Dead Man's Puzzle (2 page)
Authors: Parnell Hall
Cora got out of the car, faced a rather exasperated-looking Chief Harper. “All right,” she said, “you got me.”
“Didn’t you see me behind you?”
“That was you?”
“Yes, that was me. Why didn’t you stop?”
“Why didn’t you use your siren?”
“I don’t use the siren unless I’m making an arrest.”
“You’re not arresting me?”
“For what?”
“For whatever you’re not arresting me for.”
“I’m not arresting you for anything.”
“I guess that covers it.”
Chief Harper frowned, peered at her suspiciously. “You sound like a woman with a guilty conscience.”
“Do you know how many times I’ve been married? Probably not. I lose track myself. Anyway, it’s a lot. So I’m used to a guilty conscience. It’s practically my default position.”
Harper put up his hands. “Please. No wordplay. Which was great, by the way. Why weren’t you in that movie?”
“What movie?”
“The crossword puzzle movie.
Wordplay.
With Will Shortz.”
“Oh, that.”
“Why aren’t you in it?”
Cora wasn’t in the movie because she’d ducked interviews, failed to return phone calls, and not shown up to film. She was afraid her crossword puzzle expertise, which was nonexistent, would be exposed in such a movie. “Just bad luck, Chief. Well, if there’s nothing else . . .”
“Nothing else? I stopped you, for goodness’ sakes.”
“You did, and you didn’t say why. Instead you talked about everything else under the sun. You’re like a gossipy old woman. What do you think that is, Chief? ADD? Early Alzheimer’s?”
“Okay, let me start over. I was trying to stop you because I need your help.”
“Please tell me it’s a murder.”
“It’s not.”
“Damn.”
“At least, I don’t think so.”
“Why do you say that?”
“He died of natural causes.”
“Or so it seems?” Cora said hopefully.
“The man was ninety-two.”
“Why didn’t you say so? He clearly deserved to die. It’s a wonder they didn’t take him out and shoot him.”
“Mr. Overmeyer had cancer of just about everything.”
“Was there an autopsy?”
“Why should there be an autopsy?”
“To see if he met with foul play.”
“What makes you think he met with foul play?”
“The fact you’re asking me about him. You almost ran me off the road to do it.”
“I thought you didn’t see me back there.”
“Let’s not quibble. What do you want?”
Chief Harper took out a paper and unfolded it.
Cora’s heart sank.
In spidery handwriting and drawn with shaky pen lines was the most loathsome of all possible things known to mortal man.
A crossword puzzle.
An unsolved crossword puzzle.
A crossword puzzle that needed solving.
ACROSS
1 October’s birthstone
5 Math proof abbr.
8 Marked with smears
14 Westminster hopefuls
15 Press into service
16 Stannum source
17 Creole cooking staple
18 Start of a message
20 In a seemly way
22 Open wide in a way
23 Network: Abbr.
24 Just say no
26 El padre’s brothers
28 Spanish flowers?
30 A third of an inning to go?
34 Part 2 of message
39 Alarming event
40 Gillette product
41 Name on a 1945 bomber
43 Genghis or Kublai
44 Bite like a bee
46 Part 3 of message
48 C.E.O., e.g.
50 Cash in Cancún
51 “Our Gang” affirmative
53 Low bow
57 Concern of Winchester’s “The Professor and the Madman”
60 Ladder rung
62 Navy’s goat, e.g.
64 Part 4 of message
67 “Okay, break ___!”
68 ___ del Fuego
69 “___ Misérables”
70 Frisbee
71 Mosquito barrier
72 Had a little lamb?
73 Just-prior periods
DOWN
1 Baseball’s Blue Moon
2 Lowball or stud
3 Feel the same way
4 Attorney-to-be’s exams
5 Area near a wharf
6 “Is” to Ovid
7 Say it isn’t so
8 “I’ve heard enough from you!”
9 Swimmers in a school
10 Corn or cycle prefix
11 Clinic group
12 Lee side?
13 Hankerings
19 Bran source
21 Pre-euro money in Milano
25 Daffy Duck and others
27 Great, in Variety
29 Nose around
31 Pearl Harbor’s island
32 Russian range
33 Care for
34 Cartoonist Thomas
35 “The Simpsons” bus driver
36 It goes before the fall?
37 Folk music accompaniment
38 Nobelist Wiesel et al.
42 Some East Indians
45 Flew off the handle
47 Guadalajara greeting
49 Where Douglas MacArthur returned, famously
52 So far
54 Acting comment
55 When Antony dies in “Antony and Cleopatra”
56 Rodent
57 Baseball’s Mel and family
58 Slang expert Partridge
59 Beautician, at times
61 Old-time actress Negri
63 Toll rds.
65 Three, in Torino
66 After expenses
Cora cursed her lucky stars, which clearly weren’t doing their job. After all, what were the odds her niece couldn’t go away on her honeymoon for two short weeks without a dead body with a crossword puzzle showing up in Bakerhaven? It was a very small town. And a very short time. What were the odds?
Well, at the moment, a hundred percent. Chief Harper had just dropped one in her lap. Granted, the man wasn’t murdered; still, a dead body with a puzzle was her least favorite thing. Odd, since a dead body
without
a puzzle was her
most
favorite thing. At least a murdered one. So, take away the puzzle and let the old man turn out to have met with foul play, and it would have been the best of all possible worlds.
Instead, it was a disaster.
Under normal circumstances, Cora would stall Chief Harper, take home a copy of the puzzle, and let Sherry solve it. With Sherry in Africa, it would be hard. Could you text-message a puzzle? Could you solve it over the phone?
Cora knew what Sherry would do. Sherry would scan the puzzle and e-mail it as an attached file. Cora felt proud of herself for knowing that. Unfortunately, she only knew that was what Sherry
would
do. She didn’t know how to
do
it. Sherry wouldn’t be home for a week. Could she stall Chief Harper that long?
“Are you doing it in your head?” Harper asked.
That snapped Cora back to reality. She was most certainly
not
doing it in her head. “I was trying to concoct a scenario in which this might be of interest to the police. You say the man obviously died of natural causes. Who cares what the crossword puzzle says?”
Harper frowned. “Come on, Cora. That’s not like you. There could be lots of reasons.”
“Like what? He was an international spy and knows where Jimmy Hoffa was buried? Somehow I tend to doubt it.”
“Me too. But solve it anyway.”
“All right,” Cora said. “I take it there’s no rush. I’m a little busy, what with Sherry and Aaron away.”
“Ah, the happy couple. How are they? I was beginning to think those two would never tie the knot.”
“No kidding. When I was their age, I’d have snapped the guy up like that. Of course, he isn’t rich.”
“Were all your husbands rich?”
“When I met them.” Cora shrugged. “Except Melvin, of course. Melvin just pretended to be. I should have known he was bluffing.”
“So, solve this for me, will you?”
“Don’t you want to Xerox it first and give me a copy?”
“No need. It’s not evidence. There isn’t a crime scene. There’s no crime. It’s just a crossword puzzle.”
“That’s the problem, Chief. Under those circumstances I can’t work up any enthusiasm for it.”
“I’m not asking you to blurb it. I’m just asking you to solve it.”
“Blurb it?”
“Isn’t that what writers call it when they praise each other’s work?”
“How should I know?”
“Aren’t you a writer?”
“In the loosest sense,” Cora said truthfully. She hated to lie. If necessary, she did so with a straight face, but she much preferred to concoct an absolute truth that totally misled the person asking. Calling herself a writer in the loosest sense of the word certainly filled the bill. The sense could not be looser.
Harper was not easily deflected. “Be that as it may. I would like to know what his puzzle says. Mainly so I can cross it off my list of things to do.”
“You have a long list, Chief?”
“Is that nice? Business is admittedly slow. Early this morning I was thinking of setting a speed trap.”
“No one speeds around here.”
“Almost no one. Good thing I didn’t look at the speedometer when I was chasing you.”
“Is that a threat, Chief? Solve this for me and I won’t run you in for speeding?”
Harper was shocked. “Of course not.” He shrugged. “Though it’s a wonderful idea. So, what do you say?”
“How soon do you need it?”
“I’d like it tonight. You could fax me the answer.”
“I’m not good with the fax machine.”
“So read it over the phone.”
“The whole puzzle?”
“No, just the theme answer. That’s all that really matters, right?”
“How the hell should I know? I didn’t write the damn thing.”
“You’re a little touchy, Cora.”
“I’m disappointed. You come to me with a dead man and a puzzle. You insist it means nothing, but you torture me with it anyway. It’s cruel and unusual punishment. It ought to be illegal. No taunting the Puzzle Lady.”
“Very funny. Just have it by tonight.”
Cora couldn’t believe how quickly it had all gone wrong. Here she was, minding her own business. Well, other people’s business, actually, but she was minding it. Honing her detective skills by following random people to the mall. How could she possibly get in trouble doing that?
Only she had.
And now she was faced with having to solve a crossword puzzle.
How could she get out of it?
Cora smiled.
Of course.
Harvey Beerbaum.
Harvey Beerbaum was beaming all over his face. “I can’t begin to thank you.”
“You’ve already begun, Harvey,” Cora said. The little cruciverbalist had ambushed Cora in Cushman’s Bake Shop, seemed determined to ruin her latte and scone.
“Yes, but to the chief of police. Who always asks you first. Of course, he’s known you longer, but still. To recommend me.”
“You’re an expert, Harvey. Why wouldn’t I recommend you?”
“Because you always do it yourself. That’s how it works. Chief Harper comes to you. You give him the answer. I read about it in the paper.” Harvey realized he had taken on a petulant tone. “Not that I’m complaining,” he said to apologize for complaining. “It’s just that’s what you do. Except in this case you recommended me.”
“I’m going to take my coffee outside, Harvey. It’s a lovely day. I’d like to sit on the bench. Unless there’s someone there.” Cora looked through the front window. “No. There isn’t. I’m going to sit out there.”
She made good her escape.
Harvey, who hadn’t ordered yet, stayed inside.
Cora sat on the bench, sipped her latte, nibbled her scone. Hoped someone else would sit on the bench before Harvey came out.
No one did. The portly puzzle maker came dancing out the door on little cat feet, pirouetted to the bench. Were it not for his awkward, embarrassed advances, Cora would have thought he was gay.
“So,” Harvey said. “Here you sit alone. Such an attractive woman shouldn’t have to sit alone.”
“Yeah, I was unlucky,” Cora said.
Harvey raised his eyebrows. “Excuse me?”
“Sit down, Harvey. You make me nervous hovering.”
“Yes, of course.” Harvey plopped himself down, put his muffin on the bench between them, sipped his coffee. “I just want to thank you for sending Chief Harper to me.”
“You’ve done that, Harvey. Several times.”
“I know. It’s just so unlike you. To share the limelight.” His eyes widened, and he blushed splendidly. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. It sounded terrible. That’s not what I meant at all.”
“Relax, Harvey. I’m not offended. That’s not to say you’re not offensive. You just don’t bother me.”
Harvey plowed right through the barb as if he hadn’t heard it. That was the first hint Cora had she might be in trouble.
“I solved the puzzle for Chief Harper, and I brought you a copy in case you wanted to see it. I figured you’d want to see it, even if you didn’t care enough to solve it. Do you want to see it?”
“Well, if you brought it along.”
Harvey didn’t produce the puzzle. Instead, he took a sip of his coffee. “I had a feeling you did. So I started to put two and two together. What do you think I found?”
“Would the answer be four?”
“Your niece is on her honeymoon, isn’t she?”
Uh-oh.
Yes,” Cora said. “She and Aaron went to Africa.”
“So if you had to solve a puzzle, you couldn’t count on her for help.”
“What’s your point?”
“So, instead, you passed the puzzle on to me. This confirms something I have long suspected.”
Oh, hell. Of all the people in the world Cora didn’t want to learn her secret, Harvey Beerbaum was near the top of the list. Fussy, pedantic, gossipy, and a stickler for the rules, Harvey wouldn’t hesitate to blow her cover. Only the threat of being sued for slander might stop him. That or blackmail. Did the man have secret vices? A collection of erotic pottery, perchance? If so, could Cora uncover it in time to do her any good?
“Harvey, you’ve been reading too many murder mysteries,” Cora said. “Coming up with intrigues and plot twists and bizarre double crosses.”
Harvey shook his head. “No, no. You’re not going to put me off this time.” He leaned in confidentially. “I know your secret, Puzzle Lady.”
Cora felt sick. “Oh, you do, do you?”
“Yes, I do. This proves it.”
“Proves what?”
He cocked his head, raised a knowing eyebrow. “You’re a constructor.”
Cora blinked. “What?”
Harvey nodded emphatically. “A constructor. Not a solver. You can only construct. Not solve. If you’re asked to solve a puzzle that’s not your own, you haven’t a clue how to go about it.”
“Oh.”
“Which explains why you never solve a puzzle on the spot, you always take it home and bring it back. It took a while for me to notice, but I finally caught on.”
“I see.”
“You can’t deny it. It’s as plain as the nose on your face.” Harvey’s mouth fell open. “I didn’t mean to say that, either. Your nose isn’t plain. Quite the contrary. It’s a very nice nose. A handsome nose. I mean a pretty nose. Oh, for goodness’ sakes, I don’t know what I mean.”
“Eat your muffin, Harvey, before you have a nervous breakdown.”
Harvey subsided, nibbled his muffin. Cora nibbled her scone.
“Okay, Harvey, you got me. I’m not as quick as you are at solving puzzles. Crossword puzzles, anyway. I can take you at sudoku. But I’m not a swift solver. I’ve never entered the national tournament, and I never will. If you want to humiliate me, there’s nothing I can do.”
Harvey looked shocked. “I would never dream of such a thing.”
“Then what’s your point?”
“No point. Just that I was right.”
Cora patted him on the cheek. “Harvey, Harvey, of course you’re right. You’re a constructor
and
a solver. I’m not. I’m better at solving mysteries. Like this dead guy. Who killed him? That’s what I want to know.”
Harvey looked at her in alarm. “Someone killed him?”
“Isn’t that what the puzzle says?”
“Not at all.”
“Well, that’s disappointing. I was hoping you’d bring me news of a murder. ‘Check my son-in-law’s suitcase for poison,’ or something like that.”
“I assure you I’d have mentioned a murder weapon.”
“That’s better, Harvey. You’re back to your old, feisty self. Well, what about it? What’s the theme entry? Did he embed a poem?”
“He sure did. Take a look.”
Cora took the puzzle, read, “ ‘At noon I can not be done. So I should try to at one.’ What the hell does
that
mean?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
“Well, I haven’t a clue. What does Chief Harper think?”
“He’s glad it doesn’t mean anything. He was afraid there’d be something he’d have to investigate.”
“This poem doesn’t fill the bill. It’s meaningless.”
“Unless something else comes up.”
“Like what?”
“I have no idea.”
Cora finished her latte, tossed the paper cup in the trash can at the end of the bench, and handed the crossword back to Harvey.
“Oh, keep it,” he said. “I have my own copy. That’s for you.”
Cora plunged the crossword into her floppy drawstring purse, wondered if Harvey’d go away if she lit a cigarette. She had been trying to quit, partly at Sherry’s urging that it hurt her image but also from a recent shortness of breath, which did
not
indicate she was getting old.
Cora heaved herself up from the bench, nodded at Harvey, who still had some muffin left, and walked off.
Her car was parked opposite the police station. She considered dropping in on Chief Harper to see what he really thought of the puzzle. She immediately shelved the idea. That would make him think she was giving it credence. Which she certainly wasn’t. She just wished she were.
Cora climbed into the Toyota, backed out of the parking space. She felt good driving home. She’d averted the Harvey Beerbaum disaster. Not being quick at solving puzzles was a secret she was happy to share. It was a far cry from confessing to not really being the Puzzle Lady. She’d dodged that bullet. And she’d dodged a bullet when Harper gave her the puzzle in the first place. She’d done it without panicking and calling Sherry in Kenya. She’d done it all on her own. Sherry was having a honeymoon, and Cora was coping. That was how it should be, and that was how it was. Business as usual.
Cora pulled into the driveway of the modest ranch house she shared with Sherry and Aaron. She went up the front path, opened the door. Buddy shot out, raced around the yard in crazy circles, as if trying to make up in speed what he lacked in stature.
Cora followed the toy poodle back inside, where the answering machine was beeping. She hoped it was a bridge game. Cora liked bridge games. They played for money.
Beep.
“This is Betty Rosenberg at the Associated Press. Our fax line is down. Could you please e-mail the Puzzle Lady column as an attached file?”
Cora groaned. Boy, talk about a mood killer. She had never attached a file in her life, let alone sent one. How could she possibly do that? Screwed, blued, and tattooed. She’d have to call Sherry in Africa after all. What the hell time was it in Kenya? What was Sherry’s phone number? Cora’d paid no attention because she wasn’t going to use it, and now, here she was in a mess where she had no choice, and she didn’t know how to do it. Why hadn’t she listened? What a moron—she’d brought this all on herself.
Wait a minute. She had Sherry’s phone number. It was written down in the office. That was what Sherry said. Written down in the office. On the same page as the instructions for faxing the puzzles. Emergency numbers.
Cora hurried into the office.
Yes, of course. It was right there.
Along with . . .
On page two of the instructions was the heading ATTACHED FILE SENDING FOR DUMMIES.
Cora wasn’t offended. She was never so relieved in her life. She clicked on the mouse, opened her e-mail.
The computer crashed.