Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 05 - Trouble on the Doorstep (19 page)

I reached down and picked up my phone and moved quickly up a few steps as I dialed 9-1-1- and then pushed the send button.

Nat had jumped up the two short steps to the landing, but when he saw I’d placed the call he just leaned against the wall and shut his eyes.

Andrew Markham’s voice was very authoritative.
“When the police get here, you just tell them Nat was pounding on your door, but everything’s fine now.”

I WAS SURPRISED that it was Lt. Tortino who drove into the B&B lot and left his lights flashing as he ran up the steps to the front door, which was still ajar and letting in cold air. I had remained standing on the stairs while Nat Markham followed his father through the first floor as the angry elder Markham talked almost incoherently. Much of what he said was berating his son for being a poor businessman who spent too much time with his family instead of working.

I walked to the door as Tortino came through it.
“Thanks,” I said.

His eyes went from me to the kitchen, where Nat Markham was now talking in lowered tones to his father.

“It’s Andrew Markham,” I said. “I think he came here to try to bribe me or something. Nat’s with him. Andrew seems, well, kind of off-balance.”

Tortino’s hand had been on his holster but he took it off and walked through the guest breakfast room and pushed open the swinging door to the kitchen area.
“What’s going on?”

“Ah, Lieutenant,” Andrew Markham said, in a smooth, professional tone.
“So good to see you.”

Tortino had been standing in the doorway, so I walked up quietly behind him to peer in.
“Mr. Markham, Jolie said you came here for a rather odd reason.”

“Nonsense.
You probably know I secured a number of donations for Harvest for All…”

“It’s
over
, dad,” said Nat. “Stop talking.”

“Leave this to me, son,” he said.

“You should probably take us both down to the station to talk about…” Nat began.

This was apparently the wave that brought down the sand castle.
“I said we are going home, and I meant it,” yelled an enraged Andrew Markham.

He must have stepped toward Nat in a menacing way, because Tortino moved into the kitchen faster than I would have thought he could.
“Apart!” he said, as the door swung shut behind him.

I stood rooted to my spot in the breakfast room, listening to about three seconds of what was maybe a shoving match, and then a couple more seconds of rather intense silence.

“Are you all right, Nat?” Tortino asked.

I opened the door a crack.
Nat was sitting on the floor, looking slightly dazed. Tortino had one of Andrew Markham’s arms pinned behind him, and held the other at Markham’s side.

“I’m fine.”
Nat said this as he stood. “My father needs some help.”

“Perfectly fine.
Perfectly fine. Just a misunderstanding.” Andrew Markham looked at the floor as he said this. “A business matter, just requires some negotiation.”

Tortino looked at me and I shrugged.
“I think he’s mad at me about something, but it’s not my fault,” I said.

I LOOKED AT my watch again. The meeting at Silver Times probably started half an hour ago. I had to wonder how much difference it would make that two of the key people related to the bid for repairs were sitting in the Ocean Alley Police station, one of them having arrived in handcuffs.

I was in Lt. Tortino’s small office, and he and the two Markhams and their lawyer were in the conference room down the hall.
Apparently when you are Andrew Markham you or your son can call your attorney from the police cruiser so that said attorney meets you at the station pretty darn fast.

When I had said something about how quiet it was to a clerk who brought me coffee, she said it was because several officers were at Silver Times, “in case some meeting out there gets rowdy.”
I smiled grimly. If it got rowdy that would likely be Hank’s fault. Or maybe Elmira’s.

My eyes went to the window where I could see flashing lights outside.
I stood and looked out. An ambulance, lights on but no siren, had pulled into the parking lot. The EMTs didn’t seem to be in too big a hurry. They alighted slowly and walked to the side door of the police station, one not used by the public.

I sat back down and listened with only the vaguest interest as the EMTs spoke quietly to someone.
I didn’t want to be at the Silver Times meeting, but I was worried about what George would hear there. If Lance spoke, he wouldn’t say he got any information from me, but I wouldn’t put it past Fred Brennan to say something about someone stealing information from his office. Especially if he thought it would draw attention away from himself.

I stood up and stretched.
I wanted to leave the police station. I had told Lt. Tortino anything he needed to know, anything I wanted to tell him, anyway. That did not include saying that I had taken material from Brennan’s files.

Chairs scraped and there were voices in the hall.
“Just a mistake, boys, just a mistake.” It sounded like Andrew Markham.

“Sure enough, Mr. Markham,” said a polite man’s voice.

I stuck enough of my head out of Tortino’s office so I could see who was in the hall. The two EMTs each had one of Andrew Markham’s arms and they were guiding him toward the door closest to the ambulance. Markham had no handcuffs on. That really ticked me off. Tortino walked out of the conference room, saw me, and frowned. I pulled my head back into his office.

Five minutes later, Tortino stood at the door to his office and beckoned me without saying anything.
I followed him into the conference room, where Nat and the lawyer were sitting. Nat looked as worn out as anyone I’d seen, but he also looked more agitated than he had after Lt. Tortino had subdued his father. I glanced at Tortino and he indicated that I should sit, so I did.

The lawyer cleared his throat.
“Ms. Gentil, my client would like to speak with you for a moment. I have advised him to say very little.”

Straight out of the movies
. “Sure,” I said.

“My father has been, let’s just say unwell, for awhile.
He seems to think…”

The lawyer, an older man, perhaps sixty-five or more, cleared his throat.

Nat looked at him before looking back to me. “Don’t worry, Joseph. I’ll be discreet. It’s some anxiety thing, or something, maybe.” He leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temples for a few seconds, and then looked at me again. “He’s always enjoyed helping people, and it’s fair to say he overextended himself doing so.”

“You mean he gave away too much money, or something?”

“Too much is a relative term,” the lawyer said.

Nat and I looked at him, and then back at each other.

“As I said, he liked to help people, yes, generally by donating money.
I think he saw himself as a benevolent benefactor.”

I didn’t say anything.
Tortino was leaning against the wall, his eyes on Nat.

“He asked me to, let’s just say, recoup some of his donations.
I shouldn’t have agreed, but he’s my dad.”

“And Fred Brennan didn’t mind the extra costs?” I asked.

Before Nat could say anything, Tortino said, “Jolie” and the lawyer said, “Mr. Brennan is not the subject of discussion here.”

Nat gave me a barely perceptible nod.
“Like I said, he’s my dad, and I kind of gave my parents a run for their money for a number of years.”

“I can relate to that part,” I said, softly.
I doubted if any of my younger antics would match some of Nat’s, but my mother used to get pretty upset sometimes.

The lawyer cleared his throat again.

“Would you like a cough drop?” I asked. I didn’t have one, but I figured the offer would get him to stop the interruptions.

Nat stared at me, unsmiling.
“I can’t say a lot more. I just wanted you to know three things. I’m really sorry if my dad bothered you. He’s not himself. I did send those stupid letters when I heard Steve and Eric were going to bid on the Silver Times project. But I promise you, I had nothing to do with the deaths of those two men.”

NAT’S LAST COMMENT got to the crux of the issue. I wasn’t sure I believed his denial. Why should I trust him? On the other hand, I would never have suspected it was Andrew Markham leaning on Nat to submit an inflated bid to Silver Times, so what did I know?

Nat seemed earnest when he denied killing Steve and Eric, but his attitude had been very different when I talked to him in the Markham Construction office.
He was combative, almost threatening. The Nat I had talked to that day struck me as someone who could hurt someone. Maybe the sincere promise was an act. I wasn’t ready to check Nat off my list of suspects.

I had been back at the Cozy Corner for about twenty minutes, long enough to put the dogs outside and let them back in and make myself a cup of tea with a strong shot of Amaretto from the newly opened bottle.

I had figured I should fess up to one thing with Tortino and told him about Fred Brennan and his handyman letting themselves into Harry’s house because they wanted something from me.
I tried to imply that I had no idea what it was.

Tortino has known me since eleventh grade.
“Would that something have anything to do with Lance Wilson making a stink over the high cost of the bidding at Silver Times?”

When I had said it might, he sighed.
“Okay, we need to deal with that, but not tonight. I have a couple officers on a call about a fight at the Sandpiper Bar and Grill, two others trying to find the peeping tom, and a couple out at Silver Times in case the oldsters get rowdy. Go home and come back at nine o’clock tomorrow morning.”

Given that Tortino had made the connection between Lance’s questions and me having the bid information, there was no way I’d be able to avoid telling George about my raid of the Silver Times file cabinets.
That meant I’d probably have to say I’d had Steve’s figures too, but at least George could direct some of his anger about that to Bill.

As it turned out, I didn’t have to tell George.
As soon as he and Scoobie walked into the kitchen after the meeting I knew he knew.

“How was it?” I asked.

“About as you might expect,” George said, with emphasis on you.

I pretended not to know what his inflection meant.
“Does it look as if there was something off about the bidding process?” I asked.

Scoobie answered.
“That was kind of hard to tell from what anybody admitted in the meeting, but Brennan had to promise to turn over the bidding and repair process to two members of the board and to stay totally out of it.”

“It was what Hank said that made everybody think Brennan and Markham were trying to get more for the repairs.”
George was staring at me.

Uh oh
.

I shrugged.
“Everybody says Hank’s full of bologna. They believed him?”

“He may be,” George said,” but he said he had a source who looked at the estimates and said they were out of line.”

I never said that to Hank!
“Well, like you said, he’s always trying to make people look bad.”

George had been sitting at the table, but he stood and looked at Scoobie.
“I’ve got a really early meeting tomorrow. Can you sack out here?”

“Sure,” Scoobie said.

I knew I was going to mend a mile’s worth of fences, or maybe boardwalk, if George was going to get over being mad at me anytime soon.

As the door to the breakfast room swung harder than usual on its hinges, thanks to the hard push George gave it as he left, I looked at Scoobie.
“Does he know?”

“He knows you’ve been keeping something from him, because Hank said he saw you at Brennan’s office a few nights ago.”

I HAD SPENT an hour at the police station this morning, unfortunately with Sgt. Morehouse, who never cuts me any slack. He should get a hobby besides selling Christmas trees. The gist of it was Morehouse might never speak to me again because I didn’t tell him Brennan and his handyman came into Harry’s house uninvited. Oddly, Morehouse stayed away from how I got the information they were after.

Fred Brennan had expressed shock, according to George’s article in this morning’s
Ocean Alley Press
that “anything had been amiss in the bidding process.”

Yeah, right.
Maybe something Nat could tell the police would let them find out what a snake Brennan was. Maybe Brennan would have to give his new Lincoln back to the dealer.

Part of George’s article said that owners of two buildings the Markhams had constructed in the last year — the Knights of Columbus Hall and an insurance agency — planned to ask for independent audits for their building projects.
I told myself that I should be happy that Fred Brennan and Andrew Markham’s actions were getting scrutiny, and that they might spend a lot of money on legal defense.

What bothered me a lot was that there might not be much of a crime to punish if the only thing proved was that the bid was fraudulent and Brennan knew it.
No money had been spent. Still, Brennan might never be able to get a good job again. That was some comfort.

The police still had no idea who had pushed me down in Aunt Madge’s back yard.
If I had to guess, I’d say it was Brennan’s maintenance guy, but there would probably be no way to know.

I had one other big thing to worry about.
I wouldn’t put it past Brennan to trot out some security film footage of me in his office after hours. Maybe it wouldn’t matter since, technically, the only things I took were a couple of pieces of paper. Somehow I didn’t think that would cut much slack with Aunt Madge.

From what George’s article said, Andrew and Louise Markham faced a long rebuilding of their finances and reputations.
It turned out her rampant spending had been one reason they were in financial straits. That made me think of Robby and how much money he’d gambled away. You really never know what your spouse does when you aren’t with them. And Scoobie wonders why I have trust issues.

I pulled my mobile phone out of my pocket to see if George had called.
Should I call him? Should I give him more time to cool off?

My thoughts went back to the murders.
If Nat really had not killed Steve or Eric or maybe paid someone to do it, then the police were no closer to finding the murderer than they were the night of Eric’s funeral. I was out of opinions, not that Morehouse would listen to any of my ideas.

I could almost hear Scoobie saying, “You can’t control that.
You need to let go of it.” It almost made me think of going to one of the All-Anon meetings.

I washed out the dogs’ water bowl and put it back on the plastic placemat Aunt Madge has on the floor by the sliding glass door.

My phone chirped.
George, thanks goodness!
But no, Pooki’s name popped up.
I need to talk to Pooki like a house needs mold.
“Hi, Pooki. How are you holding up?”

“Did you see the paper?” she asked.
“Those people are going to get away with everything!”

“Really?”
I almost asked her why she thought that, but I didn’t want a long conversation with her. Instead, I said, “I think the police are still examining…”

“I’m going out there,” she said.

“Out where?
You mean to Silver Times?”

“Well, I’m not talking about going to the mall.”
Her voice was getting close to hysterical. They wanted to cheat Eric and me out of the money, you know, from the bidding stuff. That Fred Shannon, he’s…”

“Brennan,” I said.
“Pooki, there’s nothing you can learn out there. Let the police handle it.” I couldn’t believe I was the one saying that.

“You should be, like, wanting to go with me.
Steve was your friend’s brother.”

“I’ve seen all I want to see of Silver Times for a long time,” I said.

“Okay, I’ll go myself. I
need
to go. Eric might have died because of that stupid place, and I’ve never even been there.”

“Pooki, there’s nothing to see except buildings and trees.
It’s a long drive up here from Atlantic City. Why don’t you…?”

“I’m already here.
And I’m going out there.” She was almost crying.

I have no affection for Pooki, but I’d had enough emotional turmoil the last year to know it could move common sense to the back of the brain.
If she went out there in a temper she could get herself in a lot of trouble. “Okay, okay. I’ll go with you.”

Her tone changed to one more like planning a shopping trip.
“Oh, good! You want to meet out there or can I pick you up?”

The last thing I wanted was to depend on Pooki for a ride home.
“Why don’t we meet by the independent living building? It’s where the office is, so there are signs that direct you to it.”

It took two minutes to get off the phone.
I wanted to meet Ramona and Scoobie, and I hoped George, for dinner at seven, so the longer I spent with Pooki the less time I’d have to dust and vacuum the great room in honor of Aunt Madge and Harry’s return on Monday.

I was fuming about Pooki and halfway to Silver Times when it hit me that I had no idea where Harry would live when they got back.
What do you mean Harry? What about Aunt Madge?
“How could you not know that?” I asked.

We had been so busy getting the Cozy Corner back in at least some semblance of order for the wedding that the enormity of Aunt Madge and Harry’s living arrangements had not hit me.
Would Harry move into the Cozy Corner? Would Aunt Madge sell the Cozy Corner and move to his house? Where would I go?

“Ohmigod.”
Ten minutes ago I had simply not wanted to see Pooki. Now I had much bigger concerns. I needed to get to the bottom of this.

I parked a few doors down from the entrance to the independent living building and left the car running while I waited for Pooki.
I wasn’t about to move in with George when he got over being mad at me. I like him a lot, but I’m no more ready to get married again — or whatever — than I was a year ago when I moved in with Aunt Madge. Maybe Ramona and I could get an apartment together.
She eats healthy. You’d lose weight.

A car horn next to me made me jump and I glanced left to see Pooki looking agitated as she got out of her car.
I opened my car door and tangled myself in the seat belt in my hurry to get out.

“You were, like, in a trance or something,” she said.

Good, she’s not crying
. “I was making a mental list of housework to do before Aunt Madge gets home.” I punched the key fob that locked my car doors.

“This is more important than cleaning,” she said.

And Scoobie thinks I’m self-absorbed
. “It is important. Why don’t we…”

She interrupted me.
“Now I’m nervous. I can’t go in there.”

What is it with this woman?

She looked across the parking lot toward the duplexes. “Is that a walking path behind the houses? I need a walk. Walking and jogging always calm me down.”

I was in favor of anything that would make Pooki less agitated.
“I think the path starts back there. Scoobie actually knows his way around here a lot better than I do.” I began to relax. Maybe Miss Impulsive would focus on something besides Fred Brennan and Silver Times.

She nodded, still looking around and started walking toward the path.
We said nothing else until we had walked several hundred meters and were stepping onto the asphalt path.

“I think I’m going to go back to school,” she said.
“Eric was teaching me about business stuff. I think if I studied business maybe I could figure out what to do next.”

I was glad she was off on a tangent.
I felt a tug of pity for her. Eric had been her rock. “That’s a big step.”

She nodded, firmly.
“It is, but I have to stop thinking about all the bad stuff and move on, or up, or something.”

“That’s a good attitude,” I said.
I could relate to her thinking. When Robby had spent all our money and started to embezzle from the bank where he worked, all I could think of was, What’s next? What do I do now? And I hadn’t had to deal with his death. Though I would have gladly killed him the first couple of weeks after I learned about all his gambling.

“Did you see that?” she asked, pulling me out of my thoughts.

“What?”

“It was white, like a cat maybe.”
Pooki scanned the trees. “Maybe it’s hurt.”

“Cats can take care of…” I began.

She bounded off the path and moved nimbly through the light underbrush and vanished behind a large blue spruce tree. “We need to find it,” she called back to me.

“Pooki!”
I kept my volume down but it was hard not to show frustration.
This is the most impulsive woman I’ve ever known.

“Oh, look.
Kittens! There’s kittens.”

That did get me off the path.
It was going to get down to freezing tonight. A cat with kittens would have a hard time taking care of them outdoors. As I followed her I wondered how Jazz would react if I brought home a strange cat with a litter of kittens. Not well.

“Here, she’s putting leaves on them,” Pooki said.

I walked up to here and looked down. “I don’t see…”

Faster than I could have imagined Pooki could move, she shifted behind me and raised her foot to the back of my legs and kicked me behind the knee.
I fell onto my stomach, with my left hand under me. There was a small crack that was likely my wrist. I wanted to call out to her but between the pain and the sudden expulsion of breath I was totally winded.

“Stay down there!”
Her voice was harsh and she put her foot on my tailbone. It hurt.

It was very quiet.
The oak leaves crackled as I tried to turn my head. What I really wanted was to get my wrist out from under my hip, but that was not going to be easy. I breathed a bit more easily. “Pooki,” I whispered, “what are you doing?”

“Getting rid of my last problem.”
She said this in a fierce whisper.

“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I’m…I’m your friend.”
Well, not really
.

“You aren’t so bad, but you’re just like everybody says.
That ten, tena…thing. You won’t give up.”

I realized she meant tenacious.
If I hadn’t been in so much pain I would have laughed. “I’m pretty much ready to give up now,” I said.
She’s insane
.

Pooki had walked into the small woods with me and she planned to come out alone.
She had to know that it would not take long to find me. Of course, she never had struck me as bright. Then I remembered she had gone to Rutgers and decided maybe I should be worried.

Pooki was breathing hard, almost as if she was hyperventilating.

“I need to roll over,” I said, and could hear how ragged my own breathing was.

“I don’t want to look at you.
I just need to do it.”

“Do what?”
I already thought she meant to kill me, but I figured if she hadn’t done it yet she wasn’t sure what to do. That seemed like a good thing.

“I have to kill you, and then I can say someone jumped us, or mugged us, or something.
And, and, then they killed you.”

“Why would you do that?” I asked.

When she didn’t reply, I added, “I think I broke my wrist. It’s under me.”

“Oh, does it hurt?”
Her voice was all concern. “Um, okay. You can move, but you can’t, like, look at me.” She kept her foot on my backside, but lightened the pressure.

I moved my arm a bit by putting weight on my other elbow and gingerly moving the injured arm.
It hurt like all get out to move an inch. I wasn’t going to get my broken wrist or arm out from under me, but if I leaned on my shoulder it took the weight off it. I had a fleeting thought of all the TV shows where people get beat up and then swing from a chandelier or something. That would not be me.

“Pooki, you don’t want to ruin your life like this,” I said, still half gasping for breath.

“I have to.”

“No, you…” I began.

“It was all okay until this stupid bidding thing. After that Eric was mad because I wanted him to do it himself, and everything was bad.”

I had no idea what she meant.
I hesitated. “I don’t think Eric would be mad anymore. If he were here, I mean.”

“Don’t think!
I have to think.” She took her foot off my tailbone and moved a couple feet away and sat on the trunk of a medium-sized tree that had come down.