Death On Demand Part 15

Jeff Farley stood unsmiling on the porch. The two-story, weathered wooden house on pilings overlooked a dune bright with October color, the pale violet of b.u.t.terfly peas and the s.h.i.+mmering gold of camphorweed. Beyond the dune, the beach stretched two hundred peaceful yards to the ocean. No other dwelling was within view. Annie stood halfway up the wooden steps, clinging to the railing, and the wind off the ocean touched her with the light fresh scent of salt. This was a choice beachfront exposure on a perfect autumn day, yet there was a sense of darkness and isolation here. Did it come from the almost feral gleam in Jeff Farley's light brown eyes? He didn't look much like an overage cheerleader now, though he wore white duck pants and a white knit V-neck pullover with navy trim. He stood rigidly, his arms tight against his sides.

"I need to talk to you, Jeff." Annie raised her voice against the rumble of the surf.

"We're busy." His voice was flat and hostile. He was turning away to close the door on her.

"Then you want me to give Elliot's information to Chief Saulter?"

Jeff stiffened, then jerked around to face her. He lunged toward the ladder.

"What the h.e.l.l are you talking about?"

"Look, Jeff, I've come out here to give you and Janis a chance to explain.

If you can't or won't, I don't have any choice but to go to Saulter. You must see that."

The screen door behind Jeff burst open, and Jan is rushed to the railing.

Annie's eyes widened. The right side of the girl's face was painfully swollen. A reddish-purple bruise spread from cheekbone to jawline, hideously distinct against her pallid skin.

Jeff glanced distractedly toward his wife. "Get back inside."

Janis looked at him fearfully, but she took one step, another, then ran to the edge of the stairs. "Oh, Annie, please don't tell. He can't help it. He doesn't mean it, it just happens sometimes. He gets so mad, and that's what they did to him when he was a little boy. That and worse. They burned him-"

Jeff caught her from behind and whirled her around. The back of his hand hit her face with a stinging slap.

Janis screamed as the blow struck that inflamed skin.

Annie yelled, "Stop that! Stop it!" Pulling the mace out of her pocket, she charged up the porch steps.

He was using his fists now, raining blows on Janis's bent back as she huddled against the wall of the beach house.

A stream of spray from the mace container caught the side of Jeff's face.

He staggered back, his hands clawing at his face. A spasm of coughing and choking convulsed his body.

Janis, blood trickling from her mouth, turned toward Annie, arms flailing, and lunged vengefully at her, screaming incoherent curses as she rained blows on her astonished protectress. Max shot up the steps and caught Janis by the arms, imprisoning her.

"It's just mace. He'll be all right. My G.o.d, Janis, I had to stop him. He was hurting you!"

"He didn't mean it. You've got to understand. He doesn't mean to hurt me. He loves me," she whimpered brokenly. "You can't know what he's endured-"

"Did Jeff threaten Elliot when he knew Elliot was going to tell everyone?"

"That wouldn't matter," Janis said desperately. "It doesn't matter what he said-or what he does to me. Jeff wouldn't kill anyone. That's crazy.

He wouldn't kill Elliot-or Jill or Harriet. Never."

"But he beats you," Annie said wearily.

"He doesn't mean it." Janis held out trembling hands. "Please, please don't tell anyone. If you do-"

"Shut up, Janis. Don't be a b.l.o.o.d.y fool." Jeff's face was mottled with rage and pain.

"Janis, don't stay here with him. Come with us. You can stay with me,"

Annie offered.

Janis wiped the blood away from her chin. Her eyes filled with tears, but she shook her head. She wouldn't come with them no matter how they protested.

"You'll have to get him to a doctor," Annie said urgently, "or one of these days, he will kill you."

But Janis wouldn't leave him.

"We'll have to tell Saulter," Max said grimly as they drove back to the main part of the island.

"If it gets in the papers, they'll be finished."

"Finished? What do you mean?"

"As writers."

"What does wife beating have to do with writing?"

"Probably not much-except in their case. They write for children. Do you think a children's publisher is going to keep an author who regularly bloodies his wife? Think again, Mr. Darling."

"Oh. So they have a h.e.l.l of a motive. Both of them."

"Not her. She can't do anything without him."

"May I remind you that she was ready to tear your eyes out when she thought he was threatened. What do you think she would do to somebody like Elliot who was going to spread all this out for the enlightenment of the Sunday Night Regulars?"

"Punch him. At the least. Still, I can't believe Janis would have the gumption to figure out such a clever plan. But Jeff could-and she'd never give him away."

As the Porsche zoomed away from the beach house, Annie said tightly, "You know, I'd almost give Elliot's murderer a gold star-if it weren't for Jill and Harriet and Uncle Ambrose."

They were soon arguing over their next stop, Max plumping for Kelly Rizzoli, Annie preferring Capt. Mac, when a siren shrilled behind them.

Max pulled over. "Thirty miles an hour. I swear, I was going thirty miles an hour."

But Broward's Rock's only motorcycle cop was having a Mannix day. He wasn't thinking speed limits.

He dismounted and leaned down to look past Max. "Chief Saulter wants to see you, Miss."

Chief Saulter didn't want Max there, but Max wouldn't budge.

"You can talk to my client only if I am present, Chief." Max folded his hands across his chest and looked immovable.

"I can put your client in jail, Counselor."

"What charge?"

"How about first-degree murder?"

"I'll have her out on bail in two hours. You don't have a sc.r.a.p of evidence."

The police chief clenched his jaws and built a teepee with his fingers.

With a wrenching effort, he tried conciliation.

"Ms. Laurance, I just want some cooperation out of you. If you didn't kill the vet and Morgan and Edelman and your uncle, you should want to help the authorities."

"Four people. You honestly think I killed four people!"

"Somebody did, and you profit, young lady. You profit."

"Actually, Chief, Ms. Laurance doesn't have a financial motive."

Miraculously, Max sounded casual and good-humored.

"Sure she does." Saulter ticked it off on his fingers. "She's broke. She inherits her uncle's estate, including the bookshop- and you know how she feels about that bookshop. Goodbye, Uncle. The rest of them are protection. Somehow Morgan figures out she shoved Ambrose into the drink and that spelled finish for him. Plus Morgan is threatening to run her out of business with a rent she couldn't pay. The vet is knocked off to get the medicine, and that d.a.m.n Edelman busybody poked her nose into a buzz saw."

Max ran a hand through his hair and shook his head placidly. "Nope.

YouYe off base. See, if Annie wants money-or needs money-all she has to do is marry me." His dark eyes glinted. "And, after all, Chief, that's a lot easier than going around slugging, darting, and bludgeoning -and guaranteed to be more fun."

Saulter opened his mouth, and Annie knew he intended to ask tartly just how much money Max had. As his eyes moved from Max to the window with the red Porsche in view, he abruptly closed his mouth.

"I intend neither to kill for money-nor marry for money," Annie said acidly. Her counselor was finding this altogether too amusing for her taste.

"You never told anybody here on Broward's Rock about this fellow?"

"No, but-"

"Annie, tell the man truly. Could you marry me anytime you want to?"

"Yes, but-"

"So no motive." Resting his case, Max lifted his hands, palms upward.

Annie glared.

"If you two can direct your minds back to the murders, and away from me, we might get somewhere. Chief, we believe the same person who killed Elliot murdered my uncle. Somebody has stolen his ma.n.u.script."

Saulter stiffened like a dog on point. "His book about the murderers who got away with it?"

For the first time since the lights went out in Death On Demand, Annie felt a glimmer of hope. Saulter knew about Uncle Ambrose's book.

Surely he would understand the implications of a missing ma.n.u.script.

She longed irrationally to present him with a copy of The Bay Psalm Murder.

"Exactly. Max and I figure that he found out about a crime involving somebody here on the island and-"

"Naw. I'd talked to Ambrose about his murders. He was interested in the Armbruster case." Saulter's forehead wrinkled. "And the Vinson suicide, so-called. And he mentioned the Winningham thing." The sudden flash of interest in those agate eyes faded. "None of that has a thing to do with anybody here. That's a false trail."

"The ma.n.u.script is missing."

"Sure." He might as well have said, "Good try."

"Look, Chief, you aren't going to pin this on me. If you won't help, I guess Max and I will have to find the murderer by ourselves. But you can at least listen to what we've discovered-"

Max was semaphoring messages with his eyebrows, but she was too angry to pay any attention.

"To begin with, Emma Clyde, Hal Douglas, and Jeff and Janis Farley all had terrific motives to get rid of Elliot."

"Is that so?" Saulter's tone wasn't encouraging, and Annie knew he was thinking in particular of Emma Clyde's considerable wealth and power.

A leading citizen like Emma could do a lot to influence next year's elections.

"That is so. Emma Clyde killed her second husband. She pushed him off her boat and let him drown. And Hal Douglas killed hs wife and buried her in the mountains in California, and-"

"Young lady!" Saulter boomed.

"Annie, my G.o.d!" Max cried.

She raised her voice resolutely: "And Jeff Farley beats his wife."

Saulter's palm thumped on his desk and the in-box slewed sideways. In the silence that followed, he scrutinized Annie with chilly contempt.

"Just how do you know all this, Ms. Laurance?"

Abruptly, Annie understood Max's semaph.o.r.e. Oh, what an incredibly appropriate word "dumbstruck" is. She stared at Saulter. She wished she'd been born a deaf-mute. No, look what happened in The Spiral Staircase.

"Come now, Ms. Laurance, you're helping us quite a lot. But how do you know this?"

Annie picked words as carefully as footfalls on a canyon ledge.

"I keep telling you. Elliot Morgan had his big scene all planned, and everyone knew it was coming. Sunday night he was going to tell about a lot of very unpleasant things that people didn't want known." She described Elliot's planned book. "You see, the things he was going to talk about were criminal activities."

For the first time, she had Saulter's attention. "Criminal activities by all these people?" Saulter leaned forward. If he had been a dog, his nose would have twitched.

"The people who were at your bookstore-Mr. and Mrs. Farley, Emma Clyde, Hal Douglas, Kelly Rizzoli, Capt. McElroy, Harriet Edelman, Fritz Hemphill-and you, Ms. Laurance."

The last, her name, had a full, rolling sound like a tumbril on a cobbled Paris street.

That night in Santa Fe. Emily had been wrong-as the law sees right and wrong-but Annie had never regretted helping her. And she'd do it again without hesitation.