Coming Up Murder Read online

  “What if I was thinking the same thing?” he said, pulling open the door.

  Unless he’d read the latest installment of Scottish Bride, he wasn’t. I slid into my car. “You weren’t.”

  “But if I was?” he pressed.

  I gave him a glance and started the engine. “That would be magic.”

  Chapter Ten

  Despite it being a Friday—Friday nights were reserved for Italian food and a classic movie—Lenny agreed to attend tonight’s production of Hamlet. Getting him to commit involved arm twisting on my part. He said he’d rather grade American Survey papers than sit through the entire Shakespeare play. I promised him we would leave early if we found out any useful information. What that information entailed, I couldn’t say. Giles encouraged all English faculty to attend anyway. We had to put in an appearance. Reed Williams had collaborated with Martha Church in the Art Department to create an exhibition of authentic dress from the sixteenth century. It would be on display before tonight’s performance. One hour before the show, attendees could view the historic attire of commoners and royals alike. Actors performing in Hamlet would be in costume, available to answer questions about the time period. It would provide the perfect opportunity to find out more about Tanner’s fellow cast members.

  After dropping off Lenny, I decided to see if the police had uncovered anything about Tanner’s death. I turned toward the station. Beamer would want to know about the flowers—the begonias that had been left for me on the bench—and the sonnet. Giles had informed campus security, but I doubted the information had been relayed to Beamer or even connected to Tanner’s death. I wheeled into the parking lot. Probably not. A college campus was a world in and of itself, which was why Beamer needed me. We hadn’t had a chance to talk this morning. Now we could compare notes.

  “Hello,” I said as I walked through the door. I recognized the officer at the small front desk. She was here when I left my DNA sample last Christmas, another story altogether. “I’m Emmeline Prather. Is Officer Beamer here?”

  “Is this in regard to the student death this morning?” She picked up the phone.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I got it, Milly,” said Beamer, walking through a hallway. “Come on, Ms. Prather. This way.”

  “Thank you,” I said to Milly as I followed Beamer into his office. His room was at the end of the hall, larger than the others we passed, with no window. The white walls were plain but suitable for a man who didn’t like things too complicated.

  “To what do I owe this unexpected visit?” said Beamer as he fell into his cracked-leather office chair. It was well-worn, like all the furniture in the room. The rest of the building’s decor was in far better shape. Whoever was in charge of remodeling hadn’t been able to convince Beamer to part with his furniture. I imagined he was the type of man who only replaced something when it broke.

  “I have some information for you, about the case,” I said, taking the seat across from him. “We didn’t have a chance to talk this morning.”

  “I told Officer Barnes to take your statement,” he said.

  “Oh, she did,” I said. “But there was one thing I forgot to mention, and another strange thing that happened afterward.”

  He opened a notepad on his desk. “So two things.”

  “Right,” I said, glancing around the room. “This office must be new.”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought I smelled paint.” I indicated the walls. “I suppose you don’t have your decorations up yet.” When he didn’t answer, I added, “Pictures, etcetera. They can make a space seem homier.”

  He rubbed his temples, and I noticed the tufts of gray hair behind his ears reached deeper into his hairline. It had to be the slew of cases he’d taken on lately. I was glad to be here for him. I wanted to help as much as I could.

  “Could we get back to the two things?” he said.

  “Of course.” Beamer wasn’t one for small talk. “A suspicious sonnet was submitted to our Shakespeare contest Wednesday. It warned of a tragedy. Jim Giles, our chair, called somebody about it, probably campus police. I don’t know if you get those messages.”

  “And the second thing?”

  I felt my brow furrow. “Don’t you want to know what the poem said?”

  He took a drink from his coffee cup. “I think I get the gist of tragedy.”

  Poor Officer Beamer. He really was in a mood. “The second thing was a pot of flowers, begonias. I was sitting on a bench, and when I got up to talk to Sophie—Officer Barnes, I mean—someone left me a pot of begonias.”

  “As a gift?”

  I leaned in closer. “As a warning. My colleague, Jane Lemort, said begonias mean ‘beware,’ and although Jane’s not very friendly, she’s rarely wrong.”

  “So what do these two things have to do with Tanner Sparks?” Beamer’s pencil teetered near the notebook, but so far, it hadn’t touched the page.

  “Somebody’s messing with me.” Truthfully, I was getting a little exasperated with Beamer. He was usually quicker than this. “They’re trying to scare me away from the murder. We are calling it murder, now, aren’t we?”

  “We’re not calling it anything, Ms. Prather,” said Beamer. “You have nothing to do with this case whatsoever.”

  “But I do,” I said. “Someone has placed me squarely in the middle of it, like it or not.”

  “Does that someone have blue eyes and curly hair?”

  I opened my mouth, realized he was talking about me, and smiled. “I’m being serious, Officer Beamer. Even the crime scene was staged to look like a scene from Hamlet.”

  “Explain what you mean.”

  I described the connection to the play. This time he took notes.

  “How much do you know about Shakespeare?” he asked.

  “I’m an English professor, aren’t I?” My answer was in no way a lie.

  “I knew the body had been moved, but I didn’t know why.” He tapped his pencil on the notepad. “Now I do.”

  “How do you know the body had been moved?”

  “Blanching. When a person dies, blood begins to pool right away, about thirty minutes after death. Skin in contact with a hard surface turns white, or blanches, which indicates the body position at time of death.” Beamer paused. “In this case, the victim’s blanching was on the wrong side.”

  “He didn’t die on the bench,” I said. “That’s what you’re saying.”

  “Probably not far from the bench, though,” said Beamer. “The victim is decent-sized, and we didn’t find any drag marks.”

  “He was moved to the bench to recreate the scene in the play,” I said. “That’s why the liquid was in his ear. Find out what the liquid is, and you’ll find the cause of death.”

  * * *

  Later on, as I got ready to attend Hamlet, I considered the parallels between the play and Tanner’s death. The clues pointed to someone in the theater, an actress or actor who enjoyed the spotlight. Lines from another Shakespeare play, As You Like It, drifted through my mind: “All the world’s a stage, / And all the men and women merely players; / They have their exits and their entrances.” Tanner Spark had been forced to exit much too soon. The cause of death was apparently copied from that of Hamlet’s father. Could Tanner’s iconoclastic theory about the bard’s true identity have prompted the killer to give him a Shakespearean death? Tanner claimed he had proof that Edward de Vere faked his death, which meant de Vere could have been the author of the later Shakespeare plays. Was it possible that Tanner held the key to the Shakespeare mystery?

  It seemed impossible, but I had a few ways to investigate. Reed Williams would have a draft of Tanner’s dissertation. I could ask to see it. Denton Smart, the medical student helping Tanner with his research, would also know about it. When I thought about it, Denton might know more than Reed. He was in charge of the DNA. If anyone had physical evidence, it was Denton.

  I checked my hair in the mirror. After a tussle and a spray, I slipped into
my black ankle boots. They went with everything, including the blue and black skirt I’d selected. In the kitchen, I stared at my cupboards, wondering if I should eat something before the play. Because of my big lunch at Harry’s, I wasn’t hungry, but it was either now or after the play. Could I really wait that long?

  My phone buzzed on the counter. Lenny had sent me a text. Are you eating before the play? I blinked. He really could read my mind. Wondering the same thing, I replied. Let’s hit up Vinny’s afterwards. Pick you up in ten. I sent him a thumbs-up and tucked the phone into my purse. I wanted to make sure I had it tonight at the theater.

  I’d just finished feeding Dickinson when Lenny pulled up. I shrugged into my coat and grabbed my keys. Outside, Lenny and Mrs. Gunderson were having a conversation. As I locked the door, I heard Mrs. Gunderson ask Lenny if our relationship was serious. I paused, waiting for his answer.

  “Dead serious, wouldn’t you say, Em?”

  I spun around. “I don’t like the way that sounds.”

  The dimple in Lenny’s cheek was showing. He looked handsome in a dark jacket and jeans, his blond hair a striking contrast to his outfit. I skipped down the steps.

  “You’re so quarrelsome, Emmeline,” said Mrs. Gunderson. “Just agree with the man.”

  He linked his arm in mine. “Yeah, just agree with the man.”

  I gave him a glare, whispering, “Dead is what you’ll be if you keep this up.”

  “Just a minute,” called Mrs. Gunderson. “I want to get a picture of you two. You look so nice.” She stepped inside her house and popped back out with a little black camera. “Come over here by my tree.”

  We walked over to her maple, and she snapped the picture.

  “Thanks, Mrs. G,” said Lenny as we walked to his car. He opened my door, and I ducked inside.

  Mrs. Gunderson held up the camera. “You never know when you’ll need a picture for the paper.”

  Lenny shut the door before I could respond. She was still standing on her front stoop as we drove away.

  “She drives me crazy,” I said, smiling and waving.

  “You love her,” said Lenny.

  “She’s nosy.”

  “You’re nosy,” he said.

  I couldn’t deny it, though I preferred the word curious. Anyway, we had much more important topics to discuss than my neighbor. I told him about my conversation with Officer Beamer. I also told him Tanner’s body had been moved.

  “Whoever did this was strong enough to carry Tanner, or drag him, to the garden,” said Lenny, driving toward the theater. It was only two blocks from campus. Several spots in the parking lot were already taken. Other department chairs must have encouraged their faculty members to attend the exhibit before the production.

  “And Tanner wasn’t a small guy,” I said. “The question is why. We’re assuming the killer wanted to replicate the murder in Hamlet, but there might be a second reason.”

  “Moving the body to a central location makes it harder to figure out where or how he was murdered.”

  “The campus is one of the only places in town that doesn’t have surveillance,” I added.

  “Right,” said Lenny, pulling into an open parking space.

  “Keep an eye out for Tanner’s understudy,” I said. “I want to meet him. To size him up, as it were.”

  He shut off the ignition. “If we find him, can we go?”

  “It’d look bad to leave early,” I said.

  A smile touched his lips. “ ‘There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.’ ”

  Lenny quoting Shakespeare? I had a feeling this was going to be a long night.

  Chapter Eleven

  As we walked into the theater, Lenny grumbled about the purchase price. We’d missed the opportunity for rush tickets. I reminded him the faculty discount still applied. Reluctantly, he turned toward the box office, and I continued to the gallery, where I was greeted by a man in a ruffled green shirt, knee breeches, stockings, and a feathered hat.

  “Welcome, my lady,” he said.

  The actors must have been instructed to remain in character. “Hello, kind sir.”

  “And how does this evening find you?”

  “Very well,” I said, guessing he was a graduate student. Now I just had to guess what part he was playing. He wasn’t a peasant; you could tell that much from his elaborate costume. But he wasn’t royalty either. “And who are you to Hamlet?”

  He gave a dramatic bow. “I am his dear friend, Horatio, scholar and confidant.”

  I glanced around the room and saw no one in black. “Where is your good friend?”

  “Detained by a last-minute alteration, I’m afraid,” he said. “But the Queen of Denmark is standing over there. You might ask her about her son’s wardrobe woes.” He motioned toward a woman with a red gown and a blue robe that draped over her headpiece. She was talking to a small group of people, and I took a few steps in her direction so that Horatio could greet other visitors. Claudius was at her side, and the ghost of King Hamlet, dressed in armor, looked on vengefully. The ghost of King Hamlet would know the story of his own murder; he was the one to recount it on stage. I moved to his side.

  “Hello,” I said. “Am I speaking to the king of Denmark?”

  “I once was that.”

  The actor, a young student, was not a very convincing ghost. The makeup and wig didn’t do much to transform him from gangly schoolboy to hoary old man. He couldn’t have dragged Tanner into the garden any more than I could have.

  “But my brother poured the cursed hebenon into my ear as I slept,” he continued, “and now owns that coveted title.”

  Lenny entered the room, and I gave him a wave. He joined me and Hamlet’s father.

  “You must be the ghost,” said Lenny. “I like your armor, though I don’t get why you wear it. Don’t ghosts usually wear white?”

  “My mission is a patriotic one,” said the ghost, gripping the hilt of his sword as if ready to unsheathe it. “All of Denmark is in danger.”

  “And what about our Hamlet?” I asked. “Was he in danger from anyone?”

  The ghost looked from me to Lenny. Either he didn’t understand, or he didn’t want to break character.

  “She means Tanner Sparks,” said Lenny. “Is there anyone here he didn’t get along with?”

  “How to answer, I do not know,” said the ghost.

  “Yes or no would be a good start,” said Lenny.

  “I must bid you good evening,” said the ghost. “The safety of Denmark depends on my message, and time is short.”

  The ghost stalked Claudius and the queen, coming up behind them unannounced. They turned their heads from side to side, pretending to sense a presence without actually seeing him. The onlookers enjoyed the performance.

  “What does that mean?” asked Lenny. “They can’t respond as real people?”

  I shook my head. “I think they have to stay in character.”

  I noticed Martha Church, a costume designer from the Art Department, trailing a sulky man in black. She carried a needle and thread. “That must be Hamlet,” I said. “Horatio said he had a wardrobe malfunction.”

  “Mystery solved,” said Lenny. “He’s big enough to haul two Tanners. Can we go now?”

  I ignored Lenny. The new Hamlet was tall and fit, a runner perhaps. Lenny was right: he looked strong enough to carry Tanner to the garden or anywhere else on campus. His dark hair was partially covered by a cap, and he wore a sweeping black robe, scarf, and stockings. Claudius beckoned to him, and he joined the group, to the delight of the onlookers. I hoped the play would be as entertaining as their interactions.

  “I want to talk to Martha,” I told Lenny. “I met her when Austin died, and as the dresser, she’s obviously spent some time with the cast and the new Hamlet.”

  I crossed the room, and Lenny followed. Martha, a flamboyant woman with a pillow of frizzy blonde hair, wore a seamstress’s bracelet with a pin cushion and was sticking a needle into it as
we approached. The long sleeve of her purple dress kept getting in the way.

  “Hello, Martha,” I said. “I hope you remember me. It’s been a while.”

  She looked up from her bracelet and smiled. “Of course. How are you?”

  “Good,” I said. “This is Lenny Jenkins. He teaches American lit.”

  They shook hands.

  “The costumes look great,” I said, taking in the room with a sweeping motion. “Horatio said Hamlet needed some last-minute alterations.”

  “He’s six feet four,” whispered Martha. “It wasn’t an alteration. It was a miracle.”

  “Tanner Sparks was much shorter,” I said.

  She nodded.

  “Well, you did a very nice job.” I gave Hamlet a glance. “He looks like most of the other Hamlets I’ve seen.”

  “It’s not historically accurate, you know,” she said, rearranging a pin on the cushion. “Hamlet is the last person who should be in black, as the Danes never mourned anyone—not even their closest relations. He should be in scarlet. But as you just confirmed, it’s what audiences expect.” She pulled her wide sleeve over the bracelet.

  “How does he feel about taking over Tanner’s part?” Lenny asked. “That must be difficult so soon after his death.”

  “It must be,” she said, “but you wouldn’t know it. It’s what understudies prepare for. The worst. They must be ready to go on at a moment’s notice. I think that’d be hard, the not knowing.”

  “Did he say anything … about Tanner?” I asked.

  “He has nerves of steel. He was stoic, determined that the play continue.” She shrugged her shoulders. “It could be an act. We’ll see in an hour.”

  I hung on to the comment as she walked away. The room was buzzing with activity. The audience members, who appeared to be mostly students and faculty, were interacting with the characters or absorbed in reading about the costumes or scenes from placards on the wall. Two Elizabethan costumes, a man’s and a woman’s, were adorning department-store mannequins and housed in tall display cases. Another display case was devoted to Shakespeare himself—a poster of the iconic drawing of the bard surrounded by several photos and drawings from historic productions and scenes from Stratford-upon-Avon. Reed stood before that case, hands in pockets, peering in. The man always looked a little sad, but tonight he looked crestfallen. Our loss was minimal compared to his. I felt bad for him.