A Vote for Murder (17 page)

“What help could I possibly be?” I asked.

“You’re close to the Nebel family—and you don’t have any ax to grind, Mrs. Fletcher.”

“That may be true, Detective, but I’m afraid my friendship with Patricia Nebel is the extent of it. And we’re not particularly close. I barely know the senator.”

Another glance at the house. “You know about the senator’s affair with the deceased.”

I glanced at George before replying, “I’ve heard the rumors like everyone else, but I don’t have any first-hand information.”

“Let’s go down,” he said.

When we reached the dock, Moody said, “I’ll level with you, Mrs. Fletcher. We don’t get a lot of murders here in Fairfax County. This is maybe my second or third murder investigation, and I’ve been on the force for twenty-six years.” He grinned broadly, his teeth a bright white against the blackness of his skin. “And I sure never thought I’d be looking at a United States senator as the prime suspect.”

“Isn’t that a trifle premature, Detective?” George said.

Moody reacted to George’s voice as though he’d forgotten he was there. “That’s right,” he said. “You’re a Scotland Yard inspector, probably handled hundreds of homicides.”

“I’ve had my share,” George said.

“Yeah, well, I haven’t—had my share.” He faced George, hands on hips. “Ever handled a murder investigation where the president of England sticks his nose in it?”

“The president?” George said. “We have a prime minister.”

“Whatever. Look, the chief gets a call from somebody in President Dimond’s office. It seems the president—he’s the same party as Senator Nebel—the president doesn’t want the senator involved with this. My boss says the Senate is almost fifty-fifty Republicans and Democrats, and if Nebel loses his seat, the other side picks it up. In other words, my boss, who happens to be a political animal, doesn’t want the senator to be the one who killed Ms. Farlow. Am I making sense?”

“I’m sure the senator would agree,” George said.

“So,” Moody said, “it’s to my advantage to clear the senator.”

“As opposed to finding out who killed Nikki Farlow?” I said, unable to disguise my disappointment with his message.

“I deserved that,” Moody said, “but cut me some slack. You spent time with the victim, Mrs. Fletcher. Did she say anything that might point to someone at the party who didn’t like her, somebody she might have been afraid of?”

“No,” I answered.

“Inspector?”

“I was with Mrs. Fletcher all evening,” he said. “I saw, and heard, what she saw and heard.”

Moody pulled a piece of paper from his yellow Windbreaker and consulted it. “My wife says you probably make lists when you’re writing your murder mysteries,” he said. “You know, suspect lists, motives, maybe even make charts to keep things straight.”

I glanced at George, whose expression was bemusement.

“So,” said Moody, “I made a list of my own—of suspects. I figure maybe you saw something with one of these people at the dinner party, maybe overheard something one of them said.”

“Detective,” I said, “I really don’t think that—”

“My wife says mystery writers have a really keen nose for things like that. And here you were at the party with a real Scotland Yard inspector. Between the two of you, I figured—”

George’s cell phone rang. He removed it from his pocket and walked away from us. When he returned, he said, “I’m afraid I must leave immediately. There’s been a terrorist incident in London—two people killed, many wounded, I’m told—and I’m needed.”

“You’re going back to London?” I said, disappointment obvious in my voice.

“No,” he said. “We’ve set up an operations center here in Washington. I’ll be there to help coordinate things back home. I’m sure someone up at the house will fetch me a taxi.”

“Forget it,” said Moody, yanking a two-way radio from his belt. “One of my men will take you wherever you want to go. Least I can do for a fellow lawman. Hands across the sea, huh?”

“I appreciate that,” George said. While Moody made his call, George kissed me, gave my arms a squeeze, told me he’d call that evening, and went up the stairs two at a time.

The sound of a boat’s motor caused us to turn. Jack Nebel deftly maneuvered the Aquasport to the dock, tilted the Evinrude out of the water, expertly secured its lines to the cleats on the dock, and jumped out.

“Hello,” I said.

“Hello,” he replied, walking past us. “I’m late.” He hurried up the steps. I noted that this time he took the ignition key with him.

“Detective Moody,” I said, “I assured you that I would do anything I could to help in your investigation. I meant that. But you’re asking me to tell you what people said, or did, and I’m uncomfortable passing along hearsay.” I was thinking specifically of what Pat Nebel had told me. If she’d revealed something tangible, some specific piece of hard evidence, I would have immediately passed that along to Moody. But what she’d said was based on pure speculation—except, I amended my thought, for having overheard the conversation about Nikki Farlow’s blackmailing of Senator Nebel. I drew a breath and was about to tell him of that conversation when he saved me the trouble.

“The deceased, Ms. Farlow, was blackmailing the senator,” he said matter-of-factly.

I said nothing, hoping my surprise at his knowing what I already knew wasn’t obvious.

“Pretty strong motive, huh?”

“If it’s true. This city seems to be fueled by such rumors.”

“More than a rumor, ma’am. We have a letter she sent him about it.”

“Oh,” was all I could muster. “Where did you get it?”

“Not really at liberty to say, Mrs. Fletcher.”

“I understand,” I said. What I wanted to say was that I would love to see the letter. I decided there was nothing to be lost by asking—and did.

To my amazement, he said, “Sure.” He pulled an eight-by-ten sheet of white paper, folded in thirds, from his jacket pocket and handed it to me. “It’s a photocopy,” he said.

“May I take this with me?” I asked.

“Afraid not,” he said. “Sorry.”

Why is he allowing
me
to see the letter?
I wondered as I unfolded the paper and read what was on it. I handed it back to him.

“Interesting, huh?” he said.

I nodded. My mind raced. I was frantically chewing on what I’d just read when he said, “I’d like to go over a couple of names with you, people who were at the party.”

“All right,” I said, wanting to ask to see the letter again—to commit it to memory—but reluctant. “Where do you want to start?”

“How about the two members of Congress who were here, Ms. Marshall-Miner and Mr. Barzelouski?”

Once we’d finished discussing names on Moody’s list, and before I left him alone on the dock to return to the house to spend a few minutes with Pat Nebel, I told him of my observations about the Aquasport—that the engine was warm, indicating it had been used during the time the party was in progress; the black shoe marks on the terrace and a few of the steps; that the key had been left in the ignition; the oil leak in the outboard engine; and that whoever used it during the party was either a rank amateur sailor, or had been in a great hurry, judging from the engine’s being left in the water, and the slipshod way the boat had been tethered to the dock. He thanked me for the information, and requested that I not discuss the letter he’d shown me with anyone, something I expected him to do before handing it to me. I assured him, of course, that I would honor his request.

We said good-bye, and I went up to the house, leaving him to take a closer look at the Aquasport. Jardine was there when I arrived. He informed me that Mrs. Nebel wasn’t feeling well and didn’t wish to be disturbed. Whether she was physically ill or wilting under the pressures of the past few days was impossible to determine. All I knew was that she was keeping a low profile, which was probably smart. What her absences would mean to the success of the literacy initiative was conjecture. Chances were that she’d done all her important work ahead of time, and any appearances would be purely symbolic.

Jardine turned to leave, but I called his name.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“I was curious about the boat down at the dock,” I said. “The Aquasport.”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Who uses it?”

“The family,” he replied.

“Everyone in the family?”

“Yes, ma’am. Jack mostly.”

“I see. Jardine, do you ever use the boat?”

“Oh, no, ma’am. I wouldn’t know how.”

His response didn’t satisfy me. I wanted to ask further questions, but he said he had an important chore to do, and excused himself.

“I need a taxi,” I said.

“I will call one for you, ma’am.”

While waiting for a taxi to arrive, I called George’s cell phone.

“Sutherland here,” he said.

“It’s Jessica. I’m just leaving the house.”

“Fruitful?” he asked.

“Yes, as a matter of fact,” I said, thinking of the letter shown me by Detective Moody. “I haven’t had a chance to catch up on the news. The terrorist attack?”

“Worse than originally reported, I’m afraid. Five dead and scores injured. I’ll be late into the evening. I suggested returning to London, but my superior dissuaded me.”

I was pleased to hear that, but didn’t express it. Instead I said, “I suppose dinner is out.”

“Afraid so, my dear, much to my regret. Unless, of course—”

“Don’t give it even a second thought,” I said. “What you’re doing is far more important than any dinner. Call me on my cell when, and if, you get a breather.”

“Shall do. Till later.”

I told the cabdriver to take me to the Willard, but as we approached the hotel I had a change of mind. I’d asked Detective Moody for Nikki Farlow’s address in Washington, and he’d given it to me, saying that the Washington MPD, working in concert with the Fairfax County police, had already searched her apartment in the Capitol Hill area. “Her parents are here from Ohio,” he’d added. “Sad reason for a trip to Washington.”

I gave the driver Nikki’s address, and he delivered me to a pretty, tree-lined street a few blocks from the Capitol Building. I checked numbers on the doors, found Nikki’s, and rang the bell next to her name on a listing of tenants in the foyer. A male voice said, “Who is it?”

“My name is Jessica Fletcher,” I responded. “I was a . . . I was friendly with Nikki.”

“Just a moment.” He came back on the intercom a few seconds later and said, “Jessica Fletcher, the mystery writer?”

“Yes.”

“You and Nikki were friends?”

“Not exactly, but we had met and spent some time together.”

I didn’t know what to say next, because I wasn’t sure why I’d even come there. The man spared me further explanation by saying, “Please come up.”

The door leading from the small foyer to the building’s interior was buzzed open, and I soon found myself standing in Nikki’s second-floor apartment, where her father and mother, Greg and Charlotte Farlow, greeted me.

“I’m so sorry for your loss,” I said after introductions.

“It’s the worst thing a parent can face,” said her mother, “outliving your child.”

I agreed, and accepted their offer to sit with them in the pretty, sunny kitchen.

“Nikki never mentioned knowing you,” her father, a tall, heavy man with a head of tousled white hair and a ruddy face, said.

“We’d just recently become acquainted,” I said. “I didn’t know your daughter well, but I was impressed with her. She seemed such an organized, capable young woman.”

Charlotte cried, which I was sure she’d done a hundred times since receiving news of her daughter’s demise. She wiped her eyes with a pretty embroidered handkerchief. “Murdered!” she said flatly, bewildered. “How can it be?”

“Nikki always dismissed danger, Mrs. Fletcher,” Greg Farlow said, “at least where it concerned her.” He shook his head. “She was fatalistic about danger. If it happened, it happened, was the way she viewed it.”

Charlotte, as tall as her husband but considerably slimmer, managed a small smile. “I bet you’d like a cup of tea, Mrs. Fletcher,” she said.

“Oh, please, I don’t—”

“It won’t be any trouble,” she said. “I ran across tea bags a few minutes ago. Nikki was always so organized. I suppose that’s why she was successful in business.”

“She told me she’d had a placement firm in Chicago,” I said.

“Yes,” the father said. “Built it from scratch into a thriving business. I suppose that was one reason Senator Nebel asked her to join his staff here in Washington. I suggested she turn him down, but working in Congress was the sort of challenge Nikki couldn’t resist.”

I thought of the rumor that their daughter and the senator had been engaged in an affair, and wondered how much they knew about it. I didn’t have to wait long to find out. As Nikki’s mother placed a steaming cup in front of me, she said, “It’s hard enough having your only child murdered in the prime of her life, but to hear these vicious rumors about her and the senator only rubs salt into the wound.”

“I can imagine the additional pain it’s caused you,” I said. I hesitated before asking, “Did Nikki ever talk about it with you?”

“Some,” George said. “We knew how ludicrous it was.”

Terming it
ludicrous
surprised me. While I understood why a parent would want to dismiss such a salacious charge against a beloved daughter, it certainly couldn’t have been ruled out of the question. Senator Nebel’s reputation was that of a man with an eye for women outside his marriage, and Nikki was an attractive woman. They worked in close proximity, undoubtedly spending many long hours together. That they might have entered into an affair didn’t seem ludicrous to me.

“How well did you know Nikki?” her father asked me.