Blind men dont dial zero, p.6
Blind Men Don't Dial Zero, page 6
“Hello there. I’m Sister Mary.”
Sister Mary proved to be a lot less intimidating than her namesake, and Merry was surprised to see her hair was styled in a neat brown bob, not a habit in sight.
“I always feel like I’m disappointing people when I first show up,” the head nun said, reaching a hand to her hair. “We haven’t worn habits in many years, but perhaps I should bring it back?”
She was being facetious, and Merry chuckled. “Sorry. I don’t know much about all this.”
She was referring to the Catholic private school system, and Sister Mary smiled warmly.
“We’re just like any other school except we have God on our side.” She winked at another of her jokes and led the way down the dark panelled corridor towards her office where she sat behind an antique wooden desk and waved Merry into a stiff chair in front of it.
“So,” Sister Mary said. “George has called and asked me to be helpful.”
She smiled warmly while Merry thought, George, hey? Isn’t that a little familiar?
“It’s really not up to me,” Sister Mary continued. “It’s up to Charlotte. She’s currently in a Modern History class, and I won’t have that interrupted, but if she is interested, I have arranged for her to meet you in the boarders’ common room after that. You may speak to her during recess break.”
She glanced at the clock on the back wall, and Merry smiled politely, then there was a long, awkward silence before the nun said, “Until then, was there anything you wanted to ask me? Perhaps?”
“Oh! Right, of course, yes!” Merry cleared her throat and tried to think of something. “Um, well, I’m just wondering… um, how long has she been here? Young Charlie?”
“Charlotte has been a day student since Year Seven but only started boarding in third semester last year, just after the winter break. About a month before it happened.”
“Well, thank goodness for that, hey?”
Sister Mary nodded. “Our Lord certainly wanted to spare young Charlotte. We give thanks for that daily.”
“I bet you do! And she’s Year Ten now, is that right?”
“Year Eleven, actually. Charlotte is young for her year, but quite mature, and applies herself diligently to all her studies. We may even have a future Dux in the making. She’s quite exemplary. We have no issues.”
“Even after what happened?” Merry’s Lola had gone off the rails over a faulty hair straightener just yesterday, but the nun was nodding vigorously.
“More so now, I would suggest.” Then, reading Merry’s surprise, she added, “Sometimes the best elixir is busyness, Miss Kean. Throwing yourself into your work, and I can see her study has helped. Of course, that’s not to say it wasn’t a terrible shock.” She smiled grimly. “As I say, Charlotte is an extraordinary young lady. Very strong, clearly resilient, a true Saint Auggies trooper. As you will see.”
Merry nodded, wondering if Sister Mary was giving her school the credit for all that. “Can I ask you about that night? Do you mind? I’m just wondering how Charlie found out about it. Like, did you deliver the news or…?”
“Yes, of course, with Charlotte’s dorm mistress at my side. I received George’s call very early that morning, just before the girls were due to wake up. It was highly distressing, but we put all the correct procedures in place.”
“You have procedures for when a student’s family is murdered?”
Merry regretted the words the second they sprang from her mouth, and the nun looked taken aback.
“We have procedures for when we have to deliver bad news to our charges. The murders were a first, I can assure you of that. We’ve only ever lost parents to things like farming accidents or cancer, may they rest in peace. In each case, we take the student to their common room and have a cup of tea on hand. Or would you prefer we shout it to the rafters in their dormitory, in front of the others?”
“No, of course not! Sorry, that, ah… well, it sounds like a really great way to… you know?” She smiled awkwardly and added, “And how was she? When you told her?”
Now Sister Mary looked inflamed. “Utterly distraught.”
“Of course. Yes, of course!”
Merry felt like a right idiot. Her silly questions had taken her from joking with the convivial nun to combating with the enemy, and she was trying to think of something important to ask, something positive, anything that didn’t sound like silly small talk when she heard the door of the office open.
Sister Mary looked as relieved as Merry felt.
“It appears that Charlotte is available,” she said, getting to her feet. “Leanne will escort you to the senior common room now.”
Merry stood up. “Fantastic, thank you so much, Sister Mary. And thank you for your time.”
The nun smiled again as Merry left the office, but there was no warmth in it this time.
Charlotte Burlington-Brown looked straight out of Hollywood casting—tall, willowy, with a look of utter boredom on her perfect button-nosed face. Merry knew that look well. Lola might be from a very different school—suburb, dress size, bank balance—but there was something universal about the expression. It was Teen Girl 101: Feign boredom until your confidence catches up.
Merry watched as the student loped into the room and flopped down on one of the common-room beanbags with a dramatic sigh, not looking at Merry once. Merry would have laughed if she wasn’t feeling so terribly for the poor child, and not just about the lack of confidence. To lose a family member at this age was unbearable, but to lose three of them, including both parents. In one bloody night! She couldn’t even wrap her head around that. It wasn’t just nerves Charlie was masking, it was unutterable trauma.
“I’m so very sorry for your loss,” Merry began, but the girl continued staring at the wall. “I know that doesn’t help in any way, shape or form.”
Charlotte’s eyes snapped across. “Why say it then?”
Merry giggled—her own attempt to mask her emotions—and nodded. “Good point! I guess it’s just something adults say to make themselves feel better. We can be right idiots sometimes.”
“Sometimes?”
There was a sliver of humour in Charlotte’s tone, and Merry took that as her cue and nodded towards the neighbouring beanbag. “Do you mind if I plonk on down?”
Charlotte shrugged a bony shoulder beneath her crisply ironed tunic and watched as Merry dropped awkwardly into the velvety bag while Merry wondered how embarrassing it was going to look when she attempted to get up. Lola would be eye-rolling her about now.
“He talked you into it, did he?” Charlotte said.
“Sorry?”
Another sigh—a keep up, woman! huff. “Gramps. Pay you enough, did he?”
Merry almost blushed at that. Was that really why she was doing it? “So you know all about this mission of ours then?”
“He’s a fool.”
“Your grandfather?”
Another scornful look.
“Oh sweetie, you can’t blame him for wanting to prove that your brother wasn’t a monster.”
“Heath wasn’t a monster!”
“So you agree he didn’t do it?”
“Oh, he did it all right,” Charlotte shot back. “But he had his reasons.” Then, reading the surprise on Merry’s face, she quickly added, “I’m not saying they deserved to die! Oh my God! As if I would say that! My brother is, like, a total bastard. He took my parents from me, and I will never forgive him for that. Never.”
Merry nodded again, offering a sympathetic look, but she waited, knowing there was more to come. When Charlotte remained stony-faced, she said, “But?”
Charlotte swiped at a tear that was plopping out of one eye. Merry wanted to reach out and hug her. Tell her it was okay to cry. She should be crying. Hell, she should be sobbing and weeping and gnashing her teeth! Yet Charlotte seemed too self-contained for that, and already the haughty, bored look was back.
“Gramps likes to pretend we were a happy family, but it wasn’t like that. Not. One. Bit.”
“What was it like?” Merry asked gently.
Charlotte ignored the question and said, “Is it true you’re a Cluedo champion?”
Merry blinked. The girl was all over the shop!
“Guilty as charged,” she said, waiting for the mockery that usually followed, yet Charlotte’s eyes were wide and curious.
“I love that game! Everyone here prefers the Ouija board, but that’s far too creepy.”
“I agree.”
“This place is so old-school. They switch the Wi-Fi off after nine, right—or think they do…” She sniggered but let that drop. “So we’ve taken up board games, and it turns out I’m very good at Cluedo. Perhaps I should challenge you to a game one day.”
“I’d like that.”
“Aren’t you afraid I’ll whop your arse?”
Merry smiled at her arrogance but had a feeling this was a test. “I don’t think you’ll beat me, Charlie, but I’d enjoy watching you try.”
Charlie snorted. “Cocky, aren’t you?”
“No, just good at Cluedo. It’s the reason your Grandad hired me. I think. Do you mind if I ask you a few more questions about what happened?”
Charlotte looked disappointed but nodded anyway.
“Can you tell me a little bit about your family? What was going on that might have led to… well, you know?”
Another shrug. “Just, like, lots of fighting and stuff.”
“What was the fighting about?”
“Who cares? Dad and Heath were at it all the time, like they hated each other. It was sooo…” She mock snored. “Why do you think I’m even here? It’s certainly not for the ambience.” There was a splash of humour again as her eyes wafted across the bland-coloured furnishings and small kitchenette in one corner. Then, catching Merry’s surprise, she said, “You honestly thought I was exiled here like all the other losers? Nah-uh! I chose to come here. I had to get out of that house and all the festering fights.”
“Do you think that’s how it happened? After a festering fight?”
The girl’s eyes welled up again, and Merry felt dreadful for pushing. “I’m so sorry, honey.”
“Stop saying that! I thought we’d agreed that’s a stupid thing to say.”
“You’re right. It is. I’m sorry. Oops, damn, I did it again.”
The girl’s sliver of a smile was back but only briefly as a bell could be now heard through the open window. She leapt to her feet.
“Biology,” she said as she headed for the door. “Snore.” Then she stopped, twirled, and said, “Next time we play Cluedo.”
Then she released a smile so dazzling it just had to be genuine.
~
Sir George didn’t look exactly delighted when Frankie was shown back into his penthouse office, but he didn’t seem perturbed either, just held up a palm and continued scribbling at some papers on his desk.
“Can I get you anything?” Verity whispered, and Frankie shook her head, thinking how wonderful it would be to have her own personal assistant.
Then she thought of the Boss and frowned. There were already six missed messages on her phone that morning, and not all of them were friendly. She’d better reply soon, or shit would hit the—
“Fancy seeing you again so soon,” George said, breaking through her thoughts.
Frankie dropped the frown and smiled. “I know you’re busy, Mr Burlington. Sir George. I do appreciate your time. I’m here to fill in some blanks.”
“Off the record?” he asked, his tone teasing again, and Frankie tensed as her mind spiralled back to a drunken night in another lifetime.
She blinked. Breathed deeply. Told herself to focus. Sir George couldn’t know about that night, could he? Unless he’d been talking to the Boss…
She gave herself a shake and sat in the chair in front of him. Another deep breath. Another exhalation. Then, “I’m curious about the tiff that was witnessed that night, the one between Tawny and Heath in the kitchen. Are you able to shed any more light on that?”
“I did ask Tawny soon after it happened. She insisted it was nothing.”
“You believed her?”
“Of course I didn’t. I’m not a fool. She rarely fought with Heath, adored the lad.”
“And Roman?”
A smile played at his lips again. “Are you asking me if she adored Roman or if Roman adored his boy? Or if the two men fought? Which is it?”
Frankie smiled back now. “All the above.”
“We were a normal family, Frankie. We had the odd—what did you call it? Tiff? But otherwise nothing worth killing for. Completely normal, I can assure you.”
Normal was hardly a word Frankie would have used for the Burlingtons, certainly not twice in one breath, but she waited for him to answer the question.
Eventually he said, “My son and his wife had a very committed, honest relationship. They were dedicated to each other and to the rearing of their two children. It was their highest priority. They were a happy family. Content. I can assure you.”
“And yet Charlie was sent to boarding school and Heath fought non-stop with his father, or so my sources tell me.”
“Your sources are a disgrace!” he roared back before grimacing and glancing at the door as if Verity would return with one of her pointed looks. “Charlie was not sent anywhere; she asked to board at Saint Auggies. And if you’re suggesting that Heath and Roman’s squabbles led to murder, then by that measure my own father wouldn’t have lasted past my fifteenth birthday.” He leaned back in his wheelchair. “I know you’re doing what I asked you to do, but there’s nothing there, Frankie. Move it along.”
She leaned forward. “Where should I move it to?”
“The boyfriend would be a good place to start.”
“Tawny had a boyfriend?”
He stared at her. “No, I can assure you of that. I am referring to my granddaughter Charlotte’s boyfriend. A lowlife by all accounts. Lad by the name of Igor. I can’t recall the surname. Something Eastern European.”
Frankie’s eyes widened, and she reached for her phone to tap the name into her Notes. “You never mentioned him before.”
“I can’t make it too easy for you; where’s the satisfaction in that?”
She smiled. “Why do you think this Igor fellow might be the culprit?”
“I don’t, not necessarily, but you asked for a lead. He’s one. He was spotted at the party, albeit briefly—”
“Hang on. Charlotte’s boyfriend was at the party even though she was at boarding school?”
“My thoughts exactly. I never ran into the lad; wouldn’t have recognised him if I had. The police never looked at him twice, but I have it on good authority that he’s a bit of a ratbag. I was also informed that he left the party long before the murders. Was seen exiting around eleven that night. I wondered if my son grew some balls and kicked him out, but it was probably Tawny. She was the ballsy one in that family.” He smiled sadly. “But still.”
“Still you want me to check him out?”
He shrugged, said nothing.
“Got a contact number? Address?” Then she glanced up from her notes and said, “Never mind. I’ll find it.”
He smiled. “And now, my dear, you’re learning.”
~
By anyone’s standards, Susan and Clem LeDoux’s house was a mansion, but compared to Seagrave, it was little more than a granny flat—a fraction of the size and a lot less flashy.
Martin wondered about that as he stood in the driveway and rang the front doorbell, wondered too why they didn’t have a massive fence and gate and intercom system. Susan clearly wasn’t as fixated with security as her brother, and it felt horribly—tragically—ironic.
“Hello and welcome,” Susan said as she swept the door open. Then she glanced behind him and said, “On your own?”
“Were you expecting others?”
“I did hear there were five of you, so perhaps I was.” She smiled and twirled, and he followed her in.
Susan was more handsome than the party snap had indicated, with glossy auburn hair and long, shapely legs that flashed from time to time beneath a flowing silk dress as she swept Martin down the hallway to the other side of the house.
Turns out the house was also more handsome than first impressions, and Martin decided he preferred it to Seagrave. It was lighter, breezier and much more stylish, with none of the gaudy, antique furniture. It was as elegant and understated as Susan.
“Clem can’t join us, sadly,” she was saying as she flopped onto a wide, comfy-looking sofa. “He’s busy teaching the riffraff how to sail.”
“He’s a sailor?”
She chortled. “Better not let him hear you say that! My husband is so much more than a sailor, dear. He runs my father’s club, or he did before we got married.”
“Club?”
“The Burly Sailing Club, just down the road from here.”
Martin’s lips formed a perfect circle. “I didn’t realise that was you guys.”
“In his heyday, Father was an avid sailor. Nearly won the America’s Cup, don’t you know? Missed it by that much!” She indicated an inch with her fingers, then winked. “He set up the club to give something back. Clem used to run it; now he runs an entire department down at HQ. He’s so much more than a pretty face! But yes, occasionally Clemmie takes people sailing. Likes to keep his hand in. And yes, okay, he gave me some lessons; that is how we met. It was sunset, all very romantic. His French accent did the rest.”
She said all of that matter-of-factly, like she was repeating a mantra or perhaps family lore.
“How long have you been married?” he asked.
“Twelve years, next March.” She smirked slightly. “Is that important? To all of this?”
He smiled back.
“Shall I fetch us some coffee?” Then without budging she said, “You know, I’m a little miffed with you lot.”
“Sorry?”
“You’re only here because Father insisted, and Father gets what Father wants.” She leaned forward and grabbed a packet of cigarettes from a low glass coffee table, the offer of coffee completely forgotten. “The truth is I’m no fan of this ridiculous little project, and I really cannot imagine why you agreed to do it. It feels like you’re taking advantage of an old man’s grief.”
