The Ghost and Mrs. Fletcher (9 page)

But if the dehumidifier was for the books, where were they?

I turned to my left, holding up the cell phone again to add to the bulb's weak light. Along the wall was a series of bookcases, not as elegant as the ones in the library, but neither were they rough-hewn. Cliff must have built them himself. They were perhaps six feet high with six shelves each. He'd painted them black, making them harder to see in this subterranean room, but probably sealing the wood to keep it from warping in the damp air.

“Good heavens!” I muttered to myself. “Clearing these books out may take another week. They all have to be hauled upstairs.”

I went to the first bookcase, shining my light on the floor as I walked to be sure there wasn't anything to trip over. I didn't want to use up my cell phone battery, but I had to see what books were so important that Cliff had built shelves for them in the basement. Phone books! And legal-size banker's boxes bulging with papers. I tipped up the cover of one to see old school papers, photographs, and a child's drawings. Next to the box were textbooks that I recognized from my days of teaching high school English.

One case held row upon row of the yellow spines of
National Geographic
magazines. How many hours had Elliot's father spent poring over the stories and photographs of exotic places before taking off for parts unknown and disappearing forever with his wife?

As I moved down the line of bookcases, I noted medical tomes, perhaps consulted when Nanette had been diagnosed with cancer, and stacks of woodworking magazines. It seemed the more personal reading material in Cliff's collection had been stored belowground. On one shelf, a paperback lay on its side in front of a row of books. It was another Graham P. Hobart, entitled
Hidden Grave
. Cliff certainly was a Hobart fan. I pocketed the book to add to the ones upstairs.

I'm not certain what inspired me to aim my cell phone's flashlight along the top of the shelves, but as the beam moved across the wall above the bookcases, I noticed a change in the paint color.
Oh, dear, is Eve facing a major leak?
Repairs to this house were getting more expensive by the day. I stepped back, trying to get a better angle. As I stood on my tiptoes, holding the light higher, I took another step back and lost my balance. I started to fall, but an arm reached around my body and righted me. I gasped and dropped my cell phone, which skittered along the floor. I smelled sweat and tobacco and heard the rasp of a man's heavy breathing.

“You don't belong here,” he growled into my ear.

Then I saw what he held in his left hand—a hammer.

“W
ho are you? What are you doing here? You'd better tell me or I'll use this.” He raised the hammer threateningly.

I tried to wrestle free. He wore a rubber coat, the sleeve of which was wet. “Let go of me!”

I contemplated screaming, but the clanking of the dehumidifier would make it difficult for anyone upstairs to hear me, which was why I hadn't been aware of someone sneaking up behind me.

The arm loosened. I pushed it away, stepped forward, and whirled around. I couldn't see his face in the dim light, but the shape of him was tall and broad shouldered, perhaps magnified by the voluminous coat he wore and the hammer he wielded overhead.

“I'm a friend of Eve Simpson's,” I said quickly. “I'm helping her clear out the books for a sale to benefit the library. There are other people upstairs. They know I'm down here.”

“There's nothing here anyone would be interested in buying. Just junk.” He had a gravelly voice that sounded as if he smoked too much. He took a few steps toward me, backing me into one of the bookcases. He still held the hammer, though no longer overhead, but I wasn't certain what he intended to do with it.

“Your turn,” I said. “Who are you?”

“No one you need to know.” He squatted down and ran his right hand along the floor before standing again. “Here,” he said.

“What is it?”

“Your phone. It's not broken.”

“Thank goodness for that,” I said. I'd been trying to see his eyes, but his features were too shadowed. “You still haven't told me who you are.”

“Why do you need to know?”

I pressed the button on my cell phone and was glad to see the black screen come to life, although the battery icon indicated the power was getting low. I put my finger over the emergency button. “I want to know because if you don't belong here, I plan to call the police.”

He snorted and scratched the back of his head with the hammer before letting his arm swing down.

My eyes followed his every move, and I was ready to shout as loud as I could if he took a more-threatening action. It was all I would be capable of. I knew I'd never make it past him and up the stairs if he wanted to stop me.

“You're pretty brave for someone alone in a dark basement with a stranger, especially one holding a hammer.” He raised it so I could see, and made hammering motions in my direction before letting his arm fall.

“I told you who I am. Now answer my question, please.”

He waited a long time before mumbling something.

“What?”

“I'm the handyman. See?” He raised the hammer again. “Ms. Simpson hired me.”

“And what are you doing for Ms. Simpson?”

“Repair work, obviously. She didn't tell me there would be other people working here.”

“Well, there are.” I let out the breath I'd been holding. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Handyman. Do you have a name?”

He nodded slowly, his eyes avoiding mine. “Geraldo Tonelero.” He pronounced his first name the Spanish way as if it were spelled Heraldo, but he didn't speak with a Spanish accent.

“Thank you, Mr. Tonelero.”

“Call me Tony,” he said gruffly. “Mr. Tonelero was my father.” He sniggered as if he'd made a joke.

“Then thank you, Tony.” I slipped my phone into my side pocket.

“So you know my name, but you didn't bother to tell me yours. You just said you were a friend of Ms. Simpson's.”

“I'm Jessica Fletcher.”

“Okay, Ms. Fletcher, you can leave now.”

“I have no intention of leaving,” I said. “I have work to do. Do you happen to know if there's another light down here?”

“Doubt it.”

“That's going to make my job difficult,” I said.

“What job is that?”

“I told you. I'm here to pack up the books. I left a box at the top of the stairs.”

He mumbled again.

“Speak up, please. I can't understand you.”

“I thought you were a thief,” he said, raising his voice, “only I thought you weren't a very smart one. I don't see anything here worth stealing.”

“I don't see how you see anything at all,” I said, thinking that this was one of the strangest conversations I'd had in a very long time. I brushed past him and grabbed hold of the staircase's handrail.

“All right. All right. Don't get mad.” He turned in a circle. “I probably can rig up a light for you in a day or so.”

“Not sooner?”

“Can't do it now. It's raining.” He waved at me to go up the stairs.

“What difference does the weather make?” I said over my shoulder, glad my shaking legs held me up as I climbed.

“I'd rather not go to the hardware store on my motorcycle.”

“Good point. I'll appreciate anything you can rig up when you can get to it.”

“Thank
you
.”

I thought I detected a note of irony in his thanks, but I said, “You're welcome.” I reached the top of the stairs, picked up the box I'd left in the hall, and gave Tony a good once-over now that I could see him.

He wasn't quite as tall and menacing as he'd seemed in the dark, but he was a muscular man. His shaggy hair was streaked with gray, the same color as his eyes, and the nose above his bushy mustache appeared to have been broken sometime in his life. As I followed him into the kitchen, he turned his head toward the voices coming from the library.

“Would you like to meet the others?” I asked.

“No. I'm going to have my lunch.” He opened the refrigerator and took out the package wrapped in foil and the half bottle of milk, dropped them both in the pocket of his yellow slicker, and went out the back door. I watched as he pulled up his hood and sprinted across the yard to the barn.
He must be using the tools in Cliff's workshop,
I thought. I wondered what projects Eve had asked him to undertake, and when he had started to work.
I must remember to ask her about him. And now that she has someone working on the house, is she going to invite the medium to come back?

The phone in my pocket vibrated. I pulled it out and looked at the screen. A message warned me the battery was in need of charging. I quickly dialed Seth Hazlitt. We hadn't spoken since he'd told me he was requesting an autopsy on Cliff Cooper, and I'd promised to report on the meeting with the medium. I put the phone to my ear and waited to hear the call connect. But my phone chose that moment to die.

“I
t was such a scary noise, Jessica. I nearly jumped out of my skin,” Elsie said as we sat at Cliff's kitchen table having our lunch.

“It's just an old humidifier, Elsie. It needs a new motor,” I said.

“Barnaby was halfway out the door when he heard it,” Tim said, chuckling.

“I wasn't scared. It just startled me a tad,” Barnaby said.

“The only thing that kept you inside was the pouring rain,” Elsie said.

“A practical decision,” I said, smiling at Barnaby.

He tugged at his collar. “People do say there's a ghost in this house, Mrs. Fletcher. I just don't wanna meet him.”

“Who says that, Barnaby?” I asked.

“I heard it down at Mara's. They say it must be Cliff Cooper's spirit come back to haunt the place 'cause he lived here so long.”

“Then who's the figure of a woman the cleaning people supposedly saw?” Elsie said. “You forgot to mention her.”

“You mean there's more than one?” Barnaby looked decidedly uncomfortable. “Are we almost done here?”

“Nothing to worry about, Barnaby,” Tim said. “Jessica will protect you.”

“Tim's only teasing you, Barnaby. There are no ghosts here. It's just an old house with lots of noises. Oh, and Eve hired a handyman to help fix up the place. So if anyone heard footsteps, it was probably him.”

Tony had never returned to be introduced to my friends. I didn't know whether he'd left or had decided to stay in the barn until the rain subsided. I told everyone about meeting him, although I didn't describe the circumstances.

“Tony Tonelero, huh? Have to say, the name is not familiar,” Tim said.

“I've never heard of him, and I thought I knew all our local handymen,” Elsie said.

“Probably from away,” added Barnaby.

“But why would Eve Simpson hire someone from out of town when there's local men aplenty could use the work?”

“They're scared o' ghosts is why, Elsie,” Barnaby said.

“But you know there's no such thing, don't you, Barnaby?” I said.

“It was in the
Gazette
. Ms. Phillips wouldn't put it in the newspaper if it wasn't so.”

Elsie snorted. “Maybe not, but she's not past exaggerating some if it'll help sell more papers. I heard that issue disappeared from the shelves. Couldn't even find a copy in the post office, and there's always piles of them there.”

“In that case, the three of you have my undying gratitude for risking life and limb to work in a haunted house,” I said, unable to keep the whimsy out of my voice.

“Speaking of work,” Tim said, “this is the only day I can spare, so let's try to finish up as much as we can.”

I'd decided to leave the materials on the basement shelves for another time when, I hoped, Eve's handyman would be able to supply me with enough light to illuminate the task. I spent the rest of the afternoon sorting books with Tim, Elsie, and Barnaby. We continued to work until we ran out of boxes and the piles of books on the floor became a hazard to movement. I debated asking to borrow one of their cell phones but decided that the call to Seth could wait until I had some privacy.

It was late afternoon when Tim dropped me off at home, the rain still pelting down. I brought in the mail and left it on the kitchen table while I hung up my yellow slicker on the back porch where it could drip onto the same rubber tray on which I set down my Bean boots. I plugged in my cell phone next to my desk and checked the answering machine for messages.

I don't give out my cell phone number to many people. Seth had it, of course, as did Mort Metzger, but I preferred to carry a cellular phone more as an emergency apparatus than one with which to occupy my time. I didn't need to be immediately available to everyone who took a notion to call me. It distresses me to see so many young people—and some older ones, as well—with their eyes riveted on their palms while life takes place around them. Even though I was happy to use my computer to exchange e-mail with people who live far away, I'd determined that the telephone in my house would be my chief device for non-face-to-face communication, and left my old answering machine plugged in to record messages while I was away, or when I was concentrating on work and didn't wish to respond to calls immediately.

Seth had left me a message, and I was certain that once my cell phone was charged, there would be voice mail awaiting me there as well. He was usually persistent in his efforts to contact me.

“Jessica, Seth here. If you're going to march around with one of those newfangled fruit phones, at least have the courtesy to keep the thing charged up. I hate talking to machines. We need to chat. Call me when you get home. Please!”

That last part was said in an aggravated tone, and I decided that I needed a nice warm cup of tea in my hands before returning the call. While I waited for the water in the kettle to boil, I flipped through the envelopes I'd retrieved from my mailbox. They looked to be mostly solicitations for credit cards, or letters from competing television or computer companies urging me to change my service. There were a few bills, which I set aside to pay later that evening.

One envelope had a stamp that had been canceled in New York City, and I opened it first. Inside was the letter I'd sent to Arthur Bannister at his bookstore. On the top of the page he'd written in pencil, “Just ran out of stationery. Sorry. Happy to help. Just tell me where and when and where I can stay. Always on the lookout for first editions, so if you see some, please set them aside.”

I shook my head and smiled. Much as I was eager for Arthur to lend his expertise to our book sale, there was no way I was going to check the copyright page of every book in Cliff's collection to cull the first editions for my old friend. I debated the wisdom of telling him that before he made the trip, and I decided not to. I didn't want to give him any excuses to turn me down. I knew that once Arthur was faced with a sea of books, he would be as happy as a clam in mud, diving into his favorite preoccupation, discovering hidden treasures.

At the bottom of the page where I'd added my handwritten postscript to him, Arthur had scrawled, “It doesn't snow in Cabot Cove in October, does it? If it does, I won't be able to make it.”

The kettle whistled at the same time that the phone rang. I picked up the receiver and turned off the flame.

“Well, you certainly took your sweet time getting back to me.”

“Seth, I just walked in. You've barely given me time to hang up my coat and look at my mail.” I poured the boiling water over a bag of decaf English breakfast tea and took my mug to the table. “Tim, Elsie, Barnaby, and I worked all afternoon sorting the books, and I think I'm finally beginning to see good progress, although—can you believe it?—there's another set of bookcases in the basement to deal with. By the way, I met Eve's handyman, too, a disheveled sort who retreated into Cliff's barn without waiting to be introduced to the others.”

“I hope he's not planning to take off with all Cliff's carpentry equipment.”

“That's doubtful since he said he came by motorcycle.”

I heard Seth grunt. “Who
is
this guy? Did Eve ever work with him before?”

“Good questions. I'll have to ask her. She must have trusted him with the key since he made himself at home. He was using the back door and had left his lunch in the refrigerator.”

“Maybe he can explain all this haunted house nonsense.”

I laughed. “You have to admit that it adds a certain drama to the old Spencer Percy House.”

“If anybody believes in ghosts,” he said. “I don't.”

“By the way, I'm a little concerned about Lucy Conrad,” I told him. “She seems so withdrawn these days.”

“Death is a difficult ordeal to get through. You of all people should know that.”

“I do, but I'm afraid it's more than that. Lettie hinted that she's not as sharp as she used to be.”

“Happens to the best of us.”

I changed the subject. “Sorry that I didn't get back to you sooner,” I said. “The cell phone is charging as we speak. I assume you called me for the same reason I tried to reach you. Did the autopsy take place?”

“It did and it was no easy task. The medical examiner was mighty piqued at me for waiting so long, but the funeral home finally sent back the body and we did the postmortem together.”

“And did it set your mind at ease?”

“Not exactly, although I was right in my analysis of how Cliff Cooper died. He did not die of ‘respiratory failure' due to pneumonia. His diagnosis was chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, COPD. It was right there on his chart. He had chronic bronchitis, typical for such patients. Sometimes it becomes pneumonia, but in this case, it didn't.”

“He did have a terrible cough.”

“Ayuh, that he did, and the damn fool kept resisting the medicine that would ease his symptoms. Even so, he showed no signs of being in the end stage of life. He was alert, read your book in one night. No mental confusion. He made sense when he talked to you, didn't he?”

“Very much so. He was insistent about what he wanted when he dictated his will to me.”

“Exactly. He had a good appetite, enough that he complained about the hospital food the day before he died. It just didn't add up.”

“So what does that mean? What was his cause of death?”

“He died of asphyxiation. He died of no oxygen. He couldn't breathe.”

“Isn't that respiratory failure? Did his lungs fill up with fluid?”

“I suppose you can call it that in a generic sense. But no! His airway was completely closed off.”

“How?”

“Possibly with a pillow.”

“Good heavens, Seth! Are you saying that someone
killed
Cliff Cooper?”

“That's what it looks like to me.”

“Are you certain?”

“There were hemorrhages in his eyes that could have been the result of the coughing. I'll give you that. But there was a cut inside his lip, made by his own teeth. And we detected a little bruising around his nose and mouth. That could only happen if someone pressed something over his face and maybe pinched his nostrils closed.”

“When I was there, he used a pillow to muffle his own cough. Couldn't he have made those bruises himself?”

“That's what I wondered, too. But we found fibers in his nose, mouth, and in his trachea.”

“From the pillow?”

“No. We looked at them under the microscope, and the fibers were green. The hospital doesn't have green pillowcases. I checked.”

“So it's homicide,” I said. “Have you notified the sheriff?”

“Ayuh. Called him before I called you. He said it was okay to share the results with you, but the four of us—you, me, the sheriff, and the medical examiner—have to keep this information under wraps until Mort can contact Cliff's next of kin.”

“That would be his grandson, Elliot.”

“And that young man is somewhere between Anchorage, Alaska, and Cabot Cove, Maine, but no one knows exactly where.”

“That gives Mort some time to look into Cliff's death before Elliot gets here and the news becomes public knowledge.”

“I thought you might see it that way. He said he trusted you to keep the information confidential until his office was ready to make the announcement.”

“You know I will.”

“That's what I told him. He's coming to the hospital tomorrow afternoon to view the body.”

“Do you mind if I tag along?”

“I don't. That's why I mentioned it. Can't speak for the sheriff.”

“I'll call and ask to accompany you. What time will you be there?”

“Around four, if I can finish up my office hours on time. I'll meet you in the waiting room of the rehab wing.”

“Oh, Seth. I still can't believe it. Who would want to kill Cliff Cooper? He was such a nice man. I can't imagine he had any enemies.”

“Well, he had one—the person who smothered him to death.”