Treacherous Toys (25 page)

“Kind of like the height chart they use at fast-food places to help ID robbers?” I guessed.

“Exactly. We might be able to determine a few other things, too.” Chase smiled at Nick. “Are you up for it?”

Nick nodded. “Anything to help Mom.”

Christine agreed, reluctantly, to take the other children back to the apartment in the manor house where they were staying. We all knew it would be easier for Nick to concentrate on trying to come up with more details about the killer if the other kids weren’t there.

Maybe I should’ve volunteered to take them so she could go with Nick and Chase, but I felt that the kids needed to be with her. I knew she felt the same way. She was worried about Nick, but she also knew he was in good hands.

I was relieved that Nick and Jolly hadn’t done anything worse than move some evidence and push Harry down the stairs. That was bad enough, but at least it wasn’t the next step up—which was how I viewed Harry getting stabbed.

“If Jolly and Nick aren’t responsible for what happened to Harry last night,” I asked Chase, “who do you think is? What did he say to you when you talked to him?”

“Not much. He was kind of fuzzy about the whole thing. He didn’t see anything, didn’t hear anything. The next thing he knew, there was a paring knife in his back.”

We were standing outside the door to the workshop where Chris had been killed, waiting for Paul Miller to join us. The police had padlocked the door to be sure no one went inside. He had the key.

Chase had already called Detective Almond. He couldn’t be there until later that day. It wasn’t going to be any fun for the kids or the rest of us when he talked to Nick and Jolly. There would definitely be consequences for their actions. I just hoped he wasn’t too hard on them, considering all they’d been through.

It started raining as Paul Miller arrived. He was in a red
vendor’s costume and was pushing a pretzel cart. He smiled and shook Chase’s hand. I ignored him when he tried to be friendly with me. I didn’t trust him.

“So you say this young man has some information pertaining to the case?” He ignored me in return and talked to Chase, ruffling Nick’s dark hair with his hand. “How will it benefit us to go in and disturb the crime scene?”

Chase explained that Nick had seen the killer. “I thought if he went back inside we might be able to pick up on more details. If we know the killer’s height, at least, that would give us something more to go on.”

Miller shrugged. The rain had begun falling harder, chasing visitors and residents into shops and restaurants. Most visitors would wait to see if the sun would come back out. Tickets weren’t refundable because of bad weather. No one wanted to go halfway through the Village and have to leave. It was too expensive and annoying.

“I think that’s possible,” he finally said. “Detective Almond called me. He said to let you have some leeway on this.”

“Thanks,” Chase said. “Can we get out of the rain now?”

Miller opened the door with the key on his rope belt. I was surprised to see that he was carrying a small gun in his costume, too. I would’ve thought, since there were a lot of children and other people who could get hurt, that a gun wouldn’t be allowed.

“Looking at my gun, Jessie?” he asked. “It’s loaded, too. I won’t give the killer a chance when I finally meet him.”

“It’s possible the killer is a woman,” Chase said.

“That doesn’t matter.” Miller smiled at me. “The female of the species is more deadly than the male. Ever heard that, Jessie?”

I didn’t answer—but I did wonder why he was so weird.
As soon as the door was open, I followed Chase inside as quickly as I could. I didn’t want to be alone with Miller any longer than I had to be.

“Try not to touch anything,” Miller said. “And be careful you don’t walk on the chalk outline where the dead man was lying.”

I saw Nick wince at his words and I turned on the man despite my best efforts not to talk to him. “This is traumatic enough for this boy. A little tact would be nice. Or don’t they teach basic humanity in police school?”

Miller kind of chuckled, but he also stood by the door and didn’t say anything else stupid, at least for a few minutes.

Chase put his arm around Nick’s shoulders. “Show me exactly what happened and where you were.”

I stayed off to one side, not wanting to get in the way. Nick showed Chase where he’d stood at the bottom of the stairs when he’d first come down.

“I was right here the whole time. I think she couldn’t see me because the big lights in the ceiling weren’t on. Dad liked to work with just a lamp on near the toy. He didn’t like bright lights. He said they hurt his eyes.”

“Okay, Nick,” Chase said. “I’m going to come over here and sit where your father was sitting. Jessie is going to come in the door and be the woman you saw. Okay? You’re doing great so far.”

“Okay,” Nick agreed.

“You tell us if we do something different than what you saw,” Chase told him. “Don’t be afraid to speak up. This could be very important.”

I went to the door while Chase went and sat down at the table beside the chalk mark on the floor. Chase picked up a toy and turned on the lamp beside him. He looked down at the toy as though he were trying to work on it.

I walked in as I thought the killer might have done. I didn’t act out holding a gun or anything since Nick hadn’t described her doing that. I approached Chase slowly from behind and then used my fingers to pretend to shoot him in the back of the head.

The whole time, Nick hadn’t said a word. I looked at him and tears were streaming down his face. Despite my role as the killer, I rushed over to him and hugged him. “It’s okay. It’s not for real.”

“I know.” He sniffed. “But it was a lot like the real time.”

“How was Jessie’s height compared to what you saw?” Chase asked despite Nick’s tears. “Do you need her to stand near me again?”

“Chase!” I hissed. “He’s very upset. I think this could wait.”

“He’ll feel better when we catch the killer,” Miller joined in. “Was she about Jessie’s height?”

“No. She was much shorter. And even in the big dress, Jessie is skinnier,” Nick said. “She was wearing black gloves, too. And I think I was wrong. I think she put her head by Dad’s and said something before she shot him. I couldn’t hear what she said. I guess she was whispering.”

“Let’s try it that way,” Chase said.

It seemed a little relentless to me to put Nick through that again. I knew we needed to find the killer, but he was just a boy who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“Maybe we should wait.” I tried to give Chase a look that might help explain my reasoning. Maybe it was the shadows in the room, but he didn’t seem to get my message. In his way, he was as relentless as Miller.

“There won’t be a better time,” Chase said. “The longer we wait, the less he’ll remember. He’d already almost forgotten that the killer talked to Chris before she killed him.”

I had to agree with that, though looking at Nick’s face made me sorry Christine hadn’t come instead of me. I left my arms around Nick and asked, “Are you okay with this? If not, I don’t care what those bullies say, we’ll quit.”

“It’s okay, Jessie.” He wiped his eyes. “I want to help. I’m the only one who knows what happened.”

Except the killer.
“Okay. Let’s try it one more time.”

This time, as Chase pretended to work, I came up behind him and lowered my head to his, whispering, “How can you be so mean to this poor boy? I didn’t know you were that kind of person.”

And I got a strange satisfaction from pretend-shooting him again, even adding a gunfire sound effect, like one from a cartoon.

Chase looked at Nick. “Was it like that?”

“Yes. Except she didn’t have to lean down as far. And she moved her head away before she shot him.”

“So he knew the killer,” Chase surmised. “She spoke to him. He was familiar enough with her not to get up right away or turn around.”

“He should’ve,” I muttered. “Maybe he’d still be alive.”

“Good exercise, people,” Miller said. “We might have to go through this again for Detective Almond. But I think we’ve learned something here. Good job.”

Miller unlocked the door that led from the workshop to the upper floors of the manor house, and Chase, Nick, and I went upstairs to the apartment where Christine and the kids were staying. Miller left through the outside door, locking it behind him.

A strong rumble of thunder shook the house around us. It looked as though the bad weather was settling in for the remainder of the day. Rain pounded on the rooftop and
blew against the windows. Most visitors weren’t going to wait this out.

We walked into the living room, surprised to find Detective Almond already with the rest of the family. They were all eating Christmas cookies and drinking eggnog.

“I thought he couldn’t make it until later,” I whispered to Chase.

“He knew this was an important development,” he said. “And I’m sorry if I seemed heartless downstairs. But what we found out could be really important. Just think—if we clear Christine’s name, she’s out of jail and gets the money from the insurance policy. That seemed worth a little discomfort for Nick. Don’t you think?”

A knock on the front door had Merry Beth scrambling to answer it. It was Miller again. It would’ve been nice not to see him for a while.

“Great! Cookies and nog. Just what we need on a stormy day like this.”

A
n almost festive air permeated the discussion that followed even though it was about Chris’s death. Christine had sent the children, including Nick, to their rooms. I felt sure they were listening anyway. That was why they were so well-informed.

“Tell me how the role-playing went.” Detective Almond sat next to the Christmas tree, which was covered with twinkling lights and shiny ornaments. “Find out anything we could use?”

Chase didn’t say anything. He let Miller take the credit for the idea and act as if he’d actually participated in some way other than being mean to Nick.

“Sounds promising,” Detective Almond commented as he ate a cookie. “Any thoughts, Manhattan? This is your show after all.”

I was surprised that he was perceptive enough to realize that Chase had been taking the backseat.

“One thing we discussed before our reenactment with Nick downstairs is that there’s no way of knowing for sure if the killer was a man or a woman.” Chase reiterated what we’d talked about earlier. Miller hadn’t thought of that. “Everyone here is good at role-playing. Any one of them could’ve dressed up like a man or a woman.”

“I get it,” Detective Almond said. “But did we get an approximate height and weight?”

“Maybe between five-six and five-nine. Thicker in the waist than Jessie,” Chase said.

“How did you come up with that, the part about the waist?” Miller asked.

“The only place you can really tell a body-size difference is in the waist,” I explained. “The rest of it is hidden by the big skirt. And don’t forget, the killer was wearing a large black veil.”

“But the part about her putting her head near his and whispering something,” Miller interjected. “That sounds like something a girl would do.”

A girl?
The man was a complete loser.

“It does seem like a feminine gesture,” Detective Almond agreed as he wrote in his stained notebook. “Any ideas about a woman who could have a grudge against your husband and lives close by, Mrs. Christmas?”

Christine got to her feet. “I don’t know. I’ve already told you that Chris was indiscreet. I know I was, too, but only on this one occasion. There have been women in the past who were angry when I had him break it off. He always left them when I told him to. He didn’t want us to break up, you know. He just got…bored sometimes.”

“What about the guy in the castle who was your lover?” Miller asked. “Any chance he has a nice black dress and wanted you for himself?”

“He’s got an alibi for our time frame,” Detective Almond said. “Otherwise I’d like him for this, too. If he’d wear that silly outfit as king, he’d certainly wear a dress to disguise himself.”

“What about Chris’s first wife, Alice?” I asked.

“What about her?” Detective Almond faced me. “Any idea where she is? Do we know if she’s in the Village?”

“No. But she could still be here, or she could’ve come back after they split up.”

Chase shook his head. “I checked when you mentioned her, Jessie. There’s no one named Alice working here.”

“She could be using another name.”

“Would that be on the off chance that her ex-husband would show up so she could kill him?” Detective Almond sounded dubious. “That seems like a long shot after all this time.”

“What about Queen Olivia?” Christine wondered aloud. “She was here when Chris and Alice left the Village. She had an affair with him. And we came at her personal invitation. If I had known that she and Chris had an affair, I would never have come. But he didn’t tell me until we got here. He didn’t think it was important.”

“She’s a little pregnant to be going around shooting people, isn’t she?” I pointed out.

But Detective Almond seemed to like Olivia as a suspect. “Maybe that explains what happened to the king, too,” he said. “Maybe she just got fed up with everyone fooling around.”