What Evil Lurks in Monet's Pond: A

What Evil Lurks in Monet’s Pond?:

A “Paint an Impression of Murder” Mystery
#1

by Sara M. Barton

Published by Sara M. Barton at Smashwords

Copyright Sara M. Barton 2012

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Chapter One --

“If you ask me, it was a heist for profit,”
said Allie. With her usual dismissive wave of a hand, she
pronounced the case solved. The fifty-something doyenne of the
family would probably be appalled if I told you her real name is
Alberta Susan Scott and behind her back, we refer to her by her
acronym of A.S.S., as in “horse’s”. That’s because her royal
highness can behave like one.

“I completely disagree,” declared Bowie, her
son, the only fruit of her loins. “Why not steal the more valuable
paintings? Why take the lesser ones?”

“Maybe it was a crime of convenience,”
suggested Aunt Clementine. “The thief only had enough time to get
at those particular paintings.

We were all sitting around the long dining
table at Nora and Andrew’s place in East Haddam, in the cavernous
hall just off the kitchen of their faux castle. You heard me right.
Faux castle. Sound like a palace? Think again. With stones as wide
as my eldest cousin’s ample bottom and the thickness of her obtuse
head, it took the builder, Robert McPherson, ten years to complete
his replica of a castle back on the River Clyde. Started in 1892,
after he made his fortune as a minor silk thread baron in
Manchester, Connecticut, this place was damp, dreary, and bloody
cold for most of the year, and I often had to wear my thermal
underwear under my formal dress when I came for the annual holiday
party. While it looked great on the Christmas Card, with Nora,
Andrew, Finlay and the twins, Preston and Ramsay, the house was
more than a little on the pretentious side, right down to the
antique armor fixed above the massive fireplace in the living room.
Everything about it screamed Scotland, the land of my ancestors,
and my sister, Nora, had plenty of social gatherings to drill that
point home.

Don’t get me wrong. Nora is a real
sweetheart, who would give you the kilt off her hips and the shawl
off her shoulders if she thought you were cold. She’s very involved
in her church’s food pantry efforts and always trying to do the
right thing. But she loves all things Scottish.

As a professional marketer, she’s used to
convincing people to buy whatever her client of the moment is
selling. Her niche is entertainment, and her specialty is home and
garden, as in cooking shows and house makeovers. Nora handles the
marketing for “Dallas Dinners”, the show featuring Amanda Taylor on
her ranch, and Lucky Hammer Productions, with Gayle Jackman, the
handy woman’s handywoman.

Her ability to sell what you don’t want or
need is legendary. Just ask her husband. When Bothwell Castle came
up for sale fifteen years ago, the Johnsons were living in an
ordinary saltbox colonial in Centerbrook, where the commute to New
Haven was manageable. But after a well-planned blitz by Nora, who
lobbied so hard for the stone fortress, Andrew finally capitulated
and plunked down far too much money for the old ruin. The man does
love his wife, even when she’s over the top with the holidays.
Andrew takes it all in stride.

By the way, just so you know -- we’re not
allowed to call him anything but Andrew. No Andy, no Drew, not even
Andyman, at least in her presence. She thinks it’s too undignified
for a man of his position in life. Ironic, because the guy is a
down-to-earth kind of fellow, who likes to play football with his
boys, still watches cartoons when his wife isn’t around, and even
has been known to pull a few pranks in his time. He has a degree in
Business from Wharton and is CEO of Wallace Business Systems, but
in his off-time, Andrew is a bona fide fanatic of the caber toss,
and he uses his four acres to practice throughout the year. Five
times a year, he travels to Highland Games around the northeast and
competes. He’s not bad. So far, he’s ranked in the top 100
nationally. Built like a bull, with a neck that always looks like
it’s been squeezed into a collar two sizes too small, the guy is
rugged. That’s a euphemism for chunky.

“I have a completely different opinion about
the heist,” announced Georgina, my cousin with a big chip on her
shoulder. She’s convinced that we exclude her from conversations
because she believes we don’t think she’s very smart, so she always
goes out of her way to remind us she has a Ph.D. in biometric
science. (Actually, the
real
reason we dance around her is
because she always insists her theories, unlike those we formulate,
are well-based in scientific principles and are therefore more
worthy than ours.) Georgina works for a defense contractor, Ransome
Industries, building systems that use physical characteristics like
voice recognition, fingerprints, DNA, even the physical gait of a
walker, to identify individuals. Rumor has it she’s been sleeping
with her boss, William Ransome, but I have my doubts about that.
It’s not like Georgina is all that socially adept. It’s far more
likely that she would
like
to sleep with the man. “Would
anyone care to hear my theory?”

I caught sight of Annabelle’s eye roll across
the table from me. The twenty-two-year-old is fresh out of college
and substitute-teaching at the moment, until she can get a job as a
teacher. She applied for a position with an American school
overseas, but she hasn’t heard back yet. Budget cuts, no doubt. And
just so you know, she’s a chip off the old block, the daughter of
my older brother, Broderick. That’s sure to get her in trouble one
of these days.

“Sure, Georgie. Let’s have it,” I smiled,
encouraging the scientist-turned-amateur-sleuth. Why not? Her
theories are usually entertaining, since she really isn’t what you
would call an investigator. I get to say that because I actually
have some experience in the field, although my family has no idea
about what I really do for work.

“I think it was a plot by Islamic
pirates.”

“How does that make any sense?” Broderick
wondered. “What are you saying? They sailed up the Connecticut
River, scaled the cliffs, and beat a path to the door of the
Tattinger Museum? Why wouldn’t they just hit the Louvre or the Met?
Or something closer to home? Like, say, in Somalia? Why not rob a
Saudi prince?”

Ever the skeptic, Broderick is a man with a
Jesuitical mindset, constantly engaging in debates at the dinner
table. That’s because he practices law. As my mother would say,
“Maybe one of these days, he’ll actually succeed at it.” I kid
because he’s my older brother, by three years, and to this day, he
still thinks he’s in charge.

“You don’t want to rob a Saudi prince,”
Georgina scoffed. “You could lose a hand or a head. Better to hit a
kaffir, someone who offends the Islamic base. If this is to raise
money for jihad, it’s got to adhere to Sharia law. My boss
says....”

Here we go again. The great William Ransome,
who walks on water, once declared that he would single-handedly
save the planet from terrorists and mass murderers by developing
the biometric technology that would secure our borders. Ever since
he hired Georgie, he’s become her knight in shining armor. Or
rather, her knight in laser technology. There’s only one thing
biometrics can’t yet do -- take a reading on the human heart and
its intentions. As nice as it is to have these systems to identify
people, we still need intelligence-gatherers and analysts to sort
out the information. I look at Ransome Industries as the moat in
front of the castle. You can throw all the alligators in there you
want, but the second the bad guys figure out a way to hop across
the backs of the reptiles, your security system is null and void.
Then what, genius?

“Let’s hear what the art expert thinks. What
do you say, Maisie?” Nora asked. I cringed as all eyes fell on me.
Part of that was a guilty conscience. For a brief second, I worried
that Georgina would recognize my biological response as a sign of
disrespect for the work she does. I’m always thinking well outside
the box. That’s because I’m often on the front lines on the war on
terror, even though my family thinks I just paint pretty pictures
for a living.

“I don’t have the answers,” I acknowledged.
“I wouldn’t know where to start to form an opinion about a case
this complicated. But I’m certainly curious.”

There, I deflected attention from myself.
Let’s move on to someone else’s theory, I silently suggested,
glancing down at the cheery red napkin in my lap.

“Bullocks,” said my younger brother,
Cuthbert, better known as Bertie. “You’re a professional artist.
How can you not have an opinion?”

“I agree,” said Cara, his new wife. “If
anyone understands art, it’s you.”

“Maybe the thief is an art lover,” Annabelle
interjected, clearly wanting to take her place at the adult table
and be treated as an equal in the loud, often raucous
discussion.

“Are you suggesting the paintings were stolen
from the Tattinger because the perpetrator wanted them hanging in
his living room?” her father inquired, taking a long swig of his
single malt scotch.

“It could be someone enormously wealthy,”
Cara piped in. “Someone so rich, he’s willing to pay to have them
stolen.”

I let the conversation flow all around me,
sitting back in my chair as my feet began to grow numb from the
cold. My mistake was in wearing flats and pantyhose. Note to self
-- tights and high heeled boots tomorrow night. Or maybe hiking
boots and insulated socks.

“From what I understand,” said Bertie, “the
museum’s security system was totally out of date, the conditions
inside that mansion were a bloody nightmare in terms of preserving
the works, and the board of directors for the museum were at odds
with Hermione Wells Tattinger’s lock-solid will on how the museum
would be managed.”

“We think it would make a great investigative
piece for the Discovery Channel,” Cara added. “It has all the
elements of a soap opera. Apparently, the board of directors ousted
the museum director for living too lavish a lifestyle in his
apartment above the galleries.”

“Echoes of the Gardner heist,” I said out
loud, before catching myself. My family didn’t know that I did, in
fact, draft a very long analysis of the 1990 theft of paintings
from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston for my bosses a
few years ago. “You’re right, Bertie. This could make a fascinating
study on the whole museum culture. What really goes into deciding
exhibits? What are the politics of art exhibits?”

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, the
Tattinger Museum lost seven of its paintings in a heist two days
ago, on Christmas Eve. Don’t feel bad if you’ve never heard of the
obscure little museum. It’s not exactly world-renown for its
collection. And therein lies the rub.

Hermione Wells Tattinger was a gold-digger
with aspirations. Born in Brooklyn in 1888 to a scullery maid and a
groomsman, she climbed her way up the social ladder, marrying five
times, and each husband wealthier than the previous, with the
exception of Count Viktor Szabo.

She started out with Jack Whitstone, the heir
to Whitstone Paper Company. Hermione met him up at Bretton Woods,
when she was a maid at the historic hotel. He was lonely, not
particularly well-liked or respected by those in his own social
circle. With a stutter that made him shy, he was ripe for the
picking when the young woman with dollar signs in her eyes set her
plan in motion. Before his visit to the White Mountains was
completed, he had already fallen head over heels in love with the
fair maiden. They eloped and he brought home his bride to the
dismay of his socially prominent parents, who did everything they
could think of to get the marriage annulled. But Jack was made
strong by the marriage and suddenly discovered his own cajones,
standing up to his bullying parents for the first time in his life.
His father, rather than being horrified, was actually proud that
his son had finally come out of his shell. He decided to promote
the young lad to mill manager, and sent the ambitious Hermione and
her husband back to the wilds of New Hampshire, where the lovebirds
settled into their new life as big shots in a tiny mill town.
Unfortunately, there was a dreadful accident one day. Some say it
was a labor dispute that got ugly. However it happened, Jack fell
into the paper press and lost his life. Hermione became a
respectable widow at the age of twenty-three and, suddenly flush
with the money from her late husband’s estate, set about to use it
to find Jack’s replacement.