“Forget about that phone now,” Claire ordered. “Michael Danning can take care of himself. He’s been in worse scrapes all over the world. I even imagine he has been in worse prisons than we have here in Glen Cove. It can’t hurt him to be locked up for a day or two. He doesn’t need you running after him like a nanny. Sit down to eat. The kettle is already on for tea. And hand me the butter, will you?”
Vicky nodded and fetched the butter. But her mind was on the other number on the sheet. The one Michael had not known. There was an easy way to find out whom it belonged to.
Simply call it and see who answered.
Her fingers trembled as she punched in the numbers. Behind her back Claire grumbled that nobody ever listened to her, while she was putting bread into the toaster.
“Good morning,” a friendly female voice said on the other end of the line, “Rowland Loan, Mortgage and Investment. How may I help you?”
Vicky disconnected in a rush, as if she had burned herself.
The number belonged to Deke Rowland’s company. Deke Rowland, Cash’s brother. Why on earth would Mortimer Gill have wanted to call him?
She leaned against the sink to cut some cheese off the chunk. Deke had been dating Diane back then. It had been pretty serious, because when Diane had gotten her grant to study in Europe, Deke had planned on going there too, and had even tried for a job there.
But his parents had never approved of the relationship and after Celine’s disappearance and Diane’s hasty departure, they had forced Deke to change colleges. After his graduation he had been moved into a good job at a law firm and once he had met his current wife and planned to marry her, his father had set him up in that investment firm.
She wondered how Deke had felt about Diane’s return to Glen Cove. It had to have stirred up a lot of old memories.
Mr. Pug wound himself around her feet, and she cuddled him, even giving him some cheese, which was normally against the law. She was just glad to be out and about again.
Free.
As she sat down to eat, the phone rang. Vicky wanted to jump at it, but Claire had it first and answered. Vicky held her breath that it would be Diane already, or some bad news about Michael, about prolonged incarceration. Her mother was at the center of all intelligence in Glen Cove. If something was up, she’d be the first to know.
Claire listened intently, saying a lot of well, well, well. Vicky could just hear the cogwheels in her mother’s head churning. As soon as the call was finished, she asked her what was up. Her mouth was dry, thinking Michael was in real trouble now.
“Guess what they found in Mortimer Gill’s place?” Claire refilled her teacup. “A pink hair curler. Now Gwenda hasn’t lived there in months, so there must be some woman involved. A new live-in girlfriend, who got sick of his birds and his scraping, clubbed him and took his money? Maybe Gwenda herself came back and clubbed him for the money.”
“What money?” Vicky asked automatically, putting jelly on her toast. “Mortimer Gill had no money. Gwenda blamed him for it, even divorced him for it.”
“That is what everybody believes. But it seems Mortimer had just ordered a brand-new van to transport his birds in. With lettering and all, advertising his falconry business. That suggests he had some money.”
Claire leaned over. “Gwenda has claimed for years that Mortimer had a source of income that he was hiding from everybody, including the IRS. A little far-fetched if you ask me. Like some mason with a few birds has a secret bank account in the Cayman Islands!”
Claire huffed. “Still he did order this van. So he must have had some money nobody knew about.”
Or had some money coming? Gwenda had known about a scam in the making. She had wanted a part in it, in any case, a part in its proceeds. Would Gwenda know what Mortimer had taken from Perkins’ barn?
Would she also know who was implicated in it?
It could be the very person who had killed Mortimer.
Suddenly in a big hurry, Vicky jumped up from her chair. If she went to the store right now, she might call at Gwenda’s door right beside it, to offer her condolences about Mortimer’s death and ask about the scam he was supposed to undertake.
Maybe she could convince Gwenda it was in her own interest to tell the truth now and not wait until the police would make her. If somebody had killed Mortimer for what he knew, and suspected Gwenda knew something too, the woman could be in mortal danger.
“Don’t think you can get to Gwenda,” Claire called after her in a loud voice.
Vicky halted at the back door, caught red-handed. Why was her mother so good at reading minds? “How come?”
“Nobody saw Gwenda today.” Claire waved her knife covered with butter. “Or yesterday afternoon after five for that matter. She drove out of town and it’s like she’s vanished from the face of the earth.” Claire waited a moment to let the revelation sink in. “Mrs. Jones called at her apartment several times and she doesn’t answer the door. Or the phone. It just goes to prove she took off with the money after she killed Mortimer.”
“In Gwenda’s position I wouldn’t open the door for Mrs. Jones either. Having to talk to all those curious people…” Vicky made a face. “I imagine Gwenda is hiding, or that she left town for a day or two, just to escape the consternation surrounding her ex’s murder. It doesn’t prove she is actually involved in his death.”
It was a pity Gwenda was gone though as she could be holding all the interesting information.
Vicky pushed the back door open. “I’m off to the store, Mom. I’ll take the dogs along so they can have their exercise. Come on, Mr. Pug, Coco.”
The dogs scampered to get to her first and dive outside into the fresh morning air and the bright sunshine.
Marge immediately embraced the possibility that Mortimer Gill had illegally taken items from Perkins’ barn. “It’s so like him!” she exclaimed. “I didn’t exactly think he’d go blackmailing people or anything, but…”
She looked for the right term. “My husband once called him an opportunist. Someone who sees a sudden chance and takes it, without thinking about whether it’s the right thing to do. Not seeing risks either or the possibility of other people getting hurt. Maybe Mortimer was only curious about the files people were talking about. But when that barn burned down, Mortimer must have believed he had a way to get some money. He did mind a lot that people looked down on him because he worked with his hands. And Gwenda humiliated him during their marriage and at the divorce saying he could never give her anything pretty or valuable. Must have stung. Sad really.”
“I guess Mortimer had his reasons for acting like he did.” Vicky nodded in agreement. “Still taking those files was a big thing, especially thinking he could use them somehow. Against somebody, you’d assume.”
“Yes, I wonder what he wanted with those phone numbers,” Marge mused, giving Mr. Pug a back rub. The dog grunted and wriggled under her hands to get more.
Coco was more timid than usual in these strange surroundings and stayed close to Vicky.
“Yeah…” Vicky sighed. “Deke Rowland’s, Diane’s and Michael’s, in that order. Now we know he never called Michael before he died.