Now You See It (3 page)

Rahnee put her head down on one hand. “I can't believe this.” Her voice shook. “Taft was such a kind man. Do you think someone meant to kill him?”

“Did Taft have any enemies? Any rivals? Who'd benefit from his death?”

“No, this is crazy. He didn't have an enemy in the world.”

WizBoy passed me a beer. “I guess you're out of a job now, Randall.”

“Oh, no, he isn't.” Rahnee straightened and gave her face one last wipe to clear the tears from her eyes. “Randall, I want you to find out who did this.”

Bart looked at her askance. “The policeman told him to back off.”

She fixed me with a fierce stare. “That won't stop you, will it?”

“It never has before.”

“All right.” She was back in command mode now. “Give me some time. I'll have a list of everyone who was here Saturday for the auditions. Jilly should be in by then, too.”

WizBoy looked alarmed. “She wouldn't have anything to do with this.”

I could tell Rahnee was trying to be patient. “She might remember something useful. She was at the bar all night.”

He relaxed. “Oh.”

I looked around the club. “Anyone else? Waitresses? Backstage help? Cleanup crew?”

“There's only WizBoy, Jilly, and myself. When I bought the club, it was losing money. I've managed to turn it around, but I'm still working on keeping expenses down.”

“Were there any delivery men today? Repairmen?”

“I do most the repairs myself. WizBoy helps me.”

If he'd had a chest, WizBoy would've puffed it out. “I can fix most things around here. I help run the bar, too. Anything I can do now, Rahnee?”

“Go make a sign for the door, will you? Let our customers know what's happened. We'll need to have some sort of memorial service for Taft.” She shuddered and sat down at one of the tables. “Poor Lucas. I can't imagine what he's going through.”

“So they were close?”

“Oh, yes. They did everything together.”

“No rivalry between them? Some professional jealousy?”

“Not at all, and believe me, I know that when I see it. They're great guys, real gentlemen. You don't see that much these days. Taft would always—” Her voice threatened to quit again.

“I'll do my best to find out what happened.”

She squeezed my hand. “Thanks.”

Bart looked worried. “Do you suppose I could go now?”

“Give me your phone number and address,” I said. “I'd like to talk to you later.”

“Yeah, sure.” He handed me a card decorated with birds. “No problem.”

I thanked him and he left. “I'd like to look around backstage,” I said to Rahnee.

“Of course.”

The area behind the stage was narrow and empty. One side of the stage had a stack of folding chairs in one corner, a couple of card tables, and several large empty wooden boxes. On the other side, where the trunk holding Taft's body had been, were several stools and a large stack of flat boards. I looked through this stack, finding posters for past events and signs announcing special acts, or informing patrons that the club would be closed for the holidays. There was also a rack of costumes, shiny black jackets, shirts in red and blue satin, sparkly tights, and capes. On top of the rack was a box of hats, gloves, and scarves.

I came back to Rahnee. “Do any of those costumes belong to Taft? Did Taft or Lucas have any other props stored here?”

“No.”

“I'd like to look in the storage room.”

She pointed toward the front door. “To your right, past the bar.”

The storage room was bigger than I expected, lined with shelves filled with supplies for the bar, paper towels, toilet tissue, boxes of envelopes, and crates of beer. I had to move several boxes of napkins to get to the back wall. I counted seven cinder blocks up from the floor and gave the seventh block a push. It slid back, revealing an empty hole. When I put the block back in place, I noticed that unlike its neighboring blocks, number seven had a small dark splotch. Mold? A mark Lucas had made to find it? I couldn't tell, but it was possibly blood.

I put the boxes of napkins back and returned to Rahnee. She'd remembered something. “Taft's coat is in my office. He left it at the club one night. I kept forgetting to tell him.”

I followed her to her office. She took a long brown coat out of the closet. I thought I might find cards, or rabbits, or long strings of colored scarves in the pockets, but all I found was a wad of tissue, a paper clip, and several blue pills.

“Any idea what these pills are?”

“I'm not sure. I know occasionally Taft had a problem with insomnia. Maybe that's some sort of sleep medication.”

It wasn't much, but it could be a clue. I put the pills in my pocket.

Rahnee took the coat from me. “Lucas should have this, or maybe the police need to see it. You have to prove this was an accident, Randall.”

“I'll do my best.”

As she wrote a check, I couldn't help but think back to this morning and Camden's prediction of another client. Well, now I had three clients: Lucas Finch, Sandy Olaf, and Rahnee. A box, a bracelet, and a body. Maybe that old black magic was really working.

Chapter Three

Semi-Charmed Life

While I waited to hear from Rahnee, I checked in with Sandy Olaf. She lived in Deer Point Estates, Parkland's ritziest neighborhood, and not only did she live in Deer Point Estates, she lived in Barrington Trace, a gated community within the Estates. I wasn't sure I'd be allowed to breathe such rarefied air, but the gateman checked his list and let me in. Sandy's house was built along the lines of a Ramada Inn, with enough columns for a Greek temple. She was on the front steps, waving and smiling.

You'd never guess Sandy Olaf's one of the wealthiest women in Parkland. She has blonde hair and blue eyes and the pleasant addled look of a caterer who isn't sure she has enough hors d'oeuvres. She wears very little makeup and dresses in plain-looking but very expensive blouses and slacks, like the navy blue outfit she had on today.

“Good morning, David. What a chilly day! Come in.”

I followed her down a couple of acres of foyer to a huge living room decorated in vertigo-inducing patterns of stripes and flowers, all pink and blue. There wasn't a bare spot in the room. Everything had a matching pattern, from the wallpaper to the rugs to the cushions on the sofas. On one of the tables, Sandy had an array of papers and several telephones.

“Sit where you like. I'm in the middle of organizing the Arts Council Auction, so the phones are going to be ringing. I'm sorry, but I have to get it done. The Salvation Army fund-raiser is next week, and this has to be finished.”

I sat down on a striped sofa. “That's all right.”

“I had the most fun setting up the Cancer Relay. Do you know we raised over fifty thousand dollars? I was so tickled.” One of the phones rang. “What did I tell you? Please excuse me.”

She picked up the phone and chatted excitedly about a painting someone was donating to the auction. I looked around the room, being careful not to turn my head too fast. Huge ugly vases posed on little marble-topped tables. Pictures of foxhunts and flowers in heavy gold frames clashed with the striped and flowered wallpaper. Even the ceiling had flowers and stripes.

Sandy hung up. “Now then, where were we?”

“Your missing piece of jewelry.”

“Oh, yes! My diamond tennis bracelet. David, I'm embarrassed to say I have several, but this one was given to me by my dearest friend, Bertie, who passed away from AIDS last year. You can't imagine the sentimental value. I mean, I do my best for the AIDS Foundation here in town, all in Bertie's memory, but that bracelet meant so much to me. Our initials are engraved on the clasp, mine and Bertie's. I'm devastated.”

“When did you last see it?”

“Well, that's the trouble. I run around town all day, and I can't remember.” Another phone rang. “Excuse me again. Hello? Kennedy, sweetheart, how are you?” She listened a moment, and then gave a sigh of exasperation. “But I told Andre you needed those ice sculptures by Saturday. He doesn't have any of them done? All right, dear, just leave it to me. No, it's no trouble. Give my love to Boots.” She hung up. “You'd think getting a few ice sculptures for the Debutantes' Ball would be a snap in this town, but everything is such a production. Let me call Andre and sort this out.”

While she made her call, I got up and wandered the room. If the whole house was this busy, I was going to have to get some Dramamine before I began my search. I came back to the table and looked at her calendar, hoping for a clue. It was as scrambled as the room, dates and appointments marked out, rewritten, and squeezed in, with a bright confetti of Post-It notes on top.

Sandy hung up. “It's a mess, isn't it?”

“Can you recall the last time you wore your bracelet?”

She pointed to last week. “I think it was sometime here. I'm pretty sure I had it on when I hosted the PETA Banquet—I almost wore my mink—can you imagine? Yes, I think I had the bracelet on that night.”

“And you remember having it when you came home?”

“Yes, I'm pretty sure.”

I looked at the appointments for the rest of that week. Sandy had organized, hosted, or emceed four banquets, a charity ball, a dinner party, and two fund-raisers.

“David, you can eliminate the Garden Club Banquet. I wasn't able to go, and someone else took my place. And the banquet at the Silver Estate has been moved to next month.”

“So, counting the PETA banquet, that's two banquets, two fund-raisers, a dinner party, and a charity ball.”

“That's right.”

I copied down the addresses: The dinner party had been at April Meadows, the ball at the Parkland Country Club, the other banquet at the Parkland Hilton, and the fund-raisers had been at First Methodist Church and the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer. “I'll check out these places first. I assume you've searched everywhere here?”

“Everywhere.”

“Well, if I don't have any luck at these places, I'll come search your house. You may have overlooked your bracelet.”

Her gesture took in the scramble on the table. “Around here, that's possible.” She unearthed a checkbook from the piles of paper. “Let me write you a check.”

“Does anyone else know the bracelet's missing?”

“The housekeeper helped me look.”

“Anyone else?”

“No.” As she tore off the check and handed it to me, the phone rang again. “Oh, my goodness.”

“That's okay,” I said. “I have enough to get started. Could I talk to your housekeeper?”

“Yes, she should be in the kitchen. That's down the hall and to your left.”

“All right. I'll check with you later today.”

“Thanks, David.”

As I went out, I heard her say into the phone, “Ann, dear, I'm so glad you called. I need you to check on the car. Didn't you say you could donate an Infiniti? Wonderful! Well, could you get two? Oh, that would be fabulous! Can you get a black one and a silver one? That way, they'd match the decorations.”

Down the hall and to my left took me about thirty minutes. I must have passed twenty-five rooms, parlors, and other hallways. The kitchen stretched the length of the house, a gleaming array of appliances, pots and pans hanging above like copper balloons. A small woman stood at a vast cutting board in the center of the room, chopping carrots and celery.

She glanced up. Her prominent lower teeth made her look like a cheerful little bulldog. “Good morning.”

“Good morning. I'm David Randall. Mrs. Olaf hired me to find her diamond bracelet. May I ask you a few questions?”

“I assure you, we've searched every inch of this house,” she said. I almost expected her to say, And I sniffed every corner! “Not an easy task, as you can imagine.”

“Do you remember the last time you saw her wearing the bracelet?”

She continued to chop vegetables. “She had it on the night she went to the animal rights banquet, and she had it on when she came home, because she came down here and wanted a hamburger. She said she felt bad, but after all the salad at the banquet, what she really wanted was a juicy steak. We made a joke about the rights of cows.” She looked at me with an anxious expression. I resisted the urge to pat her head. “I'm paid extremely well, Mister Randall. I'd never take any of her things.”

“I'm not accusing anyone. I'm retracing Mrs. Olaf's steps.” I checked my notes. “So, she had it on the night of the PETA banquet, and you noticed she still had it on when she came home and wanted a steak.”

“Yes, I am almost certain.”

“Does she always come down here for a snack after these social functions?”

“Not always.”

“How about Monday night?”

For a moment, the housekeeper's little tongue stuck out as she tried to remember, and I had to turn a sudden laugh into a cough. “I can't recall.”

I looked at my list. “She had a dinner party, a charity ball, and a banquet at the Hilton. Okay, how about after the Lutheran Church fund raiser?”

“That was the one with all the chickens.” Chickens! Woof! “There were quite a few left over, so I helped her pack them.”

I really needed to rein myself in. “Did you notice the bracelet then?”

“I'm sorry to say I don't remember.”

“And the First Methodist Church?”

“That was the one with the yard sale and all the baby clothes. I remember because Mrs. Olaf brought home a big box for my sister's little girl.”

“Any chance the bracelet fell off into the box?”

“No, no. My sister and I emptied the box at her home. I would have seen the bracelet.”

It was hard not to envision the housekeeper and her sister frolicking like puppies in the clothes. “This may seem like an odd question, but does Mrs. Olaf have any enemies? I know she does lots of charitable work in town. Is there anyone jealous of her success? Anyone who feels replaced or slighted? Sometimes these country club women try to top each other doing things for the less fortunate.”

She paused in her chopping. “I have never heard anyone say anything bad about her.”

“Okay, thanks. I might check with you again later.”

Her teeth jutted out even further. “You check any time you like. If someone stole that bracelet, they need to be caught.”

I couldn't imagine a thief getting past this tough little woman.

Outside, I patted the Fury's hood. “Now wouldn't it be nice to find Lucas Finch's missing box with Sandy's bracelet inside?”