Murder of the Bride (10 page)

Boxed in

Rex found Helen standing
among the cluster of teachers from her school and told her to keep her fingers crossed that his hunch, which he was about to act upon, did not blow up in his face.

“What hunch?” she asked.

“It has to do with those two love birds, Clive and Jasmina.”

In point of fact, the pair seemed far less lovey-dovey now, but then everyone appeared more jaded. He drew the svelte beauty aside, while Helen looked on in curiosity.

“I wonder if you would permit me to look inside your gift box.”

Jasmina's eyes widened. “Excuse me?”

“Your wedding gift.”

Asking Helen and Clive to accompany them, he led the three guests into the reception room, where he bade them stand inside the door, out of the way of the forensics team who were packing up their equipment, while he made for the table of unopened wedding presents.

“Whatever it is you're up to, you'd better be right,” Helen warned after him in a low voice. “I have to work with Clive, remember.”

“This is yours, is it not?” Rex asked Jasmina, returning from the table and handing her a large box.

Hesitantly she untied the ribbon and lifted the lid. Rex looked inside. The box was empty, save for a few remnants of scrunched tissue paper.

“What was in here?”

“A fruit bowl.”

“Where is it now?”

“I have no idea.”

“I have an idea.” Rex took the trio into the caterers' temporary kitchen and picked up off the pine table a bowl decorated with a row of pears and cherries. “This looks the right size for the box. Is this the fruit bowl you brought to the wedding?”

“Why—yes,” Jasmina replied. “What is it doing here?”

“You tell me.” He handed her the bowl. “We got Polly and Timmy a fruit bowl too. Luckily, not the same one.”

Jasmina giggled. Rex began to wonder if the high-pitched laughter might be a nervous tic. Even Clive looked disconcerted.

“Why did you need Clive and me there?” Helen asked as they exited the manor wing.

“As witnesses. I suppose I should have cleared it with Inspector Lucas first. The police, sensitive to the occasion, must have been leaving the wedding gifts until last, hoping to find the missing antique collection elsewhere.”

“But Jasmina's box was empty. The poor girl is terribly embarrassed. Why pick on her box?”

“It was a long shot, but I saw her stealing down the stairs with it and she was reluctant to accept my offer of assistance.”

“I wonder where the snuff boxes are now. And what was Jasmina's bowl doing on the kitchen table?”

“Sometimes it's hard to see the wood for the trees.”

“What do you mean?”

Smiling at Helen's confusion, Rex went to find PC Perrin. “Any luck with the snuff boxes?”

“They seem to have walked.”

“Nonsense. Snuff boxes don't walk.”

“That's not what I meant, sir.”

“Where haven't you looked?”

“We've searched everywhere. The cellar, the attic, every knook and cranny.”

“Use your brain, lad,” Rex said in paternal fashion. “If this was an outside job, the hiding place has to be somewhere familiar. Our criminal wouldn't have had time to go rummaging around looking for a good hiding place.”

“But we searched the vehicles thoroughly,” the young constable insisted. “The wheel wells, under the seats, you name it. That Dudley Thorpe was right incensed when we poked around the bonnet of his new Miata. He called us PC Plod and PC Dimwit. Dimley gets called that a lot.”

“He's a good lad but he'll probably never get off the beat. A smart lad like you, however, could go places.”

“I'd love to make detective one day, sir.”

“Then dig deeper. What is in the house that wasn't here before?”

“Oh, you mean the mobile ovens and catering boxes with the crockery and glasses? Those are the first places we looked.”

“What else was brought into the house?” Rex prompted.

“Well, the DJ's gear, the catering staff's bags, you know, with a change of shirt in case something got spilt.”

Rex all but burst at the seams now. “The DJ has quite a sophisticated setup,” he reflected aloud. “Mikes, lighting, amps, speakers. Shame he never got to demonstrate their full potential.”

Perrin tore off toward the back of the great hall. Within minutes, a cry of triumph resounded. The two detectives dashed over to where the constable kneeled behind a speaker. “Hidden in here, sirs,” he told them, holding open a canvas sack. “Dozens of snuff boxes wrapped in paper.”

“Good work, Constable,” Lucas declared. “Let's see what DJ Smoothie has to say for himself.”

“I can't take all the credit, sir,” PC Perrin told the retreating inspector. “Mr. Graves gave me a pointer.”

“Mr. Graves, you are welcome to sit in, if you like.”

“Technically, you found them,” Rex told the young constable. “And you need the brownie points more than I do.”

“I do appreciate it, sir,” Perrin said with a broad grin, turning to follow in the inspector's footsteps.

“I would never have thought to look in the speakers,” Helen said, joining Rex.

“More wood, more trees,” he said enigmatically.

“Well, good for PC Perrin, I say. He's a lot more switched on than PC Dimbulb.”

“Dimley.”

“Freudian slip, I assure you,” she apologized as Rex strode off after the inspector, eager to see what DJ Smoothie had to say for himself, and about anyone else, for that matter.

In Flagrante Delicto

Inspector Lucas took the
suspect into the caterers' kitchen for interviewing. DJ Smoothie looked significantly less smooth than ruffled, his flagging Elvis looks pale and puffy beneath the fluorescent strip lighting. “Now, Harry, how do you explain the snuff boxes turning up in one of your speakers?” the detective asked, seated across the pine table where Rex joined them.

“I want a lawyer.”

“Mr. Rex Graves here is a lawyer,” the inspector informed him.

“I want my own lawyer,” the DJ scoffed, folding his muscular arms. “I know my rights.”

“Been down this road before, have you?” Lucas asked. “Then you know it would be in your best interests to cooperate. Murder and robbery are serious crimes.”

“I didn't murder nobody.”

“I'm inclined to believe you, given that you arrived shortly before the guests.”

“So?”

“We think the arsenic was blended with the icing on the wedding cake.”

“I had nothing to do with that. I can't bake to save my life.”

“Did you see or hear anything that made you suspicious?”

“I just do my job and let others take care of theirs. Smoothie's my name, music's my game.”

“Well, now your job is to assist the police with their enquiries.”

“I've got nothing to say to you lot.”

“You do not have to say anything­.” Lucas garbled, wearily
parroting the rest of the caution without pause or punctuation. “There may be a perfectly rational reason why the snuff boxes were found in your speaker,” he added, resuming his caustic tone. “We just haven't sussed out what it is yet.”

Harry's mouth remained firmly shut. Inspector Lucas planted his freckled hands on the knotted pine tabletop. “If you copped to the theft and gave us what you know about the arsenic, it could cut your prison time down considerably.”

“I told you, I don't know nothing. And I'd never get prison time for a first offense without proof.”

“Where did you get that idea? We're not talking about stealing an ice cream cone from off the pier one Sunday afternoon. Those are highly valuable antiques you stashed in your speaker.”

DJ Smoothie, who had recovered some of his composure, leaned back in his chair. “I never did. Someone must've put them there. The prisons are overflowing with pedos, druggies, and terrorists. I'd never be sent down on suspicion of nicking some poxy little snuff boxes.”

Rex and the inspector exchanged glances. The interview was patently going nowhere. Lucas nodded almost imperceptibly, giving Rex the go-ahead to question Harry.

A prosecutor at the supreme criminal court of Scotland, Rex was a dab hand at questioning suspects and witnesses. “You said something about this being a first offense,” he addressed the DJ. “There have been other burglaries in Derbyshire.”

“I suppose you're going to try to pin those on me too.”

“I'll bet if we had a list of your gigs, we'd find the burglaries took place at or near your venues.” Rex turned to Inspector Lucas. “Jocelyn Willington has a tennis friend who was burgled this month during a wedding reception held at her house. Might be worth inquiring if Harry was the DJ on that occasion.” He redirected his attention to the suspect whose tensed features betrayed his unease. “I imagine not all the thefts coincide with your gigs. But once you've had a chance to case the homes, you plan an encore—solo this time. Or maybe you prefer duets?”

“What's he on about?” the DJ asked Inspector Lucas.

“TVs, antiques, it's all the same to you, as long as you can find a buyer,” Rex went on. “That van of yours is ideal for transporting stolen items. It's a plain white one, right?” Parked in front of Helen's Renault. “Why not advertise your business on it? Too revealing?”

“You have a very creative mind,” Harry told him. “Almost as imaginative as Detective Lucas with his ice cream cones. I just haven't got around to putting logos on yet. What do you actually have on me?”

“An accomplice.”

“Oh, really? Go on, then. This I can't wait to hear.” Smirking, the DJ tipped back in his chair, arms crossed and bulging.

“A girl who infiltrates the parties.”

“Yeah?”

“The lovely Jasmina. How else do you think we knew where to find the snuff boxes?”

“She never. I mean—” The DJ stopped, too late realizing his mistake.

“She did, Harry. Gave you up to save her own skin.”

“You're fibbing! I don't even know her!”

Rex turned to the inspector, who had been following the line of questioning, the tic of an incipient smirk at the corner of his lips. “Should we bring the lady in?”

“By all means.” Lucas called to the constable standing guard at the kitchen door. “Perrin! Get Jasmina Patel in here.”

The inspector pulled out his container of pills and, cupping a few into his mouth, crunched them as though they were candy, breaking the silence as the three of them waited for the young woman, Harry rubbing bleary eyes in a gesture of defeat.

Thick as Thieves

DJ Smoothie shot an
accusatory glance at the young woman as she entered the room.

“Mr. Graves is assisting us in an unofficial capacity,” Inspector Lucas informed her. “You may choose not to answer his questions. Or mine for that matter.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“Not at this point.”

“I think you know what this is all about,” Rex addressed Jasmina. “Please take a seat.” She did so carefully, as if the chair might disintegrate beneath her negligible weight. “How long have you known Clive Rutherford, the mathematics teacher?”

“A month or so,” she said, knitting her smooth brow in puzzlement. Clearly, she had not expected to be questioned about Clive.

“Where did you meet?”

She glanced at the inspector. “Do I have to tell him? This is my private life.”

“Just answer the question, please.”

“I met him online.”

“You have a thing for teachers who enjoy microbrews and long walks in the rain?” Rex inquired.

Jasmina's liquid gaze fixed warily on his face. “It's just that, well, I saw on Facebook that he was single and, you know … He seemed nice,” she added lamely.

“And he'd been invited to Mrs. Newcombe's daughter's wedding. You saw the list of invitees at your father's print shop and you singled out the men who didn't have ‘
and Mrs
.' after their name. Then you did a search on the Internet and up popped Clive Rutherford of the lonely hearts club.”

Jasmina let slip a glance at Harry. “I don't follow,” she murmured.

“It's quite simple,” Rex explained. “You and Harry are the real partners. Posing as Clive Rutherford's date, you brought a big box to the wedding, took out the fruit bowl when no one was looking, and left it in the kitchen where it would blend in with the other serving dishes. Then you went upstairs, filled the empty box with the antiques, and brought it back down, which is when I saw you and we had our pleasant little chat.” He kept his tone just as benign. Jasmina said nothing, and he continued.

“Since I was following you, you couldn't give Harry the goods just then. So, during the cutting of the cake, when everyone's attention was directed at the bride and groom, you retrieved the box, helped Harry transfer the snuff boxes to the speaker, and then, prevented for some reason from going into the kitchen, put the empty gift box on the reception room table, intending to replace the fruit bowl when the opportunity presented itself. Such an opportunity, however, did not present itself. The bride fell ill and the room was cleared, preventing you from carrying out your plan to its conclusion.”

Jasmina remained so silent and still, she could have been carved out of ice.

“Caught red-handed, eh?” the inspector said to the thieves. “It was a daring plan. You couldn't have anticipated a multiple murder taking place on the big day.”

“How did you know where to find the snuff boxes?” Rex asked the young woman.

She turned to face him, a lost look on her face. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Jasmina,” the inspector said with a patient sigh. “We're giving you a chance here. I strongly suggest you take it.”

The girl flicked frightened eyes at Rex, who nodded in encouragement. “Harry overheard one of the caterers say they were all in the study. He went upstairs and picked the lock.” She stole a look at Harry.

“She's lying. She must've put the boxes in the speaker when I wasn't looking.”

“That's not true. You picked the lock.” Jasmina turned to the inspector. “He was a locksmith before he became a full-time DJ.”

Harry groaned and buried his face in his hands.

“Being a mobile disk jockey doesn't pay well?” Rex inquired.

“I had my van to pay off, and I just got some new mixing equipment. Plus Jaz has very expensive tastes. It was her idea to nick stuff. We met at a karaoke I was doing at a bar. There. That's the whole story.”

“How did you find out about the snuff box collection?”

“Jaz researched Newcombe Court on the Net to see if it was the sort of place that might contain valuables. She came across an article about the missing owner and a reference to some early nineteenth-century snuff boxes, which we figured must be worth a bob or two.”

“My father will be dishonoured,” Jasmina broke out. “Is there any way I can fully redeem myself ?”

“Your father will be more dishonoured if you go down for murder,” the inspector told her.

“Murder?” the young woman wailed. “I had nothing to do with any murder! I would never kill anyone! Never!”

“Greed can make you do things you might never have thought yourself capable of,” Lucas said evenly.

“You have no proof I was involved in a murder. Why would I murder any of these people?”

“Have either of you any idea who might have?” Lucas questioned.

“Why should we?” the DJ asked. “If someone hadn't poisoned the food, we'd be home free. Or at least on our way to Europe.”

“Except that Robert Carter discovered the items had gone missing,” Rex pointed out.

“That was after people started getting sick. What was he doing in the study anyway? It's not his house, far as I know. Freakin' busybody.”

“You are going down, Harry,” the inspector informed him with a grave shake of his head. “And not just for the snuff boxes. You are looking very good for the string of burglaries in Derbyshire. You being a locksmith by trade explains a lot.”

“I haven't confessed to anything. I just meant we were planning a holiday abroad.”

“If I help, will it get me off the accomplice charge?” Jasmina pleaded, looking at her interrogators in turn.

Rex left it to the inspector to answer.

“If either of you can give us any assistance leading to an arrest in the murders, we'll review each of your cases accordingly. You will also need to give us the name of your fence or fences for the stolen goods.”

“Harry took care of that,” Jasmina told him. “I just took my cut.”

Head bowed between his elbows and rubbing fingers through his slicked-back hair, the DJ swore softly under his breath.

“C'mon, Harry,” Lucas said cheerily. “Names, dates, locations. Otherwise, we'll just show your Elvis mug at every pawnshop each side of the River Trent and beyond, if necessary. We'll offer a reward for information and it'll cost us a ton in manpower, so we'll be mightily pissed off by your lack of cooperation when someone recognizes you as being the person who sold them the merchandise off the back of a lorry.”

With pained reluctance, Harry supplied the inspector with the relevant information, while Rex asked Jasmina what she had planned to tell Clive after the wedding, when she had no further use for him. “He seems pretty infatuated with you,” he remarked.

“Not me with him!” she said pouting. “So boring! After a few weeks, I would have told him it was over or just stopped taking his calls. Helen is much better off with you.”

“Thank you.”

“Even if you
did
catch me out,” she reproached him.
She massaged her earlobe, enflamed by the silver hoop. “Cheap fake earrings!” she spat at Harry.

Jasmina was so much more alluring when she didn't giggle, Rex thought. Harry raised a fist, before dropping it in a dismissive gesture.

“Now then,” the inspector announced when he had finished his note-taking. “Let's see if you can both be as helpful with the murder side of things.” He looked first at Jasmina. “Anything you may have noticed out of the ordinary?”

“I really want to help.” She wet her lips. “Um, the bride and that pig of a best man, Dudley, had a fight. I heard them when I was upstairs.”

“Did you see them?”

“I saw their reflections in a mirror as I crossed the landing to the study. I hid behind the door until they left.”

“Did you hear what they were saying?”

“Dudley was talking about someone called Mack and said something about her Uncle Bobby. She said something like, ‘It's not true!' She called him a lot of names, and he said, ‘I'll murder the bloody lot of you,' and then he stormed out of the room. After I gave Harry the antiques, I couldn't put the bowl back in the gift box because someone was in the kitchen. A man wearing a hooded jacket and gloves. Other than that, I couldn't give a description.”

When she finished her recital, the inspector humphed and twiddled his pencil. The reported outburst from Dudley did not surprise Rex, since the young man had a short fuse, judging by his reaction when the police searched his sports car. His threat and the hooded stranger, however, Rex treated with a degree of skepticism. After all, it was in Jasmina's interest to finger someone for the murders at Newcombe Court.

“I remember something else,” she added with passion.

“Let's be having it,” Lucas said, lethargically drumming the eraser end of his pencil on the table.

“Dudley shouted, ‘You let your scheming mother and her henchman control your life. My brother is a pawn in their games.'”

“Is that verbatim?” Rex asked.

“Word for word,” the inspector told her when she looked nonplussed.

“Oh. Yes, pretty much. I wondered who the henchman was.”

Rex turned to the DJ. “You mentioned seeing the Welsh lady go up the tower steps with Roger Litton.”

“I don't know their names. He wasn't gone more than five minutes.”

“That's not what you told me.”

“Now I remember better. They made a comical pair, him with his scrawny neck and bowtie, her short and fat. I was thinking it was just enough time for a quickie. Happens more often than you'd think at weddings, you know.”

“Thank you for your observations, Harry,” Inspector Lucas said in a deadpan voice. He gazed at the pair of thieves, awaiting further revelations. “If that's all, PCs Dimley and Perrin will take you into custody now.”

“Inspector,” Jasmina blurted. “Can we go out the back way? I can't face being paraded in handcuffs in front of all those people!”

The inspector acquiesced. As they were led out of the kitchen, he asked Rex how he had come to suspect Jasmina.

“She told me she'd put her gift upstairs for safekeeping. ‘Safekeeping' was the word Stella Pembleton used in connection with the snuff boxes, and it just resonated and made me wonder why Jasmina had really gone to the trouble of separating her gift from the rest of the presents. Plus, her relationship with Clive Rutherford seemed staged right from the start. At first I thought he had retained the services of a beautiful escort for the occasion, in order to impress my fiancée. Then when PC Perrin showed me the list with the name Jasmina Patel on it, I remembered Ms. Pembleton mentioning Patel's being the company that had printed up the invitations.”

“You canny Scotsman! Well, that's one case closed, thanks in part to you, but we still have the more serious one of the murders to solve.”

Rex was glad the inspector had said “we.”

“Jasmina may have given us a lead,” Lucas went on. “If she's to be believed, Dudley Thorpe had a grouse with the Newcombes. Of course, that stuff about the hooded intruder is probably a load of old cock. Right, well, we'll keep the family here for now. Mrs. Thorpe and her son are returning after their visit to the hospital. It is, after all, Timothy Thorpe's home now.”

“Jasmina Patel is not exactly a credible witness,” Rex concurred. “But what she said about Bobby Carter rang true.”

“At least we found our burglars. That will be a relief to the wealthy folk of Derbyshire.”

Rex nodded, pleased for the wealthy folk of Derbyshire. However, he wouldn't be satisfied until he knew the identity of the killer, and he was determined to find out by the end of the day just who that person might be. He could not justifiably stay beyond then, since he was not an official part of the investigation. Not that it was going to stop him.