P. Alderman - Haunting Jordan

Flipping to the table of contents, she located the chapter on the murder investigation and hunted for the page. After another fortifying sip of espresso, she started to read.

Though I am a man whose work exemplifies sobriety and industry, I feel it necessary to record the investigation that resulted in the arrest of the individual who was responsible for the terrible murder of Mrs. Charles Longren on that tragic night of June 6, 1890. It is my intent by recording the details of this horrendous crime that others may learn from the straightforward and thorough work of the Port Chatham Police Department, and that this learning will influence future investigations, providing a good example for generations to come .

The victim, Mrs. Charles Longren, had been recently widowed from one of Port Chatham’s most respected businessmen, who was rumored to have perished at sea at the hands of a mutinous crew. This unfortunate incident marked the beginning of a period of extreme mental instability for his widow, who it can be said then made several ill-advised decisions, resulting in her reckless and inappropriate behavior on more than one occasion, and ultimately leading to her own murder, as well as the ruination of her younger, innocent sister, Miss Charlotte Walker. Be that as it may, the Port Chatham Police Department did not shirk in its duties, as you, dear reader, will soon surmise .

Jordan rolled her eyes. The man’s gargantuan sense of self-importance was enough to almost, but not quite, trigger her gag reflex. She refrained from speculating about the borderline personality required to write such pompous drivel and continued to read.

At twelve minutes before midnight on that fatal night, this author was called upon to examine the body of Hattie Longren, whom it appeared had been bludgeoned with an auger. Within hours of the commission of the crime, I had vigorously pursued and arrested Mrs. Longren’s murderer, one Frank Lewis, a union representative with a history of violence who also may have been her illicit lover …

The restaurant owner set Jordan’s breakfast before her, the aromas of warm citrus and maple syrup jerking her back to the present. She marked her place with a torn corner of her napkin and shut the book, thinking about what she’d learned as she dug in.

According to Greeley’s version of events, Hattie had been hit from behind with an iron hand auger, described as a vise with long handles on either side, weighing approximately eight pounds. Greeley had found it lying next to her body, one handle smeared with blood. Given Greeley’s description of the tool, it was obviously heavy enough to have split open Hattie’s skull when wielded with sufficient force. Using recently imported European techniques in the science of fingerprinting, Greeley had identified a bloody print on the master bedroom door as Frank Lewis’s.

Frank claimed to have been drugged and unconscious in the library at the time of the murder. When he’d regained consciousness, he’d immediately looked for Hattie, concerned for her safety. He’d discovered her body, tried to revive her, then contacted Greeley. Frank had admitted he was woozy from the effects of whatever drug someone had slipped into his tea and was not thinking clearly—he thought he might’ve left the bloody print on the door handle as he ran out of the room to contact the police.

Greeley had written that he hadn’t believed Frank’s version of events. Based on Frank’s presence at the crime scene and the bloody print, Greeley had immediately arrested him.

Though Frank had vehemently denied killing Hattie and claimed that Greeley should investigate Clive Johnson, the police chief had dismissed his arguments. In the weeks before the trial, Greeley had gone on to establish Frank’s motive by interviewing witnesses from the neighborhood who claimed to have heard frequent arguments between Hattie and Frank, though the substance of those arguments was unknown.

Jordan frowned as she chewed. Even with the fingerprint, the evidence seemed circumstantial at best, though perhaps back then it would’ve been considered sufficient to gain a conviction. However, given what she’d already learned about Hattie’s life and her strained relationships with her neighbors, Jordan thought it entirely possible some hadn’t given truthful statements—or, at the very least, had been influenced by circumstances to believe the worst. She made a mental note to ask whether any signed statements or witness testimony from the trial might still exist.

What bothered her the most, though, were the parallels between Hattie’s murder investigation and Ryland’s. In both cases, an arrogant cop was in charge, and in both cases, one suspect had been the focus from the very beginning. Why hadn’t Greeley looked at other possible suspects? Surely Charlotte and the housekeeper had told him about Michael Seavey and Clive Johnson, even if they wouldn’t have thought to mention Eleanor Canby. Then again, according to Hattie’s diary, Greeley had held Johnson in high regard, and his relationship with Seavey was unknown. Greeley therefore might have discounted what the women had told him; he certainly made a habit of discounting what any woman said.

Perhaps Seavey’s papers would shed further light on the investigation—that is, if he’d written about it. And Jordan would have to ask Hattie what Frank had been doing in the house that night—why he’d been in the library, and whether she knew who could have drugged him. But no matter how Jordan looked at it, Greeley seemed to have focused on Frank from the very beginning, having arrested him the very same night, then concentrated on building the case against him.

She pushed her plate away, her appetite gone. From what Darcy and Carol had told her, Drake seemed to have focused exclusively on her since the night of Ryland’s murder. Did that mean Drake was building a case against her, compiling what he believed to be strong evidence that she’d tampered with Ryland’s Beemer? Had people like Didi Wyeth manipulated the facts out of spite? The thought that someone might be deliberately encouraging Drake’s tunnel vision …

No . The LAPD was a highly professional organization with more than a hundred years of technological advances in forensics at their fingertips. Surely, even if Drake did suffer from tunnel vision, the prosecutors wouldn’t indict on less than damning evidence against her, given the press’s laser focus. And that evidence simply didn’t exist, because she hadn’t killed Ryland.

She glanced at her watch. More time had passed than she’d realized—the movers were probably waiting for her. And she’d wasted far too much time already that morning obsessing. That had to stop. Downing the last of her coffee, she paid her bill, then headed home, still lost in thought, the dog in the lead as usual.

The good news, she concluded, was that she seemed to be adjusting to her spectral roommates—as long as she could find peaceful, contemplative moments like these away from them. Obsessing aside, she had a house she loved, a new town she might love even more, and an ancient murder investigation that had her more hooked than most mystery books. The cops would do their job and find Ryland’s murderer.

She needed to stay positive.

* * *

THE moving van pulled to a stop at the curb just as she arrived, sending Charlotte into a spastic frenzy, flying from window to window. Doing her best to ignore Charlotte’s ceiling-level hovering, Jordan walked the movers through the house and handed out instructions. Downstairs furniture would go in the parlor on the main floor, overflow furniture would be stored in the parlor on the second floor, and boxes would be delivered to the room designated on their labels. Then she and Hattie lured Charlotte into the library, whereupon Jordan produced the Vanity Fair she’d purchased the night before. She slipped out, shutting the doors—just in case others could hear ghost shrieks or see magazine pages flying—and taped up a note, declaring the room off-limits.