High Heels and Homicide (23 page)

“Oh, brother…”

“Tch-tch, Maggie,” Saint Just scolded, careful not to smile. “Everyone's opinion holds equal weight. Although I have as yet to ascertain a motive for either murder, Sir Rudy. Which, as it happens, brings me back to you. Maggie and I, amateur sleuths, to be sure, have been playing with possibilities, and it has occurred to us that, perhaps, there could have been a calculated effort to—”

“Oh, for God's sake. Some time tonight, Alex, okay?” Maggie interrupted, then poked a finger toward their host. “Do you have anything here worth stealing, Sir Rudy?”

“Worth? Do I? Well, of course I do. This whole place is littered with valuables. The furniture, for one. Dead old, all of it, and no more comfortable than a church pew, so it has to be valuable.”

“Yes, and it is all quite lovely,” Saint Just said before Maggie could interrupt again. “However, we were thinking of something rather more
portable
. The art, for example. Paintings, in particular. I have not had the pleasure of a complete tour, unfortunately, so I wondered if you may have a Rembrandt, for instance, in your possession? A da Vinci? A Botticelli? Two? Three? More? Or perhaps some fine Chinese pots? A collection of rare jade?”

Sir Rudy shook his head. “Afraid not. None of those things. The old girl sold that stuff off piecemeal years ago to keep this pile running. She'd made a good start on the silver, too, but then she died. Lucky for me. Why? You think somebody's here to rob me? I thought somebody was here to kill people. There are dead people, you know. I saw them.”

“He sees dead people,” Maggie said quietly, turning her face into Saint Just's sleeve. “Ready to punt back to me yet, sport?”

“Shhh,” Saint Just warned quietly, although he, too, was rather amused. “Sir Rudy,” he said, trying again. “Let me proffer another question, if I might? Did Miss Pertuccelli happen to
visit
Medwine Manor before arriving here to film the movie?”

Sir Rudy shook his head, dashing yet another possibility. “No. We met in London, as a matter of fact. Lucky for me, or so I thought at the time. Only up there for the day, you understand, to see my banker, and we met by chance, in a restaurant. Pricey place. I'll not go there again. Pay the earth and barely get two bites of food. Ate better when I was poor.”

“So you met at a restaurant in London, entirely by chance?”

“I said that, didn't I?” Sir Rudy asked, frowning at Marylou, who was still regarding him much like a leper. “She was wearing red, my favorite color. Package the Medwine Marauder in red, you know? She was sitting at the next table, as alone as I was, and we struck up a conversation. People do that, you know. Next thing I knew, she was telling me about her movie, and I was telling her how I've always wanted to have a movie filmed here. Not that I always wanted that. I only own this place less than a year. But once I thought of the idea, I was sure I'd always wanted to. All those lovely American actresses cavorting about the place in their skimpy clothes.”

“All right. Thank you, Sir Rudy. Oh, and if I might have my cell phone? We'll probably all be leaving here in the morning, and I wouldn't wish to forget it in the rush.”

Sir Rudy fished in his pocket and handed over the cell phone. “Here you go. Is there anything else you want to know?”

“Oh, right. Thanks, Sir Rudy,” Maggie said brightly. “We'd like a ladder. Do you have one?”

“A ladder? What for? You two planning on climbing out a window? You'd just land in the water, like everyone else. You'd want a ladder to go up, not down. But I've got stairs. I've got more stairs than you'll ever need.”

Saint Just was finding whole new worlds of meaning in the phrase “like pulling teeth.”

“We would like the ladder, Sir Rudy, in order to get a closer look at the mural on the grand staircase, if you don't mind. You see, there's a diagram of the floor plan of this house and—”

“Sure, sure, I know that. Four of them, actually, one in each corner, not that you can see the ones up-top without binoculars. But you don't need a ladder for that. I've got drawings in my study, along with all those histories I told you about. Laid everything out on a table. Didn't I tell you about the histories? Being a writer, too, young lady, I would have thought you'd taken a look.”

Saint Just smiled. If one waits long enough, most everything comes to one. “You said ‘too,' Sir Rudy. Does that mean Sam Undercuffler
did
look at the histories you keep in your study? Perhaps saw the floor plans?”

“I don't know what all he looked at. He was in there for hours—that was before you people got here. Told you, nothing much to do around here in the rain,” Sir Rudy said, shrugging. “But you don't need a ladder. I know that.”

“Thank you, Sir Rudy, you've been an enormous help,” Saint Just said, taking hold of Maggie's elbow and leading her toward the doorway, pausing only to pick up two of the larger flashlights and hand one to her.

“You're carrying your cane again,” she said as they made their way to the study. “You looked sort of naked without it.”

“And felt so, to be truthful about the thing,” Saint Just told her smoothly. “It's much easier to carry a flashlight and cane than to lug one of those oil lanterns about everywhere. So? What do you think Undercuffler discovered in the study?”

“That's obvious, isn't it? No footprints in the dust, remember? Sam found a way into that attic room. Amateur sleuths? Come on, Alex, we're better than that. Which means, especially since we already know what we're looking for, we'll find what Sam found in half the time.”

Unfortunately, Maggie's optimism didn't prove to be correct, as a good thirty minutes later, with one of the flashlights dimming, they had found nothing.

“Nothing,” Maggie said, unknowingly echoing Saint Just's thoughts. “If there's a secret passage built into this pile, the old guy kept his secret. Which also means that Sam didn't find any secret passage. You have any more bright ideas, or should we just call it a night?”

“As long as we avoid the main saloon. We're still waiting for return calls from the good
left
-tenant and Mary Louise. I'd rather no one else was aware that I placed calls to anyone.”

Maggie propped her elbows on the ancient library table and dropped her chin in her hands. “Yeah, right. I know why you called Steve, but tell me again why you called Mary Louise.”

Saint Just pulled yet another marble-backed book toward him, wondering why he would want to read about the third Earl and his notion that
Rotating Crops Is An Abomination Against Mother Nature.
“How odd. And here I am, pondering why I thought to call Wendell, when the first ten minutes of the conversation consisted mostly of the good
left
-tenant screaming in my ear. Anyone would think I
plan
to have all these little adventures.”

“Anyone could, couldn't they?” Maggie sat back in her chair, sighed. “Okay, so Steve is checking the backgrounds of all our fellow guests. That takes time, so I doubt we'll get much of anything, although it was nice of you to call him, let him know how we're doing, even if you did wake him up. Now explain about Mare.”

“You'll agree that Mary Louise is an inventive young lady?”

“I have completely forgotten that she's the one who made up fake identification papers for you and Sterling, your passports. That has gone totally out of my mind now that she's posing with you for those perfume ads. I even try to forget that she's younger than me, small and thin and beautiful, and that she's in on your Streetcorner Orators along with her cousin and his friend.”

“Dear Snake. Dear Killer. Or, as we prefer to call them now, since they've left their budding lives of petty crime, our good friends Vernon and George. But all of that to one side, you will agree, Maggie, that Mary Louise is very intelligent, very creative. And rather accomplished.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. NYU, all that good stuff. And a criminal mind. So?”

“So, Maggie, among her many talents, Mary Louise is also quite adept at surfing the Web. Indeed, she taught me everything I know. As we are without your laptop—”

“Don't blame me for that one. Everybody told me to leave it at home.”

“True, including me. However, Mary Louise—”

“Is a computer whiz. She's going to Google everybody? And we don't have any power anyway, and I would have worn down the battery on the flight over, and nobody else has power left in their laptops, either, so let it go, all right?”

“Done now?”

Maggie nodded. “Sorry. I'm being snarky. It's late and, like Sir Rudy, I keep seeing dead people. Except I always get to see them first. So, Mare's going to search Google?”

“Yes. Among other searches. Actors are fairly public people, after all. She may discover something useful about one of our fellow guests. Wendell will only run the names, as he termed it, for criminal activity.”

Maggie shrugged. “Okay. It's worth a shot, I suppose. Covers a few more bases. But nobody will probably know anything until tomorrow afternoon, anyway. Which leaves us where?”

“Very much back where we started, I'm afraid, as the house plans proved worthless. Unless you're interested in a small experiment?”

“If it keeps us from having to go back to that wake in the main saloon, I'm up for anything.”

“Very good. But first, I'll straighten this mess we've made with the house plans while you run down the hall and fetch us another flashlight. Oh, and if you'd please gather up Sterling and Perry, and bring them back here, while you're at it. We'll each need one of them with us, as what I plan necessitates the two of us separating for a space.”

“I get Sterling,” Maggie said flatly.

“Oh, most assuredly, my dear, as I don't expect Perry to be anything but a dead loss. But Sterling will insist on this swimming buddy notion of Tabby's, and I don't want to upset him. Now hurry along, as we're running out of time.”

“Meaning the cops will be here soon, and you want to hand them the killer on a silver platter. Okay, okay. So do I.”

Saint Just piled up the marble-backed, handwritten histories and began folding the floor plans, all while running his mind over the voice-mail message from Socks he'd discovered on his cell phone.

Saint Just had already returned that particular call while Maggie was busy reading one of the histories, telling Socks in a rather inventive spate of cryptic words, if he had to say so himself, to do nothing, as they'd be back in Manhattan in less than twenty-four hours.

Yet another reason, a very pressing reason, to solve these plaguey murders before morning…

M
aggie was halfway to the main saloon—not that long a walk, considering Medwine Manor was about as long as a New York City block—before it dawned on her. She was alone in a dark house. “Well, thanks, Alex. Nice to know you think I can take care of myself.”

Then again, she had a mouth. She could scream. Unless someone came up from behind her and clamped his hand over her mouth while he dragged her into another room—“Good. Keep thinking like a fiction writer,” she told herself as she broke into a trot.

The doors to the main saloon opened just as she was reaching for the latches, and she stepped back, an involuntary squeal making it very obvious that she was approximately two heartbeats from total hysterics.

“Sterling! You scared me to death!”

“Oh, no, Maggie, I wouldn't do that,” Sterling said, taking her hand and leading her into the main saloon. “I was just coming to see where you were. Sir Rudy wants to talk to you. You and Saint Just both.”

“Not now, Sterling, all right? Saint Just has an idea, and he wants you and Perry to come with me. Bring lanterns with you, and another flashlight for me. A big one. And before you ask me, no, he didn't tell me his idea. You know Alex. He likes the drama. So let's just humor him, all right?”

“Oh, but Sir Rudy said you'd asked him a question, and he feels he didn't give you a complete answer.”

For a moment, Maggie thought maybe Sir Rudy did have some priceless art or something here at Medwine Manor. But then again, how would even Sir Rudy forget priceless art? “I'm sure it'll keep. Go get Perry, okay? I just want to check on Bernie a minute.”

“Tabby did just that a few minutes ago. Felt her head, offered her a cool drink, told her to blow her nose because she was snoring, and all of that. Bernie says she's feeling better now, although she doesn't look very much better. She's sleeping again. And, alas, snoring, although I'd never say so.”

“That's because you're a gentleman to your toes, Sterling.” Maggie peered into the darkness that hugged the farther areas of the immense room, outside the light from all the candles and the fireplace. “Okay. I'll leave her alone. Damn it, here comes the Troy Toy. What does he want?”

“He's been very busy, Maggie. We all have been. Discussing possible suspects.”

“That sounds jolly, in a house with a pair of stiffs taking up space on the tables. Am I on the suspect list again? Because if I am, you may have to hold me back before I punch our pretty boy in the nose.”

“No, no, no, you're not on the list. None of us is, as a matter of fact. Troy is now quite certain that Evan—Mr. Pottinger—is the culprit.”

“Oh, really. Why?”

Sterling sort of lowered his head, although Maggie could still see the flush steal into his cheeks. “It…it would appear that Evan and Miss Pertuccelli were…um…that is to say, they've been…”

“Extremely friendly?” Maggie suggested, trying not to smile.

“Yes, exactly! Thank you, Maggie.”

“You're welcome. What did Evan say?”

“He didn't say anything. He just threw his wineglass at Troy. Tabby got some club soda from the drinks table and dabbed at the carpet. We don't think it will stain.”

“That's our Tabby. Having an extramarital revenge fling one minute, playing the Happy Homemaker the next. Okay, here he comes. Cover me.”

“But…but with—?”

“Figure of speech, Sterling,” Maggie said quickly. “It means I'm asking you to watch my back.”

“I see. You could have said that. You know I have trouble with these modern sayings.”

“Sorry, sweetheart.” Maggie then smiled at Troy Barlow, who was still in costume and still holding his prop sword cane in a two-handed death grip. “Hi, there. Catch any dastardly murderers lately, my lord?”

Troy's handsome face reworked itself into what, Maggie guessed, was his stock
deeply serious
expression. “I've about given that up, since Evan threw his drink at me. Gleeking bat-fowling codpiece.”

Maggie grimaced. “Do you have
any
idea what you're saying?”

Troy flourished the cane. “That's not important and it's a waste of my time memorizing all that baloney, too. Me solving the murders is important. Or it was. It's not like my agent is going to be able to use it now anyway. You know—star solves murder on set?”

“Life imitates art imitating life, you mean?”

“No. I don't think I mean that. I mean fantastic free publicity. But nobody's going to shoot this movie now. The writer's dead, Joanne's dead. It's like that old movie. Well, lots of old movies. I heard about them. Cursed sets. I think
The Misfits
was one. Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe.
The Exorcist
was another one, I think. And one where all the actors got cancer years later. Cursed sets. Nobody's going to touch this one again.”

“That's beginning to work for me, to tell you the truth,” Maggie said honestly. “As long as we all don't have to give the money back.”

“Oh, no, no, we'll keep the money, although that's probably cursed, too,” Troy told her. “So you don't want your books to be made into movies or a TV series?”

“Not unless I get a lot more say-so than I got this time, no. Look, Troy, it's been just grand talking to you, but Sterling and Perry and Alex and I are going to do a little more looking around, in case anyone asks. Has anyone else tried to leave the room?”

“Are you kidding? You'd have to be nuts to—well, you won't be alone, will you? Oh, and Sir Rudy was looking for your friend.”

“Yeah, I heard that, thanks.”

Sterling and Perry joined her, and she made it all the way back into the hallway before Sir Rudy, who had been half asleep on one of the couches, Marylou all but wrapped around him, caught up to her.

“I remembered,” he said, grinning at her. “Although I don't think it's much help.”

“You remembered something valuable? You've got so much that you could forget some priceless work of art?”

Sir Rudy gave a wave of his arms. “No, no, I know what I have, and I know what it's worth. I wanted this place, but I'm not stupid. Everything was appraised before I signed on the dotted line.” He laughed. “Foolhardy, I know, considering the way we're all
floating
here, but I knew that going in, I did, I did. Knew the place was going to eat through money until I could whip it back into shape. But it's not often a small frog can get to be a big frog right in his own pond, eh, where all his old chums can watch?”

“You sure got the
pond
part right.” Maggie liked this guy, she really did. But every moment spent with him was one less moment to figure out the murderer before the police got here and rained all over Alex's parade. “The something valuable, Sir Rudy?” she prompted.

“Yes, yes, I'm getting to that. You didn't read about it, in the histories? The book with the blue cover. It's the only one. Can't miss it.”

Maggie shook her head. “No. No book with a blue cover. Only those marble-backed ones, all tan and brown. I think they're called marble-backs. No blue book.”

“Oh, well, that's strange. I had everything all spread out on the library table for everyone. That's the one with Uncle Willis, you know. The blue one.”

“The ghost Sterling and Perry were looking for,” Maggie said, nodding. Time was a-wastin'.

Not that Sir Rudy seemed to notice that Maggie was shifting from foot to foot while she sort of backed down the hallway.

“They say that's why he never left.”

“They? Who's they? Why do people always say
they
? Why don't
they
ever have a name?” Then Maggie shook her head. Now who was wasting time? “Go on. Please.”

“I was going to,” Sir Rudy said, looking confused. “We're talking about more than two hundred years ago, remember. Uncle Willis had huge gambling debts, so he pilfered all the family jewels and hid them. But then this place flooded, and he couldn't get away…”

“That sounds familiar,” Maggie said, getting interested. Very interested.

“Yes, so he was questioned about the jewels, and his uncle had him caned—they did that back in those days. Have your servants cane someone for you, you know?”

“Know that, too. Go on, go on,” Maggie urged.

“There's not much more. Uncle Willis wouldn't give up his secret, so he was locked in that attic room so that he couldn't escape until he said where he'd hidden the family jewels—some rather lovely diamonds as well as much more. You can see most of it in the paintings of the ladies in the Long Gallery. The old lady never sold the paintings. She said they were the only way she could see the family jewels. There's one yellow diamond bigger than a goose egg, I swear.”

“Is that good?” Sterling asked.

“It's good, Sterling,” Maggie told him. “And about to get better, I think. What did Uncle Willis do, Sir Rudy? I take it he never escaped.”

Sir Rudy rubbed at his chin, one of his chins. “Well, legend has it that the beatings were kept up, but Uncle Willis wasn't budging. Went on for months. Uncle Willis went mad as a hatter, and nobody found the jewels. We heard the old boy had made a map and hidden it somewhere, but nobody ever found it. Nobody's ever found anything, not in all these years. They finally gave up and just kept Uncle Willis in the attics.”

Maggie could barely wait to tell Saint Just. “But the old lady—that is, the previous owner? The last of the line? She stuck it out here, even as the whole place started going downhill. She and the paintings of her ancestors, all wearing those jewels? Did she believe the jewels were here?”

“Everybody loves a legend. The young lads used to try to break in here and search,” Sir Rudy said, then grinned. “I was one of them. We'd break a window in the kitchens and sneak in, then think we heard Uncle Willis walking around and run back out again. The old biddy was down to living in just a couple of rooms by then, and we probably drove her crazy. Chased me all the way to the end of the lane once, with a broom. But let me finish with Uncle Willis. He was mad as a hatter after a while, so they left him alone in the attics. He didn't even try to lope off. Must have been content. I read in the blue-backed book that he laughed a lot. Then one day they found him, hanging up there, in that room. More than a few slates slid off the fellow's roof before the end, I'd say.”

“And anyone who read the diaries would know all of this? How extraordinarily interesting,” Alex said from behind Maggie.

Maggie turned around quickly, and just as quickly tried to give Alex a sharp punch to the stomach, which he, naturally, adeptly sidestepped. “Don't
do
that. Don't sneak up on people like that.”

“A thousand apologies, my dear,” Alex said. “But think of all the time we've saved, now that you don't have to repeat the story to me. Sir Rudy? Do you believe any of it? Are
you
, perhaps, still looking for the stolen jewels?”

“Me? Oh, maybe at first. If I was in Scotland, I'd be keeping an eye out for that Loch Ness monster, too. But it's probably all a hum. I'll bet the jewels were found more'n a century ago and never reported. Taxes, you understand. The very devil here in England. In America, too, I suppose. No, the jewels were found, and then they disappeared, that's how I see the thing. But you did ask if I knew of anything worth stealing. You never found the blue book? Strange. Somebody must be reading it, don't you think?”

“Or has already read it,” Maggie said quietly to Alex. “Let's go somewhere and talk.”

Alex gifted Sir Rudy with a slight inclination of his head. “My profound thanks, dear sir, although I fear you are correct. The jewels are most likely long gone. Excuse us, if you please? We're off on a small excursion of our own. Fruitless, I'm already convinced, but it will keep us occupied until the constable arrives. Sterling? Perry? Do try to keep up.”

“You just
love
taking charge, don't you?” Maggie gritted her teeth as she climbed the main staircase alongside Alex. “But do you think that's it? One of those people back there was bored, read the blue book, and decided to wait out the monsoon by looking for the jewels?”

“And found them?”

Maggie frowned. “Right. They would have found them. In just a couple of days, when everyone else has been looking for two centuries. That seems impossible. But why else would they—I'm still thinking it was Joanne and a partner—why else would they have to kill Sam, unless he stumbled on them right as they found the jewels?”

“Or the map leading to the jewels. Sir Rudy did speak of a map, remember, although that could all be conjecture, or wishful thinking, as everyone loves a treasure map with a large X marking the spot. And I agree, the idea of both the map and the jewels being hidden for several centuries, just to be discovered by chance by a pair of half-hearted treasure seekers anxious to ease their boredom? That does not, as you Americans say, compute.”