Shaded Light: The Case of the Tactless Trophy Wife: A Paul Manziuk and Jacquie Ryan Mystery (The Manziuk and Ryan Mysteries Book 1)

by J. A. Menzies

  “She was so beautiful, so alive, and to see her like that…” He bit his lower lip and took a deep breath. “What exactly do you want to know, Inspector? I don’t think you really want to chat about finding dead bodies, do you?”

  Manziuk studied the young man before him. A good-looking, bright, young man. And a wary one. Was he afraid of being arrested for murder?

  “We have to talk to all the people who were here at the time of Mrs. Martin’s death.”

  “So you want my alibi?”

  “If you don’t mind. Say from about two o’clock until the discovery of the body.”

  “Very well. I ate lunch on the terrace with the others. Then I went for a swim and more or less lazed around. We had some drinks at approximately three o’clock, after which I wandered over to the rose garden. It was twenty past three, by the way. At about a quarter to four, I went back toward the house and saw Kendall coming out with Lorry. We went to the Japanese garden and found the body.”

  “So, from about three-twenty until three-forty-five you were alone in the rose garden?”

  “Yes.” Nick was looking directly at him. “I realize that isn’t a particularly good alibi, but it happens to be the truth.”

  “Lorry Preston says you stopped in at the music room.”

  “Just for a couple of minutes, if that. It was right before I went to the rose garden.”

  “Why did you go to the rose garden?”

  “To meet Mrs. Martin.”

  NINE

  You went there to meet Mrs. Martin?” Manziuk asked.

  “Jillian,” Nick replied. “Is that better?”

  “And how long have you known Jillian Martin?”

  Nick shifted uncomfortably in the chair. “I knew Jill Jensen. I met her just over four years ago. I was twenty-one; she was nineteen. We dated for about six months, and I haven’t seen her since.”

  “Did you know she would be at the Brodies’ this weekend?”

  “Of course not. I’d heard the name Jillian Martin, but I never dreamed there was a connection.”

  “When did you first see her this weekend?”

  “Friday when she arrived. I came downstairs and saw a bunch of people outside. I knew Mr. Brodie’s partners were coming for the weekend and I’d never met them, so I glanced out just to see how they looked. Jill—Jillian—was in the car with the door open. At first, I couldn’t believe it was her.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because when I knew her, she was a waitress at a bar near where I was working for the summer. It wasn’t a bad place or anything, but you don’t really expect a cocktail waitress to show up with a high-class lawyer—not as his wife, anyway!”

  “Who put an end to your dating Jillian?” Manziuk continued.

  Nick stared at him for a moment. “She did.”

  “Why,” Manziuk asked, “were you meeting her this afternoon?”

  Nick had been sitting forward in his chair. Now he leaned back and gave a low laugh. “Look, I’d better go back and start over. This has all been so crazy. I mean, you don’t expect your old girlfriend to show up married to a top lawyer and then get herself killed all in one weekend. I realize I’m a logical suspect. Motive jealousy or revenge or some such thing. And I also realize that if I don’t tell you the ‘whole truth and nothing but the truth,’ you’ll find out and that’ll make it look worse.”

  “Okay, start from the top.”

  “The last summer of my college days, I worked for a small law firm in the sticks. Mostly, I sat in the law library and researched a lot of boring stuff. There was a reasonably classy tavern nearby, and I used to go there after five to wake up.

  “Jill was a waitress. She was… the word ‘beautiful’ is inadequate—and I got interested—along with a lot of other people. She went out with me and we—or I should say I—fell in love.” Nick’s voice was slow and hesitant. “I asked her to marry me. I thought she would. I thought she felt the same as I did. She didn’t. She said she had higher expectations. I told her I’d be a lawyer in a few years, and I’d also been asked to do some professional skiing, and that if I was any good at either I’d have no trouble supporting a family. But she said she wasn’t taking any chances. She basically said that if I’d had money right then, she’d have married me, but since I didn’t—” Nick paused for a moment and studied the floor. “I kept on trying to get her to change her mind. Finally, she got her point across.

  “A couple of months later, I went back to the tavern once just to see if she had changed her mind, I guess. But the bartender said she’d taken a better job somewhere else and he didn’t know her address.”

  “Do you have a girlfriend now?” Manziuk asked.

  Nick flashed a grin. “Lots of them.”

  “No one in particular?”

  “I believe in playing the field. When I met Jill, I was young and inexperienced. She did me a favor—showed a lot more sense than I did.” He sat forward again, hands on knees. “Look, if she’d married me, it would have lasted about a year, if that. If you’ve got any idea that I’m still in love with her, assuming I ever really was, get it out of your head. After I got over the shock of seeing her, I was happy she’d done well. Martin is successful and seems like a nice guy. I was glad for her.”

  “She wanted to meet you in the rose garden?” Manziuk asked.

  “Yes. She came over while I was in the pool and said she had a surprise for me and I should be in the rose garden at three-thirty sharp. She didn’t wait for a reply—just smiled rather mysteriously and left.”

  “What time was that?”

  “About one-thirty. We all had drinks later on, but I didn’t want to question her with other people around. No one here knew that we‘d met before, and, frankly, I preferred to keep it that way.”

  “The rose garden? Not the Japanese garden?”

  Nick shrugged. “That’s what I heard her say.”

  “Had Mrs. Martin talked to you on Friday or Saturday?”

  “Not really. She tried to talk once on Saturday, but I found an excuse to get away. I was afraid she might want to go over old times or something. So I guess I more or less avoided her. Nothing personal, but I’d pretty well forgotten about her and I wasn’t sure how she’d take that.”

  “Did you think she was happy?” Manziuk asked with a little more sharpness.

  Nick looked puzzled. “Happy? I guess so. She seemed to be having a good time.”

  “What were the attitudes of the other wives toward her? Mrs. Brodie and Mrs. Fischer.”

  “Ellen and Anne?” Nick shrugged. “Okay, I guess.” He glanced from Manziuk to Ryan and back to Manziuk again.

  “How about Mr. Martin? Did he and his wife get along?”

  “I guess so.”

  “And Mrs. Martin’s sister, Shauna? I understand there was a bit of a disturbance Saturday evening?”

  “Saturday evening?”

  “Miss Jensen and Mr. Bart Brodie were late for supper.”

  “Oh. Oh, yeah, I guess they were.”

  “I understand she looked quite different from before.”

  He shrugged. “She had a new dress or something. I really wasn’t paying much attention.”

  “According to Lorry Preston, you stopped in at the music room around three-fifteen today.”

  “I did. I asked her if she wanted to do something later. She said she was going to play the piano for a while. I told her I’d come back.”

  “And you went straight to the rose garden?”

  “I knew I was early, but I wanted to think.”

  “What did you do when she didn’t show up?”

  “To tell you the truth, I was thinking about some other stuff and I had no idea how much time had passed until I looked at my watch and it was nearly a quarter to four. Then I decided she’d stood me up. I really wasn’t worried about it. In fact, I was relieved.”

  “What would you say if I told you someone in this house had strangled Mrs. Martin?”

  Nick continued to
look perplexed. “I can’t believe it was Mr. Martin or any of the Brodies or Lorry. I guess I don’t know the others as well, but I can’t see why any of them would want to do it.” He looked at Manziuk and then relaxed a little. A disarming smile appeared. “I sure wish I could tell what you’re thinking. You know, you remind me a lot of one of my law professors. Absolutely inscrutable.”

  Manziuk allowed the slightest of smiles to touch the corner of his mouth. “If you do think of something that might help us, don’t forget it’s your duty as a law-abiding citizen to pass the information along.”

  Nick laughed and walked out.

  “I’ll bet the part about having lots of girlfriends is accurate,” Ryan commented dryly.

  Manziuk stretched back and touched the fingertips of his hands together. “He doesn’t seem to have noticed much this weekend.”

  “Perhaps he had other things on his mind,” Ryan suggested.

  “Perhaps.”

  “Who do you want to talk to next?”

  “See if the husband is able to talk with us.”

  Peter Martin slowly followed Ryan in and sank without a word into Manziuk’s chair.

  Manziuk, who had been considering the titles of the books on the shelves of the study, squeezed himself into the other chair and studied Jillian Martin’s husband. The man certainly gave the appearance of someone who had suffered a sudden shock. His eyes were puffy and red. An air of despondency seemed to have bent his shoulders.

  “Mr. Martin, I’m very sorry to disturb you at this time.”

  Peter’s hand came up as if to brush away a curtain. “That’s all right,” he said flatly. “You have a job to do. I just hope you get whoever did this. You know,” he said with a small ironic laugh, “I’m one of those people who strenuously supported legislation against capital punishment. But right now I could beat the guy’s brains out all by myself. I guess your viewpoint depends a lot on how close it comes to you, eh?”

  Manziuk nodded. “Mr. Martin, do you have any idea who could have done this?”

  Peter slowly shook his head. “I wish I did.”

  “She had no enemies you’re aware of?”

  “No. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m not going to sit here and tell you there weren’t people who disliked her. Everybody has enemies of some sort. But it takes something a lot stronger than dislike to murder someone that way. It takes pure hatred. I don’t know of anyone who felt that way. Nobody who hated her.”

  “But someone murdered her.”

  “Then you’d better get busy looking for some lunatic.”

  “We have police checking this entire area. If there was a stranger on these grounds, we’ll find out.”

  “Do that then. And find him.”

  “Mr. Martin, I understand your wife and her sister had an argument after supper last night. Can you tell us about that?”

  Peter sat up straight. “You surely don’t suspect Shauna, do you? That’s absolutely ridiculous!”

  “We’re checking everyone.”

  “Well, don’t get carried away. Yes, they had a difference of opinion. Jillian isn’t—wasn’t—very tactful. But by this morning, Shauna realized that Jillian was right and she apologized. Shauna adored Jillian.”

  “Jillian was the older of the two?”

  “Well, no. Shauna was older. But Jillian was the one with the ideas, the vitality. Shauna’s quite plain and not very outgoing. Most people would take Jillian to be older. She was out in the world more—knew what was what. Jillian used to say Shauna was an innocent babe. No sophistication.”

  “What about Bart Brodie? What part did he play in this quarrel between Shauna and Jillian?”

  He shifted in the chair. “Who knows why he did it? Likely for his own amusement. Anyway, Jillian was good and mad at him. I wouldn’t be surprised if she told him off. She had a temper, you know. Nobody’d walk over her.” His voice showed his pride. “Ask Bart if you want to know what he was up to.”

  “You didn’t go with them to the nightclub?”

  “No. I’m not much on dancing and all the noise, especially right after a big meal. There’s a good bar here, so I just took it easy.”

  “Nick and Lorry also stayed?”

  “Shauna did, too. We had a game of pool and then sat around and talked. Mostly about religion.”

  “Religion?” Manziuk asked, surprised.

  Peter Martin smiled for the first time. “Lorry’s an unusual girl. Could have a lot of men on her string. But she seems more interested in God than in men. Don’t remember how we got on the topic. Oh, yes. I asked her what she did. Goes to a Bible college. We got into a pretty good discussion about life.”

  “Did Nick say much?”

  “Nope. Mostly Lorry and me. She can hold her own, too. Surprised me. I thought I’d have her rattled in a few minutes, but she held out all the way. Knows what she believes in and what she wants out of life, too. A lot like Jillian that way.” His voice lost its animation on the last sentence and he stopped talking.

  “Jillian was your second wife, I believe.”

  “Fourth. And I know where you’re headed. You figure she married me for my money. Well, why else does a twenty-two-year-old marry a forty-three-year-old who’s getting a pot and starting to go gray? Of course she did.”

  Manziuk again looked surprised. “You didn’t mind?”

  “Not at all. If having a bit of money can’t get you a gorgeous young dame, then why have it? She married me for my money and I married her because I happened to want a young attractive blonde. We respected each other and I think we had as good a marriage as most people I know.”

  “What about your other marriages?”

  “As I was telling Nick yesterday, you make a few mistakes. I got married early. College sweetheart and all that. It lasted twelve years. We got a divorce. I’d already met Hildy. She contracted to do some personnel stuff for the firm I was with before I joined this one, and we got married a short time after my divorce was final. We lasted five years. I felt a little, shall we say, tied down, and she got mad and divorced me. I played the field for a while and then married Genevieve. She took me for a good deal of alimony and went off with some guy from a rock band. She could have done a lot better.

  “I decided since my first wife had brown hair, Hildy black, and Genevieve red, it was time for a blonde. I met Jillian at a party. She was with a doctor. She left the party with me, and we ended up married.”

  “Would you have eventually gotten a divorce?”

  Peter laughed. “What a question!” He leaned his face against the back of his hand for a moment, then looked Manziuk in the eye. “Yes,” he said thoughtfully. “Sooner or later. One of us would have gotten itchy feet. As I was saying to Lorry last night, life is to live. I don’t believe there’s anything after. What difference does it make if you get married once or a dozen times, just so long as you enjoy yourself? But,” he said more seriously, “a friendly divorce is one thing. No one has the right to cut off life, especially from someone who was so beautiful. Whoever did this deserves a very slow and very painful death.” His voice quivered. “You get him. And when you get him—”

  “Were you aware that your wife knew Nick Donovan?”

  Surprise, then bewilderment registered. “What exactly do you mean?”

  “About four years ago, he asked her to marry him and she turned him down. That’s what he says, anyway. Did she ever mention this to you?”

  “That’s what he says?” Peter repeated.

  “Yes. However, he also says he’s had no contact with her since, and was completely unaware of her marriage or that she would be here this weekend.”

  “I certainly don’t know anything about it. Nick and Jillian, eh? That’s a bit humorous. He reminds me a little of myself twenty years ago, except I was married with a couple of kids. Maybe he reminds me of what I should have been, unencumbered. So he tried to marry her? I wonder if she cared about him at all?”

  “He says she would have married him
if he’d had money.”

  Peter laughed. “Smart girl. She was no fool, inspector, no matter what anyone might tell you. She knew what she wanted and she worked hard to get it. I don’t mind telling you I wasn’t particularly in a marrying mood when I met her. But she said it was marriage or nothing. So I married her. She was one smart cookie.”

  “What’s your opinion of Nick Donovan?”

  “I’ve got a kid somewhere that must be nearly his age. Maybe a few years younger. Same age as Lorry, come to think of it.” He paused momentarily. “But you asked about Nick. You know we offered him a chance to join us?”

  Manziuk nodded.

  “He turned it down. I told him he’s making a big mistake because it may be his one big chance. If Nick goes into this skiing—say he’s good for five years. He’s what? Twenty-five. He can’t last long. Most skiers are young. So a few years from now he wants to get a good place in law, who’s going to want him?”

  Manziuk consulted the list Carnaby had given him. “What about Hildy Reimer? Someone mentioned that she’s your ex-wife. Did you know she was going to be here this weekend?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “Do you know why she came?”

  “I was told it was because she was having her apartment redecorated and she had no more idea of my presence here than I did of hers.”

  “Is there a chance Ms. Reimer is still in love with you?”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Hardly,” he said with a twist of his lips. “She divorced me.”

  “Why?”

  “She didn’t like my spending time with other women. As a matter of fact, she was surprisingly sticky. I thought she was more—well, modern, I guess. But she certainly didn’t murder Jillian. I’m sure she was merely curious, no more. She’s deceptive. Much softer than you’d guess.”

  “What exactly do you mean?”

  Peter coughed and adjusted his position. “Well, she looks like a real hard-boiled female executive—and she is. She does a good job and she works like a man. But she’s got a feminine side, too. She’s a good mother and, I guess for the right man, she’d be a good wife. Like Ellen. Home and family first. But I wasn’t the man she should have married, and we both realized it.”