The Glitter End, page 7
Delta looked her over. Suddenly she understood. “You nominated me for that title.”
“Along with other Paper Posse friends.” Mrs. Cassidy smiled. “We thought you really deserved it, and so did all the other shopkeepers. The vote was strongly in your favor.”
Normally it would be wonderful to hear this, but, under the circumstances, Delta’s heart sank. “Now I feel super guilty. You all believed in me, and, on the very day I win that medal, the shop becomes the center of a murder investigation.”
“Not the center,” Mrs. Cassidy corrected cheerfully. “The dead body wasn’t in the shop. You’re only marginally connected to it. And, the sooner we can cut that tie, the better.” She nodded briskly. “I’ll keep you posted. Also, about my attempts to lure Buddy out into the open. Don’t worry too much.” With a squeeze of Delta’s shoulder, she turned around and left.
Delta stood staring, with a burn behind her eyes. Her new friends here in Tundish truly believed in her and had wanted her to have this medal and the honorary title that went with it. But she was the one who had invited Tilly Tay to town. Who had, as it now turned out, invited only trouble herself. Whether Tilly had brought it along, or it had followed her, danger was now among them all. People were admiring the display only because they weren’t aware yet that the artist was in jail.
Well, not exactly in jail yet. She was at the Lodge Hotel, sleeping so she’d feel better and could give a statement.
But did Tilly really intend to give a statement?
Or was another escape attempt in mind? She had to be worried about Buddy. Having seen her with the dog, Delta was convinced Buddy was Tilly’s darling, her baby. She would be horribly anxious about what happened to him. At the very least, someone had to go and tell her that Buddy was cared for.
And what about her van? If Tilly hadn’t brought it into town, it was left somewhere else, with all of her possessions inside. They had to find out where it was so they could look after it.
Acting quickly, Delta told Hazel she had an urgent errand to run and headed toward the Lodge. It was probably a bad idea. West would obviously not want them anywhere near Tilly. But maybe the deputy at the door would allow her to write a note for her?
Anything to make sure that Tilly wouldn’t wake up and panic about Buddy and her van. People under emotional strain did the oddest things, and, if Tilly attempted escape, West would be furious and Ray and his family involved, which would have a ripple effect across town.
I have to make sure that Tilly Tay stays put.
Chapter Six
When Delta parked her car at the Lodge Hotel, she noticed a man in a jacket with elbow patches walking around in the parking lot, writing down all the license plates. She ducked to avoid being seen as he came closer to her vehicle.
Sven LeDuc, on the hunt. She had been pleased earlier that day to see him in their shop for the display reveal and had even appreciated his enthusiasm for the result, but now she would rather crawl into a hole and hide. He probably knew about the arrest at the museum and, perhaps, even about Tilly’s transfer to the hotel. Why else would he be here?
A knock on her window made her straighten. LeDuc stood beside the car, peering in. Delta pasted a friendly smile on her face and opened the window. LeDuc studied her with a frown. “Did you drop something?”
“Yes, my car keys.” Delta kept smiling so hard her jaw hurt. “I popped over to have a chat with Rosalyn about some crafting events Hazel and I are organizing here at the Lodge. But, in my hurry to get inside on time for the appointment, I dropped my keys and they got under the mat.”
“I thought you’d have come over here to see your protégé Tilly Tay. She’s staying here, right? I heard she had a nervous breakdown and needs to see a psychiatrist. It’s the artist’s way, I suppose. Genius coming close to madness. Beethoven was virtually certified. Or was it Chopin? Anyway, van Gogh did cut off his own ear.” He nodded solemnly. “I want to write a background piece about mental strain and the arts, and I hoped for a short word with the person treating Tilly Tay.”
That explained his skulking in the parking lot. Delta almost sighed with relief until she realized it wouldn’t take long before he learned the true cause of Tilly’s breakdown and would be on the case. She got out of the car. “I have to rush. Good luck with your article.”
LeDuc looked suspicious as she passed him by, but he let her go without another word.
Inside the Lodge, at the reception desk, she found Rosalyn in deep conversation with the clerk. Rosalyn wore a burgundy pantsuit and had her hair swept back in a loose bun. The gemstones in her long earrings glittered in the light. She tapped at a paper on the desk with a meticulously manicured finger. Everything about her was so perfect that Delta cringed at the idea of letting a murder suspect anywhere near Rosalyn’s hotel. This is bound to lead to disaster.
As if Rosalyn sensed someone hovering, she turned round and spotted Delta. Her expression changed from animated to annoyed. “You’re the very person I want to talk to. My office, right now.”
She clicked ahead of Delta on her high heels and swung the door open.
Inside, sunshine poured in across her almost-empty desk, with a computer whirring and a sleek smartphone’s screen lighting up as another message came in. Rosalyn threw a casual glance at it as she settled into her leather chair and said, “I don’t appreciate you putting pressure on Ray to accommodate a police suspect at our hotel.”
“I didn’t put pressure on Ray. I heard about arrangements after the fact.”
Rosalyn waved a hand. “I’m sure Ray offered of his own accord, but he did so because he’s under the impression he has to step in and help out whenever one of you two falls into a puddle. However, I heard you made shopkeeper of the season. With so much support from other locals, you can no doubt take care of your own business. I’m entertaining some important families here this week, and I don’t want police around or the guests to know we’re housing a murder suspect.”
“Tilly Tay has nothing to do with that stabbed salesman,” Delta said, with more certainty than she herself felt. “She’s accused because she had an altercation with him, but that’s hardly enough to base any real accusation on. Sheriff West jumped to conclusions before. Remember Isabel?”
Rosalyn flushed at the reference to her sister’s arrest during a previous murder investigation.
Delta said sweetly, “We should wait until the sheriff has a chance to look into the case more.”
“Tilly Tay could have told him what she knows. Instead, she’s pretending to be in shock.”
“Pretending?” Delta echoed. That Rosalyn confirmed her own doubts about Tilly’s integrity made her knees go weak.
“Yes. She was taken to her room, and, five minutes after the deputy and the doctor who came with her had left, I smelled cigarette smoke coming from under the door. Guests are not allowed to smoke in their rooms, and I wanted to barge in and tell her so, but there was a policeman standing guard.” Rosalyn crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m telling you that nice-looking little lady is playing games with all of you. She’s not in shock. She knows more than she’s letting on. I want her out of my hotel before the newspapers start writing about it.”
“They won’t,” Delta protested, rather weakly, her mind flashing to Sven LeDuc already skulking in the parking lot. He claimed to be looking for Tilly’s psychiatrist, but who knew what he was really up to? How much he already knew, or was about to find out…
Rosalyn said, “Since Ray agreed to this arrangement with the police, and I don’t want to argue with West, I will tolerate it for one night. But one night only. In the morning, you figure out a way to get her unshocked and out of here, ready to make her statement or whatever. Or you take her into your own home. If you are so certain she’s innocent.”
Delta put up both hands, palms out. “I didn’t know Ray would suggest it or that it would be inconvenient to you and your important guests. I’ll make sure she leaves in the morning.”
Rosalyn nodded and picked up her phone. Delta took this as her cue to leave. “Oh,” she asked at the door. “What room is Tilly in?”
“319. But they won’t let you see her either.”
Delta went up to the third floor anyway and found the deputy seated on a chair in front of the door marked 319. He was leafing through an old copy of the Tundish Trader with a bored expression on his face. Delta greeted him cheerfully. “Good afternoon. Can I talk to Tilly Tay for a moment? Her dog went missing this morning, when the sheriff came to take her to the station, and I’d like to update her on how he is.”
“She’s sleeping.” The deputy turned the page and read on, obviously considering the discussion closed.
But she wasn’t about to let him dismiss her like that. “Buddy is very important to her,” she pleaded, “and knowing he’s safe can really put her mind at ease and help prepare her for giving her statement to the sheriff.”
The deputy considered this but still shook his head. “I was told not to let anyone in to see her. If those are my orders, I can’t make any exceptions.”
Understandable. But still… Delta’s mind raced to come up with a counterargument.
In the silence that reigned in the corridor, Delta could hear a sharp click. As if a door was closing somewhere nearby.
“Can I write her a note?” she asked. “We don’t want her worrying about her dog and getting upset again. That will only delay proceedings.”
The deputy seemed to understand that she wasn’t leaving and said with a sigh, “You can write her a note if you want to, but I’ll have to see what is in it before I pass it on.”
“Fine, no problem.” Delta opened her purse, pulled up her notebook and a pen, and wrote a short message to Tilly explaining that Mrs. Cassidy was caring for Buddy and that they had also arranged for a lawyer, free of charge, for Tilly.
Again, she heard that click, but now it was farther away. What could it be? The central heating maybe? Guests entering and leaving their rooms?
The deputy accepted the note, glanced over it and put it in his pocket. “I’ll give it to her later.” He stretched his shoulders and stared in the direction of the elevators as if he wished he could get away from this dull chore.
Suddenly, a rough scraping sound like wood across stone interrupted the quiet. The deputy listened a moment, but then sank back into his lethargy. The sound hadn’t come from Tilly’s room but from somewhere down the corridor.
Delta waved goodbye and ran to the staircase to get down quickly. She walked through the lobby and the dining room onto the terrace. There she looked up and tried to determine what room was 319. Her grandmother had stayed at the Lodge for a few days when she had just arrived in town, and Delta tried to work out the layout from memory.
As she scanned balconies, she spotted wiry gray curls peeping out over a balcony railing. Instinctively, Delta scooted backwards and hid herself behind a large pot with a ball-shaped box sprouting out. She crouched and took a deep breath before trying to peek at the balcony where she had seen the curls.
Now a head was visible, peering to see inside the adjoining hotel room. Delta blinked to clear her view. Tilly Tay. Not sedated in bed, but secretively spying outside of her own hotel room doors. But no, Delta started counting, calculating quickly. That couldn’t be the balcony of 319. It was more likely 323. What was Tilly doing on someone else’s balcony? And how did she get there?
The artist quickly tiptoed past the doors and opened the gate to get onto the next balcony. A click resounded, like the ones Delta had heard when talking to the deputy. Of course. The Lodge’s balconies were constructed so that, in case of a fire, the hotel guests could easily go from one balcony to the next to reach the fire escape on the side of the building. Tilly was opening the connecting gates one by one and hurrying across the balconies to reach the staircase leading down onto the terrace.
She’s trying to get away. I can’t let her do this.
Delta’s mouth went dry. She ran from pot to pot, keeping her eyes on the figure above, but Tilly was focused on reaching the fire escape without being seen from one of the rooms. She stopped at one point and peered in, waited, and then quickly ducked past, rushing across the next balcony in a mad dash.
A voice rang out from behind a half-opened door. It opened further, and a man looked out. He spotted Tilly and called out to her. “Hey, lady, what are you doing?”
Tilly was at the fire escape and started to climb down. The metal creaked under her steps. Delta crouched behind the last pot close to it, waiting for her to reach ground level. Then, as Tilly stopped to look round the corner of the hotel, Delta jumped at her and grabbed her shoulder.
Tilly yelped and swung round. As she spied Delta, she said, “Oh, it’s you. Let me go. I have to take care of Buddy and my van.”
The anxiety in her eyes seemed genuine enough.
“Buddy is still at the museum,” Delta rushed to say. “Mrs. Cassidy is taking care of him.” She thought it better not to mention the dog was hiding.
“He doesn’t understand what happened,” Tilly said with a catch in her voice. “Why I was taken away by this loud, angry man. I have to go calm him. And my van… Someone might come and steal all my models. My life’s work.”
“Where is the van? I’m sure the police will want a look at it, and, once they’ve taken it over to the station, it will be perfectly safe there.”
“Taken it to the station?” Tilly echoed with disbelief lining her voice. “What for?”
“They’ll want to search it, I suppose, for evidence or something. Unfortunately, you’re a suspect.”
“For no reason.” Tilly’s cheeks turned red. “I have nothing to do with some guy who died.”
Delta’s emotions bounced between sympathy for the woman and annoyance that she wasn’t being forthcoming about what she knew. Couldn’t Tilly see she was harming her own interests by being so reticent? If she really didn’t know anything, she could be upfront about it.
“He talked to you on Mattock Street. I myself saw that. He wasn’t trying to sell you insurance either. He mentioned too much being at stake.” She decided to bluff a little and see if that got any answers. “You knew him.”
Tilly’s eyes flickered a moment with panic and uncertainty, deliberating how best to respond. But, suddenly, she turned away from Delta. “I’m going to see to my dog and my van, and you can’t stop me.”
“Yes, I can.” Delta tightened her grip on her shoulder. “Friends of mine vouched for you.” Frustration with Tilly’s stubbornness clogged her throat. “Ray arranged for you to stay here to recover, against his sister’s wishes. He is just rebuilding his bond with Rosalyn, and I’m not letting you ruin it for him. Mrs. Cassidy also got you a lawyer, at her expense, and…”
“So I should be grateful? Because you all want to help Tilly Tay, the famous artist? I know what it’s like. People are only kind when they want something. They’re all selfish and intrusive. Maybe you also want a look inside my van to tell the newspapers how I live. But that is my business. Not yours, or anyone else’s.”
Delta blinked at Tilly’s tone, which was sharp and emotional. She had no idea what it was like to live in the public eye and feel scrutinized and judged all the time. Maybe Tilly felt she had to defend herself because she couldn’t believe people genuinely wanted to help her?
She must be incredibly lonely.
Delta said slowly and emphatically, “I don’t want to intrude into your life at all. I just want to clear up this mistaken suspicion that you had anything to do with the murder. We believe in your innocence. That’s why we’re helping you. But you’re making it hard, if not impossible, for us. You can’t walk away now. West will surely think you’re guilty.”
“I’ve never met such an incompetent man.” Tilly huffed.
“It wasn’t very smart to walk away when he wanted to talk to you.”
“I have nothing to say about it.”
She isn’t denying she walked away. “Tilly, please.” Delta released pressure a fraction to show she meant well, but not give the woman a chance to suddenly dash off. “We’re all on the same side. You may have had unpleasant experiences with people coming after you for a scoop or whatever, but we are a nice small-town community here. People genuinely care.”
“Really?” Tilly gave her a sad look. “Maybe they care for you and Hazel. They are worried your shop will be involved in this, and they want to ensure you aren’t hurt by the publicity that is surely to follow. But no one cares about me. I can be accused, maligned, dragged through the dirt in all the media, and everything I worked for will be ruined.” She burst into tears.
Delta put an arm around her narrow shoulders. “Tilly, please, believe me, we don’t want to harm you in any way. We want to help clear your name. Mrs. Cassidy got that lawyer for you so she can sort out what happened and get you released. We don’t believe for one moment you had anything to do with this murder. All you have to do is tell the police what you know and then…”
Tilly pulled herself away. She hung her head. “I’ll go back into my room. I’m sorry I was so silly.” She started to climb up the fire escape.
“Wait!” Delta called. “Where is your van parked? I’ll go find it for you and make sure that nothing happened to your models.”
Tilly hesitated, her hand around the fire escape railing so tightly the knuckles turned white. Then she said, “There’s an abandoned campground north of town. I parked the van there, behind the old groundskeeper’s cottage. But be careful; it’s a dilapidated lot.”
Delta watched as the artist walked back across the balconies and entered her own room. She took a deep breath. If it was so easy for Tilly to get away, she might try again as soon as Delta left. If she had lied about the location of the van, Delta would be going on a wild-goose chase while Tilly took off to where the van really was. She could leave town and cause a lot of embarrassment for everyone involved.
