Father’s Day Murder (12 page)

“Well, then you'll understand that what I am about to tell you is not motivated by any personal considerations whatsoever, but only by my great love for my country.”

“Okay.” Lucy could hardly wait to hear what she had to say.

“When we met on Sunday night, I believe Luther introduced you as a top-notch investigative reporter. He had great regard for you. That's why I've decided to call you with this information.”

“I appreciate your faith in me.”

“I do have faith in you, Lucy. I have every confidence that you will use this information appropriately. There can be no indication that you got this information from me, do you understand?”

“I'll consider it off the record,” said Lucy. “I'm listening.”

“Well, I've been thinking about who might have had a motive to kill Luther, and one name keeps popping up. I thought perhaps you could investigate. It would be a big story.”

“Who is it?” Lucy had a feeling she knew the answer.

“Dick Shrubsole, that's who.”

“As part of this right-wing conspiracy?”

“I see we're on the same wavelength here.”

Same planet, yes. Same wavelength? Lucy didn't think so.

“Well, thanks for the information,” said Lucy. “I really have to go.”

“But you will follow up on this?”

“Sure,” said Lucy, crumpling up the piece of notepaper and tossing it in the wastebasket. “I'm filing it away for future reference.”

C
oming to the conference had definitely been a mistake, thought Lucy. She had expected an inspiring exchange of ideas, challenging seminars, and an opportunity to grow professionally, but instead she was discovering the seamy side of human nature. She couldn't believe Monica Underwood, a woman she had admired for years, would behave like this. Completely disillusioned, Lucy sat on her bed.

She would have been better off staying home, where she belonged. She wasn't honing her skills, she wasn't getting much out of these sorry excuses for panels at all. Instead of wasting her time here she could be home in Tinker's Cove, covering local news and, most important, taking care of her family. Keeping Toby out of trouble. Making sure the girls stayed on schedule, getting them to school and activities on time. Attending the awards ceremony.

Now poor Zoe wasn't going to get her perfect-attendance award, and it was her fault for going to the conference. And instead of giving Elizabeth the support she needed in a job that had suddenly become extremely challenging, she had left her to manage completely on her own. It wasn't fair. Instead of simply providing child care for a typical three-year-old, Elizabeth was in the middle of a family tragedy.

Lucy wanted to go home, but she knew it wasn't an option. The Trask Foundation expected a report on how the grant money had been spent, and Ted could hardly tell them the recipient had quit the conference early because she was homesick. Lucy knew she had to stick it out, but she was darned if she was going back to that “Editors' Roundtable” to listen to those two old maids natter on about dangling participles, whatever those were. She needed a break, something distracting, and she knew where to get it. She'd always heard about the fabulous bargains at Filene's Basement, and here she was in Boston. It was the perfect opportunity.

The doorman's directions were simple enough: walk around the Common toward the statehouse, easily identifiable by its gold dome, cross Tremont Street at the traffic light by the Park Street T stop, and walk down Temple Street to Filene's.

The walk took only a few minutes, and Lucy found herself in the Downtown Crossing shopping area, where the streets were closed to automobile traffic and pedestrians could wander easily among the stores and peddler's carts. There was even an outdoor café, and a group of colorfully garbed Andean musicians were playing flute music.

Filene's was an enormous department store that took up an entire block. Lucy entered through the nearest door and found herself in the men's department; from the prices she knew this was definitely not the basement. A clerk directed her to the escalator and she descended to the fabled bargain hunter's paradise.

A rather dingy paradise, she discovered, that was strictly a bare-bones operation. No attempt had been made to pretty things up. Clothes and shoes and handbags were piled in battered wooden bins beneath hand-lettered signs announcing the price-reduction policy: after an item had been on the floor for two weeks it was reduced by 25 percent, after three weeks the discount increased to 50 percent, and an item that lingered for four weeks was reduced in price by 75 percent. After that, it was donated to charity.

From the way the shoppers were pawing through the merchandise, checking the price tags for dates, Lucy suspected a four-week reduction was extremely rare. She had never seen such determined shoppers. Mostly women, they were intent on bargains and didn't bother to waste time in the dressing room, preferring instead to try things on in the aisles. And no wonder, she realized as she made her way to the children's department; much of the merchandise was from top designers. There was even, she was surprised to see, a fur department. This was off-price shopping on a whole new scale, she decided, resolving to tell her friend Sue Finch, an inveterate shopper, all about it.

On impulse, she pulled her cell phone from her bag and dialed the familiar number.

“You'll never guess where I am,” she crowed.

“I know you're in Boston,” began Sue.

“Filene's Basement!”

“Tell me all about it. What have you bought?”

“Nothing yet. But it's wonderful. They have furs and designer handbags and”—Lucy's eyes fell on the sign for the shoe department—“oh, my God, shoes!”

“What kind of shoes?”

“I'm not sure.” Lucy wound her way past the racks of toiletries and socks. “I'm on my way. I'm almost there.” She stopped at a rack and picked up a pair of strappy, high-heeled pink sandals. “Manolo Blahnik. I've heard of those. These are Ferragamos. And these”—she picked up a pair of red flats—“these are called Mootsie Tootsies.”

“Those Manolo Blahniks sound like they're straight out of
Vogue
magazine. I hope you're trying them on.”

“I don't think so,” said Lucy. “They have ridiculously high heels. I'd never be able to walk in them.”

“Oh, Lucy,” said Sue with a little sigh. “What do the Ferragamos look like?”

“Preppy. Turquoise with little bows.”

“How much?”

“Sixty bucks! Too expensive.”

“Not for Ferragamos. Give them a try.”

“Ouch!”

“They always have the narrow ones there. Anything else?”

“The Mootsie Tootsies are cute, but they're red.”

“How do they feel?”

“Great. They're really cute. Toe cleavage.”

“Sexy.”

“But they're red! Where would I wear red?”

“Red's the new beige.”

“What?”

“I read it in a magazine. Buy them!”

“They're almost thirty dollars.”

“That's cheap.”

“I don't know,” said Lucy, admiring her feet in the pretty little shoes. “You can get shoes for fifteen dollars at the outlet mall.”

“Boat shoes in colors that don't match.” Sue snorted. “Sandals that buckle on the inside because they sewed the straps on backward.”

“You're right. I'm going to get them. I have to have them. I can't live without them.”

“Thatta girl! Don't come home without them.”

“I won't.” Lucy paused. “So how's everything at home? Has my house burned down or anything?”

“So far, so good. I called to see if they needed anything and talked to Bill. He said everything's fine. And I saw Elizabeth the other day.”

“She's certainly got her hands full, taking care of that little boy with everything that's going on.”

“She looked fine, from what I could see, and I could see almost all of her.”

Lucy was suspicious. “What do you mean?”

“She was wearing an itsy-bitsy string bikini.”

“You saw her at the beach?”

“No. In the middle of Main Street. Sitting in a Jeep with her boyfriend.”

“Jeep? Boyfriend?”

“Oops. I thought you knew. A very handsome lad. Muscular. With the cutest little tattoo on his shoulder.”

“Tattoo?”

“Yeah. Some Oriental hieroglyphic. Very striking.”

“I spoke to her the other day. I can't believe she didn't mention him. And she shouldn't be riding around town with practically nothing on. Was her seat belt fastened?”

“Sorry, Lucy. I was looking at her companion and I didn't notice.”

“You're a dirty old woman.”

“He's very attractive and I'm merely human.” Sue sighed. “So how's the conference?”

Lucy didn't want to go into it. “Intense.”

“Give me a call when you get home. I want to see those shoes.”

Well, that was interesting, thought Lucy as she slid her cell phone into her bag. It was tempting to think that Sue, who loved to gossip, was exaggerating, but somehow she doubted it. Elizabeth had always been a bit of an exhibitionist, who delighted in shocking her conservative parents. She'd have to ask her about the bikini the next time she called home, resolved Lucy, firmly relegating her daughter's behavior to a corner of her mind. She had more important things to do right now.

It didn't take long to find a cute swimsuit for Zoe and designer T-shirts with prominent logos for Sara and Elizabeth. Toby was also easy; she found an assortment of boxer shorts printed with the New England Patriots football team logo. But search as she might in the men's department she couldn't find anything for Bill.

It wasn't that the selection was poor; there were shirts and pants and ties and shoes galore, but nothing that she thought he would really like. Nothing special. Nothing that spoke to her, insisting it was the perfect present for Bill Stone.

She paid for all her purchases with a hundred-dollar bill, amazed to discover she had snagged a few pairs of boxers that qualified for the 50-percent markdown. She left the store, feeling enormously proud of herself for being so thrifty—and pleased that she'd splurged on the stylish shoes—and decided to try Charles Street, where she'd heard there were a lot of antique shops. Maybe she could find a Father's Day gift there.

She had no idea where Charles Street was, exactly, but she remembered seeing an information booth on the Common. There she learned that all she had to do was walk up to the corner by the statehouse and proceed along Park and then down Beacon Street to Charles.

“Don't forget to look at the Shaw Memorial,” advised the helpful woman inside the booth. “It's opposite the statehouse and you can't miss it.”

Lucy chugged up the rather steep hill to the corner and joined the knot of people standing in front of the memorial, which was a large bronze bas-relief by Saint-Gaudens commemorating the heroic 54
^th
Infantry regiment. Comprised entirely of blacks and led by Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, the regiment's bravery in the Civil War inspired the motion picture
Glory
.

Lucy stood a moment, studying the lifelike faces of the soldiers, all so young and determined, marching off to their deaths. She hated war memorials and the thought of so many precious lives lost. It was always for a worthy cause, always an enormous waste. There had to be other ways of working out differences that didn't require human sacrifice.

Turning away she walked along Beacon Street which was lined with nineteenth-century row houses that overlooked the Common. She tried to peek inside the windows as she walked by and occasionally caught a glimpse of a chandelier, or a bit of fringe on a silk curtain. Some of the windows had a decidedly lavender tint and she wondered if it had once been the fashion to look out on a purple-tinted world.

She turned at the corner of Charles Street and poked along, looking into windows. It was a remarkably countrified street for a big city; it looked a bit like Main Street in Tinker's Cove with trees and a variety of stores. Here, of course, there were apartments above the store fronts and Lucy wondered what it would be like to live in one.

Passing an antique store with its door propped open to reveal an inviting interior, Lucy ventured in. A young woman greeted her pleasantly, telling her to ask if she needed help, and returned to her computer.

Lucy wandered about and discovered that the shop was much larger than she thought, with five or six rooms. In the farthest from the front and smallest room she found an assortment of old tools. Just the sort of thing Bill loved. A little ruler caught her eye; it was obviously handmade and had a movable stop and a sharp scribe that could be used to mark a board to a certain width for cutting. When she checked the price tag and discovered she could afford it she promptly bought it, confident that Bill would be thrilled with it.

Her packages were light and she was enjoying herself, so she continued down the street, window-shopping and looking for someplace to get a bite to eat. A little sandwich shop sold mostly takeout, but had a few stools lined up underneath a shelf in the front window. She bought a turkey rollup and perched there, contentedly munching her sandwich and watching people walk by. All sorts of people: an old lady with a small fur ball of a dog, a distinguished man in a beautifully tailored business suit, college kids in scruffy clothes with backpacks, and young mothers pushing strollers. She saw more people in the fifteen minutes it took her to eat her sandwich than she saw in a week in Tinker's Cove.

After eating she didn't have much energy, so she decided to go back to the Common, where she could find a bench in a sunny spot and rest a bit, maybe even read a newspaper. When she reached the Common she discovered that a lot of people had the same idea. There were plenty of benches, however, and she soon found a seat.

Unfolding her
Globe,
she ignored the front page and went to the Metro section, looking for news about the murder. The story was small and below the fold, but the headline immediately caught her eye:
Publisher's Death Ruled Poison.

According to Brad McAbee, whose byline was on the story, the medical examiner had found that cyanide, not asthma, caused Luther Read's death.

Lucy was stunned. Yet she realized she shouldn't really be so shocked. McAbee had cautioned everyone at the workshop to wait for the medical examiner's report. He must have known then that the report would contain some surprises.

So much for her handkerchief theory, thought Lucy. No wonder Sullivan had given her the brush-off. He was probably still laughing. She read on, wondering what this new development meant for Junior. Would the police continue to charge him with the murder?

Indeed they would, said the district attorney.
We remain confident that all charges against Luther Read, Junior, will stand,
he said.
Read had ready access to cyanide, which is used in photographic processes.

And so did a lot of other people, thought Lucy. Cyanide was a dark-room staple, easily available to anyone who worked at a newspaper. She remembered how relieved Ted had been when he got rid of the tiny dark room at the
Pennysaver.
It had been expensive and there had been a lot of red tape, but it had been worth it in the end. “Now I don't have to worry about those damned chemicals,” he'd said.