A Little Class on Murder (20 page)

Annie led the way to the living room. “All right. It’s time for some real thought.”

Max rustled in the desk, brought them each a scratch pad and pen. They settled companionably on the wicker couch. Annie glanced at the clock. Almost ten. And only a few hours’ sleep last night.

But, as her three most irritating students would enjoin, duty called.

Annie poised a pen over her pad, then looked at Max, bewildered. “Now I know how Captain Hastings feels—totally at a loss.”

“Obviously,” her sometimes charming husband suggested, “let’s begin at the beginning. The first question is: Do we need to investigate at all?”

Annie’s eyes widened. “Max, of course. Wells didn’t listen to a word we had to say—”

He held up a cautioning hand. “Annie, maybe Wells is right. Maybe the murderer is already in jail.”

Laurel would have hooted it down, the suggestion that lovely Georgia Finney had battered out Burke’s brains.

But Henny would have countered that neither youth nor beauty nor romance guarantees innocence, and suggested a thoughtful perusal of
Crooked House, Death on the Nile, Endless
Night, Evil Under the Sun
, and
Death in the Air
. And why else had Georgia tried to get rid of the murder weapon?

Miss Dora would have dismissed that solution as boring and pedestrian, two cardinal sins in the Wimsey salon.

But Annie had to consider it.

“She
was
very upset about the article in
The Crier
,” Annie mused. “If Kelly published a story on her relationship with Frank Crandall, Crandall’s career could certainly be damaged—if not destroyed. So, I can see why she might have planted the bomb in the
Crier
offices. But why would she kill Burke?”

Max sipped at his coffee. “Maybe Burke told her he was going to recommend against tenure for Crandall because of their relationship. Or, how about this—Georgia thinks Burke leaked the information to Kelly?”

Burke as the betrayer of the faculty.

It could be.

He had denied it. Emphatically.

But whoever had engineered that leak would surely deny any accusation.

“Okay. Okay,” Annie said energetically. “Look, we’ve
got
to find out who planned this. Who pulled Kelly’s string. And why.” Mrs. Dane Calthrop, in her clear-eyed fashion, put it best in
The Moving Finger
when she called in Miss Marple to help, because Miss Marple was an expert in wickedness. And that was what they faced, wasn’t it? “Wickedness,” Annie murmured. Her face was stern. “Whoever is behind this is wicked, Max, don’t you think?”

He looked at her inquiringly.

She slowly formulated her thoughts. “What kind of person would do this? Someone intelligent enough to know how Kelly would respond? Someone filled with anger? Or at the least, with jealousy? Or was it colder than that? An overweening determination to prevail?”

Max shrugged. “These are brainy people. Subtle people, accustomed to leading others, if not manipulating them. On that standard, it could be any one of them.”

“Even Burke,” she said solemnly. He had been, to her, likable. But he had also been a determined, angry man.

“Right,” Max agreed. “If so, he may have been killed
because
he leaked all the untidy secrets of the department.”

“But if he wasn’t behind it, could he have discovered who did it and have to be silenced?”

Max brooded. “Murder? Was it worth murder to hide the source of the leaks?”

Annie shrugged. “That depends, doesn’t it, on how much someone had to lose.”

Max shoved a hand through his thick blond curls, disarranging them in what Annie considered to be a most attractive fashion. Really, rumpled became Max, especially that endearing twig poking up from the back of his head.

“Look at this thing logically,” he implored.

Annie tried hard to concentrate, although she yearned for sleep. Or, at the very least, for a good slug of endorphins à la Harry Colderwood. Sleep was almost as important to her as food, and it seemed eons since she’d curled up comfortably in their very cozy bed.

“Logically,” she repeated dutifully.

“You see, there could be a number of different reasons for R.T. Burke to be killed.” Max didn’t even seem tired. He hunched over his notepad and wrote:

1. Burke discovered the identity of leak. Possible Deep Throats: a. Victor Garrison, b. Malcolm Moss, c. Kurt Diggs, d. Frank Crandall
.

He studied the list with satisfaction.

Annie rubbed grainy eyes. How did Holmes manage to track criminals for days on end? “Why would Kurt Diggs or, for God’s sake, Frank Crandall want all the dirt out in public? Both of them had awfully good reasons to hope those personnel files stayed confidential.”

“A gamble. A hope that there would be such a stink, especially focusing on Porter’s misuse of funds, that Burke would be discredited. A backlash kind of thing.”

“I’d say they’d have to be pretty stupid to unplug the hornet’s nest.”

Maybe Max was tired, too. Without any comment, he scratched through Diggs’s and Crandall’s names.

Annie nodded. “So really, on any logical basis, there are only two faculty members who might reasonably be guilty of the leak, Garrison or Moss.” She nodded with such enthusiasm she spilled coffee on the blank page of her notebook. “Sure. Look at it! They are the only two who don’t have anything discreditable that could come out. They’re just cross-ways about academic matters.”

“So far as we know,” Max cautioned.

“Damn. We need to see those files.”

“We sure do.” Max began to smile. He reached for the phone. It took a moment to be connected to the top floor of the Palmetto Inn.

“Hi, Ma. No. We’re fine. Drinking raspberry chocolate coffee.” A pause. “Something romantic before bedtime?” He sounded puzzled. Then the tips of his ears flamed. “That’s all right. We’re fine. I mean, don’t worry about—Look, Ma, I need to talk to Miss Dora for a minute.” He avoided Annie’s piercing gaze. “Miss Dora, would you have access to a set of master keys for the journalism building?” He grinned. “Great! We’ll pick them up in the morning. Thanks a—Oh no, no, I don’t need to talk to her again. Good night,” and he thrust the receiver away from him as if it might bite his hand.

Annie opened her mouth, then firmly closed it. Some questions were better left unasked.

Besides, Max was rushing into speech. “Okay, so we’ve got Moss and Garrison as possibilities. Now, let’s turn it around, make Burke responsible. Who might have killed him?”

“The same person who tried to blow up
The Crier
,” Annie offered. “Somebody who was determined that nothing more should be leaked.”

Max briskly added:

2.
Burke betrays faculty. Possible killers: Crandall, Diggs, Norden, Finney
.

Annie rubbed her eyes again and blearily tried to focus. Okay, he didn’t bother to list Moss and Garrison this time.
Obviously, Max didn’t believe anybody would kill just to hide an academic firestorm. As for Crandall and Diggs, they made sense. Each had a personnel problem that would look damn awful in cold print. One involved with a coed, the other suspected of trading A’s for sex. But she couldn’t buy Norden. Alcoholism is a disease and although Norden could be pressured to take a leave of absence for treatment, surely he wouldn’t face summary dismissal from a job he’d held for so long and previously done with distinction, according to Charlotte Porter. Besides, and she remembered his tears when he brought news of Charlotte’s death, this was a good-hearted man.

“I can’t believe Norden would kill Burke to prevent public discussion of his problem. He doesn’t seem like that kind of man.”

But Max’s face was grim. “I know,” he said heavily. “That isn’t why I listed him.” He sighed. “Funny. Now we’ll never know whether Burke would have revealed the reason behind Charlotte Porter’s theft.”

Annie concentrated. Oh yes, the ill-starred press conference scheduled for three
P.M
., prevented by murder and explosion.

“Max, nobody would do all that just to keep the truth—whatever it is—from coming out about poor Charlotte Porter!”

“I know that. But if we’d had the press conference, it might have gone a long way toward telling us whether Burke was behind Kelly’s exposé. Think about it! He kept insisting that he’d never reveal personnel information publicly—but he gave it to us. Everything but the background on Charlotte Porter.” Pensively, he underlined Josh Norden’s name. “Norden told me.” His eyes narrowed. “I’d like to know how much Brad Kelly knows. Because if that kid knows the real story, he’s a bastard for sure. Charlotte Porter took the money because her only grandson, the son of her dead daughter, was dying with AIDS, and he didn’t have any health insurance. And he’d heard about a treatment down in Mexico. Desperate people try desperate remedies, and those always cost a lot.”

“Oh God,” Annie said simply. She didn’t need anyone to
tell her what it would have meant to Charlotte Porter if the truth came out. If her friends knew. She could bear only so much.

“Josh Norden told you?” she asked quietly.

“Yes. And he was sober this morning. Sober and white hot with anger. He said, ‘If I ever find out who did this to Charlotte, I’ll kill him.’ ”

Once again, he underlined Norden’s name.

Then, he made a final notation:

3. Or, none of the above, and Burke was killed because he was chair and either thwarting or threatening someone. Possible killers: Moss, Garrison, Diggs, maybe Norden, unknown
.

“We can’t do much until we know for sure about Burke,” Annie concluded. “Was he the louse behind Kelly? Or did he discover who did it? Or did he pose some other serious threat to someone?”

“You’re right,” Max agreed. “First we have to establish whether Burke was or wasn’t behind the leak.” Again, he shoved a hand impatiently through his hair. “All right, by God, let’s find out. Brad Kelly claims he doesn’t know Deep Throat’s identity, but is he really telling the truth?” Dropping his notepad, he grabbed the telephone.

Brad Kelly. Annie wondered if the shaken young editor had managed to get free of the authorities long enough to contact the news services. Well, they’d know tomorrow. If he had, he would be in the news coast to coast.

What did Brad Kelly know?

If he had any brains, he would’ve unloaded every fact at his command and any suppositions to Chief Wells. Annie sure would have, if someone had tried to blow her away.

That had to be the point of the bomb, of course. It had been planted in Brad’s office.

Was the objective to stop the publication of
The Crier
or to stop ambitious Brad Kelly—permanently?

And why was Emily Everett there?

Was Emily an accidental victim?

Well, surely so. How could anyone have known she would choose that critical moment to come to
The Crier?

Annie scrawled:
Emily Everett
. She and Max needed to find out a lot more about the dead girl. A lot more. Why was she at the
Crier
office? Why had Burke, in one of the final acts of his life, written her name and circled it?

Was it coincidental or deliberate that Burke was killed and
The Crier
bombed within the space of half an hour?

Was Burke’s murderer also the bomber?

Did it make any sense to imagine two separate perpetrators of such violent deeds? Wouldn’t that indeed be an incredible coincidence?

But weren’t these two acts entirely separate and different?

A bomb presupposed planning.

Careful, detailed, premeditative planning.

And Burke’s murder appeared to be exactly the opposite, a spur-of-the-moment, unplanned attack, Burke’s own memento snatched up for use as a weapon, Burke’s own coat donned as a protective shield.

A hurried, desperate murder.

A thought, nebulous and unformed as the ectoplasm so beloved of Rinehart mediums, wriggled in the recesses of Annie’s tired mind.

Hurry. No time. Quick—

Max whistled and looked at the receiver.

Annie blinked and looked at him. “Yes?”

“Wait till you hear this!” He redialed and handed her the phone.

The prerecorded message began to roll after the second ring. “This is Brad Kelly, editor of
The Crier
. In cooperation with the authorities, I have agreed to accept protection because there is a reasonable assumption that the blast which killed Chastain student Emily Everett and destroyed my office at
The Crier
was aimed at me. However, the blast may have been intended to hinder publication of
The Crier
and/or serve as a warning to me to desist with my exposé of personnel and planning problems within the journalism department. Or the blast may have been intended to prevent the news conference
which had been scheduled for three
P.M
. today. Whatever the intent of the blast, I refuse to be silenced in my role as a journalist and I am scheduling a news conference for nine
A.M.
Friday morning in the Blue Auditorium in Nelson Hall. I wish to make it clear to any and all interested parties that I have communicated fully with the police department of Chastain in regard to the information afforded me as the background of the planned exposé.” A long pause and the whistle of tape. Then, gruffly, “
The Crier
shall do everything in its power to see that the murderers of R.T. Burke and Emily Everett are brought to justice.”

The wicker squeaked as Annie leaned across Max to replace the receiver. She frowned at her mystery collection, seeking inspiration. Anything there on recorded messages? Nope. There was a small silence. “Well. What do you think?”

“I think Kelly’s not stupid. He doesn’t want his ass peppered with explosive.”

“Or his cranium squashed,” Annie added. After all, Frankie Derwent (Lady Frances) had never minced words.

“Pretty smart. He’s telling the world that the cops know everything he knows.”

“And he has a nice touch for the dramatic,” Annie added dryly. “Everybody and his dog’ll be at that news conference.”

“Yes,” Max agreed. “Including us.”