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“Uh-huh. I came through the front door just after a respected businessman named Bernard Gordon had shot his partner. A little dispute over investment capital, apparently. Gordon was on his way out of the condo just as I arrived. We collided in the front hall.”
Owen’s gloriously unhandsome features shaped themselves into an ominous mask. “You could have been killed.”
“Gordon tried to do just that. He knew I could identify him. Fortunately, he was already rattled because of the first killing. His shot went wild. I had a chance to hurl my cellular phone at him. He instinctively ducked. I ran back the way I had come and headed for the emergency stairwell. I didn’t dare wait for the elevators.”
Owen closed his eyes briefly. “My God.”
“Gordon tried to chase me down the stairwell. But he stumbled on one of the steps.” Amy shuddered. “He fell to the bottom. Broke his neck.”
Owen exhaled heavily. “Damn.” He reached across the table and took one of her hands in his. He crushed her fingers gently in his own.
Silence descended once more. Amy and Owen watched the ducks on the pond for a long while.
•••
“Nothing. Nada. Zilch.” Owen glanced at the notes he had made during his last phone call. He flipped the small notebook shut and tossed it onto the bedside table. He looked at Amy, who was lounging, arms folded beneath her breasts, in the connecting doorway. “Arthur Crabshaw is as clean as you can expect a fifty-five-year-old businessman to be.”
“No scandals while down in Arizona?”
“No. At least not that my sources could determine in such a limited period of time. I suppose it’s possible that Crabshaw left a few bodies buried under one of his strip malls, but I don’t think it’s very likely.”
Amy tapped her toe, thinking. “The blackmail arrangement we witnessed this morning seemed fairly amateurish, didn’t it?”
“Yes.” Owen walked to the window and looked out at the park. “A toilet tank lid in a library restroom. Definitely the work of an amateur. And a local amateur, at that.”
“Local?”
“Crabshaw was told to leave the money in the public library. The implication is that he’s being blackmailed by someone here in Villantry.”
“Okay, that makes sense. But he’s been gone for thirty years.”
“And that means that his deep, dark secret, whatever it is, probably dates back thirty years,” Owen said softly.
“To the time when he worked for Raymond C. Villantry?”
“Yes.” Owen turned away from the window. “I think it’s time I paid a call on Arthur Crabshaw.”
“I’ll get my purse.”
“You will stay right here in this room,” Owen said.
“I’m paying your tab, remember? That means I can make executive decisions.”
“When I’m on a case, I give the orders.”
“You need me to help analyze his reactions,” Amy said persuasively. “I’m very good at that kind of thing. It’s my real estate sales experience, you see. I’m what you might call an amateur practicing psychologist.”
“Forget it, Amy. I’m handling this alone.”
•••
Arthur Crabshaw looked momentarily nonplussed to see Amy and Owen on his doorstep. Amy was sure she saw evidence of tension around his eyes. But he recovered with alacrity. He smiled genially and ushered them into his front room.
“Well, well, well.” He closed the door. “This is a surprise. What can I do for you two?”
“How was the golf game this morning?” Owen asked softly.
Arthur’s smile slipped for only an instant. He quickly got it back in place. “Fine. Just fine. Shot a three over par. Although I have to admit that on the Villantry Golf Course that’s not saying a great deal.”
