Lost and Fondue (23 page)

From the adjoining room, Lois gasped. She prided herself on her teacup collection. The Old Country Roses pattern was her favorite. She bustled in, pulled a dust rag from a pocket of her apron, and mopped up the spill.

“Thank you, Lois,” I said. “I’ll get it.” I took the rag from her. She backed out of the room, nodding in deference like a scullery maid caught listening at a keyhole.

The front door slammed. “Where is she?” I heard Urso say from the foyer. Seconds later, he stormed into the great room. “Well, well. Isn’t this cozy?” He threw me a sour look. “Did you think you’d handle this on your own?”

“I called and left a message.”

“Didn’t get it. But thanks to Gretel and Octavia, I knew you would track down Meredith.” He addressed her and her brother. “I know about the bricks. I saw the brick pallet. Mind you, I didn’t go inside the fence. I’d need a court order for that.”

Freddy blanched.

Urso said, “I also know about your little foray into the Ziegler Winery to check on said brick wall, Charlotte.”

“How would you—?”

“I do go back to crime scenes myself, and I have a nose. You smell like Camay soap and vanilla.”

He was good. Before leaving the house, I’d dabbed vanilla extract behind my ears. Grandmère taught me that little trick. Everyone liked the aroma of cookies.

To exonerate myself, I quickly relayed how Grandmère and the others believed that the murderer had set the scene. I shared the various theories about the jewels being symbolic, either relating to Harker’s gambling problem or his hunger for treasure. I left the discovery of the dumbwaiter shaft hidden behind the façade bricks for last. When I finished, I felt remarkably light. Confession was, indeed, good for the soul.

“My money is still on Quinn Vance,” Urso said.

“Not Freddy?” Meredith asked.

Urso raised an eyebrow. “Should it be?”

“No,” Freddy pleaded, “but Quinn is innocent, too.”

Urso shook his head. “I went to Cleveland. I asked questions.”

“Questions?” I repeated.

He glowered at me. “Yes, I actually do my job.”

“I didn’t meant to suggest—” I swallowed hard. “Who’d you talk to?”

“Mine to know.”

“Bullheaded,” I muttered.

“Meddlesome,” he countered. “If you must know, I spoke to her former roommate. Miss Vance was not happy with Harker Fontanne, and she was quite vocal about it. She thought he was cheating on her. He’d painted portraits of another woman. I assume they were the same portraits that were stolen from Mr. Fontanne’s portfolio.”

Meredith started to weep.

Urso cleared his throat. “Meredith, I’m sorry if I’m upsetting you, but we’ve got to talk about motive for a moment.”

“Quinn is innocent!” she cried.

“Then let’s take a hard look at your brother.” Urso zeroed in on Freddy. “Mr. Vance, you didn’t want Mr. Fontanne to get involved with your daughter, did you?”

Freddy looked like he wanted to disappear into his chair. “Harker was a student. We’d made a pact. No students were to get involved with other students. Not on my watch. I could lose my job. We didn’t have chaperones on this trip. I was the only one in charge. I set the rules.”

“Then why are you involved with a donor?” I said.

“We’re not involved.”

“Winona Westerton was in your room two nights ago. You looked pretty darned close.”

Freddy scowled. “Spying on me, Charlotte?”

I sat taller. “You didn’t pull the brocade drapes. The sheer ones provide a gauzy view.”

He huffed. His hand twisted inside his pocket. When he caught me noticing, he pulled his hand free. “If you must know, Winona is teaching me to dance.”

“Oh, please,” I said. He couldn’t really expect me—us—to buy that. “None of us fell off a turnip truck.”

“Winona said all single men should know how to dance.” He leapt to his feet and struck a ballroom dancing pose, arms extended, chin lifted. “Forward with my left foot.”

I had to admit that his posture was excellent. Occasionally I watched ballroom dancing shows on television. I was almost as expert at judging as the judges, but then who wasn’t from her living room?

Freddy said, “U-ey ... Chief, it’s true. I didn’t like Harker Fontanne. I didn’t trust him with my daughter. But I didn’t kill him.”

Urso lasered him with his steely gaze. I could see the wheels ticking in his head. He couldn’t prove Freddy was outright lying. He had nothing to go on except Freddy’s bravado and a stack of missing bricks, which I would bet he couldn’t prove were the same as the ones in the winery. Brick was brick, right?

“Okay, I’ll take your word, for now,” Urso said. “But think hard about those bricks you bought. If you come up with a theory about who took them, I want to hear it.”

“Let my daughter go. You know she didn’t do this.”

“I’m sorry, Freddy, but I’ve got enough evidence to hold her,” Urso said.

Both Meredith and I breathed easier. At least Urso had resorted to calling Freddy by his first name, not his last. That was a step in the right direction.

Meredith rose and gripped Freddy by the forearm. Her fingers dug into his jacket. “Let’s go back to the precinct to visit Quinn. Our attorney’s working on her bail. We’ll take a deck of cards with us. You know how much she loves to play gin rummy.”

“Freddy, hold on.” I bounded from my chair. “One more question.”

“Sure, why not?” He spread his arms wide. “I seem to have a bull’s-eye painted on my chest. Fire away.”

“What do you think happened to Harker’s artwork?”

“Don’t have a clue. Why anyone would take it is beyond me. He wasn’t that good.”

Meredith looked askance at her brother. Apparently she believed that Freddy and she had held the same opinion about Harker—that he was gifted.

“Did you take it?” I asked.

Freddy coughed out a laugh. “I don’t know where you came up with that idea, Charlotte.”

I did. He looked so darned guilty. He hadn’t liked Harker. He would have done anything to keep Harker and Quinn apart. Ruining Harker’s career or at least setting him back a notch would have given Freddy great pleasure.

“Lois put you up to this, didn’t she?” Freddy said. “She probably told you she saw me coming out of Harker’s room.”

“Are you saying you were in his room?” I glanced around, looking for Lois. She and the Cube seemed to have lost interest or were hiding out of sight, maybe in the kitchen with a glass pressed to the wall. Urso’s arrival must have spurred their retreat.

Freddy shifted feet. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”

“Actually, you do,” Urso said.

Freddy chuckled, but he was definitely ruffled. His neck had flushed bright red. “Fine. Here’s the truth. I shot photographs of the Ziegler Winery for our painting session. Harker borrowed them. He said he wanted to sketch them. He told me he was through with them, so I went into his room and took them back.”

“You’re lying,” I said. “Lois saw paintings in Harker’s portfolio, not photos.”

“He had my photographs, too.”

Urso shot me a hard look, obviously not appreciating my interrogation style. “Want to show me what you took, Freddy?”

“Yeah, sure.” Freddy beckoned Urso to follow him. I started after them, but Urso flashed a palm to stop me.

Minutes later, when they returned downstairs, Urso seemed satisfied, but Freddy’s left hand was back in his pocket worrying the lining. Had he shown Urso what I’d seen him stowing in the suitcase or something else just to get Urso off his back?

“May I walk you to town, Charlotte?” Urso said.

A tingle of apprehension rippled through me. I recalled the moment when he came into the shop earlier. He’d wanted to discuss something, but Gretel and Octavia had rushed into the shop and he’d hurried off to censure Prudence. Was he hoping to talk to me about us?

“I have to borrow a recipe from Lois,” I said. “She has an incredible scone that she makes with mascarpone cheese and cranberries.” Granted, avoidance behavior and I were becoming fast friends, but I also wanted to take another look in Freddy’s room.

“Sure. Another time.” Urso gave a tip of his hat and left the bed-and-breakfast.

Seconds later, Freddy and Meredith departed, as well.

To secure my alibi, I located Lois and asked her for that recipe. While she went in search of it—I’d seen her disorganized filing system; the task could take her up to an hour—I hustled to Freddy’s room. At the landing, I checked to make sure the hallway was clear. It was. All the B&B guests seemed to be out enjoying the day before the rain started to fall.

I dashed to Freddy’s room and tried to twist the doorknob, but it wouldn’t budge. I moved to the next room, hoping there was a connecting door between the two. I’d seen one in Harker’s room. To my surprise, the door handle turned. I opened the door, expecting to walk into Quinn’s room, and realized I’d confused the location. I was entering Dane and Edsel’s room. I didn’t care. I needed to get to Freddy’s any way I could.

The scent of lavender sachets flooded my senses. A cool breeze swept through the open window. Even on cool days, when guests were away, Lois liked to air out the rooms. Avoiding the clothing and shoes that had been tossed on the floor, I tiptoed across the carpet to the door joining the two rooms and flipped the bolt, but the door wouldn’t budge. It was locked from the other side. I quickly retreated to the hall and tried the room on the opposite side of Freddy’s. Quinn’s room. Unfortunately the door was locked, but the spring bolt was ancient and there was only a minimal doorframe. Rebecca would tell me to break in. I didn’t think I was strong enough to knock down the door with my shoulder or with a hefty kick, but I remembered seeing a detective on some TV show open a door with a credit card. I slipped a laminated grocery store discount card from my purse—why destroy a good credit card if this ploy didn’t work?—and wedged the card into the crack between the door and the skinny frame. Bending the card slightly, I slid it downward. The ploy would only work if the slope of the latch faced me. While wiggling the card and twisting the doorknob, I glanced over my shoulder to make sure no one was approaching. The coast was clear. Even so, perspiration broke out above my upper lip. I licked it away. Wiggled the card some more. And then, like magic, I heard a click. The knob twisted. The door opened.

I zipped inside, pocketed the discount card, and shut the door.

Quinn’s room was as neat as a pin and as cool as Dane and Edsel’s. Again, there was a lock on the door joining her room with Freddy’s, but this time when I turned the knob, the door opened. Apparently Freddy wasn’t concerned about his daughter entering his room. Maybe he was telling the truth about Winona’s and his platonic friendship.

On a luggage rack in the corner of the room sat Freddy’s suitcase. As I headed toward it, I caught sight of a handful of photographs scattered on the bed: of the winery’s hillsides, the vines, the mansion. Were they what he’d shown Urso to persuade Urso of his innocence? I wasn’t so easily convinced.

I proceeded to the suitcase and reached for the zipper, but it was sealed tightly with a combination padlock. I tried the typical sequential combinations like 1-2-3-4 and 2-3-4-5. No go. I tested single-digit combinations: 1-1-1-1, 2-2-2-2. I was up to 5-5-5-5 when I heard the sound of footsteps padding along the hallway. The footsteps stopped outside Freddy’s door.

My pulse skyrocketed. Was it Urso, back for a second look, or Freddy, ready to silence me forever? Or Lois, realizing how I’d duped her? Did it matter? I didn’t want to get caught.

The doorknob started to turn.

I eyed the door to Quinn’s room, but the distance was too far. Freddy’s bathroom was nearer and the door hung open, but the bathroom would be an obvious place to search for an intruder. I darted to the window. Batting drapes out of my way, I peeked at the grounds below. I didn’t see any sign of the Cube nor the guests.

Swiftly I clambered outside. Of course, in my haste, I hadn’t considered the consequences. I would have to descend using the crisscrossed trellis, which was flimsy at best and prickly with leafless vines.

With my heart pounding so hard I could hear it in my ears, I swung around, stomach to the window, grabbed hold of a crossbar on the trellis, and stretched out a foot to the right. I lodged a toe into a diamond pattern, grabbed hold of another crossbar, and trusted my entire weight to the trellis. Blissfully, the wood didn’t crack. The Cube was steadfast about yearly maintenance.

Thirty seconds later, I leapt off the trellis to the grass, my hands punctured and bleeding, and sprinted home.

As I tore into my kitchen and slammed the door, Rags appeared. He mewed at me as if asking what was wrong.

I scooped him into my arms and nuzzled him with my chin. “Nothing,” I whispered. “Nothing.” But I was lying. I was not cut out for a life of crime.

Frustrated with my inability to crack the padlock’s code and disappointed because I still didn’t know whether Freddy was lying or telling the truth, I needed a little emotional boost. While driving to Providence Elementary to pick up the twins, I called Matthew. He sounded prepared for and excited about the evening’s wine-tasting event. Another half dozen people had called asking if they could attend. He added that Pépère, who wanted to take a breather from Grandmère and her tech week craziness, had shown up to help. Grandmère had asked that he return in an hour, but for now, he was merrily tidying the store.

“The next onslaught won’t be until the tasting,” Matthew said. “And, hurrah, no Sylvie sightings.”

“Life is good.”

We laughed, the sound unique to both of us in the last few days.

Before he hung up, he said, “Please take Amy and Clair for a treat, Charlotte. Talk to them. Make sure they’re okay. I’d ask Meredith to spend a little time with them, but she’s preoccupied.”