Murder Most Mellow (A Kate Jasper Mystery) (11 page)

“What do you need?” I asked him. He didn’t answer me right away. “You’ll probably be all right financially—” I began. Another wail interrupted me. But this time it wasn’t Nick. It was the teakettle.

Nick got up and turned it off. “Ellen said that the two of us inherit!” he shouted over his shoulder. “And I still have Uncle Herb’s money.” He sat back down. “But I just don’t know how to do regular stuff, like drive and shop and stuff like that.” He looked at me like a forlorn child. A very large, handsome, forlorn child.

“I could teach you some of those things,” I found myself offering. Damn. Just what I needed, a six-foot-six baby. “I mean, all of us,” I amended quickly. “Sarah’s friends: me and Peter and Tony.” I could always twist their arms into helping later.

Nick grinned and clapped his big hands. “I feel like I know you all already!” he cried. “Grumpy Peter, sweet Tony, gossipy Vivian, quiet Linda. And your old husband, Craig. Sarah told me all about you guys!”

My ears perked up. At last, a willing informant.

“Did she say anyone was mad at her?” I asked nonchalantly.

“All the time!” Nick leaned back and laughed heartily. Pots and pans shook on their shelves. “Peter was always mad at her. And Vivian—and you—and her partner Myra—and her sister Ellen got mad at her. Craig used to get mad at her. Even Tony was mad at her sometimes.”

“So she knew she drove us nuts,” I said, somehow pleased. “Thanks, Nick. I was never really sure before.”

He smiled, obviously gratified by the thanks. Suddenly I realized he had left someone out.

“What about Linda?” I asked quickly.

He wrinkled his handsome forehead with concentration. “Sarah never said Linda was mad at her, I guess,” he said finally. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled. He hung his head.

“That’s all right,” I assured him. Poor guy. He was really trying to help. But before I tried to cheer him up again, I had another question. “What did you think of Sarah’s house?” I asked slyly.

“Oh, I’ve never been there!” he replied, shaking the room again. “She said it had lots of neat stuff. She said this house was ‘sterile.’ “ He hung his head once more.

I looked around. It was certainly bare. There were no pictures on the beige walls, no mementos cluttering the utilitarian wooden shelves, only a scattering of cooking implements and foodstuffs.

“You’re a big help, Nick,” I told him. He lifted his head and sat up straight in his chair. “Did Sarah ever mention a computer program to you that had to do with the stock market?” I asked. “One that was going to make her a fortune?”

“Uh-huh!” His reply came without hesitation. “She was working on it forever! She said it would model everything a stock broker did, but on a program. She said it would ‘revolutionize investing.’ I think she was about to sell it. She was real hot on it.”

Nick was watching me expectantly. I was pretty sure he would answer anything I asked him. But I just couldn’t think of any more relevant questions. And we never had gotten around to the tea and root beer.

“So you’re a sculptor,” I prompted.

He nodded his head violently.

“I’d like to see your work,” I told him.

“Really?” he bellowed.

“Really,” I answered. A smile tugged at my mouth. I could almost see why Sarah loved him. Almost. “Have you ever had a show?” I asked.

“Uh-huh! Sarah made me two showings. We sold some, but not too many.” He waved his hands in the air. “It doesn’t matter. I have money. I did the sculptures for Sarah. An
homage
” He pronounced the word carefully. “She loved them. Maybe you’ll like them too.” He looked at me shyly. I stood up.

Nick led me across the hall into the living room. There were no sculptures there. The room was sparsely furnished with exercise equipment, a tanning lamp, a television set complete with VCR, and two cushions on the floor. For a moment I wondered if he just imagined he was a sculptor. But then he pointed to a door at the back of the living room.

He opened that door onto a barn of a workroom which overflowed with sculpted works. Shelves and shelves of sculptures in various sizes, colors and media lined the walls. All of them were the same shape, a vaguely floral one that looked somehow familiar. But I couldn’t place exactly where I had seen it before.

We walked in. On one wall there were glistening bronzes, terracotta potteries and wood carvings. On another wall there were sculptures of papier-mâché and plaster. There were even cloth ones, painted and embroidered in a rainbow of colors. Against the third wall was a massive marble piece. Next to the door was a table with an ivory miniature on it. Nick patted each piece lovingly as he led me past. The display was overwhelming.

“How do you like them?” he asked, his eyes shyly lowered. For once he didn’t shout.

His restraint deserved a positive answer. And the work
was
impressive. I tried to think like a friendly art critic. “There’s a real harmony to the group as a whole,” I told him honestly. “I especially like the wood carvings. You did those with such attention to the grain. Nice, very nice.” His eyes came up, smiling. “Did you do them all?” I asked.

“Yes, every single one,” he said. “Now that Sarah’s gone, maybe I’ll do something different. She loved these, but I was running out of stuff to do them in. Maybe we could arrange a showing, you know, for Sarah.” He watched my face.

“An ‘homage’ to Sarah?” I asked.

He nodded eagerly.

I patted his elbow. I couldn’t reach his shoulder without getting too close. “Could be,” I said.

I contemplated Nick’s creations for a while, focusing on individual pieces and then stepping back to look at the total exhibition. But I still couldn’t figure out what the sculptures were meant to represent. I sighed and stole a look at my watch.

I turned to Nick. “I need to go now,” I said gently. His face fell. “But I’ll leave you my phone number,” I added quickly. “And I’ll be back. Don’t worry.”

“Thank you,” he said. It was then that I realized he wasn’t bellowing. His voice was still loud, but it had never regained its formerly painful volume the whole time we had been in this room. His sculptures were a good influence. I looked at him and wondered what kind of influence Sarah had been.

On the way home in the car, I mulled over Nick Taos. What a peculiar blend he was, with that gorgeous body and that trombone of a voice. And what about his mind? He couldn’t, or didn’t, do “regular stuff.” But he could do what it took to create intricate sculptures. Was his intelligence really limited? Was he crazy, or something else altogether? And how could someone who ate all that junk food look so damn healthy, anyway? I turned into my driveway. Nick was certainly a paradox, but was he a murderer?

I walked into my house still wondering. Then I turned on my answering machine.

First I heard the distinct sound of someone spitting. Then the machine snarled, “Get off the case or you’re dead!”

- Eight -

The room that had seemed so familiar suddenly looked grey and alien to my eyes. I stopped breathing for a moment and heard the sound of my own pulse pounding. Then I ran back across the room and locked the front door. In the years that I’d lived in a San Francisco apartment, I had been very careful to bolt my doors. But here in mellow Marin I had gotten out of the habit of locking myself in.

I sat down and focused on remaining calm. A death threat. Damn. I was shaking all over.

I took a big breath and told myself to think tranquil thoughts.
But it has to be the murderer,
a shrill voice inside my head insisted. No, I admonished, tranquil thoughts only. Think about flowers. Think about gardening on a sunny day. I imagined the colors in the garden and the buzz of sounds on a summer day. I concentrated on feeling the warmth of the sun on my hands. I took another big breath. My pulse was slowing back to normal.

I forced myself to sit a little longer. My mind was almost clear. Then a new thought jerked me out of my seat.
What if the murderer is already here?
I ran through the house, frantically checking rooms.

But I was the only one home. Besides C.C. She was cuddled up in my laundry basket, snoozing obliviously. I gave her head a reassuring pat, reassuring to me at least, and returned to the answering machine.

I replayed the message, listening carefully to the voice.

“Get off the case or you’re dead,” it said once more.

The speaker didn’t sound like anyone I knew, even disguised.

Actually, it sounded like a Hollywood-style gangster. And the spitting! As far as I knew, none of my acquaintances was in the habit of spitting before speaking.

The second rendition was enough. I called the Sheriff’s Department and asked for Sergeant Feiffer. I wasn’t going to keep the message to myself. The police had all kinds of gadgets. A voiceprint, that’s what I needed. Right? Didn’t they have voiceprint kits or something? My phone call was promptly routed to the sergeant. I said the magic words “threatening message” and he told me he’d be right out.

I played the message over and over as I waited for him, hoping that the sound of the voice would call up a corresponding face. It didn’t. The wait wasn’t long. A Sheriff’s car came sirening up to my door less than five minutes later. Sergeant Feiffer and a goofy-looking deputy hopped out. The deputy was a long, lean man with a classic hound dog face. They trotted up my front stairs in tandem.

“You don’t need your guns,” I joked weakly, opening the door and leading them inside. “The machine will talk without coercion.” Gallows humor.

But Feiffer was not smiling. “This is serious, Ms. Jasper,” he rumbled. “Let’s hear the message.”

I decided to believe his new gruffness was out of personal concern. The uncharitable thought did enter my mind, however, that it wouldn’t do his career a whole lot of good if I ended up murdered along with Sarah. The three of us stood around the machine as I played the tape once more.

“Dead” was still echoing in the room when the dog-faced deputy piped up. “I know who that is,” he said.

“You do?” the sergeant and I exclaimed simultaneously. We turned to him expectantly.

“Sure,” he said. His sorrowful eyes crinkled in a smile. “It’s this bad guy on
Philadelphia Beat.”

“What?”

“You know, the old TV show,” he explained impatiently. He sketched the shape of a TV set with his hands, then continued. “See, there’s this bad guy. And Red Cullen is closing in on him. So the guy calls Cullen, spits real nasty-like, and then says ‘get off the case or you’re dead,’ but Cullen doesn’t listen. So then the bad guy blows up his car, boom!” The deputy threw his arms outward. What a performer. “But Cullen isn’t in it ‘cause he knew that was going to happen. And then—”

“When was this show on?” asked Sergeant Feiffer. His voice was deep and ominous.

“Uh,” the deputy answered, suddenly looking nervous. Had it just occurred to him that this was serious? He wrinkled his forehead in thought. “Musta been last week.” He nodded fervently. “A rerun, you know. Yeah, last week,” he confirmed.

“But how did the murderer know last week that they were going to need a threatening message this week?” I asked. I hadn’t actually meant to speak out loud, but there it was.

“Maybe he—or she—didn’t,” answered Sergeant Feiffer thoughtfully. “Maybe they just videotaped it for themselves and then decided they could use it on you later.” I noticed that he didn’t correct me on the word “murderer.” My pulse began to race again. He was as worried as I was. I tried to think clearly.

“It’s someone with a VCR,” I said after a moment. Suddenly it seemed easy. I straightened my shoulders. “So all we have to do is find out who’s involved that has a VCR.”

“Probably
everyone
in this case has a VCR,” Feiffer said, sighing. So much for easy.

“Well, I don’t have one,” I insisted loudly, unwilling to give up the comfort of an easy answer.

“Everyone but you, then,” he growled.

I looked him in the eye. Was he giving up already?

“Oh, we’ll check into it,” he assured me. But he didn’t look excited about it.

“How about tracing it?” I asked. “Can’t you find out where the call was made from?”

“Maybe,” he said glumly. “But if it’s a local call we’re out of luck. And even if it wasn’t, I doubt that the person who called was stupid enough to do it from their own telephone.” He paused. “What time did the call come in?”

I thought for a moment. “Sometime this afternoon,” I said slowly. “I was out for a couple of hours after you left the first time.”

He gave me an accusing look. Did he know I was out sleuthing? Then he sighed. “We’ll do what we can,” he said apathetically.

His lack of enthusiasm was catching. I hung my head and hoped the death threat wasn’t really serious. Fat chance! About as good as the chances of being only a little pregnant.

“I have a question for you,” barked Sergeant Feiffer, jarring me out of my reverie. “Are you mixed up in anything else besides this Sarah Quinn business? Some other ‘case’ that someone is warning you off of?”

“I don’t think so,” I mumbled. Then I considered the question more thoroughly. There was no one I could think of in my personal life. Except… Wayne. Wayne wanted me off the case. No, not Wayne, I told myself firmly. A business matter? I was late on some orders. But people don’t threaten gag-gift peddlers with death, do they?