Last Puzzle & Testament (30 page)

“Yes, I know. But it’s important.”

“I’m sure it is, but so’s my bridge game. Do you play bridge?”

“No, I don’t. I have to talk to you. It’s about the puzzle.”

“I’m not talking about crossword puzzles tonight.”

“I didn’t say crossword puzzles. I said
the
puzzle. The one you’re working on. The one you’re judging. For the Hurley estate.”

“I
particularly
can’t talk about that.”

“All right, maybe you can’t. But in the abstract—can we talk in the abstract?”

Cora’s heart was pounding. This was worse than she’d thought. “No, we can’t,” she said. “I can’t discuss the puzzle specifically, I can’t discuss it in general, and I cannot, absolutely
will
not, discuss it hypothetically in the abstract. Is that clear? The puzzle doesn’t concern you, you shouldn’t be discussing it at all, I don’t want to hear anything about it.”

With that Cora pushed by Harvey Beerbaum and out of the room. She returned to the table, where gossip eventually wound down and the women actually got back to playing bridge.

Cora played, but her mind wasn’t on the game anymore. Harvey Beerbaum had distracted her. What could he have possibly wanted? And how did he know anything about the puzzle in the first place? Cora wished she’d been able to ask him. But for her, any discussion of the puzzle at all was entirely too dangerous. Particularly with him. One slip, one tiny slip, and he’d know. And she wouldn’t even necessarily know what constituted a slip. No, talking to him was out of the question. She had to put him out of her mind and play bridge.

Cora tried hard. She was aided by the fact that the cards kept running her way. The women played for a penny a point, and Cora wound up winning sixty-seven dollars. She won nearly every rubber, and even made a grand slam.

It didn’t help.

Harvey Beerbelly had spoiled her evening.

Sherry couldn’t help watching Aaron Grant. She stood in the back of Arthur Kincaid’s office next to Aaron, and tried to read Aaron’s body language. Was he relating to Becky Baldwin? If so, she certainly couldn’t tell. He’d given no indication whatsoever. No sign that he’d dated her the night before.

On the other hand, Daniel Hurley wasn’t relating to Sherry either. He’d strode in with Becky Baldwin, arrogant as ever, taunting his relatives with his TV performance, and sprawled out in his usual chair. He hadn’t even acknowledged Sherry’s existence.

Sherry reminded herself that she didn’t care.

She frowned as Arthur Kincaid called the meeting to order and turned the floor over to Cora Felton.

“All right, this is it,” Cora said. “This is the final piece of Emma’s puzzle. Once I hand it out, the race will begin. The first person to bring back the completed grid will be the winner.” She raised her finger. “Provided the grid is correctly filled in. If there is an error, you lose. So check your work. Don’t come complaining to me if you blow it.”

Cora Felton raised her chin, looked around the room. Philip and Phyllis didn’t look pleased, but as far as Cora could tell, the only one who out-and-out disagreed with what she’d just said was Sherry Carter. Sherry and Cora had been outside Odds and Ends when the cranky Mable Drake had opened up at eight-thirty that morning, and an exhaustive but surreptitious search of the store under the guise of shopping for a set of dish towels and a magazine rack had turned up absolutely nothing. Whereupon Cora had decided completing the grid would mean winning the game.

Much to Sherry’s disapproval.

“One more thing,” Cora said. “As I said, this time it’s a race. And I will be staying right here in this room until there’s a winner. No checking in. No calling on the phone. No leaving messages on my answering machine. You must be here in this room, personally hand me the grid. If it’s right, you win. If it’s wrong, you don’t. First correct grid wins. Now, if there are no questions, I will begin validating the grids.”

The heirs gathered around while Cora made the comparisons, as usual using the printout Sherry had provided.

Cora checked Phyllis Applegate’s first. Her grid was still perfect.

So was Philip Hurley’s.

Daniel Hurley handed his in with an insolent flourish, and didn’t even wait for Cora to look at it before slumping back into his seat. She said, “Yes, this seems to be correct,” and then stood there holding the grid, waiting him out until he had to get up and come around the table to take it back from her. He looked slightly pained as he did so. Still, he managed a strut, and an arrogant wink in the direction of Becky Baldwin, who looked on with what Cora would have characterized as fascinated disapproval of his behavior.

“All right,” Cora said, holding up the manila envelope.

“Here is the final set of clues. If you’d all care to form a line in front of the door. Not a single-file line, but a line straight across. Would the three principals—that is, Philip Hurley, Phyllis Applegate, and Daniel Hurley—if the three of you would line up next to each other. Then with the help of my niece, Sherry, I will be able to hand out the last set of clues to all of you simultaneously.”

Cora Felton slid the final set of clues from the manila envelope. She gave a copy to Sherry, took two for herself. They went around the table to the door, where Philip and Phyllis were elbowing, jostling, and shoving each other, and doing everything except standing in an orderly line.

Cora Felon smiled. “This is the part that makes it all worthwhile. You will keep quiet and hold still. Until you do so, no one gets a clue. I will wait.”

After what seemed like forever, but couldn’t have been more than twenty seconds of grumbling accusations, blame shifting, and off-color language, Philip and Phyllis were quiet. Cora nodded to Sherry, and the two of them held out the clues. Philip and Phyllis grabbed theirs from Cora and bolted out the door.

Daniel Hurley took his from Sherry. As he took the page his hand brushed hers, and for an instant their eyes met. He smiled briefly, led briethen he was ushering Becky Baldwin out the door.

Outside in the street, car doors slammed, engines revved, and tires squealed, as the heirs took off on the final leg of the puzzle.

“Where do you think they’re going?” Aaron asked.

Cora Felton frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Well, we know the Applegates are going to the library, but the rest of them? I mean, it’s a crossword puzzle. And it’s a race. If I were one of them, I’d sit down and do it right
here.
”

“Maybe,” Sherry said thoughtfully. “But then you’d have us all looking on. Which might inhibit you. You gotta remember, this is their fourth time around. So they got their little routines established, how they’re comfortable working. And it’s a small town. Nothing’s more than a few blocks away.”

“That’s well thought out,” Aaron said. “You have a real insight into how people solve crossword puzzles.”

Sherry blushed, and averted her eyes. She had a guilty thought, both for what she suspected, and for what she hadn’t told him.

Aaron turned to Cora. “Now that it’s over, you gonna let me see the grid?”

“It’s not over yet,” Cora reminded him.

“No, but it soon will be. We’re only talking one quarter of a puzzle left. Odds are you’ll have a winner before lunch. When you do, I want it. So, can I publish the grid?”

Cora Felton looked at Arthur Kincaid. “What do you think?”

The lawyer shrugged. “When it’s final, I don’t see why not. But it’s not final yet, and Aaron probably shouldn’t see it till then.”

“Well, let me ask you something,” Aaron said. “Have you been solving the grid? Have you been working the puzzle? Has Cora Felton been giving you the clues?”

The lawyer shook his head. “No, she has not. She’s kept me apprised of the situation. But she has kept the clues entirely in her possession, given them only to the heirs. There’s no possibility whatsoever of any clues falling into the wrong hands.”

“And why is that?”

Kincaid smiled. “Because I’m an attorney. And because there’s a great deal of money involved. Because in a case like this, the first person I want to protect is me.”

“So,” Aaron said. “The only people who could possibly have the clues are the three sets of heirs who just left?”

“That’s correct.”

“And the next person to walk through that door will most likely inhst likelerit Emma Hurley’s fortune?”

“If they have a perfect grid.”

“Who would you bet on?” Aaron persisted. “If you had to pick right now, who would you bet on?”

Cora Felton frowned. “Hard to say. The way I’ve been playing it there’s no way to tell. Now, the first set of clues, Philip Hurley was first. Then Phyllis Applegate.”

“But that was before Daniel decided to play,” Sherry pointed out.

From out in the street came the sound of a vehicle approaching fast. Brakes squealed. Tires shrieked to a stop. An engine roared and died. A car door slammed.

Moments later, footsteps pounded up the stairs.

“Sounds like we have a winner,” Aaron commented. “Could they have finished it this fast?”

“I wouldn’t think so, but it could be,” Cora said.

But it wasn’t.

Instead, Chester Hurley slammed into the room. He was a sight, which was saying something, as Chester Hurley was always a sight. But even to Sherry Carter, who had seen him up close and holding a gun, the man looked particularly out of sorts. His eyes were wilder and brighter than usual, his scraggly hair more unkempt, his two-day growth bordered on three. His rotten teeth could scarcely look worse, but they did. Saliva welled up among them and drool dribbled down his chin.

“I’m through,” he snarled.

He shoved past them, stomped to the head of the table.

“I’m through with this stupid game.”

Chester Hurley raised up his right hand. In it was a piece of paper. He clenched his fist, shook it over his head.

“I don’t want this stupid puzzle. I didn’t want it then, and I don’t want it now. I took it because Emma wanted me to. But I don’t have to like it. And I’m turning it in.”

Chester Hurley slapped the paper down on the table, looked up, glared, and stabbed his finger at Cora.

“I’m serving notice on
you.
As of now, I am done. Over. Finished. Through with this wretched game. I didn’t understand it to begin with, and I don’t understand it now. I don’t know why Emma did this to me, and I’m angry, but there’s nothing I can do about it. All I know is it got Annabel killed, and if I can figure out why, I aim to do something about that.

“But as for this other thing.” Chester Hurley’s eyes flashed. “This puzzle that’s poison, that makes men kill. Or women, for that matter. I’m through with it, I give it back, there it lies. Do with it as you will.”

Chester Hurley glared at them all in turn, especially , especiCora, then shook his head.

“Stupid, stupid game,” he snarled, then banged past them out the door, and thundered down the steps.

Cora, Sherry, Aaron, and Arthur Kincaid heard the front door slam, then his old truck starting up. Even so, his performance had been so captivating it was moments before anyone could speak.

Finally, Sherry broke the silence. She turned to Aaron, and grinned. “Well,” she said. “You gonna write that up?”

“Somehow I doubt it,” he replied. “It’s an amusing sidelight, but that’s all. And I suspect this won’t be a slow news day.”

“Well, we knew Chester wasn’t playing the game,” Cora said, “but this makes it official. Rather over the top, turning in his grid. But right in character. Just what you’d expect from him.”

“At least he didn’t pull his gun,” Sherry said.

“Yeah,” Cora said. “Thank goodness for small favors.”

Chester Hurley’s grid was lying facedown on the table. Cora absently picked it up and turned it over. Her eyes widened.

“Sherry.”

Sherry was talking with Aaron and didn’t hear her.

“
Sherry!
”

Sherry heard her that time. “What?”

“Come here.”

“What is it?”

“Come.
Here!
”

Sherry joined her aunt at the head of the table. Cora was holding Chester Hurley’s grid.

The grid had been filled in in pencil.