Running Out of Time

by Suzanne Trauth

  Bill shifted his attention to us. “Come on back.” He turned on his crutches and led the way.

  Lola and I mentally crossed our fingers. We wordlessly followed him to his inner office, passing Suki at the computer in the outer office. She didn’t look up. I was not having a good feeling.

  Bill was courteous, juggling his crutches and adjusting a chair for Lola to sit on. I opted for the other guest chair that was wrapped in Bill’s uniform jacket.

  “Here, I’ll take that,” he said and removed his coat.

  Bill settled himself behind the desk and then looked up at us, the intensity of his dazzling eyes distracting me for a second. “So you wanted to see me?”

  Lola placed her hands in her lap. “Chief—”

  “Bill, please.”

  “Bill…we…” She cut her eyes in my direction. “I’d like to talk to you about the theater. I know the investigation is still ongoing, but we’re having a crisis. Not only is the show up in the air and that means no box office and that threatens our next production but—” Lola looked at me.

  I smiled encouragingly.

  “Now there is…talk…that ELT members are defecting to the Creston Players. That would ruin us. What would Etonville do without the ELT?”

  Being the cultural center of our little burg.

  I wondered if any of this was making a dent in Bill’s police chief defense shield. He listened politely, and I waited for him to interrupt and explain patiently that as long as there was a dead body and no satisfactory solution to the murder, he could not honor her request, release the theater, and blah blah blah.

  He held up a hand. “Mrs. Tripper, Lola…” He smiled.

  I figured he was trying to let her down easy.

  “I was going to call you later today to let you know that I am removing the crime scene tape. The CSI team has taken all necessary samples of materials pertinent to the case and scoured the area.”

  Lola clapped her hands, ecstatic. “I can’t tell you how pleased that will make the ELT. And me personally. Thank you.”

  He accepted her gratitude graciously and they discussed the timing of the removal and the cleanup of the stage floor. Meanwhile, I was of two minds. I was happy for Lola but releasing the theater meant Bill had wrapped up the case, probably with Sally as the prime suspect.

  Suddenly the room was silent, both Lola and Bill staring at me. “Good news for the theater. Bill, do you have a minute? Lola, I’ll catch up with you later.”

  Bill nodded and Lola exited, but not before sending me ocular support and shutting the door quietly.

  “Would you like some coffee? I can have Edna make a run to—”

  “Do you have enough evidence to charge Sally Oldfield?” I asked softly. “I bumped into Archibald on my way in. He seemed awfully confident.”

  “Look, Dodie, I know you have faith in Sally, but her lack of an explanation for being with Gordon Weeks, his blood on her hands, the ME’s description of the size of the attacker…” He paused. “This is confidential. Although it will come out eventually. Archibald has information from a doctor in Boston. According to him, Sally is unstable and has been under psychiatric care for the last six months since her mother died.”

  I swallowed hard. Who had Archibald spoken with? Andy was her therapist…at least most recently. Surely Andy would have let me know if he’d communicated with a private detective, right?

  “Have you confirmed Archibald’s conversation with the therapist?” I asked.

  The molecules in the room shifted.

  Bill sat up straighter. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I know he’s your friend but getting a room in the same boarding house as Sally? I think he had it in for her from the beginning—”

  “That doesn’t mean anything,” he said.

  “And then making late-night calls at the theater and meeting with people on the sly—”

  “What people? On the sly? Have you been following him?” Bill’s ruddy face had turned a shade darker.

  “Look, I happened on him a few times and it made me—”

  “Happened on him?” Bill choked on the words. “That’s enough. This is over. I don’t know what you think you know about Archibald, but he is a crack detective and more importantly I trust him.” He was an inch away from shouting. “He’s investigating a murder and doesn’t need to check in with me every time he visits the crime scene!” He exhaled loudly. “Anything more you have to say?”

  I was surprised at the chill in the air. I guess I’d pushed Bill a little too far this time. “Only that I think it’s a bizarre coincidence that Gordon Weeks was arrested for an attempted break-in at Sally’s home in 1997.” I stood up. “Maybe Archibald can explain that.”

  “What are you talking about?” Bill’s voice followed me as I turned on my heel and flew out the door, leaving it open behind me. Suki looked up as I passed, but I kept my head down this time.

  “What’s today’s special?” Edna called out from dispatch.

  I shook my head and waved good-bye. At the entrance to the Municipal Building I stopped dead in my tracks. Sally was being escorted by Ralph, whose expression indicated he was thrilled to have abandoned crowd control for real police business.

  “Sally?” My voice quivered. “I have your—”

  Ralph hustled her into the building.

  The winter air was bracing—I needed to clear my mind and make some decisions. I walked past Betty’s Boutique, avoided Coffee Heaven, and even ignored texts from Lola; she was no doubt delighted that the ELT could get back on schedule and open Eton Town. I didn’t blame her. In directing the show, she’d contributed a ton of sweat and tears to the production and deserved to see her hard work pay off. Happy as I was for her, I was distressed by the direction events were taking. A rush to judgment as far as Sally was concerned: She was the low-hanging fruit. And what to make of Carol overhearing Sally say she didn’t care about the money? What was she hiding? I needed to find out if Archibald’s report on Sally came from Andy. He’d never even hinted that Sally was unstable.

  I kicked up slush on the sidewalk as I traipsed down Amber at a steady pace. At this rate, I would end up at home when I needed to be at the Windjammer in half an hour. I turned around abruptly and beat a hasty retreat to my Metro. The safest, quietest place right now. I tapped Andy’s number on my cell and waited as it rang, then went to voicemail. I listened impatiently as he said he was not available but to leave a name and number and he would get back in touch.

  “Andy. It’s me.” I paused. “Sally’s been arrested as the prime suspect in the murder investigation. I need to talk.” I ended the call and slumped down in my seat. I’d have given anything to climb back into bed.

  * * *

  The word was out on Eton Town. We’d barely opened the restaurant for lunch when a stream of Etonville’s citizens clambered in the door, setting the place abuzz. The show was on and the excitement was palpable. Of course, a few folks were shocked that Sally had been arrested. But mostly, her fate had already been grist for the rumor mill that by now had ground to a halt.

  “Dodie, have you heard? We can open the show!” exclaimed Mildred.

  “I sure did. Great news.” I tried to smile as I rang up their lunch check for barbecue pulled pork on Texas toast.

  “Mixed feelings for me. Glad the thing is finally going to get on its feet, but I’m afraid that the town may give it two thumbs down,” Vernon grumbled.

  Mildred swatted him lightly on the arm. “Don’t let Walter hear you say that.”

  “What?” Vernon asked.

  “Turn up the sound!”

  “Didn’t bother putting them in this morning. Nothing worth hearing around here anyway.” Vernon shuffled out the door, Mildred, shaking her head, close behind.

  “Everybody else is roaring to go,” said Benny as he drew sod
as. “A shame about Sally though. Guess the evidence is pretty strong?” He stopped pouring and studied me.

  Like everyone else in Etonville, Benny knew what part I’d played in solving previous murders and assumed I had the inside track on Bill’s investigation. “I guess.”

  “You’re being cagey,” Benny said.

  “Not cagey. Disappointed. Instincts, you know?”

  Benny nodded sympathetically and placed the drinks on a tray for Gillian to deliver to a table. “Even good instincts need a break,” he said softly.

  “Right.”

  Lola scurried in the door, cheeks flushed, eyes bright. Clearly exhilarated. “I’ve been texting you for the last couple of hours. Things are crazy busy. I called the Star-Ledger reviewer and I’m pretty sure he can make it Saturday night. Penny is emailing the cast so we can schedule the final final dress rehearsal for tomorrow night. We’re getting a clean-up crew in there today and Walter is trying not to panic so—”

  “Sorry, Lola,” I said. “I need to speak to Henry.”

  “But—” She raised a hand as I headed to the kitchen.

  “I’ll call you later, okay?” I said.

  I could not bear to hear all the chipper good news when Sally was being arraigned in a court in Creston. I needed to hide.

  In the kitchen, Henry was chopping onion and pepper chunks for chicken kabobs while Enrico was prepping the moussaka for our Greek night. Georgette had even agreed to drop off freshly made baklava.

  Benny burst through the door. “We got trouble.”

  Henry jerked up from his cutting board, worry lines immediately creasing his forehead. He hated to hear bad news. “What?”

  “Yeah, what?” I repeated.

  “We’ve got a trickle of water coming down the front of the dining room.”

  “A trickle?” I asked.

  “So far,” Benny said.

  “The roof is leaking?”

  “Looks like it. I’ll get a bucket.” Benny disappeared through a door that led to the basement of the restaurant.

  I walked leisurely into the dining room to avoid creating a stir. No luck. Patrons had already scooted tables away from the front wall. I smiled reassuringly.

  “Dodie, there’s water coming into the restaurant,” said one of the Banger sisters.

  “I’m on it,” I answered and scanned the ceiling. A steady drip fell about three inches out from the wall. I had a flashback to last week when JC lectured Henry on the perils of ice dams in the gutter melting and refreezing and blocking a path for the runoff. Forcing ice and water to back up under the shingles resulting in leaks. After a few minutes I had tuned out JC’s suggestions on creating a watertight seal under the roof. I wish I had paid more attention. I fervently hoped this wasn’t going to cost an arm and a leg to repair since the Windjammer was finally on solid financial footing after a few years of up and down fiscal uncertainty.

  “Here,” Benny said as unobtrusively as he could—considering the Banger sisters had made a point of moving their chairs to the other side of their table and covering their heads—and handed me a red plastic bucket.

  I placed it under the leak and listened to the plop, plop, plop as water landed in the pail. Each drop sounded like a mini-explosion.

  “Like last fall in the theater,” said Abby, from two booths away.

  Customers looked up. Those who had been unaware of the commotion were now tuned in.

  “Remember? We had that big leak during the storm and Walter had to put a bucket on stage,” she continued.

  I remembered. “I think it’s a small drip. This should do it.”

  Famous last words. Within an hour, leaks had sprung up across the ceiling, forming a straight line from the front window to the center of the room. People were ducking, rearranging plates on their tables, covering their food with napkins. I ran from leak to leak, substituting kitchen pots for buckets until I’d wiped out Henry’s cooking utensils. It was ridiculous.

  Lunch was ending, partly because it was two thirty and partly because people were running out of dry places to eat.

  “Henry,” I yelled, slamming through the swinging doors into the kitchen.

  He looked up from slicing chicken as though he hadn’t noticed that Benny and I had been making container runs for the past hour. “What?”

  “We can’t serve dinner tonight. The dining room is an obstacle course, customers are having to cope with buckets and pans and—”

  Benny burst in. “Maybe we should call JC? See if he can get someone here to work on the roof.”

  “Good idea.” Benny ran back into the dining room and I paused. “Henry, we should close up for dinner. Get this thing fixed so we can reopen tomorrow. The ingredients for the kabobs and moussaka will keep overnight. I’ll call Georgette and have her put a hold on the baklava.”

  Henry reluctantly nodded. Enrico nodded. I nodded.

  Geez.

  23

  By four o’clock, JC had managed to round up a roofing guy who came into the restaurant and assessed the problem. “Yep,” he said knowingly.

  “I’ll bet it’s an ice dam,” I suggested.

  “Yep. Gotta be.”

  His immediate solution was to drill holes into the ceiling to release the water and stop its flow from moving any farther into the restaurant. I watched as the roofer climbed a metal ladder and inserted an electric drill bit into the ceiling, flirting with electrocution. I was fascinated by his nonchalant attitude as he defied death. Which of course made me think of Gordon Weeks and then Sally and then Bill…

  Benny emptied buckets and pans, Carmen wiped down tables, and Gillian texted, no doubt making plans for the evening. It was a cinch the Windjammer was on lockdown until the water problem was fixed. I sat at the bar, nursing a glass of Chardonnay…after all, the restaurant was officially closed. My cell phone binged. Lola asking what I was doing. I texted back: Watching the roofer drill holes in the ceiling.

  Her return text: Heard about the leak.

  My cell rang. “Hey.”

  “How bad is it?” Lola asked.

  “We’re closing the Windjammer for the night.”

  “Oh, I was looking forward to Henry’s Greek moussaka. I wanted to get my strength up to face the stage. A cleaning company was in the theater this afternoon, you know one of those companies that specializes in removing certain kinds of stains…like rust and mold and…”

  “…blood,” I finished for her.

  “Yes. Blood.” She sighed. “Do you think we all misjudged Sally?”

  I had no idea. Earlier, while keeping one eye on the roofer, I’d doodled a list of questions about Gordon Weeks’s murder that I’d been poring over for days: Why did he attempt to rob Sally’s home in Boston in 1997? Did Sally know him even though she said she wasn’t sure who he was? Who was she speaking with on her cell at Snippets? And who was in the picture and why was the photo so important to her?

  “So what’s up tonight?” I asked.

  “Walter, Penny, Chrystal, and I are meeting to work out the final dress tomorrow night.”

  “Are you replacing Sally?” I asked.

  “I don’t think we can add anyone new to the cast at this point. Are you interested?” Lola laughed lightly. “Maybe it would be good for you. Take your mind off the murder.”

  “That’s okay. I didn’t care for the costume the first time around and all I had to do was stand in the lobby and sell early American cakes. Speaking of which, there’s not much left of our intermission treats.”

  “I figured as much. You did your best, Dodie. We’ll have to let the theme food go this time around,” Lola said.

  “I suppose. Good luck,” I said.

  “Thanks. I’m going to plunge in.”

  * * *

  JC’s roofer finished by six and promised to be on the job, literally on the
roof, first thing in the morning. Henry was grouchy and complained about the Windjammer closing, the cost of the repairs, the loss of income, etc. etc. etc. I was glad to see him go out into the night. I loved Henry, but sometimes he was too much to handle. Today was one of those times. I stuffed some leftover barbecue pork from lunch into a bag for my dinner later, wondering where Sally was at this moment. Surely by now she had “lawyered up.” I was still musing on her future when I turned out the lights and locked the front door. It was only seven o’clock, but Main Street was empty, the lights off in shop windows. Only the Etonville Little Theatre would be humming with life tonight and—

  A firm object was thrust against my mouth, wrenching my head backwards. It took a second for me to realize it was a gloved hand. I dropped the shopping bag with my dinner and an arm clasped me around my waist roughly, pulling me into a body. I whipped my head to one side and my face scraped against the scratchy wool of a coat. I inhaled the odors of a man’s cologne and stale cigarette smoke blended with the smell of cold air. My heart raced. Fear battled logic, while nausea crept from my stomach to my throat. I tried to speak. “Mmph,” was all I could manage.

  “Quiet down,” a threatening voice growled.

  A dark sedan with tinted windows pulled up in front of the Windjammer and I was thrust into the back seat, a cloth hood slipped over my head, my hands duct-taped behind my back. I was disoriented, dizzy. I sucked in air, my chest heaving. I felt a hard object stuck into my ribs. I was betting it was a gun!

  “W-Who are you?” I tried for belligerent. “W-What do you want?”

  “I said shut up.” He plucked my bag off my shoulder and dug around in it. Obviously unsuccessful, he tossed the purse aside. The car careened around one corner and made two more turns before picking up speed. My inner GPS told me we were headed for State Route 53. After that it was anybody’s guess: Creston, the Garden State Parkway, New York?

  I exhaled slowly. Why would someone want to kidnap me? What kind of ransom would they get for a thirty-four-year-old restaurant manager and part-time amateur detective? The car rocketed to the left, then lurched to a stop, then moved a few yards, then stopped again. It could be the end of rush hour traffic on the highway.