“That’s great,” the chief retorted, “but you still need electricity. And we ain’t got any in Lilac Cottage.”
“Exactly. That’s why I’m sure it’s Daley. He has a computer, and other than the vicar, he’s the only one close enough to be supplying electricity. I couldn’t find it, but there must be an underground wire from his house to Lilac Cottage.”
Merrill looked underwhelmed. “But why would he do it? And what am I supposed to do, arrest him for impersonating a ghost? Break in and demand to see his computer? The D.A. would bust a gut. Naw, you’ll have to do better’n that, professor.” He rose and stretched. “Gotta go. Saturday’s my big night. Never know when someone’ll get drunk and steal the Coke machine again. I’ll see ya later.”
After he left, Findlay did some hard thinking and hoped Merrill wouldn’t do the same, for he didn’t want that wire found until he’d puzzled this out. The chief was right about one thing. Why would Daley do it? It couldn’t be a ruse to frighten people away from Lilac Cottage; every person who could walk was going there because of the lights. A diversion, perhaps? Was the plan to keep people away from somewhere else? Findlay could feel his blood pressure mount. Away from where? The bank? The pharmacy? Then it hit him. The diamond sale! Daley would, no doubt, have added inventory for the event. Insured inventory. If he was in financial difficulty, what better time for a robbery?
Findlay didn’t sleep well that night. He faced the moral dilemma of whether to expose Daley now for the hoax or wait and catch him in the act of robbing his own store. He copped out by deciding to let the chief decide.
The idea of a jewel robbery caught Merrill’s imagination. He didn’t see any dilemma at all. Daley was a nice enough fellow, but if he was going to rob his store, he deserved to be caught doing it. He made plans to get additional police from another town. When the lights flashed this week, the store, the bank, and the pharmacy would be watched, as well as Lilac Cottage.
Friday night Findlay elected to remain with the crowd on High Street; Merrill had promised to sound his siren when Daley was apprehended. The atmosphere was charged that night, for almost at once the green lamp signaled, “Charles, I didn’t leave you. I was murdered.” Clever of Daley, Findlay thought. No one will leave now. It was then, with everyone jostling for a better view, that Findlay found himself standing next to Daley himself.
The jeweler smiled at him. “Evening, professor. Quite a show tonight.”
Findlay could hardly believe his eyes. He had been so certain. Where had he gone wrong? His heart sank as he pictured Merrill’s embarrassment when the much-touted robbery didn’t take place.
“You okay, professor?” Daley looked concerned.
Just then the siren began to wail.
Findlay was only momentarily confused. “I’m fine, Mr. Daley, but you’d better come with me. I think there’s something going on at your store.”
Findlay filled him in as they hurried to the chief’s tiny office behind the drugstore, carefully omitting any mention of Daley’s role as prime suspect. By the time they arrived, a Hancock County sheriff’s car was on its way to pick up the prisoner.
“Here’s your thief,” Merrill beamed. “Caught him up to his elbows in your diamonds, Mr. Daley.”
“But that’s George Stevens, my handyman!” Daley exclaimed.
All Findlay said was, “Call the D.A. first thing tomorrow. I’m dying to see how he did it.”
With Daley and two sheriff’s deputies, they went through Lilac Cottage the next morning. They found a small metal box wired into the electrical service panel in the cellar. In the living room, above the window, a projector peeped through a slit in the curtain valance. Stevens had evidently stayed close to the wall when he installed it so his footprints couldn’t be seen from the window. Elsewhere, no such precautions had been taken. Footprints were clearly visible on the stairs and in the bedroom where he had moved a table and the green lamp to the window.
“I wonder why he made no attempt to cover his tracks,” Findlay said. “If we had gotten inside, the whole thing would have been obvious.”
“Won’t do any good to ask him,” Merrill said. “He’s not sayin’ anything.”
Stevens’s silence lasted until Tuesday. Two things happened that day: the results of the fingerprint check came in, and Edna Waltham identified a faxed photo of her nephew. Gerald Sullivan, alias George Stevens, had a long arrest record, mostly for drug use and burglary.
After that he talked. He claimed he had been cut out of his inheritance by his aunt and had come to Blue Hill to get some of the things he felt were rightfully his. Finding nothing of value in the house, and desperate for another source of funds, he came up with his hoax. He knew his aunt would be away and couldn’t supply a key to the police. With a trace of pride, he explained how he had set up the hoax. He had tapped into the circuits of the lights and projector and connected them to his homemade “system operator,” a few microchips and a modem. It was then a simple matter to operate them via modem from his own computer. Ironically, he’d taken all his computer courses while serving a four year sentence in Florida.
When Findlay arrived at the post office Wednesday morning, Merrill was there shaking hands and basking in the admiration of the townspeople. “The whole story will be in the Weekly Packet tomorrow,” he told Findlay.
“Your stock has certainly gone up in this town,” Findlay grinned.
“So’s my job security. You wouldn’t believe how many people now think Mary Waltham was murdered. I can investigate that for years!”
Accounts Payable
by D. H. Reddall
I wasted part of the morning trying to solve a logic puzzle. According to the problem, seven guys using seven brooms can sweep up seven tons of sand in seven hours. I was supposed to figure out how long it would take ten guys using ten brooms to sweep up ten tons of sand.
Right away I rejected the obvious. They wouldn’t have bothered to put the thing in the paper if the answer was ten hours. After kicking it around for awhile I lost interest, just like I used to lose interest in the sixth grade when trying, unsuccessfully, to solve problems involving Airplane A and Airplane B.
I tossed the paper aside just as the door opened, admitting a tall gangly number wearing a suit that had gone out of style with the big bands. He looked to be in his sixties, and from the scowl I figured he wasn’t selling insurance.
“I’m lookin’ for a Stubblefield.”
“Congratulations. You just found one.” He looked me over pretty closely for a minute, then lumbered over to the other chair.
“Name’s Luther Kessler.”
“What can I do for you, Mr. Kessler?”
He stared at me as if I were simple. “Why, you can get the animals that killed Earl.”
“Who’s Earl?”
“My brother. They killed him.”
“Who did?”
“Now how would I know that? If I knew who killed him, do you suppose I’d be settin’ here and jawin’ with you?” He slapped the desk with a calloused palm. “They killed him. Blew him up on his doorstep.”
I remembered then. It had been in the news a few weeks earlier. Earl Kessler had been bookkeeper for a local trucking outfit. He’d taken a vacation in Maine, rented a cabin on a lake, and the next morning had picked up a package that was left on the porch. The ensuing explosion had flattened the cabin and killed Kessler.
I said, “The police are working on it.” Kessler nodded vigorously.
“I know they are. But there’s nothing wrong with bringing in a freelance. Reckon a man like yourself might be able to find out things the police can’t.”