I called Detective Carswell and left another of my famous messages for him. This time I asked for and received his fax number and faxed over a copy of my chat with GRrrrL. That would make him call back.
“Peter?” I said.
“What?”
“If tigress killed Abigail, that means that Daniel Mooney didn’t.”
“Unless they were in it together.”
“Either way, the murderer is still out there, and so is Audrey.” I began to pace nervously. “I wish that detective would call me back.”
“Juliet, there’s no reason to think that Audrey is in any danger. Tigress hasn’t done anything to her yet. Why would she start now?”
“I suppose. God, I wish Carswell would call me.”
I called the station house again, telling the woman who took my call that it was an emergency. Something about the tone of my voice must have convinced her how serious I was. She put me on hold. Within a couple of minutes I was talking to Detective Carswell.
I apprised the detective of my online conversation with GRrrrL and explained why I thought that Nina Tiger was the only person who could have had access to Daniel Mooney’s alias and password. Sounding somewhat dubious, he asked to explain how I’d tracked GRrrrL down. After a couple of frustrating minutes trying to explain Dejanews to a man who just barely understood the concept of E-mail, I asked him to please come over so I could show him what I was talking about. He agreed. He and his young sidekick showed up at our door half an hour later.
I led the police officers directly to my computer, and I logged on and showed them what I’d found.
The young cop looked at Carswell. “Maybe we should talk to Ms. Tiger,” he said.
“We’d planned on interviewing her anyway. She’s on the witness list,” Carswell said, nodding his head.
The younger officer borrowed my phone and called the station house. Eavesdropping, I heard him ask for a DMV address on Nina Tiger.
“Is that all you have?” he said into the receiver.
He covered the receiver with his hand and spoke to Carswell. “Last known address is in Santa Barbara.”
“She lives here, in Venice,” I interrupted. “Remember, I told you that I followed her?”
He turned back to the phone. “Check for a Venice address.” He waited a moment and then replied, “Okay, we’ll get it from the witness.”
“What’s going on?” Carswell asked.
“No Venice address listed.”
“Ms. Applebaum,” Carswell asked me, “do you remember the address of her apartment in Venice?”
“It was on Rose Street,” I said. “A fourplex.”
“The house number?” he asked.
I racked my brain. “I’m sorry. I don’t remember. It was in the middle of the block. Mediterranean. Kind of like all the others on that block.”
“Would you know it if you saw it?”
“I think so. And I’d definitely recognize her car.”
I drove with the detectives in their unmarked car, an anonymous blue, late-model American sedan, to Venice. Peter had been loath to let me go, but I had insisted. We drove onto the block, and I directed Carswell and the young detective to Nina Tiger’s apartment building. I pointed out the Mustang convertible parked at the curb.
“That’s her car,” I said.
“Now, you wait right here, Ms. Applebaum,” the young detective said.
“Don’t move,” Carswell reiterated.
I promised not to, and settled more comfortably in the backseat of the car, propping my feet up. I watched them head off up the path and imagined tigress’s face when she opened the door to them.
I hadn’t gotten very far in my fantasy when I noticed the door to the building open. With a flash of red hair and long legs, Nina Tiger strode down the path toward her car. They must have missed her!
For a moment I puzzled over what to do. I was under strict orders not to move. On the other hand, no way was I going to let her get away. She might have been on her way to Audrey’s house! I wrenched the car door open, leaned my head out, and shouted.
“YO! Tigress!”
She stopped dead in her tracks and looked around her, finally spotting me. Meanwhile, I was having problems getting myself out of the car. I gave a final heave and staggered out onto the sidewalk. She looked at me blankly for a minute, and then I could see a flash of recognition cross her face.
“My mailbox!” she said, and ran over to me, hands on her hips. “Who are you? Why are you calling me ‘tigress’? Are you on one of my lists? What’s your name?”
With the final question she reached me and, sticking a finger out, poked me in the chest. Hard.
“Hey! Watch it!” I said, batting away her hand.
“No! You watch it.” She pushed me. I staggered back and swayed, scrambling with my feet to keep from falling. At that moment I heard a voice shout, “Police, put your hands up!”
“What the hell?” tigress said, turning around and spotting the detectives running from the house. “Are you out of your goddamn minds?” she screeched. “This bitch is assaulting me!”
“I am not!” I said indignantly. “She pushed me!”
“She broke into my mailbox!”
“Well, yeah, but not today!”
By then the detectives had reached us. Carswell grabbed tigress by the arm and dragged her away from me. The young guy helped me steady myself.
“Are you okay, Ms. Applebaum?” he asked.
“You know her? What’s going on here? Is she a cop?” Nina yelled.
Carswell led her a few feet away and asked calmly, “Are you Nina Tiger?”
“Yeah. So what? Am I under arrest?”
“I have some questions for you, Miss Tiger. Shall we continue this inside?”
“No way you are coming into my apartment!” she said with a snarl.
“Shall we continue this at the station house?”
She shrugged off his hand, angrily. “Look, if this is about Abigail Hathaway, I had nothing to do with that. I was in Santa Barbara, at my mother’s house. Three of her bridge partners saw me there. You can call them all!”
Detective Carswell paused for a minute and then said, “We simply have a number of questions for you. Nothing serious. Why don’t we go upstairs and discuss it.”
“Fine.” She stormed up the path to her front door.
Carswell looked at the younger detective and said, “Take Ms. Applebaum home and then come get me. ASAP.” He followed tigress into the house.
THE detective dropped me off at home, and I walked in, shouting out, “I’m home!”
“How’d it go?” asked Peter.
“She has an alibi.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“She could have hired someone to kill Abigail,” I said, grasping at straws.
“I guess so. The police will figure it out,” Peter said.
“Yeah, I suppose they will. Is Ruby still asleep?”
“I guess so.”
“You guess so? It’s late. We’d better wake her up.”
I walked into Ruby’s room and gently shook her awake. She responded by squawking in outrage and promptly bursting into tears. I tried pulling out her Tickle-Me-Elmo. The screaming continued. I grabbed her Madeleine doll. No effect. Finally, desperate, I said, “Hey, Peanut, want to go visit the Barbie website?”
“No. I hate Barbie.”
“You do not, Ruby. You have twenty Barbies. You love Barbie. Let’s go visit the website. It’ll be fun, I promise.”
I plopped Ruby on the chair at my desk and logged on. I quickly found the Barbie website, and set Ruby up selecting the accessory set for her personalized “Friend of Barbie” doll.
I leaned against my desk, too tired to stand but too lazy to get another chair. Ruby looked so sweet, her curls tumbling into her eyes, her face screwed up with concentration. I wondered, for the thousandth time, how she was going to tolerate another baby in the house. This child was so used to being the center of attention, the queen of the castle. The birth of a prince was going to be quite a shock.
Ruby interrupted my reverie. “Mommy, the computer said ‘You’ve got mail.’”
“Oh, that means an E-mail came in. Want to help me get it?”
“Yeah!”
“Move the mouse over to the little mailbox symbol.”
She followed my instructions.
“Now click twice.”
She did.
It was a piece of junk E-mail—spam. I showed Ruby how to delete it and then helped her click back over to Barbie. And then, watching her dress Barbie in a fuchsia boa and purple pedal pushers, I figured it out. I figured out who GRrrrL was.