Detective Sergeant Morrie Steffans, one of those people who pays attention, didn’t have to ask who the waitress was for his table. He quickly picked her out from the quartet serving the room, and went to waylay her on her way from another table to tell her there were two new people at Betsy Devonshire’s.
But he didn’t go immediately back to his table. He stood a minute or two, watching Charlotte Birmingham and Marvin Pierce talking to Betsy, Jill, and Lars.
Lars, he knew, was an excellent patrol cop, very happy at his work, and therefore likely to stay on patrol until his back or his legs gave out. Which might be never-he looked built on the lines of the Stanley boiler he admired so much.
Jill, on the other hand, was on a different track. She had the quiet tenacity and wholesome integrity that would probably put her in a command position someday. She might even wind up Chief of Police.
And then there was Ms. Devonshire. Wholly amateur, not at all disciplined or even learned in the field of investigation. Yet she’d broken several cases, most of them locally. She claimed, according to Sergeant Mike Malloy of the Excelsior Police Department, to be merely lucky, a sentiment he heartily endorsed. But luck was a genuine gift, a wonderful thing to be blessed with. Really legendary investigators had it, held on to it with both hands, and were deeply grateful for it. Malloy disliked Betsy, said she was an interfering civilian of the worst sort, by which he meant she was better than he was at solving crimes-at least the sort of crimes ordinary people got mixed up in, not the sort done by professional criminals. The ordinary crook could probably run rings around Ms. Devonshire, just as the pair at the table right now could run rings around Mike Malloy.
Steffans’s eyes narrowed as he watched them work Betsy over. He didn’t think for a minute they were fooling her. He began to walk slowly back to the table, his stuck-out ears already picking up the threads of the conversation.
Charlotte was here to protect her son Broward. To do that, she would see anyone else, anyone, indicted, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison. The best candidate she could find was Adam Smith, so here she was-and she didn’t care if her story about just driving around aimlessly and just happening to stop at the Blue Heron was a little thin. It hadn’t been hard to find Betsy Devonshire. A few phone calls and here she was. Sergeant Steffans thought he was clever finding Betsy, but here was Charlotte, just as clever.
But Betsy’s face showed only keen interest. “What have you found out about Adam Smith?” she asked.
Clever Charlotte let Marvin help dig the hole into which she hoped to push Adam.
Marvin said, “It’s about the rivalry between Adam and Bill. I’m sure you know Bill bought a 1910 Fuller that Adam wanted, and wouldn’t sell it to him. But that was only one round of an ongoing fight. Adam had previously bought a 1910 Maxwell that Bill wanted, even though Adam collects only rarities and Maxwells are about the most common pioneers around.”
Jill said, “I thought you weren’t an antique car owner, Marvin.”
He said, surprised, “I’m not.”
“But you know a lot about them.”
He shrugged. “Heck, I’ve been friends with the Birminghams for a lot of years. You can’t help picking up the language.”
The police investigator’s chair suddenly moved, and Sergeant Steffans sat down. “The waitress will be here in a minute,” he said.
Charlotte said, “We were talking about how Adam Smith did things that showed he hated Bill. I think the worst was when Adam decided to run against Bill for president of the Minnesota Antique Car Club. Adam is route manager, that’s what he does best, and he’s always liked laying out the runs. Then Wesley Sweet decided to retire to Arizona. He was president for the past four terms. Bill was vice president for two, and he was very efficient, he did a lot of good work, so naturally he decided he had the best chance to be president. And like from out of left field”-Charlotte made a sharp gesture-“here comes Adam, hot to be president himself. And he runs the dirtiest, the hardest, the nastiest-”
“Now, Char, you’re getting excited,” interrupted Marvin quietly.
Charlotte’s breath caught in her throat, but she stopped herself from saying something rude to Marvin. Because he was probably right, she had gotten carried away before. “Do you think so?” she said instead, making her voice sweetly humble. Marvin’s smile of admiration made the sweetness genuine. “Well, maybe I am a little excited. But”-she turned her focus onto Betsy-“it was a very ugly campaign. Adam told lies about Bill, said he was incompetent, uncooperative, high-handed. It was just terrible, the things he said. I told Bill not to reply in kind, and I think that was a mistake, because Adam won by a very clear margin.”
“But then why, if Adam won, would he murder Bill?”
“Oh, I’m not saying Adam murdered Bill because of the election. That would be ridiculous. I’m just telling you about it to show how deep the animosity went, that Adam really hated Bill.”
“Because of the car thing,” guessed Lars.
“No, the car thing was just another symptom. You know Adam was forced out of his position as CEO of General Steel?”
Betsy said, “I know he was given a golden parachute when he was asked to retire. I didn’t know it was from General Steel.”
“Well, Adam’s method of improving a bottom line was to diversify. He was among the first practitioners of that. He wanted General Steel to get into manufacturing steel products as well as mining and smelting. He’d been expanding into a rolling mill already.”
Steffans nodded. “I remember reading about that. The mill’s in Gary, Indiana, I believe.” He said to Betsy, who was giving him a surprised look, “One of my mutual funds is into metals.”
Charlotte said, “Yes, well, a lot of the processing of taconite is done overseas nowadays, because it’s cheaper. But instead of expanding into overseas processing, Adam decided to broaden his base, and he started looking at Birmingham Metal Fabrication.” Charlotte smacked a hand onto the table to underline the enlightenment she saw in Betsy’s eyes. “That’s right, that’s why Bill brought Broward into the company, to fight off Adam’s attempt to buy us out. I was never so proud of both of them, the way they worked together to keep the company ours.”
Lars said, frowning, “You mean General Steel wanted to do a hostile takeover?”
“No,” said Charlotte, “you can only do a hostile takeover by buying up the stock of a publicly held company. We are family-owned. But Adam saw a clean, profitable, well-run company, and he started making offers.”
“All you had to do was just say no, surely,” said Betsy.
“You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But Adam sent men in to talk to our employees, about a rival company that had better benefits, and hinting we were in financial trouble-lies, just like the lies he told about Bill during the election. That’s how he works, not by showing he’s better, but that the alternative is worse, getting everyone stirred up. Production was falling off and some of the men threatened to quit.”
“So what did Bill and Broward do?” asked Lars.
“They sicced a lawyer on Adam’s company. I don’t know what the lawyer said, but a few months later Adam was out on his keester, and General Steel never bothered us again. They won’t tell you so, of course, they have strict rules about privacy. But that’s what happened.” She saw belief on their faces and smiled.
The waitress took Charlotte and Marvin’s order. Betsy made sure the waitress understood that she, Lars, and Jill were on one ticket.
The food, when it came, was delicious. Charlotte became intelligent and witty. Marvin, while more low key, was charming and funny. Betsy could see why Lisa Birmingham hoped one day the two would pair off.
It was Steffans who most surprised Betsy. He was relaxed, intelligent on a number of issues, nice without the least bit of condescension.
Toward the end of the meal, Charlotte asked Steffans point-blank, “Are you close to arresting someone for the murder of my husband?”
To Betsy’s surprise, Steffans nodded. “As a matter of fact, I am. If I can get a few more answers, I might make an arrest tomorrow.”
“Here at the run?” she asked, her attention almost painful in its intensity.
“Yes,” he replied, and she relaxed all over. Betsy nodded to herself. Broward’s not coming to the run. She thought, Charlotte’s glad he’s safe.
“But you’re out of your jurisdiction,” said Jill, faintly scandalized.
“Oh, I’ve been in touch with the Meeker County Sheriff, and I can get a warrant like that,” he said, snapping his fingers.
“If you need backup, I’ll be there tomorrow,” said Lars.
“Me, too,” said Jill, and there was a subtle shift in them, the way they sat, that linked them in a new way to Steffans. Betsy suddenly felt like an outsider.
“If you’re handy, sure,” said Steffans. Seeing the amazed look on Charlotte’s face, he said, “I see you weren’t properly introduced. These are Officers Jill Cross and Lars Larson, Excelsior PD.”
Charlotte said angrily to Betsy, “You didn’t tell me!”
Betsy replied mildly, “I didn’t think it mattered. They aren’t here in their official capacity, or at least they weren’t until just now. Lars came as owner and driver of a car I’m sponsoring, and Jill really is his girl and my best friend.”
“We understand,” said Marvin, placatingly, speaking as much to Charlotte as to Betsy. “We’re just a little surprised-which is understandable, considering the circumstances.”
“And it’s all right,” said Steffans. “We’re all still friends, right?”
“Right,” agreed Marvin.
But it was a moment before Charlotte nodded agreement.
Still, the convivial mood was gone and the party began to break up. Soon Betsy found herself down in the small parking lot in front of the building, waving as Jill and Lars in one car, Charlotte and Marvin in another, pulled out and away.
Steffans stood beside Betsy until the cars’ taillights disappeared around a bend.
Betsy asked, “Are you really going to arrest Adam Smith tomorrow?”
“No.”
“Why did you say you would?”
“I said I might make an arrest tomorrow. But not Mr. Smith. He has an iron-clad alibi.”
“Then who? Broward isn’t here-is he?”
“Not as far as I know.”
Charlotte had an iron-clad alibi of her own. “Marvin?”
“Come on, Ms. Devonshire. You’ve been dancing around the truth all evening. I could see it in your eyes. Let’s go someplace and talk. Do you still have that copy of the Excelsior Bay Times with you? I want you to show me what you saw that none of the others did.”
Saturday dawned cool and cloudy. Drivers listened to weather reports and studied the sky. Putting up the tops on the old cars that had them was a lengthy, difficult chore. They didn’t like their bars being fitted into their slots, resisted having their braces tightened, and at every opportunity pinched blood blisters on fingers. Once they were up, they blocked vision, the wind roared under them loud enough to deafen a driver to other road hazards and they caught enough wind to slow travel. The only thing worse than struggling to put the top up before starting was stopping alongside the road in the rain to do it.
Most caved in and put tops up, swearing and complaining. The few who didn’t claimed that since most did, it now certainly wasn’t going to rain. “It’s the opposite of washing your car,” one said.
Lars shrugged off Betsy’s suggestion that he put his top up. “I’m gonna go so fast I’ll run between any raindrops,” he boasted, then went back to recheck against his directions his list of places where water could be obtained, making sure he hadn’t made a slip somewhere. Running his boiler dry would damage the hundreds of copper tubes inside it, a very expensive error.
Because the steamer was so fast, it was put near the back of the pack that gathered in a large church’s parking lot the other side of the cemetery. Despite the threat of rain, a large crowd gathered to watch the old cars set off on their hundred-mile-plus run. Five church ladies had set up a table near the church hall’s entrance, from which they dispensed cookies and coffee: free to drivers, a dollar a hit for onlookers. Beside the table was the car-run quilt, on its stand. Mildred Feeney, in a big flowered hat at least as old as she was, worked the crowd, selling last-chance raffle tickets. Two men from the American Legion, in uniform and with rifles, guarded the starting line, which had a tiny red-striped building beside it meant to look like a Cold Stream Guard’s shelter. The mayor of New Brighton was on hand, in top hat and tails. Talk about mixed messages, thought Betsy, standing on the other side of the line from the mayor and the Cold Stream Guard shelter, clipboard in hand. She was herself wearing slacks, a blue-checked shirt, and sneakers-yet another fashion statement.
Off at the back of the parking lot a group of men with walkie-talkies and cell phones consulted under a big ham radio antenna. The leader of the pack was a heavyset man leaning on a huge four-wheel-drive vehicle. Not police officers, these were the crew charged with finding and rescuing old cars that faltered on the journey.
The mayor, red-faced and sweating-his suit was made of heavy wool, and it wasn’t that cool-made a brief speech honoring the people who found and restored these venerable ancestors of road travel. He said he’d be on hand again in New Brighton to greet in person every driver who completed the journey. He held up a dull gold medallion the size of his palm and said this was what the run was about, this was the prize to be given to every car that finished the run. “Good luck and God speed!” he concluded.
He stepped back and a man with a big green flag came out from behind the guard shelter. The two American Legion veterans crossed to Betsy’s side of the starting line, and Betsy checked the time on the big old pocket watch Adam Smith had fastened to the top of her clipboard. She looked at the 1902 Oldsmobile standing in quivering eagerness behind the line painted on the blacktop. The man twirled his flag, and on dropping it, the Legionnaires fired their rifles. The Oldsmobile tottered across the line and rolled past the crowd cheering him on. Betsy put a checkmark next to the Oldsmobile’s banner number and wrote the time down: 7:12 A.M.
By 8:30, most of the veterans had departed, and so had perhaps half the crowd. Some were headed for Buffalo to watch the cars arrive for lunch, while others had seen what they came to see and were headed somewhere else. Betsy could see Charlotte and Marvin now, making their way closer to the starting line, looking for Sergeant Steffans-who was closing in from behind. They did, however, see the deputy sheriff off to their right, moving toward them. Assuming he was heading off Adam Smith, they altered course, toward the starting line.
There was a roar of big engines as the follow-up trucks started up, preparing to follow the line of antique cars.
Betsy looked down the short line of cars still waiting to begin their run. Lars was at the very end, behind Adam in his Renault.
Charlotte and Marvin came close to the guard shelter to watch two deputies and Jill approach as a 1908 Buick in a bright shade of orange came up to the starting line. A fast pipe-pipe-pipe started coming from the car, but it slowed in tempo as the driver came to a stop, waiting for the green flag. The piping was obviously connected to the motor somehow, and by the grin of the driver, something intentional. The flag dropped and the car scuttled past the spectators, who made up in noise what they lacked in numbers. The piping, which had increased to a warble as he raced his engine, cut off as he turned out of the parking lot onto the street.
Next was the 1912 Winton, a woman behind the wheel wearing a pinch-brim cap turned rakishly backward and her male passenger, in shirtsleeves, waving grandly; then the 1911 Marmon, whose driver sounded its ooooooo-gah! over and over as he raced out of the lot. Betsy noted the time of each, then turned to watch Adam pull up in his huge and beautiful Renault touring sports car. He should have someone wearing Erte clothing in the backseat, perhaps with an Afghan hound, thought Betsy, smiling at him. While she would never give up the right to wear trousers, a car like Adam’s called for old-fashioned elegance.
The deputy stepped out into the starting lane behind the Renault.
Adam waved to the flagman, who raised his flag. The flag fell and the Renault pulled away and was gone, to the astonishment of Charlotte and Marvin.
Steffans, now immediately behind them, said something, and it was Charlotte who realized first what was about to happen-and she helped Marvin get away. She raised a bloodcurdling scream and flew into Steffans, knocking him down. She fell on him, clawing and scratching and still screaming. People behind them hastily backed away.
Marvin hot-footed it across the starting line, brushing past Betsy-who was stupidly frozen to the spot-to the huge four-wheel-drive SUV, where he did a very credible stiff-arm block on the heavyset man who tried to get in his way.
The heavyset man fell, Marvin jumped in the vehicle, and the man did a spectacular leap from the ground, much like a freshly landed fish, landing out of the way as the SUV bolted forward.
Betsy found her voice and yelled, “Stop him!” as Marvin roared out of the lot.
One of the deputies trying to untangle Steffans and Charlotte looked up and raced off, bound for his patrol car at the far end of the lot.
Jill stepped in to grab Charlotte by the hair with one hand and her arm with another. “That’s enough!” she said.
Betsy ran to the Stanley, wrenched open the door, and said, “Let’s go!” (Though she later remembered it as, “Follow that car!”)
Lars shoved the throttle all the way open, the steamer’s tires screamed, and Betsy was flung back into her seat. By the time she got herself untangled, the Stanley was flying up the street, actually gaining on the SUV. Lars grabbed a brass-headed knob and the Stanley’s whistle gave a long blast, causing innocent cars to swerve out of their way.
Marvin slewed crazily making the turn onto the highway, but the SUV was surefooted enough to cling to the road. Marvin got back into the right lane and floored it, and the big gas engine responded with a will.
So he must have been horrified a few seconds later to look in his rearview mirror and see an antique car still gaining on him.
Betsy, hanging on to the gas lever, was yelling encouragement at Lars, who had a fierce grin on his face.
But as they closed the gap, Betsy began to worry. How would they make Marvin stop? Was Lars going to try to pass him and cut him off? What if Marvin just crashed into them? Suddenly the Stanley’s rooflessness, its lack of seat belts, made it a very dangerous place to be.
The SUV’s brake lights came on, and the gap closed swiftly.
“He’s giving up!” said Betsy, vastly relieved. Lars shut down his throttle, and Betsy remembered how weak the primitive brakes were. They were going to overshoot. Lars would have to stop down the road and turn around. No cars oncoming, good. She looked behind. No flashing lights and sirens, just a single private car, well back.
But Marvin wasn’t finished yet. There was a grassy lane across the broad ditch that ran alongside the highway, an access lane for a farmer to get into his field. The SUV swerved onto it and crashed through the pipe-and-wire gate into the pasture. Grazing cows, startled, began to move.
Lars braked, but the Stanley was already past the lane.
“Hang on!” yelled Lars and the Stanley bounced off the highway, down into the wide ditch, and t-W-i-S-t-e-D its way up out of the ditch. Chuffing under the load, it nevertheless went through the barbed wire fence as if it wasn’t there.
The SUV was ahead of them, climbing a steepish slope, bouncing and skidding, flinging sod, mud and worse in all directions. Cows, only as alarmed as calm and stupid animals can get, scattered slowly.
The Stanley might have been on a country road, climbing the hill smoothly and effortlessly.
On the other side of the slope were the remains of a woodlot: stumps and fallen logs, heaps of brush, mud-holes. The SUV swerved and slid between the obstacles, bottoming here and there. A hubcap flew off. Marvin tried to dodge back toward the highway and snagged his exhaust on a stump. It tore loose and suddenly his engine was very loud.
The Stanley went over everything. This was common terrain when it was on the design board, and its big wheels kept the underside clear of obstructions. Lars, after years of hard driving, with special law-enforcement training and the amazing Stanley to ride, kept thwarting Marvin and his SUV’s every attempt to regain the highway.
Betsy, hanging on like grim death, watched the SUV finally dodge wildly around the last heap of brush, then crush another barbed wire fence. They were still on downhill terrain, and the SUV gained speed as it roared into a field that some hopeful farmer had plowed, harrowed, and planted with corn that had sprouted into neat rows of green about eight inches high. “Got ’im now!” Lars crowed, though Betsy couldn’t see how.
The SUV destroyed the sprouting plants in their hundreds as it veered down the gray-black field. It started up another slope, this one steeper than the last, slowing as it went, fishtailing madly, earth and small green plants flying in all directions. The big whip aerial on the back was flailing as if wielded by a mad driver and the horses under the hood were real and needed beating to greater effort.
Lars was by now close enough that some clods struck his windshield. By the time they reached the top, the SUV, despite its roaring engine and whipping aerial, was barely making any progress at all-and blocking its passage was a white board fence. On the other side, a dozen flesh and blood horses stood, heads raised in amazement.
The SUV lacked momentum to break this fence down. By twisting the wheel hard, Marvin managed to turn and start along it, Lars close behind.
“He’s going to get away, isn’t he?” said Betsy, as the SUV started again to build speed.
“Nah, there’s another fence up ahead. I’ll corner him there.”
And he did. Marvin tried to turn, but Lars was crowding him in his outer rear quarter, and Marvin ended up hard against the fence, too close to open his door. Lars shut the throttle down and leaped out of his car all in one movement. Before Betsy could even think what to do, Lars was sprawled across the hood of the SUV, pointing a gun at Marvin through the windshield, yelling at him to shut the engine off.
Marvin shut the engine off and raised his hands.
Lars called, “Betsy, blow the whistle until you see some backup coming.”
Betsy pulled the brass-headed knob on the dash, sending the horses in the meadow into wild flight. She blew a long and then a row of shorts, then a long again. She kept doing it.
It seemed like a long time before a farmer drove up on an immense tractor, curious to know what these people were doing in his field. He had a cell phone in a pocket.
“So it was Marvin after all?” said Godwin from a stool in the corner. He was wearing immaculate white shoes, socks, and trousers, and not anxious to get anything greasy on them. His pearl-gray silk shirt was also vulnerable and he hitched the stool just a little bit farther from the wall where, he was sure, spiders lurked. Godwin was not afraid of spiders, but surely their little feet were dirty from crawling up and down that dusty wall. If one got on him, it might leave a trail. He had a date with John for dinner, and John had sounded very quiet and gentle when he’d called yesterday. Things were going to be all right, probably, but Godwin always felt more confident when he was dressed especially well.
“No, it was both of them,” said Betsy.
She was sitting on a low rolling chest designed to be sat upon, made of plastic, used by gardeners who didn’t like stooping or kneeling but who had a long row to plant or weed. She was wearing denim shorts and a sleeveless pink blouse, although she was getting too old to be going sleeveless, except among friends.
But everyone present was a friend. Jill was there, sitting on the workbench, her bruises from the fight with Charlotte making bold purple comments on her smooth complexion.
And Lars, of course, since this was his barn. He was in his grubbiest jeans and T-shirt, under the Stanley, “swaging the boiler”-banging a shaped metal plug up the numberless copper tubes, making them round again. It was a long, long job. He’d divided the tubes into areas, and worked on one area at a time; otherwise, he’d fall into despair at the large number there were to swage.
During the wait for backup to arrive, the boiler had run itself dry. Lars should have told Betsy to shut it down, close off the valves, but he’d been concentrating on keeping Marvin from doing something stupid.
Betsy took most of the blame. She should have thought of it, paid attention to the gauges. But the Stanley had sat there in silence and she had fallen into her internal combustion habit of thinking a silent car was a car shut off, and so the boiler was scorched.
“How do you know it was both of them?” asked Godwin.
“Because that was the only way everything fit. She was the one who pulled the trigger. She shot him early in the morning of the Excelsior run, as they were getting ready to leave the house for St. Paul. Then she called Marvin, and he came over and took Bill’s body over to the lay-by in the trunk of his car. Charlotte followed with the trailer they hauled the Maxwell in. It was Marvin who drove the Maxwell in the run, not Bill.”
“But surely people talked to Bill,” objected Godwin. “How could they mistake Marvin for him?”
“Actually they didn’t really talk to him. Charlotte stayed with Marvin until he was parked. She talked to Adam and to anyone who came by, until Marvin was well under the hood and able just to grunt at anyone who tried to talk to him.”
“Why would Marvin help her like that?” asked Godwin.
“Because they were lovers, had been for years. Everything was okay until Bill started spending more time at home. Then he got suspicious. Marvin wanted Charlotte to divorce Bill, but Marvin wasn’t a wealthy man. And while Bill wasn’t taking care of his high blood pressure, he may have had his suspicions about Marvin confirmed before he had that fatal stroke everyone was anticipating.”
“Golden handcuffs,” said Godwin sadly.
“Yes, at least in part. But also, tyrants don’t make loving husbands.”
“What do you think, she just decided she’d had enough and shot him?” asked Jill.
“I don’t think so. She’s a very intelligent person, she would have had a better plan set up in advance. I think she told the truth in her confession; they had a quarrel, he got violent, which he’d done before, and she went for the gun and shot him.”
“Self-defense, then?” asked Godwin.
“Detective Steffans says no. She had to go into another room, unlock a drawer, and then go back with it. She could have left the house instead. On the other hand, one reason she wore those enveloping dresses was because sometimes she had to hide bruises. Bill struck her often, but was careful to hit her in places she could cover up with clothing.”
“The monster!” said Godwin, with a shiver.
“So what put you on to them?” asked Jill.
“Orts,” said Betsy.
That had been said into a break in the hammering from Lars, and he wheeled himself out from under his car long enough to inquire, “Orts?”
“Those little pieces of floss you cut off the end of a row of stitching. When you run it down so short you can’t take another stitch. The end you cut off is an ort.”
“Oh,” he said and went back to hammering.
“What about orts?” persisted Jill.
“The photographs of the crime scene you brought me, remember? There were orts on Bill’s trousers, just like they were on Charlotte’s dress. She said she left them wherever she stitched. Anyone who lay on the floor of her sewing room-where the shooting took place-would come away with orts all over his clothes. But the man who drove into Excelsior and dove under the hood of his car to repair it, had no orts on his trousers. That photograph of him in the Excelsior Bay Times showed them immaculately clean, as clean as Godwin over there.”
Godwin looked down at himself, then smiled at Betsy. “Thank you,” he said.
“That’s it?” said Jill. “Just because of some orts?”
“Well, there were some other things. The way she knew what Marvin was thinking when they came into my shop without his saying a word was exactly the way she knew what ‘Bill’ was thinking when he was sitting beside her in the Maxwell. I thought she did that with everyone she knew well, but she didn’t do it with anyone else. The smile she gave Marvin at the Courage Center pool was the same she gave the person we all thought was her husband. When I found out what kind of a tyrant Bill was, I wondered how Charlotte could feel so affectionate toward him. The answer was, she couldn’t.”
Godwin said, “So you just put it all together in your usual clever way.”
Betsy frowned. “I tried to think of other explanations, but none worked. Broward acted badly about my investigating because he thought he was the only one who knew about Marvin and Charlotte’s affair and was trying to prevent my finding out and telling his sister and brothers. Charlotte lied when she said Bro and Bill teamed up to keep Adam from taking Birmingham Metal.”
“How’d you find that out?” asked Jill.
“I didn’t. Steffans did. Bro told him the reason he came home was because he heard from Bill’s doctor that if Bill didn’t retire, he’d be dead in six months. Since Bro knew Steffans was looking for motives, Bro had every reason to point at Adam-and he did tell him about the Fuller and the race for president of the car club.
“And there was an accident in the tunnel that Saturday, just as Adam said, so his alibi checked out. So it wasn’t Broward and it wasn’t Adam.”
She turned to Jill. “Another thing that bothered me was the medical examiner’s statement about time of death.” She turned to Jill. “You know what I mean. The estimate was, he died between late Friday night and noon on Saturday. That makes the window curiously lopsided, if he’d been killed in that lay-by around noon. But if he was killed early in the morning, that was right in the middle of the window.”
Jill nodded. “I see what you mean.”
“I thought for a long while it was Marvin who did the whole thing, shot Bill and hid his body in the lay-by. But when? The night before? Marvin had an alibi for the night before; he was playing poker with some friends. Maybe late at night, after the poker game, or the day of the run, early in the morning. I thought about Bill going to confront Marvin over the affair he was having with Charlotte. I thought perhaps Marvin shot him when Bill got violent, and then, to cover the time of the murder, he took Bill’s place, driving the Maxwell in the run. But why bring Charlotte into it? He could just bury the body somewhere, or make it look like a robbery. Surely Marvin would never ask the woman he loved to be an accessory to murder. But if Marvin drove the Maxwell, Charlotte was right in the middle of the cover-up, deeply involved.
“So I thought she must be the one who shot him-only not at the lay-by, she was with me all day Saturday. Then I thought, well, what if she shot him early Saturday morning, when they were getting ready for the run? Then, okay, it still was Marvin doing the driving. She called Marvin to help her, and they came up with this hasty scheme. And there it was, all the pieces in place.”
“Clever of her to get you to provide her with an alibi,” said Godwin.
“No, it wasn’t,” said Jill. “She didn’t know about Betsy’s sleuthing skills or she would never have involved her. Once she found out Betsy has a nose for crime, she had to pretend she wanted Betsy to investigate, which was really the last thing on earth she wanted.”
Betsy nodded. “And because she was scared of what I might find out, she kept coming around to check on me. That was another thing that made me look at her. She couldn’t wait for me to come to her, she just had to find out if I was getting close. When she turned up in Willmar to shove Adam under my nose, I knew I was right.”
“That’s two police investigators you’ve gotten in ahead of,” said Godwin. “Sergeant Mike Malloy and now Detective Steffans.”
But Betsy shook her head. “No, he was onto her as well. He followed her out to Willmar because he was afraid she might try to murder me. While she was out there, he had a forensics team picking up all kinds of evidence in her house.”
Godwin cocked his head at her. “You like him, don’t you?”
“Heavens no!” said Betsy. “For one thing, he’s too tall and gawky. For another, his ears stick out. For another…” She tried to think of a personality trait to complain about, but once she started thinking about his shy smile, his charming wit, the way he looked at her with admiring eyes, she had to stop, because she couldn’t think of anything else.
Fabric: Aida, White, or Black
Design Count: 73w x 79h
Design Size: 7.3 x 7.9 in, 10 Count
The designer, Denise E. Williams, stitched this design on black 14-count Aida. On any other color fabric, stitch the design first, and then fill in the blank stitch spaces using DMC Black.
Hints
1. Take the pattern to a copy shop and enlarge it so the markings in the squares are easy to read.
2. Find and mark the center of the pattern, and the center of your fabric.
3. If you use black fabric, put a white cloth behind it to make the weave easier to see.
4. This pattern is trickier than it looks. Count twice so you only have to stitch once.