Stranger on the Shore - lanyon Josh (лучшие книги читать онлайн бесплатно TXT) 📗

“What’s the matter with you?” Mrs. Truscott’s voice was sharp, jerking him back to the present.

Griff opened his eyes. “Nothing.” He said again, more firmly, “Nothing’s wrong.”

But just for a moment it had reminded him so strongly of his own...it had been so easy to picture...it seemed so real.

What had seemed real? What did that even mean? He wasn’t sure. The feeling was fading as suddenly as it had swept over him. He was starting to identify too much with Brian. Empathy was one thing. He wouldn’t be able to do his job if he lost his ability to preserve a neutral distance.

Mrs. Truscott was staring at him, her expression one of surprise and wariness.

Griff managed, “I guess it’s just easy to imagine...”

She made an impatient sound. “Imagination is what gets people into trouble.”

Too much imagination, he could hear his mother’s voice as clearly as if she was standing there with them. He retorted, “Imagination is also what allowed men to walk on the moon.”

“That’s what I mean,” Mrs. Truscott said. She was still watching him like there was something wrong with him, as though she could see right inside his head.

He made an effort to get back to business. “Was the household staff a lot bigger in the old days?”

“Yes. Of course.”

She was always going to be a hostile witness. In fact, the only reason why she didn’t walk away now was because Jarrett had ordered everyone, family and servants alike, to cooperate with him. That, and having brought Griff up here, he was in a sense her responsibility.

“How many people on staff now were working for the Arlingtons back when Brian was taken?”

“Me and Newland. I’ve got a couple of girls who come in every day but they weren’t here back then. Cook—Molly Keane that is—has been working for the family about two years.”

Griff gave the giraffe’s hindquarters an absent pat and walked over to the toy shelf. He could feel Mrs. Truscott’s gaze like a physical weight. Was there a Mr. Truscott? Was Mrs. Truscott a completely different person behind closed doors? You could never tell about people.

He glanced at her. “What do you remember about that night?”

She raised her chin as though he had challenged her. “Almost nothing. It’s the next day I remember. The police and the reporters and everything that followed.”

“Did the Arlingtons have a nanny? I’ve never been able to tell from the news reports.”

“No. Mrs. Arlington took care of Brian herself. She didn’t believe in handing her son off to another woman’s care. She said those exact words many times. She wanted Brian to have what she called a normal upbringing.”

“Did Chloe have a nanny? Michaela couldn’t have been more than a kid herself.” Not to mention the fact that nothing he had seen or heard of Michaela so far led him to think she was the maternal kind.

Mrs. Truscott hesitated. “No.” She pressed her lips together as though to keep from saying more.

“Was Michaela a good mother?”

“It’s not for me to judge.”

“Was Gemma a good mother?”

“Yes.” Mrs. Truscott said at once. She seemed to struggle inwardly before saying, “Miss Michaela was young. It was natural for Mrs. Arlington to take care of both children. She loved children.”

There were a number of possibilities here, but Griff focused on what he believed was the key question. “The night of the party. If there was no nanny, does that mean no one checked on Brian after he was put down for the night?”

It wasn’t a criticism, but the housekeeper said defensively, “Mrs. Arlington checked on both children after midnight. That was when we learned Brian was missing.”

In actuality, at least according to what Griff had read, Gemma hadn’t checked on Brian until one forty-five in the morning. That still wasn’t a criticism; he could see no reason why she should have been hovering over her child’s bed. Though he had no doubt she’d been eaten alive with guilt because of her failure to do so.

Mrs. Truscott seemed to follow his thoughts because she pointed to the dresser next to the crib. “The baby monitor was right there. Mrs. Cameron—she was housekeeper back then—could hear if either of them cried. She had me look in on them early in the evening. They were sleeping.”

“Early in the evening when?”

“Ten o’clock or so.”

“Is it true the former butler, Mr. Tuppalo, hired Odell Johnson?”

“Yes.”

“His daughter still lives locally, doesn’t she? Tuppalo’s daughter, I mean. May Chung?”

“Yes.”

“And her husband’s name is Bill?”

Mrs. Truscott frowned. “Charles.”

“Charles, right. What did you think of Johnson?”

“I didn’t see much of him. Johnson lived over the garage. He had his meals there.”

“Were you surprised when he was arrested?”

Mrs. Truscott hesitated. “Yes.”

“Why?”

She seemed to weigh and then discard a couple of replies before saying reluctantly, “He didn’t seem like the type.”

No one ever did. That was something Griff had noticed working the crime beat. No matter how surly, unsocial, even openly hostile someone was, when they did finally snap it still usually came as a surprise to everyone else.

“Did you ever think that maybe the police got the wrong man?”

Her throat moved. “The money was under the tool shed in the place where he was living. He admitted to writing the ransom note.”

Griff asked carefully, “This is completely theoretical. If Johnson wasn’t involved, did you ever have a suspicion—”

“Of course not! What a thing to ask!” She sounded almost frightened.

No, she was frightened, he realized. And that meant two things. She did suspect someone else of being involved in Brian’s kidnapping. And the person she suspected was a member of the family.

Chapter Ten

“I wanted to write a book,” Benjamin Copper said. “But not only did the Arlingtons not authorize it, their lawyer threatened to slap me with three different lawsuits.”

He was laughing, so maybe it wasn’t too much of a sore spot. Copper, who had covered the kidnapping for the Oyster Bay Runner, was in his mid-fifties. A roly-poly man with silver hair cut in an early Beatles style. He wore a white collarless shirt and bell bottom jeans. He’d arrived for their lunch meeting in a beat-up Volkswagen. Even their meeting place, Copper’s suggestion, was a funky diner straight out of the sixties. The place was called Coffee Shop and it was located in a strip mall in Plainview.

“Was that Pierce Mather?” Griff asked, reaching for his grilled cheese sandwich. One thing about the Coffee Shop, maybe they didn’t do French dip, but they knew how to make a mean grilled cheese. And the fries were great too.

“Thomas Mather, his old man. The guy was a polar bear. Although the son isn’t much better, as I’m sure you’ve had opportunity to find out. Anyway, ask me whatever you want. Just spell my name right. Twice the AP credited Benjamin Cooper.”

“You covered the story from the very beginning, right?”

“Yep. I was listening to the police scanner that night. I do that the nights I can’t sleep. I showed up at Winden House with the police. Which is how I managed to get inside before anyone realized who I was.” He winked at Griff and speared a chunk of chicken in his chopped salad.

“I’ve read all your articles. Would you just walk me through everything you remember from that night?”

“Sure.” Copper put his fork down and sat back in the booth. “We got there about two-thirty in the morning. Believe it or not, the party was only just winding up. Nobody but the family knew the kid was missing. There were all these would-be flappers and swells in straw boaters staggering out of the sunken garden to find the place crawling with cops. It was pretty much the worst-possible-case scenario for finding Brian. No one could pinpoint when he’d disappeared, and the place was wall-to-wall strangers. There were over a hundred invited guests and half as many non-invited guests, and most of them in fancy costumes.”