by Elaine Viets
“The only ones with dark stains on them,” Helen said. “If the police find Loretta’s DNA and Chrissy’s blood, that will prove the commissioner murdered Chrissy.”
“That will prove Loretta wore the shoes,” Phil said. “That makes her guilty of shoplifting, not murder.”
“Listen to me!” Helen said. “I’ve solved the murder. I have the motive: Loretta was renting that horrible Palm Beach house to illegal immigrants. I have the opportunity: Loretta was in the back where Chrissy was killed, looking at the scarves, and Chrissy was hanged with one. Chrissy taunted the commissioner with the house of the seven toilets. Vera showed Loretta out the back door after she fought with Chrissy. Loretta waited a bit, then sneaked back into the store through the same door and killed Chrissy while she was in the dressing room.”
“I don’t like you going to that store alone,” Phil said. “I’ll go with you. I’ll help look for the shoes.”
“No, you won’t,” Helen said. “It’s almost three o’clock. You have to go to work and get fired. I’ll be fine.”
“Loretta could walk into Snapdragon’s any moment,” Phil said. “She’s already killed once.”
“So? What’s she going to do? Attack me? I’m a foot taller than Loretta. The killer could be Roger, too, and he can’t hurt me. He’s in jail.”
“This isn’t a joke,” Phil said. “We don’t know who killed Chrissy. If it’s Loretta, she’s already killed once, boldly and in daylight. She can do it again, and this time she’ll find it easier. Promise me you won’t go after Loretta by yourself.”
“Phil, there is no one in the store now except Vera. I’m not confronting a killer. All I’m doing is looking for a pair of shoes that may have potential evidence. When I find them, I’ll call Detective McNally and he’ll get them. This isn’t remotely dangerous.”
Phil stopped at a red light in front of the Floridian. Helen opened her door and started to hop out. Phil grabbed her arm. “You almost got killed in June trying to investigate a murder on your own.”
“I did not,” Helen said. “I was with someone and I got bonked on the head. It was no big deal.”
“Don’t be stupid, Helen,” Phil said. “Police officers do not go in without backup, and they’re armed. I am not letting you out of this car unless you swear you won’t tackle a killer without calling the police.”
“Okay,” Helen said, and started to leave the Jeep.
But Phil hung on to her arm. “I said, swear to me.”
Helen held up her free hand. “I solemnly swear,” she said. “Now let go of me, or the wedding is off.”
The light turned green, and an impatient driver honked at them. Helen jumped out of the Jeep, waved good-bye and ran toward Snapdragon’s.
Vera was behind the counter, looking more like her old self. Her hair was chicly smooth and her outfit this side of outrageous. She had a warm smile for Helen.
“Did you find the shoes?” Helen said.
“Not yet,” Vera said. “But I’ve already searched the front of the store. They aren’t here. They have to be in the back room, probably where I keep the extra shoe stock on the bottom shelf. You still haven’t told me why those shoes are so important.”
“Phil and I have narrowed the murder suspects down to two: Roger, who’s in jail, and Loretta Stranahan,” Helen said.
“So how do you prove it, Sherlock?” Vera asked.
“With those polka-dot heels, we might be able to nail Loretta,” Helen said. “Chrissy knew the commissioner was making a fortune renting to illegal aliens, and taunted her with ‘the house of the seven toilets.’ Phil and I found that house in Palm Beach County. Loretta killed Chrissy, got the victim’s blood on her shoes and left them behind. Loretta wore those Manolos out of the store. As soon as I find the shoes, call the police.”
“Quiet!” Vera said. “Keep your voice down. She’s here.”
“Who?” Helen asked.
“Loretta. The commissioner is trying on suits in the dressing room,” Vera said. “She might hear you. You know how sound carries in here. I don’t want to lose a good customer.”
“You’ll lose her anyway when she goes to jail,” Helen said.
“I said shut up!” Vera looked frantic. The doorbells jingled and a tourist began trying on necklaces. Helen knew Vera would have to watch the woman. Necklaces were easy to shoplift.
“I’ll wait on this customer,” Vera said. “You go in the back and look for those shoes. If Loretta needs anything else, get it for her, please.”
Helen dropped her voice and said, “Then do me a favor, too. Call Detective McNally.”
“I’ll do no such thing,” Vera said. “Not till you find those shoes.”
Helen made her way quietly to the back, passing the ridiculous monkey lamps, the Limoges china, the Blue Willow ginger jars and other breakable knickknacks, then the racks of designer clothes and shoes. The light was on in the front dressing room. Commissioner Stranahan must be trying on suits.
Helen parted the curtain to the back room. To the left was Vera’s desk, a landfill with a phone. On the right were floor-to-ceiling shelves. The top two overflowed with shirts, skirts, jeans and sweaters in boxes and bags. The middle section was loaded with lamps, china and more monkey monstrosities, from bookends to fruit bowls. The bottom shelves were a hodgepodge of shoes, unsorted by size, color or style.
Might as well get to work, Helen thought, though she didn’t want to kneel on that hard concrete floor. She unearthed a throw pillow still in its plastic bag, used it to cushion her knees and started at the lower shelf section closest to the curtained entry.
Helen moved a heap of designer heels, cleared away a flock of flats and shoved aside a swarm of suede boots. After ten minutes, her back hurt. Helen sat up, stretched, then went back to six lace-up leather shoes, tangled together by their shoestrings. Helen was struggling to separate them when she heard a slight noise, followed by a whoosh and a thundering crash. Shards of pottery flew across the hard floor like shrapnel. A green lamp had exploded near her head.
Helen was startled to see Loretta standing over her, wielding a plaster bookend. She ducked, and it narrowly missed her head. At least it’s a monkey bookend, Helen thought. She shrieked like an air-raid siren and hoped Vera could hear her up front. Loud noise could save her life. Helen scrambled to her feet and screamed louder, all the while looking for a weapon.
She threw a Waterford vase at Loretta. The commissioner dodged it expertly, and the crystal vase broke into a shower of diamonds.
Loretta was barefoot. She carefully sidestepped the broken glass. A too-tight skirt and a crookedly buttoned shirt should have hampered Loretta’s movements. But she reached effortlessly for a white porcelain pineapple on a middle shelf.
“Oh, no,” Helen said. “That’s how you killed Chrissy. I’m not going to die by a damned pineapple.”
“Some people are too nosy to live,” Loretta said, and hurled the pineapple at Helen’s head. She ducked and the pineapple smashed into her elbow. Pain shot up Helen’s arm and left her dazed and dizzy. Between flashes of bright light and threatening darkness, she searched frantically for something else to throw.
There it was—a lamp with a turbaned monkey holding a pineapple. That made it triple ugly. Helen reached for it.
Loretta moved faster. She clobbered Helen on the shoulder with a green marble paperweight. Helen punched Loretta in the mouth and the politician landed on her rump. A second punch laid Loretta out flat on the floor.
Helen shrieked once more. This time, Vera materialized in the dim back room, clutching a polka-dot heel. The store owner stood over Loretta, aimed the spike heel at her eye and said, “Move and I’ll drive this right into your brain.”
“No! Don’t!” Helen said. “You’ll mess up the DNA.” She was still holding the turbaned-monkey lamp over Loretta.
A man’s silhouette filled the doorway. He was holding a gun.
“Drop it,” Detective Richard McNally said. “Put your hand
s up and drop it right now.”
Helen let the monkey monstrosity fall to the floor with a resounding crash.
CHAPTER 29
“Officer, arrest these women,” Commissioner Loretta
Stranahan said. “They attacked me.”
>Loretta brushed herself off and stood up amid the wreckage, her shoeless feet crunching broken pottery and plaster bits. She seemed to gain height and authority as she spoke. She looked Detective Richard McNally right in the eye when she lied to him.
“We attacked her?” Helen didn’t try to hide her outrage. “She tried to kill me with the same weapon she used to stun poor Chrissy.”
“I never touched that pineapple,” Loretta said. “I wouldn’t have such a hackneyed ornament in my home. She’s lying, Officer.” She looked regal, even barefoot and with a blouse buttoned crooked.
“No!” Helen said. “It’s she who’s—”
“Quiet, ladies,” McNally said. His command silenced them.
“It’s Detective McNally, Ms. Stranahan,” he said. “Delighted to see you here. It saves me a trip. I was on my way to your office when Ms. Vera Salinda called my cell phone and said you were trying to kill Ms. Hawthorne at her store. I’d like to continue our discussion, Commissioner Loretta Stranahan, at Hendin Island police headquarters. Among other things, we can talk about how you knew Mrs. Martlet was hit on the head with a porcelain pineapple.”
“I read it in the paper,” Commissioner Stranahan said.
“That information was never released to the media,” McNally said.
“It was on television,” Stranahan said, her voice growing shrill.
Detective McNally said, “You have the right to remain silent. . . .” He continued the chant familiar to crooks and cop-show buffs. Loretta Stranahan grew silent.
Helen felt dizzy. She leaned against the cluttered shelves.
“Helen, are you sick?” Vera asked.
“I don’t feel well,” Helen said. “I need some caffeine.”
“Can I make a pot of coffee?” Vera asked.
“I need statements from you and Ms. Hawthorne,” McNally said. “We have coffee at the station.”
“I have to close my store again?” Vera asked. “I helped you and I have to suffer?”
“I hope this will be the last time, Ms. Salinda. As soon as the uniforms arrive, they’ll take you in police cruisers.”
“If I go out of here with the police, I’ll look like I’m being arrested,” Vera said. “This will ruin me.”
“You are not under arrest, Ms. Salinda,” McNally said.
“Can I call my fiancé?” Helen asked. “He’s getting fired this afternoon. I want to make sure he’s all right. If I don’t come home at my usual time, Phil will worry about me.”
“He should,” McNally said. “You can make one call in my presence. I don’t want you contacting the media.”
Helen dialed Phil’s cell and got his voice mail. “Hi, Phil, the police have Loretta. They caught her while she was trying to kill me.”
“I did not!” Loretta yelled.
“I’m okay,” Helen said, trying to reassure the machine. “Well, I guess I would be or I wouldn’t be making this call. I mean I’m not hurt, just a few bumps and scratches. I kept my promise. I didn’t confront Loretta Stranahan alone. She snuck up on me. Vera called the police, and Detective McNally arrived in time.”
Might as well give McNally a verbal pat on the back, she thought. It couldn’t hurt.
Helen continued her cell phone soliloquy. “Vera and I have to go to the Hendin Island police headquarters to give our statements. I don’t know when I’ll be home. I’ll call you when I’m free. What happened at work—did you get fired? Did you quit? Are you still employed? I hope you’re not upset. I’d better go. I love you.” She shut her cell phone, and wondered if her rambling message would ease Phil’s fears or worsen them.
It was after seven o’clock that evening when Helen emerged from the Hendin Island headquarters. The air was cooler and the station’s walled garden was a tempting rest spot. She sat down on a concrete bench near a pink hibiscus bush. Helen had to admit, for a police station, this one was a beauty.
Her first act was to call Phil. This time, he answered his phone. “Helen, what happened? Where are you?”
“I’m sitting in the garden at the Hendin Island station,” Helen said. “I’m fine. Can you pick me up? Did you get fired?”
“I’ll be right there,” Phil said. “No, I didn’t get fired. I quit. They wanted me to go to Cancún to bring home that young woman and I walked out. We can talk about it when I see you. I’ll be there in ten minutes.” Helen shut her phone.
Vera staggered out of the station, looking ragged. The skin under her eyes seemed bruised and her face was pale. She sat down on the concrete bench next to Helen.
“You arrived at the right time,” Helen said. “Where did you get that polka-dot heel?”
“In the section you were about to search,” Vera said. “I think they’re going to book the commissioner. I heard someone in the hall say Loretta won’t talk until her lawyer arrives. He’s on his way, but he was over in Fort Myers.”
“That’s more than a hundred miles away,” Helen said.
“Right. He’s supposed to get here in another hour. It’s going to be a long night for Detective McNally. Serves him right for closing my store. I was trying to be a good citizen.”
“Do you want me at the store tomorrow, Citizen Salinda?” Helen said.
Vera managed a grin. “No, I’m taking a couple days’ vacation. This week is wrecked. I need to decide if I want to save my business or sell it. Take some time off until I call you, Helen. I’ll pay you, if you want.”
“No need,” Helen said, and instantly regretted her grand gesture. “I think I broke at least a week’s pay in lamps and bookends.”
“You definitely killed half that pair of monkey lamps,” Vera said.
“I’m sorry,” Helen said. “But it was the closest lamp. And it was ugly.”
“You’re not sorry,” Vera said. “You hated that lamp. And it’s not ugly. It’s amusing. You don’t seem to get that decorating concept. But I forgive you. You solved the murder. Now the cops will leave me alone and stay out of my store.”
Vera stood up, shouldered her fashionably huge purse and said, “I’m exhausted. Do you want a ride home?”
“Thanks,” Helen said. “I’ve already called Phil. He should be picking me up any minute.” Her cell phone rang, and she said, “That may be him now.” She waved good-bye to Vera as she checked her phone’s LCD display. It had a St. Louis area code.
“Helen! Helen!” Her sister was whispering into the phone. A shrieking whisper, if such a thing was possible. Kathy sounded terrified.
“What’s wrong?” Helen asked. “Is it Tom? The kids?”
“It’s Tommy Junior.” Kathy started sobbing. “They found out. I—he—he’s going to—”
“Kathy!” Helen said sharply. She went into older-sister mode.
“Calm down. Take a deep breath, then tell me. I can’t help if you don’t tell me what happened. Where are you?”
“In my van, driving around,” Kathy said. “I’m on Manchester Road.”
“Pull into a parking lot. You shouldn’t be driving when you’re upset.”
There was a short silence. Then Kathy said, “I’m parked in a supermarket lot. I have to get back soon. Tom took the kids to the library and they’ll be home any minute.”
“Why are you whispering if you’re alone?” Helen asked.
“It sounds worse if I say it out loud,” Kathy said. “I got that phone call, panicked and ran. I had to get out of the house. I felt like it was going to smother me.”
“Tell me what’s going on,” Helen begged.
“Someone said I had to bring five thousand dollars in a plastic grocery bag and leave the money on the steps of the new church hall,” Kathy said.
“And if you don’t?” Helen asked.
/> “Then the new church hall will develop a sudden, terrible problem with its foundation,” Kathy said. “The caller knew. He knew what we did.”
Kathy sounded like she would start sobbing again.
“When do you have to have the money?” Helen asked, hoping to hear the whole story.
“He said I had two days. But where am I going to get that kind of money? I could have used the cash Mom left in the cookie jar, but I’ve already deposited it in the kids’ college account. Tom will notice if it’s missing.”
“I have money,” Helen said. “I still have that three hundred thousand. I’ll get five thousand dollars and FedEx it to you.”
“But if we pay him once, we’ll have to pay him again,” Kathy said.
“This will buy us some time,” Helen said. “Some very expensive time, but Tommy is worth it. Give the blackmailer the money. The next time he calls and makes a demand, I’ll fly to St. Louis and stake out the drop-off site.”
“What reason will you have to come to St. Louis?” Kathy asked. “Won’t Phil get suspicious if you suddenly want to come home?”
“I still have the IRS problem to straighten out,” Helen said. “And I’ll want to visit my family. What do we know about this blackmailer? What did he sound like?”
“I don’t even know if it was a man. I just said ‘he.’ The person used one of those voice-changer thingies and sounded like Darth Vader,” Kathy said. “He called our home, so he doesn’t have my cell number. I tried to use the star sixty-nine function on our landline to see where the call originated, but the number was blocked. We don’t know anything.”
“Yes, we do,” Helen said. “We know he wasn’t an honest citizen, or he would have called the police when he saw us burying—”
She heard the station door slam. A uniformed officer ambled down the walk. Helen put on her best straight-arrow smile until he went to his car.
“Helen, are you there?” Kathy asked.
“Sorry, someone was going by,” Helen said. “Your caller didn’t tell the police when he saw us doing something he thought looked suspicious. Why didn’t he? That tells us something. Also, he didn’t call your cell. He called your home. He knows where you live, but he’s not close enough to have your cell phone number. Maybe the blackmailer is that guy who was meeting his girlfriend on the church lot—what was his name?”
