Tucked inside the rear corner of the bedroom’s walk-in closet, the freestanding safe was open and empty. It was a waist-high, green-colored block, lined with three inches of high-grade solid steel, and contained an inner safe that was bare as well. As Benny the printman dusted the vault, Marge Dunn danced around shards of glass as she drew a layout of the bedroom and divided it into grids for evidence check.
The place had been tossed; furniture had been knocked over. Old-looking pieces: the skinny, austere stuff without curves or embellishments. Could have been replicas, but were probably antiques. Lots of embroidered pillows and doodads, doilies in garish colors, were mixed in with the mess. Lilah had a four-poster bed, the rumpled spread made out of chenille. Like the spread Granny used to have, Marge thought, white and full of little pompons. She smiled, remembering how she picked at them until the knots fell apart.
A couple of baby uniforms named Bellingham and Potter were hanging around, not really getting in the way but not doing anything productive either. There were already a few blues outside securing the scene so the young ’uns weren’t needed here. Marge called them over.
Nice-looking babies—tall and trim with well-scrubbed faces, eyes that seemed eager to work. Their enthusiasm made Marge feel old. Depressing, since she’d just turned thirty.
“Why don’t you two canvass the area?” she suggested. “See if anybody or anyone heard anything?”
Bellingham rubbed a spit-polished shoe against the floor. “Sergeant Decker told us to wait here. The nearest neighbor is the spa and he didn’t want us questioning anyone without him. But if you want us to go, Detective, we’ll go.”
Marge thought for a moment, fingering strands of blond hair. Pete was right. These kids weren’t savvy enough to handle the Vulcanites.
“I noticed a stable out back,” Marge said. “Why don’t you check that out? See if anyone’s hanging around, if anything looks suspicious. Count how many horses the stable holds.”
“Sure thing, Detective,” Potter said. “Should we report back to you or Sergeant Decker if we come up with anything?”
“Either one,” Marge said. “And don’t spend too much time on it. Just look around, jot down some notes, and report back. Then get on with your patrols. You two together?”
“Yes, ma’am … er, yes, Detective …” Bellingham blushed. “Sorry.”
Marge smiled, slapped him on the back. “Get your butts out there.”
After they left, she was glad to have some elbow room. The photographer had just finished, leaving Benny in the closet. The lab boys were checking the doors and windows in the front section of the house, and Pete and the maid were in the dining room.
“Detective?” Benny called out.
“Coming.” Marge squeezed her large frame inside the closet. Not an easy trick with Benny occupying most of the space. The man was big and blocky, just this side of fat. Today he was dressed in a starched white shirt and razor-pressed pants; not a spot of dust dared sully his clothes. Definitely the neatest lab man she’d ever worked with. “What’s up?”
“We got some beauties.” Benny’s voice was basso pro-fundo. “Unfortunately, they’re repeats. See right here … this is a right index, it shows up twice. Here we got a partial palm and two right thumbs on the dial. A middle over here. On the inner dials we have the same palm and index. You can see how small they are. Female. I’ll transfer them but I’m betting they belong to the lady of the house.”
“Anything else?”
“Not so far.”
Marge shrugged off the lack of progress. Most perps just didn’t leave calling cards, but almost all left evidence transfer. Even if she couldn’t find anything else, there was the semen. Marge could smell it as she approached the bed. She’d bag the sheets after she sifted through the mess on top of them.
She wandered into the master bathroom. Its walls were ceramic tiles of mint and hunter green in immaculate condition. The taps were old-style fixtures but the chrome was high-polished and scratch free. There was a beveled mirror on the back of the door. Open glass shelving served as the medicine cabinet. The racks held pottery crocks labeled in calligraphy—witch hazel, foxglove, mint, trefoil. No over-the-counter meds, not one prescription vial. The top shelf held a bowl of cinnamon-smelling pinecones and acorns. The bathroom window was clear glass, but obscured by a curtain of dangling crystal beads. They sent prismatic rainbows onto the walls.
Whoever messed up the bedroom hadn’t bothered with the bathroom.
Marge returned her attention to the bedroom. It was papered in something silky and cream-colored and dotted with a couple of dozen black-and-white photos of Lilah Brecht buddying up to celebrities. Or maybe it was the other way around. The stars looked thrilled to be in the snapshot. All the photos had been autographed.
To Lilah and Valley Canyon: With my fondest love, Georgina DeRafters.
To Lilah Brecht: the only woman who has seen me without makeup. Keep that cellulite off my thighs. Love, Ann Milo.
Georgina DeRafters and Ann Milo: old-timers who’d made strictly B movies. The As were probably hung on the spa’s walls. How did that make the Bs feel? Did they even notice? They were bound to; all actresses are narcissistic. What did Lilah tell them after they’d paid her hundreds a day and didn’t even see their pictures on the wall?
I keep my closest and dearest friends at home?
Marge shrugged. For every picture still on the wall, there were at least that many scattered about the room. The glass protecting the photographs had been deliberately smashed, as if someone had taken the pictures off the wall and smacked them with a hammer. One bull’s-eye in the center of each picture, broken seams radiating outward. The room twinkled with glass reflecting the bright midmorning light. The sunbeams coursed through two large windows—one on the eastern wall, one on the northern. Pete had found the bedroom windows locked: The lab men hadn’t found any pry marks on their sashes.
The nightstands flanking the bed had been pushed over, the table lamps crushed to dust. The impact of the lamps falling to the floor couldn’t have pulverized the ceramic bases to that extent. The table-to-floor distance was just not that great. Someone had smashed the suckers.
Someone had been pissed.
The dresser had been cleared of its contents, drawers pulled out and emptied, clothes tossed about carelessly.
Only Lilah’s bedroom had been trashed.
Maybe the perp was expecting to find something in the safe. When it wasn’t there, he’d searched the entire bedroom.
But then, why wasn’t the rest of the house tossed?
Maybe he found what he wanted.
Then he raped her.
Marge carefully fingered the broken glass on the bed with her gloved hand. She’d have Benny bag the pieces. Could be someone cut himself, leaving traces of blood. The lab man came out of the closet.
“I’m done inside, Detective. You want to search it for evidence, go ahead. I’ll start dusting the walls.”
“Find anything other than those female prints?”
Benny shook his head.
“Detective?”
Marge turned around. Officer Bellingham had returned, a very grave look on his face.
“We finished our interview with the stable hand. I think you’d better check him out personally.”
“Stable hand?”
“Yes, ma … Detective. He claims he lives there. There is a small hot plate inside one of the stables, some cooking utensils and work clothes. And there’s a chemical toilet just outside the barn. He could be telling the truth. But I don’t think the man has