"Rachel," I ask, "what do you think of Henry?"
"Henry? He's okay. Drinks too much, but basically he's a nice enough guy."
I thank her, and when she's gone we all look at each other and smile.
Kat says, "Remember, nice guys don't murder!"
"Well, this one does," insists Nadia. "I can't think why you're making excuses for him. I just know it's Henry!"
We finish our breakfast and wander over to the police station. We aren't sure if the paperwork will be ready for us to sign. Detective Donna is just arriving. She says, "You guys are early. I'm not quite ready with the statements yet."
I say, "It's okay, we're in no hurry. Perhaps we can talk to Henry while we're waiting? That is, if it's okay with you."
The Detective looks uncertain. "I guess that will be okay. You guys haven't changed your minds about Henry's guilt, have you?"
We all give a little laugh and walk in behind her.
She says, "He's back there, first cell on the left. Only prisoner we have." She pauses for a moment, "Wait a minute, let me check to see if he's awake and decent."
She's gone for just a few minutes, "It's okay. I feel sorry for him. He's really a nice guy."
It's like listening to a script. Either Henry is genuinely nice, or everyone is covering up for him. All seven of us go in. Kat and I walk up to his cell, while the others stand back at a distance where they can still hear our conversation. No point in making Henry feel like he's on show in a zoo.
"Hi, Henry."
He looks up at me from where he's sitting. "What are you guys doing here? Have you come to help me?"
I know by his reaction that he doesn't know that we're the ones who put him behind the bars we're talking through.
Kat says, "Maybe. Kit's going to ask you three questions, if it's okay with you. All we ask is that you answer them honestly."
"Of course I'll answer them honestly. I've got nothing to hide. What are your questions? But before you ask them, I want you to know that I didn't kill your friend. I'm a nice guy."
We all look at each other. I'm thinking: In that case, I hope you're innocent. And if you are innocent, who killed Sue?
I say, "Here are your three questions. They're easy, so just answer them the best you can. One, why did you go into the house when you found the kitchen door unlocked? Two, how did you know that old typewriter is in the library? Three, why did you take the spare knife out of the drawer?"
Henry looks shocked at my queries. "What kind of questions are these?" he asks. "The Inspector says I'm in here because I was in a drunken brawl last night, which by the way, I don't remember."
Kat and I look at each other, and then at the incredulous faces of our friends. We must all be wondering why the Inspector hasn't told Henry the truth about why he has arrested him. He can't have read him the Miranda Rights, as he said he was going to.
Henry sighs, clearly offended by my line of questioning. He waits a long time before saying, "I'll answer your questions anyway."
Anxiously waiting to hear what he's going to say, I know I'll either have peace about having him arrested, or be confused and perhaps need to start looking for someone else.
Henry seems to be carefully thinking out each question. I'm desperately hoping he'll answer them honestly.
Chapter 28
Finally, Henry says, "I didn't take any knife, and I didn't plan to murder anyone. You and your friends must think I'm a terrible person." He turns to Paul. "You've known me for a long time. Do you really think I could kill someone on purpose?"
We all look at Paul. He says, "No, Henry, I don't think you could kill anyone on purpose."
This is all going well, and I'm hoping Henry doesn't ask Nadia for her opinion. Her absolute certainty of Henry's guilt might put an immediate stop to his willingness to talk to us.
Henry smiles a ragged smile. "Thanks, Paul. The first time I was ever inside your house was the other day with the Inspector, so that's the first time I ever saw the library. I didn't even know there is a library in your home, Paul.
"All I know about the kitchen door is that Kathy calls and asks me to check on it, thinking they maybe haven't locked it when they left. She says Paul's family would pay me for my troubles later." Still looking at Paul, he continues. "Your parents have always been kind and generous to me. There was no need to pay me. I wanted to do it as a favor to them."
I ask Henry again, "When you found the door unlocked, why did you go inside? Why didn't you just lock the door and return back to this island?"
Henry says, "There's one thing you've overlooked."
"What's that?"
"The door to the kitchen was locked."
I say, "Impossible. We know the door was unlocked, because when we arrived we went in and out of that door. It has a bolt lock, and it definitely wasn't locked."
We wait for Henry to say something. Finally he says, "Well, he told me the door was locked, so I didn't need to go over and check. I called Kathy back and told her not to worry, everything's okay."
We look at each other, and Kat says quickly, "Who told you?"
"The Inspector. I told him Kathy called and what she wanted me to do. I was really busy working on Gary's boats, so the Inspector says since he's going to do his patrols, he'll stop off at Kimberly Cove and do the check for me. When he returns, he says it's locked and everything's secure."
I can't believe it. Is it the Inspector all this time who's playing cat and mouse with us?
We thank Henry and hurry back to Paul's Island. We want to go through our eleven questions on the whiteboard, this time with the Inspector's name on the top of the list, instead of Henry's. Perhaps Henry is "just a nice guy."
Chapter 29
We arrive back at the house and rush into the library and check the list. If Henry is right, we might be able to come up with answers to the questions that implicate the Inspector.
Inspector Charles had more access to the home, being there most of the time quizzing us. And with freedom to move around the property, he could have moved Sue's body to the pier and lowered it into the sea while we thought we were waiting for him to arrive. Henry is small; the Inspector is larger and much stronger. We quickly agree that the Inspector could have done numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 and 10 on our list on the whiteboard. Numbers 6, "How did he get the little boat" and 11, "Why murder Sue?" are the only two we're not sure of.
Wondering what our next step will be, a knock comes from the front door. Kat says, "What are we going to do if it's the Inspector?"
I feel almost in a panic. This isn't theory in our criminology classes in university, this is real life. "Let's stay quiet and let him do the talking. Maybe he doesn't know that we've been over to the Main Island and visited Henry."
I go to the board, erase the Inspector's name, and write in Henry's again.
Nadia goes to the door, and to our surprise it's Detective Donna and Officer Chung. Her face stoic, the Detective enters the library with a white envelope in her hand.
"Thirty minutes after you left, the Inspector came back, four hours earlier than I was expecting him. I'd been wondering about him. With the way he's been acting, there were things happening that just didn't seem to compute."
She pauses for a moment, and continues. "For instance, when Inspector Charles was out on boat patrol a couple of times, he returned thirty, sometimes forty minutes late. He's never done that before you all arrived. He's always back on time. Four days ago, in the morning, he returned wearing his jacket and holding it tightly done up, and I thought I saw blood on his shirt. He didn't give any explanation, and I didn't ask anything. A few minutes later he'd changed his clothes and was acting like nothing had happened.
"Then the incident with the patrol boat. Why would anyone sabotage it when there are plenty of other large boats at Gary's Rentals? Besides, he never wanted to investigate it, saying it was probably just kids out having a good time. That's not like him. He always checked into everything. The next day he told me
he wanted to hire some divers to look under the boat because he thought that the missing motor pieces were there. I told him if it was kids who did it, they'd taken the pieces to get a kick out of showing their friends what they'd done. Or else sell the items.
"He insisted. So the divers tried, but came up empty handed. He told them to go back down, that he knew the pieces were there. Sure enough, this time they came up with the lost pieces. He had a strange smile on his face, and told them, 'See, I told you I knew they were there.' He seemed so positive, I wondered why was he so sure the divers would find them.
"There were other little things that just didn't make any sense to me. When he arrested Henry, he was emphatic about no one seeing him, even threatening me that I could lose my job if I went down to the cell. This was so unlike him, and then telling Henry he'd been arrested for a drunken brawl. I thought that was very strange and wondered why the Inspector was lying to him.
"After you left, and the Inspector came hurrying back so early, the first thing he asked me was how everything was with Henry. Did Henry say anything to me or ask anything? The Inspector seemed in a panic. I wanted to see his reaction, so I looked up at him and said, 'Nothing too exciting. Paul and his friends came by and they talked to him for a little while.'
"He instantly blew up and swore at me. Then he went in and questioned Henry. This time I listened. I couldn't hear everything, but I did hear the Inspector ask Henry if he'd told his visitors that he was the one who went to the island to check that the kitchen door was locked. When Henry said 'Yes,' he swore again and headed for the door, practically knocking me down, saying, 'My life is ruined. My life is ruined!'
"When he didn't return in a couple of hours, Police Officer Chung and I went to look for him. We found his car in front of his home. The front door was open as if he was expecting us. We went inside and found him lying on the floor in a pool of blood. He'd taken his own life. His right hand held his weapon, and in his left hand was this envelope addressed to you, Paul."
We are definitely all in shock. Kat turns to Detective Donna. "I speak for everyone here. I'm sure that even though it now looks certain the Inspector killed our friend Sue, we're sorry that it has to end this way."
I can see tears in all our eyes, although I do feel a great sense of relief that the murderer isn't one of us.
Chapter 30
Detective Donna hands Paul the envelope. "Like I said, the Inspector was holding this in his hand when we have reason to believe he turned his weapon on himself." She is now sounding official. "It's addressed to you, Paul. I can give it to you, but you must read it in my presence and surrender it back to me when you are through. If you are agreeable to that, you may open the envelope."
Paul starts to open it carefully. We notice that it's the same kind of envelope that contained the other two notes. But this one isn't typed, but written by hand, not very neatly.
"It's definitely the Inspector's handwriting," Donna says, answering my unspoken question.
Paul reads it aloud for all of us to hear.
"To Paul,
First let me say I am sorry for what has happened. I know that you and your friends by now have come to the conclusion that I am the one who killed your friend. Please, Paul, let all of your friends know that I am sorry that I took away their friend, and, of course, your fiancée and child. It was not planned … it was an accident.
To answer your eleven questions that I copied from the board, I want to go through each one with you, even though you know some of them already.
1.How did I find the note? As you know, Henry told me Kathy had called him about the kitchen door possibly being unlocked. He said he was very busy, so I volunteered to go look into it on my routine patrol watch. I was just trying to be helpful to Henry.
2.I found the kitchen door unlocked, just as Kathy had expected. Oh yes, I found Paul's note first on the door. Curiosity got to me. I tried to open it very carefully, but I tore the envelope.
3.I've been in your parents' home many times over the last twenty years, so I knew about the old typewriter in the library. I went through the kitchen to the library and found the envelopes. I put one in the typewriter and typed "Welcome" on it. I thought Kathy had put it there to welcome you and your friends to your home on the island, so I didn't want you to know anyone had interfered with it.
I hadn't read the letter yet as I was upset with myself for tearing the envelope. After I used the typewriter and was putting the letter in the envelope, I automatically opened the piece of paper and read it. I had no idea who'd written it, but it intrigued me. I began to think of ways I could scare all of you, just as a joke.
4. Why did I take Sue's life? I assure you it wasn't my plan. I started out wanting just to frighten you, like I say. You young students can annoy me at times, and I decided it was payback time for the trouble visiting kids give me on the Main Island. When I checked your house out earlier and saw the two knives, I got a brilliant idea. I took one of the knives and bought some fake blood in a joke shop on the mainland where I wasn't known. It looked very realistic. I was planning to put the knife on the counter in the kitchen to frighten you all. I guessed no one would go close enough to know it wasn't real blood, and I'd be the Inspector to investigate the crime if you phoned for help. I could then warn you about a murderer on the loose and you'd be scared for the rest of your holiday.
I got to your island very early, and was preparing the knife outside the kitchen door when your friend Sue came out for a swim. When she saw the knife she thought it was real blood, and started to run into the house for help. I pulled her back and tried to tell her it was just a game. She looked at the knife and I thought she was going to scream. I told her not to make a noise, and hugged her closely for reassurance. She misunderstood what I was doing and begged me to stop, saying she was expecting a baby.
Somehow the knife went into her chest as I held her tightly. I kept telling myself it was an accident, but now I don't know. You remember Donna telling you about the death of my niece who was also pregnant. Two young women, pregnant by their boyfriends. Something seemed to happen to me, some terrible loss of control. I carried her body to the lounge chair and laid her on it while I decided what to do next.
5. I could have confessed and explained about the accident, but I heard you calling her name, and I hid under the deck until after you found her. When you all went into the living room, I slipped onto the deck and tied her body to the pier post. Then I gently lowered her into the water. I wanted to wash the fake blood away from the wound so it wasn't found in the autopsy. I'd moored the patrol boat a little way from the house and got away quickly.
On the way back to my office, I started thinking of what I'd done. I couldn't undo what had happened, so I began to plan what I thought would be the perfect crime. I mean, who would think that the Inspector on the case could be the murderer? And I was in the perfect position to cover up any evidence that pointed to me.
Believe me, Paul, I wasn't going to let you go to prison. After I found out Sue really was pregnant, and it wasn't something she just said to scare me away, I again felt terribly sorry, but by now I was doing everything I could to save myself.
I would have gotten away with it, I'm sure, but your friends wouldn't give up. It was a big mistake to arrest you, Paul, although my idea with the cigarette butts was to point suspicion at you. I didn't know you'd only smoked for a short time, and of course Henry doesn't smoke. But that was when your friends started their investigation wholeheartedly. Especially Kit and Kat. So then I began to build the case against Henry. Henry is a worthless drunk, so I had no hesitation in getting him convicted.
6.How did I get the little boat that Kit and Kat found? I talked Henry into letting me use it. Remember, he has permission from Gary to fix and use any of the boats while he's repairing them. I told Henry I'd to go to the island to check something out about the case, and that it was strictly police business and under no circumstances was he to tell anyone. He was drunk, so I was prett
y sure he wouldn't remember any of our conversation. If he did, I'd remind him again that it was strictly police business. But, of course, he never mentioned it. I went back to plant the butts.
Now for number 7. When we left the night before, and just before we pulled away, I told Detective Donna that I was going to get a glass of water from the kitchen. That was when I put the spare knife on the counter. Soon afterward, you put the bag of the cigarette butts by it.
8. I sabotaged the police patrol boat myself. The reason? I wanted Henry to return to the island with me. I was building up evidence against him. Pinning the note to the umbrella was a little more difficult. By this time, I was almost enjoying myself in a strange way. Just seeing the look on your faces gave me a rush. And with Henry being there, I was sure you and your friends would think he was the one who pinned the note to the umbrella.
That was the night I arrested Paul. Everyone was shocked at all the news of Sue's pregnancy and Paul's confession to being the father.
I walked over to the umbrella. My intention was to say, "Look, I've found another envelope," but everyone was so concerned about Paul being so upset. A pin just happened to be on the table. I picked it up and bingo, the next threatening note for one of you to find. I could hardly wait to get back and again wait for the frightened phone call to say you'd found the note. That's number 9.
10. Remember my coughing fit? It was a pretense. I acted like I needed a glass of water. When I went into the kitchen I quickly put the knife inside one of the cabinets, knowing one of you would eventually find it. I did that to create more mystery, and knew that soon one of you would come up with the idea that it was Henry who had murdered Sue, because I'd asked him to come with us to navigate the patrol boat. I was surprised that none of you asked if I'd seen the knife.
11. Why did I do it? It's difficult for me to answer. It started out as a stupid game to express my anger against the behavior of some of the visiting students, but turned into murder, then intrigue, then excitement, and now my death.