Murder With A Chaser (Microbrewery Mysteries Book 2) (2 page)

              I can’t tell you the horror we experienced as each of us contemplated the likelihood that it may have been something in the beer. We all tasted it – twice. Then rationality kicked in. If it
was
something in the beer, then any one of us would have felt even just a little off, and that just wasn't the case. Then I remembered that Campbell had disappeared into his trailer for a couple of minutes there in the interim, and had emerged a virtually changed man. All this went through my head as we worked to cordon off the area as EMTs examined and then removed the body. The Carl's Cove police were already on hand as security, and they did well to keep the crowd away.

              Deputy Mayor Collins made a careful announcement that Eli Campbell was now in the care of Southampton Hospital and he appreciated our concern and patience and apologized and please continue enjoying the events of the day.

              Very well for Deputy Mayor Collins. He didn’t have his hand on Campbell's neck feeling for a pulse that wasn't there…I did.

              And not to disparage any member of the Carl's Cove Men in Blue, but they weren't exactly seasoned cops. The police in this town exist almost solely on the virtue of parking violations, speeding tickets, and vandalism during peak season. Sudden, accidental death is a rarity for them.

              As for murder, there hasn’t been a murder here in...well, before that time a corpse showed up in my alleyway. At any rate, they had to call in an expert from out of town for that case. And they had me. But I digress.

              Still, I couldn’t help but think foul play here.

              Let’s review for a moment.

              Eli Campbell goes into his trailer and emerges visibly altered. Had he ingested something illegal during that time, one would assume it was a substance with which he was familiar. The majority of ODs, I've heard, don’t occur with a single dose. They occur over the course of several doses, with the addict unaware of the amount he or she has ingested. Campbell simply didn’t have enough time in his trailer to take anything in so great a quantity without it having some adverse effect on his appearance. There was no dizziness, stumbling or anything that would indicate someone plastered out of his mind. There was simply, however dangerous the drug he could have taken, a change in appearance that to the casual observer looked – and please note my choice of words –
relatively
harmless.

              That three to five minute disappearance was the only time any of us saw him out of public view. Eli Campbell was, if nothing else, a media and crowd hog.

              So what did I do next? What any woman who doesn’t think before she acts would do. I took advantage of the chaos and entered Eli Campbell's trailer.

              To say that this was a vehicle built for luxury travel is to do it an injustice. Some things demand more explanation than that.

              For starters, if I didn’t know any better I would swear this thing glowed in the dark. It was immaculately white, like a hospital. Better than a hospital. Plush, burgundy-colored furniture was spaced along one side in the "living room" area, which was complete with a TV larger than my couch. The floors were white with a faux-woodgrain pattern. It was disturbingly quiet in there, as if whoever had commissioned this vehicle expressly required the inclusion of space-age sound-absorption materials within its walls. As I walked, disbelieving, toward the back, I entered a lounge area with leather couches and a fully-stocked bar as its main attraction. Beyond that was the master bedroom, which had its own bathroom attached. This room was designed for the type of man who used wealth as the most potent of aphrodisiacs, as everything from the entranceway to the trailer seemed to lead one directly to this spot.

              And, if Campbell was keeping anything a secret, I thought, he was keeping it here.

              So I padded over to the dresser and opened the top drawer.

              Clothes, neatly folded. One might say obsessively neat.

              The other drawers yielded the same.

              The next place I looked was a small night table beside the bed. Besides a couple of unmentionables that a man engaged in illicit shenanigans with the opposite sex might keep close, I saw nothing other than an asthma inhaler and a tube of acne cream. While there's nothing wrong with suffering from adult acne or asthma, somehow I thought that Eli Campbell would have paid good money to keep these conditions away from the public. He seemed like the type for whom acne and asthma were regarded as stamps of weakness. After all, what could lessen a curse-filled rant more than a fit of wheezing right in the middle of it? And what could detract from your physically imposing stature more than a ripe zit on the tip of your nose? Yes, I thought, Campbell hid these things for a reason. And no, I thought, I could not, would not disclose them to anyone. My father raised me better than that.

              I searched some of the other compartments in the trailer. If Campbell was hiding anything, he hid it well – perhaps in some secret compartment somewhere. Otherwise, the place was clean.

              So I left the trailer as easily as I'd entered it. By that time, things were calming down. There was a pall over the proceedings that those closest to Campbell were feeling. Those who knew the truth – that Campbell had died right then and there amongst us – were walking around in a kind of daze, not quite shock, and not quite anything else. It was just strange, like a dream.

              Then I saw Maisie Ward, the erstwhile winner of our humble contest, standing by herself a few feet away, looking like someone who didn’t know where she should be at that moment. I went over to her.

              "This is really strange," she said.

              "I agree," I said. "And I don’t know how to break this to you, so I'll just go ahead and say it. Maisie, you won. It was unanimous."

              I can’t describe the look on her face. It was that of someone ashamed to be happy.

              "It's ok," I said, "you can smile." I offered her one of my own. She returned it and threw her arms around me.

              "You don’t know what this means to me!"

              I sort of did. Along with the grand prize came a twenty-five-hundred-dollar check, a write-up in Brew Craft magazine – the bible of homebrewing – and the chance to have her beer featured as part of a celebratory six-pack issued by Gnome, the craft beer kings of Long Island. More about them later.

              In short, it was a leg-up to beer brewing celebrity status for Maisie Ward, and I couldn’t be happier for her.

              "I just wish my family could be here," she said, sounding melancholy.

              "You're all alone?"

              She nodded. "It's not their fault. Mom lives in California and couldn’t afford the airfare. Dad's on tour."

              "On tour? What does he do?"

              "He works on a NASCAR pit crew for my Uncle Shawn."

              The name clicked. "Wait... Shawn Ward? That's your uncle?"

              She nodded, smiling.

              "I've heard of him!"

              "You don’t strike me as a NASCAR fan."

              "I'm not," I said, "I despise car racing, but my cousin Tanya comes from a NASCAR family. She's be pretty tickled to know that Shawn Ward is your uncle. You don’t think you could procure an autograph?"

              Her face lost some of its smile. "When I said I wished my dad could be here, I didn’t mean that he would be if he could. He's been estranged from the family and we don’t see them that often."

              "Oh, I'm sorry." It's always an awkward moment when someone decides to share a personal sorrow seemingly at random.

              "It's ok," she said. "I just wish they were both here. But I guess I should be done wishing for things like that at my age."

              "Well," I said, "congratulations. As for the prizes, I'll see to it personally that you're awarded in due time and with proper fanfare, ok?"

              She gave me a hug and we parted and that was it. And I felt pretty good about it.

              Until later on that day, when my sometimes-boyfriend, Detective Lester Moore of Southampton Police, Homicide division, called me up and told me that foul play was indeed suspected, and that I should expect to be contacted soon for an interview, and that I should keep my eyes open and my memories clear.

              "Talk to me," I said.

              His voice was rushed. He was obviously at work and wasn't at liberty to chat casually. "We think he either ingested or was injected with something. Our guys are on it as we speak."

              "If it means anything, he probably didn’t ingest anything. What I mean is, I kind of... tasted his breath."

              "Pardon?"

              "CPR. All I tasted was beer."

              After a moment, "That
is
helpful. Thank you, Madison."

              By this point, Detective Moore knew me well enough to know that my taste buds were a force to be reckoned with. My father always delighted showing me off in my teen years to his friends – how I could take a couple of sips of a brew and guess correctly which hops were used and all the corresponding malt flavors. Ingested poisons often leave discernable traces of themselves in the mouth and throat of the victim. If I said there was nothing else on that man's mouth except for beer, it was probably because there was nothing else there.

              We got off the phone in a hurry, without pleasantries.

              Then I made the mistake of flicking on the local news. By that point, the word had spread that Chef Eli Campbell was dead. The media, in a rare moment of wisdom, decided to leave out the word
murder
, opting instead to report that there was no known cause of death as of yet.

              The report then switched to interviews with witnesses, and would you know it, there was good old Joe Badger himself on camera, with the words "Master Brewer" under his name – a moniker no doubt of his own choosing – explaining to the viewing public that it had been he himself who administered CPR to the great chef, that the chef had personally said wonderful things about his beer, and that he had been looking forward to an enduring relationship with the chef after the competition, as Campbell had offered him an executive position based on his natural culinary ability.

              You could have taken his words, spread them over a garden, and grown a forest of redwoods.

              So I switched off the TV and sank into a chair. My cousin Tanya was working the late shift at Junior's Pizza. I had no one with whom to share my angst over this whole thing, for what was on my mind was one burning question: Who had anything to gain from Eli Campbell's death?

              The answer – which came after a half hour of ruminating the next day during my Sunday morning run – depressed me even more.

              If you're a lover of good beer, as I am, you may find it necessary to keep up a physical regimen in order to keep up the romance. Hence, I run. It helps to clear the brain, to get the fuzz out, which makes room for clearer thoughts. This probably sounds like a load of horse hockey, but it works for me and there's nothing anyone call tell me that would convince me otherwise.

              So there I was, headed back toward my car, sweaty and gross, slurping voraciously at my water bottle, when I thought about Eli Campbell.

              Eli Campbell insulted just about everyone he came into contact with that day. If it wasn't a comment about some poor soul's protruding belly or receding hairline, then it was some poor woman's bad hair day or her choice in footwear. Pamela Tweed was one such victim of the latter. She'd opted for wedgies on that fine summer day, a choice that seemed to infuriate Chef Campbell for some reason.

              "Darling," he'd said, "you don’t think flats would have been a better
ribbiting
choice? There's a lot of sand around here. It's like the
ribbiting
Gobi desert. I question the logic of anyone stupid enough to sport wedge heels in a place like this. And I know you’re not stupid, so just I'm
ribbiting
baffled."

              It left Pamela Tweed speechless, her mouth literally hanging open as she watched Campbell slink off to find his next victim.

              So I went over to her and told her that her shoes were fabulous, which they were.

              At least three of the homebrew contestants bore the brunt of his verbal assaults as well.

              If one could be pushed to impulsive murder on the grounds of such assault, it would be anyone who crossed paths with Eli Campbell that day.

              I didn’t like knowing that I could have shared a pleasantry or been rubbing shoulders with a murderer and not realized it.

              The thought wouldn’t leave me. I needed to weed him or her out. I needed to find out whom I was chatting nicely with that day that could have been harboring some terrible secret, if it was indeed someone at that event.

              I think what worried me even more was the fact that, when investigating a murder, detectives usually start with those in closest proximity to the body. That would be yours truly. I was innocent though, so why was I so nervous?

              I had no answer to that. Maybe it was because I
had been
so close.

              For me, the thing to do next was to find out who benefitted from Campbell's death, and that meant having to dig.

#

              "How do you find out about a will?" I asked Mitch the Mailman.

              We were in the process of converting our tasting room into an official bar. That process, I found out, involved enough red tape to mummify the Statue of Liberty with enough left over to tie a bow on her head. So in the meantime, we had our usual tasting room, which was gorgeous with oak tables and shiny taps and smelled of fresh wood. And we had our regular, Mitch the Mailman, who came for the flights and a pint or two, as if this was a regular bar and he was our sole patron.

              I was Mitch's only friend. No one else could stand him. I honestly don’t know why I liked him. He was a thoroughly distasteful human being, but he had, underneath it all, a kind of tortured soul that could only be healed by years of nonstop hugging. He wasn't like Eli Campbell, who seemed to enjoy belittling people. Mitch just wanted life to be perfect, and it wasn't. Normal folks can usually deal with that sad fact and get on as if all is well all the time. Mitch couldn't. Call it a birth defect.

              But once you scootched aside all the annoying aspects of his personality, there was a wealth of information there that rivalled Google, the Encyclopedia Britannica, and that weird Jeopardy contestant who won, like, hundreds of thousands of dollars and was celebrated despite the fact that everyone hated him.

              "There's a problem there," he said, taking a sip from a Darby's IPA that was second in a flight of five he had in front of him.

              "Explain," I said, elbows on the bar.

              "Well – by the way, did you mess with the hop schedule in this? Because it's awful."

              "We dry hopped it with Simcoe hops instead of the usual."

              "Bad decision. Change it back. Where was I?"

              There was nothing to like about Mitch – I loved him anyway.

              "You were about to tell me how I can find out details about Eli Campbell's will."

              "Yeah, that. There's a problem. Depends on the state, but most likely you would have to be a beneficiary to have a look at it."

              "How would I know I was a beneficiary if I didn’t look at the will?"

              He raised a finger. "Aye, there's the rub. Basically, you call the probate office and ask them if you're a beneficiary. If you are, congratulations, you just won a copy of the will. If not, better luck next time."

              "What probate office?"

              "If it's even been handed over to a probate office."

              "And if it hasn't?"

              "You ask the executor for a copy. He's listed on the death certificate."

              "And if it
has
gone to probate?"

              "You have to find out which one. Should be the one located in Campbell's home town."

              "Which was...?"

              "What do I look like? People Magazine?"

              "Oh, forgive me. You're this alien savant that knows every scrap of trivia about everything. I didn’t realize you had a weak spot."

              "Just pour me a pint of maple porter."

              "Spit in it or not?"

              "Your choice."

#

              I took the day off early. You ever go to the dentist and they plop one of those lead sheets on top of you? I kind of felt like that. This invisible lead sheet plopped on top of me. Having this guy keel over next to me left a strange, lasting impression.

              I had the house to myself, so in my quiet solitude I looked up a bunch of information about Eli Campbell. He came from a relatively privileged background. Parents were prominent hotel owners in Scotland and England. Little Eli was shuffled around a lot during his formative years due to his parents taking extended vacations around the world, either with little Eli in tow or by themselves. Whichever the case, the boy was either placed in the care of a nanny at home or placed in her care on the road. Sometimes it was a team of nannies. The point here is that little Eli Campbell had no real grounding in any sort of stable childhood, and his parents paid no attention to him whatsoever. I'm not saying that one doesn’t make his own choices in life on how to deal with the bad hand one has been dealt, but reading about Campbell's upbringing sort of made me understand a little bit why he was such a colossal jerk to everyone.

              Falling into an internet hole is never a truly pleasant experience. Here I was, Googling for what seemed like an hour, reading about Eli Campbell and following link after link to gossip blogs, show archives, and interview clips. These last bits were my favorite, offering a glimpse into the real Campbell – for even when he was being obviously phony for the cameras, sometimes it's in what a person
isn’t
saying that reveals the most about him. Like for instance, when asked if there would ever be a Mrs. Eli Campbell, the ginger-haired chef looked straight into the camera and said, "If you're out there, love, I feel sorry for you already."

              Then, I stumbled across a fundamental law of internet research: If you Google long enough, eventually you'll find something of use. Here was a five-minute YouTube clip of a Today Show interview Campbell did not more than three years ago.

              "If there's one thing I care about these days, it's the education of our nation's children."—Campbell became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1994—"That's why I make it a point to sponsor the National Reading Education Foundation for Children, the NREFFC, by holding a charity cook-off. This year it's being held in our beautiful city of Philadelphia..."

              And so it went, with the interviewer gushing over Campbell's supposed humanitarianism.

              I say "supposed" because the cynical portion of my brain, which comprises no less than ninety percent of the interior of my cranium, wanted to think that Campbell's acts of charity were nothing more than a combination tax dodge and savvy PR move. What better way to counterbalance his reputation as a mean-spirited sonofalizard than to perform some selfless act of charity? And if such an act could save you thousands every year, so much the better.

              But remember that it was in was he didn’t say that revealed the most.              

              "I believe books can be our salvation. I used to read on long trips when I was a boy. Those books were certainly my salvation."

              There was something in Eli Campbell's eye when he said this that made me think that somewhere inside, there was a hurt little boy who never had the benefit of a stable upbringing or traditional education. A boy who learned most of what he knew by reading on long trips to God-knows-where and applying that knowledge by observing how people interacted outside of himself, while he endured interminable bouts of loneliness.

              I shut down the computer, disliking Eli Campbell a little less, maybe even liking him a little bit. I loved what he said about books. I can relate. For me, many a lonely hour was always made a tiny bit more bearable by a good book. Still is.

              And so I fetched my cell phone and made a call, making a mental note to thank Mitch the Mailman with a pint on the house the next time he stopped in – if he didn't annoy me first.

              "Yes," I began, "this is Molly Nelson of the National Reading Education Foundation for Children; I believe our organization may be listed as a beneficiary on the late Eli Campbell's will. Would there be any way I could come and pick up a copy of the will?"