A Rupert Tillinghast mystery.
Prologue
“This will be perfect, what a laugh, nobody will suspect a thing.”
“Go over it again. Your Daddy’s suite is just below the floor where the party’s taking place?”
“Right.”
“So we break away from the party and use your Dad’s suite? Fun. But I’m surprised your stick-in-the-mud Dad would give you a key.”
“He didn’t …”
“… so how will we get in?
“I’ll let you in from inside the suite.”
“And you’ll get into their suite …”
“…from their balcony.”
Chapter one
Welcome back, Tillinghast, all rested up after solving those exhausting Moriarty mysteries?”
That was J. J., Jim Jenkins, head detective at 5th division, who never misses an opportunity to get my goat and make sure everyone within earshot enjoys my discomfort. As usual, he ended his zinger with a resounding snort.
Before I could come up with a satisfactory rejoinder, the chief barrelled into the squad room heading directly for me.
“Tillinghast,” he blasted.
“Chief?” And then he said the two words I didn’t want to hear.
“Lance Steel.”
I decided to play dumb but I could hear a rumble starting from J.J.’s corner of the room.
Ah, Lance Steel, a guy with looks that could get away with murder.
“I don’t want that guy to get away with murder,” amazingly came the chief’s psychic demand.
“What’s every daughter’s mother’s worst nightmare up to now, chief?”
“You must have been living under a rock these last few days, Tillinghast, it’s in all the papers. (Chief waves newspaper in Rupert’s face.) Lance Steel prime suspect in Madison Arthur’s fall to death.”
I knew all about it, I just wanted the Chief to have to have his moment in front of the new guys in the room.
“And you’re telling me all this because …”
Slamming a file on my desk, “Sort it out!”
The rumblings from J.J.’s corner erupted … “Couldn’t happen to a nicer detective” … capped off with a guffaw that encouraged everyone in the room to chip in with a foot stomp.
Lance Steel. Yes, that’s his given name and along with a Hollywood moniker Lance possessed good looks, a pedigree and beautiful women hanging on to his every word.
Not that he had much to say in my envious view. Lance favoured the quiet good life and took away more than he gave back to society.
Lance was the offspring of Major William Steel, a name in military power circles, and Jennie Woodstock, a lady of wealth and social position. Lance didn’t have a worry in the world. His education, all private school and a recognized university, didn’t prepare him for anything. And why bother? Whatever skills he had, or learned, were never going to be required in his daily life.
And what a life; travel and partying. Lance was bright and what gave him the most pleasure was beating the system. Unfortunately Lance made questionable choices for his fun, often taking romantic risks with other people’s lives and getting away with them.
I’m Rupert Tillinghast, long suffering detective out of 5th division and my assignment was to see if Lance was having innocent fun with Madison Arthur or guilty of murder.
Madison Arthur, in any other life a true femme fatale. Unfairly attractive and bright, Madison was a highly visible politician who didn’t always agree with party policy nor Daddy’s conservative ways which meant she shouldn’t get distracted by square-jawed, cleft-chin Lance. Lance didn’t fool her but he was fun and she had fun with him but always on the QT.
On his way out of the squad room, Rupert couldn’t pass by J. J.’s desk without trying to touch a nerve.
“What are you working on, J. J. beside the crossword puzzle.”
“The Philby case, you know it?”
“Right, that’s the personal trainer who choked his client to death. Talk about not taking advice.”
“Supposedly. Not obvious, I confess we’re struggling with this.”
“Well, if anyone can get a hand on this,” Rupert tried unsuccessfully to hide his grin, “It’d be you, J. J.”
Rupert dodged the flying eraser as he left the room.
Chapter two
The cocktail party took place on the roof top of the Plaza, a luxury downtown condo. Melody Morrison, a celebrated defense attorney, hosted the event. Rumour had it that she was laying the political groundwork for her campaign to be considered for attorney general.
This was a smart-setters-must-be-seen-at event and the press was out in force guaranteeing it would be next day’s news. Lance and Madison, secretly having their fun, were in attendance but came separately and avoided each other.
Lance and Madison had scheduled a rendezvous at Daddy’s suite for that night because it was located on the 22nd floor, one below the party floor. Lance couldn’t hide his excitement. Madison said she could get to Daddy’s suite somehow from the balcony. Madison had the spunk and athleticism to pull this off and Lance, playing his part, encouraged her; she sure added spice to his life.
Well into the party, Lance noticed Madison at the far end of the room unobtrusively slip out to the balcony. Minutes later, Lance thanked Melody and left the party.
“Madison? It’s your love bird,” cooed Lance as he gently knocked on the door to her Daddy’s suite.
“Madison?” repeated Lance, now showing some concern, knocked more loudly.
Just then the elevator opened and the property manager entered the hall.
“May I help you?”
You have to hand it to Lance, in addition to being bright, he was cool under pressure. He didn’t want to pass up turning Daddy’s suite into a romper room with Madison.
“Good evening, I’m Lance Steel …”
“Yes, Mr. Steel, I recognize you, anything wrong?”
“I’m a bit early for a meeting with the major, he’s probably in the shower. I’ll go downstairs and wait for him.”
“No need, here, let me help.” And with that, the property manager put his key in the door and said goodnight.
“Madison?” Lance called now inside the suite.
Still no response, the light from outdoors drew him to the balcony.
In the darkness, Lance almost tripped over a rope. Picking it up, Lance leaned over the balcony timed perfectly to be spotlighted by a police searchlight from below.
“Oh oh.”
Chapter three
If a person gets pushed over the edge of a life-threatening precipice, against one’s wishes, you can count on a couple of givens:
- Screams from the about-to-be dearly departed and those around the about-to-be-dearly departed
- Dramatic attempts by the about-to-be-dearly-departed to prevent the fall which means either scratches on the person next to the you know who or at least on anything nearby that could break the fall
As luck would have it, in this case, there were none of these. Unfortunately the weather wasn’t co-operating that night, rain and lightning so nobody was on the balcony. And nobody recalls Madison Arthur’s fall; there were no screams nor scratches.
I reviewed all the interviews, forensics and lab results but the mystery persisted; we couldn’t be sure of exactly what happened so I decided to look into Madison’s past. Why would somebody want her dead or why would she want to end it all? And since Lance was a suspect, and on the scene, I considered possible animosity between the two.
“Well Tillinghast, it’s been a week, what have you got?” bellowed Chief Falco.
Unlike the crime shows on TV where an ‘aha’ or two is forthcoming before the commercial break, I volunteered, “Nothing.”
“I don’t want this to become a cold case, R. T., the press is screaming and Madison was a populist politician. You want me to put J.J. on the case with you?”
I was tempted, that would shut him up. “No, I’m good, I’d like to work with Kayleigh, though, to see things through a classy gal’s eyes.”
“You got it and I want a report from both of you by the end of the week.”
Kayleigh, Kayleigh Quinn, a fair colleen and a first class, first class detective.
“Glad to be on board, Rupert, but J.J. says to be careful.
“Careful?”
“He says you’re a misogynist.”
“A what? Not like J. J. to use multisyllabic words. Those hours on the crosswords are paying off.”
“One who denigrates women.”
“I haven’t been denigrating since I found out what the word meant,” came Rupert’s supposedly off-putting defence.
“And you’re not that witty,” Kayleigh shot back.
“Back to being a misogynist, give me an example,” backpedalled Rupert.
“That joke you cracked the other day at J.J.?”
“I don’t recall.”
“J. J. didn’t laugh and you moved on to tell the same joke to Danya.”
“Is there a punchline to this story?”
“When she didn’t laugh, you went into great detail explaining the joke to her.”
“And that’s misogyny? I normally have to explain my jokes to J. J., too.”
“Just giving you a heads up, but I want to work with you.”
“I’m afraid to say anything. But you will correct me should I …”
“I’ll give you three swings. Tell me what you’re thinking about the case.”
Chapter four
“Melody, I want you to defend me.”
Melody’s professionalism stopped her from rolling her eyes. Can the mighty Lance Steel be begging? Can the leader of the hedonistic party actually have come down to earth? Is that a tear or did he just finish an onion sandwich?
“I’d be pleased to represent you, Mr. Steel.”
“Call me Lance.”
“Mr. Steel.”
“I can explain everything, well, mostly everything.”
“I’m sure, first thing, don’t explain anything to anyone. Whom have you spoken to about this?”
“Nobody that I can remember.”
“Can you make bail?”
“Yes.”
“Good, let’s get that settled and get you out of here.”
“I see where Lance has engaged Melody Morrison as his counsel,” cameKaleigh’s observation.
“She’s good … is that condescending?…”
“No, carry on, she’ll put up a formidable defense, I’ve seen her work.”
“OK, let’s review the case, Kaleigh.
“The big question is whether Lance pushed Madison or not. There are no witnesses yet Lance was there so he had the opportunity but why kill her? According to the press, this had all the appearance of a rendezvous. The word on the street is she’d already fallen when he got into the room so it was an accident.”
“It looks that way but we only have Lance’s word for it. And what did we decide about the rope?”
“This is how Madison had to get to the balcony from the top floor balcony.”
“I don’t understand,” said Kayleigh, “where did it come from if Lance didn’t bring it?”
“Well, her father testified that Madison visited with him that afternoon, she could have brought it and set it up on the balcony and made sure the balcony door to his suite was unlocked.”
(Kaleigh seriously) “So, do you think Lance was in the room with Madison? I’m pretty sure the defense will say Madison fell trying to come down to the balcony. But it’s easy to see that circumstantially, Lance was involved. He was there; he could have pushed her in fun and that’s grounds for manslaughter.”
(pause) “You know, Kayleigh, you’d look a lot cuter if you smiled more.”
“That’s one!”
“Oh no, I …”
“Yep.”
“Sorry. Back to work. What do we really know about these two?”
“Who knows about your romantic escapades with Madison Arthur?” questioned Melody.
“Not sure, we tried to keep it quiet. Her father would have run me out of town if he’d known.”
This will probably be the prosecution’s argument, you held their relationship over her; if she didn’t play your games you’d expose her and threaten her political career …”
“… this is crazy”
“Welcome to the wonderful world of ‘he said’ ‘she said’.”
Chapter five
Jury duty is a cattle call; a lot of people get a letter in the mail saying they’ve been chosen and you’ve no choice, you’ve got to appear.
Allow me to paint you a picture of a hypothetical day in the life of the jury selection process.
When you answer the call and show up in Room 3B, you quickly realize you weren’t one of a chosen few. The courts need lots of bodies to end up with a dozen and you quickly surmise more than half of the gathered throng would be happier to be somewhere else.
‘Do-your-civic-duty-and-uphold-the-democratic-process’ is a hard sell. ‘How do I get out of this?’ is the prevailing plea.
“I’m a part-time emergency room nurse, on call 24 hours a day.”
You’re excused. Next.
“I can’t serve on a jury, I need to work everyday, I’m a sole provider; eleven people depend on me.”
“What do you do?”
“I … uh … I’m a farmer, that’s it, a farmer.”
“And what do you farm?”
“Ah … medicinal herbs.”
“Take a seat over there. Welcome to jury duty.”
That’s just the first step, you do get another chance to dodge doing your civic duty if either the prosecution or defense doesn’t think you’d favour their client.
“Mr. Jones, what is your profession?”
“I’m an engineer.”
“And what is your responsibility?”
“I volunteer my services to help third world nations implement systems that use sustainable resources to provide their people with basic electric power and clean water. In my spare time I teach the less fortunate in these countries how to make pancakes out of flax seeds discarded by migrant monkeys. I pay for these trips myself.”
(The defense team then huddles to decide if this highly educated, in demand rational, reasonable family-man-church-going-pillar-of-the-community would be favourably disposed to their client who, though charged with dealing drugs to B celebrities from the back of his Range Rover, in his defense can still play the kazoo well enough to receive Arts Canada grants. This was a skill he perfected while being held back in junior kindergarten at reform school.
“Your honour we’re going to use one of our challenges and excuse this individual.”
So ends the hypothesis. In Lance’s situation, the defense is looking for liberal minded, red blooded frat boys of a partying persuasion whereas the prosecution would love to fill the seats with exemplary female graduates of Our Lady in Perpetual Pain primary school.
And so it goes till twelve people surface to face the jurisprudence tennis match between the defense and prosecution.
Chapter six
Rupert and Kayleigh had just finished a session with the prosecution team.
“Now what?” came Kayleigh’s query.
“We wait, hear what both sides have to say, we may be called to testify, and then wait again for the jury’s decision. Why the frown?”
“I just heard that I didn’t get the promotion. They said I was qualified and deserved it but they didn’t want to put that pressure on me. Can you believe that?”
“I’ve a confession. I was part of that decision.”
“That’s two.”
“Ladies and gentlemen on the jury, have you reached a verdict?” intoned the judge.
“No your honour,” replied the jury foreman. Gasps resonated around the panelled courtroom.
“Is there an opportunity to resolve the impasse? questioned the judge.
“No your honour,” came the reply.
“Then I declare a mistrial. Does the prosecution wish to retry the case?”
Brent Smithing, standing for the prosecution, “No your honour.”
“Then I declare the case dismissed and the defendant is free to go.”
(Sound of gavel)
“Well, well the return of the conquering heroes, at least you got a draw Rupert,” came the zing with a smile from J. J. as Kayleigh and Rupert entered the squad room.
“Probably the right decision,” concluded Rupert, “Lance was quite shaken by the experience, he certainly seemed overwhelmed. We could never nail down the time between Lance’s meeting with the property manager and when Madison fell. There was a gap, which probably caused reasonable doubt in the minds of some of the jurors.
“As the defense concluded, Madison, her recklessness combined with the bad weather, probably slipped and missed the balcony.”
“You’re probably right, Rupert,” said an understanding J. J. “You two did good work; now that that’s put that to bed, how ‘bout helping me solve the puzzle, what’s a 13 letter word for ‘A breathtaking murder’?”
“I hear you’re still struggling with the Philby case, J. J.”, Rupert reminded loudly enough so everyone in the room heard, “ … let me think, 13 letters eh?”
Rupert, enjoying himself and with a wink to Kayleigh let the tension build …
“How ‘bout ‘strangulation’?”
Epilogue
(Case windup office get together at Kayleigh’s apartment with Kayleigh at the piano playing ‘Moonglow’)
Rupert, admiring her playing, “I didn’t realize you could play the piano; that’s a favourite of mine.”
“Do you play Rupert?”
“Not at all, always wanted to, but if I could just make a suggestion …”
“Strike three … you’re out!”