Yes, Mark had a heart of gold. Of course, these admiring comments began circulating right after he announced that everything was insured to the hilt, so there would be plenty of money to reimburse everyone for the slightest effort made on Phantom’s behalf. Everyone would be paid in full for everything, regardless of the disaster.
A rush was made to fax Phantom the news about the current status of his home-to-be. He was advised to divert his path from Wyndham, since they were no longer ready to receive him. A reply, received later, was read aloud by Skip to those assembled — crammed — into the Town Hall at four on the afternoon of the fire. When he added that Phantom would be checking into a prominent Los Angeles hospital for his rest, it nearly broke the listeners’ hearts. “We’ll rebuild this house!” shouted someone. “Better than ever! Fireproof!” cried others.
Then Skip tactfully informed the villagers that Phantom would never be coming to Wyndham. The loss of his beloved possessions was too bitter a memory to face. The listeners became teary-eyed and a few in the back of the room sobbed openly. The Village Board trustees stared at each other in dismay. Years of prosperity, up in smoke.
Just as people were beginning to stir, to console each other with reminders of how many had benefited from Phantom over the last weeks, a reporter from the local paper, Mr. Scott Bade, strode into the crowded hall.
Instead of joining in the general mood of mourning, Scott snatched a chair from the mayor’s platform and stood on it, waving his arms for attention. Cupping his hands around his mouth, he announced that the name of the heir to Aisa Garrett’s company, North Shore Industries Corporation, had just been made public by the corporation’s lawyer. As some listeners loudly questioned “why bring that up now?” the reporter continued: “The heir, folks, the heir! Instead of Mr. Matthew Drexel — it’s Ms. Peggy Marcastle, personal secretary and executive assistant of Aisa Garrett. She now owns all of Mr. Garrett’s assets, including controlling shares of stock in NSIC, which pretty much makes her the owner of North Shore Industries Corporation!” Scott surveyed the packed room in satisfaction as every man and woman there froze in shocked silence.
When he judged they’d absorbed that bit of news, he blurted, “And not just that, folks! Mr. Matthew Drexel, former executive vice president of North Shore Industries, is to be arrested shortly for the murder of Aisa Garrett.” Seemingly unconcerned, or maybe just ignoring the fact that the possibly slandered Drexel was at this moment standing up on Mayor Harper’s platform next to the mayor, he continued, “Detectives from the Sixth Precinct Homicide Department will be making their arrest based on the evidence found in Aisa Garrett’s body during an autopsy.
“This poison, identified as Tri-Zan, is the same stuff that poisoned Mr. Daniels’ construction crew at Phantom’s house. Mr. Drexel had access to the poison, which was banned from Long Island after World War II, by having been put in charge of ridding NSIC of its old supply of Tri-Zan ten years ago during NSIC’s cleanup campaign, which many here will remember. A stash of it was found in his private office for which he will be asked to account.”
And with that, Scott jumped down from his perch, beaming at the stunned villagers. Only a few noticed the “okay” sign he flashed with his thumb and fingers to someone at the back of the room.
Then, breaking this silence, came a loud, high-pitched anguished, “Noooooo!” To the mayor’s astonishment, this undignified yelp had come from the mouth of Mr. Drexel. Mr. Drexel leaped from the mayor’s platform. He forged a path through the tightly packed people with his fists, propelled by furious energy.
Those standing near Ms. Marcastle at the back of the room, unaware of the goal of Mr. Drexel’s journey, turned to congratulate her. For the moment, however, Ms. Marcastle seemed unable to offer a coherent thank you since her mouth had dropped open at the announcement of Mr. Garrett’s new heir — herself! — and was still sagging in that position from the idea that her beloved Mr. Garrett had been murdered.
Suddenly Mr. Drexel reached her side and lunged, with flexing fingers, towards her throat. Ms. Marcastle’s dazed fumble for escape was prevented by the mass of villagers packed into the room. Observers began to scream.
At that moment Mrs. Risk appeared between Mr. Drexel and Ms. Marcastle and effectively blocked his progress with her body. Nobody remembered seeing the witch nearby a moment ago, which many took as confirmation of their opinion that she was truly supernatural.
Then Mrs. Risk spoke. Her low vibrant voice cut through the mayhem and silenced it.
“So you’ve discovered all your plans to be fruitless, have you, Matthew?”
Mr. Drexel was brought up short by the question. Slowly his hands lowered, as if his earlier manic energy was being drained from him. His face reflected an agonized bewilderment. He blinked at the witch, then looked around him, although without any apparent awareness of his audience.
“I don’t understand,” he said to her in a peculiarly high-pitched tone. “Wasn’t he already buried? I went to the funeral myself. When did they do an autopsy?”
Homicide Detective Michael Hahn reached him at just that moment and with a heavy hand, pushed him none too gently by the shoulder into a chair. Detective Hahn aimed a commanding frown at the surrounding onlookers, and most of them shuffled back a foot or so.
Mrs. Risk, however, stayed close beside Mr. Drexel. Her eyes flashed with a black fire, but her voice sounded only detached... casual... as if she merely wondered about some things.
“Aisa’s doctor ordered him to drink two carafes of water every day and you knew it. You added Tri-Zan to the carafe on his desk that Peggy kept filled with water for him. You’re the one who slipped that same Tri-Zan into the bottled water to poison Phantom’s construction crew, too, aren’t you.” She didn’t make it sound like a question.
He gave a short, bitter laugh. “When Aisa took over, he found that North Shore still had a supply of the banned rat poison left over from decades ago. He put me in charge of disposing of it, along with everything else. I never got around to it. I could use all I wanted and nobody would miss it, since nobody was supposed to still have any.”
“But the well water would’ve made the crew sick eventually, that was the joke, wasn’t it, Matthew?” she said.
Mr. Drexel looked aside but nodded.
“Because it was tainted with gas,” said Mrs. Risk. “The water table was slowly being polluted from those pipeline leaks you were supposed to clean up and eliminate years ago. You never finished that job, either, did you?”
“I started it, but the costs were astronomical. The pipes were so old — the engineers said they had pinhole leaks, maybe even only one or two, that we couldn’t find. The only solution they recommended was to dig up and replace the entire pipeline. I did replace some of it, but there were miles of pipes!”
“And since you were in charge, you were able to keep anyone at the company from knowing all the facts of the cleanup operation, weren’t you? Nobody but you knew that you’d left it unfinished. And so, slowly, gas has continued to leak into the water table at the east end of the village. The leak hadn’t spread to my property yet, and the only people living between NSIC and Phantom’s property are rarely there to notice anything. The plots are so large on my side of town it played to your advantage, isn’t that right, Matthew?”