Murder Most Persuasive

Chapter 31

We were in Ann’s living room. I sat on the couch curled up next to Peter. Across from me sat Aunt Winnie and Ann. Miles had been taken into custody. Reggie and Frances arrived full of questions. Ann deferred them to me. “Elizabeth’s the one who figured it out; she should really be the one to explain.”

They all looked expectantly at me. I have to admit, I felt very much like an Agatha Christie detective, calmly explaining the solution while in an elegant drawing room full of people. All that was missing was a tea cozy and a plate of cucumber sandwiches. “Well, I guess it all started with Reggie’s wedding arch,” I said. “I remember Miles laughing about what it looked like.” I paused, realizing my gaffe, and glanced at Reggie. “Sorry, Reggie.”

Reggie waved away my apology. “It doesn’t matter,” she said impatiently. “Get on with it.”

“Well, anyway, my point was that Miles knew what it looked like. But according to him, he left for New York City on July fifth and didn’t return until the twenty-ninth. However, Nana said the arch wasn’t delivered until the sixth and was removed on the fifteenth. By Miles’s own admission, he couldn’t have seen it, and yet he did. He joked about how it looked to Laura, who had seen it. She came back from her trip just as he left. Then I remembered seeing the records for his trip to New York and it struck me again that there were no receipts for cabs. Every other possible receipt was in the file but not one for a cab. I wondered why. After all, people visiting New York usually use cabs. I wondered if he might have rented a car. If he did, he’d be able to drive back to St. Michaels.”

“I don’t understand,” said Reggie. “Why would Miles kill Michael?”

“Because Miles was the real embezzler. Michael never had a thing to do with it. He was just the fall guy.”

“But why would Miles embezzle from Dad?” Frances asked. “They were practically best friends!”

“Because he needed money to start up his own company and to impress Laura. He loved her, but he believed that he didn’t have a chance with her unless he was successful. He saw her reaction to Joe and Ann’s relationship. He wasn’t going to let that happen to him.”

Ann hung her head when I said this. I was relieved to see Joe grab her hand and murmur something to her. Ann raised her head and smiled at him.

“But how did he do it?” Reggie asked. Her face was pinched with emotions I couldn’t read or begin to understand. For all these years, she’d thought that Michael had stolen from her father and run out on her. He’d done none of those things, but he had used her and tried to attack her sister. In some ways his chapter in Reggie’s life had closed; in other ways it was a fresh hurt.

“I imagine that Miles killed Michael sometime after the party and hid both his body and his car,” I said. “He then drove Michael’s car to the airport on the morning of the fifth. He was scheduled to leave for New York anyway. He met Laura at the airport and proposed on his way out. In New York, he rented a car and drove back to St. Michaels, where he knew construction on the pool was to have begun. He buried the body in the newly dug hole, knowing that the foundation would be poured the next morning. Before he left, he went inside to shower. Unfortunately for him, Bonnie had arrived unexpectedly, having just had a fight with Uncle Marty. Miles couldn’t let Bonnie suspect the real reason he was at the house, so he had to create a reason that he knew she’d never repeat.” I paused.

Ann’s mouth grimaced in disgust. “He seduced her.”

I nodded. “He knew Bonnie’s feelings for him and he used them to his advantage. I don’t know what he said to her once it was over, probably something like ‘this can never happen again.’ Remember, Bonnie seemed to suddenly hate Laura and Miles after she learned of their engagement.”

Around me heads nodded in agreement.

“Anyway,” I said, “after that he drove back to New York and pretended that he’d been there the whole time.”

“But why poison Bonnie?” Reggie asked.

“Because as daffy as she is, she figured it out. She realized that Miles was at the house around the time that Michael was killed. She not only realized it but was going to use it against him. Don’t you remember at the party how she kept going on about how she should have known who it was because she was there? She was sending Miles a message. She needed money and she was banking on Miles giving it to her. Unfortunately, she didn’t think he’d try and kill her.”

“But how did he get the poison?” asked Frances.

“He pretended that he was pushed into the pool,” I said. “The boys were right. They didn’t push him.”

“I knew it!” cried Frances. “Oh, and when I think of how Scott yelled at them—”

I interrupted her. I wasn’t up for hearing about the twins’ essential innocence. From the annoyed faces around me, I doubted if anyone else was either. “Miles fell in the pool so he’d have an excuse to go home, where he knew there were vases full of…”

“Lilies of the valley,” finished Reggie. “That bastard.”

I nodded. “As an owner of a landscaping business, I’m sure he knew the toxic aspects of the flower. I don’t imagine that it was too hard to dump a few drops into Bonnie’s drink and then bring it out to her.”

“But why kill Julian?” Frances asked.

“To distract everyone from the real reason Bonnie was poisoned. If the police thought this was all about the investments, they’d look at a completely different circle of suspects—a circle that he wasn’t in.”

“But how…?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know for sure. He probably went to the Ritz sometime after Scott had left and went to Julian’s room on some trumped-up reason, where he slipped the poison into his drink.”

I paused to take a sip of water. Ann took up the tale. “Once Elizabeth figured it out, though, we needed Bonnie to help us. Bonnie called Miles and told him that she wanted money or she was going to the police. Then Elizabeth pretended to be her by lying in her bed while we waited to see if Miles would strike.”

“Which he did,” I added.

“Joe jumped out from the closet where he was watching the whole thing and arrested him,” said Ann proudly, giving his hand a squeeze.

“That was very brave of you, Elizabeth,” Frances said after a moment. “Thank you. I know Scott will want to thank you as well.”

I nodded.

Frances leaned over and squeezed my hand. “No, really. Thank you.” She continued. “If you’d said what you knew about that night, I don’t know what the police would have done to Scott. Now that it’s all over, I guess I can tell you.” Seeing everyone else’s confused expressions, she clarified. “Scott did fight with Michael that night at the party. I heard them from my window. By the time I got downstairs to break it up, Scott had tried to hit Michael. He was so drunk, though, that all he did was lose his balance and fall, cutting his hand. I tried to defuse the situation, but Michael was particularly nasty about it. He threatened to ruin Scott. I got Scott upstairs and put him to bed. I went back down to talk to Michael, but he was gone. I looked for him, but I couldn’t find him. I was afraid to tell anyone because I knew how it would look.”

“It’s okay,” I said to Frances. “I understand. You were just trying to protect him.”

“Dear God,” said Reggie, shaking her head. “What a rat bastard Michael was. I really can pick them, can’t I?”

“Speaking of picking them, are you really back together with Donny?” Ann asked.

Reggie shrugged. “I could do worse. Hell, who am I kidding? I have done worse.”

“Amen to that,” said Ann.