Last Puzzle & Testament (2 page)
Read Last Puzzle & Testament Online
Authors: Parnell Hall
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
IT ALL BEGAN WITH A BREAK-IN.
A botched break-in.
It might have gone differently if the intruder had been sober, but Jeff Beasley, in addition to a penchant for illegal entry, also had a weakness for alcohol, and when confronted with the daunting prospect of the Hurley house, had fortified himself with a drink or three before heading out. Jeff had also seen fit to slip a half-pint of rye in his hip pocket, on the off chance his courage should happen to wane along the way. Whether it would have or not was a moot point, as Beasley managed to finish off the bottle before he even got there. Were it not for that, he might have been more careful. He might at least have broken a side window, instead of the one right next to the front door. But by then Beasley had lost grasp of some of the finer points of his trade. He staggered up onto the front porch of the huge, sprawling, gothic mansion, smashed the pane of glass with a rock, reached in, undid the lock, flung up the window, and fell right through, landing on the floor of the foyer in an ungainly heap.
Treating his clumpy entrance as a matter of course, Beasley sat up and took stock. The first thing he checked was his hip pocket. The bottle of rye wasn’t broken, but it wasn’t full, either. That surprised him. Somehow, he had expected to find it replenished. Refusing to abandon that hope, he jammed the empty bottle back in his pocket and staggered to his feet.
It was hard to keep his balance in the dark. Realizing that reminded Beasley of the flashlight he had slipped in his jacket pocket back in more rational times. He groped for it, pulled it out, switched it on. Winced to discover it was pointed directly at his face. It was several seconds before his eyes could focus. He stood there, swearing, blinking, with the light wandering aimlessly around the room. While Beasley got his bearings, the beam traveled over the red-velvet draperies, the mahogany-paneled walls, the silver candlestick holders, the marble-topped end tables.
The knight with the battle-ax!
Beasley staggered back in horror.
No, just an old suit of armor. Beasley gawked at it in amazement, his brain slowly processing what it was. For a fleeting second it occurred to Beasley to wonder if he really wanted to be doing this.
His flashlight lit up the circular front stairs with the carved wooden banister. Beasley reacted first with delight, then with increasing misgivings. On the one hand the stairs would lead to the master bedroom. On the other, they looked formidable.
Beasley’s trip up the stairs was perilous at best. While he did not actually crawl, he did not actually walk, either. He stopped once to catch his breath, once to sit, and once to recall whether he was going down or up.
Eventually he reached the top, shone the light around, and recoiled involuntarily from the grim visage of Evan Hurley in the huge oil painting that dominated the upstairs landing. The cold gray eyes of the venerable, bulldog-jowled former patriarch of the Hurley family seemed to look right through him, as if challenging his right to be there, and Beasley quickly averted the light.
Off the landing was a hallway with several doors. Beasley first tried a bathroom, a linen closet, and a knob that proved to be a brass wall ornament.
The next door was the jackpot. Even Beasley could tell. From the marble fireplace, Queen Anne chairs, vanity table crammed with cosmetics, and four-poster canopied bed, this had to be old lady Hurley’s room. Jeff Beasley shone the light around with a sense of satisfaction.
And confusion and doubt.
So much furniture.
So many places to look.
A rolltop writing desk in one corner of the room, with numerous drawers and cubbyholes, a veritable treasure chest, attracted his attention.
It did not hold it.
Beasley found himself drawn to the four-poster bed. He walked over to it, shone the light, touched the soft, puffy comforter, ran his hand over the smooth, polished, mahogany wood.
Jeff Beasley blinked, frowned.
Tried to remember why he was there.
It was nearly three hours later when Bakerhaven Police Chief Dale Harper, cruising North Elm Street on a routine patrol, stopped to check out an open window on the Hurley house. Old Mrs. Hurley had died the week before, the mansion had been locked up, and that window had no right to be open. So, on inspection, Chief Harper was not surprised to find there had been a break-in.
He was surprised to find the perpetrator sound asleep in Mrs. Hurley’s bed.
Sherry Carter was happy. She ran her hand through her hair, pushed the bangs off her forehead, tugged at her earlobe, and smiled across the table at Aaron Grant.
The young reporter was wearing a sports jacket with his shirt collar unbuttoned and the knot of his tie pulled down. His brown hair was wavy and slightly mussed. And he was clean shaven—it occurred to Sherry he was
always
clean shaven,
very
clean shaven, almost as if he was too young to shave.
“How’s your soup?” Aaron asked.
Sherry barely heard him. “Huh?”
“How’s your gazpacho?”
“Oh. It’s okay.”
“I could have warned you,” Aaron said. He gestured with his spoon. “Chicken soup you can’t go wrong. Anything else you take a chance.”
“I said it was okay.”
Aaron smiled. “Yes, you did. But
okay
is not a word of praise. It is an equivocation, indicating a reluctance to make a value judgment. And implying a less than favorable assessment.”
Sherry tried to scowl, but made a poor job of it. Her eyes twinkled. “Does everything with you have to be wordplay?”
“Not at all,” Aaron replied. “Just look me in the eye and tell me the truth—your gazpacho is barely adequate, and you could make much better yourself—which I am quite sure is a fact—and I would do nothing but agree.”
“Oh, you like women who brag about their accomplishments?”
“Who said anything about women? I like
people
who are straightforward. Sex doesn’t enter into it.”
“That’s for sure.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Does that happen to you often?”
“What?”
“That sex doesn’t enter into it?”
“Now who’s indulging in wordplay?”
“I wasn’t,” Sherry replied. “I was just looking you in the eye and telling you the truth.”
Aaron Grant laughed. Sherry laughed back. They found themselves leaning on their elbows, smiling at each other.
Aaron and Sherry were having lunch at the Wicker Basket, a small family restaurant on Drury Lane, just off Main Street in Bakerhaven, Connecticut. The restaurant was a step up from the local diner, featuring tables, not booths, with red-and-white-checkered tablecloths and linen napkins. It was a quiet, homey place, and while the food was nothing special, on this occasion the atmosphere was more important.
It was their first date.
And by Aaron and Sherry’s standards, it was going well. Even if they had taken refuge in the safety of wordplay. Both were linguists. Aaron was a writer, Sherry was a crossword-puzzle constructor, and as such they were highly competitive. Sherry loved sparring with Aaron, loved having an intellectual equal who was capable of giving it back as good as he got it. Bantering with Aaron Grant was a treat.
It was also safe.
It kept Sherry from exposing herself, from opening up, from talking about the things ack the ththat really mattered. Like their relationship, for instance, and where it was going.
There were lots of things unsaid.
Sherry was older than Aaron. Just a few years, but with an unsuccessful marriage to her credit. Aaron was only a year out of college and still lived with his parents, which made him seem young on the one hand, and precluded him inviting her up to his room on the other. Or so Sherry imagined. Their relationship hadn’t gotten to that point yet.
For her part, Sherry lived with her aunt. And while the much-married Cora Felton couldn’t have cared less if Sherry had invited Aaron over—on the contrary, from the start Cora had been the one pushing the relationship—Sherry still would have felt inhibited by her presence.
So they really had nowhere to go.
As if that weren’t enough impediment to the relationship, Sherry had one more stumbling block.
Sherry’s aunt, Cora Felton, was famous. She was known as the Puzzle Lady, both for her national TV ads and for her syndicated crossword-puzzle column. Two hundred and fifty-six newspapers carried that column, including Aaron’s paper, the
Bakerhaven Gazette.
Cora Felton’s beaming face appeared in the
Gazette
every morning.
That in itself would not have been a problem, but Cora Felton didn’t write the crossword-puzzle column.
Sherry did.
Cora Felton merely provided the image. Her face was Sherry’s conception of what the Puzzle Lady should be. Which apparently was everybody else’s, for the Puzzle Lady puzzles were wildly popular.
At the moment, this too was complicating Sherry Carter and Aaron Grant’s relationship.
Aaron knew Sherry was the Puzzle Lady.
Sherry didn’t know he knew it.
Aaron had found out while covering the Graveyard Killings, as the Bakerhaven murders had come to be known, figured it out himself and then finessed a confirmation out of Cora Felton, who couldn’t stand up to his cross-examination. Cora had left the task of telling Sherry up to him. So far he hadn’t gotten around to it.
Though, Aaron realized, that wasn’t quite the case. In fact, it wasn’t the case at all. It wasn’t that he hadn’t gotten around to it. Aaron wanted to tell Sherry more than anything. It was one of the reasons he’d invited her to lunch. And yet, he still hadn’t told her.
Because, more than anything, he wanted
her
to tell
him.
It really bothered him that she hadn’t. That after all they’d been through together, she didn’t trust him enough to let him know. Not that Aaron couldn’t make allowances. He knew Sherry had suffered at the hands of her alcoholic ex-husband. But he knew that from Cora, not from Sherry. And he wanted to hear the truth from Sherry badly, so badly he was holding off telling her just to give her the opportunity.