chapter three
police matters
The
sun rose that morning with a cold cheerfulness, cruelly indifferent
to the terrible tragedy of the night before. Inside the ancestral
home, the police officers had arrived and were busy roping off the
office in which my uncle's body had been found. According to my
Uncle Oakes, who had been the unfortunate discoverer of the body upon
hearing a sharp cry last night and going downstairs to investigate,
Mordred had apparently been attacked with some sort of sharp metal
weapon, and his face had been mutilated beyond recognition. However,
it was unmistakably my uncle's clothing and body, said Uncle Oakes.
My uncle refused to let anyone else see the body, and we were left to
imagine Mordred's grotesque passing. My mind felt weak and numb,
and I let my eyes wander over the three policemen, who had now
returned to the family in the living room.
There were two young
policemen in uniform, one blonde, one with brown hair. They moved
about the room with stiff, professional movements, talking in low and
furtive voices. Their superior officer, a Mr. Waldrop, was in plain
clothes, namely a brown leather jacket, shabby corduroy pants, and
large, geeky-looking glasses. He was a red-head, complete with
sideburns and a straggly goatee. He might have been tall, had he not
a sort of humped back that made him appear to be constantly
slouching, and he spoke in a marked Southern drawl. He seemed to me a
rather unpleasant person, with his languid, sour expression,
and when he crossed the room to speak to Jeanette and me, I noticed
how dull and spiritless his eyes looked behind his thick
glasses.
"I'll need to ask you ladies a few questions," he
said professionally, pulling out a small notebook from his jacket
pocket. "You are the nieces of the deceased, are you not?"
"Yes,"
I said, "Shirley Ingham."
"And Jeanette Ingham," murmured
my cousin, still staring at the floor. Poor Jeanette, she was still
very pale and shaken from the night's shock. I put my arm around
her shoulder encouragingly.
"Now your grandparents had three
sons, is that right?" continued the policeman.
"Yes," I
answered. "Oakes, Mordred, and Roger."
"And Roger is your
father?"
"Yes," I said, my throat going tight. "He and my
mother died in a car accident in 2006."
"I see," he said,
making some kind of note in his little book. "You'll forgive the
personal questions, Shirley, but is it true that your late uncle was
involved in some sort of university scandal a few years back?"
"Yes,
it's true," I said quietly. "We were never given the
particulars, but I understand that it was some type of ethics
violation. He is a biochemistry professor, and was working on a
research experiment with a team of Swiss scientists."
"And
what was the outcome of the scandal?"
"Nothing. The university
withdrew their charges. I don't know why."
"And when did
this happen?"
"In 2006. Big, red-letter year for the Inghams."
I stifled a sudden weird urge to laugh out loud. My uncle's death
was just so bizarre, and my brain still hadn't completely processed
it yet.
"I see," said the policeman. "And did either of you
hear anything suspicious last night?"
"No," I answered.
Jeanette shook her head.
"Well, the room you two were in is very
high up in the building. Have you any reason to believe that your
uncle ever renewed his contact with the Swiss scientists?"
"We
wouldn't know, I'm sorry. Our uncle was not very…uh,
communicative."
"I must ask one more personal question. You
will forgive me. Do you strongly regret your uncle's death?"
I
glanced uneasily at Jeanette. That was an awkward question indeed.
After a moment I answered, knowing that I spoke for both of us. "We
were never very close to our uncle, Officer, even before he became,
as you might say, the black sheep of the family. Of course we are
upset at his death, and it's a great tragedy, but um…" I tried
to think of how to explain it. "Well, like I said, we were not very
close to him," I finished lamely. I was not about to tell a
complete stranger all the things I had thought and feared, in secret,
about my late uncle.
"I see. Thank you, ladies," he said, and
returned to hold conference with his fellow officers. I saw that
Jeanette was slipping quietly out of the room, and I followed her up
to our guest bedroom.
She was sitting silently on her bed, with
her back to the wall. "Shirley?" she asked upon hearing my
footsteps.
"Yeah."
There was a silence.
"It's
so…horrible."
"I know." I had opened my suitcase and taken
out Jeanette's Christmas present, a special edition of the board
game Clue, which had been a childhood favorite of ours. I thought the
gift might cheer her up, but, upon reading the inscription on the
back, "Who killed Mr. Boddy?" I thought better of it, and shoved
the game back into my suitcase.
"Do you want to be alone?" I
asked.
"I don't mind."
"Well, I'll be back." For
some reason, my mind just couldn't accept the fact that my uncle
had really been murdered last night. The strangest ideas were
flitting about in my brain, and I couldn't stop thinking about it.
Slowly, I walked downstairs and back into the living room. My
relatives had all left the room, and there remained only the three
policemen, who were carefully inspecting the doors and windows and
were oblivious to my presence.
"Um, sir?" I asked awkwardly,
breaking the silence. The chief officer, Mr. Waldrop, whirled around,
his magnifying glass suspended in mid-air. "Yes?" he said
curtly.
"I was wondering if we could…um, talk," I said,
realizing how lame that sounded.
"Shirley, we are in the middle
of an investigation," said the policeman.
"Yes, but I have
some information--some conjectures, anyway, which might be helpful,"
I responded timidly.
With the manner of a parent yielding to a
relentless child, Mr. Waldrop laid down his magnifying glass and
turned to me with his arms folded. "You'd better tell me all,"
he said.
"The thing is," I began, "I don't believe that my
uncle is dead."
One of the younger policemen at the window made
a snorting sound that was probably supposed to be laughter, but Mr.
Waldrop ignored him.
"I know that sounds stupid, Mr.
Waldrop--"
"Please, call me Brandon,"
"Uh, Brandon,"
I said. "I know it sounds stupid, but um…do you give any credence
to impressions and feelings? Maybe you would call it women's
intuition."
His expression
was a bit skeptical and not very encouraging. I took a deep breath
and continued.
"I'll be frank with you, Brandon. I have always
been unexplainably disturbed in my uncle's presence. Somehow my
mind seemed to sense something sinister and undisclosed in those
glinting eyes of his. I have never discussed it with Jeanette, but I
believe that she shares my convictions. And now he is reportedly
dead, yet the feeling of his presence remains with me very
strongly."
Mr. Waldrop adjusted his glasses. "You have just
had a terrible experience, Shirley. It is understandable that your
mind should be anxious and disturbed."
Sympathetic fellow, this,
I thought. "I don't expect you to believe what I am saying," I
said a bit stiffly. "I'm only saying it because I think it might
help you with the investigation."
"That is good of you," he
said.
I took a deep breath. "The other thing is, I am currently
earning my PhD in British literature. And I consider myself something
of an expert on, well, detective fiction. And I cannot ignore the
fact that this event reminds me very strongly of a certain story of
Sherlock Holmes."
For a moment there was a look in Brandon's
face that I could not explain. An instant later it had vanished, and
he looked cynical and even a little amused.
"Thank you for your
concern, Shirley, but this matter is anything but fictional," he
said.
"I'm just telling you how I feel!" I exclaimed. OK,
Shirley, way to sound like a complete idiot. I looked around at
the time-beaten paneling of the living room, trying to calm myself
down. "There is so much history in this room," I said softly.
"You can almost feel the past here, separated only by the flimsy
veil of time. If only we could tear that veil, how much this room
might tell us!" I looked around to see the two younger policemen
staring at me with expressions
not unlike those of my former student Chad. "Sorry, that was kinda
random," I apologized. Where had that thought come from, anyway?
"I'll stop taking up your time," I muttered, and fled from the
room, flushed with embarrassment.
I knew how foolish I must have sounded to the policemen. But the truth was, I'd meant every word I said.
