A Purrfect Alibi

Eighteen

Mom and Millie headed off to the police station to try to wheedle some more information out of Seth Chamberlain. I stayed behind to catch up on household chores. I kept an eye out the window for Anita Pendragon. She was up to something and I wanted to catch her in the act. It took a few hours, but luck was with me. I was at the kitchen sink washing dishes when I saw her peeking out from behind a lilac bush. I hurried out to catch her at whatever it was she was up to.

I picked my way along the side of the house, my back pressed to the paint-peeling clapboards as I used the house for cover. I was at the back of the building and hadn’t gotten around to scraping and painting the exterior here yet since it wasn’t visible to the guests.

I came to the corner and quickly darted over, taking refuge behind a giant rhododendron. Peering out from behind the glossy leaves, I watched Anita as the floral smell of summer flowers wafted over. Out here in back of the house only the hum of buzzing bees broke the silence.

Anita appeared to be scoping out the grounds. What on earth was she doing? I had news for her too, her lime-green-and-turquoise shirt did little to camouflage her behind the dark green shrub.

I snuck up behind her very quietly and when I was within two feet I said, “Aha!”

Anita whirled around dropping her navy-blue tote bag as her hands flew to her heart. Once she recognized me her eyes narrowed to slits. “Josie… Waters… what in the world are you doing… scaring me like that!”

The nerve of her yelling at me! “What are you doing lurking in my bushes?”

Anita recovered from her scare. Now she looked angry instead of startled. Smoothing down the bottom of her shirt, she said, “It’s a free country.”

“Not quite, this is private property.”

“Okay, fine. I’m here doing investigatory journalism. There was a murder here, you know. And a ghost is running about. The people have a right to know.”

“Why does that necessitate lurking around in my yard?”

She leaned toward me, lowering her voice. “Your guests aren’t the most innocent of people. They’re suspects, you know. And besides, they get up to some strange things. Seances in outhouses and convening with spirits in gazebos.”

I had seen some of the guests skulking around in the yard, but seances and spirit communications? “Are you sure they’ve been doing that?”

“I’m not sure what they’re up to, but whatever it is, I’m getting the scoop.” Anita crossed her arms over her chest and adopted a bit of attitude. “You might thank me for that. It’s down to my investigating out here that I found Madame Zenda’s body. If I hadn’t come by, there’s no telling how long she would have been moldering out there.”

Found her there or put her there? I didn’t want to rile Anita up any more than she already was so I kept silent, scowling at her with my hand on my hips. I figured I’d let her talk and maybe she’d incriminate herself.

My silence must have unnerved her. She looked away. “Mark my words, someone in this guesthouse is up to something.”

“Yeah and I think it’s you.”

Anita jerked back. “Me? What are you talking about? I’m just reporting what people need to know and if it happens to be a good story that sells, well then, what’s wrong with that?” She looked at me out of the corner of her eye. “I don’t see why you’re so upset about it. Unless you have something to hide, like the fact that you’re a killer.”

Now it was my turn to get upset. “Why would I kill Madame Zenda?”

“It would make for good publicity. Come to think of it, you’ve had a couple of murders here. And didn’t the discovery of the skeleton bring you the guests you have now? This would make a good story. The black-widow guesthouse owner who kills her guests.”

“Now wait just a minute, I didn’t kill anyone! I helped catch the first two killers and now I’m going to catch this one. Which brings me to my question: Why did you break into the guesthouse?”

“Break in? What are you talking about?” She looked away. “I’ve never been in there.”

Now I knew she was lying. Could she really be the killer? And if so, maybe it was dangerous to confront her like this. But my brain must have been a few seconds behind my mouth because the words came out before I stopped to think about the safest course of action. “Ed saw you peeking in the window and said you might have been in the house, and Flora said you tracked mud into the back foyer. Now, why would you lie about that if you weren’t the killer?” I got my cell phone out of my pocket. “I’m calling Sheriff Chamberlain.”

“No wait!” She shifted on her feet, her eyes darting from the house to me. “Okay. Fine. I was in the guesthouse but not because I’m the killer. As I’ve told you, I’m working on a story. There might be a movie deal and… well… I needed an insider so I could get a scoop on what was really going on.”

“Madame Zenda?”

“Yeah, at first. She was my contact.”

That explained the open windows.

“That’s why I was the one who found her. She was going to talk to Jedediah Biddeford that night.” Anita chewed her bottom lip. “Though to tell the truth, I think she might have been a fraud. Anyway, she wouldn’t tell me exactly where and I was trying to figure that out so I could see the communication, but instead I saw her body. She was dead when I got there.”

“And you didn’t see the killer leaving or hear anything?” I was dubious.

She shook her head. “I wish. That would have made a great headline. ‘Reporter Captures Killer.’ But I didn’t see a thing. Of course, I was a bit freaked out, what with her lying there. I didn’t kill her though. Why would I? She was my contact.”

Anita’s explanation made sense and, given that she was calmly discussing this instead of trying to kill me, my feeling that she was the killer was waning. But Flora had said she’d been in the house after Madame Zenda was killed. If Zenda was her contact, then what was she doing in there? Hiding evidence?

“Then why were you in the guesthouse after she was killed?”

Anita sighed. “Fine. I’ll tell you. I was meeting Victor Merino.”

My left brow quirked up. “Why?”

“I’ve sort of teamed up with him for the story. There’s a lot riding on it.”

“So, let me get this straight. You were teamed up with Madame Zenda and then, after she died, you teamed up with Victor. How? Did you already know him?” What if Victor had killed Madame Zenda because he wanted the fame and knew that Anita could help him get it?

She shook her head. “I didn’t know him. He saw me talking to that movie producer downtown and asked me all sorts of questions. I guess he already knew about the movie. Anyway, he suggested we combine forces.”

“Combine forces? How?”

“He was going to feed me information. That’s why I met him in the foyer the other day and why I’m here now. He said something is about to happen.” Anita glanced out over the yard. “But I’m not so sure I believe him.”

“Did he say what was going to happen?” I didn’t like the ominous way that sounded, but then Victor did seem to be overly dramatic. “I think sometimes he exaggerates.”

“Yeah, that’s why I’m out here to follow him, just in case.”

I peered into the dense overgrowth of the yard. “He’s out here?”

“No. The only one I’ve seen is that weird tea-leaf reader.”

“Gail? Why do you say she’s weird?” I thought she was weird too, but wanted to know Anita’s reasons.

“No background.” At my curious look Anita stood straighter. “I’ve done background checks on all these people. They’re all mediums who have businesses and a history. All except Gail. Not even a classified ad back in her paper in Ohio. And the other day when I was talking to the movie producer and ran into Victor, guess who I saw watching us?”

“Gail?”

“Yep.”

I’d seen Gail watching Victor too. At least that’s what I thought she’d been doing when I’d run into her looking for tea in the pantry. But why watch Victor? If she’d seen him with the movie producer, then she knew about the potential movie. Was she trying to steal the limelight from Victor somehow? But why not just claim she could talk to Jed herself? If she did that, then the attention would be on her. Instead, she was hiding and following people.

“What do you think she’s up to?” I asked.

“Beats me.” Anita bent down to pick up the tote bag she’d dropped when I’d startled her. The bag spilled over and a copy of the early etching of the guesthouse with Jed Biddeford and family tumbled out.

My eyes went right to the buckle on his shoes. Anita knew about the buckle. My eyes flicked to hers, a shiver running through me. I grabbed the paper, noticing another one behind it. This other one was of Jedediah Biddeford signing something. He had a fancy carved-ivory quill pen in his hand. Why did she have these drawings of Jed? Was she scoping out Jed’s belongings? Maybe planning to leave another piece of memorabilia on her next body?

“Aha! You have a photograph of the drawing of Jed’s buckle!” I pointed to the shoe in the photo.

Anita tried to snatch the papers away, but I pulled them out of her hands. She sighed and crossed her arms over her chest. “Of course I have images of Jed. Like I just told you, I do my research. I looked up all kinds of things about the family.”

“Why would you need to do that? Seems like a lot of work,” I said.

“Not really. They have all this stuff down at the bank. There’s a whole display of Remington memorabilia and since the Biddefords were big in town back then, there’s a lot of images of the Oyster Cove Guesthouse and Jedediah Biddeford too.”

I usually did my banking online but now I remembered the display down at the bank. It was off to one side and included all kinds of things like the bank’s first coin, etchings of the original bank—an old shack complete with iron bars—various old desk implements, pens, bank notes and so on.

“Do they have personal items there?” I was thinking about the shoes.

Anita grabbed for the papers again and this time I let her take them. They crinkled as she shoved them in her tote bag. “Personal items? I’m not sure. I mean, they have an old inkwell and a desk blotter that they first used in the bank. It’s kind of like a mini museum.”

It was probably a long shot, but what if the killer got the buckle from the bank? Some of it was locked up, some of it was out in the open. If the shoes with the buckle had been there, would the killer have been able to swipe it without anyone noticing? This didn’t let Anita off the hook, she’d been there and knew what was in the collection. Would she be dumb enough to admit that to me now, though? Probably not.

Suddenly I had the urge to make a deposit at the bank. I wanted to see exactly what was in that display… or, more importantly, to see if anything was missing.