Death in a Summer Colony

by Aaron Stander

  “Can’t you use them…?”

  “Not tonight. Harry is going up to Fishtown for some fresh lake trout. He wants to show off his skill at the grill. It’s a guy thing.”

  “Obviously, you didn’t find anything in the trash, or I would be hearing about it,” observed Ray.

  “We found many things, but nothing that could pass for a possible murder weapon. I can tell you this much, these people eat way too much pizza. I don’t think they do much cooking.”

  “I’ve never known you to comment on other people’s eating habits.”

  “I’ve spent too much time with you.”

  “Where do you want to eat?” asked Ray.

  “On the beach, looking out at Lake Michigan. See, your influence continues.”

  Sue drove them to the colony’s beach in her gear-laden Jeep, and they carried the two coolers to the top of a small dune overlooking the shore. She unfolded a large blanket and carefully arranged the contents from the coolers in the center: a loaf of peasant bread, cheese, olives, grapes, apricots, and chocolate. “You can have mineral water or sparkling wine,” she teased.

  “Sorry to mess up a romantic weekend.”

  “It’s okay. He’s getting an idea of what I do, and who I am. How’s the interviewing going?”

  “I’m pretty much through the cast and crew.”

  “And?”

  “Means and opportunity, everyone. Motive, that varies. It seems that Malcolm Wudbine had, at a minimum, annoyed most of the colony members in one way or another over the years.”

  “And at a maximum?” asked Sue.

  “Look,” said Ray, motioning toward a small group of gulls floating peacefully in the wind. An eagle, wings partially folded, talons extended, dropped out of the noonday sun, grabbing one of the gulls, then opening its wings, and carrying its prey inland. A single feather, a piece of downy fluff, marked the spot of the kill for a brief moment, then was carried toward shore in the breeze.

  “How did you know that was going to happen?”

  “I didn’t. I’ve never seen an eagle go after a gull before. I wouldn’t have thought it would be worth the trouble. Gulls weigh next to nothing. Can’t be much meat there.”

  “The killing was so fast.”

  “A fraction of a second.”

  “Means and motive, a quick lunch. A target of opportunity.”

  “Motives for killing Wudbine are starting to emerge. I keep pushing the financial question, but no one is accusing Wudbine of leaving their retirement in ruins. He wasn’t a Madoff. It’s been intimated that several decades ago he seduced a number of the colony wives. Passions cool over the years, but who knows if some long festering wound might have suddenly propelled an assailant to take action.”

  Sue gripped the round loaf and tore into the bread, handing a chunk to Ray. “So how many suspects are there?”

  “I’ve got to start charting this. With the crew and actors, about twenty. Then there’s Richard Grubbs. They would all have had easy access. And that certainly doesn’t preclude someone coming from the outside. Then there is also Wudbine’s family and various employees. I haven’t even factored them in yet.”

  “One assailant?”

  “That’s what I fell asleep speculating about. We need to walk through possible scenarios with a stopwatch. My gut feeling is that two people were involved. Too much could go wrong with only one person. With two, the assailant could be at the ready when the power was switched off. Picture this, the killer is offstage, just a few steps from Wudbine. The lights go out and the fatal thrust follows in a few seconds. Then they make their escape back to the green room or out the door into the blackness.”

  “How do they find Wudbine in the dark?” asked Sue.

  “I’m not sure. The assailant would need a few moments for their eyes to adjust. Maybe they had a small light. Night vision glasses—but then that would be one more thing to hide or get rid of. The fatal strike required great precision. I don’t have an answer. Our perpetrator, or perpetrators did a lot of careful planning.”

  “And if the perp was a member of the cast, he or she had to get rid of the weapon and slide back into the green room or dressing rooms without being noticed.”

  “They could have carried the weapon out with them. We should have sent everyone through a metal detector last night before we let them leave,” said Ray. “Verity Wudbine-Merone made a big point of telling me that the crime couldn’t have been committed by any colony member, it had to be an outsider, maybe the mafia, foreign agents….”

  “Who arrived on the beach during the storm in black helicopters,” suggested Sue with a wry smile.

  “Actually, she had them flying in on private jets. She also told me that Wudbine’s daughter-in-law was Richard Grubbs’ daughter. Strange that he never mentioned it.”

  “Any other major revelations?”

  “Yes, for a few minutes the hits just kept coming. According to Verity, years ago Malcolm had a fling with Grubbs’ wife. The woman died a few years after their affair.”

  “Not mentioning the daughter is strange. The affair, probably not something anyone would mention.”

  “The weapon,” said Ray, “you mentioned it earlier. Tell me again what Dyskin said.”

  “Well, you know how he sort of mutters to himself as he looks things over. He said the weapon might have been a chisel, an extremely sharp one. There was no tearing, just a clean cut. He also mentioned a bayonet or a dagger. I think we have to brush up on knives and other sharps. The important thing he said was that the killing was done with great precision. The assailant knew where to place the blade, and they had the strength to push it through the connective tissue to effectively sever the spine and instantly kill Wudbine. He said the perp was a trained assassin.”

  “Black helicopters,” said Ray, reaching for more bread.

  “So where does that leave us?” asked Sue.

  “The choice of weapons, the scene of the attack. The whys and wherefores. We’re doing our usual early investigation wheel spinning. I need paper or my white board. We have to slow down, but I think that if we don’t solve this one quickly, it will slip out of our hands. People will start going away. The trail will cool.”

  “Lemon Perrier?”

  “Sure.” Ray leaned back, sipped on the bottled water, and looked out at the lake. “Why there? Why in the theatre? And why the chisel or knife? This whole thing is fairly exotic.”

  Sue started to giggle. She looked at Ray affectionately.

  “Where’s the humor in that?”

  “I was thinking,” Sue responded, “what if someone shot a picture of the two of us right now, think about how that would play before the next election. Put a caption on it like, Sheriff and detective sergeant enjoy a romantic lunch on the beach while killer runs wild in community.

  Ray didn’t respond, his focus elsewhere. “We’re looking for an eccentric, nothing here is conventional.”

  “Have you interviewed any eccentrics?”

  “They’re all eccentrics, so I guess I need a better term. An outlier, someone not constrained by conventional patterns of thought. I’m back to the location, weapon choice, motive. Verity, the first Mrs. Wudbine, said Malcolm was usually surrounded by security, that only up here did he move without it. And his position onstage, with his back to an attacker, made him completely vulnerable for a short period of time.”

  “That sort of limits the suspects. They had to be extremely familiar with the play. You’ve got the cast and crew,” said Sue.

  “But there could be others,” countered Ray. “Were some of Wudbine’s people around? And someone mentioned family members of the cast and crew—it’s summer, people dropping by to see Grandma. Then there are people who could have just blended in.”

  “Like?”

  “Custodians, tradespeople, trash collectors, and all the
people who come and go in white vans and seldom register on anyone’s radar. There are the colony people, with no connection to the play, who drop by and watch the rehearsals. If someone were intent on killing Wudbine, it wouldn’t be too difficult to come up with a plan.”

  “Motive? Your usual list: love, lust, lucre, and loathing.”

  “All of the above.”

  “The man is past seventy,” said Sue, “can’t we dismiss the first two?”

  “Sonnet 15, Shakespeare.”

  “What’s that suppose to mean?”

  Ray looked over at her and carefully recited four lines from the sonnet.

  “When I perceive that men as plants increase,

  Cheered and cheque’d even by the self-same sky,

  Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease,

  And wear their brave state out of memory.

  “It’s the last line, Sue. And wear their brave state out of memory. Wudbine may have been getting a bit long at the tooth, but that doesn’t mean he’d changed much. Verity talked about him as being a womanizer. He was a man of great wealth. He probably had no difficulty attracting younger women. And there are arrays of potent pharmaceuticals to extend his manhood. So don’t be too quick to dismiss the love and lust. From what everyone has said in the interviews thus far, there was no lack of loathing for Wudbine. People tolerated him because he was the proverbial goose, and no one wanted the golden egg to go away.

  “Lucre is the complicated one,” Ray continued. “Who would benefit financially from Wudbine’s death. There’s so much we don’t know.”

  “Where do we go from here?”

  “I would like you to be with me when I interview family members this afternoon. Are you almost done with the trash?”

  “We have yet to do the recycling container. I asked Brett and Barbara Sinclair to go through it after lunch. There seems to be some chemistry between those two.”

  “I thought she had a boyfriend back at college, some big football player.”

  “Absence makes the heart grow fonder for someone else,” said Sue as she started to pack up remainders of the picnic. “What else needs to be done?”

  “Until we come up with the weapon, I guess we’re not done. It’s just a question of how much we want to pull that place apart. We could spend a week or more just in the Assembly Hall, time we should probably use following other leads.”

  21

  Sue parked in the circle near the front door of Gull House. A young woman greeted them at the door.

  “Sheriff Elkins, I’m Pepper Markley, a member of Wudbine staff. Ms. Wudbine will be meeting with you in the library. Please follow me.” She guided them through a long hall to the library. “Please have a seat. Jill will be with you in a few minutes,” she said before she excused herself and left the room, closing the door behind her.

  “Quite the joint,” said Sue.

  “The furniture is beautifully designed and crafted,” observed Ray, looking around the room. “There’s no clutter, nothing to interrupt the visual impact of each piece. The place has the feel of a sculpture gallery.”

  “Didn’t she say this was the library?” observed Sue, a twinkle in her eye. She had long observed Ray’s penchant for carefully looking through the titles of books when trying to get a sense of a victim or suspect.

  Ray was already out of his chair by the time she reached the end of her sentence. “Yes, not many books. I don’t think it means he wasn’t a reader, not anymore. Although most people his age still like paper and ink. I do, also.” He carefully surveyed the room, walls and ceiling.

  Pepper Markley reentered the room carrying a tray with two glasses of ice tea. “Ms. Wudbine apologizes for the delay, she’s on a conference call and will be with you as soon as possible.” She set the tray on the small table.

  “This room won’t do,” said Ray.

  “I don’t understand. Ms. Wudbine specified this room for the interviews.”

  Ray pointed to one of the small security cameras mounted on the ceiling. “We are going to be interviewing a number of people, including Ms. Wudbine. These are confidential interviews.”

  “Oh,” she said looking up at the camera, “those are just part of the system. It goes on tape somewhere, it’s not like anyone is listening.”

  “I’m sorry, that’s not acceptable.”

  Markley looked stunned. “What are you proposing?”

  “Sergeant Lawrence and I are returning to the library building at the colony. That’s where we will conduct these interviews. In her last e-mail to me late this morning, Ms. Wudbine stated that the interviews would begin at 1:30 with members of the family and staff scheduled every 30 minutes. Please let her know that we arrived at the specified time. Also, remind her that this is a murder investigation. I will wait for her at the colony library until 2:00. After that time all further interviews will be held at our office in the Cedar County Government Complex. Do you have any questions?”

  “No. I will convey your message.”

  “What was that all about?” asked Sue as they walked toward her Jeep.

  “She established the time, then she doesn’t show up. And what member of the staff, or the family, for that matter, will be open with a camera running.”

  “So what now?” asked Sue.

  “We go back to the colony and give her until 2:00. If she doesn’t show, I’ll try to find some way to turn up the heat. These people are going to start slipping away in the next few days. We’ve got to get this inquiry going. So let’s really stay on Jill Wudbine and the others and see what we can squeeze out of them.”

  Within minutes of their return, Jill Wudbine was standing at the screen door of the library, clearing her throat rather than knocking. Ray motioned with his hand for her to enter.

  “This is not good,” she said as soon as she was through the door. “Most inconvenient to me, my family, and our staff. I can play hardball, too. None of us need to talk with you.”

  “Counselor, you’ve been out of law school a long time, and you’ve forgotten much of what you might have learned in your criminal procedure course. This is a murder investigation. You’ve told me that you will be representing the family. In that position you will be held accountable for your actions. Perhaps you should brush up on the obstruction of justice statutes in this state. At this point I am merely conducting interviews. There are currently no suspects or persons of interest. We will be moving this inquiry forward as quickly as possible. You can aid us, or you can get in our way. If you impede the investigation in any manner….” Ray let his comments hang. He carefully took in Jill Wudbine. He knew she had to be near forty, but her perfect complexion showed no signs of impending middle age. She could easily pass for 30 or younger. Her black hair was cut short in a way that added to her youthful appearance.

  “Look, Sheriff, I’m just as interested as you are in finding the killer. I apologize for scheduling a meeting and then not being available. As for the choice of room, I just didn’t think. The recording part of the security system is archival, no one is monitoring it, but I understand your concern. Now can we get started?”

  Once she was seated, Ray turned on the recorder, and established the time, place, and participants in the interview.

  “Let’s start with your relationship to Malcolm Wudbine, both familial and professional.”

  “Well, you already know this. I’m Mr. Wudbine’s daughter-in-law. I’m married to his only son, Elliott.”

  “And how long have you been married?”

  “We got married after I completed law school and passed the bar exam. I was twenty-four at the time. We’ve been married for 16 years.”

  “Children?”

  “Unfortunately, no.”

  “Where did you meet your husband?”

  “Up here, years ago, when we were kids. I can’t remember not knowing
him. I’m told we played in the sand together when we were toddlers. And we hung out during our teen years and started dating occasionally in college. It got serious when I was in law school, and we were both living in Chicago.”

  “So in addition to being a daughter-in-law to Mr. Wudbine, you’ve indicated that you also served as his legal counsel. Would you tell us how long you had this position and the nature of your work?”

  “As soon as I passed the bar, Malcolm asked me to come work for him. Initially, it was more on the business side. I was a liaison between his investment company and the law firm we had on retainer to look after legal issues. About twelve years ago he launched his philanthropic foundation, and I became the executive administrator of that endeavor while continuing to serve as his personal counsel.”

  “And what’s the focus of the foundation’s work?”

  “Really, Sheriff, I can’t see how this has any bearing on….”

  “Ms. Wudbine. We know very little about your father-in-law. We are trying to get a better sense of the man. Hopefully, this will give us some direction as we search for the killer.”

  “What was your question, again?”

  “The foundation, what are your funding priorities?”

  “Malcolm Wudbine came from a very hardscrabble background. Through diligence and solid values, he attained a university education and professional success. He was interested in helping others also pull themselves up by their bootstraps. We contributed millions to traditionally black colleges and neighborhood improvement projects. We also have funded scholarship programs to help needy farm kids get a college education. And Malcolm was always very generous with the needs of the summer colony here, too generous perhaps.”

  “How was he to work for, especially given the…?”

  “He was a wonderful man, Sheriff. He never wasted a minute of time. He was always focused on the next project. When he wasn’t working on corporate or foundation business, he was in the gym staying fit, or he was busy researching some new passion.”

  “Did your father-in-law have any enemies?”