Death Takes a Holiday (27 page)

“
I find it strange that your teaching style is to frustrate, deflect and confuse your student. You won’t answer any of my questions.”

Wellington
smiled cheerfully. “It does seem like that, doesn’t it?”

Chapter TWENTY
-two

Wellington stood
in
the center of the dining car. “All right everyone, quiet down. I have good news. I’ve spoken to the engineer. He assures me that the problem will be corrected in a few more minutes and that we will be on our way. If everything goes well, we’ll be at the hotel a few hours before midnight.”

Everyone gave little cries of delight. Well
, almost everyone, Grace thought, glancing at Meredith. She merely eyed the others suspiciously.

“What are we going to do about Jack
and Henry?” Parker asked.

Lucas snorted.
“I say leave them. No one forced them to jump off the train last night.”

“And
do what?” Felicity asked sharply. “Start skiing down the mountain in the middle of the night?”

Sara stood up and addressed the car. She quickly described her activities a few hours earlier. “The only tracks visible were Steve’s and Kyle’s.”

“Oh, how would you know?” Lucas asked sarcastically. “Do they still train you all on how to track outlaws through the harsh tundra?”

“I don’t know if every agency does
, but I do,” Wellington said. “If Ms. Michaels says there aren’t any tracks to be found then we can safely deduce Jack and Henry are still on this train.”

“Where?” several people
asked at once.

Wincin
g, Grace noticed Steve’s head rise up and turn to Sara. She wished they had told Steve about her before this, but it never seemed like the right time. She felt a pang of guilt as he dropped his chin to his chest and slid down in his chair.

Wellington
brought his hands behind his back. “There may be a secret compartment somewhere on this train.”

Standing on her toes, Grace leaned over and whispered into Kyle’s ear. “Hey,
you had the same idea as Asa Wellington.”

“
Yeah, imagine that.”

The slight edge in his voice caused Grace to look at him sharply. She leaned into him with a questioning look, but he simply shook his head and looked back at the detective.

“I suggest we search the train once again,” Wellington said over everyone’s groans.

“You’ve already done that. Let’s
just get out of here,” Lucas said quickly. Everyone else nodded in agreement.

Felicity raised her hand. “I hate to leave so soon
, especially since we don’t know who killed Robert or that poor chef.”

“Obviously a critic,” Parker said.
“His desserts were horrible.”

Ignoring her assistant, Felicity continued,
“Nor do we know who left those threatening messages on the mirrors or who threw the glass onto our dinner,” Felicity said. “Do you have any idea who could have done these horrible things, Mr. Wellington?”

They all
waited patiently to see what Wellington would say. The detective walked to the bar and turned around. Raising his head, he gazed reflectively up at the ceiling. A few seconds passed before he said, “The question shouldn’t be about what I think . . .”

Kyle snorted causing Grace to look at him curiously.

Wellington continued, “The question should be: what does the evidence point to?”

As everyone pondered that
thought, Kyle dutifully raised his hand.

“Yes, Kyle.”

“And what exactly does the evidence point to, sir?”

“Good question. Very astute.”
Wellington clasped his hands behind his back and nodded. Everyone waited patiently for him to start. A few seconds later he gazed at them thoughtfully. In a strong, clear, commanding voice, he said, “Let’s go back to the beginning. Jack Arthur Horner boarded the train exactly twentyseven hours ago at approximately eleven o’clock in the morning. Now, according to Henry, what was his stated purpose for boarding the train?”

Several voices spoke at once. He held up his
hands, before pointing at Steve who dutifully answered him. “Family reunion.”

“Very good, Steve. You’re absolutely correct.”

Steve beamed.

Kyle shook his head. He leaned down and whispered in Grace’s ear, “I remember when Steve used to look up to me like that.”

“You mean, when he thought you knew what you were doing,” she whispered back.

Kyle gave her a rueful grin, before closing his eyes and sighing. Opening his eyes, he grabbed her hand and led her to the
vestibule between the dining and the observation cars.

“Hey, where are we going?
I wanted to listen to him,” she said, pulling away from him.

“Why? We’re not going to learn anything new.
Wellington doesn’t have a clue. He’s a fraud.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Grace said with a laugh. “
The man’s a well-known detective. Even I’ve heard of him.”

“Oh, I’m not saying he isn’t good. He is good. Very good
, in fact. He has everyone convinced he knows what he’s doing.”

Grace crossed her arms in front of her. Lifting an eyebrow she said,
“You know, if I didn’t know better, I would say that you were jealous.”

Kyle’s mouth hung open in surprise for a moment. “I—I am not jealous. Why would I be jealous of him?”

“Because he’s stealing your spotlight. You’ve gotten used to playing the part of the great detective and now that a real one has come along, it’s thrown you for a loop. If you want to be a real detective and not a fake one then you should be learning from him. You should be watching him—”

“Oh, I’ve been watching him, all right. Trust me, if he knows anything about these murders
, it’s only because he’s involved in them. It’s not because he’s some master detective.”

Suddenly
, the train began to slowly move down the tracks. They could hear cheers coming from the other car. Grace looked through the door window. For the first time since Robert’s death, Tracy was smiling. She reached out a hand to Lucas who took it in his own.

Felicity, meanwhile, threw herself into Wellington’s arms. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she bounced up and down in front of him, causing him to blush.

Even Meredith appeared dangerously close to celebrating. The edges of her mouth began to turn up slightly before she recovered and scowl
ed. Grace wondered if Lucas kissing the top of Tracy’s head had anything to do with Meredith’s natural state reappearing. She thumped Kyle’s arm and nodded to Tracy and Lucas. “Meredith doesn’t seem too happy about that.”

Kyle looked through the window. “Neither does Sara,” he pointed out.

Grace glanced at the other detective as she stared at Lucas and Tracy with barely concealed irritation.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out Tracy’s lipstick. “Look what I have,” she said before telling him about her conversation with Tracy.

“That’s it then,” Kyle said excitedly. “He must be the killer.”

“I don’t know,” she said pocketing the lipstick.

“What do you mean?”

“Robert’s the one who was
murdered, not Steve.”

“
Well, someone tried to kill him last night.”

“Did they?” Grace asked. “Who pulled the emergency brake? Whoever it was could have easily pushed Steve and Oscar off the train and none of us would have known about it until the morning, but they didn’t. They pulled that brake and so far, no one on this train has admitted to doing it, yet.”

“So, what’s your theory?”

“Steve said he tripped over something and I’m betting that something was Oscar. Someone was in the vestibule trying to throw Oscar’s body out the door when Steve came in. I think he hit his head when he fell, and whoever was trying to get rid
of Oscar’s body decided to save Steve’s life. You saw those bruises on his wrist. Someone held on to him until the train stopped. Not exactly the actions of a cold-blooded murderer.” She held out her hand against the door to steady herself as the train started up a steep incline.

“So, who do you think the hero is?”

“Oscar had been dead for a while before his body went out the door. I think that whoever saved Steve was trying to clean up after the killer.”

“Why?”

“Maybe they’re protecting someone.” She braced her hand against the door as the train increased its speed along the tracks. She was beginning to hate these little rooms between the cars. Everything about the train was magnified the instant anyone opened one of the doors. From the sound of the train as it barreled through the wind to the motion—especially the motion—she thought feeling a bit sick to her stomach as the train raced along the rails.

“Maybe it’s Wellington,” Kyle said sarcastically. “He’s the only hero on the train or at least that’s what his biography says.
He’s also very tidy. He folds his empty sugar packets into neat little squares.”

She turned her head. Kyle was standing
slightly behind her with his shoulder leaning against the side door. Seemingly unaffected by the rocking of the train, he casually crossed his arms in front of his chest.

With visions of the door giving way and him falling out running through her mind, she quickly reached forward and dragged him away from the door.
“Kyle, the man is legendary,” she said after taking a deep steadying breath. “I doubt he’d cover up a double homicide.”

“
Please,” Kyle scoffed, “I bet he’s the one who started calling himself a legend.”

“There ha
ve been movies made about him,” Grace countered patiently.

“You keep telling me that. You know, there
have been movies made about Bigfoot and frankly, it has just as much chance of solving this mystery as him,” he said, jerking a thumb in the older man’s direction.

Grace glanced through the window leading to the
dining car. Wellington was still standing in the center of the room. His hands still locked behind him. Every so often, he would nod his head at something one of the other passengers said.

“He’s a fake, a charlatan. He’s a conman,”
he whispered harshly. “He’s not a real detective. He’s just convinced everyone he is. He looks pensive and reflective when thinking about a problem, but have you noticed that he never answers a direct question. He makes you think he knows the answer when in reality he’s just fishing. He waits for you to supply the information and then he nods his head sagely and congratulates you for finally figuring out what he already knows. I have asked him a dozen of direct questions about this murder and I haven’t received one direct answer.”

“He may consider you a suspect.”

Kyle leaned closer. “Grace, think about it. I’ve spent my entire life around magicians, performers and tricksters. Do you really think I wouldn’t recognize a fake when confronted with one?”

They turned
as Parker opened the door and squeezed between them. Grace was just backing up a step to give Parker room when he suddenly lost his balance. His back painfully collided with her chest, pushing her against the side door. Her breath left her in a whoosh as she hit the cold door.

Parker muttered several apologies as he pushed himself away
off her with Kyle’s help. As soon as he was clear, she immediately jumped away from the door and towards Kyle. She wrapped a nervous hand around his bicep and held on tight.

She smiled reassuringly when Kyle looked down at her in concern.

“Sorry, Grace,” Parker said sheepishly. “I guess I have to get used to the train moving again.” He gave a nervous laugh. “Good thing the door didn’t give away. I heard the engineers say that it was no longer locking after Steve fell through it last night.”

Grace rubbed a hand over her eyes. “Wrong door. He fell through the—”

“Is Wellington done in there?” Kyle asked Parker.

Parker
pulled open the door to the observation car. “No, he’s still recreating the events of the yesterday morning. It’s pretty interesting. You two should be in there,” he said, walking through the door. “He probably has it all figured out.”

Kyle
grunted. “Amazing. Why aren’t you in there then?”

“Felicity wanted me to pack. See ya,” he said
as the door closed behind him.

Dropping her hand from Kyle’s
arm, Grace leaned back against the observation car door.

“I don’t trust him,” Kyle said.

“Is that why you didn’t want me to tell him that it was the side door between the sleeping car and the observation car that Steve fell through and not this one?” At Kyle’s nod, Grace said, “It’s not really a secret.”

“
Well, better safe than sorry, right?” He ran his hands over his face and smothered a yawn. “I think for the remainder of the trip we should stay together at all times.”

“
You’re probably right,” she said with a small shake of her head. “I don’t trust him either, but then again, I don’t trust anyone on this train.”

Kyle gave her a chiding look.

She smiled. “Present company excluded.”