Part 22 (1/2)
”Ma'am, we're doing everything that can be done.” The chief's voice was gentle. ”I honestly believe the little girl is hiding somewhere. She ran away from school, and now she's afraid to come home. She's going to be all right, just you wait and see.”
Yeah, that's easy for you to say, I thought. I thought. She's not your little girl. She's not your little girl. Heck, she wasn't mine either, but if I ever did have one, I'd like one just like her, and when they did find Faye, I was going to buy her all the hot dogs she could eat! Heck, she wasn't mine either, but if I ever did have one, I'd like one just like her, and when they did find Faye, I was going to buy her all the hot dogs she could eat!
”If you don't mind, I'd like for you to stick around awhile,” Chief McBride said. ”Since you were the one who found your cousin Otto, maybe you can help us out here.” He nodded to Mildred. ”Charlie here can run Miss Parsons home if you like.”
”I don't want to go home, but I would like for you to take me by the school while they look for Faye. I think Gatlin and David might need some help when Lizzie gets out of school.”
The chief and I agreed that was an excellent idea, and after the two of them left, moved into the musty, grim parlor, where Hugh suggested we might be more comfortable. The three of us sat around the feeble gas fire, and it reminded me of my recent nasty experience, as well as the day weeks before when we had waited here after I had found my cousin's body.
The thought of it made me shudder and draw my coat closer about me. The chief must've been thinking the same thing, because he turned to Hugh Talbot, who sat next to the mantel, leaning forward with his hands clasped between his knees. ”All this has something to do with Otto Alexander's death, doesn't it, Hugh?” Chief McBride asked.
Hugh didn't answer. Why wasn't I surprised?
”Yes, it does,” I said. ”There's something I haven't told you. The day I found Otto's body, I also found a pin-about the size of a sorority or fraternity pin. It was in the shape of a flower with a star in its center, and it had belonged to my aunt-great-great-aunt really, who was supposed to have drowned in the Saluda over eighty years ago.”
Hugh made sort of a rumbling noise and s.h.i.+fted in his chair. ”You say you found that here? Where?”
”In the bathroom, in the stall next to Otto's. It was on the floor, and I almost didn't see it. I think he had it wrapped in his handkerchief, and when he pulled it out, the pin rolled under the side of the stall-just before somebody somebody smothered him.” I looked at Hugh Talbot, and this time he met my eyes. smothered him.” I looked at Hugh Talbot, and this time he met my eyes.
”It wasn't me,” he said. ”I'm not taking the blame for that.”
”Mr. Talbot, you're in and out of this place all the time. As far as I know, you, your sister, and Otto were the only ones who had a key.” The chief stood and leaned on the mantel. He was not a tall man, but he looked tall then. ”I know you announced a football game that night, but the game was over by a little before ten. Where did you go then?”
”I've already told you, I went home! We've gone over this before.” Hugh slapped his knee, and his hairpiece slid a little to the side. ”I want a lawyer.”
”Fine, call one, but if you had nothing to do with this, it will make it a whole lot easier for you and for us, too, if you just cooperate,” the chief said calmly.
The man sat there so long I didn't think he was going to answer. Finally he sighed and rose to his feet. ”I need a drink. Do you mind?”
He moved to a small cupboard that looked like part of the wainscoting and took out a decanter and several small gla.s.ses. ”Anyone care to join me?” he asked.
Of course the chief said no thank you and so did I, although to tell the truth, I could've used a belt about then.
He downed one drink in what seemed like a gulp, poured another to sip, and then sat again in the chair by the fireplace. ”I was at the bookshop-Otto's shop-that night.”
Hugh Talbot spoke so softly I could barely hear him. ”I knew Otto would be at the academy then, and there was something I wanted to find.”
”And what was that?” the chief wanted to know.
”It has no relevance to what happened. It was just something I knew Otto had, and I thought perhaps it was somewhere in the bookshop.”
So Mildred's pencils really had been moved!
Chief McBride leaned forward. ”Man, how can you say it has no relevance? A man is dead, this young lady here has been attacked, and now a child is missing.” He did everything but wave a finger in the man's face, but still Hugh wouldn't tell us what he was looking for.
”I don't suppose you found it, then?” the chief said.
”No.” Hugh slumped in his chair and stared at the feeble fire. He didn't move, rarely blinked.
”Is that what you think is concealed in the stuffed animal you wanted from the little girl?”
”That was stupid of me, I know. It was just something my sister asked me to do.”
”And why would Mrs. Whitmire want this child's toy?” Chief McBride asked.
”She thinks there's something in there that would put our family in a bad light. My sister is very proud of her heritage.”
Chief McBride sat and closed his eyes for a minute, as if the whole thing were just too much for him. ”So, you didn't go to the academy the night Otto Alexander was killed?” ”
No.” Hugh Talbot shook his head.
”But you knew he was going to be here. How was that?”
Hugh Talbot sighed. ”Otto had called me at the academy, left a message on the machine. He said he'd be here that night-he volunteered in the academy library, you know- and that he had something I might be interested to see. He'd hinted-well, more than hinted, really-that he could ruin me. Wanted money, of course.”
”So Otto was blackmailing you?”
”That was his intention, yes, but I wasn't planning to take the bait.”
”The pin,” I said. ”He told you about the pin.” I knew Otto had taken the pin from Mildred's hiding place.
Hugh nodded. ”That was part of it.” He turned to the chief. ”My grandfather, I'm afraid, wasn't as squeaky clean as he was stacked up to be. A bit of a ladies' man, I think. At any rate, he got one of the young women in the family way, and she was supposed to have drowned in the Saluda-only it turns out she didn't. Now her daughter has come back to haunt us for his sins.”
”Don't you dare make light of it!” I jumped to my feet and would have clobbered him, I think, if the chief hadn't cleared his throat really loud. ”Your grandfather forced himself on those girls-students who were supposed to be in his care! He should've been locked away.
”You killed Otto, didn't you? You got him drunk, then smothered him to keep him quiet.”
”No, I did not. I'm sorry my grandfather was a lech and that he caused grief to those young women-if indeed he did-but that's not my fault. I wouldn't kill a man for that.”
”Otto met somebody here that night,” I told the police chief. ”He had that pin in his pocket just before he was killed, only it rolled into the next stall, and the murderer didn't see it.”
Chief McBride frowned. ”Why didn't you tell us this earlier?”
”I forgot I had it. Didn't even realize what it was for a while; then I guess I was afraid. Otto might have been killed for that pin; I didn't want the same thing happening to me.”
The chief turned to Hugh. ”And you say these things weren't important to you, yet you searched Otto's bookshop for something something. Was Otto already dead?”
”Certainly not! I knew nothing about that. But I had to look there while Mildred was at that church movie thing, and I knew Otto would be waiting to meet me at the academy. Look, I was only trying to spare us both a lot of trouble.”
”So if what you say is true, someone else must have known about that telephone message. What happened to that tape, Mr. Talbot?”
Hugh Talbot shrugged and stared into his empty gla.s.s.
There was only one other person who could have heard Otto's message on that tape. Gertrude Whitmire. And she was somewhere in this town hunting for a five-year-old with a stuffed zebra.
”I have to go,” I said, and didn't stop until I reached my car.