A Little Class on Murder

by Carolyn G. Hart

  Max avoided her eyes.

  “Laurel Darling Roethke,” Annie intoned bitterly. “My class! I’ll never get it under control again until we find out who leaked that stuff.” She tried to slow her breathing, bring her heartbeat down to an acceptable level. “All right. They think they’ve got me outsmarted. They think I’ll just fall down and lie doggo while they grab my class in their teeth and run away with it. But that’s not true. We’re going to put a stop to it by beating them at their own game.” She fixed Max with a demanding stare. “Who did it?” When he didn’t answer immediately, she said—even she realized a bit unfairly—“Well, you’ve had all morning to find out. Who did it?”

  But Max never had a chance to answer, if answer he could. The mind-numbing roar of an enormous explosion shattered the gloomy quiet of the lagoon.

  They stared at each other in shocked silence for an instant, then flung themselves toward the steps and began to run.

  It stuck in Annie’s mind, as odd details will in the midst of an emergency, that the alligator had responded more quickly than they, shooting back into the dark water before she and Max took a step.

  They burst out from the dimness of the canopied trail among the cypresses and stumbled to a halt. Smoke and dust billowed out from the shattered side of the journalism building.

  11

  A chalky billow of masonry grit eddied from the doorway to the Crier offices. The door hung crazily from one hinge.

  “Emily!”

  Brad Kelly pelted up the central hall through the roiling dust. The gritty particles clung to him, coating his clothes and face with gray. He stumbled to a stop by the dangling door, his face slack with shock. “Oh God, I just went to the john—” He reached out, grabbed Max’s arm. “I just went to the john. If I hadn’t, I’d have been in—” Frantically, he began to pull on the sagging door. “Emily! Emily! Where are you? Emily, answer, for Christ’s sake!”

  The door came loose in his hands. He heaved it into the hallway and plunged into the newsroom. Glass from imploded video display terminal screens covered the floor, crunched beneath his steps. Desks and terminals leaned at precarious, unnatural angles. Broken joists and splintered lathes protruded from the shattered plaster walls. There was an acrid smell of smoke, dust, plaster, and singed plastic.

  Max yelled after the frantic editor as he careened across the room. “Is somebody in there? Where?”

  Kelly pointed at the far corner, now a tangle of construction rods and sagging ceiling tiles and mounds of bricks. The exterior wall was gone, and the remains of the office lay exposed to the outside. “My office. Emily. Emily Everett. Oh God, look!”

  Choking from the dust, straining to see through the milky cloud, Annie and Max stared at the debris and at a bloated hand, gunpowder singed, sticking through a sheet of beaverboard. As they looked, blood seeped from the puckered edges of the wood.

  Max gripped Annie’s elbow. “Quick. Go for help. We’ll see if we can get her free,” and he hurried after Kelly.

  Annie darted a frantic glance at the unstable wall tilted over the corner office. But Max and the editor had to try. Whirling around, she bolted across the hall into the departmental office.

  “Mr. Burke,” she shouted. “Mr. Burke!”

  Even as she called, her mind was admonishing her for reacting so slowly. Obviously, Burke wasn’t in the building. If he had been in his office, the explosion would have brought him immediately to the scene.

  Pushing through the swinging gate at the counter, Annie grabbed the telephone receiver and started to dial, then slammed it down. No sound. No tone. Nothing. The explosion must have blown out the lines. Then strong and high came the keen of a siren. It was one of the most welcome sounds she’d ever heard. Help was on the way. Of course it would be. It was a small campus, and the response to an explosion would be immediate and swift.

  She was turning, ready to hurry back to help Max and Brad, praying the walls wouldn’t tumble down on them, when she saw the smear of red on the floor by the swinging gate.

  Blood.

  Odd how unmistakable it was.

  Even the dried, dark splotches that had disfigured the Crier door the morning after the vandal’s attack had been immediately, unmistakably identifiable.

  This, too, was blood.

  But it wasn’t old and dried.

  Fresh, bright, crimson blood.

  The trail was irregular, the smudges growing larger as she walked from the first office into the middle room past the filing cabinets and the table with the mimeograph machine toward the chairman’s office.

  The siren shrilled to a peak, then cut off.

  Annie looked at the open door to Burke’s office and the light spilling out, marking an oblong path across the floor, framing the smudges.

  One full bloody footprint at the threshold.

  A woman’s shoe.

  “Mr. Burke?” Her voice quavered. “Mr. Burke?”

  In the distance, muffled shouts.

  Annie moved to her right, avoiding that bloody print.

  Then she could see through the open door.

  Some sights the mind cannot easily accept.

  So much blood.

  It was Burke. She recognized the awning-stripe cotton shirt, soft green and white, even though it was sodden with blood. He slumped forward, battered head face down on the desk, arms bent. It looked as though he’d tried to protect himself from his assailant—his arms and hands bloodied—until he was beaten to death.

  Annie and Max were herded into an empty classroom, along with the faculty members who’d rushed downstairs from their offices. She saw their covert glances and realized she and Max looked as ghostly as the young editor from the clouds of grit. But the explosion hadn’t slowed Brad Kelly. Resolutely clutching his notepad, Kelly confronted the moon-faced sergeant, whose undented full crown hat was too big and rested on neat pink ears.

  “Officer, I have to get to a telephone. Two people dead, one blown up, one bludgeoned, The Crier destroyed. This is the biggest story in Chastain’s history.”

  The sergeant casually rested a plump, pink hand on the butt of his service revolver. “All occupants of the building are to remain here so as not to interfere with getting those bodies out. Besides, you’ll all have to be interviewed.”

  Bodies. Annie hadn’t held much hope that Emily Everett, poor obese Emily, could still be alive, but the sergeant’s words made it clear. ‘Bodies’ was plural. Both Emily and Burke were dead. She and Max needed to talk to someone in authority.

  “For how long?” Annie demanded. “Who’s in charge? Listen, we’ve got information about Mr. Burke! We’ve got to talk to somebody. Quick!”

  Ignoring her, the sergeant genially waved them toward the seats. “Might as well get comfortable, folks. It may take a while. Chief Wells is real busy right now, getting everything sorted out. Now, first thing, everybody write down their name on this sheet of paper and where you was when the bomb went off …. ”

  Annie stood frozen by the door. Chief Wells. Chief Wells! Oh God, of course it would be. But at least this time, unlike that horrible period during the house-and-garden troubles, he couldn’t possibly think she had anything to do with the murder.

  It was a standoff. They glared at each other with equal enmity.

  Finally, Chief Harry Wells jerked his head toward the straight chairs in front of the desk. “Sit.”

  Annie felt herself flush. Did he think she was a dog? And why had she and Max been left, cooling their heels for hours, stuck in a classroom with all the other hapless persons who’d been in the building near the time of the explosion and, presumably, of the murder, and, moreover, not only stuck there, but enjoined to silence. That was the unkindest cut of all. Even Victor Garrison had refrained from exercising his smooth tenor. Malcolm Moss for once hadn’t smiled. In fact, his heavy face had looked both grim and wary. Sue Tarrant had paced nervously, her high heels clicking on the floor until the sergeant frowningly insisted she sit down. Kurt Diggs had ne
rvously fingered the heavy silver bracelet on one wrist, glancing again and again toward the door. Only Josh Norden had sat as if oblivious to his surroundings and the circumstances. And Frank Crandall, she had realized at one point, was nowhere to be seen.

  So there they’d been, cooped up with some, if not all, of the possible perpetrators, and they’d been muzzled! Annie put her hands on her hips. “Chief Wells, when did free speech go out of style?”

  Max whispered warningly, “Annie, shh.”

  Chief Wells had a face like the side of a weathered granite mountain, gray, pocked, slab-hard. He moved one massive jaw, masticating the lump of tobacco pouching out that cheek. His watery blue eyes glinted with dislike.

  “We could’ve found out a lot, in the hours we sat in that stupid room,” Annie said acidly. “Burke was busy this morning talking to the faculty about the leak to the student newspaper. Do you even know about that? And Emily called in sick this morning. Why was she in the building? And almost everybody who was mad at Burke was cooped up with us, Moss, Garrison, Tarrant, Diggs, Norden, but your little pink gestapo agent—and you ought to get him a hat that fits—wouldn’t let us say a word to each other!”

  Or to anyone on the outside. But she didn’t even want to think about Laurel’s brief appearance an hour ago at one of the open windows at the back of the room and her caroled reassurances, “My dears, do bear this enforced idleness with as much grace as you can. So sorry to see you sequestered. But rest assured, Henny, Miss Dora, and I are nose to the trail, nothing daunted, no stone too small to turn. We shall carry the banner unfurled. Tallyho!”

  It didn’t bear thinking about, what those three might be doing. She and Max must round them up, forestall this investigative nonsense. The stakes in the Who’s-Deep-Throat Contest were now too high.

  Wells’s heavy lips moved. It took Annie a shocked moment to recognize a smile.

  Not a nice smile. And a deep rumble that had to be his version of laughter.

  “So you got all stewed up, huh? Sorry about that. You just fretted when you didn’t need to, Miss Laurance.”

  “Mrs. Darling,” Max said quickly.

  “You married her?” Wells’s voice rose. He shook his head in disbelief. The look he gave Max was one of profound sympathy.

  Annie’s eyes slitted.

  The chief’s heavy laughter subsided. “Little lady, you get too het up. Now, married life ought to settle you down some.”

  “If we can get back to the point,” she said icily, “we’ve got information about Mr. Burke and all the problems here in the department and we can—”

  Wells held up a meaty palm. “Right, right. Got to get to business. Wrapping this all up. Now, I understand you found the body, Miss—Mrs. Darling.”

  “Yes, yes. But the point is—”

  “The point is, what time was that exactly? Got to get the record right.” He held a pencil stub over a small notepad. “Now, we got the call about the explosion at eleven forty-three. Exactly. So,” he licked the tip of the pencil, “when did you find Mr. Burke?”

  Annie was exasperated. Still, Wells obviously would never get to the substance of the investigation—Burke’s relations with the people around him—until she’d satisfied him on this point. She frowned, trying to be accurate. “Okay. If the call came in at eleven forty-three, the explosion had probably just happened. Say, eleven forty-one. We ran right over to the building. We probably got there at eleven forty-two. We talked to the editor, Brad Kelly, went into the newsroom, then I ran to the main office and tried to call for help. The phones were out. That’s when I heard the siren, so I guess I found Mr. Burke about eleven forty-four.”

  Wells scrawled in his notebook. When had he become as concerned with timetables as Inspector French? “Now, for the record, what were you doing on the campus?”

  Annie wriggled impatiently. What a waste of time! “Teaching.”

  Thick iron gray eyebrows rose in astonishment. “You? What would you be teaching?”

  “A little class on murder,” Max interjected proudly.

  Wells’s face congealed in disdain, like Hamilton Burger dealing with Perry Mason.

  “The Three Grande Dames of the Mystery,” Annie explained. She knew very well what he was thinking.

  Wells, mouthing the words, wrote down, “A little class on murder,” then snapped shut his notebook. “All right. That completes the record. That’s all we need—”

  “All you need? Look, we’ve got lots to tell you, important—”

  “Mrs. Darling.” His heavy head swung toward Max. “Mr. Darling. You two amateurs can relax. This investigation’s already closed—and the murderer’s in jail right now.”

  For once, Annie was too stunned to speak.

  But Max saved the day.

  “Who?” he demanded.

  A satisfied smile creased Wells’s weathered face. “Like most police work, a lot of it depends on bein’ a noticin’ kind of man. One of my officers, Davis, was off duty, fishin’ from the pier down there off Ephraim Street. He saw this girl run out to the end and look around. Said he knew that kind of look, makin’ sure there wasn’t a cop close. So he ran up and stopped her just as she tried to heave that bar into the river—and it still had blood on it. She tried to run away. He arrested her for litterin’, but he knew it was lots more serious. The blood. Said he wasn’t surprised when the call came in from the college. Knew he’d caught him a live one.”

  “A girl?” Annie gasped, then she thought of that bloody footprint.

  “Young woman. Student here. Name of Georgia Finney.”

  They had taken over the top floor of the Palmetto Inn. Three communicating conference rooms had been opened, a bank of telephones installed, a large-scale map of Chastain College pinned to a paneled wall, a chalkboard set up in the middle room. Along one wall was a hospitality table featuring a coffee urn, tea pitcher, cups, glasses, and ice.

  Laurel saw them in the doorway. Henny looked up briefly from a mound of papers and waved abstractedly. Miss Dora never turned from her contemplation of a sketch on the blackboard.

  “Annie, Max, no time to fill you in. Just pitch in. Perhaps, if you could answer this phone, Maxwell darling, and Annie, do add your order to ours for dinner. Here’s the chef now.” Laurel thrust a receiver each at Max and Annie.

  “Hello,” Max managed. “What did you say? Sorry, I can’t seem—”

  “Another ordair from suite B?” an irate, accented voice demanded in Annie’s ear.

  “You’ll have to speak up, stop whispering,” Max urged. “What? Oh? Okay. Miss Dora?” He looked toward the blackboard. “Miss Dora, he wants to talk to you.” He looked doubtfully at the receiver. “I think it’s a he. Tiny little whispery voice.”

  “Look, anything will do,” Annie said irritably. “A grilled cheese, a hamburger—”

  “Grilled sheess? Hamburgair? This is Henri. Of what ’orrors do you speak? I am Henri of La Maison d’Henri, ze only five-star restaurant upon zis coast.”

  “All right, all right, all right. Two more of anything you’re fixing. Chef’s choice.”

  “Barbarians,” the chef of the only five-star restaurant on the coast muttered. “Clods. Primitifs.”

  Annie slammed down the receiver. A sleuth can only take so much.

  “My dear,” Laurel chided, “Henri is so sensitive. And we must fortify ourselves. We face a long night.”

  Here was her opening. Annie opened her mouth to attack.

  Miss Dora said brusquely, in her crackly voice, “Stop whining, Emmett. I know exactly how Harry will react if he discovers that you are giving me information from his office. So avoid that possibility. Lock your door.”

  Annie closed her mouth and listened. Max stared at Miss Dora.

  The wrinkled parchment face settled in implacable lines. “Door locked now?” A pause. “Emmett, you’ve always been a fool. If he tries to come in, tell him it’s jammed. Now, give the information to this young man, my inquiry agent—and don’t leave anything
out.” She thrust the receiver toward Max.

  With a bemused expression, Max dropped into the nearest chair and accepted a pad and pen also proffered by Miss Dora. He tilted his head toward another phone and mouthed at Annie, “Get on an extension.”

  Extension three glowed. Annie found a free phone, poked extension three, and picked up the receiver.

  The voice at the other end cut off in midword. Then a frantic, breathless cry, “Somebody came on the line.”

  “My secretary,” Max said soothingly. “Absolutely trustworthy.”

  Annie bristled, then decided it would do no harm, for the moment, to join that long line of stalwart ladies to whom generations of private investigators owed so much. Memorable women like Effie Perrine, Della Street, Nikki Porter, Lucy Hamilton, Mary Huston, Miranda Foxworth, Giselle Marc, Rose Corsa, and, of course, the incomparable Miss Lemon.

  A piteous moan. “You don’t understand. Harry’ll kill me if he finds out.”

  “We won’t tell him,” Annie said firmly. “We don’t like him at all.”

  Max clapped his hand to his temple. Dark blue eyes glared at her meaningfully.

  Annie shrugged. So she didn’t have a secretary’s temperament.

  “You know him?” Hysteria.

  It took Max two minutes of soft, calm, soothing reassurance. “And the sooner you tell us, the quicker you’ll be off the line.”

  “Yes. Yes. Yes. All right. I have almost everything they asked for, Miss Dora and the other two ladies. Not much, really, but here it is. You understand, there was a great deal of blood, so some of the material is in the lab. I don’t know whether they’ll be able to come up with anything there. In Mr. Burke’s appointment book for today, Thursday, November ten, the following lines were filled: ten o’clock, Moss; ten-fifteen, Tarrant; ten-thirty, Garrison; ten forty-five, Diggs; eleven o’clock, Norden; eleven-fifteen, Crandall.”