Murder on Old Main Street (Kate Lawrence Mysteries) Page 16

  Mort Delahanty had been at the diner for as long as I could remember, which admittedly wasn’t all that long. His role was unclear. My impression was that he suffered from some sort of mental handicap, but I had no idea what that might be. He just seemed sort of slow-witted, but I was too busy wondering why Abby tolerated Prudy Crane’s surliness and inefficiency to wonder why she kept Mort Delahanty employed, as well. I had never heard him in conversation with Abby or anyone else, for that matter, but then, why would I have? Whenever I was in there, it was to pick up something quick to take back to the office. I really had no inkling of Mort’s relationship with Abby or with Prudy Crane either. Still, he had access to the premises, including the chlordane and the kitchen knives, and he might very well have known about Prudy’s extracurricular activities. Maybe he was her partner in crime and did away with her to keep all the blackmail money to himself. Or maybe he had known that Prudy was blackmailing Abby, as well, and had killed her out of some kind of obsessive loyalty to his kind employer.

  The only thing I was certain of was that it had been Mort Delahanty in that Trans Am this morning, Vignettes of theh past few days popped into my aching head: Mort’s face when I had appeared at the diner to talk with Abby at her request. The open windows in Mavis Griswold’s sitting room and Millie Haines’s office, under which anyone might have been lurking and listening. Mort waiting at the cash register in Marsh’s Pharmacy while Ephraim ranted behind the far-from-soundproof partitioning. He had probably been following me for days, but why? If he had been listening at the door outside Abby’s office and heard enough to know that she had asked for my help, he would know that’s what I’d been trying to do. But if he had heard only a few words at a time, an out-of-context phrase or two, he might easily have misconstrued the situation and thought I meant to do Abby harm. That was, after all, how rumors got started. A small distortion here, a slip of the tongue there, and you had a full-blown scandal in next to no time.

  Scandal. I rubbed my eyes and tried to connect the dots. According to the vicious tripe served up in her diaries, scandal had been Harriett Wheeler’s raison d’etre. She lived it, breathed it, was constantly on the alert for the possibility of it, and when none was forthcoming, she fabricated it. Now that I had seen what Harriett had implied about Abby and Frank and Mort in her diaries, I knew in my heart that it was Mort who had been trying to get his hands on the volumes in the trunk of my car, just as I was certain it was he who had vandalized the Wheeler house on Sunday night. He probably just walked in with the crowd and hid in a closet or the basement or something until Margo left. I shuddered to think of her there alone in the house with someone who was so obviously deranged.

  Alone in the house. Suddenly, I was very aware of how alone I was in the Law Barn. Despite the noise of the crowd outside, the silence within was palpable, and I was sure that nobody out there would hear me if I needed help. I jumped to my feet and grabbed the phone on Jenny’s desk. The number for the police department was prominently displayed on a small card taped to its side, and I wasted no time punching it in. Judging from the number of uniforms I had seen on the street earlier, the female officer who answered the phone must have been equally lonely in the station house. I explained that, due to the crowds and traffic, I was effectively trapped in the Law Barn on Old Main Street, but I needed to speak with Lieutenant Harkness or Officer Fletcher immediately in connection with the Crane investigation. I gave her the Law Barn number, and she promised to do her best to contact one or the other of them.

  “Are you all right, ma’am?” she asked, concern in her voice. “You’re the lady who was involved in that high speed chase in Glastonbury this morning, aren’t you?”

  I admitted that I was. I guess gossip travels fast in police circles, as well.

  “I’m fine for the moment,” I said sturdily, by way of whistling in the dark, which it literally was now. I snapped on the desk lamp and gazed fearfully around the shadowed lobby. “I know how pressed the department is right now with this hearing tonight, but I’d appreciate hearing from the lieutenant or rick Fletcher as soon as possible.”

  “You’ve got it,” she promised and disconnected.

  Okay, then. It was just a matter of hunkering down and waiting. A glance at my watch told me it was nearly six. Margo was busy with the Copelands, but I felt sure that she would return at some point, if she could make her way back through the crowds. The hearing would begin in a little more than an hour, and then surely I would hear from John or Rick or one of the other officers who were on duty in the area.

  I tried to think logically. The first thing to do was to make sure no one who didn’t have legitimate business here could enter the Law Barn. Margo and Emma and Millie Haines all had keys. I screwed up my courage and walked purposefully to the back entrance. As I reached for the doorknob, I noticed that my hands shook a little, but after the day I’d had, not to mention three or four extra servings of caffeine, that wasn’t surprising. After turning on the floodlights, I took hold of the knob and yanked open the door. I forced myself to step onto the small back stoop to be sure nobody was lurking around the building. Standing on tiptoe and craning my neck, I could just see the roof of the Altima in the service alley. It was somehow reassuring to see that it was still there.

  All was calm in the back yard, and I quickly returned inside. I threw the deadbolt on the sturdy wooden door and left the back lights on as an added deterrent to unwelcome visitors. Then I went into Millie Haines’s office and checked to be sure her window was closed and locked. For good measure, I closed the door to her office and pulled a carton of copier paper in front of it. If anyone did break in through the window, I would hear it when the door thumped the carton of paper and have time to escape out the front.

  Next, I checked the front door to be sure it was secure. In addition to the modern dead bolt, the door boasted an old fashioned plank-and-brackets barrier, which was never used but made an interesting decorative touch. I tested it out and found that the plank fit smoothly within the sturdy wooden brackets at either side of the door. Short of using a battering ram, no one was coming through that door tonight. There were no windows at the front of the first level, so I had no worries there.

  Just for good measure, I climbed the stairs to the loft and checked things out up there. The hamster cage by Emma’s desk stood empty, for once, and the law offices were unusually quiet as well. I took a good look around, even sticking my head into the office of Jimmy Seidel, phantom lawyer. I flipped on the light in his office and wondered, not for the first time, how the man managed to run a business when he was never around. Because he has Emma, I answered myself. Without her, this business would have folded long ago. I wondered if he was aware of that. She kept the whole place going almost single-handedly. She even kept the plants in his office watered so the poor things wouldn’t die of neglect. While I was thinking in that vein, I noticed that the potted pothos on the corner of Jimmy’s desk, one of the most death-defiant plants on the face of the earth, had several yellow leaves and went over to investigate. Sure enough, the dirt was dry as a bone.

  I located the water pitcher Emma kept on the credenza behind her desk and trudged back down the stairs to fill it from the visitors’ bathroom. Halfway back up the stairs with the filled pitcher, I heard the distinctive sound of the light switch in Jimmy’s office clicking off. The space above me went dark, and I froze where I stood. For fully thirty seconds I stood stock still, every sense straining to come up with some logical reason why I had heard what I heard and seen what I’d seen. Only one presented itself. I did not want to accept it, but ultimately, I had no choice. For who knows how long, someone else had been in the Law Barn with me, someone who did not want me to see him.

  Unless I was very much mistaken, I had just taken elaborate pains to lock myself in with Prudy Crane’s murderer.

  Eleven

  For a few more seconds my thoughts skittered around aimlessly. Then the confusion lifted, and I knew exactly what to do. Almost ca
lmly, I set the pitcher of water down on the step above me and turned around as quietly as I could. If Mort Delahanty was up there, he wasn’t anxious for me to discover him, or he would have made his move when I let myself into Jimmy’s office. If he had intended to harm me, he easily could have overpowered me there, but he had remained hidden and silent. When he heard me go back down the stairs, he must have assumed I wasn’t coming back. He had no way of knowing that I intended to return to water Jimmy’s plant. Obviously, he was hoping I would finally lead him to what he had been after for days, if not weeks. The diaries, I thought wearily. He’s here for the damned diaries.

  I pictured the last volume of Harriett’s chronicles lying face up where I had dropped it on the couch in the lobby. How long had Delahanty been in the Law Barn? It would not have been especially difficult to enter unseen. Jenny had been absent from the lobby for long stretches, as had the rest of us, for one reason or another throughout the day. He easily could have slipped in the back door when we were all out front after lunch and nipped up the stairs to conceal himself in one of the many nooks and crannies the old structure afforded. Perhaps he had recognized my car in the service alley and decided that I had the diaries with me inside.

  Suddenly, I was tired to the bone of the whole situation. To hell with the diaries, I thought. If that’s what he wants, let him have the one on the couch. I don’t care anymore. It’s not worth dying for. My next thought was that at least one person, and possibly more, had already died. As quietly and quickly as I could manage it, I slipped off my shoes and descended the last few steps, keeping close to the wall to minimize the creaking of the old planks. Crossing the softly lit lobby, I scurried into the coatroom and fumbled for the pressure point on the paneling behind the coat rack. My fingers located it by instinct, and the door popped open silently. Two more seconds, and I was safely within the secret room. I knew that the lamplight would not be visible under the door, because Margo and I had checked that out, but I was still reluctant to turn it on.

  I sat in the easy chair in the dark, my knees pulled up to my chest, and waited for my heart to stop thundering while I considered what to do next. Too bad my cell phone was still being held as evidence. For once, the annoying device would have come in very handy. Then I remembered that I had Emma’s phone, and it was right here in the reading room with me. Best of all, Delahanty had no way of knowing about my sanctuary, so I was perfectly safe as long as I stayed in here. I could call the police, Margo, and anybody else I felt like calling and just sit here and wait for them to come and rescue me. My relief was almost palpable.

  I remembered that I had muted the phone and set it on the edge of the vanity cabinet while I read. Moving carefully, I stood up and shuffled in the direction of the vanity, moving my outstretched hands from side to side. I located the edge of the cabinet and felt gingerly along its surface until I felt the contours of the little phone. I clutched at it gleefully—and dropped it from a height of four feet onto the tiles surround the base of the cabinet, where it bounced messily and spun to a stop. No! I dropped to all fours and felt carefully around me. I found the edge of the carpet, the contrasting coolness of the tile flooring, and then the pieces of what used to be Emma’s phone. She’s going to kill me if Mort Delahanty doesn’t get to me first and save her the trouble.

  At this point Rational Kate stepped up to assess the situation. Just look at yourself, crawling around in the dark on your hands and knees at your age so some obsessed halfwit won’t find you in a place he has no way to know even exists. Get hold of yourself. Margo and Emma are safely out of the way. Lieutenant Harkness and Rick Fletcher will check things out when you don’t answer the telephone. There are about a thousand people right outside the front door. Turn on the table lamp before you break a leg, sit down like a big girl, and wait for help to arrive.

  I imagined the picture I must have made creeping about on the floor and started to giggle. Then I took my own advice and groped my way back to the chair, sat in it, and snapped on the lamp. Warm light bathed the little room, and I felt calmer immediately. I looked at my watch. Six-thirty. It wouldn’t be long now.

  Rustling sounds in the vicinity of my left ear reminded me that I had left the listening tube uncapped. If I listened carefully, maybe I could tell what Delahanty was up to in the lobby. If he found the diary on the couch, maybe he would just take it and leave. I pressed my ear to the opening hopefully. Sure enough, I could hear cautious footfalls crossing the lobby from the stairs. By cupping my hand around my ear, I could make out the shuffling of papers. He must be at Jenny’s desk, right beneath the other end of the listening tube where it was hidden by the hideous self-portrait. Silence for a few seconds, and then the careful footsteps began again, this time heading away from the desk. A pause, then a grunt of satisfaction, followed by the sound of turning pages. He had found the diary.

  Now that Delahanty had found what he had been seeking so desperately, I considered what he might do with it, but I didn’t have to wonder for long. The sound of pages being torn violently from their binding filtered into my ear, then crumpling and more tearing. I wasn’t worried. Both Margo and Emma had seen not only the diary but the precise entries that seemed to implicate Delahanty in some ancient scandal, so it wouldn’t be Mort’s word against mine. If it came down to it, it would be him against all three of us, so let him destroy the thing. It mattered not to me. Silence followed the ripping and crumpling. Then I heard a familiar, raspy clicking that I could not quite identify at first. A few seconds more, and it came to me. It was the sound of a cigarette lighter, like the little Bic I had used years ago when I smoked. Mort was going to burn the diary, then, but where? I hadn’t heard the sound of Jenny’s metal wastebasket being dragged from underneath her desk to make a receptacle for the blaze. I hadn’t heard anything except ripping and tearing, followed by the clicking of the lighter. So where was this fire being set?

  I cupped my hand more tightly around my ear as little prickles of alarm started up again on the back of my neck. The Law Barn was old and constructed primarily of wood. We were forever being inspected by fire officials and representatives of our insurance company to be sure the appropriate number of functioning fire extinguishers, automatic sprinklers and other precautions were in place. Despite all that, we were very aware of the fire hazard presented by the old tinderbox and made sure that any smoking of cigarettes or pipes took place outside near containers of sand provided for the butts. That was one of the reasons that Jimmy and all of us at MACK Realty were solidly in favor of the proposed smoking ban. How ironic it would be if the Law Barn were torched by a cigarette lighter on the night of the hearing on a no-smoking ordinance.

  After a minute or so of silence, I heard more paper being torn and crumpled, much more than Delahanty could have ripped out of the diary. The phone book, I thought, or maybe files extracted from Jenny’s desk drawers. I heard one after the other of them being yanked open, followed by the file cabinet behind her desk. Was the man building a bonfire in our lobby? Immediately, I knew that was precisely what he was doing. Whatever flame retardancy the old sofa once had must be gone long since, so it would make a lovely base on which to heap even more combustible materials. Having lit the pile with his cigarette lighter, he would have little trouble feeding the flames with the materials readily available around him. I pictured him in a frenzy of arson, destroying Jenny’s beautifully kept files in the growing flames. How long before he was satisfied with his work and left the building so that I could escape from my hiding place?

  After what seemed like an eternity, but was probably only a few minutes, the footsteps resumed, but not in the direction of the back door as I had supposed. Instead, they were headed for the front of the building, away from the listening tube. He must truly be mad to make his exit in full view of that crowd. Smoke would have to be billowing by now, and when he threw open the front door, the draft of air would accelerate the fire enormously. I left my chair and put my ear to the crack of the door, hoping to hear
him exit. A sudden banging on the door startled me so that I fell backward and narrowly missed hitting my head on the edge of the vanity.

  “I know you’re in there,” he growled fiercely, pounding the door again for emphasis. “You won’t be getting up to any more of your mischief, Missus. It’s done now, all done, you hear me?” A final smack.

  Then I heard him dragging the coat rack away from the door. Already full of adrenaline, my heart racing, I braced myself to fight for my life. If he knew about the reading room, he must know how to get into it. I probably wouldn’t win, but I’d go down fighting, I promised myself. I’d want Emma and Joey to know that I fought like hell.

  But the door didn’t open. Instead, I heard Delahanty grunting with effort as he heaved and pushed something very heavy through the coatroom and jammed it against my door. My god, he was barricading the door with Jenny’s desk. I was going to burn to death in this tarted-up bathroom unless I could find some way to attract the attention of the crowd just outside the building.

  “Help!” I screamed futilely, unable to fight the hysteria that rose in my chest. “Please help me somebody!” I pounded on the door, the walls, any surface I could reach, on the chance that part of the wall was hollow enough for sound to penetrate. “You’ve got to help me. I’m trapped in the Law Barn!”

  In desperation, I began tearing books from the shelves next to the chair. Maybe the wall was thinner behind them. I peered between the empty shelves and saw something that resembled a doorbell. I must be delusional as well as hysterical. With absolutely nothing to lose, I pushed it. With a protesting groan of long un-oiled hinges, the entire set of shelves popped open on one side and slowly swung open, revealing what looked like a shallow closet. Cold night air huffed in from the plank wall beyond, which must have been a door at one time. Instinctively, I moved toward it and put my mouth against a crack.