If Books Could Kill (5 page)

“So… you want my help?” I ventured.

He smiled brightly. “Aye, now you’ve got the right of it.”

I took a deep breath and channeled my mother, trying for one of her cheery Sunny Bunny smiles. I would’ve succeeded were it not for the sudden nervous tic in my cheek. “Okay, sure. Of course I can help. What would you like to know?”

He asked questions and I answered, telling him everything that had taken place from the beginning of the tour until the police arrived on the scene. I tried to remember everyone’s comments, every room we walked into, Helen’s first screams, then mine, then me racing out of there and straight into Derek’s arms.

“You can imagine my shock,” I said, “when Derek Stone appeared out of the blue, just as the body was discovered.”

I hastened to add, “Not that I’m accusing him of murder or anything.”

He barked out a laugh. “Of course not.” He was remarkably boyish and cute when he smiled. Nevertheless, he didn’t take the bait and rush off to arrest Derek. Instead, he sat back in his chair, folded his hands together and asked, “What was your relationship with the deceased?”

“Kyle and I were old friends,” I said. “Good friends. Okay, we used to date. But it’s been almost four years since we broke up.”

“I see.”

“We stayed friends, though,” I said quickly. “I ran into him this afternoon and we had a beer together.”

“Where was this?” he asked as he wrote notes in a small tablet.

“The Ensign Ewart.”

He excused himself and left the room but was back a minute later. I assumed he must’ve sent someone to check out my Ensign Ewart story.

“What did the two of you talk about?” he asked.

“Books, of course,” I said. “And also, Kyle was in some trouble and asked me to help.”

MacLeod leaned forward. “Trouble? What sort of trouble?”

There was a knock on the door and MacLeod swore under his breath. He jumped up and opened it, listened to his man, then closed the door and returned to his chair behind the desk. He folded his hands together and stared at me through narrowed eyes.

“What?” I finally demanded.

He shook his head. “It’s nothing. We have a witness who saw you and the victim at the Ensign Ewart earlier today.”

“I just told you I was there,” I snapped, then exhaled heavily. “Sorry. I’m a little stressed out.”

“No harm done,” he said, and probably meant it. He seemed a cheerful sort. He checked his notepad, then said, “You were saying that Mr. McVee thought he was in some bit of trouble?”

I debated how much to tell him and decided on the whole truth, since he’d be checking up on everything I told him anyway. “Kyle said someone had tried to kill him. Tried to run him down with a car. It happened right outside the hotel.”

“Which hotel would that be?”

“Oh, sorry. The Royal Thistle, we’re all staying there for the book fair.”

He wrote it down in his notebook. “And ‘we’ would be the antiquarian book fair people.”

I nodded and he continued to write, then asked, “Did Mr. McVee tell you why he thought someone was trying to kill him?”

“Yes, he did.” And he’d been right. Someone had been after him and they’d succeeded. My mind flashed back to a picture of Kyle in the pub, laughing and teasing, then flipped to see him curled up on the hearth in that awful, dark room. My stomach clenched in pain and I shook my head to get rid of that dreadful image.

“And…?” MacLeod coaxed. “I know it’s difficult, but please go on.”

“Yes, it is difficult. Sorry.” I gulped in air. I couldn’t lose it now. Not in front of the police. No, I’d have to wait until later to have a nice little psychotic break. “Kyle thought someone was trying to stop him from showcasing a…” I hesitated, asking myself how much I was willing to reveal about the Burns book. Would anyone believe it? Did that matter? I owed it to Kyle to tell the whole truth. I inhaled, exhaled, focused, became one with the Bodhisattva warrior within, as my upbringing on the commune had taught me to do, and said, “Kyle had a special book he was going to present at the fair. There was some history behind it, and some dispute over-”

Somebody knocked on the door and blew my whole inner-warrior pretense to hell.

“Enter,” MacLeod called.

One of the police investigators opened the door. He was dressed in a white jumpsuit with disposable white cloth booties over his shoes. In his hand he held a large manila envelope. “Sir, we believe we’ve found the murder weapon.”

MacLeod gave his subordinate a severe frown as he jumped out of his chair. “Outside, McGill.” To me, he said politely, “Pardon me, won’t you, Ms. Wainwright? I shouldn’t be long.”

“No problemo.”

The door closed and I muttered, “Don’t mind me. I’ll just sit here and envision my life in a Scottish brig.”

Would they force-feed me haggis? I wondered. Would there be portions of rum for the condemned? Oh, God. Rum always gave me a headache.

With my elbows resting on my knees, I rubbed my face. I was frustrated and scared, and really wished I’d brought the bag of chocolate with me. How had I gotten myself involved in another murder investigation? In a foreign country, no less? Should I have called the American embassy before spilling the beans to the chief cop?

And Kyle, my darling Kyle, was dead. My eyes burned as I realized his worst suspicions had come to pass. And as far as I knew, the only person who had as much knowledge of Kyle’s book as I did was Perry McDougall.

Had Perry killed Kyle? It wouldn’t surprise me. Kyle had claimed that Perry threatened him.

Kyle had also said that two other people besides Perry knew about the Robert Burns book, but he’d never told me who. If he and Helen were as close as she insisted they were, he might’ve told her about the book and the story behind it. But I didn’t think Kyle was the type to upset Helen with talk of death threats.

Helen’s reaction to Kyle’s death had been so painful and over-the-top, it convinced me that she really had thought Kyle would marry her. Call me cynical, but I couldn’t believe he would’ve gone through with it. He was an incorrigible player and cute as could be, but dangerous to a woman’s heart. Poor Helen. I knew I shouldn’t talk, but the woman had seriously atrocious taste in men. First she’d married that jerk Martin, and now she thought she’d be marrying bad boy Kyle? Not too smart.

Again, I didn’t have a whole lot of room to criticize, especially since I’d been led on by Kyle, too. But I never would’ve fallen for Martin, so as far as I was concerned, that made me a genius compared to my friend.

I shifted in my chair, wondering where MacLeod had run off to. Was Helen being interrogated somewhere nearby? If so, was she telling the cops that she and Kyle were to have been married? And had she honestly bought into the fantasy that they would live happily ever after? Apparently, yes.

I rubbed my eyes, feeling more tired than ever. Who was I to judge Helen, just because Kyle had never promised me anything more than a good time? Why wouldn’t he propose marriage to Helen? She was sweet and smart and very pretty. And very rich. Couldn’t forget that. But Kyle was rich in his own right, so I didn’t think money would be much of a motivator for him.

Of course, Martin had money, too, so that probably hadn’t been a consideration when he asked Helen to marry him. I’d always thought Helen appealed to Martin because he’d mistaken her easygoing nature for subservience.

Now I wondered if maybe it was Helen on the other end of the phone call Kyle had received. He’d certainly run out of the pub in a hurry, and maybe that was a sign that he really did have warm feelings for her. I hoped so. I’d like to think that Helen had been happy with Kyle after putting up with Martin for as long as she did.

I would have to remember to tell MacLeod about that phone call Kyle received. The police would be able to check Kyle’s cell phone. Sadly, they probably wouldn’t let me in on who’d called.

The door opened and MacLeod came back in.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said, his expression falling somewhere between disapproval and condemnation. He laid that same manila envelope on the desk, then reached into his pants pocket, pulled out a rubber glove and snapped it onto his left hand.

“Can you identify this, please?” he asked as he pulled a blood-splotched hammer out of the envelope and dangled it carefully between two fingers. The look he gave me turned my toes to ice.

“It appears to be a hammer,” I said cautiously, then took a slow breath. “Is that the murder weapon?”

“Why don’t you look at it a little more closely?” he suggested, and moved the hammer so I could see it from several different angles. Icy tendrils slithered from my toes up to my spine and into my neck so quickly, I thought I might freeze and shatter into a thousand pieces.

The hammer was a familiar style. Too familiar. Unlike a typical hammer, this one was lightweight, with a shorter handle, a longer claw with a blunt end, and a smaller, dome-shaped nose.

A bookbinder’s hammer.

There were initials engraved at the base. I didn’t have to look any closer to recognize them.

The initials were BW.

The hammer was mine.

I coughed to clear my suddenly dry throat. “It’s a… a bookbinder’s hammer.”

He looked at it more closely. “Odd sort of shape.”

“Yes.” I took another breath. “Its shorter length and lighter weight allow for more accuracy and efficiency when pounding and rounding the spine of a book.”

Did my words sound as dully rote to him as they did to me?

“Thank you for the information.” He peered at the object, then pointed to something he saw near the edge. “There seems to be a design here on the end. Or are those initials? BW? Ach.”

Now he was just showing off. He knew they were mine. Spots began to circle and fade in and out of my field of vision. I took a huge gulp of air and let it go. I refused to further disgrace myself by fainting.

“Ms. Wainwright, have you ever seen this hammer before?”

“Yes, of course. It’s mine. It was a gift from my teacher. Part of a set.”

He nodded sagely. “I see.”

“What do you see?” I shook my head, still not believing any of it. “What are you saying? That Kyle was killed with my hammer? Who would do that? I wouldn’t do that! What am I, stupid? Do you think I had anything to do with it?”

“We’re still determining that,” he said calmly, and slipped the bloody hammer carefully back into the envelope.

Great, they were still determining how stupid I was. Watch me burst with pride.

“Did you loan your tools to someone recently?”

“No, absolutely not,” I said.

“They’ve been in your possession all along?”

“Yes, they’ve been in my hotel room since I arrived yesterday.” So I was the only one with access to my tools. Could somebody lend me a shovel so I could dig a deeper hole around me?

He started to make a note.

“Wait,” I said. “Sorry. I’ve got my days a little wrong. I just arrived this morning. Around noon.” I shook my head, a bit dazed. Had it been only ten hours since I’d checked into the hotel? It felt like I’d been here a month.

So in the space of a few short hours, someone had entered my room, stolen my hammer, then lured Kyle deep into that dark, bleak tenement and killed him in cold blood without anyone noticing?

And they’d used
my hammer?

Why?

Was it in incredibly bad taste to feel almost as sorry for myself as I did for Kyle?

Obviously, I was being set up. Obvious to me, anyway. Detective Inspector MacLeod didn’t seem to be seeing it my way. No, he was eyeing me with barely concealed glee, as though he were picturing me inside my very own jail cell while he received the thanks of a grateful nation for saving them from a homicidal maniac who looked a lot like me.

Who would kill Kyle like that? And who would want to frame me? Of course, the first person who leaped to mind was Minka. She would love to see me framed. But Kyle would never have gone anyplace dark with that woman. He had taste, after all.

So who else was there?

I thought of Perry McDougall. Would he go to all that trouble to implicate me just because I’d waved his paper around earlier? Had I infuriated him so much that he broke into my room to steal my hammer? Was he that nutso?

And then there was Martin, who didn’t like me very much at all. Martin had the perfect motive for killing the man, but Helen had already filed for divorce, so it wasn’t like she’d go crawling back to Martin if Kyle were out of the picture. But for some men, it wasn’t enough that they couldn’t have a woman; they didn’t want anyone else to have her, either. Still, Helen had sworn that Martin didn’t know about her affair with Kyle. Of course, she wasn’t the best person to judge whether Martin knew or not.

But then, why would Martin frame me? He was basically a lazy rich boy. I couldn’t see him going to all that trouble to break into my room and steal my stuff.

Did Martin know about the Robert Burns book? He was a bookseller. Would Kyle have consulted him? I couldn’t imagine him going anywhere near the man whose wife he was pursuing. He wasn’t that foolish. Or was I being naive?

I had to figure out the other two people Kyle had confided in. It was more than likely that one of them, or Perry, had killed him.

I couldn’t believe it was possible that Kyle had been killed over Robert Burns’s illicit connection to the English throne. The story might be considered scandalous to some die-hard Anglophile, but would it really drive someone to murder?

Who in the world was so afraid of something that happened three hundred years ago that they’d actually kill another human being? And why had they taken the time and the risk involved to sneak into my hotel room and set
me
up to take the fall? Whose toes had I stepped on so badly that I’d earned the rage of a cold-blooded killer?

“Do you always travel with a hammer, Ms. Wainwright?”

I flinched as his voice brought me back to my present predicament. “Of course.”

“Really?”

His withering sarcasm made me mad, and I had to wrestle with myself to keep my anger from gushing forth like a geyser. I seriously needed a good night’s sleep.

But of course I traveled with hammers and other tools of my trade. What if I found a book in need of repair? It was my job to fix it. Was I supposed to feel guilty about it? Just because some evil creep had stolen one of my tools?

But I did feel horribly guilty. And I wasn’t even Catholic, so it wasn’t like I’d be going to hell or anything. I wasn’t Jewish either. From what I’d heard, they had to deal with a lot of guilt. No, I’d been raised in the guilt-free environment of a new-age spiritual commune where we were free to worship any number of gods and goddesses, take your pick. And none of them spouted eternal damnation, so there was never any reason to feel guilty, right? But here I was, riddled with guilt over way too many things. Abraham’s death. Kyle’s death. Helen’s pain. My tools.

Maybe I needed to see an exorcist or something.

“Ms. Wainwright?”

“What? Sorry.” Jet lag was turning me into a zombie. “Yes, when I travel on business, I bring my tools with me.”

“Including a hammer?”

“Yes. I usually teach a workshop on bookbinding, so I always need my entire set of tools with me.”

Didn’t everyone? I was willing to bet Detective Inspector MacLeod didn’t go anywhere without his claymore or his.45 Magnum or whatever his weapon of choice was.

“And by the entire set, you mean…”

I pictured my portable tool set and named off the contents. “I’ve got my hammer, files, knives, a couple of awls, nippers, brushes, bone folders, some polishing irons, needles and thread, of course, and glue, linen tape, binder clips, rubber bands. Oh, and more tools and supplies for the students.”

“Rubber bands?”

“Sometimes the best way to hold a book together is the simplest.”

“Ah. And all these tools are in your hotel room?”

I frowned at the incriminating manila envelope still lying conspicuously between us on the desktop. “I thought they were.”

He followed my gaze. “Perhaps we should check your room.”

“Absolutely. Let’s go.”

“Please stay seated, Ms. Wainwright. I’ll send two of my men to your room to take a look around.”

“Oh, right. Okay. Great.” Yeah, just great. They’d be looking for more bloody evidence, I supposed. And what if there was some? If someone had sneaked in before, they could probably do it again to plant more evidence and set me up even further. This was so unfair.

There was another knock on the door and I groaned inwardly. Bad things seemed to happen whenever someone knocked at that door.

Derek Stone stuck his head inside the doorway. “You haven’t arrested this lady yet, have you, Angus?”

“No, no, just asking a few questions,” Angus said, then added reluctantly, “Come in, Commander. We still have some details to hash out.”

Derek walked in and closed the door. He looked around at the small space, then leaned his hip against the two-drawer filing cabinet and smirked. “She makes a damn fine suspect, doesn’t she?”

“Aye, she does, if you must know,” Angus said in a more serious tone than I was comfortable with.

“I was afraid you might think so,” Derek said, eyeing MacLeod. “That’s why I’m here to spring her.”

“Is that so?” Angus sat back in his chair. “We’re not quite finished.”

“Can’t it be wrapped up tomorrow?”

MacLeod folded his muscular arms across his barrel chest. “Questioning can continue tomorrow, but I’ll still need to accompany her back to her hotel room tonight.”

Derek’s eyes narrowed. “For God’s sake, why?”

Was he playing dumb? MacLeod seemed to be thinking the same thing but didn’t want to say so. I took pity on the cop and said, “My bookbinder’s hammer is the murder weapon.”

“Oh, brilliant,” Derek said, then noticed the envelope on the desk. He glanced at MacLeod as he reached for it. “May I?”

“You might as well, Commander,” MacLeod said resignedly, as though he were used to Derek Stone interfering in his cases on a regular basis.

Derek unhooked the envelope’s brass fastener and peeked inside, then shook his head at me as he resealed it and put it back on the desk. “You are impossible.”

“I didn’t do anything,” I insisted.

He folded his arms across his chest. “You’ve sufficiently antagonized someone to the point that they’re setting you up to take the fall for murder.”

“I’ve never antagonized anyone.”

“If you only knew.” He shook his head again.

“This is so unfair.”

“Yes, it is.” Derek extended his hand to me. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to vouch for her innocence, Angus.”

I grabbed hold of his hand and he pulled me up from the chair. Once I was on my feet, I whacked his arm. “You’re
afraid?”

“It’s just a manner of speech. Do you want to come with me or not?”

“I do.” I looked at MacLeod. “Am I free to go?”

“No, you’re not.”

“I didn’t think so,” I said, forlorn.

Derek raised an eyebrow. “What’s the holdup?”

“I’ve told you, her room must be searched.”

“Tonight? Is that necessary?”

“Of course it’s necessary,” MacLeod said, exasperated. “You know very well I can’t let her go back to her room and possibly destroy evidence.”

“I don’t have any evidence to destroy,” I said.

“She didn’t do it, Angus,” Derek said.

MacLeod was unwavering. “I follow the evidence.”

“It won’t do you any good in her case,” Derek said in mock resignation. “She’s just not capable of killing anyone. It’s too bad, because she’s rather a chary sort, don’t you think?”

I elbowed him. “Shush.”

“Hey.” He grabbed his side. “I’m just trying to help.”

“You’re making it worse,” I whispered.

“Me?”

“Just let the man do his job.”

Angus eyed us both warily. “Have you thought to take this show on the road?”

“I tell you what, Angus,” Derek said companionably. “We’ll wait in the hotel bar while your men do their searching. If you find something incriminating, she’s all yours. In fact, I’ll help you lock her up.”

“Help me, will you?” MacLeod said. “You’re a fine friend, Derek, but you’re a pain in my rear nonetheless.”

“You’re welcome,” Derek said.

As MacLeod opened the door to the hallway, he sighed. “I’m truly not getting rid of you, am I?”

“You know me better than that,” Derek said, his amiable grin belying his resolve.

“Come along, then, both of you.”

I hustled my butt out the door to freedom.

My hotel room was absent any bloodstained rags or additional bloody weapons or whatever smoking gun MacLeod had hoped to find. He’d called me in the bar where Derek had been sipping Scotch while I’d nursed a cup of tea, trying to stay awake. Derek and I arrived in time to see a rubber-gloved investigator carefully lifting my heavy cloth tool carrier from my open suitcase.

I immediately wondered if they’d gone through my underwear. I couldn’t help worrying. Maybe it was a girl thing, but those rubber gloves gave me the heebie-jeebies.

Derek and I squeezed our way farther into the room where Detective Inspector MacLeod, two crime scene guys and the police photographer were working. The first thing I was asked to do was sit down at the desk in the corner and submit to fingerprinting by one of the technicians.

“You may find black residue on some of the surfaces of your furniture,” MacLeod explained after I’d washed my hands. “We tried to wipe it off but we might’ve missed some spots.”

“That’s okay,” I said, knowing that as soon as they left, I’d get out my travel wipes and scrub down everything.

I didn’t know what to do with five men cramped inside my little hotel room. It was like a party, only not much fun.

“We assumed this was the bag that holds your tools, Ms. Wainwright,” MacLeod said, waving a hand at the investigator who was holding the navy blue cloth bag.

“Yes.” Whenever I traveled, I wrapped everything up in the bag I’d made myself out of sailcloth and white grosgrain ribbon. Each tool had its own snug pocket, and the whole thing folded up and tied and fit inside my suitcase.

The investigator placed the tool bag on the queen-size bed.

“Someone has fiddled with it,” I said. “The ribbon is tied in a knot and I always tie it in a bow.”

“Open it up, Richie,” MacLeod said.

Richie carefully spread the cloth out on the green brocade bedspread. Fully opened, the tool bag was two feet long by one foot wide.

“Crap,” I muttered.

“What’s wrong?” Derek said.

“Three tools are missing,” I said, poking my fingers in the empty pockets.

“That’s unfortunate,” Derek murmured, glancing at MacLeod.

“Yes, isn’t it?” MacLeod said. “Can you tell which ones are missing?”

“I can’t remember what was in this pocket. One of my knives, I think. Or maybe the polishing iron I brought. No, that’s still here.”

He reached out and stopped me from pulling the polishing iron out of its compartment.

“Don’t touch anything, please,” he said. “We’ll need to dust the remaining tools for fingerprints.”

“Sorry.” I grimaced at the thought that I might’ve destroyed evidence and backed away from the bed. The photographer moved in and snapped a bunch of pictures, then stepped out of the way so that rubber-gloved Richie could move in and fold up the tools. He put them inside another large envelope, then left the room with the photographer and my tools.