Strangled Prose Read online

  “Will you tell me why you ran from me, Inez?” I asked gently. Deviously, but gently. I would have patted her shoulder if I could have kept up with her at the same time, but I needed my last bit of energy to climb the hill.

  Inez shrugged but remained silent. We arrived at my car without further discussion. The Mercedes had disappeared. I put Inez in, went around, and climbed into the driver’s side. Inez’s behavior earlier mystified me. I was not, after all, a truant officer with a net. The girl had spent a goodly portion of her adolescence in my living room; she was not usually terrified by my attractive face and kindly demeanor.

  “Did Caron say anything about why she refused to go to the funeral?” I persisted as we pulled away from the cemetery. There were about twelve blocks to manipulate the conversation. I unobtrusively slowed to a steady ten miles per hour.

  “No. She just doesn’t want to talk to me anymore. She thinks I’ll tell the police what we did Sunday—” Inez slapped her hand over her mouth and ducked her head, but I had seen the look of terror flash across her face.

  “What would you tell the police?” I steeled myself not to overreact, despite the sudden icy clutch of fear in my stomach. “You and Caron aren’t exactly juvenile delinquents, after all. The police aren’t interested in silly pranks.” Dear God, let her giggle, I added to myself. An exercise in futility.

  “I can’t tell you,” Inez groaned.

  “You and Caron saw something Sunday?” I watched her out of the corner of my eye as I tried to make sense of her chopped sentence. It took only a block, but by now I had slowed to a turtlish creep. “Inez, does this have anything to do with Mildred Twiller’s murder?”

  “Not really, but Caron said—never mind, Mrs. Malloy.”

  She folded herself up and refused to speak, in spite of my barrage of pleas and dark threats. I dropped her off at school, watched until she was safely through the door, and then, my fingers white on the steering wheel, drove home.

  EIGHT

  I sat on the sofa and brooded for a long time. Mildred murdered by someone I might know. My erstwhile lover with a decidedly ugly blot on his record. My daughter withholding information from the police. Most likely the information had nothing to do with high school pranks or library fines. As distasteful as it was, I had to admit that Caron might know something about Mildred’s death. It was one thing to hope I wouldn’t be imprisoned for the crime; I certainly wasn’t going to allow it to happen to my offspring, in spite of her proclivity for melodrama.

  It seemed like the moment had come to stop wandering about aimlessly, motivated by nothing more than vague curiosity. Neither Inez nor Caron was apt to tell me whatever they felt was so vital, but perhaps I could find out myself. One step ahead of Lieutenant Peter Rosen, who might not feel the stirrings of maternal instincts.

  I went into Caron’s room to see if the Azalea series had indeed been discarded. The designated bookshelf, normally decorated with scented candles and plastic flowers, was empty. It had even been dusted, which was not only a miracle but also an act completely alien to her character. Caron is not a sanitary soul; she could scrape up the material under her bed and submit it as a science project. And win a blue ribbon.

  I found the books in the trash can in the kitchen. Delicately digging through the damp coffee grounds, I took the books out, wiped them off with a paper towel, and spread them across the kitchen table. There were twelve, but the final opus, Professor of Passion, was not among them.

  I left them and went to my bedroom. My copy, still half-read, was on the bedside table. Derek glinted at me, but I put my mug on his face and sat down on the bed. This copy had come from the carton behind the counter. The one I had purchased, complete with purple flourish, had vanished sometime during the reception. Not a tragedy of any magnitude, but annoying.

  Almost everyone at the reception had bought one of them, peer pressure being as potent in academic circles as it is in junior high schools. There had been one on my desk at one point, I remembered with a frown, but it too had vanished. I wondered if there was any way to count up the copies that had been sold—or if there was any reason to do so.

  A peculiar thought entered the mental muddle. I had been honored with the first copy of the damn thing, and everyone who came into the Book Depot had been awarded a similar honor. But Maggie Holland had been clutching a copy as she marched across the sidewalk at the head of the demonstrators. Minutes later she had stormed in to take the center ring. Where had she gotten her copy?

  Nancy Drew did not garner fame by sitting on her bed wrinkling her forehead. I went downstairs and knocked on Maggie’s door. I was gratified to hear footsteps cross the living room. The door opened to a cautious slit.

  “Claire.” Not a warm welcome, but she did get the name out without visible agony.

  “Hello, Maggie,” I said as I nudged her aside and went into the living room. “I didn’t see you at the funeral this morning.”

  “I wasn’t there.” Maggie closed the door and leaned against it, watching me with a pinched expression. She was dressed in her typical array of army surplus, bargain basement, and rummage sale. Politically correct, I presumed, but a bit baggy. Khaki was not her color. It tended to clash with her sporadic splotches.

  “I would have thought propriety demanded your presence, what with Douglas destined to head the department and all,” I said. I dug my heels into the carpet and ordered my feet to sprout roots.

  “I submitted my resignation this morning. It seems the regents met last night to discuss the potential threat to Farber’s pristine reputation. The dean called afterward to suggest I slip away quietly.”

  “Oh, Maggie, I’m sorry,” I murmured. “I suppose that Mildred’s book has done a lot of damage to us all. Farber is not the most liberal of liberal arts schools, but don’t you think you could—”

  “What do you want, Claire? I’m in the middle of packing, and I need to make some copies of my résumé to send off before the gossip seeps across the western hemisphere. At this point I’m praying for a backwater junior college to at least read my résumé.”

  She spoke softly, but there was a venomous edge to her voice that hinted at impending fury. I decided to push on before the fireworks started—and someone got burned.

  “I wanted to ask you a question.”

  “The question being: Did I strangle Mildred Twiller? No, I’m sorry to say that I didn’t have the opportunity. If I had been there, who knows what I might have done.” She looked at her taut fingers.

  “No, of course not, Maggie,” I said hastily. “I was wondering where you found your copy of that—that nasty book? It occurred to me that you never came into the Book Depot to buy one, and I didn’t notice anyone leaving once the champagne fountain started to bubble.”

  “I told that policeman about it. An anonymous donor.”

  “That’s odd, Maggie. The books came in cartons, and they weren’t opened until Mildred arranged a display. Who could have sent you the copy?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “I don’t know.” I didn’t, for that matter.

  Maggie glowered, visibly battling with herself to remain under control. “I have no idea who sent me that book, but if I ever find out, I’ll gladly tell you. Perhaps I can send you a postcard from my new post in Greenland, if I’m lucky enough to find one there or anyplace else. Good-bye, Claire.”

  I obediently edged toward the door. “Did it come in the mail?”

  “It appeared in my mailbox Sunday about noon, in a plain brown wrapper. Unmarked.” She reached for the doorknob. “Good-bye.”

  I stopped in the doorway. “Where’s your copy now?”

  “I considered having it bronzed, but changed my mind. I don’t know where it is—and I really don’t care. Look around your store for it if you want a souvenir of my swan dive into academic obscurity.” A hand shoved me into the hall, and the door slammed inches from my nose. My hair fluttered in the breeze.

  I stood in the foyer f
or a moment, chewing on my lip as I tried to visualize the scene at the reception once Maggie had finished her selected readings. Mildred’s exit, the expectant faces awaiting bloodshed, the awful confrontation with Douglas … Maggie had come up behind me to bellow at Douglas—and had shoved the book at him.

  Seconds later he had gone to my office to call Mildred to see if she had arrived home safely. Maggie’s copy, ergo, was the one left on my desk. Then, undoubtedly influenced by the human conduct that seemed prevalent that day, it had vanished. But my office is not the most organized place; perhaps the book had fallen on the floor and had been kicked under something or into a corner. It might be there, and it might have some clue to its origin.

  And it might not be worth a Confederate dollar, I warned myself as I went upstairs to get my purse and keys. The Book Depot was officially closed for the day in a gesture of respect. However, that was no reason not to slip in and hunt for Maggie’s copy of Professor of Passion. It was preferable to sitting on the sofa worrying about Caron’s foray into felony.

  I hurried down Thurber Street and let myself in the store. Sunlight spilled into the front room but left in a huff when I closed and locked the door behind me. The building had few windows, and the ones it did have were too high to be cleaned more than once a year. My office had no windows at all. I put my hand on the light switch, then dropped it and went on.

  The shelves were dim, misshapen structures that reminded me of the tombstones in the cemetery. I forced myself to listen to the cars rumbling down the street in a haze of carbon monoxide. It was the middle of the afternoon, after all. Hardly a midnight drama with a vaporous, chortling shade and a distant rattle of chains from the attic.

  There was more than enough light to move down the center aisle to the office. I knew I was behaving like a gothic novel heroine, allowing myself to imagine the worst in the shadows. Old buildings make noises; there was no reason why mine shouldn’t shudder occasionally. Perhaps the cockroaches were throwing a party or the rodents plotting a revolution. I would catch them in little army jackets, identical to Maggie’s, and they would throw up their paws in panic. Their maps, drawn on the insides of match covers, would—

  A chair squeaked in the office. The squeak was loud, unmissable. Not even in my fantastical ravings could I envision rat revolutionaries large enough to produce that squeak. I sucked in a gulp of air, my foot poised in midstep and my fingernails cutting into my palms. Nancy Drew was better at this, I thought as I stood and gaped at the darkness at the end of the aisle. She prowled ahead, undaunted by the possibility of danger. I, on the other hand, felt that a silent retreat and a quick call to the police would be more seemly for a woman my age, who had every intention of having more ages in the future, including that referred to by Madison Avenue as the Golden Years.

  I tried to convince myself that I had heard one of those antique sounds I had been smiling about seconds earlier. Broad daylight outside, a Tuesday afternoon in Farberville, throngs of people on the sidewalk. It was not a castle in Bavaria; it was my very own musty bookstore.

  It took several minutes of mental dialogue to get my foot back on the floor, but I did. Squaring my shoulders, I prowled ahead. I admit there was a slight tremble to my hand as I opened the office door, but I had resumed breathing, which I felt was a minor triumph. My lungs refroze as a figure stood up behind the desk.

  “I thought that might be you,” said Lieutenant Rosen.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I demanded when I could trust my voice.

  “Same thing you’re doing, I would imagine. But I’m glad you came by; it was getting a little boring in the dark by myself.”

  “Do you have a search warrant?” I knew there was a reason why I read all those police procedurals.

  His white teeth glinted in the darkness. “I didn’t search anything. To the best of my knowledge, judges don’t issue sit warrants.”

  “Would you please explain what you’re doing here? Then, if it’s not too much trouble, I’d like to know how you got in and when you’re leaving!” I was rather proud of myself for the show of indignation, since my knees had turned to Jell-O and my heart to whipped cream topping.

  “Sit down, and I’ll answer at least two of your questions.” He switched on a penlight and escorted me to the chair across from the desk. “Now,” he said genially, when he was back at his post, “I would suspect you’ve been trying to find a copy of the book that stirred up all the trouble. Miss Holland’s, to be more precise. She doesn’t know where it came from or where it went, which is puzzling.”

  I numbly repeated the earlier conversation with Maggie, inwardly despising the man for the superior expression I couldn’t see in the darkness. I admitted I had come to search the office for the copy and was sweetly informed that it was not there.

  “You searched!” I accused him, jabbing a finger in his general direction.

  “I looked around. You could have misplaced a herd of buffalo in this room and not found it for years, Mrs. Malloy. Have you ever considered using some sort of filing system?”

  I considered a few tart replies but bit down on my lip and sulked for a few minutes. “Then where do you deduce the errant copy is, Sherlock? Do you think the buffaloes ate it?”

  “I have no idea,” he said cheerfully, “but I’m hoping someone else is equally concerned about it. Concerned enough to come looking for it here, while the store is closed and its proprietor safely at home where she belongs.”

  Protected by the darkness, I made an unladylike gesture at him and said, “I am where I belong. If you suspect someone is going to skulk around my store and search my office, then I prefer to be here. If you don’t like it, get a warrant.”

  For the first time, he sounded a bit churlish. “I wish you’d leave, Mrs. Malloy. A visitor might not appreciate my surprise.”

  “I wish none of this had happened, but that hardly alters the situation, does it?” I crossed my legs and tried to find a comfortable position in the upright chair. There wasn’t one. After resolving to buy a new chair, I resumed the conversation. “So, whom do we suspect?”

  “Well,” he said, giving in gracefully, “I told you that Britton Blake is not the white knight you had assumed. Margaret Holland has also been investigated, and it seems that Twiller’s notes are for the most part accurate. That, coupled with the references to your husband, does provide a motive or two.”

  “Three.” Even I can add.

  “Three. We’ve also been checking on some others, including the maid and the gardener. They both appear to be what they claim: graduate students in need of a job. No one saw the maid at the library, but she has a pile of reference cards to back up her story. The gardener, when pressed, admitted he had been drinking beer with some friends instead of cleaning the flowerbeds. His story is confirmed, and I imagine the maid’s will also be confirmed.”

  “What about Douglas?”

  “We pressed him, and he finally yielded. It seems he drove directly to an apartment complex on the other side of the campus. He claims one of his students needed to revise a paper and had requested help. He didn’t want to involve the student, unless it was necessary. Chivalry thrives in Farberville, apparently.”

  “The student has blond hair and a closetful of miniskirts, right?” I sighed, remembering Douglas’s vow of innocence. On the other hand, I added judiciously, he had said one affair was over; he simply hadn’t mentioned that a new one had sprung into existence.

  “The girl agrees that he was there from three-thirty until almost seven o’clock helping her with her paper. He went home to find the police cars in front of the house. A busy day, but all of his time has been accounted for.”

  The chair squeaked, but I couldn’t tell what he was doing. Loading his gun, I thought with a twinge of nervousness. At least he had no idea about Caron and Inez. I was still one step ahead.

  “Is there any estimate of the time when poor Mildred died?” I asked.

  “Between three o’cloc
k, when she was last seen, and four-thirty, when her body was discovered,” Lieutenant Rosen answered in his cheerful voice, not sounding the least bit daunted by the vagueness. “Miss Belinski was quite firm about the time she arrived at the Twiller house. She said she stared at the kitchen clock the entire time she talked to you, and it etched itself on her mind.”

  “So you’ve made almost no progress on the case. I should have called Scotland Yard, even with the transatlantic rates so high.”

  “Not true—” He broke off, and even in the darkness I could sense his body tensing as he rose to his feet.

  “What?” I whispered, staring about with no success. “Did something crawl up your leg?”

  “Shhh. I heard a noise.”

  “I didn’t hear anything,” I protested in a hiss. I was beginning to feel like a teapot, but I was alarmed by his actions.

  “Shhh. Sit there and don’t move, no matter what happens. Someone is outside the back door.” He tiptoed across the floor and crouched in the corner behind the door.

  I did as ordered, but after several minutes the routine grew tedious. I hadn’t heard anything, and I was not about to sit and hold my breath indefinitely. Although, I admitted to myself, it seemed that Lieutenant Rosen had no need of oxygen.

  When I was about to suggest he take a tiny breath, the door opened. A flashlight flooded into my eyes, dazzling me as if it were a hundred-carat diamond. I put my hands on my eyebrows and tried to blink away the glare. “Who is it?” I snapped.

  The light whipped across the room as the lieutenant came from his corner with the determination of a rejuvenated boxer. Contact was made. The two bodies, entwined like amorous octopi, began to stagger around the room, thudding and stomping, grunting and growling, careening into furniture. I could see arms, legs, shoulders, and a few jabbing elbows, but no faces. The beam of light darted across the ceiling and back in a frenzy of indecision.

  As amusing as the scene was, it too began to pale. I reached over my shoulder and switched on the light. Then, bright with curiosity, I sat back to watch the rest of the show.