Trophies

by J. Gunnar Grey

  "And that's it? You said you didn't find anything?"

  "Just the clothing, some old jewelry, and suchlike."

  "Like that frigging ring you're wearing?"

  He'd noticed. The ruddy thing was actually comfortable, no matter how awful it appeared, and I'd forgotten I wore it. "Yes, this was part of the collection. Old family treasures, I suppose."

  "Yeah. Okay, we'll take this systematically," Sherlock said. "Caren, if you'll help me go through the writing desk? Patricia, will you glance through the armoire, make certain these two didn't miss anything important? And Robbie my Robber, see if you can't get that old trunk open. It looks like it's been rusted shut for ages." He finally paused. "Unless, of course, anyone minds interfering with a police investigation?"

  Caren slid him an amused sideways look and settled on the floor by the desk, rolling the old chair out of the way. Her ready acquiescence surprised me. I knew her to be a deeply moral woman, it was part of what attracted me to her, and although I hadn't paused long enough to consider it before, in my heart I hadn't expected her to put those morals aside for this vaguely illegal operation. Was it interest in the puzzle that pulled her in or friendship? If the latter, was this show of support for Patty or me? Curious, I waited for her to glance up, wondering where her gaze would touch. But she hauled open the lower desk drawer and pushed at the vertical files stuffing it. Disappointed, I turned to fetch the lockpicking kits from downstairs. I seemed to recall leaving them on Uncle Hubert's old desk in his study.

  Beside the door, Patty stood alone. She stared at me with sad and disillusioned eyes. It brought me to a dead stop. I hadn't meant for my favorite mouse to see this side of me, but she had, and I couldn't just brush past her now.

  I spoke the simple truth. "I'm sorry, Patty. But this is who I am and what I do."

  She bit her lip and looked away. "I think I'll go to the hospital. I called earlier, and Mum and Dad are there."

  Someone sympathetic who would listen while she poured out her heartache, she meant. Perhaps she hadn't heard anything comforting from Caren during their time in the kitchen.

  It was time to pull out the heavy ammunition. She had an unwelcome new image of me; what she needed now was a new one for herself, as well, as Aunt Edith had known when she and I wrote her will. "At least take a look at the wedding dress. It's in the armoire and Aunt Edith left it to you."

  I trotted downstairs, chest tight and aching. If this didn't work, our relationship was over. If she turned and walked away, I promised myself, I wasn't going to cry.

  When I returned with the two toolkits, she stood at the armoire, the wedding dress in her arms. Her eyes were huge, her lips parted. Tears streamed down her face. Her right hand skimmed over the seed pearls, traced the purple insets in the sleeves, arranged the pleats of the skirt. The fact that it was a wedding dress was incidental. It was Aunt Edith's most prized possession, she had judged Patty most worthy to receive it, and Patty's delicate, reverent touch reflected the value of the gift. She didn't seem to notice anyone else was in the room, even though Sherlock and Caren weren't being quiet.

  "Damn, more investment records," he said as I entered. "Those high-rolling guys got nothing on this woman."

  "And more copies of checks and cash deposit slips." Caren sat on the floor cross-legged, thumbing through the contents of a small box that looked designed to hold just such records. "Goodness, Patricia, here's another one from your brother Jacob. Do you think she made him a loan? That's what, five deposit slips so far?" She finally glanced up. "Patricia?"

  Patty turned, holding the gown to her front. Even though the bound-up train made her look pregnant, even though her hair was tied severely back, and even with tears on her face, the transformation was astounding: instead of the family mouse, she looked like the princess in a fairy tale. As we stared, I swear her shoulders straightened, and I couldn't restrain a grin.

  Caren gave me a mischievous smile. "So how long will it take for you to fall desperately in love?"

  "Two weeks." Patty sniffed. "Give me two weeks." She carefully folded the gown back into the garment bag and closed the armoire door as if it held her soul rather than a bunch of old clothes. Then she slid down beside Caren and grabbed a handful of papers from the desk drawer.

  Sherlock finally awoke; his long considering stare I did not take as a good sign. "You gonna prop up the wall, Robbie, or work on that trunk?"

  I wanted to tell him off, but wasn't willing to risk bruising the fragile new accord with Patty by fighting so soon with someone else. So instead, without a word, I worked on that trunk.

  It was rusted shut, as Sherlock had pointed out. I tried silicone powder, sewing machine oil, whatever I could think of, but the picks bent alarmingly and the lock refused to budge. Finally I made a fourth trip downstairs, came back with a screwdriver and hammer from the garage, and had it open within seconds. Everyone applauded, even Patty. I shot Sherlock, at least, a filthy look.

  "Great performance," he assured me.

  Even for peace with Patty, I couldn't let that pass. "At least it was a performance from Shakespeare and not A.C. Doyle."

  Of course, he came right back. "If so, it's from the cheap-seats half."

  Caren held the box before her face but her shoulders were shaking.

  Bugger them all. I forced open the lid of the chest, hinges grating. Whatever was in that cavernous container occupied amazingly little space. I leaned over and peered in.

  "What?" Patty stared at Sherlock as if she couldn't believe he was educated enough for such a comeback. I could have warned her otherwise.

  He huffed, pretending to take insult. "Everybody knows Shakespeare wrote poetry for the upper crust and comedy for all the rest of us. Right?" He gave me an arch look. "So what do we finally have?"

  "Looks like more clothes." I lifted out a classic black tuxedo jacket, folded so long ago the creases were set and wouldn't shake out. It stirred a memory, at first pleasant, then painful. "This was Uncle Hubert's. I think he wore it the night he died."

  "The back's all stained," Patty said.

  I turned the jacket around. The stains were stiff, matte black against the shinier fabric, and rust-colored if turned at an angle. "She didn't have it cleaned." I folded it with the stains inside, set it beside me, and returned to the trunk. "Trousers, cummerbund, dress shirt that was once white, all in the same condition." I made certain Patty didn't see the horrible shirt, no matter how much she irritated me, by rolling it inside the trousers. "No shoes."

  "Remind me," Sherlock said. "Who's Uncle Hubert? And how did he die?"

  "Sorry," I said. "Hubert Hunter was Aunt Edith's husband, a tenured British history professor over at Harvard. He was struck by a hit-and-run driver the night he won a special award for teaching. Here, what's this?"

  It was a uniform jacket; I knew those too well to miss the marks of old-fashioned tailoring, notched collar, and epaulets. This one wasn't from any military organization I recognized, although the dark blue of the heavy serge made me think it might be from some banana-republic air force or police unit. Threads dangled from the breast, upper sleeves, and wrists, as if patches and insignia had been ripped off. A bullet's entry hole, right above the heart, was small and neat; the exit hole, in the back, was larger and ragged; and the same sort of stains covered front and back.

  "Death clothing," Sherlock said. "No wonder she locked it away and never opened that trunk."

  "Are you saying someone died in that?" Patty demanded.

  "Judging from the location of the bullet, probably." I looked back inside the trunk, but the rest of the uniform wasn't there, so I moved on to the next layer of clothing that was. "Black trousers, and a black sweater that looks hand-knitted and also heavily stained."

  "Those are women's trousers." Caren took them and examined the insides. "And they're hand-made, as well." She scrambled up and measured the trousers against her leg; they fell to her mid-calf and couldn't possibly stretch around those curvy hips. "Did Edith s
ew?"

  I tore my stare from the hips. "I don't know, but she could knit. She always made sweaters for Uncle Hubert and me every autumn." Suddenly I realized I was speaking of her in the past tense. It felt disloyal. I forced myself not to glance toward the door and instead leaned back into the trunk. It was almost empty. "Now, what's this?"

  I thought at first it was an old photo album, the sort that held black-and-whites of people staring solemnly out at you, and indeed such a stare embellished the first page. But the photo, of a pale and handsome young man with lively eyes and chin held low, was part of a newspaper article, and as I flipped a few more pages, I realized what it was.

  "It's a scrapbook." I skimmed through the article on the page before me. "But I don't recognize any of these people's names."

  "Let me try," Patricia said.

  I handed her the album, or at least I assume I did. I know I lifted it out of the trunk and moved it aside, and I know it wasn't in my hand a moment later. But what I saw in the bottom of the trunk so shocked me that I don't remember whatever actually happened in those few seconds.

  It was a pistol.

  Chapter Eleven

  current time

  Before Sherlock could say, "Fingerprints!" I'd picked it up by the barrel. In the abrupt silence we all stared, fascinated and horrified. The pearl grey grip sported three black-rust ovals on its left side, whorls and arches unsmudged.

  "Have I ever mentioned," I said to Sherlock, "how I hate your little flashes of intuition? I mean, why can't I have a normal commanding officer, like everyone else?"

  "Why be normal?" Bonnie strolled in and glanced at the pistol I held. "Family heirloom?"

  "It seems so." I examined it more closely. "It's a Browning, I think one of the old blow-backs, probably made between the two World Wars. About a seven point six five; it's too small to be a nine millimeter and the Europeans didn't make many twenty-twos."

  "Did you find Theresa?" Sherlock didn't look away from the Browning.

  "Yeah, no sweat, except for her." Bonnie snickered. It sounded out of place. "She's still at Laughlin Air Force Base. She's hitched a ride on a transport trainer heading this way, but takeoff's been delayed and they won't tell her why."

  "Oh, no." Sherlock winced. "I hope she's taking it calmly."

  "Well, she yelled something about dynamite and the men's room. But she said it sort of calmly."

  He tilted his head back and stared at the roof. "One officer doesn't have the sense to hop a commercial flight when the flyboys won't dance her tune, another without the sense to not pick up a murder weapon with his bare hands. Why can't I have a normal command, like everyone else?"

  "Oh, stuff it, boss. What makes you think this is the murder weapon?" The holes in Aunt Edith's chest were small, made with something about this size. But that trunk had definitely not been opened anytime recently.

  "I said a murder weapon, not the. And if those fingerprints are in blood, as I suspect, then that's what it probably is. Right?"

  "I hate it when you are." Along the nickel-toned slide was engraved Fabrique Nationale d'Armes de Guerre Herstal-Belgique; the pistol had been manufactured in Belgium and brought across the pond. Legally? "So, do we give this to Detective Wingate?"

  "No!" Sherlock ran a hand through his hair. Before the war, he'd kept it ultra-trimmed, but since then he'd let it grow longer even if he couldn't keep his hands out of it. The way this situation was developing, it might remain eternally mussed. "Hell, no. Was your aunt ever fingerprinted?"

  "I beg your pardon?" The ice in my voice startled even me. But after a moment's thought, even through Sherlock's rumpled glare, I didn't back down. Aunt Edith's reputation was as a thief, nothing more. Nothing worse.

  He grabbed the folded tuxedo jacket. "We know someone died in this — Hubert, you said his name was? So this is probably his blood." He set the old tux aside almost reverently, grabbed up the uniform coat. "We're pretty convinced someone also died in this. The bullet holes make a strong argument and that blood almost certainly came from the person wearing it when they were made." He set that coat aside, too, and picked up the black knitted sweater. "There are no holes in this, but there's blood on it. Chances are, it's someone else's blood, not the wearer's, and same for that Browning. So how did it get there?"

  In the pause, the only sound was Patricia's ragged breathing.

  "So you suspect those are Aunt Edith's fingerprints." My voice was still cold, but now it reflected the goose bumps prickling my arms. Her family reputation notwithstanding, what in the world was she doing with these evil old things?"

  "Could possibly be," Sherlock said, "not suspect. They could also belong to someone else and she might have just hidden them. But that makes her an accessory after the fact. Anyways, for the family's sake — and that includes you — we should protect her reputation. In my humble opinion."

  "Thank you." Patricia's voice was very small.

  "Anytime, ma'am. So was she ever fingerprinted?"

  I forced myself to think. "Probably when she first entered this country. Do they keep such things on file that long?"

  "The police and the Feds keep everything. They still have the ballistics evidence from the Sacco and Vanzetti case. Why wouldn't they still have an import's fingerprints?"

  I shrugged. "We can always lift her prints from her bedroom if we have to. Granted, she wore gloves a lot." Her white-sheathed hands used to select just the right coins from her purse and slide them into a parking meter without fumbling. She was the only person I knew who could wear gloves and not be made clumsy by them — except for me, the other Ellandun family thief.

  The memory comforted me. If Aunt Edith had — it was unthinkable, but if she had shot someone, she would have worn gloves. I'd help Sherlock go through his exercise, but these couldn't possibly be her fingerprints.

  "There is another possibility besides murder," Caren said.

  We all turned. Patty dabbed her eyes with a tiny embroidered handkerchief. It took me a moment to recognize the one from Aunt Edith's hat box, and another to decide Patty may as well have it as anyone else.

  Caren still held the little box open on her lap. She stared down at the financial papers, lips pursed, a wrinkle between her dark eyes. "I'm finding lots of deposits — large deposits, at regular intervals — from three or four different people."

  "Like blackmail checks?" Sherlock asked. "Do blackmailers take checks?"

  "They might if the blackmailee was family." Caren laid a hand on Patricia's arm. "Some are from your brother Jacob."

  Patty froze. Bewilderment darkened her face, as if she felt attacked on all fronts and wasn't certain where to turn for help. I had to admit, I could relate.

  "Makes you wonder, doesn't it?" Bonnie said into the pause. "Among all this incriminating evidence, which part did the killer mean when he said, 'They're mine?'"

  It couldn't possibly get any worse. I felt unable to think and turned to the one person who would keep his cool. "Sherlock, what are we going to do?"

  "We sort out this evidence." He refolded the sweater and reached for the tuxedo. "I'll get in touch with von Bisnon, have him find a private laboratory that can run tests on these blood stains, see if there are any matches among all this. I'll ask him to cover the costs, too. Yes, Robbie, I know you can afford it, but I don't want the family name connected to this little legal breach. Remember, the man's seriously rich. Not only can he afford to pay for a little immoral forensics work from his pocket change, he can also afford ninety attorneys to your one, and once the Boston P.D. get an idea of his resources, they won't bother with anything as stupid as charging him with a crime."

  "Who on earth are you talking about?" Patty asked.

  "Our — well, one of our commanding officers." Sherlock stacked the clothing into a pile and hefted it. "The cool one. Caren and Patricia, would you two bring the scrapbook and those financial records? Robbie, your fingerprints are already on the Browning, you bring that downstairs. And make sure it's not loaded,
will you?"

  Archive Eight

  seventeen years earlier

  "Edith, love," Uncle Hubert said, "I've done it again." He winked at me, one blue eye closing for a second in his jowly face. I'd only lived with them a few weeks and was still feeling my way through many daily situations. Uncle Hubert, the kindest man I ever met, did his best to help me feel at home and never gave me any cause to doubt my welcome. From our first meeting I adored him, even if I had to concentrate on his accent to understand some of his words.

  Father had returned to Wiltshire alone.

  "Done what again?" Aunt Edith appeared in the doorway of the parlor. She seemed distracted; looking past her, I saw the stocks section of the Wall Street Journal spread open on the sofa.

  "I've locked myself out of my own study." Uncle Hubert, very security conscious, tended to flip the catches on doorknobs in passing without even realizing he'd done so. "And Charles' books are in there. We were just doing his homework and took a break—"

  "Oh, Hubert, not again." But Aunt Edith was already halfway up the staircase even as she spoke. When she returned a minute later, she held a blue leather case in one hand. It was about the size of a large trade paperback book and encircled by a zipper, and looked like nothing more than the sort of cover some people use to enclose their Bibles. But when she unzipped it, I could see that it was full of odd tools, all dull metal so that none of them caught the light. I had never seen anything of the sort before.

  "What's that?" I edged closer for a better look.

  "My kit." She selected two of the tools and handed the kit to Uncle Hubert, then knelt down in front of the doorknob, inserted the ends of the tools into the lock, and wiggled them about. Seconds later, the lock clicked sadly in defeat, the knob turned, and she thrust the door open.