A Catered Tea Party (20 page)

Chapter
37

L
ibby was quiet on the drive back to the garage. “What are you thinking about?” Bernie finally asked her after five minutes had gone by.

“I'm just thinking about the case and what we've found out so far,” Libby told her.

“Me too,” Bernie said. “In one sense we know a lot, and in another sense we know nothing.”

Libby tapped her fingers on the Civic's dashboard. “That's true.” She began to summarize. “We suspect that Zalinsky was running some sort of scam and that that scam was about to come crashing down, which is why he was getting ready to get out of Dodge.”

Bernie picked up the narrative. “Which meant his income stream was drying up. Which is why Hsaio was about to get thrown out of her apartment and Zalinsky wasn't going to pay for Magda's children to go to college. And then,” Bernie continued, “Zalinsky was throwing Erin out for a younger model, blackmailing Jason, who'd been sleeping with Erin, not to mention giving Casper a really hard time.

“And let's not forget George and Stan,” Libby added. “Zalinsky bought their business and ruined it and them and their family.”

“While forcing them to be in his play,” Bernie said. “The coup de grâce.”

“He was just an all-around nice guy,” Libby observed.

“True. A real prince among men,” Bernie said. “The question becomes: Who didn't want Zalinsky dead?”

“His creditors,” Libby said. “If he died they couldn't get their money back.”

“As opposed to the cast,” Bernie observed. “He was worth more to them dead than alive.”

“Which is why,” Libby continued, “the person who took the teapot from Casper is probably the same person who killed Zalinsky.”

Bernie stopped at the corner to let an old lady with a walker cross the street. “I'm thinking that's the case. The note on Casper's dining room table was angry, threatening.”

Libby nodded. “Agreed.”

“Ergo the writer was.”

“Obviously,” Libby said, thinking that a piece of cheese and a cucumber did not lunch make. Maybe she'd be less irritable if she had eaten more.

Bernie continued. “Which means that the person who wrote the note had expected to get the teapot, and he didn't. That's the reason he was angry. Why did he expect to get the teapot? Because he knew that Zalinsky was going to be dead, and the only way he'd know that is if he or she was the one who hotwired the teakettle. The only problem was that when he went to get the teapot the teapot wasn't there.”

“Which leads us back to the same question again,” Libby said as she bent over to refasten her sandal. “How did Zalinsky's killer know that it was Casper who took the teapot?”

Bernie slowed down again for a calico cat that looked as if it was going to run across the road. “I thought we agreed. He had to have seen him take it.”

“Then why didn't he get the teapot back from Casper immediately?” Libby challenged.

Bernie sped up again as the cat changed its mind and scurried under a parked car instead. “Maybe he didn't want to confront Casper and risk being fingered; maybe he couldn't follow him and see where he left it—or he did, but by the time he got back there, Casper had already taken the teapot to his house.”

Libby straightened up. “So then he goes to Casper's house to look for the teapot, only he can't find it, so he writes this note in essence telling Casper that he'd better get the teapot back or else.”

“But why leave the tin of tea?” Bernie asked, thinking out loud. “There had to be a reason.”

Libby shook her head. She didn't have a clue. “If the killer wrote the note, then who took the teapot from Casper?”

“I don't know,” Bernie said. “But obviously the killer didn't know that someone had stolen the teapot from Casper.”

“He wouldn't exactly broadcast that fact, would he?” Libby said

“Well, I certainly wouldn't,” Bernie replied. “Poor Casper. He's certainly having a rough time.”

“He is, isn't he?” Libby said. She took a drink of water from the bottle in the cup holder next to her and made a face. The water was warm. “I wonder what Dad would say about the tea.”

Bernie shook her head. She couldn't even surmise.

“Too bad he's not around to ask,” Libby observed tartly.

“Yes, it is,” Bernie replied softly. For the last two weeks, Sean had been spending most of his free time with Michelle. “I miss our talks,” Bernie said.

“Me too,” Libby admitted. “A lot. It's not the same.”

“No, it isn't,” Bernie agreed.

The sisters were quiet for a moment.

“I'm still having trouble believing Casper took that teapot,” Libby said, breaking the silence.

“I know. He's hardly a master criminal,” Bernie replied.

“No. He's a klutz, and yet he managed to steal the damned thing,” Libby said.

“I guess he got lucky,” Bernie said.

“Not really,” Libby said. “Not when you consider what happened afterward. He should have put it back,” she added.

“Given everything that's happened, I bet he wishes he had. But once he had it, I think it would have been easier to hide it. Putting it back—now, that would have taken nerve. Would you have put it back?”

“Yes,” Libby said.

“Seriously?”

Libby hedged. “I like to think I would.”

“Me too,” Bernie said, “but I'm not so sure I would have had the guts to do that.” Bernie clicked her tongue against her teeth while she thought. “It could lead to all sorts of unpleasant consequences, especially with Zalinsky dead.”

Libby took another sip of water. She needed some chocolate in the worst way. “Well, even without stealing the teapot, Casper is still their number-one suspect.

“True,” Bernie said.

“Wait,” Libby cried. “I know who did it. An alien.”

Bernie laughed. “Now why didn't I think of that?” She furrowed her brow as another idea occurred to her. “You know,” she said as she stopped for a red light, “maybe we should be talking to some of the galleries down in the city that specialize in Asian art and see if they've been offered the teapot for sale.”

“It couldn't hurt,” Libby said. “Maybe we'll actually turn something up.”

“Maybe,” Bernie said. “I guess we'll have to trot out our fancy clothes and pretend to be better off than we are.”

“That's not going to take a lot,” Libby replied. Then she added, “Maybe Hsaio can help us get a list together.”

“Call her,” Bernie suggested.

Libby did. Hsaio said she could and she would.

“Good,” Libby said, settling back in her seat. A minute later, she reminded her sister that they needed to pick up some coffee on the way back to Sid's garage, after which she turned on the radio. Neither of the women spoke for the rest of the trip.

M
arvin gave Libby a baleful look. It was seven-thirty at night, and Libby, Bernie, and Marvin were standing in the rear of Marvin's dad's funeral home. The loading dock was empty, as were the parking spots in front. No one was there. Death, as Bernie had quipped when they'd pulled up, had taken a holiday. This, of course, was the reason Marvin had called.

“I shouldn't be doing this,” Marvin said for the fourth time. He'd gotten a bad case of cold feet in the interval between his conversation with Libby and the sisters' arrival.

“Yeah, you should,” Bernie told him.

“Easy for you to say,” Marvin shot back. “You're not the one who's going to get in trouble.”

Libby put her hand on Marvin's arm. He was wearing a short-sleeved, button-down shirt, and his skin was warm to her touch. “You're not doing anything wrong,” Libby said. “And anyway, your dad isn't going to know. He's not here.”

“He always knows,” Marvin said gloomily.

“But you're helping to solve a crime,” Bernie said, not bothering to argue Marvin's point.

“And you know what my dad's opinion of that is,” Marvin retorted.

Bernie did know. He disapproved of her and her sister's activities. He thought crime solving was better left to the police, an opinion he was not shy in sharing.

“Look,” she said. “All we want to see are the gloves and shoes Zalinsky wore. It's not like we're asking to see his body.”

“That's it?” Marvin asked.

“That's it,” Libby said. “I already told you that.”

Marvin remembered that that was true. He had a tendency to inflate things.

Libby raised her hand. “I swear. It'll just take a minute.”

“Two at the most,” Bernie said.

“Then we can get a beer at RJ's,” Libby said. After the day's events, especially given what she'd found out when she picked up the coffee, she needed a drink.

“And you'll tell me what this is about?” Marvin asked.

“When we know for sure, you'll know,” Libby assured him.

“Think of it this way,” Bernie added. “The faster we solve this, the faster Casper will be out of your house.”

Marvin grinned. As far as he was concerned, that couldn't be fast enough. Not only did Casper never shut up, he never picked up after himself. “You wanna come in, or do you want me to bring the stuff out?” he asked.

“Out,” both Bernie and Libby said simultaneously. They both knew it was silly, but they didn't like to go in the back, where the bodies were kept.

Marvin shrugged, “Alrighty then. I'll be back in a few.”

While Libby and Bernie waited for Marvin to reappear, they watched three seagulls fishing for food in the dumpster behind the funeral home.

“It always surprises me when I see them so far from the ocean,” Bernie noted.

“We're not that far from the river,” Libby reminded her. She heard a door open and turned around.

Marvin was coming out holding Zalinsky's gloves and shoes in his hands. He handed the gloves to Libby and the shoes to Bernie. “What are you looking for?” he asked.

They showed him.

“It's right there,” Bernie said, pointing. “If you know where to look.”

Marvin's eyes widened. He never would have thought of that.

* * *

A half hour later, Marvin, Bernie, and Libby were sitting at RJ's nursing beers, eating pretzels, and watching the Longely baseball team get drunk. There was a lot of arm wrestling and high fiving and trash talking going on. Evidently, they'd just won a game against the neighboring town—a rare occurrence.

“So,” Brandon said to Bernie in a quiet moment, “you want to fill me in on how you came to this conclusion?”

Bernie ate a couple of pretzels and took a sip of her Blue Moon. In the summer, she liked wheat beer, with its golden color and its bubbles. “You sound as if you think I'm wrong.”

“I didn't say that. I just want to know how you arrived at your conclusion,” Brandon reiterated.

“Okay.” Bernie took another sip of beer, then ate the orange slice and rested the rind on her napkin. “First there's the teakettle in Zalinsky's kitchen. It's the exact same electric kettle he used at the theater.”

“So?” Brandon said. “Maybe, he liked the model.”

“Maybe,” Bernie replied. “But I'm almost positive there was something weird about the handle. Anyway, why would he have an electric teakettle when he didn't have any tea in the house?”

Brandon planted his elbows on the bar. “That's the basis you're using to say that Zalinsky substituted a hot-wired teakettle for the regular one himself?”

“It's the only thing that makes sense. I think that the police will find that he used the one in the kitchen to practice on.”

“And why would he do something like that?” Brandon asked.

“To provide a distraction so an accomplice could steal the teapot.”

Brandon shook his head. “I don't know about this.”

Bernie leaned forward. “What about his gloves?”

“What about them?” Brandon asked.

“They had a rubberized lining in them. Why would he do that otherwise?”

Brandon had to admit he couldn't think of an answer. “So what you're saying,” he said slowly, “is that his accomplice double-crossed him.”

Bernie nodded her head vigorously. “Exactly. His accomplice hid the gloves he was supposed to wear and substituted another pair, a pair that had a cut in them. And then someone very carefully took off the soles of the shoes he was wearing, hollowed out the heels, and put pieces of wire in them.”

Bernie took another sip of her beer. “The new gloves had a cut in the lining, so when Zalinsky grabbed the teakettle handle, the cut would open up and put him in contact with a live wire. And bingo. Zalinsky was gone.”

“And the shoes?” Brandon asked.

“Insurance,” Libby said.

Brandon crunched down on a pretzel. “What was Zalinsky going to do with the teapot?”

Bernie shrugged. “Sell it, I imagine, so he could get out of town for a while. Everything was about to be revealed.”

“From what you said, he could have left without it,” Marvin observed. “He had money. He had a passport.”

“I'm guessing he couldn't resist one last scam,” Libby said. “He was greedy—the kind of man who never has enough.”

It was an assessment Brandon agreed with. “So who killed him?” he asked.

“I wish I knew,” Libby said.