Death, Guns, and Sticky Buns

by Valerie S. Malmont

  I stared at her in silent shock. I don't know what I had expected to see, but this was definitely not it.

  “Have you ever seen anything so hideous?”

  “Charlotte… you're… you're beautiful!” The face she had uncovered was unblemished, so far as I could see.

  “No,” she wailed. “I'm ugly. There're scars beneath my skin—maybe you can't see them, but Mack could. He couldn't bear to look at me after the fire. Or touch me. He said nobody would ever want me again. Then he said he was going to leave me. Leave me alone. Alone and hideous. And poor. You understand why I couldn't let that happen, don't you, Tori?”

  No, I did not! Charlotte been responsible for three deaths: her own husband, Dr. Washabaugh, and Dari-ous. And she'd nearly killed Professor Nakamura and me. I could not feel any sympathy for her.

  I also knew the only reason she'd told me all this was because she had no fear I would tell anyone. And the only way she could be sure of that would be to kill me. This was the end. Tori Miracle would be another casualty on the battlefield of Gettysburg, only there would be no beautiful monument erected in my memory. I'd be lucky if my father sprang for a tombstone.

  “We're going up to the top,” Charlotte announced. She pointed to a flight of metal steps while keeping the gun trained on me.

  “Please, don't make me go up there,” I whispered.

  “Climb, or I'll shoot you right now.”

  Even another minute of life was precious at that moment, so I climbed with Charlotte close behind me. We emerged onto an open-air platform near the top of the tower, with only a waist-high metal railing between us and the blue sky beyond. Stacks of metal gratings lay on the floor, waiting to be placed around the edge so that no one could fall or jump off.

  “Walk over to the railing,” Charlotte ordered. “And don't try any funny stuff.”

  I minced my way to the edge, where I grabbed hold of the railing and hung tight. The world spun around me, and I already felt the terror of my death plunge. She wasn't going to shoot me, I realized. She was going to force me over the railing. Make it look as though I'd fallen by accident. But I wouldn't climb over it. She'd have to shoot me first.

  “Don't turn around,” she said. She wasn't going to shoot me. A blow on the head would knock me senseless, then she could simply shove me over. The mark the gun made on my skull would never be noticed amid the trauma caused by the fall.

  “I'm not a bad person,” Charlotte said. “Circumstances forced me to do what I did.”

  “How many more people would you have been forced to kill, Charlotte?”

  “Only one more. Lillie White was next.”

  I steeled myself for the blow that would surely follow what I was going to say next.

  “You're not as smart as you think, Charlotte. Your husband outwitted you.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Mack was no dummy, Charlotte. He must have known you wouldn't share the insurance money with Lillie. That's why he left the Wonder Wads and the keys in his desk instead of bringing them home. He knew someone would find them there and figure out his death was a suicide. Then you'd have to produce the suicide note to save yourself from being charged as an accessory to insurance fraud. The letter might save your skin, but it also meant you wouldn't get the insurance money.”

  “That's ridiculous. Besides, there's other money— the collection is probably worth a million dollars.”

  “Your husband wrote a new will, Charlotte.”

  Her gasp of surprise told me I was right. Macmillan had double-crossed her.

  “He left half his estate to his unborn child, Lillie's baby. While half a million dollars might seem like a lot of money to some people, it wouldn't support your lifestyle for long.”

  Behind me, there was absolute silence. I'd apparently shocked her into silence. I braced myself for the blow. Please let it be over with quickly, I prayed.

  “Didn't you hear me, Charlotte? Your husband outsmarted you. He made sure his child would be cared for and that you would be out of the picture.” I looked over my shoulder at her, but I didn't see her. I spun around, still gripping the rail. She was gone. She must have slipped down the stairs while I was talking. For some reason, she had decided to spare me.

  I slid down the stairs, two at a time, to the observation room. The elevator door stood open. There hadn't been time for her to ride it down. She had to still be up here with me, somewhere. I leaped inside the elevator and pressed the down button. After a long, frustrating wait, the door slid shut and the elevator lurched downward.

  I stood an inch away from the door, ready to spring from the elevator as soon as it came to a stop. When at last it opened, I ran screaming for help toward a small group of people standing in a semicircle. Why did they pay no attention to me? I stopped. Something was horribly wrong. They were staring at a crumpled object on the ground. As if I were walking underwater, I slowly moved toward them and saw that the object was beige and streaked with red. And as the realization of what it was hit me, my wobbly knees gave way, and I collapsed in a heap on the sidewalk.

  CHAPTER 22

  Halloween Evening

  SOMEONE HELPED ME UP AND LED ME TO A BENCH near the small pond at the foot of the tower. Another brought me a cup of ice water, and I dipped my fingers in it and rubbed some on my cheeks and forehead. I'm not sure when Luscious Miller arrived, but he was suddenly there.

  “How did you know to come here?”

  “I heard on the scanner that a woman had fallen from the tower. I knew you was in Gettysburg for the wedding, and I kind of thought I'd find you in the middle of things.” He turned bright red. “I was afraid it was you what fell, Tori. I prayed for you all the way over the mountain.”

  I took his hand and squeezed it, loving him for his unabashed concern. Suddenly, we were nearly overrun with white police cars. The only differences I could see was that the park rangers’ vehicles had green stripes on the sides, the Gettysburg police cars had blue stripes, and the state police cars had black stripes. Close behind the white fleet came an ambulance and the Adams County coroner.

  With little confusion, the allied forces herded the witnesses, three tourists, Joey from the Sutlery, and a groundskeeper into one area, then turned to me for an explanation. My heart sank when I recognized one of the rangers who had interrogated me at the visitor center. His grin told me he recognized me as well.

  I turned my back on the grisly scene and spent about fifteen minutes explaining what had happened. Then another fifteen minutes explaining why it had happened and why I was involved. Luscious, bless his heart, stood by my side with an avuncular arm around my shoulders. Fortunately, one of the park rangers had been to Darious's barn to identify the stolen items from the park's collection and was able to verify parts of my story. Both rangers were ecstatic when they learned they were going to get General Meade's sword and other treasures back. After ordering me to go home and stay there until they could come and question me some more, the police and the park rangers went back to measuring, photographing, and taking affidavits from the witnesses who were huddled together near the revolving entrance to the tower area.

  While Luscious and I walked to the Lickin Creek police car, slowly on account of my sore feet, we saw three cars hurtling down the driveway toward us. The first screeched to a stop and was nearly rear-ended by the car behind, which in turn was gently bumped by the car behind it. When the dust and noise settled, I realized Woody, Moonbeam, and Tamsin were in the backseat of the front car. Professor Nakamura sat in the front seat beside the driver, his son.

  Moonbeam climbed out, bells atingling, and embraced me. “We just heard someone from the wedding had fallen from the tower. You and Charlotte were the only guests missing. I was so afraid it was you, Tori.” She burst into tears.

  I patted her back. “I'm not always the victim of foul play; it just seems like it's been happening that way, lately.”

  Gloria Zimmerman emerged from the second car. She'd changed from h
er gray silk gown to a slinky silver mini dress that wouldn't have gone around one of my thighs. Helga Van Brackle and Dr. Godlove got out of the third car and assessed the damage done to their bumper. Gloria was the first to see the body, now covered with a white cloth. “What happened?” Her voice was barely more than a whisper.

  I was too exhausted to talk, so Luscious filled them in with what he knew.

  “Charlotte was a murderess… I can hardly believe it. She did so much for everybody in the community. Good people like her don't kill other people.” Moonbeam shook her head, nearly dislodging her gold tiara, and Woody put a protective arm around her.

  “Look,” I said, “I really want to get home. Can we talk later?”

  They moved their cars so Luscious could get out. As we went around the traffic circle, I realized they were following us. I groaned. “When I said later, I meant later as in next week, not later as in twenty minutes from now.”

  Luscious patted my hand. “I'm sure they just want to show you how much they care.”

  “For me, or for Charlotte?” That wasn't a very nice thing to say, and Luscious sensibly chose not to answer it.

  When we were assembled in my large front parlor, I confronted Moonbeam and Woody. “Shouldn't you two be at your reception?”

  Moonbeam smiled. “They won't miss us. Right now you're what's important. Besides, we brought some champagne. We can celebrate right here.”

  Nods and smiles all around confirmed what she said. Even Helga didn't look as disagreeable as usual.

  With Tamsin's assistance, I set the dining room table with the platters and bowls of food left over from my last two disasters. I hoped my neighbors had run out of patience with me and wouldn't be showing up on my doorstep with more goodies. We put everything out, except for the half-empty box of sticky buns Charlotte had brought, which I tossed in the trash. I didn't know if I'd ever be able to eat another.

  “This is almost as nice as the General Pickett,” Moonbeam said, surveying the table. “Let's have a toast. Where are your glasses?”

  “In the sideboard, over there. I'll put on some coffee. Gloria, can you help me?” She looked surprised but followed me into the kitchen. I started the coffeemaker, then said to her, “I saw your picture—in a frame—in Darious DeShong's workshop.”

  She gasped. “You didn't think I had anything to do with his death, did you?”

  While such a thought had crossed my mind, I didn't need to tell her that. “What was going on between you?” And a much younger man, I wanted to add.

  “Nothing. Well, nothing anymore. We did have a thing going for a little while. I met him while I was investigating the puppy mill the Hostettlers ran at their farm. It was one of the worst I've seen; I gave them six weeks to clean it up or go to jail.”

  “They haven't,” I said.

  “I know. I should have gone back there, but I didn't want to run into Darious again. Tori, there was something wrong with that man. But he was gorgeous, don't you agree?”

  I nodded, agreeing with both statements, Darious was gorgeous, and there had been something wrong with him.

  “I can't put my finger on it, but shortly after we… I mean… well… you know, I began to suspect he wasn't all he appeared to be. And that carousel… if you're rich enough to own one, you don't have to live in a barn. And you don't try to hide it. He'd disappear, sometimes for days at a time, and get furious with me when I asked him where he'd been. He hit me—once— that was enough. After that, he called… maybe half a dozen times. I hung up on him every time. Then that ended. I never saw him again.”

  “You were lucky to get away with only being hit,” I said. “He tried to kill me. And he did kill Dr. Washabaugh.”

  “How do you know…?”

  “Charlotte confessed everything to me. She and Darious were truly a team made in hell. I don't know which of them was worse. Let's go into the parlor, so I can tell everybody at once what happened on the tower.”

  The eight people in the parlor had already helped themselves to food and had begun to eat. I sat down and waited for Gloria to fill a plate.

  “How did you figure out Charlotte killed Darious?” Tamsin asked, too eager to wait. “Did you find a big clue?”

  I smiled. “No big clues, Tamsin. I'm not really Nancy Drew.” I drew a blank stare from her on that one. “The Hardy Boys? Sherlock Holmes?” Blank again. Kids these days. What do they read anyway?

  “Champagne?” Moonbeam asked me.

  “Just a little.”

  She filled a glass to overflowing and handed it to me. “Then how did you figure it out?” Moonbeam asked.

  “I guess you could say there were a lot of little clues that didn't mean much until they were added up. As you know, my attention was focused on discovering how Mack Macmillan could have been shot. Everything pointed to an error on Woody's part, but somehow I couldn't believe that a professional like Woody could ever make such a tragic mistake.”

  Moonbeam smiled at Woody, who beamed back at her.

  “But nobody else had access to the room where the guns were, except Janet Margolies, and although I learned she resented Macmillan because he decided to put a road through her family's business, I couldn't really picture her, at nine months pregnant, doing such a thing.

  “So that meant someone else had to have access to the key, and according to Janet the only person who could have gotten hold of it was Mack himself. I knew he had the opportunity to load the guns, but I also had to look for a reason. What would make a man stand in front of a firing squad when he knew it would be firing real bullets at him?

  “The answer came when Vesta Pennsinger, Dr. Washabaugh's assistant, told me Mack had been devastated when he heard his cancer diagnosis. That was what suggested suicide to me. I thought perhaps Charlotte had helped him plan his death, but when I confronted her with my suspicions, she produced a suicide note, in Mack's handwriting, absolving her completely. Case closed, I thought.”

  “Wait a minute, Tori,” Moonbeam interrupted. “More champagne anybody?” She poured drinks all around while Woody opened another bottle.

  When they'd settled down, I continued. “Case closed—until the next day when I learned that Lillie

  White, Mack's mistress, was expecting a baby, and he'd told her very recently that the child would always be provided for. Buchanan McCleary told me that Mack tore up his trust recently and had written a simple will, which had the clause in it that stated half his estate was to go to his children. I think, Luscious, if you read Mack's will, you'll find that that provision will cover Lillie's baby.”

  “Providing her baby is Mack's child,” Helga sniffed.

  “There's always DNA testing,” Moonbeam said, refilling her glass.

  “I still didn't have any reason to suspect that Charlotte killed her husband, though. After all, she was at Penn National racetrack that weekend. Not until last night… when I couldn't sleep and was mulling everything over—I remembered she always interpreted for him, converting everything said to him into sign language. And Vesta had told me how upset he was when he learned about the cancer. Naturally, he would be upset, for using sign language that Vesta and the doctor didn't understand, she told her husband he was going to die slowly and painfully, and very soon.”

  “But she loved him dearly,” President Godlove said. “That was obvious. At faculty parties she never left his side. Seemed to adore him.” He wiped his mouth with his paper napkin. “Now you're saying Charlotte convinced her husband he was dying and coerced him into planning his own death so she could get his insurance money? That sounds rather improbable.”

  “But I can understand how she did it,” Helga said. “She made him so dependent on her, interpreting for him even when he was in Congress, that he trusted her completely. He was enchanted by her, as if she were a witch casting a spell. She stole him right out from under me.”

  “What was he doing under you?” Moonbeam giggled. Too much wedding champagne, I thought.

  “Fas devant
les enfants,” Woody said, looking at Tamsin and surprising me.

  “I'm old enough to know what's going on, and I'm in second-year French,” Tamsin huffed.

  “What made you suspect her?” Gloria asked.

  I answered President Godlove's question, which had almost been lost in the champagne-induced gaiety. “Her heart was broken when he told her about Lillie and the baby and asked for a divorce. Her passionate love for him turned to passionate hate, almost overnight. She'd rather see him dead than with another woman. She knew she could persuade him to commit suicide, but she was a practical person. If he was killed in an accident, she'd get the insurance money. She convinced him she'd share it with Lillie. That was all the assurance he needed. He still trusted her.”

  “This is awful,” Ken Nakamura's son spoke for the first time. “I really don't think Tamsin should be listening to this.”

  “Leave her be,” Moonbeam snapped. “She's almost grown up. As you'd know if you ever spent any time with her.”

  The ex-husband's jaw clamped shut and his face reddened. Moonbeam and Tamsin exchanged knowing smiles.

  “There's a thin line between love and hate,” Moonbeam said with a hiccup. I couldn't tell if she was talking about Charlotte and Mack or herself and her ex-husband.

  “How did you figure out she killed Darious?” Tamsin asked eagerly.

  “More little clues. When we found the stolen antiques in his barn, we discovered that much of what was there had been stolen from Gettysburg, but the most valuable article of all, General Meade's sword, was gone. Later I remembered seeing it in a photograph—of Mack—hanging in his office for everyone to see.”

  “What?” President Godlove looked as if he were about to have a fit. “That picture… the one in his office… in the general's uniform? What nerve!”

  I waited for him to stop sputtering and continued. “So that proved there was a connection between Dari-ous and the Macmillans. In his barn, enough evidence was found to convince me that it was Darious who had tried to kill me three times.”