Fear of Frying

“No guilty starts, gritted teeth, or furtive looks?'

“None of the above,' Jane said with a smile. 'She could be a fantastic actress, I guess. I'd swear that she was utterly sincere about how content she is with her life, though. She positively glowed when she talked about how much she loves this place, her quilting, her computer friends, her family. There's no room in the woman's life for a murderous grudge.'

“So what about Benson?' Shelley said. 'I wouldn't have thought he had a spare second to waste killing someone. I wish the sheriff had believed us and questioned everyone about their movements and alibis the night we found Sam dead. He was very likely with his family or staff the whole time after we left. There was a lot of cleaning up and putting away to be done.'

“That's a good point, Shelley. Now Taylor believes us, but everybody, including the murderer, can quite logically claim to not remember details of that evening. So much has happened since.'

“Tell me again about the patent business with Benson,' Shelley said.

Jane repeated what Allison had told her about Benson inventing a mechanical gadget in his free time.

“So it wasn't part of his job for the Claypools?' Shelley asked.

“She said he got the idea from something at work and invented it in his spare time,' Jane said. 'I don't know what the gadget was. I'm not sure Allison knows. Why do you ask?'

“Only because patents on inventions sometimes become a lot more valuable with time. Suppose Sam had decided that he had some right to the profits because Benson worked for him when he invented it.'

“What I know about the law would barely fill a thimble, but I'd guess it's too late. Benson sold the patent some time ago, and wouldn't Sam have to go after the patent office, or the people who purchased it, rather than Benson?'

“Maybe. The problem with this theory is that Sam and Benson hardly acted like they even remembered each other. I can imagine Sam concealing his feelings, but Benson? Not a chance. He looked like he was going to explode or have a stroke when Lucky Smith turned up here.'

“Lucky Smith!' Jane exclaimed. 'I'd forgotten about him. Now, he's somebody I can imagine getting tanked up and committing a senseless murder. And remember my telling you about him bashing into me outside and blathering about how somebody was blaming him for something he didn't do?'

“But nobody would have been blaming him then for Sam's death. Nobody believed us then that he was dead.'

“No, Shelley, somebody could have been accusing him. Even if nobody believed us, Sam was dead by then. The murderer knew Sam was dead. And so did Henry McCoy — who might be one and the same.'

“If you believe Henry's story via Marge, the murderer might not have known he succeeded in _killing Sam,' Shelley said. 'He — let's say Lucky Smith — might have had only a dim memory of smacking somebody with something. I don't say Luckycouldn't have done exactly that, but I'm more inclined to think it was somebody blaming him for the silly stunts. The missing keys and such. For which he probably was responsible.'

“It does seem his speed,' Jane admitted. 'We're not getting anywhere. Somebody killed Sam Claypool, and we're no closer to figuring out who he was.'

“He or she,' Shelley corrected.

“What 'she'? Who did we leave out?”

Shelley nodded toward the doorway to the lobby. Edna Titus was standing there, hands on hips, looking around the room.

“You two haven't seen Sheriff Taylor, have you? I need to find him.'

“Why?' Jane asked bluntly.

“To confess,' Edna replied with equal candor.

Twenty

'Confess!' Jane exclaimed.

“You killed Sam Claypool?' Shelley asked.

Edna looked at them as if they'd lost their minds. 'Kill Sam Claypool? Me? Of course not. Why would I do that? I didn't even know the man, and I'm not a killer.'

“But what are you confessing to, then?' Jane asked.

“A number of very silly, embarrassing things,' Edna said, sitting down at the table with them. 'I've made a fool of myself.'

“How is that?' Shelley asked.

“My daughter-in-law is much sicker than she'd have anyone know. I do, by the way, trust that you'll keep that to yourselves. She has a serious heart condition, and I'm determined to keep her alive as long as I can. She must live near a good medical facility.'

“Isn't that really up to her and her husband?' Shelley said.

“Yes, it should be. But they're so — so good, so naive. So blind to the hard facts.'

“They're also very happy here,' Jane pointed out.

“Allison isn't going to be happy when she's dead, and neither is Benson,' Edna said harshly. 'And she will be dead if she has a serious heart attack here in the woods.'

“So you tried to sabotage our visit,' Jane said, sensing that the moral position Edna had taken was probably wrong and certainly unalterable.