Murder at the Mall Read online

  “Why me?” Frank asked. “You’ve already been there!”

  “Exactly. They all know me—the lobby security guys, Eberhardt, Meister, their secretaries. After the stunts I pulled last time, I’d have zero chance of getting through.”

  So that was how it went down. I went straight up to the lobby security desk and asked to see Mr. Eberhardt. When the guard told me I needed an appointment, I started arguing with him.

  Meanwhile, I had cleverly positioned myself so that the guard had his back to Frank—who walked right on through to the elevators, totally unnoticed.

  As soon as he’d disappeared inside one of them, I gave up the fight and apologized to the guard. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I had no right to get angry with you—I mean, you’re just doing your job, right?”

  “Right,” the guy said, sounding relieved and a little puzzled. A minute ago I’d been acting angry enough to cause bodily harm. Now, without any help from him, I was suddenly a pussycat.

  I waited outside the building, sitting on the front steps, out of the way of foot traffic, until Frank came out five minutes later.

  “Well?” I asked.

  “Well,” he said, sitting down next to me, “I went up to thirty-four and told the receptionist I had a personal message to deliver to Mr. Meister, from Mr. Lerner of the American Bar Association.”

  “And?”

  “She said, ‘I’ll have to give him the message—he called in sick this morning.’ I gave her a look like I didn’t believe her, and then she said, ‘No, really, he did. He sounded just awful, too—his voice was practically gone.’”

  “Hmm … or maybe it wasn’t him at all!”

  “That occurred to me, too, Joe. But why would someone do that? Why wouldn’t Meister just call in sick himself?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t have a clue, Sherlock. How about you?”

  He shook his head. “If Meister killed Oskar, he’d probably want to lay low until he was sure it was safe to show himself.”

  “So how do we find him?”

  “How ’bout we try dialing information?”

  Frank couldn’t get his address from the operator, but we did find it in one of the phone books at the Bayport Public Library.

  We rode over there—way over into the suburbs north of town along the bay. Meister lived in a nice house, all right—but from the looks of things, he wasn’t home. No car in the driveway or the garage, no sign of life inside.

  We checked in by phone with police headquarters next. Con Reilly answered. He told me they were still searching for Stephanie Flowers, but that they’d rounded up Paul Burns and his friends and were grilling them for information about Oskar’s murder.

  “Can I suggest something, Con?” I asked.

  “Sure.”

  “Tell them you know the truth about who paid them to spray that graffiti.”

  He sounded surprised. “They’re the ones who did that? How’d you find that out?”

  “Frank wormed it out of them, but they lied about who paid them.”

  “But you think they’ll tell us the truth.”

  “Well, yeah. If they tell you it was Stephanie Flowers, don’t believe it.”

  “Oh, no? Why not?”

  “Just trust me on this one, Con. If they say it was her, tell them you know it wasn’t. Tell them you know it was Bob Meister.”

  “Bob who?”

  “He’s the lawyer for Shangri-La Enterprises, LLC.”

  “Are you nuts, Joe? Shangri-La is a major player in this city. I’m not going to start dragging their name into this mess, and neither is the chief!”

  “Just try it, Con, okay? You might be surprised at their reaction.”

  He sighed. “All right. But I expect a full explanation later.”

  “No problem,” I said. “You’ll have it by the end of the day.” I flipped my phone shut. “At least, I sure hope so.”

  We headed over to the mall next. We weren’t due at work for another hour, but we couldn’t think of a better place to look for Meister.

  I didn’t buy for one second that he was really sick. He hadn’t gotten his cell phone back, after all. He might still be looking for it, and the mall was one place Oskar could have hidden it (I’d have bet Oskar’s apartment had already been searched).

  Frank headed for In the Groove first, to see if Adriana had shown up. I made a beeline for the food court.

  Clem was behind the counter at Healthy Wraps. “I can’t believe it—you’re early!” he greeted me.

  “Oh, no. I don’t start for another hour.”

  He shook his head and frowned. “I don’t know. First you don’t show up, then you show up early, but not to work …”

  “Just remember, Clem—the price is right,” I said.

  “Well, salary or no salary—you’d better be here in an hour, ready to work, or the whole deal’s off!”

  “All righty, then.” I was ready to lose the job anyway, now that the case had completely taken over my life. Besides, Clem was turning out to be a real pain.

  I took a seat at a table, not far from Phil’s Phranks ’n’ Phries. At this early hour, not even Phil’s was busy. In fact, only one place was doing any business at all: The Big Chill.

  Chet was behind the counter, scooping up enormous portions to a crowd of juniors from Bayport High. I recognized a few of them: Sam Scarfone, Adam Franklin, the Daniels twins, Tommy Carroll …

  Suddenly there was a commotion as Chet’s boss Ernesto arrived and saw what was going on. You’d think he’d have been happy about all those customers, but no.

  “What kind of portions are you giving out?” he screamed at Chet. “You want to send me to the poorhouse? Look—this is how you do it!”

  He grabbed the scoop from Chet and handled the next customer himself. She gave him a nasty look when she saw how small her cone was, compared to all the ones Chet had doled out.

  “Hey!” she said, frowning. “This place is a rip-off!”

  “You see what you’re doing to me?” the boss shouted at Chet. “And look—now we’re out of vanilla! Go back in the freezer and get me some more!”

  He turned to argue with the angry girl, while Chet disappeared into the storage area in back of the food stalls.

  A minute later I heard him screaming.

  I stood up and turned to look, just like everyone else. Chet stepped out of the storage area, empty-handed. In fact, he was waving his hands around like they were on fire. “HELP! Somebody help!!”

  Everyone else seemed frozen, so I sprang into action, leaping over the counter and sprinting to his side. “What’s up, Chet? What’s wrong?”

  “Th-th-there’s a d-dead man in there!” he stammered, pointing behind him.

  I let go of him and rushed back to the storage area. The door to the food court’s walk-in freezer was wide open, and a cold mist was pouring out of it. I waved it away as I went inside.

  And that’s when I saw him.

  At the back of the freezer, sitting on a pile made of cases of Phil’s Phranks, was the frozen body of our number one suspect—Bob Meister!

  12.

  A Friend in Need

  When I got there, In the Groove was still locked up. Adriana was nowhere in sight, and neither was Steph. In fact, my boss hadn’t been seen since just before Oskar’s murder. The police hadn’t been able to find her, and neither had anyone else.

  So where was she? Had she skipped town? Left the state—the country, even?

  I didn’t think so. Something told me Stephanie Flowers was still close by. I didn’t have any evidence—just the fact that she’d been here last night, and the logic that said she wasn’t about to walk away from something she cared so much about.

  Maybe she was just hiding, waiting until the police found the person who was really responsible for all this madness.

  I was still standing there when I heard something that sounded like Chet Morton screaming “Help!” I took off at full speed for the food court, and arrived to find a huge c
rowd hanging around the Big Chill.

  As I cut through the ranks of the curious, I could see that Chet was at the center of all the commotion. He was sitting on a high stool, looking distinctly green, with his boss at one shoulder and Iola at the other.

  “Is he okay?” I called to Iola.

  She shook her head. “But he’ll live. Which is more than you can say for whoever’s in there.”

  She nodded with her head toward an open door at the back of the food stand. Joe was standing in the doorway, motioning for me to join him.

  As I passed Iola, she said, “Frank, when you’ve got a minute, I have to talk to you about something—something important.”

  “You want to tell me now?” I asked.

  “No, later … in private.”

  She looked troubled—even worried. I wondered why, but Joe was hissing at me, waving for me to hurry up.

  “Back here,” he said. “In the freezer room.”

  I followed him in there—and that’s when I saw the corpse. I didn’t recognize the poor guy, but then, he was kind of blue, and probably not looking his best. “Do I know him?” I asked Joe.

  “It’s Meister. Looks like he’s been in here awhile, too—maybe since last night. We should find out if anyone else came in here today.”

  “We should call the police, too.”

  “Already did,” Joe said. “They’re on their way.”

  “Joe, if Meister was in here since last night … he might not have been alive long enough to kill Oskar.”

  “Or maybe Oskar killed him, and then someone else killed Oskar.”

  “Who? Steph?”

  “I’ll tell you one thing—it wasn’t Paul Burns and those kids, Frank. I would’ve heard them. Whoever killed Oskar did it solo, and quietly.”

  Chief Collig, Con Reilly, and two other officers burst into the freezer room.

  “Great Caesar’s ghost!” the chief cried when he saw Meister sitting there. Then he took a long look at the two of us. “All right, boys,” he said, frowning. “Let’s have it—the whole story, if you please—and don’t leave anything out.”

  We started to tell him, and we were about halfway through when Reilly said, “Hey, chief—check this out.” He handed the chief a folded piece of paper. “It was in the stiff’s suit pocket.”

  The chief read it, looked up at us, and said, “It’s a suicide note.”

  “No way!” Joe told him.

  “I agree,” I said. “No way.”

  The forensics officer joined our little group.

  “How long has he been dead?” the chief asked her.

  “Hard to tell, Chief, because the body’s frozen,” she said. “But not more than twelve hours.”

  The chief checked his watch. “That means he was killed sometime after three in the morning,” he said. “Which means the janitor died first.” He turned to us, looking grimmer than ever. “Finish your story, boys.” And we did.

  “Well, now, try this on for size,” he said when we were done. “Meister here pays those juvenile delinquents to spray the graffiti on the roof to implicate STEMM. He cuts the glass and loses his cell phone. Oskar finds it and tries to blackmail him. He fights with Oskar and kills him. Then, out of guilt and remorse, Meister takes his own life.”

  “Chief, I don’t want to sound rude, but that’s absurd,” I said.

  “I think so too,” said the chief, taking me by surprise. “And who would choose to die by freezing himself to death? That’s a pretty extreme suicide.”

  “I think someone else wrote it, lured Meister in here, knocked him unconscious, then stuck the note in his pocket to make it look like suicide.”

  “There’s just one problem,” Chief Collig pointed out. “This freezer has a safety door—it can be opened from inside as well as out, so why didn’t he let himself back out when he came to?”

  “Well, then, maybe whoever lured Meister here killed him,” I said. “It wouldn’t have mattered that the door could be opened from in here, because Meister was already dead.”

  “Any evidence of violence on the body?” Chief Collig asked the forensics lady.

  “No, sir.”

  “Well, have some toxicology tests run. The whole gamut. This man may have been poisoned.” He turned to me and Frank. “All right, you two can go now. We’ll take it from here.”

  “Chief?” Joe said.

  “Go on now, it’s freezing in here. Get some hot cocoa and thaw yourselves out—let the pros handle this. We’re closing the mall and making everyone clear out.”

  Joe and I always hate when he does that—rubbing it in about us being amateurs. But we couldn’t argue with him—not without revealing our secret to every officer in that freezer room.

  “Chief, one last thing,” said Joe. “Could you show that note to my brother?”

  The chief made a face, but handed me the note.

  “Frank,” Joe said. “You’re a handwriting expert, right? Quick—tell me, was that note written by a righty or a lefty?”

  One quick glance at the note was enough. “A righty,” I stated. “Definitely.”

  “See, that proves it’s not a suicide note. I’ve met Meister. I’ve seen him sign his name,” said Joe, with a grim look on his face. “He was a lefty.”

  Chief Collig looked startled. “You’re sure?”

  “I’d testify to it in court.”

  “Well, then,” said the chief. “I guess we’ve got two murders on our hands.”

  “What about suspects?” I asked. I didn’t think the chief would answer, but I figured I’d try asking anyway.

  To my surprise, he turned to Con Reilly and ordered, “Send out an all-points bulletin. I want Stephanie Flowers brought in—tonight!” Turning back to me and Joe, he added, “It can’t be those kids. I’ve had them in custody since midnight on suspicion of the other murder.”

  “Are you going to let them go now?” Joe asked.

  “No way,” the chief said, shaking his head. “Just because they didn’t kill our frozen fish here doesn’t mean they didn’t drown the janitor. Until we speak to Ms. Flowers and get a full confession, they stay locked up.”

  Thoughts and theories were racing through my head, but I wasn’t clear enough about them to lay it out for Chief Collig. I needed some time to toss things around with Joe and put the whole case together in my mind. “Come on, Joe,” I said. “I’m freezing.”

  We went back out into the food court, where it felt like a hundred degrees by comparison. A team of paramedics with a stretcher marched past us toward the freezer, but Joe and I knew there wasn’t any hurry. Meister was gone—and with him, our number one suspect.

  Which left only Steph, really, if you didn’t count those kids—and I was satisfied they weren’t killers. Trouble was, I didn’t think Steph was either….

  Chet came over to us, still looking a little green. “I can’t believe what just happened!” he said, his voice shaking.

  “Calm down, buddy,” Joe told him.

  “Hey, where’s Iola?” I asked Chet, remembering that she wanted to tell me something.

  “Uh, I guess she went home.”

  “No, she wouldn’t have done that.” I looked around some more, craning my neck to see past the crowd of shoppers that had gathered to watch this bizarre CSI: Bayport reality show, live from the food court.

  Iola was nowhere in sight. Strange, I thought.

  There was her boss behind the counter, closing up for the night. “Excuse me, Phil,” I said, going up to him. “Is Iola around?”

  “Iola? Uh, no, she must have taken off.”

  “She was just here a few minutes ago.”

  “Yeah, but in all the commotion …”

  “She didn’t tell you she was leaving?”

  “No, but like I said, everyone was watching the—well, you know …”

  “Yeah. So, you didn’t see her leave, then?”

  “No. She might still be around somewhere. Maybe in the bathroom?”

  “Okay, t
hanks anyway.”

  I stood at the entrance to the ladies’ room and shouted Iola’s name. There was no response, so I went back over to Joe and Chet. “You sure you didn’t see her go?” I asked Chet.

  He shook his head. “I was distracted! But don’t worry—I’m sure she just went home, Frank.”

  “She said she needed to talk to me,” I told him. “She looked scared, but it was just after the body was found. I told her to wait for me, Chet—she wouldn’t have just left.” The alarm bells going off in my head suddenly got a whole lot louder. “We should go look for her. Now.”

  “Should we split up?” Joe asked.

  “Good idea. I’ll go that way, toward In the Groove. Joe, you go toward Applegate’s office. Chet, you head thataway. If none of us finds her, there’s only one direction left—toward the parking deck. That’s where she would have headed if she was leaving the mall—so once we do our search, we’ll know she’s not still here.”

  We took off at a jog, each of us searching a different promenade. We arrived back at the food court ten minutes later, empty-handed. Meanwhile, the body had been taken away, and the food court had been cleared of everyone but the police, who were finishing up their investigation.

  “I want a twenty-four-hour police detail on this entire mall,” the chief told Reilly.

  “We’re short of men, Chief. They’re all out after that Flowers woman.”

  “Well, then, as soon as she’s apprehended!”

  Right on cue, we all heard screaming and shouting coming from the direction of the emergency stairs.

  “Let me go! This is police brutality! The whole world is watching!”

  It was Steph! She had her hands cuffed behind her back and was being marched down the promenade by a couple of big, burly police officers. Her hair was wild and uncombed, and she was struggling with every ounce of her strength, like some untamed animal.

  I felt sorry for her, and I wasn’t the only one. Mr. Applegate came running up behind the procession, yelling, “Let her go! Let her go—I’ll take responsibility for her!”

  “Sorry, Mr. A.,” said Chief Collig. “This woman is wanted for two murders. I should think you, more than anybody, would want to see her in handcuffs.”

  “She’s no murderer!” Mr. Applegate insisted. “She’s … she’s my granddaughter.”