Murder Take Two (20 page)

“How did you know?”

“Fifer was getting ready to chop off heads. Oooh.” Clem turned slightly green, clapped a hand over her mouth, and rushed to the bathroom. Sounds of retching could be clearly heard. The toilet flushed, water ran, and Clem came back patting her face with a towel.

“Sit down,” Susan said. “Take it easy.”

Clem sat and breathed quickly and shallowly for a few moments. “And I came back here. Something was wrong or she'd be on the set. I mean, if she wasn't there, she'd be having a tantrum and we'd hear about it. She wouldn't just—she'd be screaming to everybody and—I knocked on her door and—”

“Was the door locked?”

Clem shook her head.

“Was the light on?”

“I don't know. Yeah. No.”

“Which?”

“On.”

“You're sure?”

“Yeah. It gleamed on the blood—like a one K—”

“One K?”

“Light. Like a scene—kinda like from
Lethal Promise?
” Clem rubbed her face with the towel, removing much of the mess of white makeup and black mascara and further smearing around the rest. “Except the blood wasn't red enough. I thought—I thought Fifer's gonna yell about this and make them do it over. It doesn't look at all realistic. I had no idea.”

“No idea about what?”

“They were so flat. Dead people. Flat—like, like—I don't know.”

“What did you do yesterday evening?”

Clem pressed the towel hard against her cheeks, pulling them down and distorting her eyes. She looked like a sad clown. “What?”

“Where were you yesterday evening?”

“After wrap, you mean? Here, I think. Dinner in the coffee shop. A drink out there on that, that—” She waved her hand.

“Where was Sheri?”

Clem shrugged. “In her room. I don't know. Later she came out. She was miffed at Fifer. Saying something about she'd show him. She's not really all that swift. I didn't listen.”

“What about her family?”

“We weren't buddies. I don't know anything.”

“Who else was out there last night?”

Clem squeezed her eyes shut. “Robin.” A tear seeped under a closed eyelid and trickled down her face.

Susan pressed a tissue in her hand. Clem took it and blew her nose.

“Who else?”

“I don't know. Some guy. Oh, and a woman.”

“Describe them for me.”

“The guy was medium. I don't know. He was kind of on the edge.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don't know. Creepy.”

“What did he look like?”

Clem's mouth turned up in a quirky smile. “Oh, wow, you're asking an awful lot.” She shifted from side to side, and leaned her elbows on the chair arms. “Just a guy. Thirties? Maybe brown hair.”

“Tall? Short? Fat? Thin? Skin color? Eye color? Distinguishing marks?”

Clem tugged on a tuft of pink hair. “You ever think of being a script supervisor?”

Susan smiled. “Not my field. Come through for me.”

“He important?”

Probably not. Likely, he was just a guest who had a drink, then went innocently to his room. Unless he followed Sheri Lloyd and drove a knife in her back. Reason? Susan couldn't guess. A stalker, if they had one, was obsessed with a single individual. Assuming the person was Laura Edwards, why attack Sheri? He felt, somehow, she stood in his way?

Clem curled her fingers over the ends of the chair arms. “He was medium height, maybe a little stocky. That's the best I can do. Oh. He had a backpack. A little one, it was on the floor right by his feet. The only reason I noticed was he patted it now and again.”

“Was anybody with him?”

“I don't think so. He was just sitting there.”

“What about the woman?”

“Maybe fifty or something. Pretty. I mean for her age. She wore this long kind of skirt, white. There was something about her—I liked her and I didn't even know her.”

Without looking at him, Susan was aware that Yancy, standing behind Clem near the door, tightened up like a bird dog spotting a quail.

Susan refilled both coffee cups and waited while Clem added cream and sugar. “Did Sheri mention that anyone was bothering her? That she was getting phone calls? Maybe notes or flowers?”

“Like Laura, you mean?”

“You know about that?”

“Sure. Everybody does. There are no secrets on location. Anyway, Sheri doesn't—didn't keep quiet about things. She would have gibbered on to everybody.”

“What about you? Anybody annoying you?”

Clem looked startled, then shrugged. “Why would anybody send me flowers? I'm a nobody.”

Not in Hampstead, she wasn't, not with that hair. Susan refilled her own cup, set the pot down, and leaned back in the chair. Clem, with one forefinger made tiny rubbing movements on the chair arm, as if she were feeling for grains of sand.

“Is there anything else you can tell me?” Susan asked.

Clem shook her head.

“Who shall I have stay with you?”

Clem propped her head on one hand and tipped it sideways to look up at Yancy. “Him.”

Susan smiled. Sweet, handsome Yancy with his soft brown eyes and soft voice. “Sorry. I need him.”

Clem took a breath. “I'm okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

Susan left her feeling for imaginary grains of sand. When they had gone partway along the corridor, Susan turned and faced Yancy, “Who was the woman?” That sounded like the leadin to a tired joke.

He gave her a wry smile. “My mother.”

That was unexpected. “She's involved?”

“No.”

Stated in a nice firm tone. “Then why are you worried?”

“She was here last night, on the Patio. Howie—the assistant manager—called me to come get her.”

“She was causing trouble?”

“The dog was with her.”

“Clem didn't mention a dog.”

“I don't know why, he's a big dog.”

“Vicious?”

“Very friendly. Sheri Lloyd complained.” He stood squarely, feet planted at a wide stance.

“You think your mother stabbed Sheri Lloyd because Ms. Lloyd complained about her dog?”

“No, ma'am.” This wasn't said with quite the same conviction.

“Then what is it?”

He hesitated. “She had blood on her hands when she got home.” He spoke easily, but it came hard; ethics played hell sometimes.

“You realize I'll have to talk with her.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“You wouldn't happen to know who the guy is, would you? The guy who's medium all the way around?”

“As a matter of fact, I think I might.”

*   *   *

Brown. Laura my beloved. The universe is brown. From the edge of the parking lot, he watched them roll the stretcher toward the ambulance. The body was all wrapped up in a black bag, like a package. They lifted the stretcher, shoved it in, and drove away. It could have been you, Laura, my darling. Don't worry. I'm coming soon. Nothing will get in the way. Until then you can be assured. She won't bother you anymore. She was a snoop, not worthy of attention. She couldn't compete with your beauty. Soon, my beloved, soon.

*   *   *

“His name might be Delmar Cayliff,” Yancy said.

Well now. She liked Yancy; he was easy to have around, young enough to be handy for college student problems, if necessary, and it looked like he might be coming along to being a good cop. “How do you know this?”

“A man of his description waited for the elevator with me one evening. He had a backpack that he handled like it had the combination to the safe. It had a luggage tag with his name on it.”

“Do you know anything about him?”

“No, ma'am. Except he's been around watching the filming.”

“Any reason why you noticed him?”

“No. Just a face I saw a lot.”

They searched out Howard Gilbert in his office. When they came in he stood up from his desk and grimaced. “Don't tell me there's something else.”

“I need a piece of information,” Susan said.

“Oh, boy, this really isn't good for the hotel. The manager's not happy. This really isn't good. What information?”

“Have you got a Delmar Cayliff staying here?”

“I can't tell you that.”

“Sure you can.”

“No.” Howie looked between her and Yancy and gazed somewhere in the distance. “There's privacy and confidentiality and—”

“Don't be an ass,” Yancy said. “Tell her.”

“Oh, God. Why do you want to know?”

“Only to talk with him,” Susan said.

Howie shook his head back and forth in another “oh, boy, this isn't good for the hotel” gesture, then without sitting down tapped keys on the computer. “We have a Delmar Cayliff staying here.”

“Room number?”

He sighed extravagantly. “One-oh-three.”

Yancy leaned over the desk and patted Howie's cheek. Howie didn't think it was funny.

In the corridor, she asked, “Have you known him long?”

“Ever since elementary school. He's a sort-of friend.”

“What kind of friend is a sort-of friend?”

Yancy smiled his enchanting smile. “The kind your mother tells you to be friends with because he's a weird kid and nobody likes him and he never gets chosen for the team and he's lonely.”

Susan would have picked Howie for that kind of kid, she'd guess as an adult he was a loner. When her knock at 103 went unanswered, she tapped again. “Mr. Cayliff?” No response.

Before she could get back to check on Osey's progress, Officer Ellis said Robin McCormack wanted to see her.

17

“I heard Sheri Lloyd was stabbed.” Robin McCormack, standing at the steps to the prop truck, which was actually a long trailer, jammed his fists into shorts and directed the question at Yancy.

Susan replied in the affirmative and waited to see where this was going. The sun was riding low over the hills and mosquitoes were venturing out for the night's victims. One buzzed past her ear and she slapped at it. The ever-present wind was blowing in warm breezes.

“And the knife has a silver eagle on the handle?”

“It might be an eagle, yes.”

“I think it's mine.” He slapped his bare thigh leaving a bloody smear where a mosquito had landed for dinner. “I just checked. One's gone.”

“Where was it kept?”

Robin, a hand raking reddish hair back, took the four steps into the trailer with two jumps.

A narrow open space ran the entire length. Tall wooden chests lined both sides, their tops covered with plastic bins and cardboard boxes, all labeled—wedding rings, eyeglasses, police hardware, earwigs, license plate screws (wherever the story was supposed to be had to have the correct license plates). “You never know what the director might call for,” he said as she read labels.

He shoved a plastic basket of umbrellas closer to a phone booth and stacked a box of handbags on top of a hotel-type ice machine, handed Yancy a box of briefcases, and removed the padlock on the solid piece of metal running up the length of a stack of drawers. In the bottom drawer, knives of all shapes and sizes—curved blade, curved handle, rope handle, with silver, with turquoise, with lapis, jeweled—were wrapped in bubble packing.

“One's missing. Steel blade, bone handle with a silver eagle inset.”

“These are all real?”

He nodded. “Except the gems. They're as fake as you get. But the blades are steel and I keep them sharp.”

“You always keep them locked up?”

“Not always, but the truck doors are locked unless I'm here.”

“You never leave without locking the door?”

“No.”

“Then how did the knife get itself missing?”

“If I was going to be gone for just a second—only a second or two—I might not take the time.”

“When was it taken?”

“No idea. It was there Friday morning because we used one.”

“This one?”

“No.” He unwrapped a black-handled knife with a six-inch blade. “But the eagle-handled knife was here then.”

“How do you keep track of things?”

He looked around the solidly packed truck. “You'd be surprised how good I am at it. It's my business.”

“Do you have any guns?” If a gun or two were also missing, there'd be additional worry. To use a knife, the assailant had to get close to the intended victim. With a gun that wasn't necessary.

“Yeah.”

“Where are they?”

“The safe.”

At the other end, surrounded by boxes, sat a tall black safe. “Who has the combination?”

“I do.”

“Anybody else?”

“No.”

“Blanks?”

“Yeah.”

“No live bullets?”

Robin shook his head. “They're never used.”

“After it's been gone over for prints, I'll have somebody show you the knife to be certain,” she said. “I need to ask you a few questions.”

“This hasn't been questions?”

She smiled. “A few more.” She nodded at the caterer's tent. “Let's go over there.”

At eight in the evening the long tables were empty. She indicated to Robin that he should sit at one and she sat across from him. Yancy stood behind him and the sunlight that angled in sketched his shadow long.

“What time did you see Sheri on the Patio?” she asked.

“I don't know. It felt late, but it probably wasn't. Putting in a long day makes you cash in early.”

“Sheri was still there when you left? Who else?”

He leaned back in the folding chair and slid his feet under the table. “Some guy. Who knows.”

“Have you seen him before?”

He shrugged. “Maybe.”

“Where?”

“The hotel, I guess.”

“What does he look like?”