Inside, people were gathered in little groups, talking quietly but earnestly. Stone shook the hands of a few people he’d met before. He waved at Caleb Stone, sitting at a table with his twin sons. A moment later, Sergeant Young of the state police and another uniformed officer walked into the club, and the commodore rapped on a table with a beer bottle for quiet.
“Good afternoon,” he said. “Sergeant Young from the state police is here and would like to speak to us.” The commodore stepped aside, and Young replaced him.
“Hey, everybody,” he said. “I’ve met a lot of you, but I’d like to introduce my colleague, Corporal Tom Best. Tom and I are going to be living on the island for the rest of the summer, or until there’s an arrest for the crimes that have occurred here. We’ve had a telephone line installed.” He gave them the number, and many people wrote it down. “You can call us anytime, night or day, if you have anything important to report. Make that anything at all, whether it seems important or not; we need all the information we can get.
“Now, I want to bring you up to date on our investigation, tell you what we’re doing. We’re running criminal record checks on everybody on the island, full-time and part-time residents, and yes, this means you, no exceptions. We’re particularly interested to know if anybody on the island has ever been arrested or convicted of a crime of a sexual nature, so if there’s something like that in your background or the background of a person you know, I urge you to come to me directly about it, rather than wait for the record to turnup.
“We’re also rechecking the ferry records to see who was and wasn’t on the island at the time of the first murders, those of Richard Stone and his wife and daughter. There are no records of which private airplanes were parked at the airstrip at that time, but a resident who lives within sight of the airport has told us what he remembers about who was here, so we have a pretty good list of owners. Tom and I are going to be visiting every single residence on the island, so you will be seeing us at your house pretty soon. We’ll be talking by telephone with those residents who have recently left the island to return to their homes.
“We are going to determine from these interviews the name of every single person who was on the island the day the Stone family died, the day Don Brown died and the day Janey Harris died, so we’ll be asking each of you about that, and believe me, we’re going to verify every statement you make, so I want the truth from everybody first time out. Anybody who lies to us will immediately be treated as a suspect.
“Now, anybody have any questions? I’d rather you ask them now, because I don’t want to have to go over this again with every person I meet.” He looked around the room.
A man raised his hand. “We heard that you had determined that Janey had been raped.”
“That’s true,” Young said.
“Did you recover any DNA evidence during the postmortem examination?”
“I can see you’ve been watching CSI on television,” Young said. “The answer is no, we didn’t. The body had been in the water for several hours, and that would have helped remove any superficial DNA evidence or hairs or fibers that could have been of use. We found no DNA internally, either, which could mean either that being in the water removed it or that the perpetrator used a condom.”
Another man raised his hand. “Was there any connection between the firearm used to kill the Stones and the one used to kill Don Brown?”
“No,” Young replied. “They were each killed with their own weapons: the Stones with a.380 and Brown with a.45.”
Another hand went up. “How did the killer achieve entry into the Stone and Brown homes?”
“We believe that both homeowners failed to secure their properties and that the killers just walked in. Mr. Brown didn’t have a security system in his house; Mr. Stone had a very good system, but he did not activate it that night. This should be a lesson to all of you who have security systems or who plan to have them installed. If you don’t arm them, they’re not security systems; they’re just a bunch of useless wires and keypads. I want every home on this island to have its doors and windows closed and locked at night, and every security system armed.”
“Do you have any motive for any of these murders?” somebody asked.
“All we have now is supposition. If any of you has any reason to believe that any person had a motive in any of these killings, please see me after the meeting. That could be crucial information. There’s something else I want to talk to all of you about.” He looked around the room. “I’m aware that a number of you have applied for a license to carry firearms and that others of you have purchased weapons. Corporal Best is going to pass out a brochure to all of you that summarizes Maine law on the possession and use of firearms, and I want each of you who owns a weapon to take steps to see that you are entirely within the law. I will not tolerate the illegal possession or use of firearms on this island. I refer particularly to the securing of weapons to keep them out of the hands of children.
“Further, I want each of you to give serious thought about the circumstances under which you might use a firearm. It would be best if you had a plan of behavior if someone should enter your home, or if you should otherwise feel the need to use a weapon. Tomorrow afternoon at three, Corporal Best and I are going to hold a seminar here at the yacht club on the storage and use of firearms, and you should bring your weapons with you. Do not, however, bring any ammunition. Before you leave your home, check to see that your weapon is unloaded. We will only do dry firing during the seminar. Any other questions?”
From a rear corner of the room came Ed Rawls’s distinctive voice. Stone had not seen him there. “At yesterday’s meeting somebody expressed some curiosity about Stone Barrington’s role or interest in all of this. Maybe Stone would like to address that now.”
Sergeant Young turned toward Stone. “Mr. Barrington?”
“Thank you, Sergeant,” Stone said. “Dick was my first cousin, my mother and his father being brother and sister. On the day that Dick and his family were murdered, I was in New York City. I didn’t learn of their deaths until the following evening, when a colleague of Dick’s told me the news.”
“I should say that we’ve verified Mr. Barrington’s whereabouts at the time of the murders,” Young said.
“I want to tell you all I know,” Stone said. “Shortly before Dick’s death I received a package from him containing a letter hiring me as his attorney and naming me as his executor, as well as an envelope to be opened in the event of his death. When I opened the envelope, after being informed that he had died, I found a properly executed will, and since I am under no obligation to keep its contents confidential, I will tell you what his bequests were. Dick left the use of his house to me and my heirs in perpetuity; if I choose to sell the house, the proceeds would revert to his estate.” He thought it better not to mention the exclusion of Caleb and his family from ownership of the house. “There were a number of personal bequests to friends and relatives on Barbara’s side of the family, and the residue of the estate was left to a charitable foundation. Additionally, there were two large insurance policies in the estate: Three-quarters of their combined value went to Caleb Stone, and the other quarter to the foundation.”
“Why did Dick leave his house to you?” somebody asked.
“Quite frankly, I don’t know, and Dick offered no explanation in his letter to me. I had seen him only once, for dinner, about eight years ago, since the summer I spent on this island when we were both eighteen. Dick said he planned to see me on his next trip to New York, when he might have explained things more fully, but, of course, that trip never took place.” Stone looked around. “Does anyone have any other questions?” Apparently, there were none.