Presumed Guilty

by Tess Gerritsen

  Bring on the next Tremain.

  Chase drove on and turned onto Chestnut Hill. Half a mile up, near the highest point on the island, sat the Tremain mansion. A monstrous yellow wedding cake was what it used to remind him of, with its Victorian turrets and gingerbread trim. The house had since been repainted a distinguished gray and white. It seemed tamer now, subdued, a faded beauty. Chase almost preferred the old wedding-cake yellow.

  He parked the car, grabbed his suitcase from the trunk and headed up the walkway. Even before he’d reached the porch steps the door opened and Evelyn was standing there, waiting for him.

  “Chase!” she cried. “Oh, Chase, you’re here. Thank God you’re here.”

  At once she fell into his arms. Automatically he held her against him, felt the shuddering of her body, the warmth of her breath against his neck. He let her cling to him as long as she needed to.

  At last she pulled away and gazed up at him. Those brilliant green eyes were as startling as ever. Her hair, shoulder length and honey blond, had been swept back into a French braid. Her face was puffy, her nose red and pinched. She’d tried to cover it with makeup. Some sort of pink powder caked her nostril and a streak of mascara had left a dirty shadow on her cheek. He could scarcely believe this was his beautiful sister-in-law. Could it be she truly was in mourning?

  “I knew you’d come,” she whispered.

  “I left right after you called.”

  “Thank you, Chase. I didn’t know who else to turn to....” She stood back, looked at him. “Poor thing, you must be exhausted. Come in, I’ll get you some coffee.”

  They stepped into the foyer. It was like stepping back into childhood, so little had changed. The same oak floors, the same light, the same smells. He almost thought that if he turned around and looked through the doorway into the parlor, he’d see his mother sitting there at her desk, madly scribbling away. The old girl never did take to the typewriter; she’d believed, and rightly so, that if a gossip column was juicy enough, an editor would accept it in Swahili. As it turned out, not only had the editor acquired her column, he’d acquired her as well. All in all, a practical marriage.

  His mother never did learn to type.

  “Hello, Uncle Chase.”

  Chase looked up to see a young man and woman standing at the top of the stairs. Those couldn’t be the twins! He watched in astonishment as the pair came down the steps, Phillip in the lead. The last time he’d seen his niece and nephew they’d been gawky adolescents, not quite grown into their big feet. Both of them were tall and blond and lean, but there the resemblance ended. Phillip moved with the graceful assurance of a dancer, an elegant Fred Astaire partnered with—well, certainly not Ginger Rogers. The young woman who ambled down after him bore a closer resemblance to a horse.

  “I can’t believe this is Cassie and Phillip,” said Chase.

  “You’ve stayed away too long,” Evelyn replied.

  Phillip came forward and shook Chase’s hand. It was the greeting of a stranger, not a nephew. His hand was slender, refined, the hand of a gentleman. He had his mother’s stamp of aristocracy—straight nose, chiseled cheeks, green eyes. “Uncle Chase,” he said somberly. “It’s a terrible reason to come home, but I’m glad you’re here.”

  Chase shifted his gaze to Cassie. When he’d last seen his niece she was a lively little monkey with a never-ending supply of questions. He could scarcely believe she’d grown into this sullen young woman. Could grief have wrought such changes? Her limp hair was pulled back so tightly it seemed to turn her face into a collection of jutting angles: large nose, rabbity overbite, a square forehead unsoftened by even a trace of bangs. Only her eyes held any trace of that distant ten-year-old. They were direct, sharply intelligent.

  “Hello, Uncle Chase,” she said. A strikingly businesslike tone for a girl who’d just lost her father.

  “Cassie,” said Evelyn. “Can’t you give your uncle a kiss? He’s come all this way to be with us.”

  Cassie moved forward and planted a wooden peck on Chase’s cheek. Just as quickly she stepped back, as though embarrassed by this false ceremony of affection.

  “You’ve certainly grown up,” said Chase, the most charitable assessment he could offer.

  “Yes. It happens.”

  “How old are you now?”

  “Almost twenty.”

  “So you both must be in college.”

  Cassie nodded, the first trace of a smile touching her lips. “I’m at the University of Southern Maine. Studying journalism. I figured, one of these days the Herald’s going to need a—”

  “Phillip’s at Harvard,” Evelyn cut in. “Just like his father.”

  Cassie’s smile died before it was fully born. She shot a look of irritation at her mother, then turned and headed up the stairs.

  “Cassie, where are you going?”

  “I have to do my laundry.”

  “But your uncle just got here. Come back and sit with us.”

  “Why, Mother?” she shot back over her shoulder. “You can entertain him perfectly well on your own.”

  “Cassie!”

  The girl turned and glared down at Evelyn. “What?”

  “You are embarrassing me.”

  “Well, that’s nothing new.”

  Evelyn, close to tears, turned to Chase. “You see how things are? I can’t even count on my own children. Chase, I can’t deal with this all alone. I just can’t.” Stifling a sob, she turned and walked into the parlor.

  The twins looked at each other.

  “You’ve done it again,” said Phillip. “It’s a lousy time to fight, Cassie. Can’t you feel sorry for her? Can’t you try and get along? Just for the next few days.”

  “It’s not as if I don’t try. But she drives me up a wall.”

  “Okay, then at least be civil.” He paused, then added, “You know it’s what Dad would want.”

  Cassie sighed. Then, resignedly, she came down the steps and headed into the parlor, after her mother. “I guess I owe him that much....”

  Shaking his head, Phillip looked at Chase. “Just another episode of the delightful Tremain family.”

  “Has it been like this for a while?”

  “Years, at least. You’re just seeing them at their worst. You’d think, after last night, after losing Dad, we could pull together. Instead it seems to be driving us all apart.”

  They went into the parlor and found mother and daughter sitting at opposite ends of the room. Both had regained their composure. Phillip took a seat between them, reinforcing his role as perpetual human buffer. Chase settled into a corner armchair—his idea of neutral territory.

  Sunshine washed in through the bay windows, onto the gleaming wood floor. The silence was filled by the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece. It all looked the same, thought Chase. The same Hepplewhite tables, the same Queen Anne chairs. It was exactly the way he remembered it from childhood. Evelyn had not altered a single detail. For that he felt grateful.

  Chase launched a foray into that dangerous silence. “I drove by the newspaper building, coming through town,” he said. “Hasn’t changed a bit.”

  “Neither has the town,” said Phillip.

  “Just as thrilling as ever,” his sister deadpanned.

  “What’s the plan for the Herald?” asked Chase.

  “Phillip will be taking over,” said Evelyn. “It’s about time, anyway. I need him home, now that Richard...” She swallowed, looked down. “He’s ready for the job.”

  “I’m not sure I am, Mom,” said Phillip. “I’m only in my second year at college. And there are other things I’d like to—”

  “Your father was twenty when Grandpa Tremain made him an editor. Isn’t that right, Chase?”

  Chase nodded.

  “So there’s no re
ason you couldn’t slip right onto the masthead.”

  Phillip shrugged. “Jill Vickery’s managing things just fine.”

  “She’s just a hired hand, Phillip. The Herald needs a real captain.”

  Cassie leaned forward, her eyes suddenly sharp. “There are others who could do it,” she said. “Why does it have to be Phil?”

  “Your father wanted Phillip. And Richard always knew what was best for the Herald.”

  There was a silence, punctuated by the steady ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece.

  Evelyn let out a shaky breath and dropped her head in her hands. “Oh, God, it all seems so cold-blooded. I can’t believe we’re talking about this. About who’s going to take his place....”

  “Sooner or later,” said Cassie, “we have to talk about it. About a lot of things.”

  Evelyn nodded and looked away.

  In another room, the phone was ringing.

  “I’ll get it,” said Phillip, and left to answer it.

  “I just can’t think,” said Evelyn, pressing her hands to her head. “If I could just get my mind working again....”

  “It was only last night,” said Chase gently. “It takes time to get over the shock.”

  “And there’s the funeral to think of. They won’t even tell me when they’ll release the—” She winced. “I don’t see why it takes so long. Why the state examiner has to go over and over it. I mean, can’t they see what happened? Isn’t it obvious?”

  “The obvious isn’t always the truth,” said Cassie.

  Evelyn looked at her daughter. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Phillip came back into the room. “Mom? That was Lorne Tibbetts on the phone.”

  “Oh, Lord.” Evelyn rose unsteadily to her feet. “I’m coming.”

  “He wants to see you in person.”

  She frowned. “Right this minute? Can’t it wait?”

  “You might as well get it over with, Mom. He’ll have to talk to you sooner or later.”

  Evelyn turned and looked at Chase. “I can’t do this alone. Come with me, won’t you?”

  Chase didn’t have the faintest idea where they were going or who Lorne Tibbetts was. At that moment what he really wanted was a hot shower and a bed to collapse onto. But that would have to wait.

  “Of course, Evelyn,” he said. Reluctantly he stood, shaking the stiffness from his legs, which felt permanently flexed by the long drive from Greenwich.

  Evelyn was already reaching for her purse. She pulled out the car keys and handed them to Chase. “I—I’m too upset to drive. Could you?”

  He took the keys. “Where are we going?”

  With shaking hands Evelyn slipped on her sunglasses. The swollen eyes vanished behind twin dark lenses. “The police,” she said.

  Two

  The Shepherd’s Island police station was housed in a converted general store that had, over the years, been chopped up into a series of hobbit-size rooms and offices. In Chase’s memory, it had been a much more imposing structure, but it had been years since he’d been inside. He’d been only a boy then, and a rambunctious one at that, the sort of rascal to whom a police station represented a distinct threat. The day he’d been dragged in here for trampling Mrs. Gordimer’s rose bed—entirely unintentional on his part—these ceilings had seemed taller, the rooms vaster, every door a gateway to some unknown terror.

  Now he saw it for what it was—a tired old building in need of paint.

  Lorne Tibbetts, the new chief of police, was built just right to inhabit this claustrophobic warren. If there was a height minimum for police work, Tibbetts had somehow slipped right under the requirement. He was just a chunk of a man, neatly decked out in official summer khaki, complete with height-enhancing cap to hide what Chase suspected was a bald spot. He reminded Chase of a little Napoleon in full dress uniform.

  Though short on height, Chief Tibbetts was long on the social graces. He maneuvered through the clutter of desks and filing cabinets and greeted Evelyn with the overweening solicitousness due a woman of her local status.

  “Evelyn! I’m so sorry to have to ask you down here like this.” He reached for her arm and gave it a squeeze, an intended gesture of comfort that made Evelyn shrink away. “And it’s been a terrible night for you, hasn’t it? Just a terrible night.”

  Evelyn shrugged, partly in answer to his question, partly to free herself from his grasp.

  “I know it’s hard, dealing with this. And I didn’t want to bother you, not today. But you know how it is. All those reports to be filed.” He looked at Chase, a deceptively casual glance. The little Napoleon, Chase noted, had sharp eyes that saw everything.

  “This is Chase,” said Evelyn, brushing the sleeve of her blouse, as though to wipe away Chief Tibbetts’s paw print. “Richard’s brother. He drove in this morning from Connecticut.”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Tibbetts, his eyes registering instant recognition of the name. “I’ve seen a picture of you hanging in the high school gym.” He offered his hand. His grasp was crushing, the handshake of a man trying to compensate for his size. “You know, the one of you in the basketball uniform.”

  Chase blinked in surprise. “They still have that thing hanging up?”

  “It’s the local hall of fame. Let’s see, you were class of ’71. Star center, varsity basketball. Right?”

  “I’m surprised you know all that.”

  “I was a basketball player myself. Madison High School, Wisconsin. Record holder in free throws. And points scored.”

  Yes, Chase saw it clearly. Lorne Tibbetts, rampaging midget of the basketball court. It would fit right in with that bone-crushing handshake.

  The station door suddenly swung open. A woman called out, “Hey, Lorne?”

  Tibbetts turned and wearily confronted the visitor, who looked as if she’d just blown in from the street. “You back again, Annie?”

  “Like the proverbial bad penny.” The woman shifted her battered shoulder bag to her other side. “So when am I gonna get a statement, huh?”

  “When I have one to make. Now scram.”

  The woman, undaunted, turned to Evelyn. The pair of them could have posed for a magazine feature on fashion make-overs. Annie, blowsy haired and dressed in a lumpy sweatshirt and jeans, would have earned the label Before. “Mrs. Tremain?” she said politely. “I know this is a bad time, but I’m under deadline and I just need a short quote—”

  “Oh, for Chrissakes, Annie!” snapped Tibbetts. He turned to the cop manning the front desk. “Ellis, get her out of here!”

  Ellis popped up from his chair like a spindly jack-in-the-box. “C’mon, Annie. Get a move on, ’less you wanna write your story from the inside lookin’ out.”

  “I’m going. I’m going.” Annie yanked open the door. As she walked out they heard her mutter, “Geez, they won’t let a gal do her job around here....”

  Evelyn looked at Chase. “That’s Annie Berenger. One of Richard’s star reporters. Now a star pest.”

  “Can’t exactly blame her,” said Tibbetts. “That’s what you pay her for, isn’t it?” He took Evelyn’s arm. “Come on, we’ll get started. I’ll take you into my office. It’s the only private place in this whole fishbowl.”

  Lorne’s office was at the far end of the hallway, past a series of closet-size rooms. Almost every square inch was crammed with furniture: a desk, two chairs, a bookcase, filing cabinets. A fern wilted, unnoticed, in a corner. Despite the cramped space, everything was tidy, the shelves dusted, all the papers stacked in the Out box. On the wall, prominently displayed, hung a plaque: The smaller the dog, the bigger the fight.

  Tibbetts and Evelyn sat in the two chairs. A third chair was brought in for the secretary to take accessory notes. Chase stood off to the side. It felt good to stand, good to straight
en those cramped legs.

  At least, it felt good for about ten minutes. Then he found himself sagging, scarcely able to pay attention to what was being said. He felt like that wretched fern in the corner, wilting away.

  Tibbetts asked the questions and Evelyn answered in her usual whispery voice, a voice that could induce hibernation. She gave a detailed summary of the night’s events. A typical evening, she said. Supper at six o’clock, the whole family. Leg of lamb and asparagus, lemon soufflé for dessert. Richard had had a glass of wine; he always did. The conversation was routine, the latest gossip from the paper. Circulation down, cost of newsprint up. Worries about a possible libel suit. Tony Graffam upset about that last article. And then talk about Phillip’s exams, Cassie’s grades. The lilacs were lovely this year, the driveway needed resurfacing. Typical dialogue from a family dinner.

  At nine o’clock Richard had left the house to do some work at the office—or so he’d said. And Evelyn?

  “I went upstairs to bed,” she said.

  “What about Cassie and Phillip?”

  “They went out. To a movie, I think.”

  “So everyone went their separate ways.”

  “Yes.” Evelyn looked down at her lap. “And that’s it. Until twelve-thirty, when I got the call....”

  “Let’s go back to that dinner conversation.”

  The account went into replay. A few extra details here and there, but essentially the same story. Chase, his last reserves of alertness wearing thin, began to drift into a state of semiconsciousness. Already his legs were going numb, sinking into a sleep that his brain longed to join. The floor began to look pretty good. At least it was horizontal. He felt himself sliding....

  Suddenly he jerked awake and saw that everyone was looking at him.

  “Are you all right, Chase?” asked Evelyn.

  “Sorry,” he muttered. “I guess I’m just more tired than I thought.” He gave his head a shake. “Could I, uh, get a cup of coffee somewhere?”