Murder in a Good Cause

by Medora Sale

  “I was out of the house before the paper arrived,” said Britton with definite irritation in his voice. “This is a very busy day.”

  “In that case,” said Sanders, “come in. We have some explaining to do to each other.” He led the way into the study. Briefly and economically, he outlined the events of the previous night.

  Mr. Britton paused a moment to register shock. “A terrible thing,” he said, “to happen to a charming and gracious lady. With some awkward implications for Mr. Milanovich,” he added after a longer pause. “Mrs. von Hohenkammer called yesterday and insisted that I see her today. She was so insistent, in fact, that I arranged to finish up early this morning so I could fit in this visit. Not that it matters,” he added. “Accountants often work strange hours. Like policemen, I suppose. But my impression was that they were in urgent need of financial advice.”

  “Was this common?” asked Sanders. “I mean, for her to call and ask you to drop everything and dash over?”

  “Not at all,” said Britton. “We do have wealthy clients who feel that every utility bill is a potential financial crisis, but Mrs. von Hohenkammer was not like that. She was a wealthy woman, with large holdings in Canada, and elsewhere, and a complex tax situation. Generally, though, she went at things rationally, took excellent advice, and never panicked. This is the first time in three or four years that she has asked to see me right away, and so I made a great effort to comply.” He nodded soberly. “She was the sort of person you enjoyed working with. Very pleasant and reasonable.”

  “Didn’t her business manager handle her financial affairs?” asked Sanders.

  Charles Britton shook his head thoughtfully. “I wouldn’t say so.” He paused to consider his next sentence. “She may have called him a business manager, but basically she employed him as a personal secretary. I think that is the best way to put it. He made appointments and wrote letters and so on. And paid bills or looked after minor accounts. But he didn’t make the day-to-day decisions, except as her theatrical agent.”

  “Who called you yesterday and asked for the appointment?”

  “That was rather odd,” said Britton. “First of all, Whitelaw called and set up an appointment at eleven a.m. today. I was to examine the books of a firm called Triple Saracen Development with Milanovich, its principal, who is Mrs. von Hohenkammer’s son-in-law, and with Whitelaw. Then Mrs. von Hohenkammer called me herself later in the day and said that she wanted to discuss the results of this appointment and to go over some other matters with me alone. She suggested that it be over lunch. I was looking forward to this with some interest.” As he paused for breath, his eyes narrowed, and his normally imperturbable face betrayed signs of excitement. “Triple Saracen is rather notorious at the moment. One hears that the bottom is about to fall out of it, although people connected with it still insist that it has the capacity to become extremely profitable.”

  “What do you think?”

  “Since I don’t suppose I will get to look at the books, I couldn’t really hazard an opinion.” He cocked his head slightly to one side. “I wouldn’t advise you to sink much money into it right now, though, if you were to ask me.”

  That seemed to be a joke, and Sanders smiled.

  “If there is nothing else I can help you gentlemen with, however, I suppose I should be going. It doesn’t seem likely that there will be a meeting today, does it?” Mr. Britton eased himself out of his chair.

  Sanders shook his head. “Where did she keep her financial records?”

  “Not in here,” said Britton, “although you’d think this would be the logical place for her office. She worked either in the conservatory or up in her sitting room. I generally saw her in the sitting room. You should find everything you need in the filing cabinets and drawers up there.” He picked up his briefcase. “It was quite a promotion to get to do business with her upstairs, by the way. For the first couple of years I came here, she had all her records and statements brought downstairs.” He shook his head in mild wonder at human peculiarities. “She had her oddities, I suppose, but they were fairly mild ones. I can see myself out, gentlemen. If you need any information, just get in touch with me through the office. I left my card on the desk.” Mr. Britton smiled. “Oh,” he said, turning back, “do you think anyone would mind if I used this phone to call in? Don’t go, gentlemen—nothing private.”

  Sanders shook his head and pushed the telephone across the desk.

  “No, no, don’t worry about it,” Charles Britton was saying firmly into the mouthpiece a moment later. “It’s just as well that I came over here. Thank you.” He hung up and pushed the phone back toward Sanders. “Someone called in this morning and canceled this appointment. Didn’t give his name. It was just by chance that the office didn’t reach me. Goodbye, gentlemen.”

  “Must remember to ask Mr. Milanovich about that canceled appointment,” said Sanders, watching Mr. Britton’s retreating back. “I wonder if he was afraid we’d find out about the meeting. Interesting.”

  “Or why he was afraid,” Dubinsky said. “Isn’t Fraud doing a thing on Triple Saracen?”

  “Fraud? How in hell do you find out about all these things?” asked Sanders. “Because I haven’t the faintest idea. Better give them a call before we have a go at the sitting room. Then maybe someone in the family will tell us about this meeting. Where are they, anyway? This place is like a morgue.”

  “The housekeeper is sulking in the kitchen,” said Dubinsky. “And I think the daughter and the nephew are still upstairs. I don’t suppose they’re used to getting up in the morning.”

  In fact, Dubinsky was maligning the entire family by assuming that they were all sleeping the long morning sleep of the rich and idle. While he and his partner were standing in the middle of Clara von Hohenkammer’s bright and sunny sitting room, trying to decide where to start, all of that lady’s closest relatives had been awake for hours.

  Theresa Milanovich was sitting in the dining room of her sprawling suburban-style house, staring out into the back garden, her attention apparently entirely absorbed by a pair of squirrels chasing each other up and down trees. It would have been more tactful of her to have devoted some of that attention to her husband, who was pacing up and down the room and addressing her in vehement tones, but if the expression on her face was anything to judge by, she was not concerned with trying to please him. “I don’t see why you’re being so bloody unpleasant about it,” he was saying. “Or were you just waiting for the chance to see me in jail?”

  “For God’s sake, Milan, don’t be so stupid. What good would it do me to have you in jail?” She whirled around from her contemplation of nature and looked at him. “If I had wanted to get rid of you, it would have been easy enough the ordinary way. I didn’t need to try to get you arrested.” Her eyes narrowed to thin cracks in her face. “You certainly have given me enough grounds to ditch you. And if I haven’t chosen to get rid of you up until now, I’m not going to start while the whole world is watching us.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that there was cyanide in Mamma’s tea, and it sure as hell didn’t get there by mistake, did it? Somebody went down to Klaus’s little lab in the basement, took it out, and put it in that cup. When did you get it from the basement? While we were at the reading? Because you were in and out of the kitchen all night. I saw you. Wandering around like a restless cow. Did you poison Mamma?”

  “Jesus, woman, watch what you’re saying!” he gasped, looking at her in horror. “How can you even think that?”

  “It’s easy.” Her voice was calm. “You’re in a hell of a hole. You hated my mother, and you knew perfectly well that the second anyone with any brains looked at your books, you hadn’t a chance of getting a penny out of her. This way you don’t have to. You figure you can always get it out of dumb little Theresa, don’t you? The way you got all my father’s money out of me. Well, don’t count on it.�
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  “When did you come up with all this crap?” he asked heavily.

  “Last night. I was thinking. I got up and had a drink and sat in the living room and thought. I had some interesting ideas.” She turned again to contemplate the squirrels. “But if you did poison Mamma, you’d better tell me about it and we’ll figure out what to do. With your brains, they’ll catch you in a minute.”

  “Hold on there,” he said. “I didn’t kill your mother. You’re trying to push me into something, aren’t you? I mean, maybe you could’ve killed her just as easy. You’d love to get your hands on all that money.” He resumed his walking up and down. “Anyway, I didn’t have a thing to worry about today. You must really think I’m stupid if you think that accountant was going to get anything but a lovely, clean set of books. We were all set,” he said, and flashed a confident smile at his wife. “This is a real bind.” He stopped and placed himself directly in front of her. “I’d have been better off if she’d still been alive.”

  She looked up wearily. “You always did underestimate all of us, didn’t you? Must be because we’re women and you can’t believe that we could have any brains.” Suddenly she yawned, an enormous, exhausted yawn. “Well, if you didn’t do it”—she sounded as though she had not quite accepted that proposition—“then it must have been Nikki. Nobody else had any reason to kill her.”

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” said her husband in an oddly flat voice.

  “Somebody had to do it,” she said, and picked up a magazine.

  “No, you don’t,” he said, yanking it out of her hands. “You don’t turn off like that until you call that lawyer in Munich.” He looked at his watch. “Eleven—just in time for a nice late-afternoon chat. Come on, Theresa. I have to know what’s in that will before I face the bankers on Monday morning. It’s the only way.”

  “No.” She picked up another magazine. “Can’t you see how that would look? Murdered woman’s grieving daughter phones lawyer in Munich to find out how much she’s worth? We’re supposed to be rich, Milan. Remember? We’re not supposed to be worried about money. It has never occurred to us that the bank won’t extend your loan on Monday. We don’t need an extra penny!” She glared at him. “You have to remember that. We don’t need an extra penny. Mother’s money is of no interest to us at all.”

  Her husband returned her glare for a moment and then sat down in a large chair and took up his wife’s vigil over the squirrels.

  Sanders looked around Clara’s bright and cheerful sitting room for a good couple of minutes before he turned to Dubinsky, who was leaning in the doorway, watching him. “I think we’ll get further talking to people, don’t you?” he said, trying to sound as if he believed it. “Instead of ploughing through a lot of paper here.” His tired brain shied away from the enormous amount of work the four-drawer filing cabinet and the three-drawer desk seemed to represent. “What about the housekeeper? Did you manage to get anything from her last night?” He yawned, sat back in an overstuffed chair, closed his eyes, and appeared to go to sleep.

  Dubinsky pulled out his notebook and read rapidly, in a flat, bored voice. “She said that at eleven the women from the catering service put the coffee urn, cups, and plates of cakes and cookies in the dining room. The bartender was supposed to be on duty until eleven-thirty, but at twenty after he put clean glasses, ice, and mix on the table, collected the dirty glasses, and left. She seemed to feel he was cheating on his time,” he said, looking up. “In fact, she seems to be convinced that everyone is cheating, including us. So after that, no one was noticing what was going on with food and drink. It was a help-yourself situation.”

  Sanders spoke without opening his eyes. “Did she go around the living room and pick up dirty dishes and things like that? Or was she in the kitchen all the time?”

  “I asked her if she stayed in the kitchen, and her answer was ‘Where else would I be?’ Which doesn’t really help, does it? Then Mrs. von Hohenkammer told her to have tea ready for her at midnight. She got it ready and took it out, and since Mrs. von Hohenkammer was talking to a lot of people and she didn’t want to interrupt her, she put it down where her employer could see it and left. And that’s all she knows. Except that no one was in the kitchen but the gardener. Who came in two or three times.”

  “Why?”

  “Supposedly to check on the progress of the party, but probably to cadge food and drink. And that’s all I got. I’ve met hit men who were more cooperative witnesses.”

  “Okay,” said Sanders, pushing himself slowly to his feet. “We’d better talk to her again. But first, call the business manager and get him over here so we can start in on the filing cabinets.” Dubinsky shrugged and headed for the telephone.

  “When do you want to see him?”

  “When? Now, of course. Where does he live?”

  Dubinsky dropped the receiver back down and shook his head. “On Woodlawn. In what he calls a small flat. And I’m not facing that little fart-face until I’ve had some lunch. Two o’clock,” he said mutinously.

  “Big,” said Sanders. “He’s really quite a big fart-face. Two o’clock it is.”

  Bettl Kotzmeier was standing precariously on a kitchen stool in front of a row of cabinets. Her head was in the cabinet, and her strong arms were scrubbing the middle shelf as if she were trying to purify it. “Miss Kotzmeier,” said Sanders. There was no response. “Miss Kotzmeier!” This time his voice reverberated through the room. “Inspector Sanders, Homicide. I have some questions about your statement to Sergeant Dubinsky last night. I would appreciate it if you would come down here so we can talk.” The shoulders continued to rotate as her arms scrubbed in circular motion. “Or, if you prefer, we can conduct this interview downtown.” The movement slowed and stopped. Her head and shoulders emerged from the cupboard. She dropped her sponge into the brown plastic bucket beside her on the counter and climbed heavily down off the stool. She folded her arms in a gesture that he hadn’t believed anyone used off the stage and said, “Yes?”

  The interview inched its painful way through a recalcitrant hour. Sanders started with all the questions that Dubinsky had asked and got answers that were, if anything, briefer and less helpful this time. Yes, she had stayed all evening in the kitchen. That was where she was supposed to stay, wasn’t it? “Except when you brought in the tea? You didn’t stay in the kitchen then.”

  “No.” Grudgingly. “I brought in the tea.”

  “At twelve?”

  She nodded.

  “At exactly twelve?”

  “That was when she wanted it.”

  “It must have been pretty cold by the time she drank it. Did your employer like her tea cold?”

  She glowered and then finally shook her head. “No. Frau von Hohenkammer was . . .” She waved her hand while searching for the word.

  “Then it is very odd that she drank the tea without complaint.”

  No response.

  “I said it’s odd that she drank the tea cold, Miss Kotzmeier, isn’t it? Or don’t you think so?”

  “She didn’t drink it cold.”

  Sanders stared at her, irritation building up to higher and higher levels.

  Her gaze dropped, and she muttered, “Somebody got her more from the pot. The pot was still hot. It was in the tea basket.”

  “What?” Sanders stared at her. “You mean somebody came into the kitchen and refilled her cup from the teapot?”

  She shrugged. “That’s where the pot was.”

  “Who?”

  “I didn’t see.”

  “Then how do you know somebody got her a fresh cup?”

  “Because when I made the tea, I poured a cup and put the pot in the tea basket. Frau von Hohenkammer often had more before she went to bed. When I looked over at the counter, the pot was out of the basket, and it was almost empty. I had to put on another kettle for when she would want more
tea.” There was bitterness in her voice.

  “What did you do with the teapot?”

  “I washed it, of course, because when she would want fresh tea, I would need to use it again soon.”

  “Where is this pot?” he asked.

  “They took it away.” Her shoulders twitched with resentment.

  “I don’t understand,” he said softly, “how you failed to notice someone come in, look for the teapot—where was it, by the way?” She pointed wordlessly to the counter beside the stove. “Find it, dump out the cold tea in the sink, refill the cup, and walk out again. That just isn’t very likely, is it? That says to me that either you replaced the tea yourself or you’re trying to protect some member of the family. It won’t work, you know. We’ll find out, anyway.”

  “I tell you, I didn’t see who it was. I don’t know. I just know that someone moved the teapot out of its basket.” Her mouth closed in a narrow line. “I wasn’t in the kitchen then.”

  “Where were you? I thought you said you had been in here all night.”

  She glared. “People left glasses and dirty plates everywhere. Those maids were supposed to clean up, but there were glasses in the dining room and dirty plates in the study, and glasses. I couldn’t leave them there. They would mark the furniture. I took them away and polished off the marks with a cloth.” Dubinsky grinned and shook his head in disbelief. Even Sally’s mother didn’t polish furniture during a party.

  “So between twelve and twelve-thirty, you were polishing the furniture in the study and the dining room?”

  She glowered. “Not twelve-thirty. Twelve twenty-five. I checked the time. I figured when she’d had her tea, they’d be going soon.”

  “Especially with you polishing the furniture all around them. And so at twelve twenty-five you came into the kitchen, put on the kettle, and washed the teapot. What else did you do?”

  “Nothing. There was nothing to do until people left.” She turned her back on them and reached into the bucket for her sponge once again.