“Am I overreacting? Do you think Jaeger had an agenda from the beginning?” she asked. “I mean, other than just a fresh start? He really was a nice guy in the beginning—or at least he seemed like one.”
“I don’t think you’re overreacting,” I said. I ran my hand along the arm of Maggie’s chair. It didn’t look very comfortable but it was. “Aside from the fact that Peter Lundgren was his lawyer and Peter was from here, Mayville seems like an odd choice for a place to start over. And Jaeger changing his name, changing the way he looked, just because he’d been in prison, it seems a bit much.”
“Why did Peter go along with the whole charade?” she said, stretching both arms up over her head.
“Probably some kind of lawyer/client thing.”
Maggie nodded, but I realized most of her focus was on the piles of boxes in the room. “You know, there’s a lot of Jaeger’s stuff to be dealt with between the studio and here,” she said slowly.
“I wonder if he had any family,” I said.
She twisted her mouth to one side in thought. “Peter has lunch at Eric’s at least a couple of times a week.”
“He does.”
She made a show of looking at her watch—or where her watch would have been if she’d been wearing it. “If we left now, maybe we could catch Peter and see if he knows who Jaeger’s next of kin is.”
“Maybe we could,” I said, getting to my feet. “It’s not as though you want to vent on Peter a little.”
“Uh uh,” Maggie said.
I did the Mr. Spock eyebrow.
She flushed. “Well, maybe just a little.”
I stared at her without saying anything.
“Well, maybe a lot,” she said. “I just need to wash my hands again and we can go.”
“All right,” I said.
Maggie stopped in the doorway. “Wait a second. What are we going to do with Hercules? We can’t take a cat to Eric’s.”
It didn’t seem like a good idea to tell her I’d actually done that once.
“We could leave him here in your office,” I said. “He’s nosy, but he won’t damage anything. He’ll probably end up sleeping in your desk chair.”
“Fine with me,” Maggie said.
While she went to get cleaned up, I went out into the open area at the top of the staircase where we hung up our coats and changed our shoes for tai chi class, intending to call Hercules. He was sitting under the coat hooks next to a pile of boxes and he looked, well, smug. That look generally meant he’d found something. I’d given up trying to find a logical explanation for the cats’ skill at sleuthing. My best guess was that it was somehow connected to their other abilities.
I shot a quick glance back over my shoulder, and then I bent down and held out my hand. “Spit it out,” I said. “Maggie will be back in a minute.”
He spit out what looked like part of an old pen. I stuffed it in my pocket and wiped my hand on my pants. The cat walked over to the top of the stairs, glanced down and meowed.
I looked over the railing. There was a corpse of something gray and furry lying by the front door. “Very nice,” I said approvingly. I crouched down to scratch the top of his head. “It is dead, right?” I whispered.
His response was to start washing his face with unconcerned confidence.
Maggie appeared then. “Stay here for a minute,” I said to her, straightening up.
Her eyes went from me to the cat. “Why?” she asked, her voiced edged with suspicion.
“Hercules found…something.”
She took an involuntary step backward. “Something…alive?”
I glanced over the railing again and gave a slight shake of my head. “Not anymore.”
Hercules was still zealously washing his face. I was pretty sure I knew whose job cleaning up down by the door was going to be.
When I came back up the stairs again, Maggie was sitting on the bench, talking to Hercules who sat about three feet away from her. “You’re my hero,” I heard her say. He did his best aw-shucks head dip.
“Gone,” I said to Maggie. Then I bent down and picked up the cat who was still doing his modest shtick, looking at Maggie sideways through his whiskers. “You’re laying it on a little thick,” I whispered as I carried him into Maggie’s office.
I fished in my purse for the little bag of cat crackers I’d brought with me. Maggie found a small glass bowl and went to get some water. “We’ll be less than an hour,” I said in a low voice. “You better be in here when we get back.”
Hercules pretended to suddenly be very interested in the bottom of his right front paw. “I know you’re not actually going to stay in this room the entire time but don’t leave the building.”
He looked up, all green-eyed kitty innocence. Then he licked my chin.
“I’m not kidding,” I said sternly. “I have three words for you: Animal Control Officer.”
16
Maggie was in luck. Peter was sitting at a table by the end wall at Eric’s, just finishing his lunch. He was dressed as though he’d just come from court, or somewhere equally formal. The jacket of his dark gray suit hung over the back of his chair, and his sandy hair was pulled into a ponytail. He’d loosened his striped tie and rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt.
Claire showed us to a table and before we could sit down, Peter had gotten up and walked over to us. “Hello, Kathleen,” he said. He looked just a little uncomfortable to me, hands jammed in his pockets.
I smiled. “Hello, Peter,” I said.
He turned his attention to Maggie. “Hello, Maggie,” he said. “I heard about what happened to Jaeger Merrill. I’m sorry.”
Maggie stood perfectly still and straight and studied Peter for a long moment. “Why did you lie about who Jaeger was?” she said finally.
Just a hint of color flushed Peter’s cheeks. “He was my client.”
“Was it your idea for Jaeger—excuse me—Christian Ellis to start over here in Mayville Heights?”
Peter shook his head. “No.” He took a deep breath and let it out. “That case was my very first solo case. I’ve always wondered if I could have done better. Christian didn’t deserve the sentence he got. When he showed up here using a different name, looking for a new start, I didn’t see how it could hurt to let him have it. And it’s not as though anyone asked me if Jaeger Merrill was Christian Ellis.”
I thought about Ruby who had been so certain she’d recognized Jaeger from somewhere. What would have happened if she’d figured out who he really was when he was still alive?
“You’re splitting hairs, Peter,” Maggie said, her tone cool. “I vouched for Jaeger—excuse me—for Christian with Sam, so he could get studio space at River Arts”—she gestured to the counter—“and with Eric for a job, and with the other artists at the co-op, and it turns out I didn’t even know who I was speaking for.”
He slid a hand back over his hair. “I am sorry about that, Maggie,” he said. “Christian was punished more severely than anyone else in that scam.” He held up his hand. “I know he broke the law and I’m not excusing what he did, but he didn’t even realize what was going on in the beginning and when he did figure it out, he stayed in because he needed the money to take care of his sick mother.”
He shook his head and laughed. “I know it’s a cliché, but it’s the truth. Christian cooperated with the authorities when the whole scheme was exposed, he took responsibility and pled guilty, and then he ended up serving the most time because a judge threw out the plea deal.”
“He wouldn’t have had to serve any time at all if he hadn’t broken the law in the first place,” Maggie said.
Peter traced the edge of the table with a finger. “I know. But in the real world people make mistakes. And Christian didn’t kill anyone. He wasn’t selling drugs to kids. He faked paintings. I’m not saying it was a victimless crime, but…” He shrugged.
Mags took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I know that,” she said. “And I don’t want to fight with you.”