A Fright to the Death (21 page)

“Oh, it’s you guys again,” Vi said from the doorway.

“What are you doing here?” I said.

She pulled her hand behind her back and said, “Nothing. Just thought I’d look around while your mother does her card readings.”

She’d been quick, but I had spotted the deep purple drawstring bag in her hand.

“What are you going to do with the pendulum?”

“Pendulum?” Mac said.

Vi brought her hand out from behind her back and sighed. “I wanted to see if it would tell me who else had been up here that night.”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Mac said.

Vi drew herself up to her full five feet, two inches. “Detective McKenzie, just because you don’t understand it, doesn’t mean it won’t work.”

“You’re trying to solve this case using a piece of glass on a string?”

“What are
you
using? Intuition and gut feelings?”

“No, I’m using my experience in solving murder cases,” Mac said.

“Well, I’m using my experience in answering questions with a pendulum.”

“We’re pretty much done here, Mac,” I said. “We might as well let Vi swing her crystal around.”

Vi pressed her lips together and narrowed her eyes at me. We all stood staring at one another.

“Well, are you going to ask some questions or not?” Mac asked.

“I’d prefer to be alone,” Vi sniffed. “The pendulum doesn’t respond well when there is negative energy in the room.”

I figured she also thought we’d steal her top-secret pendulum information if we hung around.

“Ms. Greer, you have to promise not to move anything or touch anything,” Mac said.

“Don’t you think the crime scene has been fully contaminated by now, what with cats and ghosts and who knows who else wandering through here—plus what do you think Clyde is doing?” She pointed at the clothing piled on the floor. “I know Clarissa left her shoes everywhere, but I don’t remember her storing her clothing on the floor.”

Mac rubbed his forehead. He glanced at me for guidance.

“I’ll put it all back and then you can ask your questions,” I said to Vi. “Just try not to disturb anything.”

Vi humphed. “Don’t tell
me
not to disturb anything. I know how to act at a crime scene—I’ve been Googling police procedure for months.”

I tidied up Clarissa’s clothing without finding a key, and Mac and I went back downstairs, leaving Vi and her pendulum alone in Clarissa’s room.

As soon as we exited the stairwell, Mac grabbed my arm and propelled me toward my room.

“We need to talk,” he said, “privately.”

I pulled out my key and unlocked the door.

Mac ushered me inside, locked the door, and put the chain into the metal slider.

“I need to tell you something that you absolutely cannot share with anyone,” he said. He held my gaze and all I saw were his cop eyes.

I nodded. “Of course.”

“Not Vi, or your mother, or even Seth. Don’t even think about it around that kid—sometimes I think he can read minds.” Mac held Clarissa’s notebook out and flipped it open.

I stepped toward him to get a better look.

He pointed to the column of numbers and letters.

“I think this is a list of cell phone types and numbers of units.” He ran his finger down the column.

I followed his finger and it became clear—IP, BB, NK, SS, for iPhone, BlackBerry, Nokia, Samsung. The numbers looked like they would correlate with what we had found in the storage room. There were way more iPhones listed than BlackBerries.

“Great,” I said. “But, what do we do with it?” I didn’t think this was any big secret—she kept a list of the inventory—if anything it just proved that she had her nose in everyone’s business.

“That’s the part you can’t tell anyone,” he said. “Kirk is an undercover cop working this cell phone case.”

“What? How do you know?”

Mac flipped the notebook shut inside the large baggie.
He hesitated. “I recognized him. He worked a case in Saginaw a few years ago. I didn’t know him well, but I’m pretty sure he made the connection as well. We talked about it when we took the snowmobiles out to check the road. I need to let him know what we found without exposing him. I don’t want to mess up his case, or put him in danger.”

“Okay. It’s probably better if we don’t both go looking for him,” I said. “I guess that explains why he’s such a terrible maintenance man.”

Mac shoved the baggie-wrapped notebook into his waistband and covered it with his snowman. I noticed that his sweater had sprouted buttons. It seemed Mavis was still finishing.

“Let’s leave the box here until we find a key or can turn it over to the police,” I said. “Who knows if there’s even anything in there worth hiding. It could just be legal documents or jewelry.”

Mac nodded and looked around for a place to put it. “I don’t know about that. You’re sharing a room with Vi.”

“As far as I know, she can’t pick a lock, so she’s not likely to take much interest in it. She might try to wave her pendulum over it to see if it contains anything she would consider important . . .”

“Still, we should put it somewhere she’s not likely to find it . . .”

I pointed to the closet. The wall safe wasn’t big enough, but the top shelf was deep and we could push it to the back. Unless she really was on the hunt, she wouldn’t notice it up there.

After we stashed the box and Mac double-checked that the notebook was well hidden behind his sweater, we opened the door and stepped into the hallway.

Mavis was there. She shut her door and clicked the lock with her key.

“Oh, Detective McKenzie,” she said. She hurried toward us on her sturdy shoes, her purple pants making that zip-zip sound of polyester rubbing against itself. It was clear she had reapplied her lipstick without benefit of a mirror when she smiled.

Her jaunt down the hall had left her breathless, or maybe it was just Mac’s proximity, but she put a hand to her ample chest as she caught her breath.

“I need to speak to you,” she said. She glanced at me and added, “Alone.”

“Mrs. Poulson, if you have something to tell me about the investigation, you can speak to both of us. Ms. Fortune is a police officer as well.”

Mavis sniffed and her mouth pursed as if she’d been given a lemon to suck on. It became clear to me why she bothered Vi so much—they were exactly alike.

“Very well,” she said. She turned to me, “I hope your professionalism will override any family loyalty you may have.”

Mac gestured toward the stairs, but Mavis balked.

“This needs to be a very private conversation,” she said. “Selma is still downstairs; we can go in my room.”

She led us to her room and reapplied her key to the lock. Swinging the door wide, she waved us inside.

This room was obviously the pink fantasy room. The curtains were heavy velvet in a deep rose color. The dark wood of the furniture glowed pink in the misty light from the window. Mavis and Selma had evidently been working hard on their yarn-bombing project. Large swaths of knitting draped over the chairs and the couch.

Mavis gestured toward her sitting area, and Mac and I perched on the small loveseat and tried not to upset the rainbow of knitted items. Mavis pressed her lips together and took the wing-back chair.

“I need to confess,” she began. “I didn’t tell you the whole truth earlier when you asked me about my movements on the night of the . . . of poor Clarissa’s death.”

Mac leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. I noticed he hadn’t whipped out his notebook.

“When I came up to get my medicine, I saw Isabel coming back down from the turret room,” she said.

Mac and I exchanged a glance—the tilt of his head told me that this had piqued his interest.

Mavis held up her hand. “That’s only part of what I want to tell you,” she said. “I didn’t mention it before because I just know Isabel didn’t hurt Clarissa. I’ve known them both for many years and if anyone was going to turn into a murderer, it would have been Clarissa.”

“Did you speak to Isabel when she came back down?” Mac asked.

Mavis shook her head. “She didn’t see me. I had just opened my door and I heard someone coming down the stairs. She wasn’t very quiet.” Mavis took a deep breath and continued. “I popped into my room and cracked the door just enough to see who it was. Isabel came out of the doorway. She was rubbing her head like it really hurt and then she passed by my door and must have gone on to her own room around the corner.”

“Why didn’t you tell us this before?” I asked, unable to hide my irritation.

Mavis had the decency to look ashamed. “I didn’t want to get Isabel in trouble, but now I know who really killed Clarissa.” She leaned forward in her chair and looked at each of us in turn. “Violet Greer is your killer, I’m sure of it.”

I stifled a snort and turned it into a cough. Mac put his hand on my leg to steady me and probably to keep from laughing himself. It took him a moment to speak.

“Why do you think that Violet is the killer?” Mac asked.

“I know it will be hard for you to hear.” She looked at me. “She’s your aunt, after all.” She turned to Mac. “And a good friend of your mother’s. But that woman is not to be trusted.” Mavis held her finger up in such a likeness to Vi, I wondered for a moment if these two were punking us.

“Okay, let’s stick to the evidence you have against her,” Mac said and this time he did pull out his notebook, I assumed for show.

“She’s been sneaking around the castle ever since Clarissa died, acting very suspicious if you ask me.” Mavis held up one finger. “She didn’t like Clarissa because Clarissa had made fun of her pet-psychic business and the knitters in general—which annoyed all of us, but only Vi had a murderous gleam in her eyes.”

“So, your evidence is that Vi had a murderous gleam and she’s been sneaking around?” Mac asked.

I thought that if that were enough to arrest Vi, we would have been visiting her in prison on a weekly basis.

“And I saw her steal that cable needle.” Mavis nodded and sat back in her chair, having given us the clincher.

“Cable needle?” Mac said.

“Jessica told us that Isabel’s fancy new cable needle was found at the crime scene—I saw Violet slip it into her bag on Thursday afternoon.”

I wondered what Vi would have to say for herself. The sad part is I didn’t doubt she had taken the needle. She probably wanted to sneak it up to her room to conduct some sort of knit-swatch experiment. She must have returned it at some point or someone took it from her.

“Tell me about seeing Isabel,” Mac said. He casually slipped his notebook back in his pocket as if the Isabel information wasn’t worth writing down.

Mavis flapped her hand as if waving away an annoying
bug. “Oh, that was nothing. I talked to Isabel about it.” Mavis’s mouth pulled into a frown. “She wasn’t pleased when I told her I was going to discuss this with you, but you need all the facts, and not telling you was wearing me down. She accused me of being a traitor.” Mavis huffed and took a moment to breathe heavily in indignation.

Mac and I waited for her to continue.

“She said she made a mistake and went the wrong way. She never went up to the room—I just saw her coming back out. That’s what she told me and I believe her.”

“Mrs. Poulson,” Mac said, “this has been very helpful and I’m grateful you came forward with your information. I would just like to say, that if you are ever in a position to be questioned by the police in the future, it would be best to tell your whole story up front.”

Mavis’s face fell from a broad smile to a contrite countenance. She nodded.

“So, will you arrest Violet?” Mavis asked. “It would be really nice if she wasn’t snooping around the castle the whole time we’re stuck here. Where will you keep her imprisoned while we wait for the police to arrive?”

“Unfortunately, we’ll need to gather some more information before we can make an arrest,” Mac said. “But you’ve given us something to think about.” He stuck out his hand and Mavis grasped it eagerly.

She showed us to the door and as I passed into the hall, she put a hand on my arm. “I’m so sorry to have to be the bearer of such distressing news. You have certainly shown grace and poise under these difficult circumstances.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Poulson,” I said. “I try to remain professional in these situations.”

“I think I should go talk to Kirk about this,” Mac said, and patted the notebook through his sweater.

“I’ll work on finding the key to the lockbox,” I said.

“How are you going to do that?” Mac asked. “Is this another pendulum thing? Are you going to get your aunt involved?”

“No! I’m not even going to tell her about the box,” I said. I didn’t add that I had to keep the information from her or risk losing a bet.

Mac lowered his voice and said, “Are you going to do that finding thing you do?”

I stopped in the middle of the hall. “What are you talking about?”

“I know you can find things.” Mac didn’t meet my eyes. “I’ve seen you do it.”

“You have?” I didn’t remember when I would have told him that I was tapping into that sense to find something.
Ever since we had gotten back together after so many years apart, I had avoided discussing my . . . talents with him. When it came to talking about my psychic abilities I was a coward. Neila’s guidance had at least moved me in the direction of not outright denying them. But treating my “finding ability” the same way Mom treated the tarot deck or Vi relied on her messages from animals? I wasn’t there yet.

Mac put his hand to my cheek. “Of course I have. I think you’re incredible. Even though I don’t understand it, I recognize that you have a gift. You should use it.”

My heart started pounding. I couldn’t believe he was encouraging me to use a psychic method to help solve a case. He didn’t even have to write it in a note! Something had shifted between us and the relief I felt at not hiding that part of myself from him had me blinking back tears.

I swallowed hard. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll see what I can do.”

He gave me a quick kiss and turned toward the back door to look for Kirk.

I wandered past the lounge, trying to focus on the key and where it might be. Not knowing exactly what it looked like made the process more difficult.

I glanced in the room and saw Isabel there with a small bundle of yarn in her arms. She smiled when she saw me.

“You caught me,” she said. “I’m glad you aren’t one of the knitters—I left them working on their projects to sneak down here and do my yarn bombing.” She held four or five furry knitted animals. I identified a fox, an elephant, and a monkey. She had already placed a small horse next to the horse statue.

“Wow,” I said. “That looks really complicated.” I reached out and she handed me the monkey.

“They can be a little fiddly, but it’s fun,” she said.

I gave the monkey back. “I’m having enough trouble with the scarf.”

Isabel looked around the room, presumably searching for a place to exhibit the animals.

I hated to do an interview without Mac, but this seemed like a perfect opportunity to ask her about Mavis’s accusation.

“Isabel, I need to ask you again about the night Clarissa was killed.”

Her smile faded and she nodded. “Should we sit?” She pointed at the couches by the fireplace.

She set her animals on the coffee table and sat back against the cushions. “How can I help?”

“A . . . witness has come forward reporting that you were seen leaving Clarissa’s room on the night she died.”

Isabel took a deep breath and let it out. She closed her eyes briefly. “I know who your witness is and I’ll tell you the same thing I told her. I did go up to Clarissa’s room that night, but I didn’t talk to her. She had made a remark about Teresa—that’s Mavis’s daughter—and how suicide was such a waste, and such a selfish act.” Isabel laced her fingers together on her lap and squeezed. “Mavis turned white as a sheet. I was furious, and on my way to my room to get my headache medicine I went to her room. However, halfway up the stairs I came to my senses. There was no reasoning with Clarissa and no way to appeal to her conscience because she didn’t have one. I went to my room to calm down and the rest is just as I told you before.”

“I’m sorry about your friend,” I said.

“Thank you.” Isabel relaxed her hands. “Mavis and I got into a bit of a tiff over this whole thing. She told me she had seen me and that she would ‘cover’ for me. I couldn’t believe she thought I had killed Clarissa—and that she would offer to cover it up!” She shook her head. “I’m sorry I didn’t say anything earlier, but I just thought it would confuse the issue.”

And that she would be a suspect, I thought to myself. It was starting to look like the entire hotel had visited Clarissa that night and they all had a reason to want her dead.

“Thank you for telling me about it now,” I said.

Isabel gathered up her animals and I left her in the lounge to continue her surreptitious placement.

Back in the hall, I leaned against the wall for a moment to clear my head. I would have to fill Mac in on Isabel’s story, but first I needed to find that key. Usually, I can visualize the item and then “zoom out” and see where it is. Instead, I kept getting a picture of Seth.

Seth couldn’t have the key, but I had been down this road enough times to just go with it. If I was seeing Seth, then I should go find Seth. Just like that tug to look in the wardrobe, I had to follow this hint.

I found him rather quickly in the front reception area. He sat on the couch staring out at the snow. I almost hated to disturb him. I was shocked he wasn’t already in the dining room since it was close to lunchtime, and it had been at least three hours since he’d last eaten.

As I got closer, I saw that he was petting the demon cat. I heard its purring across the room.

“If you sit down really slow, you won’t disturb her,” Seth said quietly.

I hated to disturb the crazy cat, so I sat down slowly on the chair across from Seth. The cat opened one eye and stopped purring. Seth scratched her head and she closed her eye and resumed her little motor noises.

“How did you catch her?” I asked. “It seems like everyone in the hotel has been trying to find her.”

“I just sat out here to listen to my music and watch the snow and she found me.” He smiled at the pile of fur in his lap. She rubbed her head against his hand.

“Maybe there are two cats, because that doesn’t look like the streaking, yowling, scratching cat I’ve seen before.”

Seth grinned. “It’s the same cat.” His smile faded. “She’s really scared.”

I didn’t realize Seth had the same affinity for cats as he did for dogs.

“What’s she afraid of?”

Seth shook his head. “It’s kind of strange—she’s just showing me pictures of things. Yarn, a room with yellow walls and flowers . . . tile with a pool of blood.” Seth looked at me.

“It sounds like the turret room—have you been up there?”

He didn’t answer right away. “No. Is it really bright during the daytime? She’s showing me a big patch of sunlight.”

“The windows face east and there are a lot of them, so it probably is bright.”

“She likes that room, but she’s afraid of it now.”

“Seth, did she see who killed Clarissa?”

Seth’s big brown eyes took on a faraway look. “She might have, but I’m not sure she realizes it. She keeps showing me yarn, balls of yarn in a basket, and a hand putting food down for her.”

He stroked the cat some more.

“I don’t know what it means,” he said.

I didn’t know what it meant, either. Maybe nothing. Maybe Duchess thought about yarn the way Tuffy thought about food—all the time.

Duchess continued to purr with her eyes closed. I continued to not see the key in my mind’s eye.

“Are you hungry?” I asked after a few minutes of listening to the purring.

His eyes lit up. He shifted position. Duchess hopped off
his lap and stretched her back legs before jumping onto the windowsill. She sat looking out the window, tail twitching slowly.

“I did find this,” Seth said and held out his hand, palm up.

A small silver key glinted in his hand.

“Where did you find it?” I took it from him and looked for numbers or markings on it. It had to be the key to the lockbox.

“It was taped to the inside of her collar,” he said. “It was bugging her because it kept pulling her hair.”

I glanced at the cat. She kept her gold eyes trained on me while her tail slowly swept back and forth.

I wondered who else knew that she had the key the whole time. And knew what it was for. I tucked it into my pocket.

“Let’s go see if this key works,” I said.

“What about lunch?”

I grinned at him. “Soon.” I slung an arm over his shoulder and we headed upstairs.