Where There's a Will

“Would that be ‘bruises’ in English?” Julie asked.

“Yes, bruises.”

“Fingermarks,” John said.

Gideon nodded. He poured a little coffee onto a napkin, wet his index finger, middle finger, and ring finger with it, and grasped the edge of the table, his thumb underneath, pinching hard. When he lifted his hand, there was a curving row of three spots on the glass, to all intents and purposes exactly like the bruises on Dagmar’s shoulder.

“Somebody grabbed her from behind—hard—maybe while she was sitting on the bench.” He gently placed his fingers on Julie’s shoulder to illustrate, his thumb in back.

She shivered. “And pushed her over the edge?”

“Looks like it.”

“So what’s the verdict?” Fukida asked, coming back with his cardboard cup of coffee; the four-dollar vente size.

“Murder,” John said. “You agree?”

“Sure, no question about it. Also—and this you probably can’t tell from the pictures—she was laying a good four feet from the base of the cliff. No way did she just fall off, or even jump. Somebody shoved her, good and hard.”

“Or threw her,” Julie said. “How hard would it have been? She’s nothing but skin and bones.”

“That’s true, too.”

“Fingerprints?” John asked.

“No.”

“Did you check the bench? The paint might have been soft from being out in the sun, there might—”

“Johnny, for Christ’s sake! Of course I checked the bench. We dusted everything. Give me a little credit, will you?”

“Sorry.”

“Anyway, whoever did it wore gloves.”

“How can you know that?” Julie asked.

“We picked up some glove-leather impressions. One on her watch, one, maybe two, on the bench.”

“Glove smears,” John said. “That’s not gonna do you much good.”

Fukida shrugged. “Yeah, well.”

“What about suspects?” Gideon asked, handing back the photos.

“Oh, yeah, suspects, we got suspects.” He sucked coffee through the opening in the lid, made a face, and twisted the lid off to get a healthy mouthful. Gideon could smell the sprinkling of chocolate on top. “The kid that found her, the waiter, he was there earlier, too, delivering pastries to her at about one—”

“One?” John interrupted. “Wait a minute, that means the noon end of the TOD range is wrong. It had to be after that.”

Fukida put a finger to his temple and looked archly at him. “Whoa, not too much gets by this guy.”

“Duh,” John said, not taking offense.

“And the kid told us she had company. Guess who.”

“Inge?” Gideon answered on the spur of the moment.

“Hedwig?” John offered. “Axel?”

“Right, right, and right. Also Felix the Cat, all the way from sunny Waikiki. The whole sorry bunch of them.”

“Felix?” John repeated. “Must have been important to bring him over. Do you know what it was about?”

“No. The kid says he didn’t hear anything, but they looked like they weren’t having any fun. He thought they were fighting about something and shut up when he came in. He said Dagmar looked really upset.”

“What do you think it was about?”

“What do you think it was about?”

“I think they were having a strategy session,” John said bluntly. “Figuring out where they go from here, coming up with whatever new cockamamie story they were going to befuddle you guys with.”

“That’s what I think, too.”

“And so those are your suspects?” Gideon asked. “The nieces and nephews?”

“Who else? Last people to see her alive . . . fighting about something... all kinds of nasty, threatening things popping on the old case... sure, they’re my prime suspects, you bet. Well, and the two spouses, too—Malani and what’s his name, Keoni. They’ve got a stake in this, too. My guess at this point is that one of them—who knows, maybe more than one of them—wanted to make absolutely sure she never told anyone what really happened.”

“Yes,” Julie said nodding, “I remember, the other day when we were all talking on Axel’s porch, she looked really depressed, really tired. She talked about being ready for it all to come out.”

“Well, there you go.” Fukida was impatiently twirling the cup lid on the table, leaving little rings of foam. He