“Thought you were stealing, did he?” the chief said.
“Oh, he knew what I was doing,” Endicott said. “Had himself a good laugh at my expense. I said a few unpleasant things in return, and left.”
“And you have no idea who might have killed him?”
Silence, but I assumed Endicott must have shaken his head, because I heard the chief sigh.
“That’s all for now, then,” he said. “I’ll be in touch if I think of more questions.”
“Oh, come now,” Endicott said, over the scraping sound the folding chair made as he stood up. “Don’t you mean when you think of more questions?”
It didn’t sound as if he waited for Sammy to show him out. The floor squeaked, the door opened and closed, and Chief Burke sighed again.
“Sad, isn’t it?” he said.
“Sir?” Sammy said.
“For a man to quit this earth in the prime of his life and leave behind nothing but enemies,” the chief mused. “That’s a sad, sad thing.”
“Well, sir,” Sammy said. “Maybe if he hadn’t made so all-fired many enemies while he was here on this earth, no one would have been in such a hurry to help him quit it.”
“An excellent point, Sammy,” the chief said. “And let that be a lesson to us all. So who else have we got out there?”
Sammy answered, but I didn’t catch what he said. Just as he was speaking, the dumbwaiter lurched, banged against the side of the shaft, and jerked up a foot.
Chapter 14
I reached out and grabbed the ropes to stop the dumbwaiter from moving any farther.
“What the dickens was that?” the chief exclaimed.
A good question.
I felt a series of jerks, and the dumbwaiter strained against my hold. Someone was trying to raise it. No, now they were trying to lower it.
“Probably those guys on the roof,” Sammy said.
“That came from the walls,” the chief said.
“You don’t suppose it’s rats?” Sammy asked.
“Give me a hand, Frankie,” piped a voice beneath me. “Pull on this.”
I took a tight grip as the dumbwaiter strained downward, presumably because Frankie had joined Eric’s attempt to retrieve it.
“Sounds too mechanical for rats,” the chief said. “Check that little door over there.”
Damn. With their first tug, Eric and Frankie had jerked the dumbwaiter up so it was squarely in front of the door. The second Sammy opened the door he and the chief would see me. I loosened my hold on the rope so the boys’ tugging would pull me down again, out of sight.
Unfortunately, they chose that moment to give up.
I heard Sammy walking toward the dumbwaiter door.
I was reaching out to grab the ropes and haul myself away when the dumbwaiter lurched and then sailed upward, as the boys reversed their tactics and pulled on the other rope. I banged my hand hard on the side of the shaft, and then my head against the ceiling when the dumbwaiter reached the top of its course.
“Okay, I know what we can do now,” the small voice from below piped.
Something that didn’t involve the dumbwaiter, I hoped. If only they’d start up their protection racket again. But at least I was out of sight when Sammy opened the panel and peered in.
“It’s a toy elevator,” he said, his voice echoing up the shaft.
“That’s a dumbwaiter, you ninny,” the chief said.
“What’s it for?” Sammy said.
“When the rich people who used to live here gave dinners, they’d haul the food up from the kitchen in that.”
“But the kitchen’s on this floor,” Sammy objected.
“Well, maybe it used to be in the basement in the old days. Or maybe they used it to haul wine up from the wine cellar. Shoot, maybe it was just for show. I can just see old Mrs. Sprocket—Edwina’s mother-in-law—making her poor cook run all the way down into the basement to put the food in the dumbwaiter. Mean as a snake, she was. Shut the damned thing and bring in Mrs. McCoy.”
Presumably he meant the disgruntled soon-to-be-ex-wife, Carol. I waited a few seconds for Sammy to shut the dumbwaiter door, and then began carefully lowering myself again.
Carol had taken her seat by the time I had returned to my listening post. I peered through the cracks in the dumbwaiter door and then nodded. Carol was the slim, elegant Gypsy I’d seen going into the barn. While I’d largely gotten over being jealous of slender women, in no small part thanks to finding Michael, who appreciated my more normal female shape, I had no trouble understanding why the plump Marie Antoinette and the stout older Gypsy disliked her. She looked rail-thin; remarkably self-possessed for someone who had just lost a husband (even an unwanted one); and altogether too chic to have anything to do with Gordon in the first place. I wondered how such an odd couple had ever gotten together.