Claire McNab - Dead Certain

Carol leaned her chin on her hands. “Okay, let’s get this over and done with, and we can both go home.”

He passed her a neatly ruled sheet. “Time of death is so vague that it seems almost any of his nearest and dearest could have helped him on his way, not to mention his enemies.” They went down the list together, stopping to discuss each one.

Kenneth and Nicole Raeburn had agreed that they were both at home most of Saturday and Sunday. “They’d alibi each other, anyway,” said Bourke, “so that means very little.”

“Motives?”

“Kenneth Raeburn’s in real financial trouble, and rumors persist that his son was about to dump him, audit the company and then bring in a professional manager. A verdict of accidental death will get him Collis’s eight hundred thousand insurance, the embarrassment of HIV hushed up and the company assets to play with.” He made a face. “As for his sister, strikes me she’s nuts about her brother, in more ways than one. Still, the way he died seems too disciplined for her-she’s the sort who’d lose her marbles, shove him off a building and then say, Ooops, he slipped…”

Corinne Jawalski had claimed to be at the Town Hall in the audience for Elijah , although, as Anne Newsome had pointed out, she had plenty of time to go to Collis Raeburn’s room and then return before the end of the oratorio.

“How about bitter pique for a motive?” said Bourke. “She thinks she’s got head diva sewn up, then he reneges and says he’s staying with Alanna and it’s just too bad for her.”

“Doesn’t seem enough motive for a murder.”

“How about,” said Bourke grimly, “he infected her with AIDS? Wouldn’t that be a reason to kill him?”

Graeme Welton was working alone all weekend on final touches to Dingo and had ignored phone calls, so he had no alibi. Bourke was jocular. “Welton’s a friend of Nicole’s, though God knows what’s in it for him. Maybe he killed her brother on her behalf to save daddy’s bacon, as well as to punish Collis for saying his new opera was going to go belly up.”

His smile faded when Carol said, “He had a sexual relationship with Raeburn, and we don’t know what his HIV status is…”

On Saturday night Edward Livingston had been at the Opera House gladhanding a group of society matrons who formed the influential fund-raising committee of a national charity. The cocktail party had ended with a harpsichord recital starting at eight in the tiny Playhouse Theater. “Livingston would have had no probs,” said Bourke. “He could have slipped out, walked to the hotel, dealt with Raeburn, then been back in time to smile at the ladies as they trotted off into the night.”

“And he might want Collis dead because he was about to lose him. Even if Livingston held him to his contract, there’d be a debilitating legal battle, expensive and embarrassing.”

Both Alanna Brooks and Lloyd Clancy had been guests at a function honoring an ancient but still prolific artist at the Museum of Modern Art at the Rocks, which was very close to Raeburn’s hotel. “Pat was there, too,” said Bourke, “and she remembers speaking to both of them at different times, but she’s vague about when. People came and went from seven-thirty on, and it was very crowded. Didn’t end until well after eleven, and I’m still chasing up a guest list to see if I can get anything more concrete.”

“All right, Mark-Alanna Brooks kills him because she’s about to be supplanted as prima donna… and maybe there’s a love triangle there too, with either Corinne Jawalski or Graeme Welton at the other point.”

Bourke yawned. “Sorry Carol, had a late night-we went through the wedding rehearsal a hundred times, it seems. Now, who’s left? Lloyd Clancy and Mr. X.” He yawned again. “Clancy has a motive because Raeburn’s career was eclipsing his. Something like that wouldn’t worry me, but then, I’m not an opera singer.”

“A mercy,” said Carol.

“Cheer up,” said Bourke, “if none of these motives attract you, there’s always Mr. X-the guy Raeburn told his singing teacher he’d get even with. Maybe Mr. X got in first.”

Carol frowned. “Doesn’t have to be a Mr. X who infected him,” she said. “Could be a woman.”

Madeline, wearing a russet shirt, tight white jeans and an incandescent smile, opened the door. Carol said, “I’ve got to pick up David and my Aunt Sarah from Sybil’s house, so I can only stay a few moments.”

She had deliberately dropped the clue, and Madeline immediately picked it up. “At Sybil’s house? Has she left you, Carol? Or did you throw her out?” Then, immediately contrite, “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Why did you want to see me?”

Madeline seemed chilled by Carol’s tone. “Are you coming inside? Please…”

Carol followed her down the short hall to a charmingly furnished sitting room with plate glass windows opening onto a landscaped garden. Stingingly conscious of Madeline’s physical presence and of her heavy musk perfume, torn by fresh anguish over Sybil, Carol gazed resolutely at the greenery tossed by the wind.

“Amos Derringer’s disappeared.”

Carol looked at her. “Something’s happened to him?”

“No. He’s gone to ground. I think he’s been paid off to keep him quiet.”

“Any ideas?”

Madeline’s heavy copper hair shone as she shook her head. “Thought your people’d be able to turn up something. I suspect it might be the father trying to hush things up, but then again, Collis could have been moving with some pretty heavy characters we know nothing about.” She took a leather folder from a side table. “These are statements, notes, the report from a private detective we had check Berringer out-everything we collected.” She gave a small smile. “I’m cooperating with the police, Carol. Won’t you cooperate with me?”

“In what way?”

“Have you and Sybil separated?”

Carol stood. “This isn’t a topic for discussion.”

“It’s important to me.”

“Why?”

“You know why, Carol.”

Checking her watch, Carol said, “I have to go.” Madeline laughed as though she’d won a victory. “Go,” she said.

When Carol, David and Aunt Sarah came back from Sybil’s, darkness was falling. While Aunt Sarah organized David into a bath before dinner, Carol listened to the one message on the answering machine.

The same whispered voice as before admonished her: You haven’t been paying attention, Carol Ashton. It was an accidental overdose. Why not just say that or do you want everyone to know what you and Sybil Quade do in bed? Collis Raeburn’s death was an accident. Make sure your report says that .

Sounds of enthusiastic splashing from the bathroom preceded Aunt Sarah, who came hurrying back into the kitchen area. “Who was that?”

Her aunt always moved with unsettling energy, towing less enthusiastic people along in her wake. She also had a tenacity that made prevarication pointless. Carol was horrified to hear a shake in her voice as she said, “It’s just a rather well-mannered anonymous call trying to persuade me that Collis Raeburn accidentally killed himself.”

Aunt Sarah squeezed her hand in unspoken comfort, obviously realizing that Carol was struggling for control. She said prosaically, “Why well-mannered?”

It helped to be objective. “Anonymity often encourages people to swear, describe in graphic detail violence or sex… this one’s polite to an extraordinary extent, considering that he, or she, is threatening me.”

Aunt Sarah looked alarmed. “Threatening you with what? Physical harm?”

It was hard to say the words. “Just exposure as a lesbian, Aunt. Just that.”

“What are you going to do?”