me. Equally eager to meet her own friends, Emma looked as frustrated as I felt. We both looked around the room bleakly.

  “If she has any secrets, she knows how to keep them,” I said, “much like Harriett Wheeler. Maybe it’s a family trait,” I speculated, bitter from a day’s unproductive sleuthing. I was tired and grubby and wanted nothing so much as a hot bath and a long snuggle with my fella. “Any ideas?”

  Emma was staring fixedly at Millie’s desk, and I followed her gaze. There in plain sight was an old-fashioned Rolodex, dog-eared cards spewing out from every angle. “Can you believe it?” She touched it with awe. “The woman is a dinosaur. Nobody keeps their contacts on cards these days. Do you suppose …?”

  I snatched it up eagerly and headed for the anteroom. “Never mind the chitchat. Fire up the copy machine, and let’s get this done.”

  We worked quickly as a team, carefully removing the cards from the Rolodex and laying them out on the glass of the copy machine. We used the largest paper it held, eleven by seventeen inches, so we could cover a lot of ground quickly. In less than twenty minutes, we had successfully copied and reassembled the spinning file, artfully replacing all the inserted scraps of paper as well. Emma punched off the machine, and we scuttled back to Millie’s office. I replaced the Rolodex on her desk and took a final look around to make sure we had covered our tracks. Then we heard it—the sound of someone else unlocking the front door.

  Horrified, I grabbed for the copies we’d made and knocked a mug full of pens and pencils all over the floor. With no time to pick things up, Emma hit the light switch, I stuffed the copies into my handbag, and we groped our way out of Millie’s office. We’d never make it to the reading room, so we headed for the back door, feeling our way along the wall. Luckily, whoever was trying to come in was evidently having trouble getting the key to work, so we had time to pull open the back door and ease out onto the porch.

  Pulling the back door shut as quietly as I could, I felt my way down the porch stairs behind Emma and flattened myself next to her against the building. Suddenly, light spilled from Millie’s window over our heads. “What the--? Oh, it must have been that damned dog,” we heard her grumble, then the clinks and clunks of writing implements being collected and dropped back into the mug. We waited, hardly daring to breathe. If she spotted us, what on earth could we say to her? One minute passed, then two, as Millie apparently went about her business, opening and closing desk drawers and her file cabinet. As we tried to summon the nerve to tiptoe out to the back alley, scrabbling could be heard in the leaves near the trash cans, which stood near a chain link fence. Prickles of alarm ran down my spine. I grabbed Emma’s arm and put my mouth close to her ear. “Friend of yours, or rodent unknown?”

  She shushed me and peered into the darkness. “It’s probably Jake, scrounging a snack,” she whispered, and to my horror, she started toward the trash cans. I’m an animal lover, too, but confronting an unknown animal in the dark felt very risky. Connecticut had had a rabies outbreak among its raccoons and other critters not too many years ago, which is why even housecats have to be inoculated every three years now. Emma fumbled in her jeans and came up with her car keys, which jingled alarmingly to my overstretched nerves. On one hand, I didn’t want Millie to get the wind up. If we could hear her moving around inside, she could probably hear us, too. On the other, some noise might encourage whatever was raiding the trash cans to call it a night. Emma’s keychain had a pen light attached, which she switched on and aimed toward the trash cans despite my waving at her frantically to cease and desist.

  “Ohhh, it’s Fat Squirrel,” she whispered far too loudly for my comfort. “He’s stuck in the fence.” She knelt down in the gravel.

  “Emma, don’t go near him, for god’s sake, he might be rabid!” I blurted and threw caution to the wind. I reached her side in three running steps and attempted to pull her to her feet. Then I saw the sad little scene that she had already assessed. It was indeed Fat Squirrel. His head and most of his torso were on the far side of the chain link fence, but his hindquarters were solidly stuck on our side, his rear paws twisted in the remains of a plastic bag. How long he had been trapped there, it was hard to guess. Since squirrels retire at dusk, it was safe to say he’d been stuck for at least several hours, and he panted with exhaustion. It was only a matter of time before Jake found him on night patrol and made a late snack of him. Emma and I looked at each other.

  “We can’t just leave him here,” Emma pleaded.

  My head said yes, we could, but my heart agreed with her. The poor little guy looked done in as his sides heaved in the small pool of light. “Okay, okay. He can’t bite us with his head stuck on the other side of the fence. I’ve got some nail scissors in here somewhere. We’ll cut the bag off his back feet, and he can go on his way.” I rummaged in the recesses of my handbag, and Emma aimed her light inside to help.

  Just then, the floodlights over the back porch came on, fully illuminating the small yard, and Millie Haines stepped cautiously out of the door holding her cell phone. She shielded her eyes with her free hand and peered toward us. “Who’s out there?” she quavered. “Whoever you are, you should know that I’ve already called the police, and they’re on their way.”

  I groaned. “Perfect!” I snapped at Emma. “Now we get to explain ourselves to Millie and to the Wethersfield police.” I turned toward the porch and waved feebly at Millie. “It’s Kate and Emma, Millie. We’re trying to get a squirrel unstuck from the chain link fence.” It sounded pretty strange even to me, but Millie smiled with evident relief at the sound of my voice and bounded down the steps.

  “Well, hey, you guys! What’s going on? Can I help?” She seemed totally unfazed by our presence in the back yard of the law barn after dark on a Saturday and as eager as a puppy to be included in whatever was going on.r />
  Emma snatched my handbag and rummaged around in the bottom. “Found ‘em,” she announced triumphantly, holding my nail scissors aloft. “Now stand back a few feet, and let me get this thing off him.” She knelt to her task, and I held the pen light over her head.

  Millie watched over my shoulder. “Eeeuuww, it’s all hairy and gross looking. Are you sure it’s a squirrel? Don’t squirrels bite?”A police siren wailed in the distance.

  “Only if they’re rabid, and we’re pretty sure this one isn’t,” I snapped less than reassuringly. Millie took a step backward. The police siren got louder as the patrol car neared the Law Barn. A couple of other porch lights went on in the neighborhood. “The police seem to be here. Maybe you should go tell them it was a false alarm while we finish up here.”

  “Well, okay, if you think I should,” Millie responded eagerly, backing farther away. She broke into a trot and headed back inside.

  “There!” Emma exclaimed as the final shred of plastic fell away from the squirrel’s hind legs. For half a second, he remained frozen, unable to believe that he was free at last. Then with one final heave, he was through the fence and gone, the scraps of plastic Emma held the only evidence that he had ever been there. “You’re welcome,” she called after him, but her sarcasm was lost on F.S.

  “Okay, great.” I tried to get her head back to our present situation. “Now quick, what are we going to tell these cops?”

  But it was too late to collaborate on a story. Apparently, Millie had not been successful in calling off the emergency visit, because the back door opened once again, and two burly young officers tromped down the steps. I was pleased to see that the one who was brandishing a large torch was Rick Fletcher. Maybe there was hope for us yet. Cautiously, Rick moved his torch from me to Emma and back again. Millie, coward that she was, hung back from the scene.

  “Evening, Emma, Miz Lawrence,” he said dryly and switched off his light. I felt as guilty and as ridiculous as I’m sure I looked, huddled next to my daughter in the glare of the floodlights. If possible, Emma looked even less plausible. She held my handbag in one hand and her car keys in the other, a few scraps of torn plastic peeking from her fist. There was no car in sight and nowhere to park one.

  “Hey, Rick,” said Emma. “We were rescuing a squirrel that got stuck in the fence.”

  “Uh huh,” Rick responded with a straight face. I was willing to bet he was a first rate poker player. “Officer Chapman here and I are responding to a 911 call made by Miz Haines a few minutes ago. She told the dispatcher that there were strange noises coming from the rear of the Law Barn and asked us to investigate, believing that the property might be the target of vandals.”

  Officer Chapman was a sturdy towhead who looked enough like Rick to be his brother. Though he wasn’t very tall and looked like a youngster to me, he was probably around thirty and packed enough muscle beneath his uniform shirt to inspire respect. He nodded briefly in agreement. “When we arrived, Miz Haines met us at the front door and explained that she had discovered the source of the noises to be …” he consulted a small notepad, “a rodent of some sort.”

  Millie smiled and nodded helpfully. “That’s right. Kate and Emma said it was a squirrel, but when I saw it, it looked much bigger and hairy, like maybe a—“

  “It was a squirrel,” Emma repeated, “one I know personally. He had his back feet caught in a plastic bag, because he’d been raiding our trashcans, even though I put peanuts out for him today, so he really shouldn’t have, and he got stuck halfway through the chain link, and I couldn’t just leave him here for Jake to eat, so I cut the plastic off, and he ran away.”

  I encouraged her to stoop blathering with a hard pinch. She winced and held up the pieces of plastic and my nail scissors.

  Rick stared at her for a two-count, then turned to Chapman. “Ron, I don’t think we have anything ongoing here. Mind calling it in?”

  “No problem,” said Chapman. He flipped his notebook shut and trudged around the corner of the Law Barn back to the patrol car that was presumably parked out front.

  Millie tittered self-consciously. “Well, if there’s nothing else you need from me, Officer …” Clearly, she wanted to make her escape, and Rick let her off the hook.

  “If we need any information for our report, we know where to find you, ma’am. You have a good evening now.”

  “Okay, if you’re sure. Bye Kate, Emma!” And she fled back into the building.

  Rick returned his attention to Emma and me.

  “Ma’am?” Emma twitted him. “Nice touch.”

  Rick didn’t take the bait. “Maybe you’d like to tell me what the two of you were doing prowling around out here in the dark on a Saturday evening?”

  Judging from the number of porch lights that now peppered the dark, I imagined that the neighbors would like to know that, too. “I stopped by to pick up some files,” I said.

  “… my jacket,” Emma ended simultaneously.

  We glared at each other, and Rick glared at both of us.

  “You keep your files in the back yard?”

  I looked at Emma, and she deferred to me with an after you gesture. God only knew where the lie came from, but it rolled right off the tip of my tongue. “We spent the afternoon with my partner, Margo Farnsworth, getting the old Wheeler property ready for an open house tomorrow afternoon. Margo’s dog Rhett spent the afternoon here in his pen, and Margo forgot to collect his favorite chew toy when she picked him up. She knew I had to swing by here to collect some files,” I shot a warning glance at Emma, “and asked me to pick it up. If Rhett doesn’t have his favorite toy, he’ll drive us crazy tomorrow. You know how dogs are.” I tried my most winning smile.

  “So where’s the toy?” Rick wanted to know.

  “Yeah, where’s the toy?” Emma chimed in viciously, but I was up to the challenge. Because I’d put Rhett into his pen yesterday, I knew which toys stayed there. “Gee, thanks for reminding me. In all the confusion about the squirrel, I forgot all about it. It’s a rubber bone that squeaks. Be a dear and get it for us, would you, Rick?”

  But Rick was not to be deflected so easily. “Be glad to in a minute. Would you be good enough to give me Miz Farnsworth’s phone number? I’ll need to have her corroborate your story. It’s just routine for the report.” He smiled blandly, his pencil poised above his notebook. Gotcha.

  Looking as if she were watching a tennis match, Emma swiveled her attention back to me and raised an eyebrow.

  Oh, no, you don’t, I smiled back at Rick. Did this kid really think he could outmaneuver a woman who had survived raising two teenagers? “Her cell phone number is 209-1515, but I doubt that you’ll be able to reach her right now. I believe she’s at dinner with Lieutenant Harkness again this evening, isn’t she, Em?”

  Emma turned to Rick with interest. He didn’t change expression, but he finished writing and snapped the notebook shut. “I’ll try her later then.” He tromped off to the dog pen to collect Rhett’s squeaky toy.

  Check and mate.

  I arrived home more than two hours later than I had told Armando I’d be there, and he was nowhere to be seen. All that was waiting for me in my totally dark house were two hungry, huffy cats. I imagined that Armando was in much the same condition, since I had turned off my cell phone during dinner and never turned it back on again. I’ve tried time and again to explain that I consider cell phones major contributors to noise pollution, not to mention the dangers of driving. I carry mine for emergencies only, but he insists on getting his feelings hurt when I don’t answer it.

  At the moment I was too weary to worry about it. Armando was a big boy. He’d get over it. I did feel bad about the cats missing their dinner, though, and hurried to make amends. Jasmine accepted a scratch and a bowl of her favorite chicken and herring, served on the pass-through between the kitchen and dining room, and Simon wove annoyingly between my ankles as I struggled to place his dish of wet food sprinkled liberally with crunchies next to his water bowl
.

  That done, I headed for the bathtub but checked the house phone for messages first. Sure enough, the light was blinking, and the indicator showed two messages had been left. I felt sure that at least one of them was a blistering Latino rant. Well, Armando might be mad as hell, but at least he was speaking to me. I braced myself and pressed Play.

  “Hope you’re havin’ a lovely evenin’ with that good-lookin’ man of yours, Sugar, but I simply could not wait to tell you the news. I found the diaries, can you believe it? I got to thinkin’ about where I’d hide somethin’ in that little place of Prudy’s, if I had to, and I kept comin’ back to the idea of hidin’ in plain sight. You know, if you want to hide a file folder, you stick it in a drawer with a hundred other file folders and label it somethin’ totally unrelated to what’s really in there. So where would I hide a book? Why, in a big bunch of other books, naturally. So I ran back up the stairs to Prudy’s apartment and started openin’ the covers of all those mystery novels on her bookshelves, and voila! You know, my mama was so right, you should never judge a book by its cover. The one I’m holdin’ in my hand right this minute might say Agatha Christie on the outside, but it is pure Harriett Wheeler on the inside.”

  I shook my head in disgust. Didn’t that just figure? We had wasted an entire day looking for something that wasn’t even hidden. Well, at least we hadn’t compounded our error by spending the evening poking around that creepy basement. Sighing, I pushed Play to hear my second message.

  “It’s Abby, Kate. I’m so sorry to have to intrude on your evening, but I just don’t know where else to turn. I’ve been arrested for the murder of Prudy Crane.”