Cheat the Hangman

by Gloria Ferris

  Marc took a turn at being heroic. “Lyris, Eva and Cherie were hoping they could have a tour of the house after dinner. Both of them are interested in Victoriana.” Like I cared what those two spoiled brats wanted.

  Conklin caught the ball. “I’ll be pleased to show the young ladies around, Madam, and point out the various objects of interest.”

  “Thanks, Conklin, and be sure to show them the collection of mourning memorabilia in the green bedroom upstairs.” I spoke slowly, but still had trouble with the word memorabilia.

  “Of course, Madam.”

  “When someone died,” I said to the two girls, “they used to cut off locks of hair and make wreaths and jewellery. There’s all different colours of human hair up there—red, blond, brown.” I hoped the little snots had nightmares tonight.

  To a chorus of “Oh, neat” and “Can we see that first?” from the twins, and “How gross” from Jody, we got up from the table at long last. My right leg was wrapped around the chair and it took me a moment or two to untangle it.

  Dennis fumbled in his pocket for his keys. “Guess I better get going.”

  Mitch plucked them out of his father’s hand. “Tiffany and I will drive with you, Dad. We can walk back.”

  At the door, Dennis said to me, “I almost forgot what I came here for in the first place.”

  “You mean it wasn’t to ruin my dinner?”

  He laughed like I had made a huge joke. “No. Tracey and I want to bring Amy to the reunion, and I thought I better tell you first so you won’t be surprised to see us there. Tracey discovered she’s a distant relation to the Pembrookes and wants our children to get in touch with their roots or something.”

  “Tracey is related to the Pembrookes? When did that happen?” I vowed to investigate that particular twig of the family tree. And somehow I didn’t think this was the real reason he came here today.

  Jody decided to leave at the same time, and I breathed a sigh of relief when I closed the door on the clammy night air that was rushing into the hall. Nick professed an interest in mourning memorabilia and dragged Patsy upstairs with him. That left me alone with Marc.

  At last.

  He gave me a sexy smile and opened his arms. I pushed them aside. “Come with me. I have evidence.” The floor seemed to be slanted and I had to step with care.

  “Evidence of what, my dark-eyed Madonna?”

  More of that Madonna shit? I refused to be sidetracked, and opened the drawer where the porcelain fragments were wrapped in a piece of paper towel. Explaining what had happened, even though it was painful to recount—that fell swoop remark still hurt—I asked Marc about fingerprints.

  “If I hadn’t smashed the shepherdess, would you have been able to take fingerprints from it?” It was a moot point now, but I wanted to know.

  He fingered the tiny pieces, all indistinguishable except the head and hands. “There have been some instances where laser equipment has raised fingerprints up to ten years later or even more, but not sixty-eight. So you’re off the hook for destroying evidence.”

  With that weight off my chest, I took him to the landing and showed him the padded shelf where the peacock had stood.

  “The figurine must have been behind the peacock. What I can’t understand is, how did it elude discovery for so long? This place is cleaned every Friday. The crew doesn’t clean under or behind everything every week, but after sixty plus years you’d think that stuffed bird would have been moved a few times.” With a plunk, I sat down on the top step, hoping it looked deliberate. Marc wrapped his hand around my elbow and pulled me up.

  We walked down a few steps to a point underneath the padded ledge.

  “I agree the peacock must have been moved,” Marc said, “but never lifted down. If the figurine was stuck between the feathers somehow, the cleaning staff would have missed it. Look up there. What do you see?”

  “I see a very high shelf, and yes, it would be difficult to clean up there. Which means…” I stopped and looked at him.

  “Right. How did it get up there in the first place? Look how far up it is. Not even a circus acrobat could clamber up the wall and swing from the ledge while tucking the figurine in far enough to stay hidden for sixty-eight years. Which means…”

  “Which means that somebody used a ladder. And had the time to fuss with the placement of the figurine.” My lips appeared to be working fine, my legs not well at all.

  We walked back downstairs and out into the sultry night. At the side of the house, we passed the fishpond and sat on the rustic bench that curved around the giant maple in the middle of the shade garden.

  “I guess we’re talking about murder, after all,” I said as Marc removed my sandals and started to massage my right foot. Good thing I had had a pedicure the day before. I lay back on the bench with a sigh of pleasure. There’s nothing like a foot massage to make you forget ex-husbands and trampy cousins. But my head was spinning, and I felt like I was going to roll off the bench.

  “Nobody said anything about murder.” His hand was at my knee. “The autopsy revealed a crushed hyoid bone. In a baby that age, it’s not hard to inflict enough damage to cause death.”

  I had to put my hand on his own to stop its ascent. This wasn’t the town square, but anybody could come springing out of the bushes—his daughters, my son, his best friend, my best friend, a butler.

  “Somebody put Tommy in the closet, and somebody hid the figurine. I think that lets Aunt Wisty and Aunt Clem out. I can’t imagine Uncle Patrick doing it either, so we’re left with Bruce Wingate.”

  Marc’s hand stopped working my left foot. “How do you know that name?”

  “I went to the library this afternoon. I read the newspaper account, but there wasn’t much information. Why are the police archives in the library attic, by the way?”

  He squeezed so hard, I yelped out loud. He let go at once. “Sorry. So you read the police report?”

  “I couldn’t help it. They were right out there in plain view. I didn’t even need to search.” Hellfire beckoned.

  “I see. Well, I’ll need to have a word with the library board. They promised they would store those records in a secure area until we received the money from the province to have them microfilmed. And Ronnie—he went over there to photocopy the Pembrooke file and didn’t mention they were accessible to just anybody.”

  “I’m not just anybody…” Then I stopped. I was being led off topic. “Never mind that. I must say I was not impressed by the report. Three pages. Was that McPherson guy incompetent or what?”

  “There was a war on. All the young men were in the military, and McPherson was forced to come out of retirement to run the police force in Blackshore by himself. I agree the report is short on detail, but no doubt the man did his best. If there had been anything else to add to the report, he would have documented it.”

  “All right, don’t get uppity. I didn’t mean to insult your fellow peace officer. But now that the body has been found, aren’t you going to launch an investigation?”

  “I’ll do what I can, but that won’t be much given the length of time that’s elapsed. Which I am still not calling a murder.”

  “I guess you won’t mind, then, if I poke around a little on my own?”

  “Go right ahead. But while you’re investigating a sixty-eight year old crime, and concealing a body is a crime by the way, promise me you’ll think about something?”

  “Sure, what?” Will wonders never cease, I thought, swinging my legs off the bench and sitting up. My head still swam, just a little. Marc was telling me to go ahead and investigate. He must think I won’t find anything. But somebody put little Tommy in the closet with his blanket and yellow bunny, and I wanted to know who, and why. Finding out why was important.

  “What?” I said again.

  “You aren’t listening to me.”

  “Sorry, I am now. What did you say?”

  “I said I love you and I want to marry you. I know you have an aversion to the marita
l state and that’s understandable considering what an ass Dennis is, but I think you might love me too. So maybe you could take a chance? You might like being married to a man who worships your every little finger and toe, not to mention the most beautiful legs in town and the most elegant neck.” He held my hair back from my face and kissed my elegant neck. “And there are other parts I haven’t been allowed to see, but I’m sure are every bit as worthy of being worshipped.”

  “Yeah, well, that sounds tempting, but you know I don’t like to rush into things.”

  He laughed, which under the circumstances I believed was uncalled for, then said when he could speak again, “The only thing you don’t rush into is matrimony. And that’s okay, I’ll wait as long as I have to. I just want you to think about it once in a while, maybe while you’re investigating Tommy Pembrooke’s death.”

  “Okay, I’ll think about it, just because you’re as cute as a bug.” And to prove it I hopped onto his knee and we spent a satisfying minute or two in a hot and sweaty embrace, which felt better than it sounds.

  Before we got too sweaty, though, I heard the inevitable, “Madam, Madam,” emanating from the darkness.

  I jumped up and dragged Marc by the hand behind me. “Come on. Either I’m neglecting my hostess duties, or Conklin wants to weed the petunia bed.”

  “There are no petunias, and why would Conklin…?”

  But there was no time to explain. The guests were standing around under the portico, except for Mitch and his girlfriend, who were walking up the drive toward us. The illumination from the tall lampposts surrounding the circular driveway made the night as bright as day. The thunder rumbled, but I don’t think anyone even heard it anymore, or noticed the flashes of lightning on the horizon.

  Patsy threw me a knowing smile and waggled her eyebrows at me, like a plump Groucho. Eva and Cherie did not look as pleased to see me emerging from the dark with their father. I adopted a casual air, like we hadn’t been doing anything, but I knew my hair was a mess. And where the heck were my shoes? My head still buzzed.

  Nick and Marc firmed up their golf date for the next morning, and everybody thanked me for a lovely time. Nick and Patsy sounded like they meant it—Nick even said it was the most interesting dinner party he had ever attended—but the twins couldn’t quite pull it off.

  Mitch and his blonde had already gone upstairs, and I wandered through the dining room on my way to the kitchen. It was spotless, looking as pristine as it had earlier in the day. The wood of the table gleamed, as did the rather frightening sideboard with its tortured mythical animals twisting a path up the corners.

  In the kitchen, the dishwasher was shirring softly. Conklin and Caroline were having a cup of tea. Caroline jumped up to offer some to me, but I waved her back down and thanked them both for the work they had put into my dinner. The food and service had been perfect—it wasn’t their fault the evening turned out so awful.

  I made myself a cup of bedtime tea, a soothing mixture of chamomile, rosemary, liquorice root and catnip leaf. Saying good night, I took my tea upstairs with me, where I experienced the expected fleeting aroma and tingle.

  Tonight there was something else. Another smell lingered after the first one departed. Again I couldn’t identify it, but it was still there at the second then third breath. Then it too was gone, and I was left with the smell of ancient wood and fabrics. Was it my imagination or something more unworldly? I wished it would go away.

  Feeling troubled, I went into my bedroom. It was the middle one at the back of the house and I had given Mitch and Tiffany the rooms on each side of me. If they hoped to get together in either one, they were out of luck. I planned to stay up all night if necessary to ensure they did not. I fired up my computer and prepared to go online for a long session on the Internet. There were lots of things I could look up and much to learn.

  Once I had to go into the hall. I intercepted Tiffany on her way to the bathroom, so she claimed. After that, all was serene and at about two in the morning, I thought it safe to go to bed myself. I was wrong.

  CHAPTER 11

  I forced one eye open to find my bedroom filled with a yellow half-light. It must be morning. No bird noises, though.

  As I struggled out of REM sleep and opened the other eye, I realized the light was not coming from the morning sun. Nor was it the moon shining in on me. That orb was just one-quarter full and hidden somewhere behind the pine woods. I remembered catching a glimpse of it while I was sitting in the shade garden with Marc after dinner.

  I heard the sounds of cricket legs rubbing together in the grass and a few frogs ribbeting in the fishpond. I stumbled to the window seat and knelt down. As the sleep fog started to clear from my brain, I realized the motion detector lights mounted on the corners of the house had been tripped.

  The detectors were set so that a ground-crawling animal such as a rabbit or raccoon could pass undisturbed, without alarming the household. So something more substantial had moved through the grounds, maybe a deer, or a bear. A black bear and two cubs had been sighted at the municipal dump in the spring, foraging through the garbage.

  While I was trying to remember if Conklin had shown me the magic button that reset the motion detectors, I glimpsed a shadow slip into the trees beyond the edge of the sun garden beyond the terrace.

  I was still not fully awake and wondering if I had seen a shadow at all, when suddenly the crickets stopped chirping. I heard a rustling noise, and a sound like twigs snapping on the dry ground beneath the pines. It wasn’t a heavy sound like a bear would make, but a calculated, deliberate tread.

  It had to be a man. I jerked my head back from the window in case he looked up and spotted me. Then, feeling foolish, I peeked around the window frame and saw the shadow dart from the trees around the corner of the house. I ran across the hall to the middle bedroom and pulled aside the heavy draperies.

  I strained my eyes to pick out a moving shape somewhere within the blackness of the front lawns, but the darkness was total and complete. The electric lamps lining the driveway were turned off at night, and it appeared there was no motion detector set up at the front of the house. The intruder could have been turning cartwheels on the grass and I wouldn’t have spotted him. But he might have slipped back over the fence, frightened off by the bright lights of the motion detectors at the back. I crossed the hall and returned to my bedroom.

  I stood there for several minutes trying to decide whether or not to call the police. I didn’t believe the intruder had entered the house, but if he was part of the gang that Marc was investigating for breaking into local homes, then the police needed to know about this attempt. On the other hand, Marc was inclined to think I overreacted to situations, and I didn’t want to embarrass myself again.

  In the end I decided to call the police station and report what I saw, like any other citizen, and let them take it from there. Marc could sleep undisturbed unless his duty officer woke him. I pulled on shorts and tee-shirt over the camisole and bikini underpants I had taken to wearing during the heat wave.

  I turned on all the hall lights before waking Mitch and his girlfriend and telling them what had occurred. Not for the first time since I moved to Hammersleigh, I wished fervently for a telephone in my bedroom. As soon as the reunion was over, I would get the Bell boys in to install phones in every room of the house.

  After making the call from the airless little room under the stairs, I turned toward the kitchen to put the kettle on before rousing Conklin and Caroline. A movement under the table startled me until I realized it was the devil’s familiars.

  “What are you doing under there? You, Jacqueline, you need to go outside.” I opened the door and shooed her out, then turned back to the cat.

  “Don’t you have a litter box or something you need to visit?” Rasputin refused to even look at me, just carried on grooming his tail. I didn’t like his attitude at all.

  Conklin came to his door after a few minutes, his white hair standing on end, but quite cohere
nt. He grasped the situation immediately, announcing he would get dressed and join me in the drawing room.

  Caroline, on the other hand, opened her door at my first knock, although it was some time before she understood what I was telling her. Her pale face was blotchy, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen, poor girl. It had been a long day for her and she might have had trouble sleeping, this being her first night in a strange bed.

  Mitch and his girlfriend were in the drawing room by the time I ushered Conklin and Caroline in. Mitch was wearing pajama bottoms, while the girl had a shirt. All of us looked the worse for wear.

  I started to explain in more detail what I had seen from my window, when the doorbell interrupted me. Conklin beat me to it and opened the door for Ronnie Guilbert and Tammie Wilberts, two of Marc’s officers. Ronnie seemed to have a cauliflower stuck to his right ankle until Mitch reached down and detached Jacqueline from his pant leg. The fur ball scooted off not knowing how lucky she was to have chosen Ronnie’s leg. She would have been turned into buzzard food by Tammie who, inexplicably, was allowed to carry a gun.

  Ronnie was the sergeant and Tammie the constable, but that didn’t matter. Tammie took charge right away.

  “Okay, Ms. Pembrooke, what is it this time?” Out came the notebook and pen. “Just give me the details.”

  While I was trying to collect my thoughts, she nailed me with her bead-shaped eyes. “Well?”

  I cleared my throat. “The motion detectors were activated and the light woke me up.”

  “What time was this, please?” She drew all of her sixty-two inches up as high as possible, but I still towered above her. I felt like apologizing for being taller.

  “About twenty minutes ago now.”

  Constable Wilberts checked her watch and made a notation. “Continue.”

  “I looked out the window and saw a shadow melt into the trees. It went around the corner of the house, so I looked through one of the front bedroom windows, but couldn’t see any movement. I figured he climbed back over the fence…”