by Carolyn Hart
“K.C., what are you going to do now?”
She stood between me and the door. One hand rested on the neck of a heavy cut-glass decanter. The sun streamed through a window behind her. I saw her through a glare. She looked indistinct and larger even than she was. And Priscilla was not small.
“I don’t know, Pris, I’ll have to think about all this. Now, why don’t you give me all the stuff you took . . . ?”
She laughed, a throaty satisfied laugh. “I’m not so damn dumb. There isn’t a scrap left. I burned the papers and mashed the ashes. I tore the tapes to pieces, then I burned them, too.” She wrinkled her nose. “They smelled.” She laughed again. “I played them first. I’ll have to say that bitch knew how to find things out. Did you know they caught old cousin Edmond with his pants down in the park? And it turns out Cousin Travis is a fraud and you,” and she glared at me, hostility naked in her eyes, “and you, clever clever K.C., you tipped Sheila out of the boat, didn’t you?”
Shock roared in my ears. So that had been Francine’s game. Not the truth, that Sheila had pulled away, leaving me to drown. No, she had twisted it, turned it, would have left me dangling in the wind as my sister’s killer,
“And Grace,” Priscilla continued shrilly, “oh, how I would have loved to see that printed. Righteous Grace and her roll in the hay.”
“But Priscilla,” I interrupted sharply, “you’ve forgotten something!”
“Forgotten?”
“Yes, you’ve forgotten yourself. She really had the goods on you.”
Priscilla raised the decanter. It glittered richly in the sunlight. She pulled the stopper and once again filled her glass. She took a deep swallow.
“Maybe she did,” Priscilla said thickly, “but it didn’t do her any damned good. I’ve got the picture now and I burned it and the negative and nobody will ever know.”
Picture, picture, picture. Something teased at my brain, wavered in my memory. Picture. But what the hell was it?
“Yeah,” she said heavily, “and that’s the only picture there ever was, that one in the Beacon.”
I remembered. Amanda had sent me the clipping. “Poor Miss Prissy,” Amanda had written, “I’m so afraid she will never learn to know good people from bad. She has had such a narrow escape but it’s an awful thing . . .”
I looked at Prissy, standing there swaying, holding the decanter, now tipping it again to refill her glass. Beautiful Priscilla with her clear lovely skin and china blue eyes. Everyone always made excuses for her, blamed her mistakes on her “crowd.” The picture had been a dreadful one, the sleek rounded body of the sports car tilted crazily against a brick wall, and, starkly pitiful against the pavement, three sheeted figures. Such small sheeted figures. Children’s bodies.
I didn’t remember the details of the picture now, though I dimly recalled the driver’s door had hung open. I did recall the headline:
CHILDREN RUN DOWN, DRUNK DRIVER DIES; PASSENGER THROWN
Prissy had been the passenger. It was her car but Jimmy Fremont was driving. An all-night party and Jimmy had driven through a school zone and two little brothers and their friend died. Prissy left town, went to Acapulco for a year to avoid questions about why she had let a drunk drive.
“So that was it,” I said quietly. “Jimmy wasn’t driving, after all, was he, Prissy? And you were drunk, too.”
She stared at me a long moment, her face heavy with drink, then slowly, sickeningly, she began to laugh. “I fooled them all, didn’t I?”
“You didn’t fool Francine.”
The laughter stopped. Black anger twisted Prissy’s face. “That bitch. She brought me the picture, showed it to me.”
Francine made Prissy understand that the picture proved it was impossible for Jimmy to have been driving. There had been time, after the crash, for Priscilla, with minor injuries, to climb out of the upended car and stagger to the sidewalk. But Jimmy’s body was beneath the car and it could have been wedged there only if he tumbled from the passenger seat as the car began to tip.
How had the police missed it then?
Prissy shrugged. “Those little kids . . . The mother of one of them came and she screamed and screamed . . . and Jimmy was still alive, see, right after it happened, so they lifted the car and pulled him out from under, then nobody thought about it because I said he was the driver, of course.”
Of course. That was Prissy. She could kill little kids and in the next breath be busy saving herself.
Perhaps Francine had run into a tougher customer than she had expected.
I drove to my office, told Pat to bar the door and sat down to think.
First, I listed the suspects.
Grace.
Priscilla.
Edmond and Sue.
Travis.
Kenneth.
Myself.
Then—and did I do it reluctantly?—I put down Harry’s name. He had been at the scene of the crime. If he were the murderer, he could have waited nearby and followed me onto the scene to be sure that the murder was reported then.
What would be the point of that?
For one thing, it was he who had the letter, purportedly from Francine, that directed the police to Kenneth.
But I had no reason to believe Harry knew Francine or could have any motive for murdering her.
Could he be Francine’s Mr. Wonderful? Could he be Francine’s link to La Luz? He would certainly have the kinds of information that could have led Francine to the sorry secrets of the Carlisles.
If only I knew more about Francine.
Impatiently, I called John Solomon’s office.
“No, Pamela’s not in. She’s still working on the Boutelle case for you.”
“Has she come up with anything else on Boutelle’s boyfriend?”
“Not yet. She’s trying to get in touch with Boutelle’s best friend at the Cocoa Butter, but so far she hasn’t found the woman at home. Course, with that kind of gal, who knows when she might come home. You still interested?”
“Yes. Have her keep after it. I’ll check back later today. When you talk to her, get the woman’s name and address.”
It sounded like the best bet for information. It was from the Cocoa Butter that Francine had come to La Luz. Francine. Bright, beautiful, unprincipled. What had lured her from the Cocoa Butter to La Luz—and death?
On the surface, it was to write a story about the Carlisles. But why had she wanted to do that? Was it just to make a fast buck? Maybe. But why the Carlisles? Until Kenneth went into politics, the Carlisles weren’t at all well known beyond the confines of this little coastal town. How could Francine have come up with the dirt on each of us? It suggested a long and intimate acquaintance with La Luz or the family but so far as John Solomon and Pamela had been able to discover, Francine had never in her life been to La Luz until she showed up six weeks ago.
Six weeks to death.
It would never have occurred to Francine, young and sensuous, vibrantly, crudely alive, in love with a ‘magical’ man, that she had an early appointment with death. It must have been quite a surprise when death reached out to her.
Francine came to La Luz and died because she threatened to write a story detailing the sins and follies of my family.
I sighed. No matter how I looked at it, it always came back to the Carlisles.
All right, turn it around. Who profited from Francine’s death?
Grace. Priscilla. Travis. Edmond and Sue. Kenneth. Myself.
But only because Priscilla lifted the manuscript and the tapes.
What then did the murder itself accomplish?
Most obviously, it removed Francine. It resulted in Kenneth’s arrest.
Wearily, I poured a cup of coffee from my desk thermos and stirred it slowly. The coffee was murky, murky as my thoughts.
The scarf. That was critical, of course. If Kenneth were innocent, it meant the scarf was deliberately taken with murder in view and the ultimate goal of saddling Kenneth with the crime. I tried to
picture Travis, hearty red-bearded Travis, opening the cloakroom at Kenneth’s office, looking swiftly around, then reaching out to grab Kenneth’s scarf. Or Priscilla? Or Edmond?
The scarf, if Kenneth were innocent, meant that death had stalked Francine all that day. It was no spur-of-the-moment, angry attack. It was cool and deliberate and planned.
Their faces, the faces of my kin, moved in my mind. Imperious Grace, greedy Travis, retiring Edmond, selfish Priscilla, confident Kenneth.
Suddenly, I felt very discouraged. I wasn’t getting anywhere. I could posit from here to Christmas, and one theory would be as good or as bad as another. I had no proof and I had no inkling who was the murderer.
I picked up my pen and made a series of heavy dark XXXXXs across the face of my pad. Nothing, it all came to nothing. But pettish scrawls on a legal pad weren’t going to help Kenneth. Grimly, I tried again. What did I know?
Francine Boutelle was alive at six.
Grace came at six, paid, left.
Then came Travis or Priscilla, I was uncertain in what order.
I picked up the phone and dialed Grace’s. Travis was wary.
“I don’t admit to anything.”
“Travis, stuff it. Just answer two questions, yes or no. When you came to a certain apartment Wednesday night, did you see a shoe box sitting on the desk?”
“A shoe box?” I could tell from his tone he thought I was crazy and that convinced me he had not seen Grace’s shoe box or the fifty thousand it held.
“No, sis, I didn’t see a shoe box.” He was relaxed now, amused. I wasn’t a threat.
“Okay. One final question. Was the room in disarray? Did it look like it had been searched?”
He was cautious with this one, uncertain of its meaning. “Yes,” he said finally.
“Thanks, Travis.”
I hung up and wrote quickly on my pad, for his answers clarified the order of appearance.
Grace at six.
Priscilla at six-forty-five.
Kenneth at seven.
Travis next.
Me. Then Harry.
If I accepted everything I had been told, the shoe box was gone when Priscilla came. But the manuscript and tapes were there.
The last puzzled me. Why? Had the murderer been frightened away before grabbing up the manuscript and tapes? Maybe. But it would be pretty dumb to kill someone to hide certain facts then leave, for the police to find, a manuscript containing the blackmail material. Panic? Somehow, I didn’t think the hands that had so skillfully and mercilessly dropped a scarf around Francine’s neck and pulled it inexorably tight would be prone to panic.
I pushed up from my desk, began to pace.
Try another tack. Think of the night from Francine’s point of view. She had gone to a lot of effort, organizing that night. She had arranged for her victims to come, one after another, bringing pay-off money. If she had lived the night, she would have been rich. Grace brought and left fifty thousand. Priscilla, Kenneth, and Travis all came with fifty thousand, but didn’t, of course, leave the money because Francine was dead.
But Francine didn’t live the night. She died sometime between six and seven. That we knew as a fact because the tape recorder came on at seven o’clock. It recorded Kenneth’s frantic effort to loosen the scarf, Travis’s arrival and cautious survey, and my coming and Harry’s.
If only the murder had happened after seven, then it would have been captured on tape. It was bad luck that the murderer had chosen an earlier time . . .
I stopped walking, pressed my fingers against my temples. Grace’s money . . . seven o’clock . . . no record from six to seven . . . no record from six to seven . . .
My chest ached. I tried to breathe, tried to think beyond the enormity of that statement, no record from six to seven.
It all fell into place, all the odd-shaped pieces that hadn’t quite fitted the puzzle. It was quite simple and perfect and sickening.
I sank into my chair. My mind pulsed with thoughts and conjectures and guesses, but they all came together. Now everything made sense. I knew how Francine Boutelle knew so many facts about the Carlisles. I knew why Kenneth was the goat.
Francine had made a very basic mistake. She had trusted the wrong person. Death must indeed have been a surprise.
The objective of the killer had been two-fold, to be freed from Francine and to injure the Carlisles. The murderer had succeeded absolutely—and there wasn’t a vestige of proof that I could offer. It would be my word against the killer’s.
But there must be a way, now that I knew . . .
The phone rang. It was Kenneth and he was upset. “I want you to talk some sense into Megan.”
“What’s wrong?” I was impatient. I didn’t have time for this.
“I want her to go to Laguna, stay with her folks. I’m afraid for her.”
“Why?”
“A man called here last night. He spoke in a thick German accent. He asked Megan to report to the hospital, there had been an emergency, a bus load of people hurt on the edge of town and they were calling in volunteers to help. Megan went, but it was a hoax.”
“A hoax?”
“Yes. She got to the hospital and nothing had happened and no one there had called her. When she came back out to the car, she had a flat tire. And, damn it, she didn’t call me. I had gone on to bed. She didn’t get home for a couple of hours.”
“She wasn’t hurt? Nobody threatened her or anything?”
“No, but I don’t like it. It’s damned odd.”
It was odd but not, in the scheme of things, too important. “I wouldn’t worry, Kenneth. Megan’s okay and after this, she can be more careful about responding to phone requests. But she ought to stay here. It will look odd if she leaves La Luz now. Besides, she really should show up with you tonight at the debate.”
“That’s what she says,” he agreed reluctantly. “But I don’t like it.”
I soothed him finally. I asked him to call his office staff and tell them I would be coming by and that I had his permission to talk to them.
“Sure. But why?”
“The scarf, Kenneth.”
“Oh yeah.” His voice was flat, the reminder not a cheerful one. “K.C., have you discovered anything?”
“I’m getting close, Kenneth. I have to find out a little more.”
“Sure,” he said again. I knew he didn’t, really, have much hope.
I didn’t want to tell him yet. I was sure, but the scarf was a real stumbling-block. Everything fitted, in my new picture, except the scarf.
Kenneth’s office staff was subdued, as might be expected. I asked all of them, the office manager, twelve secretaries, four paralegals and the kitchen help, to come into the main conference room.
“I appreciate all of your taking time to talk to me. I don’t know if you all know of the difficulty Mr. Carlisle is in?”
They knew. Some of them shifted uncomfortably, looked away, embarrassed.
“First, I want to make one point very clear. Mr. Carlisle is innocent.” I said it firmly and looked at each of them in turn. “That’s the most important thing to remember. Now, I know all of you would like to help him?”
Some nodded. Some murmured yes.
“Then listen very closely to what I have to say. It may make all the difference to him. First, do you know how Miss Boutelle was killed?”
One of the older secretaries nodded. “Strangled, Miss, that’s what it said in the paper.”
“That’s right,” I said approvingly. “She was strangled. But does anyone know what was used by the murderer?”
They looked at me, blank-faced. The scarf had not been mentioned in the news reports.
“Miss Boutelle was strangled with Mr. Carlisle’s white silk scarf.”
It was utterly quiet.
I tried to watch all of them at once. That isn’t easy but when you’ve spent five years watching the faces in a jury, you widen your field of vision. I saw what I hoped to see.
“Now,” I said slowly, “that sounds bad for Mr. Carlisle. And it is. The murderer planned it that way.”
They were hanging on every word now and there was one face I watched especially closely.
“The murderer deliberately used Mr. Carlisle’s scarf.”
“But Miss Carlisle, how did he do that?” a paralegal asked.
“That’s what I’m hoping one of you can tell me.”
You could have heard a mouse sneeze.
“The scarf was here Monday morning. Last Monday. Do all of you remember Monday? That was the day several of the Carlisle family members were here for a meeting. The scarf was in Mr. Carlisle’s coat pocket when he put it in the closet last Monday.” I paused, said slowly, “It was not in his pocket when he left the office Monday afternoon.”
There was an excited buzz.
“I’m hoping that one or several of you may be able to help me. I’m going to stay in the conference room after our meeting is over and I will be waiting to talk to anyone who knows anything about the scarf.” I looked directly at a plump, pleasant-faced girl in her mid-twenties.
She lagged behind as everyone began to leave. I rose and closed the door and we faced each other.
“How did you know?” Tears welled in her eyes. “I never thought . . . I didn’t mean . . .”
“I know you didn’t,” I said gently, “and your stepping forward now proves you didn’t mean to cause any trouble for Mr. Carlisle.”
“Oh, I didn’t. Miss. It was . . . I thought it was some kind of a lark. She explained it to me that way.”
“She?” For a moment, I wondered if I could have it wrong, all wrong.
“Yes, and you could have knocked me over with a feather when I saw her picture in the paper.”
It was all incoherent and a little jumbled, but, in essence, the girl’s story was simple enough.
Francine Boutelle had struck up a conversation with her over lunch one day in the drug store. Boutelle had expressed a lot of interest when she found out that Trudy worked in Kenneth Carlisle’s office. Somehow, Trudy wasn’t quite sure how, the conversation came around to the excitement of knowing celebrities, and Francine, though that was not the name she gave Trudy, confided that she collected things that belonged to famous people and, since it looked as if Kenneth might be going to Washington, she would like to have something of his for her collection. Something he wore. That stumped Trudy but Francine, after some thought, said what about that silk scarf he wore? If Trudy would get it for her, she would be willing to pay a nice sum. Fifty dollars or so.
