She put her hand gently on his. “Looks like we both think we are kind of out of tune with our parents’ dreams.” She brightened. “Let’s form a club. How about it? We could build a clubhouse and everything.” She looked at the watch pinned to her dress. “Well, I do have to get back to work before Francis fires me.” Steve thought she sounded regretful.
She took his hand and led him outside and gave him another longer peck on the cheek. She looked into his eyes for a lingering moment, got into her car, and roared down the drive.
Steve shook his head and wandered around the house to the terrace, avoiding the interior of the house to bypass the organized chaos within. He noticed the low hedge of several new plants, as Wanda had said. He had to admit that the expanse of greenery, intermingled with brilliant swaths of color, was relaxing. Steve sat on a sandstone bench, wondering if it was the one on which Anna Carlyle had perched the night of the murder. It was close to the mansion wall, but whichever way he turned his head he could see to the end of the balustrade outlining the terrace. The French doors to the ballroom were open, and the din of setup was clearly audible. He froze as the strident tones of Emma Black issued forth. She was complaining that the tables were too close together and the tablecloths were not pressed well enough.
That woman can really complain, he thought. He took out a cigarette, snapped a match alight, and lit it. He almost flicked the match away but held himself back. He looked around the white marble terrace and finally leaned over and stuck the match into a potted plant, burying it with a finger full of dirt packed onto its grave. He slid closer to the large sandstone pot containing the corpse of his match in order to use it as an ashtray. He felt slightly self-righteous; he had heard somewhere that ashes were good for plants.
His feelings about lunch, however, were in turmoil. Silene was much more complex than he had at first thought. Was she trying to con him, or was she serious? She could be trying to influence the murder investigation. She could be bored, and it would be amusing conversation to tell her rich friends what a fool he was. Maybe she would be right. This brought Julie to mind. Did she want to be his girlfriend again? He wondered how much of her antagonism was because of how he had treated her. Or if it was really relief that their relationship was over so it could not interfere with her career ambitions. Did she wish to get him into harness or anger him enough to make him keep his distance? “I hate my life,” he muttered, mashing out his cigarette with more force than necessary.
His thoughts shied away from Silene and Julie and leapt down another road. He remembered his younger years on the family farm. He and his father seemed to fight from the time he could talk. By the time he was sixteen, he had decided that his mother would be a lot happier if he was gone and the arguments ended. He “knew” his father would be happier without a son fighting him tooth and nail. His brother would be happier with “the brat” gone. Most important, Steve would be happy getting out from under his father’s thumb. He had gone to school one day and never come back. He had left his mother a note and had written letters to her over the years, but he cut his ties and never visited again.
He had headed to New York and shipped out as an able seaman on a freighter bound for Africa. By nineteen, he had money in the bank from cargo and wages. His last trip was back to New York. He confronted George Chase of the New York Law School and convinced him that he could keep up with his studies even though he had never graduated high school. He passed the bar and was recruited by the Connecticut State Police. What he did not know is that his father, at his mother’s insistence, had gotten his boyhood friend, Bob Crowder, to offer him the job. His father still refused to contact his son, both of them too stubborn to make the first move. It was only years later that he found out his father’s role in the story and was tempted to quit.
Even though his mother begged him to come home, Steve refused. He paid for his mother to visit him, though the tickets he finally sent for his father were never used. These visits always ended with his mother in tears. Steve would be depressed for a week. He was still making his mother miserable ten years after he had left home.
Chapter 15
Steve’s bittersweet memories were interrupted by the arrival of Buck Daniels, who joined Steve on the bench and handed him a folder. “Looked for you at the mill,” he started. “They said that you and Silene went to the house for lunch. I saw her leave, but with her you can’t be sure if she’s driving the way she was because she’s mad or if it’s just her normal style. Mama Chandler should have restricted her to a wheezy Model T or maybe given her one of Churchill’s tanks from the Great War.”
Steve picked up the folder and looked through the medical examiner’s report. A quick review showed nothing to add to what he already knew. The shears were definitely the cause of death, and they were in a position that kept her from pulling them out. She must have lain there for a few minutes in a state of shock, while the murderer probably thought she had been killed instantly. While reading, he gave several grunts in response to Buck’s comments. “Huh?” he said when he finished. “I missed that.”
Buck was about to answer when Jeremy stepped out with a tray. “I thought you gentlemen would like some refreshments,” he said as he placed it on a nearby glass-topped table with a base made from the same sandstone as the balustrade. The two officers took comfortable cushioned chairs. Buck poured himself coffee while Steve assembled a drink. When he tipped the last of the liquor from his flask, Jeremy offered to clean it for him and took it away.
Steve turned back to the report. The sheriff’s men had taken fingerprints from the committee members and the servants, including Cookie. There were no unmatched prints in the room, and the shears did not provide any prints at all.
Steve ran through his day at the mill and his conversation with Bob Crowder. “Bob is going to have a coronary, or he will clamp down and ride it out. My guess is that he will start getting mad, fight back, and be fine. Francis was either taunting me with the fact that he could get away from the mill by telling me how he did it, or he was telling me that he knew what I was looking for. Either way, I am pretty sure that he is the one.”
“So, which one? Was he admitting his guilt and challenging you to prove it?” asked Buck.
“I think he did it. I’ll go so far as to say I’m sure that he did it,” answered Steve. “He knows I think he did it, and I know he knows I think he did it.” He shook his head in irritation. “Enough of that. From what people said, not to sound like Mrs. Black, Francis is a gambler. He admitted it to us when we interviewed him yesterday. I’m wondering if he looks on this as a game. He thinks he has covered his tracks. Oh, he knows I can make a case for him getting to the house. I can, probably, build a circumstantial case for a motive. Money is always good for that. What I cannot prove is his hand on the shears. I can’t even place him in the room.” He tapped the folder. “Nothing ties him to the weapon—no fingerprints, no snags of cloth from his clothes, no bits of material from a bike pedal, no oil or anything. He’s daring us to prove anything.”
“It’s worse than that, you know. He’s laughing at us,” commented Buck. “I don’t know about you, but I hate it when people laugh at me. Makes me want to do something to wipe it.” He held up his fisted hand and looked at it.
“I hope he’s too smart for his own good, ’cause we don’t have a thing on him,” said Steve sourly. He shoved the folder along the table to the captain. “You going to the shindig tonight?”
Buck pushed out a huff of air. “Every deputy who has a wife will be here. It is the biggest soiree of the year that lets people dress up and mingle with what society there is around here. Everybody is invited, though I have noticed that politicians are a little thin on the ground this year. They are waiting for the shakeout.” He looked at his watch. “As a matter of fact, I have to get down to the station to check on things and see to the shift change so I can get home and into a suit and get back here. I really hope that Margaret forgot to have my tuxedo cleaned. A suit is
bad enough.”
They rose and started down the hall, stepping quickly past the ballroom to avoid any contact with the head of the flower show committee. At the front door, Jeremy handed Steve his hat and the flask. Steve noticed that there had been an increase in the weight of the container, and he raised it in salute to the smiling butler.
“Miss Silene informed me where she sequestered a supply, sir,” he said.
Steve followed Buck down the hill and waved at the old man in the garden behind the guardhouse before driving through the gate in the stone wall. He turned off the main road to Chandler and took a rutted track to the old farm road that ran by the house. A look at Francis’s route might jog a thought loose, though he doubted it. He turned left and followed the track slowly around town toward the mill. The road wound through a tunnel of old second-growth pines. He stopped several times and opened the door, letting in the summer smell of pines and the sounds of birds. Steve saw the tracks of a bicycle in the dirt. The brush on either side hid the road from casual observation from the town.
He stopped when he saw where a wide trail met the road. Exiting the vehicle, he followed the trail a short way through the trees until he could see the mill. This was, he thought, the path from the mill. He found a wide spot to turn the car and drove back the way he had come. Past the intersecting road from the house, he continued until he found, a little way along, a second trail connected with the road. Leaving the car, he made another reconnoiter that showed him the surrounding wall ten yards from the edge of the trees and brush.
Steve returned to the car and tilted his head back on the seat. He cautioned himself against concentrating on Francis to the exclusion of other possibilities. The problem was, his gut told him that he had the solution. “Now you have to work on the proof.” He voiced this last consideration aloud. A hand moved toward the flask. Steve snatched it away with the thought, Too easy to go down that road. One drink is lonely and wants a friend; then the two of them invite another. Before you know it, there’s a party. He realized his drinking had picked up since he had split with Julie, and his thoughts fled from the obvious reason.
Steve pulled his mind back to the murder and tried to develop a plan to get the proof he needed to nail Francis or any other suspect. He got a glimmer of an idea that needed fleshing out. He concentrated on Francis, proof, and the flighty idea. He pondered the quilt. Everything centered on the quilt and the sewing room. The murderer had to have known two things: what night the committee would meet and that Mrs. Chandler would be alone after the meeting broke up for the night. The one question that kept nagging at his thoughts: Why had the pin been in that spot? It could not have been pointing to who did it. Even the printed tea rose pointed to more than one person. Why would a seriously injured person drag herself to the wall just to leave a vague clue? He knew he was missing something. Something important. He sat up, remembering something Mrs. Black had said. Leaning back, he knew he had the answer to the question of the clue and what it meant. Now, how to get Francis to hoist himself on his own petard?
When a shaft of light struck his eyes, a check of his watch showed him that he had been sitting there for over an hour.
He reversed to the connecting road and drove back to the hotel. A telegram from Bob was waiting for him. When he ripped it open, there was a short, sweet message: “On your own. Solve it. (signed) Crowder.”
Steve muttered to himself as he walked across the lobby, “Bob must have gotten over his anxiety attack.” He stuffed the message into his pocket and changed direction. He stopped in the restaurant and ordered dinner to be sent up at six o’clock. On the way up to his rooms, he discussed with the elevator operator the dismal showing of Boston, which was sitting solidly at the bottom of the standings, and the likelihood of another New York World Series between the Yankees and the Giants. “Why da Red Sox ever sold Ruth, I’ll never know,” the kid lamented.
Steve tossed his hat onto a chair in his room and thought about making himself a drink. He walked to the refreshment shelf and checked himself in mid-reach. With a sense of self-righteousness, he poured a glass of water over ice instead. Fresh fruit was piled in the basket on the table. He selected an apple and returned to the window. “I could really get used to this,” Steve spoke out loud, staring out at the hotel garden. Before taking off his shoes and stretching out on the chesterfield, he removed his tie. He settled into a comfortable position with a cigarette in one hand and the water in the other.
He tried to concentrate on the Francis plan that was half formed, but his thoughts wandered to Julie and then to Silene. He finally admitted to himself that he had treated Julie badly. Steve did not know if he was glad that their relationship seemed to have thawed. A wry grin twisted his lips. If it had thawed. Maybe she was only being friendly to get a story. Both? What did he feel about her, anyway? And what about Silene? He wished he knew whether she was interested or just amusing herself. Their lunchtime conversation seemed to indicate an interest. Then a twinge of guilt intruded. Should he even think of Silene if he was reevaluating his feelings about Julie? He wished he understood women. He closed his eyes. I wish I understood myself.
Shaking his head, he forced himself to consider that night and Francis before his thoughts got a chance to wander again. Steve pictured himself as Francis.
He said aloud, “I climb out the window and down the fire escape. I take the bike and roll it across the parking area and through the gate. I hear the crunch of the gravel under the bicycle’s tires. Then I mount the bicycle and pedal along the narrow farm road through the trees. I smell the scent of pines and feel the wind in my face. I ride the bicycle to the house, through the gate. If I am seen, I just park it and go upstairs to bed. Otherwise, I park it out of sight in the carriage house to preserve the illusion that I am still at work. I enter the house and walk normally down the hall. If no one has seen me, I slip into the sewing room and maybe exchange words with my mother and, when she turns her back, stab her. It does not matter if I run from the room. I am caught if anyone from the committee or staff sees me; my cycling outfit is as good as a sign. Even if seen from the back.
“Once I get back to the bicycle, it is a matter of returning to the mill. Though it is unlikely, if a vehicle is on the road, the sound of its motor will give me enough time to hide until it passes. The only real danger is a hiker or another cyclist, but that is also unlikely. The road is away from normal paths and on the estate.”
Steve pursed his lips, took a sip, and continued, “The next danger point is if Haney notices that the bike is gone, but he doesn’t pass it on his rounds, and the old man would not wander around unnecessarily. I wait to cross the parking lot when there is no chance that the watchman will come out the employee door. I wait near the fence until Haney makes his rounds. That will be safest. I wheel my bicycle back across the lot, park it, and climb up the fire escape. No, I carry it across the lot, both from and to the rack. Then the only sound will come from my shoes on the gravel. Once I am in the office, I take a shower if necessary, dress, and wait until the murder is discovered.”
The big question: How to prove Francis had been in the room?
Steve took another swig of water and swirled the ice in the glass. “I really do need a vacation,” he muttered.
He settled deeper into the couch and picked up the thread of his thoughts. He picked at the knot again. He knew how Francis had gotten from the mill to the house. He knew how Francis had slipped into the house. He knew how Francis had gotten back to his office at the mill. He could see in his mind the whole process. What he did not have was Francis in the sewing room. A good, or even a poor, lawyer could shatter the circumstantial case he had, and Francis would not have a mediocre lawyer. Far from it—he would have the best legal team that money could buy.
His tentative plan was his only hope. He had one question, and everything hinged on the answer.
With his decision made, he allowed his thoughts to wander along personal paths. He remembered the fun he had had with
Julie and the intense conversations about politics and current events they had enjoyed before the breakup. Then his mind slid to the lunch with Silene. He had enjoyed that, too, at least until the game of twenty questions got too personal. That was when the tension began to build. He did not need to share deep emotional childhood memories with a suspect in a murder, even if she was not, technically, a suspect any longer. Of course, she might be a little irritated if he could prove that Francis was guilty and if Steve arrested him. Especially if he was tried, convicted, and sentenced. What an opening line for a date. “Good evening, Silene. I just saw your brother convicted of the murder of your mother. Want to dance?”
One good-looking, smart, and wealthy and, maybe, interested. The other good-looking, smart, and funny and, maybe, interested. They even resembled each other. The same tall, slim figures. One with light tawny hair, the other with darker honey-colored hair. Different personalities, he thought. Julie’s temper was fiery, while Silene’s was cold, if the interview was any indication. Julie showed no interest in their friends’ children, while Silene seemed excited about having little ones. Similar drive to be successful. Neither was a shrinking violet.
He mentally opened the marriage door that he had believed firmly closed. He admitted that he did not want to be a lifelong bachelor. “There,” he said. “Steve, old son, you finally admitted it. You want to get married and have a family. Of course, you should have realized it a month or two ago, and the ‘who’ decision would have been a lot easier.”
He sat up suddenly at the knock that announced his dinner, slopping his half-finished water over his front.
Steve debated whether to wear his shoulder holster and carry his cuffs, but he finally decided that he was officially on duty and put on his rig before shrugging into his coat.
The Rose Quilt Page 14
