The Pastor’s Daughter: Episode XI

I found a bottle of vodka in the closet built against one of the walls of the lounge. In the kitchen, I found a glass,  poured myself a drink. I carried the drink out on to the balcony, where I sat down in one of the chairs. I stared at the magnificent view without seeing it, while I drank the vodka slowly. My mind was numbed with panic  because of my new assignment. I suddenly noticed that I was shaking.

My eyes began to register again as soon as I finished my drink. From where I sat, I looked down the road that led down  to Atlantic City Rail Terminal.  I also saw the Rolls that was taking Reverend Waters back to the Marriott hotel. It was moving fast through the road and I thought either the driver or the Reverend was in a hurry.

“This Graham Reed business is all yours, Harry,” he had said as I walked him to the car. “Keep me informed. I don’t care how much it costs. Don’t waste time calling or writing if you come across anything, okay? I will make sure my parish secretary knows where I am all the time.  So I will be waiting for your call. I want to get this Graham Reed business settled fast.”

Why won’t I be worried? He just handed me a razor and he is telling me to hurry up and cut my throat. He had also wanted me to examine the vacation house properly while I was up here. In addition, he also want me to double check the areas around the spot where Brittany felled, even though the cops have already combed the area.

“I am also giving you the authority to use her car for this investigation,” he had said. “Sell it and give the money to some charity when you are through with the investigation. Also, I don’t want her stuff in there. So you can sell them as well. I leave it all to you Harry. I will make arrangements to have her body taken down to Middle River. I really want you to find this guy, Harry.”

At which point he shook my hand.

“I’ll try,” I said.

“I want you to do more than try Harry,” he said, pushing his chin out at me. “Listen Harry: just find him. I’ll tell Shabray to hold the Trenton job open for you until you find him. I want you to put all your energy to this, understand?”

Which was just another way of telling me that I wouldn’t get the Trenton job if I didn’t find Graham Reed.

The vodka did me some good. I was able to shake off my panic and begin to think after my second drink. First, I still find it hard to believe that Brittany is gone. Was she really murdered? Or, did she commit suicide? I don’t believe either of these theories. I was sure her death had been accidental.

I hadn’t been her real lover – at least I knew that. But then, I had no way of proving it, assuming that news about my association with her breaks out. Reverend Waters has told me to find Graham Reed whom he believed was her lover. I am Graham Reed, and I wasn’t her lover. What this implies is that there was another man involved. What I do know was that I can give anything to save what was left of my future. And, it followed that the only way I can do this is to find this mysterious guy and prove he had been Brittany’s lover.

I lit a cigarette. While I was smoking the cigarette, I allowed my mind to work on this thing. I remembered the intruder I had spotted at the vacation house. Was he the man I had to look for? If he wasn’t, then who was the intruder? Certainly this intruder was not looking for Brittany’s box of jewels. Those jewels had been on her dressing table. In other words, if this intruder was looking for them, he couldn’t have failed to have seen it. So, what was he looking for, then?

I continued to think about this for a while but I wasn’t getting anywhere. So, I decided to shelve it for the moment and try another option that might yield the outcome I want. Brittany had been in Middle River for fourteen weeks. During that time, she met Mr. A, whoever he was,  who eventually became her lover. So, where did she met him?

It was then that I realized that I knew nothing about Brittany’s activities in Middle River during those weeks. Of course I had taken her out a few times. I had also been at her apartment. That was after we met at a party. That was it. Other than that, I had no clue how she had spent her time.

She had stayed at their house in Victory Villa – a hamlet in Middle River – after I picked her from BWI Airport. From what I observed during the brief moments I had been with her, she was living a luxurious lifestyle. That kind of lifestyle must have soaked up nearly all of her bi-weekly one hundred dollars allowance. She also liked to go to parties – and I did see her in one of them. So, do this mean that she had met Mr. A at one of these parties? The more I thought about it, the plainer it became that I should have to start this hunt for Mr A in Middle River. I also realized that I will need help to dig into Brittany’s past. As a journalist, I knew of a firm of reputable private investigators. So my first task would be to consult  them.

While all these was going through my mind, I got up and wandered into Brittany’s bedroom. I had only glanced into her room previously without paying much attention to it. But I decided that this might be the right time to examine it in detail.

I looked at the double bed in the room and grimaced. Brittany had really planned this vacation for both of us. Indeed, it is very obvious. The way I see it, her affair with A has petered out. But, because she desperately needed a new lover, she had selected me. But, was she really in love with me? It may also be that she was simply looking for a father for her unborn baby. Was that what she  wanted from me, then? The thought was unsettling. I decided I will not waste my time brooding on these questions at the moment. Only Brittany can answer those questions, and, she was dead.

Before I knew it, another idea dropped into my mind. I remembered what Phorbus had said about Brittany. Brittany will make a play at anything in trousers so long as he has your physique, believe me… Brittany’s mission in life is money, and this makes her a menace to men. Suppose she had grown tired of Mr A even though he had still been in love with her? Suppose Mr A had found out she was planning to spend time with me in this vacation house? If this was true, he might have come down to even the score. This will then make it sound logical that Mr A might have thrown her over the window.

I knew that Reverend Waters will love this theory. To him, Brittany was a thoroughly descent girl. The problem, however, is that I couldn’t lay this theory before him without implicating myself.

This idea continued to nag at the back of my mind. Trying to distract my mind, I spent the next one hour going through Brittany’s three suitcases. I knew that both Lieutenant Ludlum and Reverend Waters had been through them and had found nothing, but I didn’t care – I went through them anyway. Brittany’s clothes carried a faint smell of expensive perfume. That smell really made her memory very alive to me. So naturally, I felt more depressed by the time I had completed repacking the suitcases.

I looked at the whole vacation house, trying to find more information about Brittany’s death. I was particularly interested in figuring out  what she had done from the time the village woman left her arranging the flowers to the time she had died. I did not find out anything. So I decided I should better start getting ready to leave. So I took the suitcases downstairs and loaded them on the back seat of her convertible. Feeling more depressed and thirsty at the same time, I went back into the vacation house and gave myself another drink.

I once again told myself that my search must begin in Middle River. Here I had found nothing. As I was thinking about this a new idea again dropped into my mind. I stood thinking for a moment. Why not? I crossed to the telephone and called the Atlantic City police headquarters. When I got through, I asked for Lieutenant Reid.

“This is Harry”, I said. “I forgot to ask you if you have processed the film? I mean the film in Brittany Waters cine camera?”

“There was no film in the camera,” he replied.

“No film?,” I said, surprised. “Are you sure?”

“Sure – no film.”

I stared at the opposite wall in disbelief.

“It is strange that there was no film in her camera,” I said. “It means that she wasn’t using the camera when she died.”

“It is not as simple as that,” he said. “She could have forgotten to put a film in. That kind of thing happens all the time.”

I doubt it because I remembered seeing  the indicator on the camera. At that time it had shown that twelve feet film had been run off. I don’t know much about these cameras. But I do know that when you put a film in, there is a catch that opens the film gate through which you thread the film. So, as the gate opens the indicator is automatically set back to  zero.

“You may be right,” I said. “Did Lieutenant Ludlum think anything of it?”

“There’s nothing else to think about this case,” he snapped.

“I have one more question,” I said, ignoring his irritation. “There wasn’t anything taken from the vacation house, was there? I mean, besides her jewels?”

“Nope,” he said. “We didn’t take anything.”

“Well, thanks,” I said. “I am collecting Ms Waters things now. Can I drop by and have the camera?”

“Sure you can,” he replied. “We don’t need the camera anymore.”

“Okay, I’ll be there in a couple of minutes. So long, Lieutenant,” I said and hung up the phone.

The number showing in the footage indicator of the camera was twelve feet. This obviously meant there had been a film in the camera. There’s no doubt in my mind that this film had been removed by someone who wasn’t familiar in handling this type of camera. Whoever this person was used force to remove the film. And in the process of doing this the person ripped the length of the film out of the gate without releasing the gate lock. I am very sure that the film had been ruined by taking it out this way. It also meant that whoever had taken it out hadn’t wished to keep the film. So it followed that the main reason for removing the film was to destroy it.

Why would somebody do that?

I poured myself another drink. I began to think that I am making some progress. I was suddenly excited. This could be the clue Reverend Waters had said I would find. Having found this one, perhaps I may find another one? That was a tough question to answer.

Brittany wouldn’t have ripped the film out of her camera.  I am so sure that I can bet on that. Then, who did? Then the second clue dropped into my mind: I remembered Brittany showing me ten cartons of the cine film when I was at their house in Middle River. I also remembered I had teased her about buying so many. Her response  was that she will  use it to keep a record of her stay in Atlantic City.

And yet there wasn’t a single carton of film in her luggage or in the vacation house.

There wasn’t even a film in her camera either. Lieutenant Reid had said they had taken nothing from the vacation house. That meant that the police hadn’t taken the films. So, who did? I remembered I saw an intruder creeping around the vacation house. Had he found and taken them?  Was it him that ripped the film from the camera and then tossed it away? Was he the Mr. A, or was he working for him?

I needed to be absolutely sure that the films were missing. So I searched the whole vacation house again, looking for the cartons of films. Like I expected, I didn’t find them. By now I was satisfied that they are missing. I locked up the vacation house and dropped the keys into my pocket. Leaving Brittany’s Mercedes convertible where it was, I walked down the path at the back of the vacation house, trying to take a closer look of the other nearby vacation house  built in the hill face.

By now it was a few minutes past midday. The sun blazed down on me as I got closer to the inaccessible vacation house. I paused to look more closely at the house. I saw a black woman on the house’s terrace. She was lying on a lounging chair that is under the shadow of a table umbrella. She was wearing a white swimsuit and appeared to be reading a newspaper. The edge of the umbrella prevented me from seeing much of her. But one thing I noticed was that she definitely had a good body contour.

I started wondering who she might be. I however, changed my mind since I had too many things to think about. So I turned back and starting from that spot, I methodically started searching the path and the rough grass that leads towards Brittany’s vacation house. Again,  I knew the police had already done this but I thought it might pay dividends to do it. Who knows,  there might be something they overlooked. I didn’t know exactly what I was looking for but I kept at it anyway. I continued until I reached the place where Brittany had fallen – that is, at the back of the vacation house. I did found something that I did not consider important at the time. It was a half-smoked Cohiba – a type of Cuban cigar. Cohiba was an expensive cigar in those days because they were made in Cuba and smuggled into America.

I bent down and picked it up. I turned the butt over between my fingers as I stood in the hot sunlight. Suddenly I started having an unmistakable feeling that I was being watched. I was pretty scared! But, I told myself that I will never let whoever is watching me know how rattled I was at that moment. So, even though my heart had begun to thump, I continued to study the butt. Being here in this lonely and dangerous compound, knowing that someone was close by in hiding and watching me gave me an eerie feeling.

I slid the butt into my pocket and straightened. Moving away from the back of the house and going towards the front of the house, the feeling of being watched persisted. I looked around casually. I could only see the dense shrubs in the woods surrounding the house and the neighborhood. I knew then that anyone could be hiding there and watching me without a hope of my spotting them. I continued to the  front of the house, all the time feeling a pair of eyes boring into my back. I refused to look over my shoulder. I had to exert a lot of willpower to be able to do that. It wasn’t until I had got into Brittany’s Mercedes convertible and was driving fast towards the Atlantic City metro area  that I began to relax.

END OF EPISODE XI

P.S. Episode Twelve  will be published here next Monday.