Stabbing Stephanie (14 page)

“A queen!”

“And now she's fencing jewelry.”

“Hey,” Jane said with a smile, “a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.”

He laughed. “Guess business isn't very good at Carson & Hart.”

“Guess not.”

 

 

Stephanie wasn't her usual gabby self at dinner that night. She stared for long moments at nothing in particular, preoccupied as she had been at lunch.

“Miss Stephanie,” Florence said softly, “can I get you something else to eat?”

Stephanie glanced down at her plate of broiled pork chops, rice pilaf, and peas—one of Florence's favorite Friday dinners—as if it had just materialized before her. She gave Florence a too-sweet smile. “No, thank you, Florence. This is delicious.”

Jane frowned and noticed that Florence did, too. How could Stephanie know her dinner was delicious? She hadn't touched it.

Nick, as if sensing a need for conversation, spoke up. “Scott's dad heard some more about the bum down in the village.”

“I've told you not to call him that,” Jane said.

“That
gentleman
down in the village,” Nick said punctiliously, and Jane gave him a warning look. “He escaped from a loony bin.”

“What!” Florence said.

“That's right. He's schizo—” He struggled with the word. “Schizophrenic. He hears voices. He's crazy—I mean mentally ill, but he doesn't have his medicine.”

“How ridiculous,” Jane muttered, cutting her pork chop.

“You never know,” Stephanie murmured, surprising everyone. They all looked at her. “You can think a person is a certain way . . . you can think it for years . . . and they turn out to be someone else entirely. No matter how well you think you know someone, you never really do, not
really.”

Jane slid her a speculating look. Did she know about Lillian Strohman's jewelry and Faith?

They all waited for Stephanie to continue, but she slipped back into her reverie.

“More rice, Mr. Nicholas?” Florence asked cheerily.

“No. I hate the rice. It has onions. I've
told
you not to put in onions, Florence.”

Florence looked guilty. “Can't you learn to like them?”

“I don't mind how they taste, but they're slimy.” Nick, apparently bored with this subject, turned to Stephanie and tilted his head pensively. “A penny for your thoughts!”

“Hm?” She sat up, startled. “I beg your pardon?”

“A penny for your thoughts,” Nick repeated.

She gave him a kind smile. “All right. My thoughts were kind of a riddle.”

“I love riddles!”

“Good. Here it is. How can the light change in a room with no windows?”

Jane frowned, bewildered.

“I know!” Nick cried. “Turn off the light!”

“Good guess, but it's not the answer.”

Nick thought for a moment. “Okay, I give up. How can the light change in a room with no windows?”

They all waited. After a moment, Stephanie looked up and gave a little shake of her head. “I don't know!”

Nick's mouth dropped. Florence caught herself staring in puzzlement and busied herself with her dinner.

Jane watched Stephanie out of the corner of her left eye. Odd, she thought; decidedly odd. Stephanie may not have known the answer to her own riddle, but she knew something.

Yes, she knew something . . .

I
n her study, Jane drew squiggles and curlicues on the margin of her notepad, next to the draft of her submission letter for
The Blue Palindrome
. She gazed out the window above her desk. On the front lawn, Nick and his friend Aaron tossed a football back and forth, laughing and calling each other silly names. She smiled, wishing Kenneth could see this.

The phone rang. It was Greenberg.

“Are we still on tonight?” he asked.

“Sure, if you want to.” She knew she didn't sound enthusiastic, but she couldn't help it. She was still deeply troubled by what Florence had told her about Una the day before. She also knew Stanley was upset with her for telling him what she had but insisting that he keep most of the important details to himself. She didn't particularly feel like going out, but she thought she should make an effort to see Stanley, especially since she'd be leaving for her vacation in a week.

“Sure I want to go out,” he said, his tone flat.

“You don't sound any more enthusiastic than I do,” she joked.

“Sorry. We found something today, something bad.”

She sat up. “What?”

“A body. In Adams Pond.”

“What!” Adams Pond was across the street from Nick's school, Hillmont Elementary, and not far at all from Jane's house. “Who is it—was it?”

“A local small-time criminal type, a character by the name of Roy Lynch. Young guy,” Greenberg said, a meaningful note creeping into his voice. “Black hair,
a roll of fat around his middle . . .”

Jane swallowed. “I see.”

“Yes, I thought you would. Sounds familiar, huh?”

“Was it . . . an accident?”

There was a silence as he hesitated. “I get into trouble for telling you things, but I'll tell you this because you should know. It appears he was stabbed, then held under the water. Someone was taking no chances.”

“Who found him?” Adams Pond was completely surrounded by woods.

“Three little boys chasing a runaway dog. The body had washed up at the edge of the pond.”

“How awful.”

“We're looking into his background and already know a lot. I'd actually heard about this guy. He was a professional thief with a history of convictions for various acts of larceny. Lived in Boonton,” he said, referring to a town that bordered on Shady Hills. “We searched his apartment and found jewelry—a lot of it. Many of the pieces are the ones stolen from Mrs. Strohman, but she says there's still a piece, a very important piece, missing.”

“Stanley, I—”

“You've put me in a very difficult position, Jane. I'm sorry,” he said, sounding downright angry now, “but I think I can't make it tonight. I'll talk to you soon.” And he hung up.

Slowly putting down the receiver, Jane frowned, deeply troubled by this conversation. A man was dead, perhaps because of her. Outside, Nick, cradling the football, plowed headlong into Aaron and collapsed on top of him. They both howled with laughter, struggling on the brown grass. Their image faded, and Jane saw the bloated body of a young man lying half out of the water of Adams Pond.

With sudden resolve, she got up from her chair and went in search of Florence.

 

 

Florence often went out on weekends, but today she was in her room. Jane heard her moving around inside. She knocked softly on the door.

“Yes, come in,” Florence called.

Jane poked her head around the door. Florence was sitting up in bed reading
Queen of Heaven
. She smiled at Jane. “Morning, missus. Is something wrong?”

“Florence, we have to talk. May I come in?”

Florence's face grew concerned. “Of course. Is something the matter with Nick?”

“No, he's fine. It's not about him.” Jane entered the room and sat down on Florence's bed. “Florence, I just spoke with Detective Greenberg and he told me something upsetting. I'm going to tell you what he said, in total confidence, because it's important for you to know it.” She repeated everything Greenberg had said: the little boys finding Roy Lynch in Adams Pond, Lynch's physical description, the jewelry found in his apartment.

Florence put a hand to her mouth. “It's the man Una saw.”

“Without question. Florence, you
have
to speak with Una again, try to get her to tell the police firsthand what she saw.”

Florence set down the book on her night table. “Yes, of course you're right, missus. I'll call her now.” There was a phone on the night table, and Florence picked up the receiver and dialed.

“Una, it's Florence. Something has happened, something bad. It has to do with what you saw yesterday . . . I don't want to tell you now; I want to come over there and speak with you. Mrs. Stuart and I, we both want to speak with you . . . I'll tell you when we see you . . . No, you won't get in trouble—Una, stop screaming! . . . Yes, you can trust her; I promise you that. She is a good person . . . Good. Can we come over now? . . . All right, we will. We're coming over there just now.”

Hanging up, Florence turned to Jane. “She says we should come over right now. Mrs. Strohman isn't home. That makes things easier.”

“All right,” Jane said, already at the door, “let's go. I'll tell Nick he has to wait for us inside and that Aaron has to go home now. We'll drop him off on our way to Mrs. Strohman's.”

“Can't Miss Stephanie watch him for a little while?”

“She's not here. She's off with Myrtle Lovesey, the real estate agent, looking at apartments. Apparently the one she wanted fell through.”

Lillian Strohman's house, which was built of pale stone and resembled a castle, made Puffy's look like a cottage. A wide drive made of paving stones climbed the slope of an immense lawn and passed beneath an arched porte-cochere in the house itself.

When they were halfway up the drive, Florence said, “Una asked us to come around to the back door, so we should go through here.” She pointed to the archway. “There's a place to park in the back.”

“Why does she want us to come to the back?”

“Because that's the door to the kitchen, and she's working in there right now. Or she might be in the laundry room, but that's right off the kitchen. She didn't want us coming to the front door, all public—you know.”

Jane drove through the porte-cochere, and they emerged onto a wide paved area behind the house.

As they got out of the car, Florence said, “Sometimes Una doesn't hear the doorbell when she's in the laundry room, because the washer and dryer make a lot of noise, so she said she would leave the door unlocked for us.”

“Okay.” Approaching the kitchen door, Jane noticed that some construction work was in progress. The ground between the paved area and the door itself had been torn up—chunks of concrete lay off to one side—and a wooden frame had been put in place, the kind of frame used to contain poured concrete. The floor of this frame consisted of exposed earth as well as large amounts of white dust from the broken-up concrete.

“Oh,” Florence said, seeing this mess and remembering, “Una said to watch where we walk. Mrs. Strohman is having this part replaced.”

“So I see,” Jane said, irritated that no boards had been put down between the concrete that was still intact and the door. Carefully she and Florence picked their way across. Jane's feet sank into the earth and concrete dust; she could see white powder collecting on her shoes.

The door had a window in it, but it was covered with a shirred white curtain, so they couldn't see into the kitchen. Jane turned the knob and the door opened. She was about to enter the house when Florence placed her hand on Jane's.

“Missus, I'm thinking it would be best if I go in first and speak to Una, tell her again that you're okay. Would that be all right? It will only take a minute or two.”

“Yes, if you think so,” Jane said, and stood aside so Florence could go in. With a nervous smile, Florence stepped into the kitchen, which Jane could see was large but old-fashioned, as many of the kitchens in these old mansions were. Florence left the door ajar.

Jane turned away from the door and gazed up at the house. From here it was clear that the building was a jumble of levels at various heights; she could easily see how a burglar might have climbed up and used the roof of one level to gain access to Lillian Strohman's bedroom.

Jane jumped. It was Florence, shrieking in terror, shrieking as Jane had never heard her shriek. Jane spun around and pushed open the door. It nearly hit Florence, who had been running toward it. Her face was twisted in terror and tears streamed down her cheeks.

“Missus—” Panting, she leaned on Jane, apparently unable to say any more.

Jane's heart pounded. “What is it? Florence, what happened?”

“Missus,” Florence gasped. “It's Una. She's . . . dead!”

“D
ead?” Jane echoed. “But—how?”

“Come see,” Florence said, and as she led the way across the kitchen toward a room Jane could see was the laundry room, she walked slowly, cautiously, as if afraid of someone lurking in the shadows.

At the door to the laundry room she stood aside. “In there.”

Jane looked in. She saw a washer and dryer, a table for folding clothes, an ironing board and iron, several lines hung with bags of clothespins. “Florence, there's no one in here.”

“On—on the door, missus,” Florence said, gesturing to Jane that she should look on the other side.

Taking a deep breath, Jane did—and froze. “Oh dear God.”

Una, whom Jane had never seen before, had been a petite woman. Her short slim body in a white maid's uniform hung on the back of the door like some article of clothing on a hook. Indeed, it must have been a hook she hung from, her arms dangling at her sides, her shoes—white Nikes—two feet off the floor.

From the center of Una's chest protruded the dark wood handle of what appeared to be a kitchen knife, a large kitchen knife. Glossy red-brown blood soaked the front of her white blouse around the blade. Jane looked at Una's face. Her eyes were shut tight, as if she still felt the pain of the blade entering her chest. Her mouth was set in a little tight-lipped line. Jane couldn't help noticing that Una had been a pretty young woman, with a flawless coffee-colored complexion and short-clipped curly black hair on a well-shaped head.

“Missus . . .” Florence stood off to one side, where she could see Jane but not Una. She held both her hands to her mouth, as if she were about to be sick. “What do we do?”

Jane sprung to action, taking charge. “We get out of here, for one thing. Come on, Florence,” she said, taking the younger woman by the arm and leading her firmly out the kitchen door. “Now, I want you to go sit in the car and wait for me.” Florence hesitated, her expression questioning whether this was the right thing to do. “Go ahead,” Jane urged. “I'm going to call Detective Greenberg.”

Florence obeyed, walking with a sort of weak limp, as if she'd been injured herself, and getting laboriously into the car.

Jane took her cell phone from her bag, dialed the police station, and asked for Greenberg.

“He's out, Jane,” Buzzi at the desk told her. “I'll tell him you—”

“It's an
emergency
, Buzzi. Put me through to him.”

Buzzi must have immediately understood the gravity of the situation, because he said, “All right, I'll patch you through,” very quickly; there was a brief pause and then Greenberg came on the line.

“Jane?” His voice sounded hollow. “Jane, what's the matter?”

“Stanley, I'm at Lillian Strohman's house. There's been a murder.”

“A murder! Who? Mrs. Strohman?”

“No, her maid, Una. Stanley,” Jane said, and burst into tears, “it's horrible. She's been stabbed and hung on a door like a towel and I—” She stopped, a thought occurring to her, and looked around the yard, at the dark forest encircling the small yard. “Stanley, what if the person—”

“Jane, I want you to listen to me. Where are you?”

“I told you!” she screamed into the tiny phone. “At Lillian Strohman's.”

“I know that,” Greenberg said patiently. “But where, exactly.”

She forced herself to calm down. “In the back, near the kitchen door.”

“Where's your car?”

“Over there.”

“Where?”

“In a parking area right in front of me. Florence is with me. Una is—was her friend. Stanley, Una's the one who—”

“I know who she is, Jane. Is anyone else in the house, that you know of?”

“I don't think so, no. Everyone's out. Or at least they were a little before we got here. Everyone except Una.”

“Okay, here's what I want you to do. Get in your car and lock your doors and drive back down to the road. Park in front of the house next door and wait for me. I'm on my way; I'm already on Highland.”

“All right, Stanley, I'll do that.” Still holding the phone to her ear, Jane ran to the car and got in beside Florence, who sat crying, her face in her hands. “Florence, lock your door. Lock the back doors.”

Florence looked up, nodded quickly, and complied, reaching behind her into the backseat.

“Jane,” Greenberg said, “you can hang up now; I'm just turning onto Fenwyck. The important thing is that you and Florence get out of there.”

“Okay, we're getting out,” Jane said, and in her agitation she clicked off the phone, tossed it onto the console between her and Florence's seats, and started the car with a roar. She backed up in a K-turn so fast the wheels screeched, then drove back under the archway.

“Where are we going, missus?” Florence asked, looking about them as they plummeted down the driveway.

“He said to wait in the car in front of the house next door. That's over there,” Jane said, pointing to a smaller Tudor across the street and a little to the left. She pulled onto the road, turned into the Tudor's driveway, and backed out so she was facing in the other direction, the direction from which Stanley would come.

At that moment his car appeared. “Thank God,” Jane breathed, and she and Florence flipped up their door locks and jumped out of the car. He squealed to a stop on the other side of the road, at the foot of Mrs. Strohman's lawn, and got out.

Jane rushed up to him and cried against his chest, felt his arms fold around her. “Stanley, it's horrible; you won't believe it.”

“My poor little friend,” Florence said a few feet away. A car, a midnight-blue Mercedes, appeared from the opposite direction. Jane saw that its driver was Lillian Strohman. With a look of consternation, she stopped the car where Greenberg and the two women stood and rolled down her window. “What's going on? What's happened?”

Greenberg went up to the car. “Mrs. Strohman, I have some upsetting news. Your maid, Una, has been murdered.”

“Murdered!”

He nodded. “Mrs. Stuart and Miss Price here found her.”

The old woman's face went from a healthy rosiness to the white, it occurred to Jane, of a maggot, a yellow-white. She took a deep breath, swallowed. Great beads of sweat broke out on her brow, and her eyes began to close; clearly she was about to pass out.

Greenberg, seeing this, spun around and said to Jane, “You and Florence go and wait for me at the station. I'm going to call for an ambulance for Mrs. Strohman.” He ran to his car.

“Come on, Florence,” Jane said, and with a reluctant glance back at poor Mrs. Strohman, she got into her own car, waited for Florence to shut her door, and started the engine once again. She raced down the street.

“Oh, missus,” Florence said, and to Jane's surprise there was a note of anger in her voice. “First the burglary, now this murder . . . Una told me Mrs. Strohman was going to write a book for Faith Carson's company. You see what it is, don't you? Don't you?”

“What?” Jane asked, distraught.

“It's your cousin, that awful woman Stephanie! All of these terrible things started to happen because of her coming to town. She's terrible trouble, missus—I'm sorry to say it, but she is. She should never have come here!”