“What’s the matter with him?” Crater asked.
“He was the man’s dog.” I didn’t try to force Blue to move. He was clearly distraught, behaving entirely differently from when he picked up Beale’s scent at the movie location. Somehow, he knew his master was dead.
I looked around the room. The bookcase had been righted, but its shelves were bare. Newly had taken everything for review in an effort to determine what Beale had considered so important.
“Can you tell me what would have been on the top two shelves?”
“Lighter books and pamphlets. We didn’t want the case to be top heavy.”
“Were they materials contemporary with the college or things written later?”
Crater looked at the upper empty shelves as if trying to visualize what had been there. “Some college catalogues, spiral notebooks with minutes of staff meetings, and miscellaneous enrollment records. Nothing really valuable like the artwork we have in the exhibition room.”
“What do you know about the alarm system?”
Crater shrugged. “Just the code to turn it on or off.”
“How many others use it?”
“We have a small staff and volunteers. Around ten people total. It’s known by anyone who opens or closes the museum. But the police said no one turned off the alarm. Power was cut to the building.”
“Can I see the alarm and the power box?”
Crater led me through the back hall where a keypad was mounted just inside the door. The logo read “CopBeat” and I didn’t recognize the manufacturer.
“Where’s the brain and power supply for this device?”
He opened a closet door and swept aside a few reams of printer paper from a central shelf. On the inner wall hung a gray metal box with a black power cord and thinner wires that must have connected various motion detectors or window and door alarms.
“And the battery?”
“I don’t know,” Crater said. “I guess it’s built in.”
I used the flashlight app on my phone to read the model number and then took a photo to send to Nathan Armitage.
“Where’s the power box for the building?”
“Right out back. The on-off handle was thrown, but whoever did that also cut the wires going from there into the building. Plus they severed the phone line.”
The main panel was mounted beside the meter. Whoever had disrupted power had been thorough, not simply trusting the main switch. I thought about Harlan Beale’s handyman experience, how he’d built his own house, which probably meant he did his own electrical wiring.
“Do you need to see anything else?” Crater asked.
Again, Blue preempted my response with a series of deep, throaty barks. I hurried inside to see what had set him off.
Roland Cassidy stood in the doorway from the exhibition room, his hands away from his sides like Blue was a police officer demanding him to freeze.
“It’s just me, Blue.” Cassidy stepped back when he saw me.
“We’re closed,” Crater said curtly. “Didn’t you see the sign?”
“Your door was unlocked.” Cassidy pointed at me. “What’s he doing here?”
“I’m helping the police.” I figured my two-way-street arrangement with Newly kept the statement from being a total lie.
Cassidy turned to Crater. “I’m the author of Love Among the Ridges.”
Crater folded his arms across his chest. “So?”
Cassidy reddened. “So, my book put Black Mountain College in the homes of thousands of readers. Surely you’ve seen an increase in your visitors.”
“Yes. But why are you here?”
Cassidy looked around the room. “I was a friend of Harlan. We spent a lot of time talking together.” He paused and moistened his lips. The phony author persona began to disintegrate. “I can’t believe he’s gone. I’d have no book without him.” He shifted his gaze to Blue lying on the floor. “Is this where it happened?”
“Yes,” I said.
“I heard a bookcase fell on him.”
“Who told you that?”
“My Uncle Arnold. The police were out to the movie set after you left. When they told him, he suggested they speak with me.”
“Do you have any idea what Harlan could have come here for?”
Cassidy shrugged. “I assume it was something for you. He was just sharing mountain stories with me. I’d pretty much mined everything to do with the college.” He looked at the bare shelves. “Did the police take the books?”
“Yes,” Crater said. “If you’re interested, I can let you know when the materials are returned.”
Cassidy nodded. “Okay. Sam, are you about finished?”
“I guess.”
“Then let me buy you a drink. I feel badly about the way I acted yesterday. I know Marty’s changes weren’t your idea. And I deeply regret that my last conversation with Harlan was…” he paused, struggling for the word “… was confrontational. What about LAB? We can sit outside so Blue can be with us.”
LAB was short for Lexington Avenue Brewery, one of my favorite spots. I wasn’t thrilled to spend time with the writer, but I’d learned a long time ago that you never know where you’re going to find vital information, so you hang out with all sorts of characters.
“All right. Why don’t you get a table? I’ve got a few quick phone calls to make.”
“Want me to take Blue?”
I handed him the rope. Cassidy gave it a gentle tug but Blue refused to get up. Cassidy whistled and then called the dog’s name in a soft, friendly voice. Blue got up, shook himself, and then walked over to stand by me.
Cassidy dropped the rope. “Looks like he prefers your company. I’ll go ahead. What do you want to drink?”
“A porter.”
Cassidy left and I picked up the makeshift leash. “I don’t want to take any more of your time,” I told Crater. “I’ll use the back door so I can make my calls without bothering anyone.”
I thought perhaps Blue wouldn’t want to leave the spot where Beale’s body had lain, but he responded to an easy pull and walked by my side. I stopped at the damaged power box next to the meter and took a photo with my cell phone. Then I sent both that picture and the one of the security alarm to Nathan Armitage with a note asking if the damage would have been sufficient to put the alert system out of commission.
Blue and I looped around the back of the building toward Lexington and a cold beer. A Duke Energy truck passed us going the opposite direction. The museum would soon be powered up.
I found Cassidy at a table in the open-air front of the brewery. He sat at a table for two with his back to the sidewalk. The afternoon was chilly and only a smattering of patrons ate outside. I suspected the vain author would normally opt for a table of greater visibility in hopes he would be recognized, but whatever he wanted with me must not have involved publicity.
Like many Asheville restaurants, bowls of water were scattered on the floor for their customers’ canine companions. I gave Blue enough rope to reach one beside Cassidy’s chair while I took a seat opposite him. The pint of porter was already served, and Cassidy had ordered a pale ale.
“So, you and Harlan got to be pretty close?” I took a sip from the glass as if the question was nothing more than a casual conversation-starter.
“It took me eighteen months to write the book. I went to his house about ten times during that period.”
“And there’s the cell phone you bought him.”
Cassidy nodded. “Yeah. Questions would come up on the spur of the moment. You see, everything doesn’t have to be historically accurate, but it does have to be historically plausible. I’d get an idea and I’d want to bounce it off Harlan while it was fresh in my mind.” He glanced down at his ale and twisted the glass in a circle. “That’s why I wanted to talk to you.”
&n
bsp; “About an idea?”
“Yeah. I’m not so blind that I can’t see there’s something strange going on with Harlan’s death. An old man climbing a bookcase in the middle of the night?”
“You want to write a mystery?”
Cassidy’s mouth turned down in disdain. “Who killed Colonel Mustard with a candlestick in the library? Please. I write literature.”
I didn’t say anything. As a detective, mysteries were my business.
“I’m interested in what stirs the human soul,” Cassidy said. “What drove Harlan to do whatever he did? Or what motivated someone else to do him in? I’m about the psychology of the process. And I know you’re about the solution.”
I wanted to say what the hell’s the good of the process if you don’t find out who killed Colonel Mustard, but I knew Cassidy was up on his elitist literary high horse and wasn’t worth the breath of an argument.
“What’s that got to do with me?”
“I want to help you. And, as it’s appropriate, you can share details with me. I’d like to follow the investigation step by step. This could be for me what In Cold Blood was for Truman Capote.”
“You have to understand I’m a private investigator. I represent a client’s interest and that might be for the client to remain anonymous.”
“I know.” He raised his ale in a toast. “Here’s to your integrity. All I’m asking is a little reciprocity for whatever I can do for you.”
I realized I had nothing to lose and the blowhard had spent a lot of time with Beale. “Then let me ask you a few questions. As an old-timer, did Harlan have any trouble operating the cell phone?”
Cassidy laughed. “He wasn’t Steve Jobs, if that’s what you’re asking. He could make a call and retrieve his messages. That’s all I ever showed him. He never asked what else it could do.”
“How about taking photographs?”
“Well, yes. I did show him the camera icon. It was one of the apps that came with the phone. Biggest problem was the reception at his house. He could only get one bar, and sometimes he’d have to walk up his driveway to get a more stable signal.”
That was interesting. The message he’d left on my voicemail the previous evening had been crisp and clear. That reinforced the theory he’d called me from Lake Eden.
“Was there any idea you suggested that Beale said was implausible?”
Cassidy thought a moment. “Not directly.”
“What do you mean?”
“He has a cousin named Nadine. Nadine Oates. She’s over ninety and lives out Fairview way.”
I recognized the area to be where Paul Weaver and his sister Violet had grown up.
“I mentioned that I’d like to talk to her,” Cassidy said. “See what she remembers. He told me not to bother. She was nutty as a hickory tree and she’d send me off on a wild goose chase.”
“Did Nadine attend the college?”
“No. She’d go up when they had a dance or were putting on a show. Harlan said she stopped going before he started working. But he’d heard her talk about the college, which was why he went looking for a job in the summer of 1948.”
“What kind of wild goose chase?”
Cassidy smiled and leaned across the table. “Communists,” he whispered. “Behind every tree and rock.”
Chapter Twelve
Blue and I left Roland Cassidy a little after four. Next on my agenda was to see Newly in person rather than talk over the phone because it would be harder for him to evade my questions. But, Blue wasn’t going to pass for a K-9 police dog so I decided to swing by the office, leave Blue with Nakayla, and then see if Newly or Tuck Efird had anything to share. That plan fell apart a few seconds after I loaded Blue in the car. My cell rang and I recognized Newly’s number.
“Where are you?” he asked.
“I’m leaving the museum. I went back and spoke with one of the staff.”
“Josh Crater?”
“Yeah. He didn’t seem to know anything. But you might be interested in who showed up while I was there.”
“Enlighten me.”
“Roland Cassidy. The writer who used Harlan Beale as a research source for his book.”
Newly grunted dismissively. “Tuck and I spoke with him this morning. He seemed clueless.”
“He is. But he wants to follow the investigation. He envisions a literary masterpiece-in-the-making.”
“So, first you’re in a movie and now a literary masterpiece. Remind me to bow next time I see you.”
“Just honoring our two-way street, my friend. And guys like Cassidy sometimes know things they don’t realize they know. Now, what can you share?”
I heard the squeak of Newly’s chair as he shifted his weight.
“Tuck and I just came back from visiting Beale’s next of kin. Nadine Oates.”
“Did she say the Communists killed him?”
The phone went silent a moment. Then Newly said, “How the hell did you know that? Yes, she said the Communists had been stalking her cousin for years.”
“Cassidy said that Beale told him his cousin was nutty as a hickory tree and to avoid her. Sounds like he wasn’t exaggerating.”
“I don’t know if she’s certifiable, but I think she’s a few apples short of a full bushel.”
“Anything more from the M.E.?”
“No. And with tomorrow being Saturday, I might not get a preliminary till Monday.”
“How about the phone?”
“Sent a request to the carrier for all activity. But we did catch a break on the code. Four fours. I guess it proves even a dumb ass can stumble across a good idea.”
I laughed. “Then you should take hope your day will come. So what did you find?”
“Most calls in the log came to and from Roland Cassidy’s number. Last one was to your cell. There were some photos he took at the movie location. Some were of the actors. Some of the construction work and that dome thing they were trying to re-create. Nothing looks very promising.”
“I’d like to see them.”
“I’m headed out, but if you come by Monday morning I’ll show you what we pulled off. You going to see the Oates woman?”
“I guess I should. I’ve got Beale’s dog that needs go to someone.”
“I don’t think Nadine Oates is an option,” Newly said. “She’s already got a pet.”
“Blue’s laid-back. Another dog or even a cat might not be a problem.”
“Not in this case.” Newly gave a deep, throaty laugh. “Her pet’s a raccoon. Even you wouldn’t be dumb enough to put a raccoon and a coonhound in the same room. Or would you?” He laughed again and hung up.
Nakayla was at her computer when Blue and I arrived at the office. The hound, unperturbed by the new surroundings, rested his head on Nakayla’s thigh as a canine hello.
She scratched behind his ears. “How did you two do?”
I gave her the summary of my conversation at the museum and then the surprise encounter with Roland Cassidy and his request to shadow our investigation.
“I don’t see how that will work,” Nakayla said. “No telling what he’ll do with the information.”
“I agree. But he did spend a lot of time with Beale, and Newly confirmed the description of Nadine Oates as a nut job. I don’t think it will hurt to keep a line of communication open. As for Nadine, I think we should see her tomorrow.”
Nakayla got up, walked to the printer and retrieved several pages from the tray. “You might want to delay her for a more promising lead.”
She handed me the papers. The top sheet was a Wikipedia entry for Eleanor Patricia Johnson that described her as a stellar dancer of the nineteen-fifties and nineteen-sixties, most prominently with Merce Cunningham’s dance company. She then went on to teach and her list of pupils was a veritable Who’s Who of Performers, at
least, according to the article. My knowledge of dance was only slightly ahead of my knowledge of nuclear physics. Eleanor Johnson had worked into her seventies before retiring to her native Brooklyn. The brief bio reported two marriages and one daughter. There was no date of death, and from her birth date, I learned she was ninety.
The second printout was an article published in an online magazine called The Art in Heart. Its mission seemed to be to highlight artists who were engaged in humanitarian efforts or giving of themselves to support the arts. The headline read Keeping Dance in Motion. Beneath were two photographs side by side, one featuring an elderly African-American woman seated in a rocker, and the other, the frozen leap of a female dancer on a stage with a colorful backdrop of geometric shapes. Centered underneath both pictures was the name Eleanor Patricia Johnson. The article told how Eleanor opened her four-story brownstone to dancers and dance students who needed inexpensive housing while actively pursuing their art. “Dance is a journey,” she was quoted as saying. “You are never done, and even if physically you can no longer move like you once could, the dancer’s mind spins forward, capturing the motion and energy around you. It’s the young people around me who keep me young.”
The publication date was two months earlier.
“She sounds pretty sharp,” I said. “We need to talk with her.”
“There’s an early flight connecting through Charlotte that arrives at LaGuardia at eleven-fifty tomorrow morning. I’ve got her Brooklyn address.”
“Phone number?”
She shook her head. “There’s not one listed. I sent an e-mail to The Art in Heart, but haven’t had a response.”
“They should be leery of giving us personal information. I think we should just go. She’s ninety. Where else will she be?”
“Do you want to clear the ticket expense with Violet Baker?” Nakayla asked.
“Do we have the photographs to take with us?”
Nakayla picked up a copy of the book now in police possession. “Pack Library had two. This one was in the reference section but I begged a librarian friend to let me take it out for the weekend.”
“Then call Violet and bring her up-to-date. If she’s good, then book the flight. See if you can get an evening return.”
Hidden Scars Page 11
