MURDER TUNED IN (Allie Griffin Mysteries Book 4) (5 page)

              The show was off. That much was obvious. Allie knew Del was working at the theater today, helping to clean up. Angus had taken a bereavement day for himself.

              That morning she'd gotten a text. It was a picture Beauchenne had snapped of the piece of rope they'd found. It was a crystal clear snapshot in full color and very detailed. Her heart melted a little for the kindness that Frank Beauchenne never failed to show her.

              She saw her friend pushing a clunky piece of scenery off to the side of the stage.

              "Well, hello there," Del said, wiping sweat from her forehead.

              "Sorry to interrupt. Listen, stage techs use ropes, don’t they?"

              "Ah ha. I was wondering how long it would take before you asked that question. Yes they do. All kinds."

              "Black ones? Or dark blue?"

              "Both."

              "Good, I want to see where they keep them."

              Allie climbed up onto the stage and Del led her over to a trunk underneath what she called a pin rail, the main board that served as a mooring point for every rope that was tied to something in the house.

              "Here you are."

              "No lock on this thing?"

              "Not that I know of. Maybe before we leave it's locked. But it's kept open during hours of operation. It has to be. Stagehands are a busy lot."

              "May I, Watson?"

              "Be my guest, Sherlock."

              Allie bent down and lifted the trunk open. It looked as though there were an infinite number of ropes in there. Hinged onto the inside lid of the trunk was an expanding and contracting shelf with compartments covered by a Plexiglas protective cover. The compartments housed every type of clip and pin and winch imaginable, plus some Allie would never have been able to imagine. What went on behind the scenes in order to make the action onstage as flawless as could be—and still be invisible and inaudible as it happened—was always impressive to Allie, especially after hearing Del's war stories all these years. But nothing drove the point home more than seeing this tiny, specialized section of artistry. If this was what it took to rig scenery and keep the theater physically afloat, imagine what it took to run everything else. She found a new respect for the theater blossoming in her.

             
But back to the ropes
, she thought.

              "Is there anyone here who can tell me about these?"

              "Yeah," said Del. "Ernie is here. He's an old stagehand. He's been doing it for years."

              "Where's Ernie?"

              "I'll get him."

              A stout man with graying hair, wearing a heavy leather utility belt that had many pockets with just as many tools crammed inside them, walked over with Del as escort.

              "Ernie Banks, Allie Griffin. Allie Griffin, Ernie Banks."

              Ernie Banks towered over Allie. He had forearms like Popeye, she thought.

              "How do you do?" For a big, scary man, he was incredibly polite. Dainty almost, in the way he bowed and took Allie's hand as if he were holding a baby bird.

              "Very well," said Allie, "thank you. So, I have a question. Would any of these ropes keep their shape once they’ve been twisted up?"

              "They're called kernmantle ropes, designed to take a beatin'. But they're made of nylon, so no, they aren’t as strong as other kinds of material. But it also depends on the braid. To answer your question, any rope will get twisted up if enough tension is put on it. Some will milk on you."

              "Pardon? Did you say milk?"

              "Yeah." He picked up a specimen of rope and held it before her, pointing out things as he spoke of them. "Each one of these has a core. The rope on the outside is a sheath that gets wrapped around it. You put enough tension on the rope, and the core separates from the sheath. You call that milking. Then it bunches up. You get kinks in it. Not good for certain kinds of rigging, like when you need a clip to slide over a certain area. If there's kinks, the clip'll get stuck."

              "Interesting. So you can tell probably how old a rope is or how much it's been used by its condition?"

              "Listen I've been doing this for so long I can tell you different kinds of rope with my eyes closed."

              Allie brought out her phone and showed Ernie the photo of the evidential piece of rope Beauchenne had gotten for her.               "This, for example."

              He took the phone in his meaty hands and studied the photo closely. "Yeah, this one's been through the wringer."

              Allie winced at his unknowing choice of words. She leaned in and looked at the photo with him. "Interesting. How would you tie a rope like this?"

              "Depends on what you need it for."

              "Say I needed it to stay tied."

              "That would be a bowline. It's the most widely used knot. Here." He handed her phone back to her, then took the piece of rope he'd been holding and tied the knot for her like he'd been doing it since birth. "That's a bowline. That will stay tied no matter what."

              "Can I see that?"

              "Sure. If you're interested in how they look when they're tied, I'd say it looks like that one in the photo'd been tied  for a long time."

              "Really?"

              "Pretty positive."

              She looked at the knot he'd tied for her, then inspected the rest of the untied rope. On either end was a piece of colored tape wound around it like the plastic at the end of a shoelace.

              "Why this?"

              "It's an old stagehand trick. Keeps the ends from fraying. But there's another reason. You put two different colored pieces of tape in order to distinguish one end from another. Safety precaution. You always have to tie these things the same way, and sometimes you're working in the dark."

              "Really."

              "Yeah. Right over left, left over right. That's a square knot. You can't tie it any other way. No stagehand would tie it any other way. Same with a bowline. There's a certain way you have to do it."

              "Huh. That's very interesting," Allie said, looking closely at the rope. She then looked all around the theater at the myriad ropes hanging all around, some suspending weights and balances, some moored to the pin rail, and some performing functions she couldn’t even guess at.

              She held up the rope he'd tied for her. "Can I hold onto this for a little while?"

              "Sure thing. Hang on." He reached into his work belt and pulled out a utility knife. This he used to cut the rope cleanly into a two-foot long section. "Want me to tape that up for you?"

              "Not necessary. Thank you."

              "Anything else you need, you let me know."

#

              "Look closely at this photo." Allie and Del walked to Allie's car and paused in the middle of the almost-empty parking lot.

              "What am I looking at?"             

              "What do you see?"

              "I see a rope."

              "What about it?"

              "It looks worn."

              "More than worn," said Allie. "It's been milked. That's what they call it when the sheath becomes detached from the rope's core. Look even more closely. You see this? It's been twisted in a certain direction."

              "I don’t see it."

              Allie felt her frustration growing. "Look closely. Don’t look at the knot. Look at the rest of the rope."

              "Yeah, I'm looking. I see a used, messed up rope."

              Allie took a heavy breath. "Look. Hold out your hand."

              Del did as she was told and Allie slipped the sample of rope Ernie had given her around it.

              "Watch," she said, as she began to twist the rope gently. "See how it has already been twisted in this direction?"

              "Ok, now I see it. What does that prove?"

              "Watch how I'm twisting it. Clockwise. It's only natural when using a garrote to grasp it with one hand facing up and the other facing down. The one facing up is the dominant hand, because that's the hand that has the strength required to strangle someone, which is how it was done here." She pointed to the photo. "The rope twists clockwise. You can see it right there in the photo. I was right. We're looking for a left-handed killer."

              As soon as she got into her car, Allie's phone alerted her to a text. From 000, she knew exactly who it was. Her heart raced slightly when she read it.

             
Swordfish. 8:00

              She hadn’t seen the secret code she shared with Sgt. Frank Beauchenne's to arrange a meeting in quite some time. It meant that there was something he needed her to do. Perhaps something only she had access to.

              She had to admit to herself that she felt a bit queasy about Tad Mills being a possible suspect. She liked Tad, had gotten a good vibe from him. But she was smarter than that. She knew you can't always trust a good vibe. Still, the thought pained her. And something about this case gnawed at her in that way she'd come to recognize: That all was not right in the way things appeared to the naked eye.

              The shadows cast by the full moon were well-defined, twisted, and eerie, as if cast by withered old trees possessed by evil spirits.

              Sgt. Beauchenne was already waiting for her there. She had been immensely grateful to the powers that be when she'd pulled up next to his squad car. She didn’t feel much like waiting alone.

              He was standing amidst the shadows, looking like some sort of wizard taking command of the night. He was sexy in the moonlight, she thought.

             
Enough,
she told herself.
You're not falling for him.

              "Got some news for you," said Beauchenne. "We found traces of haloperidol in her system."

              "Wait. I think I know that. Why does that sound familiar?"

              "Your husband's colleagues may have mentioned it from time to time. Better known as Haldol. It's normally used to—"

              "Psychological disturbances."

              Beauchenne smiled. "One of these days you're gonna stop being smarter than I am. Yes, it's used to treat psychological disturbances. Severe psychological disturbances. At smaller doses it can cause drowsiness. This was a dose that you would give to an average patient in need. What I'm saying is that was a good tip on your part, running the toxicology report. They found that the Haldol was administered around the same time as the alcohol in her system, causing a bad combination of side effects."

              "So, I was right. She had to have been drugged in order for the killer to get the rope around her without a fuss."

              Beauchenne rubbed the back of his neck. "Looks to be that way. My God, what I wouldn’t give for a vacation."

              She looked at his tired face. "Are you ok?"

              "I'm getting too old for this job. Too old to watch guys like Tomlin brown-nose their way to promotions and then do a terrible job once they get them."

              "That means they need you more than ever, Frank. You can’t retire yet."

              "Oh, you're calling the shots now?"

              She flashed him a flirty smile. "Don’t act like you don’t love it."

              He chuckled. "Well I don’t. Besides, and I say this with all the affection in my heart, you don’t know what it's like having to go to a civilian for help on a case."

              "Gee, thanks."

              "Stop that. You know what I mean. I shouldn’t have to go to you. I should be putting all my trust in Tomlin. But we all know what a mistake that would be."

              "You think Chief Fraser will understand if you told him everything you just told me, disregarding the part about all the affection in your heart, of course."

              "He might. He's got a low threshold for B.S. Anyway, I'm going to need you to check up on something. Tomlin's got his hooks in on this one and the Chief wants to see how he performs. So I've been told to back off a bit and let him work. But that doesn’t mean I can’t just happen to come across information when I'm on my own. You know, at random."

              "I get it," Allie said. "What do you need from me?"

              Beauchenne looked as though he was hesitating. "We need you to take a close look at your friend Tad."

              Allie cocked her head to one side. "Ok."

              "We need three things to establish suspicion: proximity, access to the weapon, and motive. We have two out of three. We know Tad's non-union."

              "Wait. Non-union? What does that have to do with anything?"

              "Some of the actors have been talking. Del hasn’t said anything to you?"

              "About what?"

              "I guess she hasn’t. There was talk about getting rid of the non-union employees of the theater. I don’t know what authorities are on their case, but apparently Sally Kane had her hand in it. Did you know she worked a day job in the county representative's office? She'd just recently drafted a memo regarding the theater hiring non-union members. Tad, as we found out, is non-union."

              "He's the choreographer."

              "Right, and he probably wouldn’t have been if Sally had gotten her way. You're forgetting what a big deal this is, Allie. The big Broadway producer was coming. This is the thing you see in movies where everyone in the small town has a chance to make it to Broadway. Once in a lifetime fairytale, you understand? You don’t think a dream like that put in jeopardy is enough for an artist to kill?"

              Allie was speechless. She needed to gather her thoughts. "I can’t believe this," was all she could say.

              "I know."

              "No, I really can’t believe what I'm hearing."

              "Allie—"

              "You're telling me Tad is a murderer."

              "Now hold on."

              "Hold on? Tad's not a murderer. I can tell you that."

              "He's left-handed."

              Allie breathed heavily. "He didn’t do it."

              "He had access to the weapon. He had proximity to the victim. He had motive. He's left-handed."

              "Sergeant, I'm leaving," she said with venom in her voice.

              "Allie—"

              "No, don’t Allie me. You've allowed Tomlin and his idiot theories to cloud your judgement. Are you forgetting who solved the last two big ones you guys had? Little Allie Griffin, that's who. The bored widow from the small town got the best of you. You know what I think? I think you're jealous of that fact. Anything I say, you’re going to contradict it. If I say hello now, will you say goodbye? I hope so. See you around, chum!"

              She got into her car, fuming. She started it up and drove away.

              Driving this late through a small town was a good activity to undertake in this state of mind. It would allow her time to brood. She took a turn onto the main highway that led out of town and started driving miles through nowhere. The moon raced ahead of her while thoughts and voices bounced around in her brain.

              Tad?

             
Get a hold of yourself
, she thought.

              She didn’t know when it happened, but somewhere in the middle of that drive, her heart rate decreased, her breathing became steady and slow, and her muscles relaxed, dropping her shoulders. Her neck ached from being stiff with anger and frustration for so long. However, the rest of her was somewhat at peace. She let her mind go. Here in this nowhere, where no one could see or hear her, where there was no one to judge, she gave logic free reign to consider the unthinkable.

             
You're not falling for Frank
, she told herself.
You’re falling for Tad
.

             
Maybe Frank was right
, she thought, a nasty coldness numbing her from the inside out.