Murder at a Vineyard Mansion

by Philip R. Craig

  “What time did you see them?”

  “I was coming home from work in Edgartown, so it must have been about five.” She looked at me with a steady gaze. “His mother found his body about four hours later, according to the papers. No loss, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “Don’t you want to know who killed him?”

  “I don’t approve of murder, but this one was overdue. Are we through here?”

  “Just two more questions. Do you have any ideas about who might have wanted Harold dead?”

  “You mean besides me and every other woman he slept with and a few husbands and boyfriends? No. But I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some others. What else can I tell you?”

  “Did you know Ollie Mattes?”

  She looked puzzled. “No. I read about him in the papers. Why?”

  “Just wondering. Do you know Ron Pierson?”

  “That’s three questions. No, I don’t know Ron Pierson. I’ve read about his big house, but he and I don’t frequent the same social circles. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

  She turned and walked back to the ball game, and I went back to my truck. There I remembered where I’d seen the SUV I’d parked beside. It had been hooked to a horse trailer in Cheryl Bradford’s yard. I was next to Sarah Bradford’s wheels. I looked around but saw no sign of Cheryl’s car or of Cheryl. I got into the Land Cruiser and went home to save my family from death by starvation.

  17

  That evening, before and after supper, Zee and the kids took turns playing with our new computer. I watched them, full of increasing doubt that I would ever be able to manipulate it without having an instructor peering over my shoulder and guiding my every move.

  “Don’t worry, Pa,” said little Diana as she headed off to bed. “It’s hard at first but then you get good at it.”

  “Thanks, sweetie.” I gave her a good-night kiss.

  “She’s right, you know,” said Zee, coming to where I was seated and reading my Computers for Idiots book. “You just have to keep at it. It’s like driving a car. You don’t have to know why it works the way it does, all you have to know is how to run it.”

  “I was a danger to my father’s car all the time he was teaching me to drive, and the first time I soloed I ran into a tree. I don’t want to hit the wrong key and wreck this machine.”

  “Well, even if you manage to run the computer into a tree, it will probably survive. Watch the kids. They’re fearless. If they do something that screws things up they just keep pecking away until everything’s right again.”

  “I think I’ll read this book about how to do what I want to do instead of just finding out as I go.”

  “You’re the product of a bygone century, Jefferson, and I guess you’ll never change.”

  I put down my book and ran my hands down over her hips. “Nice,” I said. “Some things are timeless.” Between the top of her shorts and the bottom of the shirt she had tied around her waist was a strip of flat belly. I leaned forward and gave it a lick. She ran her hands through my hair.

  “I’ll show you more tongue tricks later,” I said. “Meanwhile, though, check me out while I try to get myself onto the Internet. I want to see if I can remember what I’ve just been reading.”

  “I can do that,” said Zee. And she did. “See,” she said when I got there, “that wasn’t hard. Anything you’d like to check out, now that you’re here in cyberspace?”

  I thought for a moment. “How about sound systems?”

  “Sound systems? Are you interested in buying a sound system?”

  “No, but I’d like to know how the Silencer wrecks them. Maybe he learned how to do it on the Internet.”

  She lifted her eyebrows. “Could be, I guess. Well, let’s find out. Move your cursor up here and type in ‘sound systems.’ ”

  I did that and up came a page telling me that I was looking at the first ten sites out of more than 3,300,000. Not an encouraging start.

  I clicked on one of the sites and then another and learned that I could buy such things as the world’s loudest car audio system, a set of device drivers that would provide a uniform API across all of the major UNIK architecture, or other systems that were described by capitalized initials whose meanings the advertisers saw no need to explain.

  I tried a half dozen more sites and was offered more marvels of the electronic arts. A lot of people wanted to sell me sound systems but no one seemed to be selling information on how to destroy one.

  I carefully and successfully extracted myself from cyberspace. I was exhausted.

  Zee patted me on the back. “Well done, thou good and faithful servant. You went out there and got back again in one piece. It’s what we gobs call a successful cruise. Of course you didn’t find what you were looking for, but what the heck.”

  I abandoned the computer and pulled her down on my lap. “This will do as a substitute,” I said, running a hand up her thigh.

  The next morning I was back in Chilmark.

  Anita Pereira lived on Black Pony Farm, not too far from the Bradford place on South Road. She and her husband, Mack, were part of the considerable group of islanders whose lives revolved around horses. They stabled horses and offered trail rides and training for equestrian competitions. I’d seen the Pereiras with their horses and students at the county fair and in the Fourth of July parades. That was about as close as I preferred to get to horses.

  The Pereiras, I recalled, were both about forty and both sported shiny black hair and pleasant faces. I found Anita down by their indoor riding arena and saw him in a far corral apparently instructing a girl on a pony the art of steeplechasing.

  Anita gave me an evaluative glance and smiled. “May I help you, Mr….?”

  “Jackson. My friends call me J.W.” I told her the story I’d told so many others: of my investigation into the death of Harold Hobbes. “You were mentioned as someone who was close to him,” I said. “I’m trying to find out who might have disliked him enough to kill him.”

  “We were lovers, Mr. Jackson, but he didn’t whisper his enemies’ names in my ear while we were having sex. Is that what you had in mind?” Her smile widened. “I hope I haven’t shocked you. My husband and I have a very open marriage. He doesn’t mind my men and I don’t mind his women.”

  “I’m not shocked,” I said, barely managing not to be.

  “You looked shocked but now you’re smiling. I’m glad.” She gestured toward my wedding band. “I see that you’re a married man, but do you swing?”

  “Is that still the term that’s used? No, my swinging days are long past. Now one woman is all I can handle.”

  “Then I can only hope that you’re all the man that your wife can handle. Are you?” Her smile was wider and bolder and full of good humor.

  “She’s the one who would know that. We’re in the book and she’ll be home about suppertime if you want to phone and ask her. Her name is Zeolinda. Zee, for short.”

  “Oh, Zee Jackson. Is she your wife? I know her. She works at the emergency room in the hospital. I’ve taken a few of our students there when they proved to be worse riders than they claimed. She’s very beautiful. Far prettier than I am, certainly.” She tipped her head to one side, still smiling. “She has the look of a woman who has a good man.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. Do you know of anyone who might have wanted Harold Hobbes dead?”

  “If I were you, I might think that Mack and I were logical suspects, but I’m me and I know we don’t qualify.”

  “Maybe Mack isn’t as indifferent to your lovers as you think.”

  “But Harold and I stopped being lovers a month ago. He found a new woman and I found a new man and Mack hasn’t shown the slightest interest in killing anyone. Mack isn’t the killing type. He just likes to have sex with women, including me.”

  “Maybe you were mad at Harold for leaving you.”

  “You’re funnier than you think. Harold was a hard worker in bed but he was a little too mechanical for my tas
tes. You know what I mean? He was a real stud, but that’s about all, and after the rides were over we were both glad to kiss and say good-bye. Are you sure you don’t swing?”

  “I’m sure. Do you know the name of the woman he took up with after he left you?”

  “Do you think you might change your mind? We could have a good time together.”

  “I don’t doubt it for a minute, but I don’t expect to change my mind. You’d probably give me a heart attack. What’s the woman’s name?”

  “Funny you should mention a heart attack, because that’s just what they say happened to Cheryl’s father. Died of a heart attack having sex with a woman he wasn’t married to. Not a bad way to go, I’d say. Cheryl Bradford. She lives right down the road. You know her? Say, I think I’ve given you two shocks in five minutes.”

  “More reason for me not to climb into the sack with you. You’re a danger to me before you even get your clothes off. I’ve met Cheryl Bradford. Are you sure they were lovers? How do you know?”

  She spread her hands. “What’s not to know? Cheryl is my best friend. We tell each other everything. When he left me, he went to her and everyone was happy. Say, if you’re not interested in sex with me, how about renting one of our horses and taking a couple of riding lessons? If you buy yourself a Stetson and some high-heeled boots you could pass for a cowboy.”

  “Your first offer was a lot more tempting. Horses and I don’t get along. Do you think Cheryl might have hated Harold enough to kill him?”

  “Cheryl? Not a chance.”

  “He was a rolling stone. Maybe he left her for another woman just like he left all of his other conquests. Not everybody is as casual about these breakups as you are.”

  She was cheerful. “As far as I know they were still sharing sheets when he got himself killed. Cheryl doesn’t have too much going on between her ears but she’s not the murdering type. Now, if her mother had known about Harold, she might have done him in. Sarah hates men in general, and even though Harold wasn’t as much of a man as he thought he was, he was still a man. Sarah might have plugged him on general principles.”

  “Harold wasn’t shot; he was beaten to death with a blunt instrument.”

  “Whatever. In any case, Sarah still doesn’t know about Cheryl and Harold. Cheryl made me swear not to tell her, and of course I didn’t. I hope you won’t either. Cheryl’s already got grief enough. She doesn’t need Sarah browbeating her and bad-mouthing the man she loved.”

  “Why is Sarah Bradford so down on men?”

  “I guess she got soured by her husband’s lifestyle. Not everybody’s like me and Mack.”

  Very true. “Did you know Ollie Mattes?”

  “According to the grapevine, Ollie was the result of old man Bradford’s last act on earth. I don’t think I ever saw him, though.”

  “How about Ron Pierson?”

  “Sarah was a Pierson and I think that Ron is her nephew, or something like that. I hear Sarah doesn’t like him any better than she likes any other men. In fact, maybe she hates him more, because they say there’s a Pierson family feud of some kind, and fights in families can be the worst kind.”

  “Ron Pierson is building the house where Ollie Mattes was killed. Ollie got his head mashed in just like Harold Hobbes did. You have any thoughts about any of that?”

  “You bet. It makes me glad I live here with Mack in Chilmark and not down there on Chappaquiddick where people kill each other with sticks.”

  I drove away feeling improved by my contact with Anita Pereira. Her combination of good nature and shameless sensualism was a tonic, and her thoughts about Harold and about women had given rise to thoughts of my own.

  18

  I drove down the Bradfords’ driveway for a second time in a week after never having been there before during my many years on the Vineyard. I was conscious, and not for the first time, that there was a lot more of this little island that I’d never seen than I had seen or probably ever would see, because like many places that looked small on a map, it was bigger than it seemed. I remembered once reading that if you gave every person in the world two square feet of earth to stand on, you could put all of them on Martha’s Vineyard.

  Beyond the farm buildings and the green fields where horses grazed, the blue Atlantic reached away toward a misty southern horizon and lines of rolling, white-topped breakers crumbled against the sand.

  The first Bradford on this land had probably been one of those combination farmer-fishermen like so many other people who live near the oceans of the world and make a hard living from the unforgiving land and sea. The current generation seemed to have progressed well beyond that tough start and become the inheritors of wealth sufficient to make them gentlemen and gentlewomen who didn’t have to work for a living.

  One indication of this was the figure of a woman in riding clothes coming along a bridal path toward the barn. I recognized her at once as Cheryl Bradford. Not too many working people take cross-country rides in the middle of the morning.

  I drove into the yard and saw that her mother’s SUV was missing. Maybe Mom had a job. Too bad, because I wanted to talk with both Bradfords. But I could start with Cheryl, so I walked down to the barn, where I found her putting away her saddle and blanket and preparing to currycomb her horse. I stayed outside the stall holding her and the horse.

  “Mr. Jackson. What brings you here again?”

  “I neglected to ask you some questions I hope you’ll answer now.”

  She began to curry her horse. “That depends upon the questions, I guess. Let’s hear them.”

  “I wasn’t quite frank with you when we spoke before. I’m investigating Harold Hobbes’s death.”

  Her currycomb paused and then moved on. “What’s that got to do with me?”

  “You and he were lovers, and you were with him just before his body was found.”

  “That’s a lie!”

  People lie about the truth and they lie about lies. I’ve done it myself more than once. “No, it isn’t,” I said. “If the police don’t already know about your relationship with him, you’ll be a prime suspect in his murder when they find out.”

  She sagged against the horse. “You can’t be serious.”

  “I am. Harold was the love-’em-and-leave-’em kind of man. There were a lot of women in his life and you were the last one. You wouldn’t be the first jilted woman to kill her man.”

  She gave up the pose of innocence. She lowered the currycomb and put her arms around her horse’s neck, laying her head against its warm skin. I was aware of the sweet barn smell of straw and leather.

  “No. He wasn’t leaving me. We loved one another. We made plans that last night. We were going to go away together. Get away from the people we know here and start a new life somewhere else where we could be happy.”

  It was a different story than I’d gotten from Hobbes’s other women. He had never promised a new life with any of them.

  “You’re in trouble,” I said, “so don’t lie to me. Harold Hobbes used women and dropped them. He did it again and again. He never loved anybody.”

  Her voice was weak but angry. “You’re cruel and you’re wrong. He was kind and gentle and he loved me. He did!” She began to cry. “And now he’s dead and my life is empty. I feel like I’m living in my own tomb.”

  I studied her. Her face was buried in the slick hair of her horse’s neck and her shoulders were shaking. The horse turned its head slightly and looked down at her before turning away again. Its eyes were gentle and curious.

  “Why did you want to lie to me about your relationship?”

  Her voice sounded wet. “Because you could tell my mother and I don’t want her to know. She didn’t like my husband and she’s never liked any of the men I’ve dated. I don’t want her saying things about Harold that she said about them! Please don’t tell her! Please!”

  “I won’t. But I’m not the only one who knows. I’ve talked with Anita Pereira.”

  “Anita! Anita would
n’t tell Mother.”

  “You’re probably right, but she told me.”

  “I don’t think I could stand Mother knowing. My father was a philanderer. You probably know that. My mother hasn’t trusted any man since.”

  “Not even your brother?”

  “He’s her son but he’s a man. She’s not warm toward him because he’s got our father’s blood in him, but he’s her son so she tries to treat him fairly, at least. I think he’d love to be closer to her but she won’t allow it.”

  The Bradford family had more than its share of problems.

  “Somebody killed Harold at his own house,” I said. “Do you have any idea who might have done it? Did he mention any enemies?”

  “No. He didn’t try to hide his past, but he said he’d changed. Something had happened to him that had never happened before. The something was me, he said. I know about his other women, and Anita and I have talked, but Harold wasn’t the man Anita described. I think he wanted us to leave here so he could get completely away from his past and we could start again together. I know people must have disliked him, but he never mentioned any names.”

  “Did he tell you that he was the one who broke all of the windows in Ron Pierson’s house?”

  She wiped at her eyes and nodded. “It was another reason for us to leave. Especially after Ollie Mattes was killed. Harold was sure that if anyone found out about the windows they’d think he’d gone back again and killed Ollie. But he didn’t!”

  I could almost hear the click in my mind. “You know he didn’t because he was with you that evening.”

  “Yes, yes. We were together all afternoon and into the evening.”

  “He wouldn’t tell his mother where he’d been. Do you know why?”

  “No. I would have testified that we were together, even if it meant my mother would learn about us. But he wouldn’t have it. He told me never to tell anyone. He said we’d go away and no one would ever find us.”

  I thought about the number of windows that had been broken in the Pierson house. “Someone was with him the night he broke those windows,” I said. “Do you know who it was?”