Caught in the Middle Read online

  Now my car, my trunk, my parking lot, even MERRY had become police business.

  I sighed as I watched another heavy peg pounded into the macadam. Hopefully my landlord would understand that it was the police who had made the holes in his parking area, not me. Somehow, knowing Mr. Jacobs, I doubted it.

  “Miss Kramer, please tell me what happened here tonight,” the policeman repeated.

  I forced my eyes from the activity and looked at him. “Nothing much happened here,” I said. “I opened my trunk, and there he was. I closed my trunk, hoping he’d go away. I opened my trunk and he was still there. I called you.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it.”

  A car squealed into the alley behind the official cars. A man climbed out and walked authoritatively toward the open trunk. He leaned under the protective plastic and around the men taking photographs, studied the situation, then walked to the policeman and me.

  As he watched the approaching man, the policeman snorted, little puffs of foggy breath erupting from each nostril. “The press already! That’s all we need.”

  “Don!” I said as I flung myself at the man. He ducked to miss the points of my umbrella and patted me comfortingly on the back.

  “It’ll be okay,” he said as though to a crying child. “It’ll be okay.”

  Suddenly I realized that I had thrown myself at my boss, a man with whom I had only the most superficial of working relationships, a man I had on a pedestal. Ever since I’d gone into journalism and realized what editors did in putting together a newspaper every day, I had been in awe of them. And here I was, hanging all over my editor like a Southern belle with the vapors. I pulled back in embarrassment but was glad when he kept a comforting hand on my shoulder.

  “Don, there’s a body in my trunk,” I said.

  “I noticed. Who is he?”

  I glared at him. “Why does everyone think I know him?”

  “It is your car.”

  “That doesn’t mean I know him! I suppose you think I put him there, too?”

  “Did you?” asked the policeman.

  I blinked, my anger gone as quickly as it had come.

  “You don’t really think I did, do you?” I could feel the handcuffs already.

  The policeman shrugged. “Someone put him there.”

  “Well, it wasn’t me.” I hoped I sounded confident. “If he were really my body, I’d put him in someone else’s car.” I looked from the policeman to Don. “That only makes sense, right?”

  The policeman shrugged.

  Don smiled.

  I shivered. “I think I’ll go inside.”

  I sat forlornly in my living room for a few minutes seeing the bright light from the generators through the tall windows. That was a nice thing about old buildings—tall windows.

  Restless, I got up, went to my minuscule kitchen and put some water on to boil. People would be in soon, and hot drinks would be welcomed. Personally, I still wanted my Coke and Oreos, but there was no way I had the nerve to get a can from the trunk, even if they let me.

  Ten minutes later, the policeman, whose name was Sergeant William Poole, sat carefully in my blue wing chair, his hair hanging damply on his forehead and his shirt gaping a bit about the belly. A mug full of coffee sat on the end table beside him, and he had a clipboard in one hand and a pen in the other. “All right, Miss Kramer, tell me all about it. In fact, why don’t you tell me about your whole day.”

  I nodded. “Okay.” I cleared my throat nervously. “This morning I drove my car to Taggart’s garage for its annual state inspection. Jolene Meister, the secretary from work, picked me up at the garage at six forty-five.”

  “Where do you work?”

  “At The News.”

  “Then he’s your boss?” Sergeant Poole nodded at Don Eldredge, who was sitting comfortably on the sofa.

  “Yes, he’s my boss.”

  “You been at The News long?”

  “About three months. I started just after Labor Day.”

  “What do you do?”

  “I’m a general reporter and feature writer.” Which sounded more glamorous than the gofer I often felt like.

  “Have you lived in Amhearst long?”

  “Since Labor Day weekend.”

  “Where do you come from?”

  “The Pittsburgh area.”

  Sergeant Poole nodded. “Did you leave a family in Pittsburgh?”

  “My parents and Sam, my younger brother, who’s at Penn State.” And Jack, I thought. And Jack.

  “So you took your car to be inspected this morning. Why’d you go to Taggart’s?”

  “The people at work recommended that garage. No huge bill for unnecessary work, you know?” I noticed I was picking nervously at my cuticles and forced myself to stop. “Lots of garages like to bleed single women, but they told me Mr. Taggart wouldn’t do that.”

  Sergeant Poole nodded like he knew Mr. Taggart and agreed. “When’d you get your car back, Miss Kramer?”

  “Jolene dropped me off on her way home. I hadn’t expected to be able to leave by five because of a late-afternoon meeting I was to cover and write up, but the meeting was canceled.”

  I gulped some tea, then continued. “Mr. Taggart wasn’t around when Jolene dropped me off, but my car was waiting, the new inspection stickers on the window and the bill on the seat, just like we’d arranged when we thought I’d be late.” I shrugged. “I just climbed in and drove off. After dinner at Ferretti’s, I covered the Board of Education meeting at the high school. Then I came home.”

  “Did you have dinner with anyone?”

  I shook my head. “I ate alone.”

  “You didn’t stop for those sodas sometime between picking up your car and coming home?”

  “No, I bought them yesterday. I just hadn’t taken them out of the trunk.”

  Sergeant Poole nodded. “Did anything else significant happen today?”

  I realized that, in place of my cuticles, I was playing with the string from my sweatshirt hood. I tucked it inside so I couldn’t fiddle with it anymore and said, “I almost had an accident on my way home when some guy pulled out in front of me over on Oak Lane. But I didn’t.” I paused, thought, then shrugged my shoulders. “That’s it.”

  Sergeant Poole chewed the tip of his pen for a minute, wrote something down, then asked, “Does the name Patrick Marten mean anything to you?”

  “Patrick Marten?” I thought for a few minutes, then shook my head. “I don’t know anyone by that name. Why? Is he the man in the trunk?”

  Sergeant Poole nodded.

  Patrick Marten. I sighed. Was there a Mrs. Patrick Marten somewhere waiting for him to come home? Were there kids? Certainly there was a mother and a father. A girlfriend? Obviously there was an enemy.

  By the time Sergeant Poole capped his pen and hefted himself to his feet, I was feeling more normal. I almost smiled as the gaps in his shirt slid shut. After all, I was used to talking with people in living rooms. It was just corpses in the rain that bothered me.

  And I had finally realized that I was in the middle of the biggest story of my fledgling journalism career.

  “I’m sure we’ll be talking again, Miss Kramer.” Sergeant Poole pulled on his still-dripping slicker. “Maybe tomorrow when you stop in to sign your statement.”

  “Whenever you want, Sergeant Poole.”

  He stopped and turned at the door. “By the way, we’re going to have to impound your car for at least a few days.”

  I stared in consternation. “My car?” How could I investigate a murder without a car?

  Don spoke for the first time. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow morning, Merry, and take you to one of the local car dealers who leases as well as sells. We’ll charge it to The News.”

  I nodded as I almost pushed Sergeant Poole out the door. What other unforeseen complications hunkered down just out of sight, eager to pounce?

  But who cared about complications? I had a story!

&n
bsp; “Don,” I began.

  “Yes?” His voice was full of suppressed emotion. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought he was laughing at me.

  I glared at him. “You don’t even know what I’m going to say.”

  “Of course I do,” he said. “I sat on your sofa and watched you go from scared victim to professional reporter. You want to cover this story.”

  “You bet I do! It’s the story of a lifetime, and I’m the perfect one for it! Who better?’

  “Do you think you can handle it?”

  “Can I handle it? Of course I can!” I was too excited to be mad at the suggestion that I couldn’t.

  Don grinned at me as he patted his carefully barbered graying hair. Everything about him was neat and precise, even the tidily folded scarf resting on the chair back. He shook it out and draped it about his neck, making sure the ends were even.

  “To be honest, as soon as I heard the call on the police scanner at the office, I knew we had a winner. If you have any trouble as the story develops—” He held up his hand at my indignant look. “If you have any trouble, Mac can help you.”

  Don took his mug to the kitchen, and I heard him rinse it out. I stood in the middle of the living room and grinned like an idiot. I had a story!

  I made myself act professionally as I walked Don to the door. I even made a pretty speech. “Thanks for being here when I talked to Sergeant Poole, Don. Something about a policeman always makes me feel guilty even when I’m innocent, which is all the time—except for the time I got a speeding ticket for going forty-five in a twenty-five mile zone.”

  Don laughed. “You’ve got nothing to worry about, Merry. I’ll vouch for your character if they ever begin to suspect you.”

  “And my whereabouts,” I said, suddenly remembering Don eating spaghetti at Ferretti’s, talking intently with some unknown man. I hadn’t approached him because the two of them looked so involved. In fact, I deliberately sat with my back to him. “That is, if you saw me like I saw you.”

  Don hesitated, then shook his head. “No, I don’t think so.”

  I shrugged. “Oh, well, I doubt it matters. Thanks again for being here.”

  I watched him drive up the alley, then locked my door carefully. I washed my mug and Sergeant Poole’s and decided there was no way I was going to take the trash out. I didn’t care that the police were still in the parking area. I was in for the night!

  I checked and rechecked the doors and the windows, the tall, breakable windows that suddenly seemed less wonderful than usual. It was when I tested them for the fourth time that I noticed the moon peeking through the running clouds. The storm was over.

  I got into bed with Whiskers and plumped the pillows carefully against the headboard. When I leaned back with my lined pad on my lap, Whiskers promptly climbed onto the pad.

  “Not now, baby,” I said, lifting the heavy creature and setting him down beside me. “I’ve got to write everything down before I forget it. Who knows?” I grinned at him. “Maybe I’ll even write a true-crime book about this someday.”

  Whiskers yawned hugely, and I tickled him beneath the chin. I had selected him at the pound because he kept coming to me to be petted, purring whenever my hand even reached toward him. Now he lay close against me, a comforting presence after an unbelievable night.

  I turned to my pad, feeling ghoulish as all my journalistic juices flowed and excitement coursed through me—now that I didn’t have to look at the body again. Admittedly, what had happened was a great tragedy, especially for Patrick Marten. But a great story is a great story and deserves to be written about, I told myself hard-heartedly. In all great stories people suffer. If I could just get the information together, find the motive, the means, and the murderer, certainly I would reduce the suffering for Patrick Marten’s family and friends. If Don was hugely impressed with my work, that was just a small extra.

  Satisfied that I had manipulated my motives well, I wrote:

  Took car to Mr. Taggart’s. Spoke with him for a few minutes about its tendency to overheat.

  Jolene picked me up. She never got out of her car. We were five minutes late for work.

  Spent the morning opening mail and running dumb errands for Don and Mac. Felt trapped without my car.

  Went to the mall in Exton with Mac to look for a camera over lunch. He made a pass. I rejected it. He asked me out. I said no. We laughed. I don’t think he’s mad even though he’s famous for his grouchiness. Certainly he’s not mad enough to put a body in my trunk. I bought the automatic-focus digital camera he recommended, which pleased him. I’m now broke.

  Mac dropped me at Premier Medical, the new private emergency service, for an interview. Spent an hour with Drs. Mitchell and Wenger. Learned lots of new terms and used my new camera. The pix look good.

  Called a taxi. Went back to the paper. Did telephone interviews with the head nurse at the hospital’s trauma center and with three doctors in private practice. I really ought to find a doctor. What if I get sick?

  Wrote up the story. Gave it to Don. He didn’t moan too much.

  Walked to Mayor Trudy McGilpin’s office to observe a meeting between her, the water authority people and the recreational people. The meeting was canceled because Trudy’s sick. I walked back to The News. Is Trudy as good as a lawyer as she appears to be as a mayor? How old is she? Forty?

  Since I had no meeting to write up, I left much earlier than I’d planned. Jolene, the chatter queen, dropped me at Taggart’s at about 5:20.

  Got my car. I saw no one at all at the garage. I just took the car and left.

  Stopped at Ferretti’s Ristorante for some spaghetti. Delicious. Saw Don but he didn’t see me. Did the Philadelphia Inquirer crossword puzzle while I ate. I couldn’t decide whether I’m still lonely or not—which I guess is a good sign.

  Went to the Board of Education meeting at the high school and arrived on time! High drama when the man in charge of the athletic committee started yelling at the woman in charge of the curriculum committee because she wanted too many books and accelerated classes. She will ruin the school and the budget that way, he said.

  Left the high school about 10:25.

  A wild ride home. Almost hit a man on Oak when some guy pulled out in front of me. What if I’d had an accident with that body in the trunk?

  Got to my apartment about 10:45.

  Found Patrick Marten at 10:47.

  Got the shakes at 10:49.

  Cops arrived at 11:05.

  Questions:

  Was the body in the trunk when I got the car at the garage? It must have been.

  Who put it there? Mr. Taggart? A nice old man like him?

  Why did someone put it in my car? Because he/she doesn’t like me? No one around Amhearst knows me well enough yet to dislike me. And no one’s ever disliked me like that my whole life.

  Or maybe he/she doesn’t like The News? But who would know that my car was the car of a News reporter? There’s nothing written on the doors or anything.

  Maybe it just happened because the car was handy? That means it was someone at Taggart’s, doesn’t it? Or was it someone driving by who happened to need a place to get rid of a body? It was dark even before I got there. Winter solstice approaching and all that. He could have just dumped Patrick and run. But how did he get the trunk open? My extra set of keys was locked in the car. Did the murderer lock the keys in the car after he left Patrick, and I just assumed Mr. Taggart put them there?

  A huge yawn interrupted my note taking. I didn’t bother to smother it even when Whiskers looked at me askance.

  I glanced at my clock—1:45 a.m. I groaned. Morning would be here all too soon. I turned out my light and lay down. Whiskers came to sleep in the depression between my shoulder and the pillow.

  I closed my eyes and saw a man in a green jacket lying on cases of soda. Instantly I was wide-awake, afraid to close my eyes again. I stared unhappily at the ceiling and jumped every time Whiskers moved.

  “Stay still, b
aby,” I said, scratching his ears. He purred happily and began grooming himself. The bed shook with each slurp.

  I put my hand between his tongue and body. “Not now, Whiskers.”

  He purred again and began licking my hand. I pulled away from the rasping wetness, and the cat continued on his paw without missing a beat.

  I sighed. The sensible thing would be to kick the animal out of bed, but much to my surprise I felt a strong need for his warm presence.

  I reached out and turned on my light. In the brightness, my shoulders relaxed, and the world righted itself.

  I looked around carefully, finding exactly what I knew was there: nothing. I lay back and flicked off the light again. I turned it back on immediately.

  “Don’t tell anyone,” I told Whiskers as he blinked at the brightness, “but we’re sleeping with the light on.”

  THREE

  Last night’s storm had indeed blown itself out to sea, leaving behind a thin coating of ice that caused a one-hour delay in school openings and a massive slowdown for morning commuters.

  True to his word, Don picked me up and took me to arrange for a rental car. He solidified his place in my heart when he said, “Charge it to The News.”

  “I need your piece on the murder by nine,” Don said as we left the car dealer. “Make it personal, real human interest. Mac will write a parallel news piece. You’ll both be front page.”

  I nodded. The News was a twelve-to sixteen-page afternoon paper, which meant we scheduled news deadlines at nine, editing deadlines at ten, and it was printed and ready for delivery by noon. Don took personally any news that broke between ten and three because it couldn’t make the paper, yet readers expected to see it there.

  “The Board of Education stuff?” I asked.

  “Anything scandalous?”