Free Medieval Murders by Aaron Stander Page B

plastic bag holding the key Ray had brought in and inspected it closely again. “I guess the mystery you gotta solve is how that woman got the AC001. And, like I said, over the years a lot of those went out of here. And given the looks of that one, it’s seen a lot of miles.”

11

    Thursday morning Elkins sipped on a mug of coffee as Char Pascoe briefed him on a long list of items. Working toward her summary, she leafed through pages of a legal pad to check her notes.
    “Pennington is still at his place in northern Minnesota. This is according to the dean’s secretary in the music school. He had a heart attack in early August. They hope he will be back and well enough to play in the next couple of weeks. She told me that he has been emeritus for almost ten years, but he continues on as the carillonneur. She said he usually comes back to campus the week before the first home football game. I guess that won’t be true this year.”
    “They don’t have anyone else?”
    “I asked that question.”
    “And?”
    “It was just weird, like Pennington has always been here. No one expected that he wouldn’t show up. She said they were scrambling for a possible replacement.” Char paused briefly, “I did get his number, and I called him in Minnesota. I wanted to know if anyone else had a key to the carillon.”
    “And?”
    “Pennington said that in recent years he’s the only one that’s ever in the carillon other than the maintenance people. The public tours stopped years ago, something about the stairs and lighting, a question of safety and liability. He said that he used to give graduate students keys so they could practice, but he said these days few students want to learn how to play a carillon. Then he told me when he’s dead, they’ll just put some long haired kid up there with an electric guitar and big speakers.”
    “Did you tell him what happened?”
    “I had to. He wanted to know why the police were so interested in who had keys. I told him and could tell the news upset him.”
    “Well that’s understandable. What a violation of his space.” Ray paused for a long moment, then asked, “What else?”
    “I’ve got prints for Bensen, and they matched the ones on the key and the chair. I’ve also had a phone conversation with Dr. Gutiérrez.”
    “And,” said Elkins.
    “She wanted you to know about an interesting finding.”
    “Okay?”
    “Gutiérrez said she found partially dissolved calcium tablets in Bensen’s stomach.”
    “What?”
    “Calcium tablets, you know, women, osteoporosis. It looks like Bensen had her vitamins and minerals with her breakfast. So why would you bother if you were going to kill yourself?”
    “Who knows? We’re all such creatures of habit.” Elkins paused and sipped his coffee. “Or she hadn’t planned to kill herself.”
    “So what are you thinking, a capricious act? She decided to kill herself on a whim sometime after breakfast?”
    “If this was suicide, it wasn’t capricious. She had somehow acquired a key, thought about how she was going to do it. That wouldn’t have been her first trip in. But what if this was a murder?”
    “We don’t have any evidence.” She looked and asked with emphasis, “Do we?”
    “Well, no, but we always have to keep that possibility out there.”
    “For a reasonable time,” said Char. “But if there’s no evidence to the contrary, you’ve got to reach some kind of… Looking at your face I can tell you’re not comfortable.”
    “I just have this feeling, and I don’t have data to support it. Until we do, we keep saying it’s an apparent suicide. Anything else?”
    Pascoe flipped through the papers again, reading as she went. She looked up and said, “It seems to me there was one more thing, but I can’t remember it. Oh yes, Bensen’s car. It was parked in the main campus faculty parking ramp.”
    Elkins nodded to signal that he took in the information.
    “You have someone waiting to see you,” said Pascoe.