Carolyn G. Hart (57 page)

He took one step toward her, then swung around, head down, and walked away.

19

“W
asn’t it a lovely funeral?” Idell’s froglike eyes glistened with pleasure. She still wore her funeral dress, a shiny black polyester. She leaned on the Inn counter, obviously eager to talk.

Lovely? How lovely is it to watch lives disintegrating from the pressures of public and private suspicion?

“Everyone came,” Idell prattled on. “Corinne would have been pleased.”

Certainly Idell was. She radiated good humor, and something more. Excitement? Anticipation?

How much did Idell know about her recently deceased neighbor and those who hated her? Swallowing her distaste, Annie leaned on the counter, too. “Mrs. Gordon, I’d
love
to have your opinion on this case. You know these people
so
well. You must have a great deal of insight into who Corinne’s enemies really were.”

The landlady bridled with pleasure. “I know a lot
about people, that I can tell you. Why, you’d be surprised what you learn running an inn. Why, people can be just dreadful!”

Annie lowered her voice. “Now, just between us, what do you think about Mayor Webster?”

“Oh, poor Leighton. She led that man around like he had a ring through his nose. I thought it served her right when he took up with that Miss Taylor. Met her out on his walks.”

“Do you think he would have asked for a divorce?”

For an instant, genuine sympathy gleamed in those shiny brown eyes. “I would have hoped so, but Leighton always was such a gentleman. Even the way things are today, everybody getting divorced, I don’t believe he could have brought himself to do it. Poor Leighton.”

Was he too much of a gentleman to murder his wife?

“But Leighton didn’t do it. I’m sure of it.”

There was such a ring of confidence in her voice, Annie looked at her in surprise.

Idell’s gaze fell away in confusion, and she began to rearrange the drooping daffodils in the tarnished holder next to the telephone. “These flowers. Must see to them. It’s better to have fresh every day.”

Feeling that her prey was slipping away, Annie plunged ahead. “And you knew Corinne as well as anyone.”

Idell was suddenly less absorbed in the flowers.

“Oh, yes, of course. Known her forever!”

“How did she seem the last time you spoke to her?”

“She was
impossible
. No wonder she got murdered.” Idell yanked viciously at a dead bloom. “Always trying to cause trouble. She said the Board was going to have to bring me into court if I didn’t shore up the fence between the Inn and the Society Building. Claimed it was unsightly for visitors. Well, why
couldn’t the Society help? I need every penny I can get to keep the Inn going, with utilities going up every year and people using air conditioners even in April. I told her I couldn’t do it, and I didn’t have the money to go to court. Oh, she was a mean person.”

“I guess it did make it hard, having the common boundary with the Society.”

Idell looked at her gratefully. “Well, you run a business. You can understand. And the Inn is all I have.” There was a note of fear in her voice, the spectre of old age and no money and all her assets gone. But there wasn’t the least bit of concern about her quarrel with Corinne. Obviously, Idell didn’t see herself as a potential suspect. So scratch that dark horse.

A sudden thought struck Annie. “You’re right next door to the Society. Did you happen to look out that way—” She paused and thought. “It was one of three nights in the middle of March that we think the letter was typed next door. The nights of March 19th, 20th, and 21st. I don’t suppose you saw anyone going in or coming out of the building after hours?”

Idell’s eyes slid away from Annie. Then she shook her head vigorously. “No. But I remember the middle of March.” She touched her jaw. “Oh, I had an awful toothache.”

Annie stood in the middle of the room, holding the large cylinder of cardboard that contained the five Death on Demand mystery prints, and checked to see if she’d forgotten anything. Max had already taken down the stacks of mimeographed sheets with the Mystery Night information, the autopsy report, the suspects’ original statements to police, and the clue box. She was walking toward the door when the phone rang.

“Hello.”

“Miss Laurance.”

Chief Wells’s voice reminded her of gravel being dumped from a truck. Annie gripped the receiver tightly and knew her voice was strained when she answered. “Yes, Chief?”

“Got a tip on the murder.”

She waited.

“Got a waiter here from a restaurant over on Broward’s Rock. Says he thinks he’s got a description of the killer. Cute blonde about twenty-three or so, gray eyes, good figure.”

“Oh, now wait a minute—”

The heavy voice rumbled over her protest like a steamroller squashing rocks. “Know what he overheard? Girl said she’d decided to bash the lady with a croquet mallet.”

“I was talking about the Mystery Nights plot,” she said furiously.

“So you admit that’s what you said?”

Annie phrased it very carefully indeed. “On the occasion in question, I was describing to Mr. Darling the means by which the mythical murderer in the mythical Sticky Wicket murder intended to attack a
mythical
victim.”

He wheezed loudly. “So you say.”

“So I say.”

“You’ll be at the Prichard House tonight?”

“I’m not fleeing to Timbuktu, if that’s what you’re asking.”

There was a long pause, and she thought she detected the juicy mastication of a tobacco wad. She wondered if there were a Mrs. Wells.

“Smart ass talk won’t get you far, young lady.”

“I understand you haven’t even bothered to talk to Sybil Giacomo and Tim Bond.”

His voice scraped like flint on a fire rock. “I can manage my own investigation, young lady. And I’ll tell you this much, if I can prove either you or that reporter had a handkerchief on Monday, I’ll arrest you.”

“A handkerchief?”

“Yeah. Think about it, Miss Laurance.”

Annie thought about it as she introduced the suspects for Wednesday’s Mystery Night. She thought about it all evening, between frantic moments of the Mystery Night. Why a handkerchief? As a matter of fact, she never carried one. Which would distress her maternal grandmother, who expected a lady always to possess a dainty, lace-edged hankie. But hankies went out with garters and girdles. Who, today, carried a handkerchief? Apparently not Bobby Fraizer, either. If the killer carried a handkerchief, that narrowed the circle indeed. At one point, she whispered her query to Ingrid, who with a true librarian’s skill could be expected to find the answer to any question. She came back in less than half an hour with this news: Leighton, John Sanford, and Roscoe, as might be expected, always carried handkerchiefs in their left hip pockets. Tim Bond, also as might be expected, owned not a single handkerchief, although he occasionally wore a ragged red bandana. Gail didn’t carry handkerchiefs, but sometimes Edith, Lucy, and Sybil did. Miss Dora, of course, was always equipped with one.

Her head spun.

A hand tugged at her arm. “Miss Laurance, there’s a discrepancy.”

It was hard to say whether Mrs. Brawley was delighted or offended. Her nose wriggled with eagerness.

“What’s wrong?”

“Last night Lord Algernon said that he gave Miss Snooperton the ticket to Venice on the Orient Express
before
they played croquet. Tonight, he said he gave her the ticket
after
they played croquet.” She waited eagerly.

“Very good,” Annie praised. “We’d better take care of this at once.”

Mrs. Brawley padded happily alongside Annie to the Suspect Interrogation Tent. Annie patted her on the shoulder, then stepped up to Max and whispered in his ear.

He grinned and said firmly, “I gave the ticket to Miss Snooperton before we played croquet.”

Annie and Mrs. Brawley exchanged satisfied smiles. Annie moved slowly around the tent. She paused behind Lucy, who still wore her navy dress and white gloves. She looked bone weary, but perhaps all of this at least took her mind off of the murder for awhile.

Sanford continued to play his role with panache.

Mrs. Brawley’s team (No. 7 tonight) clustered around him. This time, Annie noted with amusement, Mrs. Brawley was Team Captain, and savoring every moment of it. She leaned forward, finger waggling, a picture of ruthless inquisitorial determination.

“Mr. Hoxton, have you ever before been a guest at a country home where a jewel theft has occurred?”

Sanford stroked his chin. “Ah, my dear lady, perhaps. It’s so hard to remember when one is so often a guest.”

“You can remember,” she snapped.

“I do believe there was one instance. At Lord
Healy’s home, Castle-On-The-Thames. I think I recall the disappearance of a diamond brooch.”

Mrs. Brawley stalked nearer. “Was that theft ever solved?”

“I don’t believe so, dear lady.”

“Did you then enjoy a spurt in your income, Mr. Hoxton?”

He registered shock. “That is an unwarranted assumption.”

Mrs. Brawley raised a hand. “It is time to demand a search warrant of Reginald Hoxton’s room and its contents.”

Her group stormed triumphantly after her and received this information: In the pocket of Hoxton’s trousers worn that afternoon, the police laboratory (with emphasis on the second syllable) discovered a fragment of gold, apparently from a jewelry setting, and a trace of putty.

Smiling, Annie moved on to Edith, playing Miss Susannah Greatheart.

An eager questioner demanded, “Isn’t it true that Miss Snooperton had stolen Nigel Davies from you, and you quarreled with her shortly before her murder?”

Edith dabbed at her eyes with a crumpled linen handkerchief. “Oh no, I never quarrel with anyone, and I felt certain Nigel would come to his senses when he discovered that Miss Snooperton was involved with Lord Algernon.”

“And how did you know this?”

“Why, dear Lord Algernon felt I would be sympathetic to his problems. He was trying his best to be rid of Miss Snooperton. He thought her a dreadfully fast young woman, who had tried to ensnare him with her
wiles. I do find Lord Algernon to be such a gentleman.”

After a hasty consultation with his team, Team Captain No. 3 brayed, “We demand a search warrant against Miss Greatheart.”

The warrant revealed: A ruby necklace stuffed in among Miss Greatheart’s lingerie, and a bloodied croquet mallet thrust deep in her wardrobe. Upon investigation the necklace was declared a replica of the missing Red Maiden, and the mallet was identified as the murder weapon.

Taxed with these facts, Miss Greatheart broke down, declaring she had been framed. “Someone must hate me very much.”

Team No. 3 stampeded to surround Lord Algernon. The intensity of their questions delighted Max, who responded with élan.

“I had broken off my involvement with Miss Snooperton. Fact of the matter, gave her a ticket to Venice this morning, then wrote her a note I couldn’t meet her at the arbor after tea.”

“Was it your note that was found in her pocket?”

“Must have been.”

“You say you were finished with Miss Snooperton. Was she finished with you?”

“Felt like Nigel had taken me off the hook there, getting himself engaged to her. Damn disgusting the way he was treating Miss Greatheart. Tried to cheer her up.”

“Isn’t it more, Lord Algernon, that you were exhibiting your longtime weakness for members of the opposite sex other than your wife?”

“Oh, that’s a rum suggestion. Besides, Alicia’s a sport.”

He finally admitted, though he downplayed its significance,
that he’d had a few angry words with Miss Snooperton at the rose arbor, but he insisted that he left her alive with the clear understanding their affair was ended, whether or not she accepted the ticket to Venice.

Team Captain No. 8 demanded a search warrant against Lord Algernon, and these facts were unearthed: A packet of angry letters from Miss Snooperton threatening to reveal their affair to Lady Alicia unless he made a substantial settlement upon her. One letter stated:
Cough up or sweet Lady Alicia will learn about our weekend in Nice
.