Trick or Treachery

by Jessica Fletcher

  “You’d never know Paul Marshall was in financial difficulty, judging from this place,” Doug Treyz said absently.

  “Is he?” Decker asked.

  “That’s the scuttlebutt from my treatment chair,” the dentist said. “The way I hear it, his partner, Scott, never did come up with a solution for BarrierCloth’s flamability problem, and paid the price with his life. Without that, the company can’t compete with L. L. Bean and Lands’ End.”

  “One of my patients told me that the two partners took out hefty ‘key man’ insurance policies not long before the accident,” Seth said. “Paul should have collected on the policy—millions, I understand.”

  “Yes, but I heard the company hasn’t paid yet because of the suspicious nature of the fire,” Tina Treyz added.

  “Looks like if you want to know anyone’s financial condition around here, go for a root canal or a routine physical,” Marylou said, raising her eyebrows.

  “Maybe he did perfect the formula,” Decker offered. “I heard he might have.”

  A pair of large white doves, or maybe they were swans, joined us on the patio. They turned out to be Peter and Roberta Walters, owners of the area’s only radio station. “These people keep up on the news,” Jack Decker said, turning to the new couple. “We were just speculating on whether Tony Scott solved the flame problem with BarrierCloth before he died.”

  “Can’t prove it by me,” Pete Walters said. “What’s new with the nut out on the old quarry road?”

  “Lucas Tremaine?” Decker said. “Our copy editor, Brenda Brody, has been attending his . . . what would you call them, services?”

  “Con games,” Seth said, guffawing.

  “She calls them seances,” Marilou interjected. “You know Brenda lost her husband a year ago.”

  “Ayuh,” said Seth. “He was my patient. Fell off a ladder while putting on a new roof. Damn fool was too old to be roofing.”

  “Brenda believes in reincarnation and the ability to speak to the dead. I told her that giving money to Tremaine was a waste, but when someone is grieving the way she is, you grasp at straws. She swears Tremaine puts her in touch with Russell, that they have long conversations.”

  “The man is a charlatan,” Doug said.

  “Unconscionable,” added Pete.

  “There’s got to be a law against what he’s doing,” Seth said.

  “If there were,” I put in, “Mort Metzger would have invoked it long ago.”

  “Look at that.”

  We directed our eyes to the right, where Tina Treyz was pointing. Two party-goers in moose costumes could be seen walking through the small, ancient cemetery adjacent to Marshall’s property, where The Legend and her unfaithful spouse were buried. The moose couple’s antlered heads were silhouettes in the light of the full moon. Beyond the cemetery, I knew, were two cottages, the Rose Cottage, where Matilda Swift lived, and on the other side of a grove of spruce trees, the one inhabited by Robert and Lauren Wandowski and their daughter.

  “Sneaking off for a little moose smooching, I suspect,” Seth said, smiling.

  I turned to my right, where a lonely figure in a moose costume stood on a second patio, gazing out over the cemetery, where the couple was walking. Although he or she was a considerable distance from me, I could see from the stiff stance and fisted gloves that this person was not happy. Seconds later, another moose joined the first. The two exchanged a few words before stepping from view.

  “That music is too good to waste,” Roberta Walters said, swinging her tail feathers around and taking her husband’s wing. “You promised me two dances this evening. You owe me one.”

  We followed the Walters inside and wandered through the elaborate decorations in Paul Marshall’s mansion. In the dining room, where the walls and chandelier were draped with cotton cobwebs, a buffet rivaling the best on any cruise ship was set up along one wall. Cold shrimp and oysters cascading over tiered ice sculptures were displayed next to pots of hot chowder, pastas, carving stations of turkey, roast beef and lamb, and more salads and side dishes than I’d have time, or stomach, to sample.

  Across from the buffet was a table right out of Dickens’s Great Expectations. It had been set to re-create Miss Havisham’s long-abandoned banquet—platters of moldy food, dusty champagne glasses tipped over and skeins of cobwebs on the candelabra that tilted in its center. Guests had gathered to admire the culinary displays both real and counterfeit, but before we were invited to partake of the overflowing buffet tables, our host asked that we gather around him at the foot of a winding staircase leading up to the second floor.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, my dear friends, I am so happy to see all of you here enjoying yourselves, and I know you’ll continue the festivities at the buffet tables. But it would be derelict of me not to mention that this night marks the one-year anniversary of the untimely, tragic death of a man who was not only my trusted partner, but also my friend. I speak, of course, of Anthony Scott, who died in that terrible fire one year ago today. Would you join me in a moment of silent tribute to his memory?”

  Marshall lowered his head, and a hush fell over the room. Then he looked out over the throng of revelers, raised a glass of champagne he’d been holding and said, “To Tony Scott, partner, genius and sorely missed friend.”

  Those holding drinks answered by raising their glasses.

  “Tony was a shy man, but he loved a good party, so I know he’d want you to enjoy this one. Now, get to those buffet tables,” Marshall sang out. “Bon appetit!”

  The adage that time passes when you’re having fun certainly applied to this particular evening and party, and I couldn’t believe how quickly the night slipped by. Before I knew it, waiters and waitresses were bringing in trays of magnificent desserts specially baked for the party by one of Boston’s top bakeries, many of the sweets decorated with imaginative Halloween figures, tiny marzipan witches and pumpkins and white chocolate ghosts and other symbols identified with the day.

  By midnight, most of the guests, filled with food and conviviality, had said good night to their host and gotten into cars delivered to the front portico by parking attendants hired for the occasion. Before the guests left, however, the women were each presented with a small sterling silver paperweight in the shape of a pumpkin, the men a silver tie clasp formed to resemble a broomstick, momentos of a memorable evening.

  “Shall we, Jessica?” Seth asked me a half hour later.

  We’d lingered to chat with the Metzgers and the Lerners.

  “I’m ready,” I said. “I can’t wait to shed The Legend and get back to being just Jessica.”

  “Me, too,” Maureen said. “It was fun being Cher for a night, but I wouldn’t want to have to dress up like this every day.”

  “Well, you can come as you normally are to our party,” Joan said with a smile, “providing you wear something slightly military.”

  As we started for the door, Paul Marshall approached. “Not leaving so soon, are you?” he said.

  “So soon?” Seth said. “Long past my bedtime.”

  “Oh, stay a few minutes longer,” Paul said. “I’ve asked a special few to join me for a night-cap. You’ll hurt my feelings if you go.”

  As much as I wanted to leave, it would have been impolite, I felt, to decline his invitation. Paul told a waiter to deliver a tray of brandy to the living room, and Seth and I, along with the Metzgers and Lerners, followed him there, where a small group, many in moose costumes, mingled. The patio doors were open, and guests wandered in and out. A skeleton staff—literally since that’s how they were costumed—had begun to gather the dishes and glassware and other remains of the party, and to bring back the furniture that had been removed to make room for the dance floor. Marshall grabbed one of the moose. “Have you seen Erica?”

  The moose shook his head, and Paul sent him—I think it was a him—to turn off the sound effects, which were still groaning and rattling in the background.

  “Please excuse me. I won’t be bu
t a moment,” our host said. “A little business to take care of.” He strode from the room.

  As the Metzgers and the Lerners went to join the Deckers on the patio, Seth looked at me and shrugged. “Might as well sit down,” he said. “Bein’ on my feet for so long’s got me all tuckered out.” He moved toward a wing chair, one of a pair flanking a marble fireplace, and sank into its soft cushion with a grateful sigh. I took the chair opposite and watched as one of the skeletons made the rounds of the room, delivering drink orders.

  Marshall rejoined us several minutes later and pulled up a chair. His voice was hearty, the success of the party obviously buoying his spirits.

  “You know, I never get a chance to really talk with my guests,” he said. “There are so many things that pull me away during the evening.”

  “It was a wonderful Halloween party, Paul—as usual,” I said as the waiter appeared with brandy in snifters. “Thank you for inviting us.”

  “Thank you for coming. Wouldn’t be as much fun without you. By the way, you look terrific as The Legend. Are you sure I didn’t just see you haunting the cemetery?”

  “This is the night she’s supposed to appear,” Seth put in, “but I can vouch for Jessica’s presence all evening.”

  Paul started to say something, but changed his mind and said instead, “Yes, tonight was fun. I just wish Tony could have been here to share in it.”

  “Yes, I’m sure you do,” I said. I tasted the brandy, then put the glass down. The natural heat felt good going down, but I was tired and knew the drink would make me more so.

  “We were like brothers,” Marshall said, waving the waiter away, “much more than business partners. I just can’t accept that he’s no longer here. When I first learned he’d died in that explosion and fire in his lab, I—”

  A loud wail cut through the air. All conversation stopped, and the small cluster of guests looked up.

  “I thought I told you to turn off the sound,” Marshall growled at a nearby moose.

  “I did,” the masculine voice responded.

  The wail erupted again, raising the fine hairs on my arms. We jumped up as a group and rushed onto the patio, where we peered out over the dark property in the direction from which the sound seemed to have come. We heard it again, louder this time, now closer to a scream, coming from the cemetery, or beyond.

  “Good Lord,” Paul said.

  “I’d better see what’s happening,” Mort said, instantly shifting into his law enforcement mode.

  He took off at a run, the rest of us following. We raced to the cemetery, the damp earth pulling at our shoes. Dodging tombstones and grave markers—nothing there—we continued running downhill toward the Rose Cottage. The screams had stopped by now, but we followed the sound of sobbing. As we approached, two figures could be seen standing together near the bare branches of rose bushes that climbed the brick wall. The two people were in costume, their bodies so close together their moose heads touched.

  “Stand back!” Mort ordered, bringing us to a halt. We weren’t so far away that we couldn’t see what had caught his attention. There, in a pool of moonlight, lay a motionless form. A stain, the same rich hue as the roses that bloomed on this brick wall every spring, had turned white hair to crimson. Those incredibly blue eyes were open and dull.

  It was Matilda Swift.

  Chapter Six

  Sheriff Mort Metzger, dressed in his Davy Crockett costume, stretched his arms out wide and stopped the forward motion of the small crowd. “Come on, folks, give us a little room, huh. Dr. Hazlitt, would you . . . ?”

  Seth walked to the recumbent figure and slowly, with obvious arthritic stiffness, lowered himself to one knee so he could place his fingertips against Matilda’s neck.

  “Is she dead?” Mort asked, pulling his badge from a back pocket and pinning it above the suede fringe on his shirt.

  “Ayuh. Looks like it,” Seth replied, his fingers now on the chin of the corpse, gently moving it back and forth to check, I knew, whether rigor mortis had begun to set in. Witnessing this macabre tableau, besides Seth, Mort and me, were a movie star, a pair of pirates, two swans, a bear, a cheerleader and a half dozen moose. Had it not been so real and tragic, it might have been a surrealistic scene from a Fellini movie.

  “Who could have done such a thing?” Paul Marshall’s voice boomed as he pushed his way to the front of the group and tugged off his costume head.

  Mort turned from the corpse and faced us. “First thing, everybody get rid a’ those damn moose heads so I can see who I’m talking to.”

  One by one, the guests pulled off their furry heads until their identities were exposed.

  “Who discovered the body?” Mort asked, turning to the couple who’d been there when we arrived at the scene. “Who screamed?”

  “I did,” replied Erica Marshall, dropping her animal head to the ground.

  “Erica!” Warren Wilson’s face was red as he flung his moose head to the side and glared across the body at her. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

  “What were you doing down here?” her father asked in a tone that demanded an answer.

  “I was . . . I was taking a walk, getting some air,” she said.

  Marshall turned to the moose standing next to her. “You,” he growled, “do as the sheriff said. Take off that head!”

  Jeremy Scott slowly removed his costume head and dropped it next to Erica’s.

  “You were here with Erica?” Wilson said, the anger in his voice rivaling Marshall’s.

  When Jeremy didn’t respond, Erica’s father repeated the question.

  “No, sir,” Jeremy said nervously. “I just got here, a few seconds before—”

  “Hey, you there,” Mort interrupted as he spotted a moose standing behind Jack Decker’s broad pirate hat. “Take off your head right now.”

  The tall figure hesitated, but with all eyes upon him, he realized he didn’t have any choice except to follow the order. He reluctantly pulled on his snout until the head slid off, revealing Robert Wandowski. His face was pale, and his dark hair stood on end from static electricity. “I . . . I . . . I didn’t do anything,” he stammered. “I swear I didn’t. Even though I didn’t like her, after she lured my daughter into her house—”

  “Just calm down,” Mort said, “and be quiet. And don’t leave until we get your statement.”

  “I will, Sheriff. I’ll stand right here.”

  I wondered where Wandowski’s wife was. Mort patted his back pocket. “I got my beeper, but the phone’s in the car.” He took in the group. “Somebody call nine-one-one,” he said. “Tell ’em we’ve got a dead body on the Paul Marshall estate and to send my deputies and an EMS team on the double. And rustle up the ME.”

  Jeremy started for the front door of the cottage.

  “Where are you going?” Mort demanded.

  “To call nine-one-one,” Jeremy replied.

  “Not in there, you don’t. That’s part of the crime scene. Go up to the house.”

  “How did you know there’s a phone in there?” Jack Decker asked Jeremy.

  Jeremy held up his hands in a gesture of bewilderment. “I just assumed there’s one,” he replied nervously, taking off at a run up to the main house.

  “Stay away from the cottage,” Mort told us. “I don’t want any more footprints added to the scene here.”

  Mort was right not to allow anyone into the cottage without police supervision. It was always possible that some piece of evidence might be inadvertently compromised or tainted, including the phone.

  I shifted my position to try to see through the open door into the cottage, but my attention was directed back to Mort, who was addressing the crowd. A few curious people had begun to inch closer to the body. While some averted their eyes from viewing it directly, like watching a gory scene in a motion picture through slightly spread fingers, others faced it head-on, moving in for a better look. Since, to my knowledge, none of them knew the deceased well, the shock that energize
d the crowd was the result of a murder having been committed, not the loss of someone they cared about.

  “Get back,” Mort shouted, directing the group away from the body. He turned to Erica. “You see anybody down here, Ms. Marshall?”

  “No! I mean, no one but . . . her.” She pointed at the body and turned away, the fingers of her right hand hovering in front of her mouth, her eyes still wide with fear.

  “Anybody see anything unusual tonight?” Mort asked.

  “Why are you asking us, Sheriff?” Paul Marshall demanded. “This was obviously the work of a madman who strayed onto the property. Surely, you don’t think anyone invited to my party might have killed her.”

  Mort ignored Marshall and faced Seth, who remained on his knees; I didn’t know whether he’d stayed there next to the body because he was still examining it or was having trouble getting up. Mort knelt at his side. “Well, Doc, what do you think?” he asked loud enough for us to hear.

  “Somebody hit her pretty hard,” Seth said, adjusting his position to better see where she’d been struck in the head.

  “What sort ’a weapon?” Mort asked.

  “Hard to say,” Seth replied, continuing to scrutinize Matilda. “I’m no medical examiner, but it was a pretty large object, something flat.”

  Mort stood. “Anybody see anything around here could’ve been the weapon?” He extended his hand to assist Seth to his feet.

  As onlookers swiveled in search of a possible weapon, Joan Lerner dropped to her knees. “Here, kitty, kitty,” she called softly.

  A large black cat, back arched, was rubbing its side against the corner of the cottage. Large yellow eyes gazed warily at the intruders in its domain.

  “Ah, the witch’s familiar,” Peter Walters muttered. “The spirit that accompanies her everywhere.”

  His wife swatted his arm. “Peter, you’re as bad as those people in town. This is no time to kid.”

  As Joan moved slowly toward the cat, it gave out with a yowl, quickly turned around, tail high, and disappeared behind a hedge.

  “We can’t just leave the cat.” Joan frowned, brushing mud off her hands. “There’s no one here now to feed it.”