White Elephant Dead (10 page)

Max looked at his watch. “I’ll spot you an hour. Okay?”

September is still T-shirt and shorts season on the sea islands. Annie picked a navy top, navy shorts, navy sneakers. It took a minute—she kept checking her watch—to find the particular hat she wanted, a wide-brimmed straw with pink ties. She put her hair up in a ponytail, put the hat on, pulled down the brim, tied the ribbons beneath her chin and added oversize sunglasses, an old pair of Max’s.

Dorothy L. rollicked into the bedroom, then jumped sideways, her tail puffing.

“Thank you, Dorothy L.” Annie glanced in the mirror. She was definitely generic tourist. Maybe Max’s plan was going to be easy after all.

In the kitchen, she pulled the gardening gloves out of the miscellaneous drawer and turned to the album, still lying casually on the counter. She found a brown paper sack beneath the sink, dropped the album into it.

In the garage, she placed the sack in her bike basket, punched the garage door opener and swung onto her seat.

Max buzzed for Barb.

In a second she skidded to a stop beside his desk. “Max, I’m picking up some stuff about Miriam Gardner, credit card history, that kind of thing. But it all starts about five years ago. I can’t find anything earlier than that.”

“That’s okay. Barb, I’d appreciate it if you’d take a break, walk down to the harbor. There’s a pay phone near the
bandstand. Wait until no one’s paying any attention to you, then call here. Disguise your voice. Okay?”

Not even Evelyn E. Smith’s Miss Susan Melville could have shown more aplomb. “Sure thing.” She turned and sauntered out.

And Hercule Poirot thought he had a gem in Miss Lemon.

B
icyclists, both tourist and native, were a common sight on the island. Annie was so confident of her disguise that she waved hello as she encountered cyclists in the forest preserve. In the morning sun, the preserve seemed cheerful and welcoming and she was glad to note that the occasional alligator rested somnolently on lagoon banks, not the path. Once out of the preserve, she pedaled faster. No one paid any attention as she rode past the church and turned onto the dusty road that ended just past Kathryn Girard’s shop. She rounded the bend. It was quiet except for the chirrup of birds and the rustle of the live oak leaves in the light breeze. There was no car parked in front of the store.

But other people had bikes, too.

Annie hugged the edge of the road, keeping in the shade of a line of loblolly pines. She paused at the edge of the clearing, looking for the best place to leave her bike, finally choosing a willow opposite the back door. She slid the bike deep within the long hanging fronds.

Tucking her sack with the album under one arm, she gathered a handful of pine cones. She threw one hard against the back door, then, clinging to the shade, she moved alongside the store and tossed two cones at a second-floor window. Finally, a careful distance from the front steps and poised to sprint for the forest, she slammed three cones against the front door.

She glanced at her watch. Twenty-eight minutes of her hour was gone. It should only take her a minute to achieve her goal. Her sack firmly in hand, Annie hurried up the creaky steps. Last night, they’d found the front door unlocked and been grateful for their ease of entry. Annie’s gloved hand slipped a little on the brass doorknob, but the handle moved. She stepped inside and wished she had a better temperament for this sort of thing. Her ears buzzed and her heart thudded. Linda Barnes’s Carlotta Carlyle never seemed to breathe heavily in scary situations.

Annie hurried down the center aisle, ignoring the ricky-ticky furniture and chipped dishes that looked even tackier in the morning light. On the stairs, she paused to listen before thudding up the steps. On the landing, she froze. Last night, Max had shut the door to Kathryn’s apartment as they left. Now it was ajar.

A cat?

She’d watched Max tug on the knob.

Cats were smart, but the last she knew not even Rita Mae Brown’s gifted Sneaky Pie opened doors. Besides, what she’d learned to date of Kathryn Girard didn’t suggest a woman who would love an animal.

Annie’s foot gingerly poked out, a pale imitation of Max’s lunge the night before. But she’d never pictured herself as 007. Her heroines were Julie Smith’s Rebecca Schwartz and Sarah Shankman’s Sam Adams, brains and humor over brawn.

The door swung open. Annie edged into the room. Last night she’d felt chilled by the remorseless anonymity. Now she stood still and tense, her gaze traveling over the sham
bles of the opened, upended and emptied suitcase, briefcase and carry-on, clothes flung and twisted, papers crumpled, bank statements thrown. The single lamp lay on the floor, the shade crumpled, the bulbs broken. Flung down, then kicked.

Annie wanted out. The room exuded malevolence, the basic bare ugliness overlaid now by violent anger. She opened the sack, pulled out the album. But maybe the disorder was useful. Just to give Chief Garrett a little help, she opened the album and draped the pages over the edge of the emptied suitcase. Then, with a little shrug, she lifted up a plastic flap and moved the photo to expose one end of a thousand-dollar bill.

Short of marking the album with an X, Annie didn’t know any better way to—

Her thought was interrupted as outside a car door slammed.

“Confidential Commissions.” Max cradled the receiver between his chin and neck and waggled his putter. A man couldn’t spend every minute working. Annie had given him the putting rug and it was his duty to appreciate such a thoughtful gift. He sighted, swung. The ball dribbled off the green onto the wooden floor.

“This is an anonymous call.” The whisper was very artistic, giving no hint to the sex of the speaker.

“Really! As Reggie Fortune would say, ‘Oh, my aunt!’” Max raked the golf ball back onto the green. “Tell me something really fascinating, such as how many steps around the sundial before I should start digging. Or perhaps you have a secret formula sought by super agents from around the world.” Max gently putted. This time the ball spurted across the green, skimmed over the cup and ricocheted off his desk.

“At midnight”—the whisper was vigorous—“Count Antoine will meet you behind the fifth crypt in the haunted cemetery on Hangman’s Lane.”

“Cool,” Max marveled. “Would you ask him to send Lady Alicia instead?”

A snort of very familiar laughter was quickly smothered. But Max would have no need to report that part of the conversation.

“Hist! The fog rolls in. Footsteps approach. I must flee.” The connection was broken.

Max nudged the ball into the hole with his toe and checked his watch. Good. It was time to visit the Broward’s Rock Police Station.

Downstairs the front door creaked open.

Annie looked wildly around the littered room. She stared at the door—still ajar; why hadn’t she shut it behind her?—which led to the only means of escape, the stairs leading down into the store.

Frantically she turned and hurried toward the bedroom, knowing she was burrowing ever deeper into the trap. She tiptoed past the clumps of Kathryn Girard’s belongings, pushed past the bedroom door.

Under the bed?

Soft footsteps sounded on the stairs.

Annie stared at the bed. If she rolled beneath it, she would truly be trapped. So far, everyone who came to this apartment seemed to be looking for something. So, not under the bed.

Annie ran lightly toward the closet, her heart hammering. At the last minute, she whirled and plunged toward the bathroom. Bathroom doors lock. Once within, she closed the door, twisted the lock, an old-fashioned lock.

In the mirror over the lavatory, Annie looked at her reflection and for a minute felt as unsettled as Dorothy L. by the straw hat with its pink ties and the oversize men’s sunglasses and the hands hidden by bulky cotton gardening gloves. She looked for a weapon. The towel racks were wooden dowels in ceramic holders. Annie pulled. No give at all. She looked up at the shower curtain. She would need
a screwdriver to loosen the rod. She opened the bathroom cabinet. No handy screwdriver. Or machete. Or anything that could offer any kind of defense. Finally, she reached behind the toilet and picked up the plunger. On a scale of one to ten, it maybe came in at one-half. But she could at least poke an assailant. Face or gut? Whichever she could manage the most quickly.

Through the thin door, she heard the muffled sounds of search and the footsteps growing ever nearer.

It came finally, the twist of the knob, another twist, then a rattle. They stood on opposite sides of the door, Annie and the unknown searcher.

Then, maybe because she was so scared, maybe because she was beginning to feel like a miner in a blocked shaft, Annie hefted the plunger and beat the hell out of the door with the wooden end.

The Broward’s Rock Police Station overlooked the Sound, a half block from the ferry dock. The cinder-block station was painted a soft cream. Max pushed inside, welcoming the blast of air-conditioning.

Mavis Cameron looked up from her computer behind a counter. Her hair, now a natural glossy brown, fell in soft waves. Her face, which had been so gaunt and strained when Annie and Max first met her, was fuller now and she flashed a quick, bright smile at Max. Her eyes still had a haunted quality that happy years of marriage to Billy had not quite erased.

“Hi, Mavis. How’s Kevin?” He’d been a toddler when they first met and was now a stocky eight-year-old who loved to play soccer with his mom and go fishing with his stepfather.

She pushed back her chair, came to the counter. “He’s great.” She glanced toward the closed door and the frosted glass marked
CHIEF
. Her voice dropped. “Max, have you found out anything to help Henny?”

“Things are happening. Will you check with Chief Gar
rett, tell him I’ve got some information that may be helpful?” Max grinned. “Some stuff that just happened to come my way.”

“A little bird told you,” Mavis said with a wink. “Sure.” She started to turn, then hesitated, swung around and whispered, “Max, he’s just a kid—”

Mavis was maybe a couple of years older than the new chief, but she’d escaped a brutal marriage, snatched her baby and run.

“—give him some slack, if you can.”

Mavis tapped on the door, opened it. “Chief, Max Darling wondered if he could talk to you for a minute.”

Garrett might be young, but he apparently was quickly learning the identity of the town movers and shakers. He came around his desk, hand outstretched as Max entered. His round face sported a smile, but his eyes were wary and defensive. “I was talking to the mayor this morning. He told me you and your wife are outstanding members of the community.” Garrett pulled a straight chair from the wall, positioned it carefully to afford a great view of the Sound.

“We try,” Max said cheerfully, settling comfortably into the chair.

Garrett sat behind his desk. He added stiffly, “As is Mrs. Brawley.”

Max knew capitulation when he saw it. But it never hurt to help a man save face. Max had read enough of John P. Marquand’s Mr. Moto to understand the importance of social niceties. “Oh, Annie and I understood your plan right from the first. I hope we played our parts well enough,” he said earnestly. “It’s very clever of you.”

Garrett managed not to look too bewildered.

“It’s truly brilliant”—Max’s tone was admiring—“making everyone think Henny Brawley is the suspect while you figure out”—he spoke slowly, distinctly—“who Kathryn Girard was and why someone killed her. From what everyone says, Kathryn was a real loner. Anyway, you’re doing a great job and I may have some information to help. Of
course, I know anonymous calls are always suspect, but the minute I got this one, I thought you ought to know about it.” Only an Irish setter gazing at the sunset could have looked more noble.

Garrett yanked a pad out of his desk drawer. “Anonymous call? In reference to Girard? When? What was said?”

Max reached in his jacket pocket for a small notebook. He flipped it open, frowned at the page. He looked up apologetically. “I want to get it just right. Let’s see. Time: Nine-seventeen this morning. An unidentifiable voice.” He looked up at Garrett. “A husky whisper. Couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman. The call lasted”—Max checked his notes again—“thirty-six seconds. First, the caller said, ‘I want to speak to Max Darling.’ And—”

Garrett moved impatiently in his chair.

“—I said I was Max Darling. Then the caller said, ‘Are you the blond guy who was helping look for Henny Brawley last night?’ I said I was. The caller said, ‘She’s an innocent victim. You’d better put a double guard on her at the hospital to keep her safe. As for Kathryn Girard, nobody knows the truth about her. Don’t let the bitch get away with it. Look for the money in Kathryn Girard’s apartment.’ I tried to ask who was calling, but the caller hung up.”

Garrett scratched notes. “How about background noise? Any hint where the person called from?”

Max looked thoughtful. “There was a kind of squeaking noise. It might have been seagulls.”

Garrett wrote down,
Seagulls
. He tapped his pen on his pad. “Man? Woman? Think about the tone, the pitch.”

Max turned his hands palms up. “A whisper, Chief. That’s all I know.”

“Name’s Pete.” Garrett studied his notes. “It may be a hoax, somebody wants to see the cops hurry over to the woman’s place. But”—he pushed back his chair—“can’t do any harm to check. I’ll get Mr. Parotti to let us in. He’s been real cooperative.”

Max stood, too. He started to turn away, then, resisting
his impulse to clap himself dramatically on the forehead (shades of the old days when he played Mortimer Brewster in
Arsenic and Old Lace
), Max jerked to a stop. “Almost forgot. My wife found this”—Max pulled the now much rumpled note card from his pocket—“in Henny Brawley’s pocket. At the hospital last night, they gave Henny’s clothes to Annie, said they didn’t have anyplace to keep them in the ICU. And the new addresses are in Kathryn Girard’s handwriting,” Max said carelessly. “Annie had seen her writing at the clubhouse. Anyway, we figured those had to be the houses Kathryn went to last night and we thought you’d like to know.”

Garrett reached for the sheet, looking like a river otter ready to belly-slide into the water for a succulent turtle.

Max smiled pleasantly. “Hope some of this is helpful. And Chief—Pete—we’ll let you know if we hear anything else useful.”

The silence reminded Annie unpleasantly of an overgrown cemetery she’d once visited, the stones tilted and broken, the old mausoleum almost hidden beneath a growth of fragrant wisteria. The silence pulsed with a heavy, waiting, guarded quality.

Annie looked at her watch. Her hour was up. Actually, she was five minutes past. If Max’s mission had succeeded, Chief Garrett should arrive any minute. How long would it take from the police station? Three minutes? Four? Was his car pulling out of the oyster-shell lot while she stood, waiting, the plunger in her hand?

A car motor roared.

Annie twisted the lock and this time 007 would have been proud. Yanking back the door, she burst out of the bathroom, plunger whistling like a samurai sword. She skidded to a stop in the middle of the living room. No one waited to attack her.

The sound of the car was fading. Annie ran to the window overlooking the road, but all she saw was a swirl of
dust. Without pausing, she turned and ran to the stairs and pounded down the steps.

The searcher was gone, but Garrett was coming. She loosed the chain to the back door and turned the knob.

A car door slammed. The sound came from the front of the store. Annie closed the back door as the front door opened. Edging along the back wall, she craned her neck, checked around the corner, saw no one and sprinted for the weeping willow.