Climate Change: A Nina Bannister Mystery (The Nina Bannister Mysteries Book 7) (23 page)

Then, looking at Margot, she asked:

“Why
will
they say that I am mad?”

“That,” said Nina quietly, “is a line from a Boris Karloff movie.”

“Oh. Well, it doesn’t matter. I’m
not
mad; I’m just cozy.”

“Is there,” Margot asked, “that much difference between the two of them?”

“What?”

“Nothing, Molly.”

“And they will all realize that I’m a great writer, with wonderful murder methods that have never been written about before, not even by Agatha and Jessica and Janet and, well, not
any
of them. And they will publish my murders and, as God is my witness, I’ll
never
be self-published again!”

Now I’m definitely going to be sick,
thought Nina.

But she said nothing.

It was James Thompson who spoke, saying:

“The point is, Ms. Badger––”

“Molly, remember?”

“All right, the point is, Molly, the murder occurred at around ten o’clock this morning.”

“I know.”

“In Garth Amboise’ room.”

“I know.”

“His skin was shredded, and his body mutilated.”

“I know.”

“How do you know, Molly?”

“Because I’m smart. I’m a genius, actually. I understand all about electronic devices. I was an electronics engineer, you know, before God came to me in a vision and told me that I was to become a Cozy Writer. That’s the highest thing a person can be, you know––a Cozy Writer.”

“I’m sure that’s true, Molly, but the question is:
 
how could you have committed this terrible, ghastly, bloody murder, if you were here all morning?”

“That’s the question, isn’t it?”

“Yes, ma’am. How did you do it?”

But Molly Badger merely shook her head:

“Won’t tell, won’t tell!”

Silence for a time, then Molly Badger held her index finger in front of her sealed lips and whispered:

“It’s my secret. That’s why it’s the perfect murder method. No one can figure it out. Not ever. It’s never been done before.”

“Molly––”

“But if I told you now, then you’d simply take me away. And you would tell no one. You’d simply say that I was crazy. But none of the cameras would come. And I wouldn’t be published, after all. And that would be so sad. All of those people would have died for nothing.”

Something about this sentence froze Nina, who asked:

“What people?”

And Molly Badger looked at her:

“Why, the rest of them.”

“The rest of whom?”

“The rest of those people out at The Candles. The writers. The ones who didn’t want me. Oh, I’m not that vindictive. I’m not planning to kill them just because they rejected me. No, it’s still sad, them having to die. And with so much blood.”

She shook her head:

“But it’s the only way, don’t you see? The murders will keep happening. And HBO will be there to record it. And then I’ll tell them how I did it. And I’ll be the most famous murder mystery writer in the world. Because I will have committed—several times over—the most perfect murder in the world.”

They all sat for a time in silence.

Finally, James Thompson stood up, gestured to Margot and Nina, and spoke to Molly Badger.

He said:

“Molly, will you excuse us for just a second?”

“Of course.”

“We’re just going outside a minute to talk about this.”

“Help yourself.”

They did go outside.

Margot asked:

“Well?”

James Thompson shrugged:

“Well what?”

“What are you going to do? Are you going to arrest her?”

“Arrest her for what?”

“For murder.”

He seemed exasperated.

“Let me see if I’ve got this straight. I’m supposed to arrest this woman for the murder of Garth Amboise? She was here in this motel room, seven miles away!”

“Well, we don’t exactly know that.”

“No. But she was here early this morning and she’s here now. So you’re saying she just trotted up the road and murdered the man and turned around and trotted back?”

“No, she could have gotten hold of a car.”

“So she drove out to Candles. Walked in, unseen by anybody, climbed the stairway, went in the room, tore all the skin off a man who was bigger and stronger than she was, went out of the door, then got back into the car she’d somehow gotten hold of, drove back to her motel room, and wrote and had delivered a letter saying she’d committed the murder.”

Silence for a time.

Then Margot:

“I suppose that might be hard to prove.”

James Thompson nodded, then said:

“The woman’s obviously crazy as a bedbug.”

“So what are you going to do about her? Take her in?”

“On what charge? Writing a letter?”

“But if she’s crazy––”

He nodded:

“She’s crazy all right. But that’s not against the law, and, given that she’s a writer, it’s probably a help to her. No, the best I can do is this. We’ll post an officer outside the motel here, to kind of keep an eye on her. We don’t want her wandering off and maybe getting hit by a car. I’ll send a court psychiatrist out her to talk to her. He can at least make a recommendation as to whether or not she’s a danger to herself or anybody else.”

“All right.”

“All right.”

It was not all right
, thought Nina.

Nor was the weather all right, since the dark clouds heralding Clarence, the Cross-Eyed Hurricane, were beginning to roll across the sky.

None of these things were all right.

They were, in fact, all wrong.

But just how wrong—this she was yet to learn.

CHAPTER TWELVE:
 
THE COZY WRITERS EXPLAIN HOW THE PERFECT MURDER WAS COMMITTED

When the three of them returned to Candles, they were met in the driveway by a fresh-faced young officer who said to his superior:

“Chief, there’s a bunch of people lined up to talk to you.”

Thompson, who’d just gotten out of the squad car, used a red handkerchief to mop the back of his neck.

“What kind of people?”

“The writers.”

“What do they want to talk to me about?”

A shake of the head:

“I don’t know. They won’t talk to any of the rest of us.”

“How many of them want to talk to me?”

“All of them.”

“
All
of them?”

“Yes, Sir. That’s what it looks like.”

“Where are they?”

“They’re all lined up outside one of the rooms that used to be a kind of parlor.”

“All right. Lead me to them.”

They went across the porch and into the house.
 

Harriet Crossman met them in the corridor.

“Harriet,” asked Margot, “what’s going on?”

“The writers. Each of them has come up with the solution.”

Thompson frowned:

“The solution to what?”

They turned a corner and saw a line of people standing patiently, most of them texting.

“What are they doing?” he asked.

“Oh, they’re writing. It’s such a unique experience actually to have a real murder to write about. The fastest of them should finish their novels any time now—they’ve been at it for more than two hours.”

“This is unbelievable.”

Harriet Crossman shook her head:

“No, that’s the most unforgivable sin a cozy writer can commit. It has to be believable. That’s why all of them are waiting to talk to you.”

“Me? What do they want to tell me?”

“Why, the solution. The murder method. And, of course, the identity of the killer.”

“But my people have been working for hours up in that room! I’ve just been in radio contact with my chief forensics guy—he hasn’t come up with a shred of evidence!”

Harriet Crossman merely smiled:

“You policemen are always hard-working and sincere. But we all know you’re not really very smart. Not when it comes to matching wits with a clever murderer. No, the only person who can really do that is a seventy-year-old retired woman.”

“Ms. Crossman, I don’t mean to be rude, but––”

“Please, Officer Thompson. So few ‘teachable moments’ such as this come our way!”

“All right, all right. I suppose I can at least listen to what they have to say. Who’s first in the line?”

“I have the list written down here. First there’s Rebeccah Thornwhipple. Her heroine is ninety-two-years old and still is able to––”
      

“Okay, okay, let’s get on with it.”

They made their way through the line, speaking to this writer and that, and trying not to disturb the incessant typing. Nina thought at first that the coziests were replying to them, but then she realized that they were only muttering out loud their dialogue before writing it down on paper, or, in this case, in digital space.

“Excuse me, ma’am––”

“Belinda Boxworthy sipped her second cup of tea, gazed out over the stormy New England coastline, and tried to see how Andrew could have brought the sixty razor blades––”

And:

“Pardon us, ma’am, while we get through here into the parlor––”

“Ms. Chutsworthy might have been old, but she was sly as a fox, and she knew that the police officer who had so discarded her theories concerning the mutilation—and the fiendish mind that had concocted it—was long on good intentions but short on brainpower! So as she walked along the deserted beach and saw clouds envelop the old Nantucket lighthouse––”

Etc. etc. etc.

Finally, they were seated in the parlor, a table before them and a huge picture window behind. Through the window, Nina could see gray clouds scudding over the sky, and rain droplets beginning to spatter on the glass.

“All right. Send this Thornwhipple woman in.”

The small, white-haired woman entered and sat down.

“I’m Rebeccah Thornwhipple. The name of my heroine is––”

“That’s all right.”

“Her cat is named––”

James Thompson interrupted:

“I’m sorry to rush you, ma’am, but I believe you have something to tell us in relation to the crime that’s been committed?”

“Yes, I certainly do.”

“Well, then?”

“I know how it was done. And I know who did it.”

“How do you know these things, Ms. Thornwhipple?”

A smile.

“Logic. Deduction. When one looks at the facts––I mean truly examines them—there is only one possible theory of the crime and one possible culprit.”

“And who is that? Who did it?”

Rebeccah Thornwhipple turned, so that she was looking straight at Nina, and proclaimed:

“
She
did it!”

There was silence in the room for a time.

This is not happening
, thought Nina.

It can’t be happening.

But it was happening, of course. It was reality. And reality, as Nina had learned in recent months and years, could be utterly preposterous and still go on being reality, since God was the only true self-published writer, and the only one guaranteed to get everything into print.

And made into movies, for that matter.

“I’m sorry,” she found herself stammering.

But Rebeccah Thornwhipple merely shook her head:

“It’s no good, Ms. Bannister—if that really is your name.”

“Of course, it’s my name! It’s always been my name!”

“We’ll see about that!”

“We don’t have to see about it! We already know it!”

“Nina,” said Margot, “take it easy.”

“But she’s accusing me of murder!”

Rebeccah Thornwhipple continued to shake her head and smile:

“
I’m
not accusing you, my dear. The facts are accusing you.”

“
What
facts?”

James Thompson leaned forward in his chair and growled:

“Yes, ma’am. What facts are you speaking of? Please explain this theory of yours.”

A request to which the elderly white-haired lady was all too eager to respond.

“I believe, Ms. Bannister, you took the late Mr. Amboise his breakfast? I know because I saw you ascending the staircase, and then, some minutes later, two boys going up behind you.”

“Right. One of the boys carried a decanter of coffee and the other a box containing some of the publishers’ gifts:
 
shirts, matching medallions and cat collar charms, things like that.”

“And the two boys left before you opened the door?”

“Yes, I told them to.”

“And why was that, my dear?”

Nina thought for a while, and asked herself:

I didn’t really kill him, did I? I would have remembered, wouldn’t I?

And yet it was starting to sound bad for her.

“I told the boys to leave because I wasn’t really looking forward to confronting Mr. Amboise.”

“And why not? Did you hate him? Did you detest him?”

“Of course not.”

Hearing this, Rebeccah Thornwhipple settled back in her chair, folded her hands neatly in front of her, smiled an immensely smug smile, and said, softly:

“No. No, you didn’t detest him, did you?”

“Of course not.”

Then the woman sprang forward in the chair and shouted:

“Because you were in love with him!”

Silence for a time.

Several of the other writers had crowded into the room. Nina could hear soft voices murmuring:

“That’s good!”

“I didn’t think of that—did you think of that?”

And, in the midst of all this tension and shock, Margot began to laugh.

Actually cackle more than laugh.

Nina turned on her:

“What are
you
laughing at?” she shouted.

But Margot merely kept on guffawing, and trying to get her breath.

“You! Having an affair with Garth Amboise! Oh, my God, I think I’m going to die!”

Nina felt certain concerning the intensity of her anger, but somewhat unsure as to its object. She did not know, in short, if she were angrier at Rebeccah Thornwhipple for accusing her of murder, or at Margot for thinking it impossible.

“Why,” she muttered, “couldn’t I have an affair if I wanted to? I mean if a ninety-two-year-old woman can do it in an iron lung––”

“Now wait a minute,” said Officer Thompson. “Ma’am, do you have any evidence to support the belief that Ms. Bannister here was having an affair with this man?”

A shake of the head:

“Logic, my dear officer. ‘Once you rule out the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’ I believe it was Janet Evanovich who said that.”

“It was Sherlock Holmes,” growled Nina.

But Rebeccah Thornwhipple merely smiled and shook her head:

“Try not to be angry with me, my dear. Surely you must have realized that these facts were destined to come to light in time. Why not simply confess everything now? The awful burden of the secrets you’ve been carrying around will be lifted, and you can tell your side of the story. He was trying to break off the relationship, wasn’t he? He told you this when you delivered his food. You were outraged, but you acted calmly. You suggested one more act of passionate love-making. You told him it was to be a final good bye, but to yourself you meant it as a last ditch possibility to change his mind. So you entered the room with the breakfast dishes, tore your clothes off, had mad, passionate, stinking sex for half an hour, perhaps more. After it was over, you begged him to keep the relationship alive. You told him you would meet him anywhere in the country, anywhere in the world. But he refused. He refused! And so you attacked him! He was already nude, and his skin simply shredded beneath the incessant stabs of the foot-long butcher knife you’d brought inside the scrambled eggs platter.”