~~
Steve pulled his truck up outside the respectable abode with its well- trimmed lawn and collection of pansies and crocuses arranged beneath the front room window, and walked with his father along the immaculately cemented path towards the bright white front door. "Nice place," he commented, not being able to see a spot of dirt past the mailbox in sight.
Mark rung the doorbell, stepped back, and hit head on a wind chime. It tinkled angrily before Steve put his hand up to steady it.
A small, lithe woman came opened the door, the tips of her golden-blonde hair brushing her shoulders. "Hi, can I help you?" She asked sweetly, wearing a smile that had lips of strawberries and gleaming teeth of cream.
"Good afternoon, ma'am, is this the house of Maria Chartham?" Steve asked, making sure he'd got the right place before he began to question her concerning a murder.
"That's me," Maria said, still smiling like her face might crack. "What can I do for you?"
"I'm Lieutenant Steve Sloan, LAPD, and this is my father, Doctor Mark Sloan, a consultant with the police department," he said, fishing in his pocket for his ID card and badge. "May we come in?"
"Sure, but I could save you the trouble, I paid that parking ticket this morning," she told them, unable to think of what other matter the police could be visiting her for. "Ask your friend, I think his name was Dan, he was quite cute actually."
Steve made a mental note to tease Dan when he got back to the station, but now he had more pressing business to attend to. "Ms Chartham, this has nothing to do with an unpaid parking ticket," he said as they were ushered through the hallway towards the kitchen. "This concerns the murder of Doctor Anthony Holmes."
The woman stopped in her stride and turned to face the Sloan men. "Anthony's dead?"
"I'm afraid so, Ma'am," Steve said solemnly.
"Murder?" She said, not able to believe it, and then she recalled something. "That guy on the news this morning, the doctor that was shot at the Mayfair last night, that was Anthony?"
"Yes, it was," Steve said, taking the seat he was offered at the kitchen table. "Ms Chartham, we'd like to ask you a few questions regarding the murder of Doctor Holmes."
"Okay," she said. "Can I offer you a cup of coffee?"
"Black, one sugar, thanks," Steve said, grateful for all the coffee he could get that day. He'd not had any sleep since eight pm the previous evening, and it was beginning to catch up on him.
"None for me, thank you," Mark said, speaking for the first time. He'd spent the time trying to assess the character of this woman, and preparing any questions he wished to ask her. Even without him asking any questions, he knew a fair bit about this woman judging from what he had seen of her house and her character thus far.
"Ms Chartham, how would you describe your relationship with Anthony Holmes?" Steve asked, sipping the black liquid gratefully, feeling more awake and alert already.
"We were friends," she said shortly. Mark and Steve looked at each other, they'd asked one question and already she was lying to them - not such a good start.
"My sources tell me that you were more than friends with Anthony," Mark said, knowing that already he was beginning to tread on thin ice. "You and Anthony were engaged at one time, but then he broke it off. Why was that?"
Maria sighed. "I'll never understand men," she said wistfully. "Anthony decides he wants to marry me, and of course I'm overjoyed and say yes, but three months later he calls the whole thing off, saying that he wanted to concentrate on his career." Mark noted this, feeling that it tied up with what Amelia had told him about Anthony being career-minded, but he still felt there was more to it than Maria was letting on. "Fair enough, he was a great doctor, and I respected that, but why ask me to marry him in the first place?"
Steve tried another approach, one he'd looked into before he'd arrived at the house. "Ms Chartham, your bank statement tells me you made several substantial withdrawals since you and Anthony cancelled the wedding, which have continued on a regular basis to the present day. I'm willing to bet that those withdrawals will stop now that Anthony Holmes is dead."
Maria did not like the way that things were going, this detective guy knew more than she was comfortable with. Instantly her sweetness disappeared and was replaced by anger. "And just what are you implying, Lieutenant Sloan?"
Mark took it upon himself to change tact and try and calm Maria down, a brawl would get them nowhere. "Ms Chartham, are all the medals and trophies in the hall yours?"
The young woman softened and said, "Yes, I used to be an International gymnast. I finished my professional career a couple of years ago, and since then I've been teaching gymnastics at Lincoln High School."
Gymnastics? Mark immediately thought of the rope backstage at the Mayfair, where Anthony was shot. For a gymnast, particularly one of Maria's standard, climbing down the rope would be child's play.
"That's where I met Anthony, at gymnastics classes when we were fourteen. He quit going after he picked up an injury, but I had dreamed of a career in gymnastics since I could walk, and I made it," she continued proudly.
"One last question, Ms Chartham, where were you between eight and ten pm yesterday evening?" Steve asked, checking to see whether she had an alibi or not.
"At Lincoln High School, it was the senior class prom yesterday," she said. "I was chaperoning between six thirty in the evening and two thirty this morning. And before you ask if there were any witnesses, besides a couple of hundred pupils, the Film and Media Studies teacher, Mr Wood, was filming the evening with a video camera, which if I recall has a time and date stamp in the corner of the picture throughout the footage."
Something occurred to Mark when she said this. "Tell me, Ms Chartham, is Melanie Thomas one of your pupils?"
Maria knew exactly what Mark was getting at. "I don't teach Mel, but I do know her. How is she, by the way?"
That was when Mark knew that Maria Chartham's alibi was practically airtight. Driving back to the hospital in the truck, Steve enquired as to why Mark had asked her that. Mark explained, "I pumped Melanie's stomach last night, and I remember Kurt, her boyfriend, saying that they'd been at the Lincoln High Prom. Her alibi is good, Steve."
"Yeah, but that doesn't mean she was telling the truth all the time - I'm sure Holmes was black-mailing her. And, I think that there's more to their break-up than she's letting on," he said, remembering how heated that part of the conversation had become. "I just wish I knew what the main reason was."
"Let's hope Amanda has more luck tomorrow," Mark said, watching as the first lead came to a dead end.
~~
Small place, but fancy looking, Amanda thought to herself as she parked her car in the lot at Oakes Valley Hospital. She was nervous and excited at the same time - she was investigating and going undercover without Jack there to dig her out of the holes she frequently seemed to fall into. She locked her car and set off towards the building, her heels clicking on the tarmac.
It was Sunday morning - Mark had told Amanda to go home and get a good night of sleep before she did any investigating, a remedy that he had also prescribed to Steve and himself - and Amanda was awake, refreshed, and ready to seek the information needed to find Anthony Holmes' killer.
She soon found the Paediatrics Department in the establishment, and began to look around, seeing if there was anything at all that might point the finger at someone who had a reason to kill Anthony Holmes. A nurse, who had been watching her for some minutes, walked over to her and said, "Can I help you?" The nurse was short and well rounded, with greying hair tied back into a bun.
"Hello," Amanda greeted amiably, "I'm Doctor Claire Horton. I'm a psychiatrist, sent here Oakes Valley by the local police department to make sure that none of the staff here were suffering from any kind of stress or trauma following the death of Doctor Holmes on Friday." It was a little far-fetched, Amanda admitted, but it was the best she could come up with.
"Well, I think we're all doing fine, thank you," she said, a slight hint of spite within her voice. She shifted her eyes left and right, moved closer to Amanda and whispered, "some more than others."
"Some more than others, huh?" Amanda said, giving the gossiping woman the push she needed to reveal more. She thanked her lucky stars that she had met this character, she knew that once you got a gossip started, you could find out just about anything from them.
"Dr Holmes wasn't exactly Mr Popularity around here," the nurse said, only too pleased to tell the story. "Don't get me wrong, the guy was an excellent doctor, very thorough and efficient and I respect that, but you sometimes got the feeling that he didn't care for the patients as human beings, more like science studies to see whether the treatment he was using was working or not, and that's not such a great thing when you're working with kids."
"I see," Amanda said, nodding to what the nurse had said to her. "You know, I hear that he was made Head of Paediatrics having been here only a year and eleven months - he must have been some doctor."
"Like I said, he was efficient, but that's not the only thing that contributed to his promotion. When Doctor Murray retired last year, there were only two doctors being considered to take his place - Doctor Holmes, and another man called Doctor Forrester. Everyone thought Doctor Forrester would get the job - he's been here eighteen years, and every single kid he treats leaves with a smile on their faces, but the Board chose Doctor Holmes. You wanna know why?"
"Tell me," Amanda said, egging the nurse on in her tale.
"Well, Doctor Forrester has had some problems with drink in the past, but he's been to AA meetings and is getting it all under control, and he had totally recovered two years ago. But unfortunately, someone tipped off the Board a week before they made their decision, and they obviously thought it was a bad idea to promote someone with that kind of history, so Doctor Holmes was chosen instead. Whether or not Holmes stretched the truth or not is another matter," she added, nodding knowingly.
"I see," Amanda said, pleased that she had made so much progress. Now, here was someone with a motive to kill Anthony Holmes, a big motive. "What about Doctor Forrester now?"
"He was made Head of Paediatrics, as of yesterday," the nurse told him. "He's moving into his office right now, actually, if you want a word with him." The nurse was obviously looking to stir the pot, and create some action in the seemingly sterile and lifeless hospital.
Amanda considered this, but she thought that perhaps she might leave that one to either Steve or Mark - it would look odd for a woman who was supposed to be a psychiatrist to walk into someone's office and start accusing them of murder. "Thank you, but no, I am afraid I have an appointment at eleven o'clock, and since you say that no one in here is in need of my assistance, I'll be going now. Thanks for your help," she said, the nurse not understanding just how helpful she had been.
~~
Steve pulled his truck up outside the respectable abode with its well- trimmed lawn and collection of pansies and crocuses arranged beneath the front room window, and walked with his father along the immaculately cemented path towards the bright white front door. "Nice place," he commented, not being able to see a spot of dirt past the mailbox in sight.
Mark rung the doorbell, stepped back, and hit head on a wind chime. It tinkled angrily before Steve put his hand up to steady it.
A small, lithe woman came opened the door, the tips of her golden-blonde hair brushing her shoulders. "Hi, can I help you?" She asked sweetly, wearing a smile that had lips of strawberries and gleaming teeth of cream.
"Good afternoon, ma'am, is this the house of Maria Chartham?" Steve asked, making sure he'd got the right place before he began to question her concerning a murder.
"That's me," Maria said, still smiling like her face might crack. "What can I do for you?"
"I'm Lieutenant Steve Sloan, LAPD, and this is my father, Doctor Mark Sloan, a consultant with the police department," he said, fishing in his pocket for his ID card and badge. "May we come in?"
"Sure, but I could save you the trouble, I paid that parking ticket this morning," she told them, unable to think of what other matter the police could be visiting her for. "Ask your friend, I think his name was Dan, he was quite cute actually."
Steve made a mental note to tease Dan when he got back to the station, but now he had more pressing business to attend to. "Ms Chartham, this has nothing to do with an unpaid parking ticket," he said as they were ushered through the hallway towards the kitchen. "This concerns the murder of Doctor Anthony Holmes."
The woman stopped in her stride and turned to face the Sloan men. "Anthony's dead?"
"I'm afraid so, Ma'am," Steve said solemnly.
"Murder?" She said, not able to believe it, and then she recalled something. "That guy on the news this morning, the doctor that was shot at the Mayfair last night, that was Anthony?"
"Yes, it was," Steve said, taking the seat he was offered at the kitchen table. "Ms Chartham, we'd like to ask you a few questions regarding the murder of Doctor Holmes."
"Okay," she said. "Can I offer you a cup of coffee?"
"Black, one sugar, thanks," Steve said, grateful for all the coffee he could get that day. He'd not had any sleep since eight pm the previous evening, and it was beginning to catch up on him.
"None for me, thank you," Mark said, speaking for the first time. He'd spent the time trying to assess the character of this woman, and preparing any questions he wished to ask her. Even without him asking any questions, he knew a fair bit about this woman judging from what he had seen of her house and her character thus far.
"Ms Chartham, how would you describe your relationship with Anthony Holmes?" Steve asked, sipping the black liquid gratefully, feeling more awake and alert already.
"We were friends," she said shortly. Mark and Steve looked at each other, they'd asked one question and already she was lying to them - not such a good start.
"My sources tell me that you were more than friends with Anthony," Mark said, knowing that already he was beginning to tread on thin ice. "You and Anthony were engaged at one time, but then he broke it off. Why was that?"
Maria sighed. "I'll never understand men," she said wistfully. "Anthony decides he wants to marry me, and of course I'm overjoyed and say yes, but three months later he calls the whole thing off, saying that he wanted to concentrate on his career." Mark noted this, feeling that it tied up with what Amelia had told him about Anthony being career-minded, but he still felt there was more to it than Maria was letting on. "Fair enough, he was a great doctor, and I respected that, but why ask me to marry him in the first place?"
Steve tried another approach, one he'd looked into before he'd arrived at the house. "Ms Chartham, your bank statement tells me you made several substantial withdrawals since you and Anthony cancelled the wedding, which have continued on a regular basis to the present day. I'm willing to bet that those withdrawals will stop now that Anthony Holmes is dead."
Maria did not like the way that things were going, this detective guy knew more than she was comfortable with. Instantly her sweetness disappeared and was replaced by anger. "And just what are you implying, Lieutenant Sloan?"
Mark took it upon himself to change tact and try and calm Maria down, a brawl would get them nowhere. "Ms Chartham, are all the medals and trophies in the hall yours?"
The young woman softened and said, "Yes, I used to be an International gymnast. I finished my professional career a couple of years ago, and since then I've been teaching gymnastics at Lincoln High School."
Gymnastics? Mark immediately thought of the rope backstage at the Mayfair, where Anthony was shot. For a gymnast, particularly one of Maria's standard, climbing down the rope would be child's play.
"That's where I met Anthony, at gymnastics classes when we were fourteen. He quit going after he picked up an injury, but I had dreamed of a career in gymnastics since I could walk, and I made it," she continued proudly.
"One last question, Ms Chartham, where were you between eight and ten pm yesterday evening?" Steve asked, checking to see whether she had an alibi or not.
"At Lincoln High School, it was the senior class prom yesterday," she said. "I was chaperoning between six thirty in the evening and two thirty this morning. And before you ask if there were any witnesses, besides a couple of hundred pupils, the Film and Media Studies teacher, Mr Wood, was filming the evening with a video camera, which if I recall has a time and date stamp in the corner of the picture throughout the footage."
Something occurred to Mark when she said this. "Tell me, Ms Chartham, is Melanie Thomas one of your pupils?"
Maria knew exactly what Mark was getting at. "I don't teach Mel, but I do know her. How is she, by the way?"
That was when Mark knew that Maria Chartham's alibi was practically airtight. Driving back to the hospital in the truck, Steve enquired as to why Mark had asked her that. Mark explained, "I pumped Melanie's stomach last night, and I remember Kurt, her boyfriend, saying that they'd been at the Lincoln High Prom. Her alibi is good, Steve."
"Yeah, but that doesn't mean she was telling the truth all the time - I'm sure Holmes was black-mailing her. And, I think that there's more to their break-up than she's letting on," he said, remembering how heated that part of the conversation had become. "I just wish I knew what the main reason was."
"Let's hope Amanda has more luck tomorrow," Mark said, watching as the first lead came to a dead end.
~~
Small place, but fancy looking, Amanda thought to herself as she parked her car in the lot at Oakes Valley Hospital. She was nervous and excited at the same time - she was investigating and going undercover without Jack there to dig her out of the holes she frequently seemed to fall into. She locked her car and set off towards the building, her heels clicking on the tarmac.
It was Sunday morning - Mark had told Amanda to go home and get a good night of sleep before she did any investigating, a remedy that he had also prescribed to Steve and himself - and Amanda was awake, refreshed, and ready to seek the information needed to find Anthony Holmes' killer.
She soon found the Paediatrics Department in the establishment, and began to look around, seeing if there was anything at all that might point the finger at someone who had a reason to kill Anthony Holmes. A nurse, who had been watching her for some minutes, walked over to her and said, "Can I help you?" The nurse was short and well rounded, with greying hair tied back into a bun.
"Hello," Amanda greeted amiably, "I'm Doctor Claire Horton. I'm a psychiatrist, sent here Oakes Valley by the local police department to make sure that none of the staff here were suffering from any kind of stress or trauma following the death of Doctor Holmes on Friday." It was a little far-fetched, Amanda admitted, but it was the best she could come up with.
"Well, I think we're all doing fine, thank you," she said, a slight hint of spite within her voice. She shifted her eyes left and right, moved closer to Amanda and whispered, "some more than others."
"Some more than others, huh?" Amanda said, giving the gossiping woman the push she needed to reveal more. She thanked her lucky stars that she had met this character, she knew that once you got a gossip started, you could find out just about anything from them.
"Dr Holmes wasn't exactly Mr Popularity around here," the nurse said, only too pleased to tell the story. "Don't get me wrong, the guy was an excellent doctor, very thorough and efficient and I respect that, but you sometimes got the feeling that he didn't care for the patients as human beings, more like science studies to see whether the treatment he was using was working or not, and that's not such a great thing when you're working with kids."
"I see," Amanda said, nodding to what the nurse had said to her. "You know, I hear that he was made Head of Paediatrics having been here only a year and eleven months - he must have been some doctor."
"Like I said, he was efficient, but that's not the only thing that contributed to his promotion. When Doctor Murray retired last year, there were only two doctors being considered to take his place - Doctor Holmes, and another man called Doctor Forrester. Everyone thought Doctor Forrester would get the job - he's been here eighteen years, and every single kid he treats leaves with a smile on their faces, but the Board chose Doctor Holmes. You wanna know why?"
"Tell me," Amanda said, egging the nurse on in her tale.
"Well, Doctor Forrester has had some problems with drink in the past, but he's been to AA meetings and is getting it all under control, and he had totally recovered two years ago. But unfortunately, someone tipped off the Board a week before they made their decision, and they obviously thought it was a bad idea to promote someone with that kind of history, so Doctor Holmes was chosen instead. Whether or not Holmes stretched the truth or not is another matter," she added, nodding knowingly.
"I see," Amanda said, pleased that she had made so much progress. Now, here was someone with a motive to kill Anthony Holmes, a big motive. "What about Doctor Forrester now?"
"He was made Head of Paediatrics, as of yesterday," the nurse told him. "He's moving into his office right now, actually, if you want a word with him." The nurse was obviously looking to stir the pot, and create some action in the seemingly sterile and lifeless hospital.
Amanda considered this, but she thought that perhaps she might leave that one to either Steve or Mark - it would look odd for a woman who was supposed to be a psychiatrist to walk into someone's office and start accusing them of murder. "Thank you, but no, I am afraid I have an appointment at eleven o'clock, and since you say that no one in here is in need of my assistance, I'll be going now. Thanks for your help," she said, the nurse not understanding just how helpful she had been.
~~