Deadly Valentine (31 page)

“It was a hell of a yell,” Annie said with some pride.

“Eileen Houghton was watching a late movie in her bedroom and didn’t hear anything. The movie ended and she started downstairs for a glass of milk. That’s when she realized the general’s light was on. She hurried into his room, afraid he had been taken ill, and was startled not to find him anywhere. She was just coming outside to search for him when he arrived with the group of witnesses.”

“Wonder why he didn’t tell her?” Annie asked.

“He said her door was closed and he assumed she was asleep. Saw no need to disturb her. Besides, he was certain the scream had come from next door. Thought he ought to hurry.”

“Did he tell you all this?”

“Actually, Barb tackled him. Told him she was police lieutenant Sigrid Harald.”

Annie grinned. But obviously Barb had not gone on to explain that Lieutenant Harald, Margaret Maron’s protagonist, was with the NYPD.

Max continued, “Recently, Buck Burger threatened to cut off the money when his son, Buddy, moved out on his wife and shacked up with a girlfriend.”

“What happened?”

“Buddy decided to come home. He’s still seeing the other woman, but circumspectly.”

“Ah, those Burger men,” Annie said dryly.

“As for Billye, if she’s ever strayed off the reservation, nobody knows about it.”

“Did you see Buck and Sydney together Tuesday night?” Annie asked. “I did, and I had the feeling he’d done some feeling there before.”

“That would be no surprise,” Max agreed.

“You know,” Annie mused, “it would help a lot if we knew when the mace was taken from the stand in the front hall. Did you find out anything on that?”

“No luck there,” Max admitted. “Some people think they saw it during the party, others swear it was gone. So who knows?”

“It makes a big difference. If it was in place at the end of the party, after all the guests left, it looks a lot worse for Howard.”

Max disagreed. “No way, honey. Look at it. Laurel was with Howard after Sydney ran down the path and Carleton rushed off toward the tennis courts. If Howard killed Sydney, then he was taking advantage of Laurel’s appearance to set up a kind of alibi. After he left her, he would have had to run like hell to get to the gazebo so the mace would have had to be already hidden there. Certainly there wouldn’t have been time for him to return to the house, get it, then go to the gazebo.”

Annie poised her pen over her pad. “Max, that’s brilliant.”

“Of course,” he said modestly.

“Not the bit about Howard. We all know that. No, I mean you’ve put your finger on the critical point. Who had the best opportunity to kill Sydney? Come on, let’s work it out and rank everybody in order.”

“What order?”

Annie was patient. “The most likely to the least likely in terms of opportunity.”

There were a few interruptions. A pause for more coffee. An interlude with Dorothy L., who had to be dissuaded from climbing the macramé plant holder in the kitchen. A
frantic search by Annie for the peanut butter. (She could face—temporarily—being out of peanut butter cookies, but she had to have some sustenance to tide her over.)

But finally they finished and exchanged lists.

Annie’s list

1. C
   ARLETON
   C
   AHILL
   . He was closer to the gazebo than anyone. Howard saw him running toward the house, clutching a bloody jacket.
   

2. H
   OWARD
   C
   AHILL
   . He could, of course, have reached the gazebo in time if he ran—and if Sydney took a walk before reaching the gazebo.
   

3. T
   HE
   G
   ENERAL
   . If he committed the murder, he could have heard Annie yell and decided to arrive on the scene, playing good neighbor to the rescue. There was absolutely no proof at all that he was in bed and came from his house.
   

4. D
   ORCAS
   A
   TWATER
   . She could easily have paddled across the lagoon after the party ended. But how could she have obtained the mace? Could she have slipped unseen through the gardens earlier? Sure! She could have just finished putting the mace in the gazebo when she accosted Annie on the pier.
   

5. E
   ILEEN
   H
   OUGHTON
   . On the spot, of course, but tricky to see how she could have done it and gotten back to the house before the general came out. However, she could have seen him leaving the house and hidden in the shadows until he passed.
   

6. G
   EORGE
   G
   RAHAM
   . If he did it, he must have just missed being seen by Laurel. But it was certainly possible.
   

7. D
   ITTO
   L
   ISA
   G
   RAHAM
   .
   

8. D
   ITTO
   J
   OEL
   G
   RAHAM
   .
   

9. T
   HE
   B
   URGERS
   . Their bodyguard said they didn’t leave the house, but either of them could have timed his circle of the property and slipped by. Also likely to have run into Laurel.
   

Max’s list had a drawing of the lagoon and enough X’s and O’s and arrows to pass for a football coach’s blackboard.

Max’s list

The grandfather clock chimed eleven and the glazed gleam in Max’s eyes was replaced by a warmer glow.

Annie would have worked longer.

But sometimes Max had such good ideas.

Max slept, of course, the sleep of a man well satisfied with his day and its close.

Annie tossed and turned.

The timing.

More to it than just the spread of moments between Sydney’s departure for the gazebo and her discovery by Annie (and previously by Carleton, if he could be believed).

Why Tuesday night?

Because Valentine’s Day gave a good excuse for that enticing missive?

Or was there some other reason?

Annie sat bolt upright, her heart pounding.

That splash. That splash that sounded so near. Laurel out on the lagoon.

Annie rolled out of bed and ran for the stairs. At the garden-room door to the patio, her hands fumbled with the lock. Hurry, hurry, hurry. Behind her, she faintly heard Max’s sleepy call, “Annie? Annie?” The urgent, desperate, overwhelming sense of something wrong propelled her out into the night.

A single lamp at the far end of their pool glowed golden in the impenetrable darkness.

“Laurel?” Annie heard the sob in her voice, felt the thickness in her throat.

Something awful.

Certainty pervaded her.

She was almost past the pool, racing toward the lagoon, when she saw the crumbled mortar at the corner near the lamp. Three-foot-high porcelain vases sat on low, tiled platforms at either end of the pool. In season, they would hold a profusion of marigolds.

Skidding to a stop, Annie stared at the bereft platform. The vase? Where—

Relief pumped through her. She moved swiftly to the deep end. That splash! Certainly the vase toppling into the pool would be enough to wake her. Her heart still thudding irregularly, Annie peered over the side into the greenish depths, the waters faintly illuminated by the occasional underwater lights spaced every few feet.

“Oh, no,” she cried aloud, not wanting to see, not wanting to believe.

Khaki. Oh God, khaki! And wavering tendrils of blond hair.

T
HE WATER WAS
cold, so cold. Down, down, down. Her hands grappled against sodden cloth, pulled. Oh God, too heavy! She couldn’t—Her lungs were bursting.

A splash drummed against her ears, and the water quivered against her. Helping hands. Together, she and Max pulled, hauled, burst up to the surface, Annie gasping for breath. Water slapped into her mouth. She choked, and a scarlet thread of pain laced her chest.

“Hold steady,” Max yelled, and he was up and over the side, pulling their deadweight burden onto the tiles. Then he reached down and lifted Annie out of the water, held her tight until her choking subsided.

Her shoulders still shaking, she stared down at the inert form.

Khaki and limp blond hair, darkened by the water.

“Oh God, Max. It’s Joel!”

Never again in this lifetime did Annie want to see the kind of anguish that transformed George Graham’s face, destroying forever her image of the smooth, self-satisfied, prideful dentist and leaving in its place a shattered figure, with empty, tortured eyes.

He clung to his dead son’s hand and cried, over and over and over again, “Joel.” Lisa stood rigidly beside the grieving father and the dead son, hands thrust deep into the pockets of her robe, her face flattened with shock.

Chief Saulter knelt beside him for a long time. “Go home for now, Dr. Graham. Please, go home for now.”

Everyone was there, of course, roused by the siren, drawn to tragedy and held there by the unspoken knowledge that once again a resident of Scarlet King had killed. They knew. It was clear in the abrupt, sidelong glances, in the way they stood, tense and wary.

Howard Cahill turned to his son. “God, I can’t believe this.” Howard’s face held an unaccustomed look of bewilderment and uncertainty.

Carleton didn’t answer. His eyes moved from one person to another.

Laurel stood quietly by Howard, her face sad in repose.

Buck Burger, barechested and barefoot in his Levi’s, glowered at Saulter. Finally, he erupted. “Goddammit, Chief, there’s a madman running loose on this island. I want complete police protection. How the hell did something like this happen?”

Saulter ignored him.

George Graham was on his feet now. The dentist looked shrunken. He finally turned, at Saulter’s continued urging, and began to walk toward his home, his steps shambling. Lisa followed. But she didn’t touch him. Her hands were still thrust deep in her pockets, her shoulders rigid.

Buck moved restively, still glowering at Saulter. Billye put a quieting hand on his arm. No matter the hour or circumstance, Billye’s unruffled blond hair glistened a pale silver in the light of the lamp. She wore a well-fitting negligee that emphasized her voluptuous figure. Her face was pale and strained. And alert.

Once again a pistol butt poked from the pocket of the general’s tattersall robe. His gaunt chin sunk against his chest, he stared coldly at Joel’s body. With his balding head and iron-gray mustache, he looked like an ancient and dangerous bird of prey.

As Saulter turned to face the watching residents, General
Houghton rasped, “Better ask
Mrs
. Darling why that young man was here—in the middle of the night.”

Beside him, Eileen Houghton tensed. She raised a hand, as if to intervene, then let it fall and remained silent. Her face was smooth and expressionless, but her breathing was quick and shallow.

Dorcas Atwater provided the ugly finale. Thin, pale lips stretched wide in her bony face, and she began to laugh, little snickering hiccups of laughter. “Scarlet King Lagoon. A nasty green murky place, that’s what it is. Who knows what goes on in the depths of the water—or on the shore. Wouldn’t you all like to know?” She turned and lurched a step or two toward Saulter, then began to walk with mincing dignity, her unbelted chenille bathrobe dragging the ground. “Wouldn’t you all like to know!”

Dorcas Atwater was royally drunk.

Some sleep, yes, but not enough, troubled sleep that left Annie tired and drained. She poured more coffee for Max and for herself.

“Shouldn’t we take some breakfast out to Laurel?”

Despite their pleas, Laurel had insisted upon returning to her boat.

“My vigil is not yet at an end,” she informed them with great dignity.

It was, surely, safe enough now. Saulter posted an all-night guard to patrol the circumference of the lagoon. And every security light in the compound glittered until long after daybreak.

Max shook his head. “Let’s leave her out there, as long as she’ll stay. It gives me cold chills to think of Laurel wandering around this compound. Maybe Buck’s right. Maybe there’s a homicidal maniac loose. Why would anybody kill Sydney, then Joel? It doesn’t make sense.”

Annie took another sip of the always strengthening coffee. “What if our guess is right and Joel was involved with Sydney?”

Max shrugged. “In effect, so what? You think somebody killed Sydney because she was cheating on him, then killed Joel because he was the guy?”

“No,” Annie said simply. She didn’t have to explain. It was Sydney’s tragedy that no one had ever cared enough, not enough to really love her, surely not enough to hate her.

But if nobody loved her or hated her enough to kill her, then why—