There were five in all, various collections of journal back files and one new e-book collection. The total was just over half a million dollars.
Peter had scrawled his name on each one, and they all bore the same date, January thirteenth. I checked the calendar on my computer. January thirteenth was a Monday.
Was that the last day Peter was in the office? I couldn’t remember.
I knew who would, however. I picked up my cell phone and speed-dialed Melba.
“Sorry to bother you at home,” I said. “I’ve got a question for you. Do you remember the last day you saw Peter in the office?”
“I sure do,” she said. “It was a Friday, January tenth. I remember telling him to have a great weekend. He actually smiled at me and said he planned to. He said he’d tell me all about it on Monday, but then he never showed up again.” She paused. “Why did you need to know?”
“Just curious,” I replied nonchalantly. “I was thinking about him, and I couldn’t remember exactly when it was he left. I took the first half of January off, as you recall.”
“Yes, you missed all the excitement of those first few days,” she said. “I was never so surprised in all my life. Peter never seemed the kind to just up and vamoose like that.”
“No, he didn’t,” I said. “I can’t remember, did he leave a note? Or an e-mail?”
“E-mail,” she said. “To the president, and he copied me on it, too.”
“Do you recall exactly what it said?”
“Let me think.” Melba was quiet for a good twenty seconds. “Yes, he said, ‘Sorry I screwed things up, consider this my resignation.’”
“That was it?” I asked.
“Yes,” Melba said. “I was surprised there wasn’t more detail. He didn’t even leave me a forwarding address for his personal mail. I’ve actually got a handful of letters from friends of his, and I don’t know what to do with them. I keep thinking he might get in touch with me to ask me to send them on to him, but so far he hasn’t. I tried calling his cell phone, too, but he never answered. The most recent time, I got a message that it wasn’t a working number. Strange.”
Definitely strange. I looked at the purchase orders Peter had supposedly signed three days after he left the library.
I suddenly had a feeling that Peter might not have gone voluntarily.
THIRTY-THREE
“And you know another strange thing?” Melba said. “Well, not exactly strange, I guess, but a little unusual.”
I wasn’t really paying attention. My mind was racing over the possibilities. Could Peter be dead?
“. . . Margie at the grocery store on the way home, and you should have seen the ring she was wearing. I’ve never been so envious in my life. Gorgeous blue stone.”
I knew if I didn’t get out of this conversation now, I’d be on the phone for a good twenty minutes.
“Sorry, Melba, I heard a beep. Somebody’s trying to call me. I’d better take it.”
“Okay, I’ll tell you the rest in the morning.”
“Sure thing.” I ended the call and set the phone down.
I heard Melba’s voice repeating Peter’s message: Sorry I screwed things up, consider this my resignation.
Had it been Peter who caused the problems?
I wondered.
I looked through a year’s worth of purchase orders. Odd how Peter’s signature got so bad only within the last month or so before he left.
What about the date under the signature?
January thirteenth. Anybody could get confused and write the wrong date. I had done it often enough myself.
But just as often I wrote the day’s date without even thinking about it. Especially if I were writing a number of checks, for example, or holiday cards. I didn’t think twice about it, simply wrote the date and went on.
Perhaps the person who signed those purchase orders on Monday the thirteenth of January had done the same thing without realizing it.
I had no real proof, but I was convinced that Peter had not signed those documents, not when he didn’t show up to work that day.
What about the date the purchase orders were created?
I picked up the documents in question and examined them.
They all bore the same date, January twelfth. The day before Peter supposedly signed them. A Sunday.
Peter didn’t create purchase orders that I was aware of. I would have to check that with Melba, but I was pretty sure I was correct in this. I found a notepad and jotted that down. I would probably have a number of questions for Melba before I was done thinking this through.
Peter left in the middle of a pay period, I realized. What had happened to his final paycheck? He rarely took vacation time, so his final check would have included his regular salary along with payment for unused vacation. That would have been a pretty hefty check.
Where was it sent? And was it ever cashed or deposited?
More questions for my list, but how could I get answers? I couldn’t simply call the payroll office and ask.
Perhaps Penny Sisson could find out the answers for me. Good idea, Charlie. I dashed off a quick e-mail to her, saying I was trying to tie up loose ends with the budget. Since Peter’s salary was part of the library budget, I thought it was a pretty legitimate request if I went through Penny. I also asked whether she had any kind of forwarding address for him, or the address of a next of kin. I mentioned personal mail that needed to be sent to him.
What about Peter’s house? His car? Surely he wouldn’t have abandoned his house? He would want to sell it or at least rent it if he was leaving town for good.
I found a popular real estate website and searched for houses for sale or rent in Athena. I remembered Peter’s address because I had been there several times for holiday parties.
No listing for it on the real estate site. That didn’t mean it wasn’t for sale or rent, though. Peter could have handled it privately, or it could already have sold or been rented.
One way to find out, but I felt slightly foolish. Should I jump in the car and drive to Peter’s house? What might I find? No, I shouldn’t do that. It was crazy. Exactly the kind of thing Helen Louise, Sean, and Laura would tell me not to do.
You don’t have to go alone. There’s a sheriff’s deputy upstairs.
Would Haskell and Stewart think I had lost my mind if I asked them to go with me?
One way to find out.
All the way up to the third floor I debated with myself. Had my imagination run completely away with me? Was I seeing murder where there was none?
Peter was probably enjoying the sun in California right now. He had lived there for many years, and that would be where he’d want to go, I felt sure.
If he isn’t dead.
I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong.
Could I convince Haskell and Stewart to go along with this?
I paused on the third floor to catch my breath after my hurried climb. I almost turned back, feeling foolish again, but then I took a deep breath and approached Stewart’s door.
I had to knock a couple of times, because it sounded like they were watching a movie with car crashes. Finally one of them heard, and Haskell came to open the door. He stood aside and motioned for me to enter the dim sitting room.
Stewart turned down the volume on the television set and froze the movie mid-scene. He then rose from the sofa and turned on more lights.
“Where are Diesel and Dante?” I asked when I realized I couldn’t see them.
“They’re snuggled up on the bed,” Stewart said. “Neither one of them cares for action movies, and they wore themselves out playing earlier.”
“I’ll get Diesel for you,” Haskell said.
“No, not yet,” I said. “Actually, I need to talk to you both about something. Would you mind?”