Take a Dive for Murder (19 page)

It was a late night by the time Christopher, Carrie, and Charles finished giving their statements to Becker and the police finished their work in the study. Carrie was exhausted and slept late.

When she went down for breakfast, she learned from Mrs. Cavanaugh that Charles went to the office. She was sure he was starting the search of archived photographs.

Sleeping late had its advantages because while she was resting, she had an idea. She decided to call Charles at the office and share her plan. After she dialed the number, she wondered if Sandy Waxtrum would put through her call. Carrie was sure Charles received many unwanted calls and solicitations, which Sandy no doubt screened out. When she reached Sandy, she identified herself and asked to speak with Charles. She was prepared to go into further detail about the purpose of her call, but it wasn’t necessary.

“Oh, yes, how are you, Ms. Kingsford?
Please hold I’ll ring Mr. Faraday.” Carrie was sure her heart skipped a beat when she realized Charles must have instructed Sandy that she was a priority call. She decided she liked the idea of being a priority in Charles Faraday’s life.

“Good morning. What a pleasant surprise!”

“Speaking of surprises, I can’t believe, after last night, you were up early and off to the office.”

“I wanted to get started looking for photos. Thousands of them are boxed and stored, not to mention the newer shots housed on digital files. What are you up to this morning?”

“I was wondering if you’ve heard from Joel.”

“Not a word, but we
’re definitely on the same wavelength. I left another message for him this morning. The person answering the phone initially indicated he was available. Once I identified who I was, suddenly she remembered Joel was in a meeting and not taking calls. It’s pretty clear he’s trying to avoid me.”

“Today’s airwaves carried a brief story about the shooting,” Carrie said. “You would have thought that news would have generated a phone call from Joel.”

“Do you think Joel was involved last night?” Charles asked, as if he was struggling with his own answer.

“No, I don’t, and I also don’t believe Joel was involved with Jamie’s death, but I think he knows something he’s not telling us. Why would he break into the studio unless there was something he wanted? What do you think?”

“I know for someone who was interested in all the details of this case a few weeks ago, he’s quickly lost interest. Of course, it’s going to be tough to confront him if we can’t talk with him.”

“That’s why I’m calling.
I’ve an idea. If he won’t come to us, how about we go to him?”

“What makes you think if he won’t take my calls, he’ll talk to us in person?”

“We aren’t going to his office. When Joel and I ate lunch, we ate at the
Harbor Net Restaurant. You said he eats at that restaurant almost every day around one o’clock and the restaurant reserves the same table for him. How about if we get there early? We tell the manager we’re Joel’s guests, they seat us at his table, and when he comes in…well, I don’t think he’ll want to make a scene at his favorite restaurant.”

“And if for some reason he doesn’t show?”

“Then you and I have lunch together.”

“Sounds like a win
-win situation to me,” said Charles.

***

At twelve-thirty, Carrie and Charles were seated at Joel’s favorite table enjoying a bottle of his favorite white zinfandel wine. On cue at one o’clock, Joel Wheeler was escorted to his table. Apparently the maître d’ never mentioned he had guests waiting because there was no disguising the surprised look on his face when Joel saw Charles and Carrie at the table. His natural inclination was to back away from the table, but the maître d’ blocked his path.

“Hello, Joel. We got here a little early, so we went ahead and ordered the wine. Hope you don’t mind?”

Sensing Joel’s panic, Charles stood and shook his hand, keeping a tight grip on his arm. The maître d’ never sensed anything was wrong as he pulled a chair out for Joel. Charles released his grip as Joel took the seat. Assuming a friendly lunch among associates was underway, the maître d’ returned to his position at the front door.

“You know, Charles, I don’t remember inviting you and Carrie for lunch. I use my lunch time to refresh both my body and my mind, and I would prefer to eat alone
,” He emphasized the word alone.

“Joel, we would have respected your privacy if you had returned any of my phone calls. Since you didn’t call me, we thought this would be a pleasant way to return an item you lost,” Charles said, still smiling.

Carrie reached into her handbag and placed the pocketknife on the table. Joel reached for it, but Carrie quickly covered it with the palm of her hand. Joel recovered and said, “I only wanted to see if it was mine. That’s a very popular knife. Many people own them.”

“It’s yours, Joel. Popular or not, most people
don’t have their knives engraved with the initials J.W. Secondly, most people wouldn’t have lost their knife while breaking into Jamie’s studio.”

The same waiter who took their order when Carrie lunched with Joel appeared. “The usual, Mr. Wheeler?” he asked politely.

“What?” he snapped. “No, I don’t think I want anything today.”

“Now, Joel, you need to refresh your body and mind.
Besides, you’ll just get hungry watching us eat.” Carrie turned to the waiter and said, “I think we’ll have three cups of the New England clam chowder and three crab cake sandwiches on rolls, with sides of slaw.”

When the waiter received no additional instructions from Joel, he left with the order.

“Excellent choice, Carrie,” Charles said, taking another sip of wine.

“You two think you’re cute. Well, I don’t have time for this.”

“Then let’s cut the nonsense. Joel, in the scuffle with me the other night, your knife dropped out of your pocket.” Charles said. “But if you don’t want to talk with us, perhaps you would prefer telling the police why you broke into Jamie’s studio? I’m sure the police will also ask you about the recent fire at the studio and Suzanne’s shooting last night.”

Joel had been avoiding eye contact, but now he looked directly at Charles. “What are you talking about? Are you saying Suzanne
’s been shot?” Joel was genuinely surprised.

“It was in the
morning papers and on the air this morning about the shooting at our home last night,” confirmed Charles.

“
Honest, I didn’t hear anything about it. I listen to CDs on my ride in and then read the newspaper at the office. But this morning I was working on a brief and didn’t have time to read the paper.”

“Suzanne was shot just as she was about to reveal the name of my brother’s murderer.”

“That means that Suzanne was working with…” Joel didn’t finish his sentence, but took the extra wine glass on the table and grabbed the bottle of zinfandel. He filled his glass to the brim and took a large gulp of the wine. “It’s not what you think. I’m not tied in any way to your brother’s murder, and I didn’t know anything about Suzanne being shot.”

“I noticed you are now saying
‘murder,’” Carrie said. “Before when we met, you tried hard to convince me Jamie’s death was an accident.”

“That’s because I
was worried about you. I didn’t want you poking around the way Jamie was poking around. He hadn’t changed over the years. He would dig and dig until he found something, even if what he discovered had nothing to do with his original story idea.”

“So, what did my brother find out about you?”

Joel looked around to make sure no one was listening and then lowered his voice. “All right, but I need your assurance that everything I say stays between us. No cops!”

Charles and Carrie exchanged a glance.

“You’ve got my guarantee, providing what you tell us isn’t directly linked to my brother’s death.”

“It isn’t. What about you, Carrie? Will you agree to keep what I say between us?”

“Of course, I agree,” she confirmed.

Joel looked from Charles to Carrie, satisfying himself he had their promises, and then continued
. “Jamie was researching a story on the importing and exporting of goods. He contacted me when he returned to the States because he came across my name.”

“What do you mean he came across your name?” asked Charles.

“I don’t know the details. Jamie never told me. He simply said he heard my name mentioned in certain circles in relation to exporting items out of Europe.”

“Joel, I’m going to
be brutally honest with you. We know Jamie was working on a story not about the business of importing and exporting, but about smuggling. I think Jamie probably was on the trail of stolen goods and how they arrive in TriCity. I think he heard your name mentioned in relation to stolen goods. What type of importing business are you running?” demanded Carrie?

“Absolutely not
! I don’t smuggle!” Joel started playing with the stem of his wine glass.

“Joel, we said we would protect you, but only if you’re honest with us,” said Charles sternly.

“Alright, there have been times when people want to get an item out of a country and they contact a legitimate import/export dealer like me to help them.”

“Joel, let me see if I understand. These items you help people get in and out of the country aren
’t stolen?” asked Carrie in disbelief.

“Shh, not so loud.” Joel checked again to see if anyone was listening to the conversation. The nearest table was a group of tourists who were thoroughly engrossed in their experience of opening and eating hard-shell crabs. Satisfied no one was paying any attention to them, Joel continued, “Not stolen goods exactly
. I’m talking about private collectors who want to get a piece they own out of a country. I helped them get their item packed with a shipment of something else. Look, the majority of my business is the normal importing of items. I’ve helped out with these special deliveries only a couple of times.” Joel took another large gulp of wine. “We are a port city. I do a great deal of legal work for the shipping industry, and these couple of ‘special deals’ can’t become public knowledge, do you understand?”

Charles ignored Joel’s justification of his business practices and asked, “I assume you’re substituting the word
‘normal’ for the word ‘legal’? So my brother finds out about your little side business and confronts you. You’re worried about the loss of your import business and the possibility of being disbarred, so you...”

The conversation ceased when the waiter brought their plates of food. Joel refilled his wine glass, and Charles ordered another bottle of zinfandel. When the waiter left, Joel continued
. “No, you’re wrong. That’s not the way it was. Jamie also made a deal with me. You remember, Carrie, how Jamie was always making deals?”

Carrie nodded her head, remembering Jamie’s methods.

Joel continued. “Jamie promised that if I helped him with some inside information about importing, he would never mention my sideline deals to anyone.”

“Jamie would have required more of a deal than just some information about importing,” said Carrie.

Joel briefly stared at Carrie and then smiled. “Yeah, he did. I promised I’d stop any questionable activities in the future. Since these transactions aren’t the majority of my business, it was easy for me to agree.”

“Now that sounds like a Jamie deal,” Charles said. “He wouldn’t say you were wrong, but he would figure out a way to get you back on the right path.”

“Exactly. That was Jamie, and that was our deal.”

For a man who originally didn’t want any lunch, Joel now dug into his food with a vengeance. Carrie and Charles had barely touched their soup, and Joel was already attacking his crab cake sandwich.

“If you had a deal from Jamie, why did you break into the studio?” asked Charles.

“I had a promise from Jamie, no
one else. I was afraid he might have mentioned me in his notes. All I was trying to do was make sure there was nothing around to implicate me.”

“But, Joel, you knew I was going through Jamie’s papers. Why didn’t you say something when we ate lunch?
I’d have honored Jamie’s deal, and it would have saved us all this aggravation.”

“To be honest, when we started reminiscing, I couldn’t get past the old memories. I kept remembering your sense of right and wrong. I wasn’t sure I could trust you not to turn me in
to the authorities.”

“You’ll be glad to know I’ve mellowed. I’ve learned there are all kinds of shades of gray, but let’s get back to your meeting with Jamie. What kind of questions was Jamie asking?”

“As you suspected, his questions all concerned smuggling. What was the best way to hide an item? How did the person receiving the item get it? Was there someone on board the ship or someone at customs working with the smugglers? What happens at customs? What were the penalties if you got caught? Questions like that.”

“Did Jamie say what types of goods he thought were being smuggled? Drugs?” asked Charles.

“I don’t think it was drugs because he never asked any question specifically related to drugs.” Joel was silent, but then an idea flashed across his face. “Wait a minute. Now that you mention it, Jamie did say one thing. When we were talking about penalties, he asked if the penalty for smuggling weapons or drugs differed from smuggling consumer goods.”