Nantucket Sawbuck (20 page)

I took a page at random. Helen Sandler. She had thrown the benefit party on the night of the murder. She had just bought an expensive digital camera and an Apple G4 Powerbook. She had spent the whole night taking pictures, and at Haden Krakauer's suggestion she had e-mailed them to the station. I put the paper aside and pulled my computer toward me. I logged onto the NPD site, found the note with the attached photos, opened the file and scrolled down through the pictures.

They were useful, if only for the time references built in: a stove clock visible in the kitchen in some of them, a TV tuned to the local news in others. Some of them gave solid alibis for their subjects: the coroner had estimated the time of the murder at around 11:15. Kathleen Lomax had gone out to her second round of parties at 10:30. I had done the drive from Eel Point to the house in Squam several times in the last few weeks. Squam Road was a dirt track that ran along the east coast of the island, between Wauwinet and Quidnet. The mid-point was about as far as you could get from the Lomax house without a boat. There was a lot of construction going on out there and trucks had dug deep ruts in the mud that had frozen into ice-hard ridges and gullies. It wasn't an easy drive. I figured it would have taken more than an hour that night, round trip. It took me forty-five minutes in broad daylight.

Fiona, Bob Haffner, and two other people from Mike Henderson's paint crew were posed next to a grandfather clock in the living room that showed 10:55. That cleared them; and the local news cleared the people in the picture with the TV in the background. The kitchen stove digital read-out showed 9:55, which didn't prove much of anything. Other pictures, which included the family's kids, were equally useless for my purposes. The oldest girl was in bed by ten.

There was a knock on the door.

“Come on in.” I clicked the file closed.

Haden was right. There was something vulgar and oversized about Diana Lomax that I hadn't seen in her darkened car when I pulled her over. The flower pattern on her dress, the gold belt-buckle that cinched it at the waist, her great mane of teased-out hair. She used the most expensive perfume and make-up, but way too much of both. The blue of her eyeliner matched her eyes exactly. A lot of thought had gone into her presentation, but no taste.

She was like a woman walking a straight line for the highway patrol. It wasn't just her stiff, careful gait, it was her whole presence. She was pacing out that tightrope in her mind, clenched and dizzy with the effort to appear calm and stay vertical. Most of it was grief and alcohol and the forbidding venue of the crowded police station. I felt sorry for her. I stood up.

“Mrs. Lomax. Thanks for coming in. Sorry to keep you waiting. Please, have a seat. This won't take long.”

“Thank you.” Her voice came from the back of her throat, choked and thin.

“First of all, my sincere condolences.”

She let out a breath that might have been a laugh if she had put a little energy behind it. “No one knows what to say. Even my friends. I suppose that will do as well as anything else. Sincerity is so important at a time like this.”

“Mrs. Lomax—”

“I'm sorry. I don't seem to have any patience left for formalities and niceties. So let's cut to the chase. You're far too nice a young man to say this, but I am the obvious primary suspect in my husband's murder. The spouse is always the first choice, and for obvious reasons. Certainly I had mine. If I was capable of such a thing. Apart from Preston's defects of personality, even a cursory investigation will reveal that our pre-nuptial agreement is voided by an override in his will. If I survived him and we were still married at the time of his death, I proved my loyalty and I got everything. If that seems uncharacteristically generous and decent, it was. But don't worry—he was planning to change his will on the first of the year. I was to be cut out almost completely. That's the Preston Lomax I knew. He actually challenged me to kill him before he could send the document to his lawyers. That will seems to have disappeared. It may never have existed. It's natural to assume I destroyed it, like some harridan in a Victorian novel. Certainly, I do very well under the terms of the current document. Not to mention the life insurance benefits, which are far greater in the case of ‘unnatural death,' as this was. That's enough motivation for two murders. My mother was immensely wealthy but she left everything to my children to evade the estate taxes. I didn't receive a penny from her estate. I would have been destitute if the new will had been formalized. So I say, investigate to your heart's content. If you want to subpoena my e-mails and depose my friends, feel free. Turn my life inside out.” She smiled. “See if you hate it as much as I did.”

“Past tense?”

“It's over. What begins now, I have no idea. The body is being shipped to New York tomorrow. The memorial service is next week. After that…”

“You're free.”

“But I don't feel that way. Isn't that peculiar? I read an article the other day about the Berlin Wall coming down. People had hoped for it all their lives. But it made life ten times worse for everyone.”

“I'm sure you'll be fine.”

“I hated him, Chief Kennis. And now I can't seem to function without him. I'd laugh at that but I've lost my sense of humor, also.”

“It will come back. Let me just say this, if it helps at all. You're not a suspect. You're free to come and go as you please. And once again, I'm truly sorry for your loss.”

“I—I don't have to stay here? I don't have to testify or whatever it is people do, when they—”

“No. I may call you if I have a question, but I think the sooner you get away from this island, the better.”

I stood up and walked around the desk. “Let me show you out.”

She stood and slipped into her coat. “How can you be so sure about me? I was off-island when it happened but I could have hired someone, some thugs, to do the job.”

“Thugs? Could you really?”

She looked down. “Well…no. I suppose not.”

“I'm not sure you'd even recognize a thug if you saw one.”

“My mother made that exact point when I got married.”

I opened the door and she stepped into the hall.

A second later she backed up into me. “I'm sorry,” she said. “I just…I have to—” She peered out the door again and then jerked her head inside with a look of utter of horror and confusion. She stared at me for a long moment before she was able to speak.

“That woman out there,” she said. “Standing in the hallway. It was her. She did it. She murdered my husband.”

Chapter Twenty-five

Voices of Nantucket

I led Diana Lomax back to the chair facing my desk, took her elbow to guide her down. She sat heavily. The shock and anger scarcely registered on the surgically tightened mask of her face. But her whole body was trembling.

“Mrs. Lomax?”

It took her a moment to look up. “That woman in the hall out there,” she said. “The tall blonde, her name is Tanya Kriel. She's a killer. She's dangerous. She should be in a holding cell. Instead she's slouching around like this was a
Vogue
photo shoot.”

“Are you all right?”

“I feel ill suddenly. I have to take this coat off.”

She was struggling with it. I pulled at one of the arms to help her disentangle herself.

“I'm sorry, but this is so strange and horrible and sick. It's like seeing a ghost. Like Anna had come back. They look so much alike. She's come back for revenge. There's no other possible—have you arrested her? Is she going to jail?”

I leaned back against the desk. “Tell me about her.”

“She's a killer, Chief. She swore to kill Preston and now he's dead, and she's standing there with that cocky attitude, like no one can touch her, and—”

“Please, Mrs. Lomax. Tell me what happened.”

She took a breath. “I'm sorry. This is quite upsetting. All right…Preston had an affair with a girl named Anna Kriel. She was working for us. This was two years ago. Light housework, some secretarial duties. A ‘gal Friday' position. But she dressed provocatively. I thought she was flirting with my husband. I confronted him and he laughed at me. Of course I was right. They were sleeping together. They got careless and I actually—I caught them. I found e-mails later. And—photographs. She was very photogenic. I wouldn't normally discuss this, but…I—”

“It's all right. Can I get you some water? Or tea? We make a mean cup of Earl Grey tea here. We even have decaf.”

She tried to smile. “I'm fine. Really. I just needed to catch my breath. I'll be quick. Anna got pregnant. Preston insisted she have an abortion. There were complications. The girl died. And now the sister is here. Do you think that's a coincidence?”

I shook my head slowly. “I don't like coincidences. I can't use them.”

“She killed him, Chief Kennis. She came here to kill him and she did it, in cold blood like an assassin. What other reason could she have for being here? How long has she been here? How long has she been planning this? It wasn't some heat of the moment thing, you can be sure of that, some crime of passion. Oh no. Not this girl. She organized all the details, and when the moment was right, when she knew my husband was alone and helpless…”

“Please, Mrs. Lomax. Try to stay calm. This is good information. I mean that. It's an excellent lead. Thank you. You've been tremendously helpful. But you've done all you can. It's police business now. We'll take it from here.”

“Are you going to arrest her?”

“If I have reason to believe she killed your husband, yes I will.”

“But I'm telling you—”

I reached over and put a hand on her shoulder.

“We'll handle it. You've got a memorial service to organize. And a daughter to take care of. And a new life to begin.”

She started to say something else, she was half on her feet; then she gave up and subsided back into the chair. “I'm sure you'll do what's right.”

I stared at her for a second. “I can't promise you anything else,” I said. “I hope it's enough.”

I took her outside through the rear of the station to avoid all but the most enterprising reporters. When I got back to my office, Lonnie Fraker was waiting for me.

“You want the good news or the bad news on your friend Trezize?”

“Start with the good news.”

“The Escape in the driveway? The family just called it in. Apparently someone took it for a joyride that night. They thought their son had it. Someone abandoned it on the shoulder of Rugged Road, just off Milestone. One of our guys found it, and called it in. And that was that. We have forensics on it. There may be some trace DNA. We'll see. So it that would get Jimmy Olsen out there off the hook. If not for the bad news.”

I made a little beckoning gesture with my hand. “Go on.”

“One set of tracks in the mud match these fancy orthopedic sneakers Mindy Levin sells out of her chiropractic office. Guess who wears them.”

My eyebrows went up and the corners of my mouth went down, riding a slow nod of appreciation. “Nice job, Lonnie.”

He shrugged. “You just have to work the databases, Chief. Scan in the picture, find the company, track the sales outlets, isolate the one vendor on-island, vector that with Mindy's customer records and the medical files of everyone who bought a pair of sneakers in the office, looking for the shoe size. And boomp, you're done. Takes about twenty minutes, tops. That's the advantage guys like me have, you know, guys who live in the twenty-first century? Over dinosaurs like you. No offense.”

“So what's your conclusion?”

“Trezize was smart enough to use a different car. But he's the kind of guy who never wears boots in the snow and he was too angry to care about wet feet.”

“How did he get into the house?”

“He's friends with the daughter. Maybe he had the alarm code.”

I walked around behind my desk and sat down. “Here's where you twenty-first century cyber cops strike out,” I said. “Real detectives study people, not computer screens. No offense.”

“And your people powers tell you Trezize couldn't have done it.”

“They tell me…dig a little deeper and you'll find the real reason David was there.”

“You gotta be kidding me.”

“Go on your computer again. Check the duration of that little thaw we had. Build a simple chronology for the mud. How long was it soft enough to take a print, when exactly did it freeze up again? Then you'll have a real time line for David's trip to the house. David or anyone else.”

“You do it. I got a killer to book.”

So Lonnie Fraker solved the Preston Lomax murder. It was his first solution—but not his last one. If he could have somehow gotten credit for the number of times he cracked the case, Lonnie would have been running the state police by New Year's.

I called Tanya into my office a few minutes later. I remembered her from the bar fight at the Chicken Box. She was hard to forget.

She wore the same faded jeans today, with a black turtle neck sweater that offset her thick blond hair. She slouched down in the chair, legs crossed, assessing and dismissing me simultaneously. The fact that she was a suspect in a capital crime and I was a high-ranking police officer investigating her connection to the deceased apparently had no effect on her. Her own effect on me was all she cared about, yet she contrived to seem indifferent. It was a neat trick. She crossed her legs again. The pants were impossibly tight, more like a full body tattoo than an article of clothing. I looked away, out the window.

“Yeah, I wanted to kill Lomax,” she said. “Can you arrest me for that?”

I swiveled the chair back to face her. “A lot of people wanted to kill Lomax. I can't arrest all of them. Where were you the night of the murder?”

“At the benefit party, along with half of the rest of the people in the station today. Helen, the hostess, she was taking pictures constantly. It's got to be the best documented party ever. Plus, at least a hundred people saw me there. I think I danced with most of them.” She paused.

“What?”

“I just…I left early. That's all.”

“How early?”

“I'm not sure. When was the murder?”

“I can't tell you that, Tanya. Just think. Did you watch television when you got home? Did you hear the church bells? Maybe someone called you?”

She half closed her eyes, put a fist to her mouth, and bit down on a knuckle. Then she cheered up. “It had to be before eleven; ‘Arts and Ideas' was on the radio. On WCAI. They were just starting some new segment. So maybe…ten fifteen? Does that clear me?”

It didn't, not even close. But I didn't want to alarm her and I didn't want to arrest her—not yet. “Mrs. Lomax thinks you came here to avenge your sister.”

“How shrewd of her.”

“But someone beat you to it?”

“I got distracted. Fell in love with a married man. I guess it runs in the family.”

“It would have been almost impossible to pull off. You were bound to be a primary suspect.”

“Motive and opportunity.”

“That's right.”

“I knew that. When I came here it didn't bother me. Actually I liked the idea. If I killed Lomax I'd want everyone to know. I'd be proud of it.”

“And jail?”

“Three meals a day and a clean bed? All the books I could read? It sounded pretty good, Chief. You should see my apartment in the East Village. Jail is nicer. Free rent and you learn a trade. Supposedly.”

“Cold.”

“Practical.”

“Yeah. But then you fell in love with the married man.”

She nodded.

“Going down in flames lost its appeal at that point.”

“Until I got dumped.”

“Recently?”

She nodded.

“I'm sorry to hear that.”

“I should have seen it coming.”

“So what now? Lomax is already dead. Anyone else you want to kill?”

“No, I only had one sister.”

“How about Mrs. Lomax? She certainly hates you. She wanted your sister to get rid of the baby. She was jealous. She was angry. She had a strong influence on her husband.”

“Are you trying to talk me into it?”

“I'm trying to decide whether or not to put you in custody until this case is solved. One murder at a time during the holiday season, that's my policy.”

“Sounds good. It could be a new slogan for the Chamber of Commerce.”

I smiled. “I'll run it by them. But I need an answer.”

“I'm not going to do anything to anyone, Chief Kennis. I barely have the energy to get out of bed in the morning. I might not swerve to avoid hitting a rabbit in the road. That's about the extent of the threat I pose right now. I can't pay my rent because I just got fired from my job. I may go back to the city.”

“Not until the case is resolved. I'm sorry.”

“Whatever. Fine, I'll stay. I may do some carpentry. There's an all-girl crew that's hiring.”

“Sounds good.”

“Okay…so are we finished? Can I go?”

“Sure. Thanks for coming in. I'll be in touch if I need to talk to you again.”

When Tanya Kriel was gone, I sat back and took a few deep breaths. I turned on my police monitor and listened to the soft crackle of calls and dispatcher's instructions. The room, with its essential atmosphere of purpose and sanity and virtue, reasserted itself. The click of the shutting door dissolved the intricate, geometric tension that Tanya carried with her. It melted like a snowflake on a window pane.

I picked up the internal phone line and asked for a cup of coffee. Then I got down to work.

I spent the rest of the morning going through the transcripts, highlighting quotes that struck me as odd or significant.

Molly Burke:

I don't know anything about that murder, and why should I? I cleaned his house but I've cleaned a hundred houses, haven't I? And I never wanted to kill anyone. I don't even know why you're asking me these things. I don't know anything and I'm glad I don't.

Kathleen Lomax:

I came in late from dinner, we'd been at The Pearl and we had a few drinks—what? Oh, just friends from grad school and Barry Hewitt, he just got engaged to Annette Moore and he took us all out to celebrate. It was like, nine when I got home. I took a shower and talked to my dad. That was the last time—I'm sorry. You don't need to—but it just keeps kind of coming at you from behind, you know? You think you're doing okay and then it surprises you. Anyway, sorry, I'm okay. Really. I'm fine now. I guess I left the house about eleven fifteen or so. There was a party, this benefit thing I wanted to go to. I reset the alarm and locked up. Dad was a little whacked about that alarm. We used to argue about it, I mean this is Nantucket after all, but I guess he was right. Not that it makes any difference.

Kevin Sloane:

Of course my fingerprints were on the headboard! That doesn't make me a killer. I had a thing with Diana Lomax, all right. The chief knew it. He pulled us over one night and he don't miss much. Anyway, she liked doing it with me in her own bed. I just used the headboard for traction. There's probably a dent where her head slammed it, too. Anyway, I wasn't the only one up there.

Billy Delavane:

Actually, my brother Eddie once asked me about Folger's keys. The guy caretakes at least a hundred houses. What did I say? Frankly, I told him to go fuck himself, Officer. Ed's always been screwed up about money. Our parents made me the executor of the estate because they knew I wouldn't sell it out. I mean—hey, I've unloaded a few parcels. There was a two-acre lot in Madaket last year. But Ed's always looking for some way to make a fast buck. He's no killer, though. I mean—sure, he killed people in the war. But aiming a carbine into a dust storm and squeezing off…that's not cold blooded murder. Trust me. Ed's a little crazy and he's got a temper like a snapping turtle. Especially when he's drunk. But you could say that about half the rednecks on this island. People used to say that about me in the old days. Before I mellowed out.

Derek Briley:

Only a matter of time, mate. Someone was going to kill the bloke. End of the day, you can only ask for it so long. Someone's going to oblige, aren't they? But it wasn't me. I did my bit, ratting him out to the newspaper. I like to work behind the scenes. That's my style.