by Vicki Delany
“I suppose I can do that.” The clerk reached for the desk phone and placed the call. She hung up after a couple of seconds passed. “No answer. Sorry.”
“But . . .” Jayne said.
“We’ll come back later,” I said. “By the way, do you have a swimming pool?”
“Yes.”
A large mirror hung on the wall facing us. I could see the back of the clerk’s head, and Jayne’s and my smiling faces. I could also see a two-car convoy of overloaded SUVs with New York license plates pulling up out front. “How nice. My brother’s coming over from England for a vacation, and he’s insistent on staying at a place that has a pool. I’d like to have a look at it before I make a booking.”
“I don’t think . . .” At that moment, the new arrivals spilled through the doors. I headed for the corridor leading to the pool.
“Thanks for your help,” Jayne said as she ran to catch up. She then asked me, “What brother?”
The elevator was opposite the enclosed pool area. Parents watched as children splashed. I punched the up button and the elevator doors slid open. “Room two-four-five.”
“How on earth do you know that?”
“I watched her push the buttons on the phone, of course. You should be more observant, Jayne.”
“What are we going to do? She’s not in.”
“That she didn’t answer her hotel room phone is no indication of absence,” I said. “She might be in the shower or asleep. Or, more likely, hiding.”
“Hiding from who?”
“From whom, and that is the question we are here to have answered.”
We arrived at the second floor, and the doors slid open. Jayne emerged first. She read the signs directing us to the rooms incorrectly and headed in the wrong direction. I called for her to come back.
Room 245 was at the end of the corridor, next to the stairs. No one else was around. The door by the staircase squeaked, and children’s laughter drifted up from the pool below. The slightest crack showed us that the door to the room in question was not fully closed. I glanced at Jayne, and then I knocked loudly. “Hello! Anyone at home? It’s Gemma and Jayne from the Sherlock Holmes Emporium. You left something earlier today. Hello?”
I pushed on the door. It swung open.
“We can’t just walk in,” Jayne whispered.
“Of course we can,” I said. I gave the door one more solid knock and shoved it fully open.
It was a typical budget hotel room. Two double beds, a desk and chair, a dresser with a large-screen TV on top of it, factory-produced prints on the walls, and thick red-striped curtains. Those curtains were closed, and all the lights were switched off.
“She’s asleep,” Jayne said. “We can’t go in.”
“If she’s sleeping, she’ll thank us for alerting her to the fact that she forgot to check the lock on the door.” I turned on the light. I blinked and froze in my tracks.
Behind me, Jayne gasped.
I recognized her instantly. The Small Woman who’d been in the Emporium earlier. She lay on the bed closest to the window, on top of the covers, fully dressed, even down to the dirty trainers. But she was not asleep. Her arms were thrown out, her head lolled over the side of the bed. Her wide eyes were staring directly at us, but she did not see us. She was dead.
Chapter 4
Jayne and I backed slowly out of the hotel room. Or rather, I backed slowly; Jayne tripped over a loose edge of carpet and tumbled across the hallway to hit the far wall. There she stood, hands on her knees, gasping for breath.
“Breathe deeply but slowly.” I moved my arms up and down in a rhythm to help time her. “Deep breath in. Deep breath out.”
She looked up at me. “I’ll breathe any way I want.”
“Now that you’re back to normal, go to the lobby and call the police. Try not to run. We don’t want to create a panic.”
“Gemma, a woman’s dead in there. How can you be so calm?”
“Panic helps no one,” I replied. I was, in fact, not calm in the least. My heart was pounding, my temperature was elevated by at least half a degree Celsius, and drops of sweat were running down the back of my neck. But I knew that running through the hotel corridors, screaming and waving my arms in the air, would be of no use to anyone.
The elevator tinged and the doors whooshed open. A man emerged and turned in the opposite direction from us. He was talking on his phone and paid us no attention whatsoever. Cell phone technology truly has made it possible to move unnoticed through public spaces. Sherlock Holmes would have loved it.
Jayne took one more deep breath and then straightened up. “Okay. Let’s go.”
“You alert the authorities. I’ll remain here.”
“Why?”
“So no one else, a hotel maid perhaps, goes into the room inadvertently and is overcome by shock.”
“The room’s been cleaned already.”
“Go, Jayne.”
She turned and dashed down the corridor. She pounded at the elevator buttons. It was still on our floor, and the doors opened immediately. As soon as she was inside, I slipped back into the room.
I pulled out my phone and snapped photographs quickly. First, a full view of the room. The Small Woman lay on the bed. The scarf she’d worn earlier was still around her neck but now wrapped so tightly, I suspected that was what killed her. Her sightless eyes bulged, her tongue protruded, and her fingers were dug into the scarf, as if trying to release it. I took more pictures, closer up. I didn’t touch anything.
Fortunately, I was also wearing a scarf. A pretty blue-and-white silk one that went nicely with my white capris and blue-and-white-striped T-shirt. I pulled the scarf off and wrapped it around the fingers of my right hand. A tattered backpack lay on the bed nearest the door. I lifted it up. Empty. Then, somewhat awkwardly, I opened doors and drawers. At first glance, the woman didn’t seem to have much. A pair of beige trousers hung in the closet along with a baggy sweater and a raincoat that had seen better days. Black flats with drying mud on the toes had been tossed on the floor. The drawer beneath the TV proved more fruitful: two pairs of pants, one pair of socks, a many-times-washed black T-shirt . . . and a small blue box.
I opened the box. A pair of earrings that, if they weren’t made of pure gold and real diamonds, were a darn good imitation. A necklace of interlinked gold rings and a large brooch consisting of a circle of diamonds around a brilliant sapphire. The overhead lights caught the jewels and threw beams around the room. I took a picture of them and then replaced the lid on the box, closed the drawer, and continued searching the room. Sirens were approaching, and I knew it wouldn’t be long before I was interrupted.
I found the woman’s handbag on the floor, half-kicked under the bed. I picked it up, put it on the desk, and opened it as quickly as possible, taking care that my fingers didn’t emerge from the protection of my scarf. The contents were typical of a woman’s bag: a jumble of tissues, a key ring, scraps of paper, a couple of pens, some lip balm. I pulled out the wallet and flipped it open. The Massachusetts driver’s license was in the name of Mary Ellen Longton, with an address in Boston, and a date of birth that put her at age sixty-seven. The picture was definitely the woman who’d been in the Emporium earlier and now lay dead a couple of feet from my probing fingers. As well as the license, the wallet contained one credit card, also in the name of Mary Ellen Longton, five twenty-dollar bills, and a handful of coins. A plain, white, letter-sized envelope lay at the bottom of the purse. My luck was in, and the envelope was unsealed. I slipped the flap open and pulled out a collection of newspaper clippings. They were, judging by the color of the ink and stiffness of the paper, fairly recent. I didn’t have time to read them, so I laid them out on the desk and snapped a series of pictures.
Then I put everything back where I’d found it, tied my own scarf jauntily around my neck, and went to wait for the officers of the law in the corridor.
I was thinking that it was time the faded and dated wallpaper was refreshed whe
n the elevator doors slid open to emit Jayne, surrounded by men and women in blue, and a man in a badly fitting cheap suit, flapping his hands.
That must have been one crowded elevator.
“Let’s not make a fuss here,” the suited man was saying. “No need to disturb anyone, is there, officers?” He could only be the hotel’s duty manager.
I indicated the room in question, and after giving me suspicious glances, the police went in. Radios crackled, and outside, more sirens sounded.
None of the police had said a word to me, which suited me fine. I was about to suggest that Jayne and I take ourselves out of their way when one of the cops emerged from the room. He was balding, with a bad comb-over (why do men insist on doing that?) and a red-veined nose. He was substantially overweight and sweating profusely. Considering that the hotel was not too hot, that he had come up in the elevator rather than the stairs, and that the scene of the crime wasn’t gory or disturbing to an experienced cop, I gave him about a month before he had his next heart attack. “Perhaps you should sit down. Your color isn’t good,” I said, trying to be helpful.
Jayne hissed at me.
“Who are you?” he snapped.
“Gemma Doyle.”
“On vacation, are you?”
“Not at all. I’m a resident of West London and the proprietor of the Sherlock Holmes Bookshop and Emporium on Baker Street. Ms. Wilson here is my business partner and colleague.”
“Oh yeah,” he said, “my . . . wife loves that store.”
“I’m sorry to hear she left you,” I said.
His beady black eyes made me think of a mouse. They studied me. “How’d you know that?”
I shrugged. The hesitation in his voice had shouted it loud and clear. He almost said ex-wife but caught himself. Therefore, he had regrets, even if she did not. He did not appear to be on the verge of tears, so she was likely not deceased.
“What brings you here then, if you live nearby?” he asked. “Are you friends with the dead woman?”
“I’d never seen her before today. She came into my store this afternoon and left something behind. My friend and I wanted to return it.” I glanced at his name tag. “Constable Richter.”
“Officer,” Jayne whispered to me.
“Sorry. Officer Richter. Now if you don’t need us anymore, we’ll be on our way.”
“Not so fast.” He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped sweat off his brow. I moved my estimate of the arrival of his heart attack up by two weeks.
“Why don’t we discuss this in my office?” the hotel manager said. “No need to stand around where everyone can see us.” He flapped his hands again, indicating that he’d escort us. It had as much effect as if he were attempting to corral Moriarty and a pack of feral cats.
“What did she forget?” Officer Richter asked.
“A magazine.”
“A magazine?”
“Yes, a magazine.”
“You came all the way out here to return a magazine?”
“Whyever would I not?”
“Where’s she from? Why’s she in a hotel in West London?”
“Of that, I have no idea.”
“She told you she was staying here. She must have told you why.”
“She didn’t tell me anything. We never exchanged so much as a single word. I . . . deduced . . . that she was at this hotel.”
“You deduced?”
I was about to explain my reasoning when a shout from the room had Officer Richter pointing his stubby pink finger at me. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”
Another officer, a young woman, began stringing yellow police tape across our end of the hallway.
“Hey!” the manager cried. “Don’t do that. You’ll upset the guests.” He rushed away to argue his point.
“Are you going to tell him what the magazine’s worth?” Jayne whispered once we were alone.
“It’s estimated worth. I don’t think that’s wise. Not at this time.”
“It looks suspicious. Us coming out here to return a magazine to someone we don’t even know. Anyone else would assume she’d finished with it, or, if she’d dropped it, she’d come back another time.”
“I am not anyone else.”
“You don’t have to tell me that, Gemma. But the receptionist is going to tell the police she called up and the woman didn’t answer. We snuck in under false pretenses. That looks suspicious.”
“Before I reveal the potential significance of the magazine, I want to gather more information. I don’t trust Officer Heart-Attack-Looking-For-A-Place-To-Happen to handle this situation with delicacy.”
Richter had left the door partially open. I stuck my head in. Two cops stood over the body. Another was peering in closets. I wondered if I should point out to them the handbag on the floor. Judging by the position of the boots of the observing officers, one of them had kicked it further under the bed. Richter was standing by the window, talking on his phone.
The elevator pinged again, and I withdrew my head and resumed my expression of complete innocence.
My foolish heart betrayed me.
“What’s the matter?” Jayne whirled around to see what had caught my attention.
A man had stopped to talk to the hotel manager. “. . . begin moving people off this corridor.”
“But we’re completely full. It’s the beginning of the season.”
The newcomer didn’t bother to stand and argue and resumed walking toward us. He was in his thirties, tall and solidly built, with chiseled cheekbones, cropped black hair, large expressive blue eyes, and a strong jaw thick with five o’clock shadow.
“Nice,” Jayne said.
He wore black boots; faded, but not torn, jeans; and a blue button-down shirt under a black leather jacket. The jacket was open, revealing a gun belt and a badge. I was standing slightly behind Jayne. I might have ducked.
He saw Jayne and was about to say something, but the words stuck in his throat.
I stepped out from behind my friend. My pounding heart threatened to burst out of my chest. “Ryan, hello. I didn’t know you were back in town.”
“Gemma. This is a surprise. It’s only been a week. I uh . . . haven’t had time to pop around and say hi.”
Jayne’s head was moving back and forth as though she were at a tennis match, her eyes wide with interest.
“Did you call this in?” he said.
“Yes,” I said. “That is, my friend did, while I waited here—outside the room, I mean, not inside, of course—to protect the integrity of the scene pending your arrival. I don’t mean your arrival, as in you in particular, but the police in general. I thought it my duty to . . .”
“My friend babbles when she’s uncomfortable,” Jayne said.
I forced my mouth shut. I have been told that before.
“I’m Jayne Wilson and this, as you seem to already know, is Gemma Doyle.”
“Ryan Ashburton.” He gave her a nod, but he scarcely even looked at her. “Gemma and I are old friends. How you doing, Gemma?”
“Well, thank you, Ryan. Except for discovering a dead body, that is. Most upsetting.”
“I’m going to have a look at the scene, and then I want to talk to you. Why don’t you two go downstairs and take a seat in the hotel office? I’ll be as quick as I can.”
“Brilliant idea.” I grabbed Jayne’s arm. Now, to get the heck out of here while no one was watching. Ryan could hunt me down if he wanted to. He knew where I lived.
“Officer Johnson,” Ryan called to the young woman who’d been stringing crime scene tape while the hotel manager yelled at her, “See that these women have a private place to sit down and stay with them until I can question them. No talking among yourselves, please. No phone calls.”
He went into room 245, and Jayne and I meekly followed the policewoman.
“Okay,” Jayne said the minute we were in the elevator. “Spill. Who is that?”
“No talking,” Officer Johnson said.
> “Ryan Ashburton,” I said. “Detective Ashburton. I didn’t know he was back in West London.”
“I know who he is,” Jayne said. “I don’t know if he remembers me, but he used to hang with my older brother Jeff back in school. What I mean is, who is he to you, and why, I might ask, would you need to know he’s back in town?”
“No talking!” Johnson barked. “Except to say, he’s sizzling hot, isn’t he?”
“Is he?” I said. “I hadn’t noticed.”
* * *
A few short minutes before, the lobby of the West London Hotel had been almost deserted. By the time we returned, it was packed to overflowing. A police officer guarded the elevator, guests milled around, chatting in excitement, and more people were arriving every moment. Irene Talbot, a reporter with the West London Star, was trying to get a statement from the receptionist. The news had traveled mighty fast, even by West London standards.
The receptionist saw us heading her way. She pointed a red talon in our direction. “You! You said you were checking out the swimming pool. I told you not to go upstairs.”
Irene whirled around. She saw Jayne and me and hesitated for a fraction of a moment before her professional façade dropped into place. “Ms. Doyle, is that true? Do you have a statement for the press? Did you know the deceased?”
“No comment,” Officer Johnson snapped. “Don’t you say a word to the media. Either of you.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I said.
“Of course not,” Jayne said.
“You got here fast,” I said to Irene.
“I was passing by when word came from the guy who monitors the police scanner,” Irene said.
“No talking,” Johnson repeated.
To the great interest of the assembled guests in general, and the Star reporter in particular, we were hustled behind the reception desk and into an office. Johnson shut the door firmly behind us.
The room was barely large enough for the three of us. Jayne and I nabbed the two chairs, leaving Johnson to glare at us from a standing position.
