by Joanne Fluke
“Just a minute,” he barked, with clipped military diction. “I’ll be right down.”
Seconds later, he clambered down from the ladder, the CDs on his orange tree twinkling in the reflected light of the sun.
“Keeps the squirrels away,” he said, pinging one of the CDs. “They don’t like the glare. Bet my wife told you they don’t work, but they do.”
He snapped his ladder shut and propped it against the garage.
“So you’re an insurance investigator.” He looked me over with piercing gray eyes.
Uh-oh. It wasn’t going to be easy to fool this guy.
“Yes. I’m representing Seymour Fiedler, the roofer who was working on Mr. Janken’s house.”
“Is that so? What company you with?”
“Century National,” I said, praying he wouldn’t ask me for identification. He’d never fall for my phony laminated card.
I breathed a sigh of relief when he didn’t.
“So how can I help you?” he asked.
“We at Century National don’t believe Mr. Janken’s death was an accident. We believe someone tampered with the shingles on the roof.”
“What are you saying? You think it was murder?”
“Yes, we do.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me. I hate to speak ill of the dead,” he said, not hating it a bit, “but that man was a no good cheat and a liar.”
“I heard he beat you a few times in the Christmas decorating contest,” I prompted.
Blood rushed to his weathered face.
“He didn’t win fair and square. He bribed the judge, that’s why he won all the time. Not only that, he cheated. Last year he beheaded my Santa Claus! He claimed it fell off in the wind, but it didn’t just fall off. It was sawed off!
“Let me show you something.”
He grabbed the ladder and I followed him as he brought it into his garage, a spotless haven complete with workbench and fancy built-in storage cabinets. A handyman’s dream.
Propped up along one of the walls, in stark contrast to the white cabinets, were a chorus line of large red-and-white striped neon candy canes.
“Garth saw these being delivered to my house. And before I had a chance to put them up, he had candy canes up on his roof. He stole my idea!”
“Oh, Willard, honey. He didn’t steal your idea. It was a coincidence.”
We turned and saw Ethel standing in the doorway.
“Please, Ethel. He saw those candy canes being delivered, and beat me to the punch.”
“Whatever you say, dear,” she sighed. “I just came to tell you lunch is ready. You’re welcome to join us if you like, Ms. Austen. I’ve made an extra sandwich.”
“Oh, no,” I said, thinking of all the mayo in the egg salad. Not after those chimichangas I had last night. I really had to exercise some self-restraint if I expected to cram myself into a bathing suit in Florida. “Thanks, but no.”
Two minutes later I was sitting across from Willard and Ethel at their vinyl-topped kitchen table tucking into one of Ethel’s heavenly egg salad sandwiches.
What can I say? I’m impossible.
When I finally came up for air, I resumed questioning the Coxes.
“Do you have any idea who might’ve wanted to see Garth dead?”
“Me, for starters,” said Willard.
Ethel put down her sandwich, horrified. “Willard, how can you say such a thing?”
“He killed Pumpkin, didn’t he?”
“It was an accident, Willard. A tragic accident. I simply can’t believe Garth would run over a helpless little poodle on purpose.”
“Well, I can.”
At that moment, there was so much hate in his eyes, I thought he really might be the one who sabotaged the roof.
“I can’t pretend I’m sorry he’s dead,” he said, as if reading my thoughts, “but I didn’t do it.”
“Anybody else on the block dislike him enough to want to see him dead?” I asked.
“There’s Mrs. Garrison next door,” Willard said. “She hated his guts ever since he reported her to the city for illegally removing a tree from the front of her house. She had to pay a big fine, and she was furious.”
“You think she might’ve loosened those tiles on the roof?”
“I doubt it.” Ethel smiled wryly. “She’s eighty-six and uses a walker.”
“How about Libby Brecker?” Willard suggested, beginning to enjoy this game of finger pointing. “She looks like a potential killer to me.”
“What an awful thing to say, Willard!”
“I’m serious,” Willard insisted. “There’s something about that woman that’s downright creepy. She’s just a little too perfect, if you know what I mean. Like one of those Stepford Wives.”
“Just because she takes pride in her house doesn’t make her a Stepford Wife.”
Ethel rolled her eyes, exasperated.
“I haven’t felt right about Libby since the day she moved in,” Willard said, ignoring his wife’s objections. “They say she’s a widow. I’d like to know what happened to her husband.”
“I’m sure he died of perfectly natural causes,” Ethel said, taking a dainty bite of a gherkin pickle.
“That’s the trouble with you, Ethel. You’re too trusting. You believe any cock and bull story someone hands you.”
“What was Libby Brecker’s relationship like with Mr. Janken?” I asked, steering the conversation away from Ethel Cox’s personality flaws and back to the murder.
“Hated him,” said Willard.
“I’m afraid she did,” Ethel conceded. “She accused Garth of poisoning her roses. Those roses of hers were her pride and joy.”
“Why would Mr. Janken want to poison her roses?”
“Libby claims Garth was getting even with her for calling the police when one of his parties got too loud.”
“Which house is Libby’s?” I asked, eager to question this promising suspect.
“It’s the two-story Spanish across the street,” Willard said, “with the Swarovski Rudolph on the lawn out front.”
“The Swarovski Rudolph?”
“Rudolph the Reindeer’s nose is a Swarovski crystal,” Ethel said. “Lord only knows how much it cost!”
“I tell you,” Willard said, wagging his gherkin at me, “there’s something strange about that woman.”
I thanked the Coxes for their time and their egg salad and headed back outside, contemplating the nature of life on Hysteria Lane. Who would’ve thought there’d be so much hostility lurking beneath the surface of this picture-perfect block? It made the Middle East look like a picnic in the Amish country.
I was in the middle of a war zone, all right. Trouble was, I didn’t know the good guys from the bad.
The nose on Libby Brecker’s Rudolph was indeed a red crystal, in all probability a genuine Swarovski.
I found Libby on her lawn spritzing it with Windex. She was a plump woman with bright brown eyes and hair so glossy, I could practically see my face in it.
Once again posing as an insurance investigator, I flashed her my Century National card and explained that I was looking into Garth’s death on Seymour’s behalf.
“If it’s all right with you, I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“Go ahead,” she chirped. “Ask away.”
By now she was down on her knees, buffing the runners on an elaborate wooden sleigh that was probably once owned by Currier & Ives.
I asked her if she’d seen anyone on the roof in the days before Garth’s death and like everybody else I’d spoken with, she gave me the same disappointing answer.
“Just the roofers. Who, incidentally, seemed to be doing an excellent job. I was thinking of using them myself, but after what happened to Garth, that’s not going to happen.”
Poor Seymour. I was certain most people would react the way Libby had. If word of Garth’s death got around, his business would be ruined.
“Of course, Garth was foolish to go up on the roof in
the first place,” she said. “You really need to hire a professional for that. I always do. But then I’m acrophobic. Dreadful fear of heights,” she added, in case my vocabulary didn’t extend beyond three-syllable words. “I get dizzy in high heels. Ha ha.”
(Translation: If you’re hinting at foul play, sweetie, don’t even think of trying to pin this on me.)
“Are you sure you didn’t see anyone else up on the roof, other than the roofers?
“Omigosh!” she cried, hitting her forehead with the palm of her hand. “I just remembered!”
At last! A lead!
“My cookies!” she said. “I’ve got cookies in the oven!”
So much for leads.
“C’mon inside, and we’ll talk there.”
I followed her into her house, past a border of newly planted rosebushes, little stubs with the nursery tags still on them. Probably replacements for the ones that had been poisoned.
“Take your shoes off,” Libby instructed, kicking hers off. “I just waxed and buffed the floors, and I don’t want to track in any mud.”
We put our shoes on something Libby called her “mud rug,” an area rug so pristine, it was hard to imagine it had ever been sullied by a speck of actual mud.
“I’ll be right back,” she trilled. “Make yourself comfortable in the living room.”
She pointed to a room off the foyer and then scurried to the back of the house.
I made my way through an arched entranceway to the living room.
Yikes, I thought, looking around. The place was a real-life issue of Martha Stewart Living.
The furniture was upholstered in a palette of white and beige, accented by colorful throw pillows and strategically placed vases of fresh-cut flowers. Cinnamon spice potpourri scented the air. And framed in the window was a magnificent Christmas tree, studded with what looked like exquisite handmade ornaments—angels and snowflakes and fragrant pomander balls. What a masterpiece. It made the one at Rockefeller Center look like a blue light special at Kmart. I wondered if the resourceful Libby had grown the darn thing herself.
Padding around the room in my socks, hoping I wouldn’t skid into a tailspin on the freshly waxed floors, I came across a pine étagère filled with artfully arranged photos and mementos.
There was Libby on the beach with a sunburned potbellied man, both of them wearing leis, smiling into the camera. Her deceased husband, I presumed. There were several pictures of twin boys at various stages in their lives, from diaper days to high school graduation. But what caught my attention was a framed newspaper photo of Libby grinning at the camera, clutching a trophy. The headline above the photo read: LIBBY BRECKER, 42, WINS ANNUAL ROSE COMPETITION FOR FIFTH CONSECUTIVE YEAR. And indeed, proudly displayed and dramatically lit on a center shelf were five golden trophies from the West Los Angeles Gardening Club for Most Beautiful Rose.
Interesting, I noted, how the roses got better shelf space than her husband and kids.
Libby was crazy about her roses, all right. Crazy enough, I wondered, to have killed someone she thought poisoned them?
“I see you’re looking at my family pictures.”
I turned to see Libby sailing into the room with a tray of cookies and milk.
“The twins just went off to college this year,” she said, putting the tray down on a gleaming pine coffee table. “Golly, I’ve missed them. Empty nest syndrome, you know.”
Why did I get the feeling she was secretly relieved not to have to worry about the twins tracking mud onto her floors?
“I brought us some cookies.”
She waved me over to the matching white sofas that fronted the fireplace and I sat across from her, sinking into a luxurious down cushion.
“Have one,” she offered. “They’re chocolate chip.”
As if I didn’t know. I can smell a chocolate chip cookie baking in Pomona. And these looked particularly scrumptious, studded with chunks of chocolate and walnuts.
Of course, I couldn’t possibly allow myself to have a cookie, not after the brownie I’d just had at Willard and Ethel’s. (Okay, so I had a brownie at Willard and Ethel’s. Okay, two brownies. Oh, don’t go shaking your head like that. I’d like to see what you’re eating right now.)
The last thing I needed was another calorie clinging to my thighs. But I couldn’t say no, could I? Not after all the trouble she’d gone to put them on a tray and bring them out to me. No, under the circumstances, the only polite thing to do was eat a cookie. But just one, that was all.
“Thanks,” I said, grabbing one. “They look scrumptious.”
“They are,” she said, with a confident nod.
I took a bite. I thought I’d died and gone to cookie heaven.
With great effort, I forced myself to resume my questioning.
“So do you know anyone on the block who might’ve wanted to see Garth dead?”
“Of course not!” Libby exclaimed, plucking an errant cookie crumb from her lap. “He wasn’t a very popular man, but nobody actually wanted him dead.”
“Nobody?” I asked, suppressing the urge to reach for another cookie. “Are you sure there wasn’t anybody who had it in for Garth?”
“Well, maybe Willard Cox,” she conceded. “He and Garth fought like cats and dogs. But I doubt Willard actually climbed up on Garth’s roof and jimmied the shingles, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“Speaking of Mr. Cox,” I said, grateful for the opening she’d just given me, “he happened to mention an altercation you had with Garth.”
“Me?” A brief blip of annoyance flashed across her face.
“Yes, he said you accused Mr. Janken of poisoning your roses.”
“Willard said that? How absurd!” She laughed a tinkly laugh about as genuine as Maxine Fiedler’s hair color. “I never accused Garth of any such thing.”
“I heard the same thing from a few other people,” I lied, trying to rattle her.
But she was a cool customer.
“Golly, no,” she smiled serenely. “Garth and I had a perfectly cordial relationship. I pride myself in bringing out the best in even the most difficult people.”
“So you don’t think he poisoned your roses?”
“Not at all,” she cooed. “Roses get sick and die all the time. I’m sure Garth had nothing to do with mine dying, and if Willard Cox or anyone else said anything to the contrary, they’re sadly mistaken.
“Gracious!” she said, jumping up from the sofa. “Look at the time!
“If I don’t get started refinishing the twins’ bedroom shutters, they’ll never get done in time for Christmas break.”
Her lips were smiling but her eyes had turned to steel. My audience with Libby had clearly come to a close.
I retrieved my shoes from her “mud rug” and as I did, I was gratified to see a defiant pink dustbunny clinging to the baseboard of her floor. Somehow the little devil had managed to escape annihilation during Libby’s recent waxing and buffing fest.
More power to you, little dustbunny, I thought, as I put on my shoes.
I thanked Libby for her time and headed back out to my Corolla.
I wasn’t buying her Little Miss Sunshine act, not for a minute. I’d bet my bottom Pop Tart her relations with Garth had been about as cordial as a Ku Klux Klan reception for Martin Luther King.
No, Libby Brecker had been lying through her perfectly whitened teeth. Now all I had to do was prove it.
Chapter Five
That night, after a Spartan dinner of tuna and a toasted English muffin (honest, that’s all I ate!), I went out to the storage space behind my duplex and dug out my Christmas tree.
It was one of those wimpy tabletop models, with the ornaments already glued on—a sorry sight compared to the towering extravaganza at Libby’s.
I used to have real trees with real ornaments, but Prozac, convinced the ornaments were evil spirits from hell, was constantly diving at them with the ferocity of a kamikaze pilot. The poor trees never stood a chance.
I plopped it down on an end table, and after dusting it off and draping it with tinsel, I turned to where Prozac was lounging on the sofa.
“How does it look, sweetie?”
She glared at it through slitted eyes and got to her feet. Tail erect and waving in anticipation of an ornament ambush, she cautiously approached it. Then she put her nose to one of the branches and took a sniff.
“So?” I asked. “What do you think?”
She sniffed under the tree, then turned to me.
What? No presents?
Then, having decided the tree was free of lurking enemies, she curled up and went to sleep.
Minutes later, I settled down next to her on the sofa with a cup of cocoa and a stack of Christmas cards. I’d long since conceded defeat to Prozac in the photo-card skirmish, and had picked up some cards with an old-fashioned drawing of Santa on the cover.
I got out my address book and began my task. I tried to think of heartfelt personalized messages in twenty-five words or less, but I couldn’t concentrate. Ever since I’d left Libby’s house that afternoon, I’d had the nagging feeling I’d seen something significant there. An elusive something I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
Now I drummed my pen against my teeth, trying to remember exactly what it was. Images began flitting through my brain: The Swarovski Rudolph, the family photos, the newspaper clipping, the trophies, the handmade Christmas angels, the “mud rug,” the defiant pink dustbunny—
And that’s when it hit me. It wasn’t a dustbunny I’d seen clinging to Libby’s baseboard—it was a piece of flocking. Pink flocking. Just like the pink flocking I’d seen on Garth’s Candyland roof!
True, Libby could have been working on a project of her own that involved pink flocking. The woman was probably working on more projects than the NASA space team. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help wondering if she’d picked up that piece of pink fluff while jimmying the shingles on Garth Janken’s roof.
Yes, folks. It’s very possible that Libby Brecker’s latest project had been Attempted Homicide.
Armed with my Dustbunny Discovery, I paid a visit to the cop in charge of the Janken case, Lt. Frank DiMartelli.
