Murder in the Mystery Suite (A Book Retreat Mystery) (15 page)

Unaccustomed to rudeness, Uncle Aloysius stiffened. He recovered immediately, however, and gestured to the staff elevator and said, “Of course. This way, please.”

Jane fell into step next to her uncle. “Can we talk in your office while Aunt Octavia has her session with Mr. Lowe?”

Her uncle nodded. “It’d be better if we were in another country, but my office will have to suffice.”

Stifling a grin, Jane pressed the button for the third floor while Gordie glanced around the elevator cab. As soon as the doors slid shut, Gordie began to whistle. He was far from being an adept whistler, and whatever tune he was trying to carry sounded jarringly off-key. Jane glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and saw that he was rocking back and forth on his heels.

Aunt Octavia is going to eat him alive
, she thought with a small measure of satisfaction.

Uncle Aloysius unlocked the apartment door and invited Gordie into the living room, where Aunt Octavia was busy reading the newspaper. Muffet Cat was stretched out in the next chair, a felt catnip mouse nestled under one paw. Both Aunt Octavia and Muffet Cat looked at the man in scrubs with wary eyes. “Who the devil are you?” Aunt Octavia demanded.

Gordie put his hands on his hips and surveyed the room with a frown. “I suppose this will have to do.” Instead of answering Aunt Octavia’s question, he fixed a disapproving gaze on Muffet Cat. “I’m your new physical therapist. I heard that you and Max weren’t a good fit.”

“That’s because Max is an ogre,” Aunt Octavia replied, snapping her paper. “I hope you know how to treat a lady.”

Gordie produced another fake smile. “I’m sure we’ll manage. All you have to do is work hard and maintain a positive attitude. Negative energy will delay your healing.”

Aunt Octavia stared at him with unmasked dislike. “You’re not one of those yoga mat, New Age, incense-burning, mantra-spouting types, are you?”

Jane could tell that her aunt had struck a nerve. Gordie’s jaw tensed, but then his humorless smile instantly returned. “One day, you might be open to trying a healthy activity like yoga. It has all kinds of benefits—even for someone your age.”

“I’d rather have hot needles driven into my eyeballs,” Aunt Octavia said. “Let’s get started. The sooner we begin the torture, the sooner we can finish.”

Gordie waved a warning finger. “
Tsk, tsk.
Where’s that positive attitude?”

For some reason, Muffet Cat treated the finger wag as a threat. He leapt to his feet, his fur bristling like a Halloween cat’s, and hissed.

Jane and Uncle Aloysius exchanged nervous glances. Jane hurried to open the front door and Muffet Cat shot into the hall in a blur of black-and-white fur. With Aunt Octavia’s champion headed for the great outdoors, Jane and her uncle escaped to the office, where the twins were still happily occupied with the new train set.

“Look, Mom! I made a tunnel out of a tissue box.” Hem pointed at his feat of engineering while attempting to hide the pile of unused tissues under his rump.

“And I’m almost done with my bridge,” Fitz said. He had dozens of rubber bands spread out before him. “Can I borrow your rulers, Uncle Aloysius?”

“Certainly. Pedestrians must be able to cross over the railroad tracks in safety.”

Hem turned to his brother. “Sweet! After that, we need—”

“People,” Fitz said, finishing his twin’s sentence. The boys did this all the time, but Jane never failed to marvel over how in synch they were.

While they debated the merits of Candyland figures, which they could poach from the game room in the basement, over LEGO figures, which were in their bedroom at home, Jane and her uncle sat in the Chippendale-style chairs overlooking the side lawn.

“Sheriff Evans is down the hall,” Jane said. She wasn’t concerned about the twins listening in. They were far too engrossed in their toys to pay attention to boring grown-up talk.

“I know. I’ve spoken with him.” Her uncle took a piece of paper from the pocket of his tweed coat and laid it on the table between them. “These are the names of the staff members who’ve been to our rooms in the last month.”

It was a short list and Jane read it aloud. “Ned, Gavin, Sterling, Butterworth, Sinclair, Mrs. Hubbard, and Mrs. Pimpernel.” She sighed. “Hardly a suspicious lot. Four of them are Fins, and Mrs. Hubbard’s been discussing menus with Aunt Octavia since time immemorial.”

“Don’t let
them
hear you say that,” Uncle Aloysius cautioned.

“And Ned?” Jane continued. “We’ve known him since he was knee-high. Why did he come up? Package delivery?”

Her uncle made a noise of assent. “Indeed. Your aunt was a bit of a spendthrift last month. She’s been engaged in early Christmas shopping and is always buying something to tuck away for the twins.”

“I suppose this train set was among the items Ned delivered.” When Uncle Aloysius nodded, Jane shook her head in amusement. “Aunt Octavia spoils those boys.”

“She prefers the term ‘doting’ over ‘spoiling.’”

Jane examined the list again. “The only name that seems out of place is Mrs. Pimpernel’s. She hasn’t cleaned a room since her promotion to head housekeeper last year. Why the sudden desire to care for your apartments herself?”

Uncle Aloysius furrowed his brow. “I’m not sure. Other than my office, I can’t say that I pay much attention to the tidiness of our living space. While I can tell the papers on my desk blotter have been moved half an inch to the right or left, I wouldn’t notice spots on the bathroom mirror or dust on the bookshelves. Octavia keeps an eye on that sort of thing.”

At that moment, they heard a resounding crash from the direction of the sitting room. Jane bolted to her feet and rushed for the door, but the twins were faster. They raced into the next room in front of her and then came to an abrupt halt at the sight of broken glass.

Gordie was cowering behind a floral wing chair. Seeing Jane, he shouted, “She’s crazy! She needs a psych eval, not a physical therapist!”

“How dare you?” Aunt Octavia bellowed. “Get out of here this instant. I never want to see that disingenuous smile or be subjected to another second of your patronizing banter for as long as I live.”

“With that attitude, it won’t be long!” Gordie hollered back and then ducked as a brass candlestick sailed over his head.

“Time out!” Jane waved her hands like a referee. “Aunt Octavia—”

“Tell him to take his bag of tricks and go!” her aunt cried. Jane caught a glimpse of the twins’ startled faces and decided it was best to do as Aunt Octavia asked. Handing Gordie his duffle bag, she said, “I’m sorry things didn’t work out. My sons will be glad to show you to your car.”

The twins clearly didn’t want to serve as guides. Jane could tell from the stubborn set of their mouths that they’d prefer to stay and hear what the man in maroon scrubs had done to make Aunt Octavia so angry. “Fitzgerald. Hemingway.
Now
,” she said in a no-nonsense tone to which the boys mercifully responded.

Gordie left the apartment, muttering about “old hags” and “hopeless cases” on his way out.

When the door had closed behind him, Uncle Aloysius moved forward to comfort his wife. Caressing her cheek, he murmured softly, “What happened, my sweet?”

“He treated me like an imbecile.” Jane was surprised to see Aunt Octavia’s eyes fill with tears. After all, her great-aunt cried only while reading particularly moving book passages. “I told him that I wanted to stand while holding a chair, but he insisted on grabbing me under my arms and hauling me to my feet without an ounce of decorum. And when I was finally upright, I said that I was feeling dizzy. He declared that my recovery would depend on mind over matter. As if I could simply walk again by sheer will and determination.”

“We know you have an abundance of both, dear,” Jane’s uncle said.

“I do, but I feel weak and light-headed and frightened. And while I truly hate to admit to the latter, it’s the truth. I don’t want to be difficult, Aloysius, but I’m not strong enough to jump up and dance and I won’t be forced into moving faster than I’m ready to move by some bumbling idiot.” She gave Jane a look of appeal. “Can’t someone I know help me? Ned or one of the chauffeurs?”

Jane considered the question for a long moment. “I think you need a professional, Aunt Octavia. But perhaps it would be better for you to meet a few therapists first. You can vet them the same way Butterworth would a new staff member.”

Uncle Aloysius smiled. “That’s an excellent idea. Now, why don’t I order some tea and ask Mrs. Pimpernel if she could stop by with a dustpan? What object served as your projectile?”

Aunt Octavia waved her hand airily. “A plain flower vase. It was the only thing within reach besides that trout carving you’re so fond of.”

“Very considerate of you, my dear. I know you’ve never liked my trout. Perhaps I’ll remove it to my office.” Under his breath he added, “That way it’ll be safe before your next PT appointment.”

Jane was watching her uncle scurry off, wooden fish tucked under his arm, when the phone rang.

“Can you get that, Jane?” her aunt asked. “I’m simply too flustered.”

The caller turned out to be Butterworth. “Sheriff Evans is looking for you,” he said. “Shall I send him to your office, or would you like him to join you in your current location?”

“Have him come here, please. We’ll have more privacy,” Jane said. Her aunt and uncle’s rooms were at the end of a long wing and were separated from the main hall by a door marked
NO ADMITTANCE.
It was unlikely that guests would be in the vicinity, and Jane felt more at ease meeting with the sheriff in the cozy sitting room with her family surrounding her.

She only had time to place an order with the kitchens for a tea service delivery when there was an authoritative rap on the door.

Jane opened it to find a grim-faced Sheriff Evans and a wide-eyed deputy standing in the hall. She invited them in, perturbed by the deputy’s jittery behavior and the manner in which Sheriff Evans kept brushing his fingers against his gun holster as if to reassure himself that his side arm was within easy reach.

“Is there an update on the investigation?” Jane asked anxiously while Uncle Aloysius sat down next to his wife.

“Deputy Higgins was in the process of interviewing a Mrs. Pimpernell when she received an urgent call from a housekeeper on the fourth floor. Apparently, a staff member unlocked the door to a guest room and found another, what did you call them, a Van Winkle?”

Jane gasped. “No!”

“I’ve conducted an initial inspection and two deputies are guarding the room,” Evans said. “I thought you’d want to know that we may now be facing two suspicious deaths. According to what you’ve told me, this Van Winkle has ties to Alice Hart and was also interested in acquiring Mr. Hampden’s prize.”

Jane pressed her fingertips to her temple where a headache had begun to bloom. Though she already knew the answer, she asked, “What’s the room number?”

“Four twenty-six.”

“Moira,” Jane whispered sadly. “Moira McKee is dead.”

Sheriff Evans nodded solemnly. “I’m afraid so. I’d like you to look at the deceased to determine if she resembles Mr. Hampden’s body as it was
in situ
.”

“
In situ
,” Jane said dully, too stunned to react. “I need to see if she looks as if she was poisoned? Is that what you’re saying?”

“It is. Can you come now?”

Aunt Octavia grabbed her husband’s arm. “Aloysius, should you go with her?”

Jane’s uncle shook his head. “My place is here. With you. Jane can handle this. I have complete faith in her.”

Hoping to be worthy of her uncle’s confidence, Jane squared her shoulders and told the sheriff that she was ready to view her second corpse of the Murder and Mayhem Week.

Jane walked to Moira’s room as if she were wading through waist-high water. Her limbs felt heavy and uncooperative, and though she managed to greet passing guests with a smile and a friendly hello, her voice sounded alien and distant.

To Jane’s relief, Sheriff Evans adopted a casual demeanor. Between his unhurried pace and pleasant grins, the guests would never guess that he was in the middle of a murder investigation. In fact, he and Jane strolled down the carpeted hallway looking like they’d just completed a routine inspection of the carbon monoxide detectors.

When they reached Moira’s room, Evans knocked on the door three times. It was opened only wide enough to reveal a sliver of freckled cheek and one suspicious brown eye.

“You can let us in now, Dawson,” Evans said.

The face disappeared and Evans pushed the door open. As soon as he and Jane entered the room, and the freckle-faced deputy gestured at the bathroom. “No one’s been inside, sir, and the ME’s on his way. He’ll be here in fifteen.”

The medical examiner’s office was over the mountain. Jane wondered if he was surprised to discover that he was being called to examine yet another body from Storyton. Jane couldn’t help but worry that a second poisoning victim might lead to an indiscretion. If the ME, whom Jane had never met, had loose lips, then everyone in the region would soon know about the horrors occurring at Storyton Hall.

That is,
if
Moira was poisoned,
Jane reminded herself.
You have no idea what happened to her.

“I must ask you not to touch anything,” Sheriff Evans said, breaking into her thoughts. “And do not enter the bathroom. Just look inside, please.”

Jane nodded and crossed the floor to the bathroom. She could feel the eyes of the sheriff and the two deputies on her, but a strong smell caught her attention, pulling her forward and making her forget about the other people in the room. The scent had heavy floral overtones—gardenia or magnolia—combined with a subtle hint of rot. It was both sweet and putrefying. Appealing and repellent. And it became more powerful the closer Jane drew to the bathroom. At the threshold, she stopped and peered in at the dead woman.

An involuntary cry escaped from Jane’s throat, and she slapped a hand over her mouth, as if the subtle sound was disrespectful. It wasn’t Moira’s fault she’d been turned into something frightening, and Jane’s initial repulsion quickly gave way to pity and remorse.

“Oh, no,” she whispered. “You poor thing. I’m sorry. So sorry.”

Moira McKee was sprawled on the floor in the small space between the sink and the commode. Jane glanced at the woman’s plaid pajamas and wondered if Moira had been getting ready for bed before she fell. Jane steeled herself as her eyes slowly traveled from the dead woman’s body to her face.

Moira’s head was turned toward the door and her mouth was stretched wide as if she’d died in the middle of a yawn. There was a smear of bright blood beneath her cheek marring the clean white tiles. Part of Moira’s white hair was matted with dark, sticky blood, and there was another blotch on the edge of the commode. Jane guessed that the woman had lost her balance, struck her head on the porcelain, and then hit the floor. Her fingers were curled into tight claws, just as Felix Hampden’s had been, but Moira’s long nails had left little red half-moons in the skin of her palms.

“You were in pain,” Jane murmured, staring at the marks. She looked at the dead woman’s face again. The longer she stood utterly still, the more details she noticed. She didn’t know how much time had passed when Sheriff Evans appeared at her elbow. “What do you see?” he asked.

“Her neck is arched at an uncomfortable angle. Her whole face seems stretched, with every muscle tensed to the max. Look at the veins in her neck. Look at her fingers. She must have been in incredible agony. The same agony Mr. Hampden experienced.”

The sheriff said nothing, and Jane continued with her observations. The only way she could help the dead woman now was to stay sharp and calm. In an attempt to imprint the scene in her mind, she let her gaze roam all around the bathroom. There were other signs of disturbance. The water glass was on its side in the bowl of the sink, and Jane pictured Moira trying to fill the glass and then dropping it as she was battered by a wave of pain.

On the floor to the left of the counter was the source of the floral scent: a broken perfume bottle. Jane could tell from the torn label that the perfume was Flora
by Gucci. An ounce of pink liquid still swam in the bottle’s base, and Jane spied the words “Gorgeous Gardenia.” She imagined Moira knocking the bottle off the counter at the same moment the glass tipped into the sink.

That pair of objects—one shattered and the other out of place and in the wrong position—showed how Moira must have panicked when she began to lose control of her muscles.

And then, she’d fallen. She’d smacked her head against the toilet and then collided with the cold, hard floor.

“Do you think she was still alive?” Jane asked. “After she hit her head?”

“I’m no expert, but I believe so. The ME will tell us more, but it’d be my guess that the blood made that pattern because she was moving. Arching her neck and back, just like you said. It would have been a gentler end had she been unconscious.”

Jane’s eyes filled with tears. She wasn’t used to being near someone who’d died violently, and she felt grief overwhelm her. It grew in her like a cresting wave, and she fought to keep it from breaking.

Abruptly, she retreated from the threshold. She didn’t want to look a moment longer at what had become of the woman she’d talked with at the ball. She didn’t want the tortured, lifeless figure sprawled on the bathroom floor to replace the image of the woman who spoke with such emotion about the Broadleaf School of the Arts. Though Moira had acted a little overly desperate in trying to ensure a future for the college, her passion and devotion made her crackle with vitality. Jane could see the older woman now, her eyes shining as she talked about Broadleaf.

She’s the kind of person who probably wasn’t noticed much while she lived. But I bet she’ll be deeply missed now that she’s gone.

Jane was wondering what would become of the once-esteemed college when she backed right into Sheriff Evans. She turned to face him. “It looks like she died exactly as Mr. Hampden did. Do you think they were both given the same toxin?”

“It appears that way. The ME—” Evans was about to say more when a voice burst from the radio clipped to the front of Deputy Dawson’s uniform shirt.

Jane couldn’t understand the code-speak, but she recognized the names “Kevin Collins” and “William Faulkner.”

“I’m going to interview Mr. Collins now,” Evans said to Jane. “My deputies will bring the ME up on the staff elevator.” He waved vaguely toward the bathroom. “It would be best if you left now.”

“Of course,” Jane said. She had no desire to linger.

Back in the lobby, the sheriff veered toward the conference room wing and Jane headed for the Henry James Library. She found Sinclair filling out borrower’s cards for a group of children. Unlike the traditional lined white rectangles with spaces for a title, due date, and date of return, Storyton Hall’s borrower’s cards were works of art. The cards were created on a hand press and featured beautiful script in the center and ornamental flowers and scrolls in each corner.

The cards were meant to remind borrowers of the value Storyton Hall placed on its library holdings. Guests who failed to return books before leaving the resort were charged a replacement fee (which, because many of the books were out of print, could be quite hefty), but those who followed the lending rules were rewarded. Whenever a guest returned a book, they were given a Storyton Hall bookmark. There were twelve designs in all, and the guests were always eager to acquire a complete set.

At this moment, Sinclair was presenting a young girl with a bookmark depicting an enormous moon rising over the roofline of Storyton Hall. A photograph of a barn owl occupied one corner and a partial quote by Byron ran along the bottom in gilt letters. It read,
The night of cloudless climes and starry skies
.

“This is my fifth one!” the girl whispered in excitement. “I want to finish twelve books while I’m here so I can collect them all.”

“That’s the idea, my dear,” Sinclair said, smiling at the young reader. “And I think you’ll be very entertained by the adventures of Ramona Quimby.”

Jane tried to be patient as she waited for Sinclair to finish his duties. He spent another minute listening to an exuberant boy explain why he was so fond of the characters in Judy Blume’s
Superfudge
before a Beatrix Potter Kids’ Club staff member finally gathered her group together and led them out of the library. Jane watched the children leave, drinking in the twinkle in their eyes and the energetic bounce to their step. They were the polar opposite of what she’d just seen in Moira McKee’s room.

When the kids were gone, Sinclair pressed a flask into her hand. “You’d better have a nip of this. I imagine what you saw was quite awful. Butterworth told me that Mr. Collins has been installed in the Faulkner Room. We need to listen in on that interview.”

Jane waved off the flask. “That won’t help. What I need is to find out who’s targeting my guests. How can we overhear the conversation between the sheriff and Mr. Collins? Are the conference rooms bugged?”

“No. Ours is a far more antiquated system, but it’s served us well for many years. Come. We must hurry.”

Reentering the lobby, Sinclair led Jane through a doorway marked
STAFF ONLY
, and into one of the many cool and dimly lit service corridors. This one led to the west wing, which was where all the conference rooms were located.

Jane had walked the length of the corridor hundreds of times, so she couldn’t understand why Sinclair suddenly stopped in front of a metal storage closet and pulled both doors open. Pushing aside several broken brooms and a discolored mop head, he reached inside the closet and rotated his entire arm to the left. Jane heard a click. Sinclair peered down the hallway to make sure they were alone and then gestured at the closet. “After you, Miss Jane. Go quickly and quietly. There will be a small ridge where the closet ends and a passageway begins, so be careful. It’ll be dark, but I’ll be right behind you.”

Jane entered the closet. Feeling like one of the Pevensie children in
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
,
she raised her hand and put one foot in front of the other. After three steps, her toe caught on the lip of metal dividing the closet from another concrete floor. She pressed herself against the bare drywall to her right until she heard Sinclair moving behind her. He shut the secret door and switched on a penlight.

“And from this point, we can’t talk,” he whispered in Jane’s ear. “No coughing, sneezing, gasping, nothing. If you must make a sound, get inside this closet as fast as you can.”

Perplexed, Jane followed Sinclair to the end of the narrow passage, where she saw an illuminated pattern on the floor. The rows of overlapping octagons were familiar, and Jane stared at them until she heard a man’s voice. And then a second voice. They were coming from behind a rectangle of brass in the wall. With a start, Jane realized that she and Sinclair were standing on the other side of the air return screen attached to the wall of the William Faulkner conference room.

Light snuck through the vent to create the octagon pattern on the dusty ground, and when Jane shuffled closer, she could see the wood floor and the edge of the midnight blue rug inside the Faulkner room. She stopped, fearing that Sheriff Evans would notice the movement if she crept any closer.

“Mr. Collins—” Sheriff Evans was saying.

“That’s what people call my dad. I’m just Kevin.”

“All right, Kevin,” the sheriff said. “Let’s review what you’ve told me so far. You came to Storyton during the Murder and Mayhem Week to find out if Moira McKee knew why your fiancée, a Miss Alice Hart, called off your engagement.”

“It wasn’t just to talk to Moira. I could have gone to Broadleaf to do that. I was here in September because I was following Alice. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one. When I read on Facebook that her boss planned to come to Storyton Hall in October, I knew something weird was going on. I wanted to see for myself who or what had drawn Alice here. I didn’t figure it out before Alice died, but I wasn’t going to give up. I
had
to know.” Kevin spoke so rapidly that his words ran together. “But I only talked to Moira once in the elevator. She kind of freaked out when she recognized me and refused to answer my questions unless I told her where the book was. The woman’s gone nuts. Her train has derailed.”

A brief silence. “Did you tell her about the book?”

Kevin laughed humorlessly. “I wish I knew what book she was talking about. In fact, after seeing how crazed Moira acted when she mentioned this mystery book, I’m beginning to think I was wrong about Alice. Maybe she didn’t come here to meet a guy. Maybe she came here in search of a book. This place is loaded with them. There must be thousands. My university library doesn’t have half as many.” He released a derisive grunt. “But why would anyone get this worked up over a book, even one about Adela Dundee? A book is just wood pulp and glue with some text. How important could it really be?”

Feeling a rush of indignation on behalf of bibliophiles everywhere, Jane scowled. Beside her, Sinclair was practically radiating his disgust.

Sheriff Evans ignored the insult. “Are you absolutely sure that the only time you came in contact with Ms. McKee was in the elevator Saturday night?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. Wait. What’s going on? Is this about Alice?” A note of fear crept into his voice. “It was an accident, you know. She had a heart condition. Look, I admit that I acted kind of like a stalker by following her in September and then coming back here to talk to her boss and find out who Alice’s lover was, but I had nothing to do with what happened to her. Her heart gave out. Just like that.” He snapped his fingers.

The sheriff wasn’t about to be distracted from his initial question. “You saw her in the elevator. But did you also go to Ms. McKee’s room Saturday night?”