Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 143, No. 1. Whole No. 868, January 2014

Home for the Holidays by G. M. Malliet

G. M. Malliet’s debut novel, Death of a Cozy Writer, set in Cambridgeshire, England, won the 2008 Agatha Award for Best First Novel, was nominated for Anthony and Macavity awards, and made Kirkus Reviews’ Best Books of 2008 list. In 2011 she launched a new series set in an English country village, and garnered another Agatha nomination. The second book in that series, A Fatal Winter (2012), received starred reviews from PW and Library Journal. The author is currently settled in the D.C. area, but she has lived in many different countries, and has a special attachment to the U.K.

I always liked Dan. To be sure, he drank, in time-honored, hard-bitten cop fashion, and after he retired he drank a lot more. A D.C. cop has more to forget than most people.

But Dan was a good cop, no matter what anyone said.

He’s been gone ten years now. And it had been at least ten years before that since I’d seen him. I’m not counting that waxy facsimile in the pine box at his funeral.

It’s always at this time of year I think of him. And I realized why when I was called out to the Casey house.

The name’s Graham, by the way. Carter Graham. Police detective, newly retired and living the dream aboard the Star-Crossed, out of Avalon. Pleased to meet you.

My sergeant and I were called out to the Casey place last December thirtieth. Mr. Casey had called to say he and his family had returned from ten days in Disney World to find their house broken into. Someone had disarmed the burglar alarm, jimmied the window, and taken whatever looked valuable, leaving the window open in case we just couldn’t figure out how they’d gained entry. It turned out later it was the wife who’d disarmed the system before leaving the place for her boyfriend to ransack, but that’s another story having to do with community property. We see a lot of that stuff. The fancy mega-house built in Ye Olde Plantation style with its big, designer Christmas tree in the foyer — all purple ribbons and ornaments and a matching angel on top — is what put me in mind of Dan.

Only Dan’s story had a murder in it.

Dan had taken the call to another isolated address in Northwest D.C., near Rock Creek Park. It wasn’t that far from where they found poor Chandra Levy years later, but that also is a different story. The station had received a call around five P.M., soon after Christmas. The caller said he’d just killed an intruder. So Dan and his partner and the usual backup drive over to the swank address — hello, Tara! — to find the caller at the door. In the foyer is a body under another fancy purple Christmas tree. But the body was dressed more for Halloween in full burglar regalia — ski mask, swag bag, gloves, and all. Apparently the homeowner had surprised the burglar, there’d been a struggle, and the guy had stabbed the burglar in the neck with the first weapon that came to hand, which happened to be a letter opener. There was no question he’d done it: He said he’d done it. That he’d come home early from vacation and disturbed the intruder. There was the bag full of silver and stuff, its contents spilling out, right next to the homeowner’s suitcases, which he’d dropped at the front door once he’d spotted the in-progress.

There was the intruder, a known case with a history of larceny and petty theft. I forget his name now. The cops were mostly just glad someone had put the guy out of business: He’d had a good long run and wasn’t above doing a little bodily harm if the occasion called for it.

You’re looking at me with that “So?” look in your eyes. Don’t worry, I’m getting there.

Another drink? Don’t mind if I do.

So Dan and his people go through the routine. Nothing much in the house was disturbed apart from the few goods in the bag. The blood guys studied the spatter patterns; somebody took photos with one of the enormous cameras they used back then. Other guys examined the locks and saw that yes, indeed, they’d been jimmied. They took a statement and asked Mr. Ketchum — Bill Ketchum was the homeowner’s name — to stay elsewhere for a few days while they completed the investigation, although what was there to investigate? Open and shut.

Ketchum, in his triumph over evil, was a model of cooperation. He told Dan and Co. he’d be at the Mayflower downtown if they needed him. A few days later, the police called the Mayflower to let Ketchum know the house was clear to move back in. They told him they’d update him as needed at the number he provided. Ketchum might have to come to the station to go through a few more formalities, and sign his statement, but they didn’t expect any complications. The chances of his being charged or having to go to court were zero for killing an intruder inside his front door. Ketchum thanked them very kindly and said he’d probably move back in a few more days. The memories were so disturbing he was thinking of putting the house on the market. They were so sorry, they told him, he’d been through such an ordeal. That’s okay, he told them: It was all the fault of those damn Democrats on the city council. No one knew or wanted to know what he meant by that.

But — and I can see you’re ahead of me here — he never did: He never did move back in or put the house up for sale. He did go back to the house for an hour or two, and put things back where they belonged, and he cleared up the minor forensic mess in the foyer with its enormous beribboned Christmas tree. There was a purple glass ornament that didn’t make it, with little pieces of it to be found here and there. The hall was bare marble, no carpet, so cleaning up wasn’t that difficult.

A few days later, the real Bill Ketchum came home from his trip, none the wiser.

You look confused, my friend.

Come to find out, the real story was this:

Two burglars, working the area as a team, were starting to disagree on the finer points of the art of breaking and entering, with a particular angry emphasis on the division of property. And Burglar #1 — we’ll call him Al — Al decided it was time to retire, after one last job.

As was their M.O., the pair targeted a place with an owner who lived alone but who happened to be on vacation. This particular house was chosen because the guy, as mentioned in captions in the society column, was a regular snowbird, spending the winters in Florida. Al did the choosing.

And while Al was at it, he chose a homeowner with a passing resemblance to himself, and arranged for a fake photo ID. The resemblance wasn’t strictly necessary, but Al thought it was a nice touch, just in case. Then he arranged to meet Burglar #2, his old pal, at Ketchum’s. Al did the breaking in — that was his specialty: locks and alarms, and the gift of gab. He didn’t really need his pal except as a lookout, and to help with the heavy lifting. He waited and when his partner arrived and set to work gathering the silver, he killed him. Al had already taken care to hide the few photos of the real Bill Ketchum that had been sitting around the living room.

That was it. The only props Al needed, apart from the letter opener, were the suitcases, which he’d packed in advance. The letter opener — the murder weapon — is probably still sitting in an evidence box somewhere at the station.

Next, Al called the station, posing as the distraught but outraged home-owner. He put away the gloves he’d been wearing; he’d been careful to touch nothing. Why would police doubt he was who he said he was? It was not standard procedure then or now to ask for photo ID, but Al was prepared, just in case. Burglar #2 had ID on him, too, but the M.E. fingerprinted him at the morgue to be sure.

It also wasn’t standard procedure, but elimination prints should have been taken. Dan should have thought of that, but there is always that chaos at a crime scene.

You wonder how they nailed Al? Well, they never did, not for murder. They caught him in the act during another burglary two years later — it seems he found retirement wasn’t to his liking after all. It was only chance Dan recognized him when they brought him in to the station.

Al told Dan the whole story. I suspect Al was counting on Dan’s discretion, and maybe his help with a reduced sentence. And somehow Dan never did get around to telling anyone higher up.

He’d discuss it with me when he was in his cups, but he knew I’d never tell. It makes cops look bad, this kind of thing. Like we accidentally helped a guy get away with murder.

I mean, we’re human, you know? We make mistakes, rookies especially. You don’t fingerprint the guy who’s been robbed, for Chrissake.

The real homeowner never knew the difference. Besides, one less crook in the world and the case was closed. The tax-paying public was once again safe, and damn the city council.

And that’s all that matters.

I’m telling you, but maybe I’m just making it up.

Maybe Dan was making it up. Dan did drink a bit.

This round’s on me. No, I insist.