A Rose From the Dead (12 page)

Marco sat back, looking every inch a savvy, confident private eye. “There’s not a doubt in my mind. Sybil was found in a storage room inside a closed casket, wearing only her underwear, her clothing—”

“Back up,” Crawford said, holding up his hands. “Did you say inside a
casket
?”

“With a heavy tool chest propped on the lid so she couldn’t get out,” I added.

“Holy stars and bars. Had she been restrained? Were there any ropes on her wrists, any handcuffs?”

“Not that we saw,” Marco replied. “Also, there were no visible marks on her throat. I don’t know what the autopsy or toxicology reports will show, but at first blush it appears she willingly climbed into the casket.”

The attorney’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head. “She
climbed
into the casket?” The poor man was starting to come undone.

“I know that sounds off the wall,” Marco said, “but bear in mind that this convention is for morticians, and some of their activities are, well, a little out there for the rest of us. The storage room was the holding area for caskets that were entries in a contest, and Sybil was the judge.”

“The caskets were supposed to be decorated as different objects,” I explained. “You know, like a jet plane or a piano keyboard.”

For a moment Crawford simply sat there as though his mind wouldn’t accept what we were saying. Then he took off his glasses and polished them with the linen table napkin, muttering, “My, my, my.”

“Sybil was supposed to announce the winning entry after the banquet,” I said, “but she never showed up.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but choosing a winning—er, entry wouldn’t require her to take off her clothing and climb
into
the casket, would it?” Crawford asked.

“I don’t think the people here are that far out,” Marco said.

“But there
was
a rumor floating around that Sybil had arranged to meet someone in the storage room before the banquet,” I said.

“For what purpose?”

“Supposedly for a tryst,” I said.

“A tryst. In a
casket
. Which she then died in.” Crawford calmly hooked the wire ends of his glasses over his ears, blinked a few times to adjust his vision, and put his hands on the table, as though performing a normal act would restore his bewildered mind. “I have to agree with your assessment, Mr. Salvare. It seems a clear case of homicide. What about this witness you mentioned earlier?”

“She’s definitely way out there,” I said.

“Her name is Angelique DeScuro, and her business is called Music of the Soul,” Marco said. “Whether she was involved in Sybil’s death isn’t clear at this point. The only information she provided was her discovery of the tool chest sitting on top of the closed casket and a nylon stocking hanging out of one end. Apparently that stocking was her tip-off—otherwise, she wouldn’t have looked inside the casket.”

“Is this Angelique a prime suspect, then?” Crawford asked.

“I don’t have any information on that yet,” Marco said, as though he expected some momentarily. “Angelique seemed very taken with Sybil, almost to the point of idolizing her, so it doesn’t make sense that she would kill her.”

“Actually,” I said, “it does. Angelique told me she wanted to record Sybil’s soul music, and she can’t do that unless the person is checking out.”

“Whoa. Hold on a minute,” Crawford said. “What do you mean by Sybil’s soul music?”

“According to Angelique, it’s the music the soul makes when leaving the body,” I explained. “She records the so-called soul music onto a CD for the family of the deceased. It’s weird, but that’s what she does for a living. She told me Sybil’s soul was so unique that it had to be recorded. Make of that what you will.”

“Are these people crazy?” Crawford asked.

“It gets crazier,” I said. “When the police arrived, Angelique had her tape recorder with her and she was sitting in front of the casket rubbing one of Sybil’s nylon stockings against her face. That has to raise a few red flags. And if you think about it, Marco,” I said, turning to face him, “Angelique could have held the lid down to keep Sybil from escaping while she did her recording, then positioned the chest on the floor and claimed she found it on top.”

Marco shook his head as though my idea reeked. “So you’re saying Angelique killed Sybil to get her recording, then called the cops when she was finished? Not likely. How would she have convinced Sybil to get inside the casket?”

“Who’s to say Sybil didn’t swing both ways? Maybe she was meeting
Angelique
for that tryst.”

“So your opinion then is that this Angelique is the killer?” Crawford asked me.

I scratched my nose, slightly embarrassed that I’d painted myself into a corner. Across the table, Marco was waiting to see how I’d get myself out. “Um, well, actually, no, that would be Ross and Jess Urban, or maybe just Ross. But certainly both of them had the strongest means, motive, and opportunity of anyone here at the convention.” I went on to explain how the Urban twins had lured me into the coffin–phone booth, about the prank they’d played on Sybil, and about finding Sybil’s clothes on the mannequin.

“These young men wouldn’t be Conrad Urban’s sons, would they?” Crawford asked nervously, reaching for his napkin.

I nodded. “Do you know Conrad?”

The attorney mopped his forehead. “Do you see our waitress? I need water. Fast.”

T
he waitress had gone behind the bar to fill an order and was standing with her back to us, so Marco called out, “Excuse me, can we have some service here, please?”

She didn’t hear him, so I jumped up and grabbed a full glass from a woman at the next table. “Have you had any of this yet?” I asked the startled female, who quickly shook her head.

“Great. Thanks. We’ll get you a fresh supply in just a minute.”

I put the glass of water in the attorney’s hand, and he took a long gulp, then held the cold tumbler against his forehead just as the waitress bustled over.

“She needs a glass of water,” I said, and pointed to the bewildered lady next to us.

“I apologize,” Crawford said to us. “All this talk about caskets, and soul recordings, and now the Urban family…It’s a little much for me to absorb.”

“No problem,” Marco said. “Take your time.”

The attorney took a slow drink, then put down the glass. “I’m sorry. Please continue. You were talking about the Urban boys.”

“I don’t have anything else,” I said, “except that I’m absolutely certain Ross and Jess are behind Sybil’s death. They pulled a prank that went terribly wrong, and yet the police cleared them.”

“They would,” Crawford said. “Do you have any idea how much power Conrad Urban wields?”

“He’s not from our neck of the woods, and we’re not in the funeral business,” Marco said. “I’d never even heard his name until yesterday. Had you, Abby?”

“All I know about Conrad Urban is that he owns a big funeral-home chain, makes a lot of money, and has two spoiled-rotten sons,” I said.

“
Big
doesn’t begin to describe his business,” Crawford told us. “Conrad heads the Unified Mortuary Service Corporation, a leviathan chain that covers a five-state area and is still growing. He holds a tremendous amount of political clout. He golfs with federal judges, takes councilmen and state representatives for vacations on his yacht, and throws lavish parties. When he backs candidates, they win. By the same token, his clout would make a district attorney gun-shy were it to come to prosecuting any of Conrad’s family members. Trust me on this—without irrefutable evidence, his sons will never be suspects.”

“That is so totally unfair,” I protested.

“Money talks,” he said. “But let’s go back to this friend of yours. There must be some reason she’s being questioned. How does she fit into the picture?”

Marco explained about the scene Sybil made at the booth and Delilah’s run-in with her at past conventions as well as in the storage room before the banquet. “Now the cops are claiming that Delilah was the last person to see Sybil alive, as if that makes it a foregone conclusion that she’s the killer.”

“Honestly, Mr. Crawford,” I said, “Delilah didn’t have a problem with Sybil. It was Sybil who had a problem with Delilah, and I’m sorry if this offends you, but I saw Sybil trying to provoke an argument with her.”

“Let me tell you a little bit about Sybil,” Crawford said. “I got to know her about ten years ago when her husband, Thaddeus, hired me to take care of his estate planning. Sybil was demanding and quick to take issue, but I managed to get along with her. Of course, it helped that I only saw her twice a year.

“About a year before Sybil’s husband passed away, she became obsessed with the fear that she was going to be left destitute one day, and after Thaddeus died her fears intensified, even though I assured her that he’d left her well off. Since she had been a cosmetician at the Billingsworth and Blount funeral home—that was where she met her husband—she decided to develop and sell her own line of cosmetics, calling it her retirement fund. I know she aggressively pursued clients, but her business never really took off. I’m sure her personality had something to do with that, but I can’t imagine her making any
mortal
enemies from selling cosmetics.”

Obviously he hadn’t seen any of her products.

“What about the message she left you?” Marco asked. “Do you still have it?”

Crawford pulled out his cell phone, tapped in his code, and handed it to Marco, who held it between his ear and mine.

“Rex,” we heard Sybil say, her voice hushed and panicky, “I need to meet with you right away. Something happened and I’m worried, but I can’t go to the police and I don’t have anyone else I can trust. I’m at the Woodland Convention Center off Route 12, about half an hour north of New Chapel. Please, Rex, I need you to keep some things for me just until I get back into South Bend next week, so call me the minute you get this. I wouldn’t ask you to come all this way if it wasn’t urgent. I’ll explain more when I see you.”

The message ended and Marco handed the phone back. “Do you have any idea what she wanted to give you?”

“Not a single clue, so I’m not sure I’d know them if I saw them. As I said, I haven’t spoken with her in months. This call came completely out of left field, and unfortunately, my cell phone was off all weekend while we attended a family wedding in Ohio—my wife has a rule about cell phones at family events and I’ve learned not to break it, for harmony’s sake. So I received the message only this morning. Now that you’ve heard it, you can understand why I came straight here.”

“What do you think she meant when she said she couldn’t go to the police?” Marco asked.

“Son, I wouldn’t want to speculate on that.”

That was more lawyer talk. This time it meant,
My client might be involved in something illegal, but I can’t say so.

“I’d like to get into her room and have a look,” Crawford told us, “but I know I’ll be fighting an uphill battle to get the police to let me in.”

“We know ways around that,” I told him, only to have Marco throw me a glance that said,
That’s not what you admit to a lawyer.
Okay, so there was another reason why I hadn’t passed my law school exams.

“Have you checked with the front desk to see if Sybil left an envelope or package for you?” Marco asked.

“She didn’t, nor did she mail anything. I had the clerk check as soon as I arrived. Since it’s a weekend, nothing went out. So either she didn’t feel as though she was in any immediate danger or she did but never got to take steps to ensure the items reached me.”

“What time was her message sent?”

Crawford checked the screen on his cell phone. “Three fifteen yesterday afternoon.”

Obviously whatever had prompted her distress call had happened well before she met the killer in the storage room. I tried to recall what had been going on at three fifteen. Lottie had arrived at two o’clock, and not long after that Sybil had come around with her checklist. What could have triggered her panicked phone call? Had she been threatened by someone as she made her way around the hall? Would security cameras have recorded her movements? I’d have to remember to ask Marco later.

“Are you aware of any personal relationships that might have placed your client in danger?” Marco asked.

“I never probe my clients’ personal business.”

“What about inheritance problems? Did she have any children or stepchildren?”

“None.”

“What do you know of her husband’s family?”

“They predeceased him. Thaddeus had one close friend whom he treated like a brother, and that was Walker Billingsworth, his partner in the funeral-home business. I handled Walker’s estate for awhile, but after Thaddeus died, the colonel retired and decided to take care of his finances himself.”

Marco glanced at me to see whether I had anything to add, but I was fresh out of ideas.

“Did you have anything else to ask us?” Marco said.

“Not at present. My next step is to try to talk the police into letting me into Sybil’s room—if they ever show up.” He pulled out a business card and wrote his cell phone number on the back. “Will you let me know if there are any new developments?”

“Be glad to, if you’ll do likewise.” Marco took out one of his own business cards and gave it to the attorney. At that moment, a hotel employee in a burgundy coat came into the lounge accompanied by an officer from the sheriff’s department. He pointed to Crawford.

“Looks like the authorities have finally arrived,” Crawford said, springing up. “Let’s see if I have any luck.”

“Attorney Rex Crawford?” the cop asked, striding toward us.

Crawford tapped the face of his watch. “It’s about time you got here. I’ve come all the way from South Bend to pick up some items my client insisted I keep for her, only to find that the hotel won’t let me access her room.”

It was great posturing, but it didn’t do him any good. The cop said gravely, “Mr. Crawford, your client is dead. We’ve sealed off her room.”

“I’m well aware of the circumstances, Officer, but she didn’t die in her room, did she?”

“No, sir.”

“Then it’s not a crime scene. Why is it sealed?”

“Because her death is under investigation.”

“But she didn’t die in her room.”

“As you know, sir, there’s always the possibility that evidence may be contained in a victim’s room.”

“Was a search of the room conducted?”

“I believe so.”

“So, legally, Officer, there’s no reason to keep me out, is there? So how about letting me inside to take possession of the belongings she set aside for me; then you can seal it up again?”

The cop looked flustered. “I can’t go against orders, sir.”

Crawford heaved a big sigh, looking very disheartened. “In other words, I’ll have to get a judge to give me an order saying you have to let me in, and then you’ll have to come back out here and do what you could do right now, on the spot. Why go through all that rigamarole?”

“Because I have orders, Mr. Crawford.”

“Then I’ll just have to see the judge in the morning.”

“That would be fine, sir. Is there anything else I can help you with today?”

Crawford cast us a quick glance, then rocked back on his heels. “You can tell me who your suspects are.”

“I can’t do that, Mr. Crawford. You’ll have to take it up with the DA.”

“Then I guess there’s nothing else you can help me with.”

As the cop strode away, Crawford turned to us and shrugged. “It was worth a shot. I’ll have to file a petition with the court in the morning so I can get a hearing set on the matter, although to be quite frank, the judges in this county don’t know me from Adam, so they may not be inclined to rule in my favor. By that I mean don’t hold your breath.” He put a five-dollar bill on the table. “That should cover my coffee and a tip.” He held out his hand. “It was a pleasure to meet you both. I’ll let you know what happens in court.”

As we watched Crawford stride out of the lounge, I said, “Marco, we can’t wait for a court order that might not even happen. We’re going to have to get inside Sybil’s room ourselves.”

“Yep,” he said, standing to stretch his legs, “I came to that same conclusion.”