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Saturday, December 21st
Detective Barnes was back at the Garibaldi residence when they arrived, along with a crime scene crew. The laboratory was blocked off with yellow tape.
Charlotte was surprised by the range of forensic activity still going on. “I didn’t know there were this many people available for anything other than a plane crash or something.”
Barnes grunted, and then sighed, steam coming from his mouth and nose in the cold. “There’s usually not, but there’s the potential here of drugs, espionage, conspiracy, and possibly even gang involvement. Want to collect every piece of evidence we can, and quickly. Snow melts, plants die, trouble comes back.” He stepped away to talk privately to an investigator for a moment, then came back to address Alexa.
“The house appears to have not been disturbed during the incident yesterday, and by the time your mother is discharged this afternoon, we’ll be out of there. We ask that you avoid making any big changes in it for a while, in case we need to take another look. The laboratory, however, will remain sealed over the weekend, as that is where the crime occurred and it’s a complicated setup.” He gestured for Alexa to walk with him up to the house, where they met with the CSI team working there.
Charlotte was distracted, however, by a handsome, familiar-looking man who came out of the laboratory. His head was slightly down and he walked slowly, hands in the pockets of his parka. His beautiful golden-brown skin was so different in the snow-covered yard where the other faces were white, red, olive, and black. He looked up as he approached her, and she realized that this was the first time she was seeing heart-breaking loss in anyone’s face since discovering Dr. Garibaldi’s body.
He stopped, and two or three seconds passed before he seemed to recognize her. “Charlotte?”
She opened her arms at the same time he did and could feel him trying to choke a sob as they hugged.
“Hi, Gani.” She couldn’t say much more, because it had been such a long time since she last saw him and didn’t know what the present circumstances were, other than that Alonzo and Gani were department colleagues at Corton University.
His hands remained on her upper arms as he looked at her with pleased confusion. “It’s been years! But why are you here? Are you with the police?”
She shook her head. “I’m a friend of Alexa’s. Just giving her a ride here, and then—.”
He nodded in understanding. “And then—, yes. I can’t believe what happened—Alonzo—all our work—.” He turned to look at the barn as if it were a train wreck.
“You worked with Dr. Garibaldi?” she asked. “Here?”
He nodded, without speaking.
Charlotte heard Barnes approaching. She saw he was alone, and he looked from one to the other of them.
“I take it you two know each other?”
Gani nodded as he placed a hand on Charlotte’s shoulder. “We started teaching at Corton around the same time. What’s it been?” he asked, turning to Charlotte, “Seventeen, eighteen years now?”
“Yeah, that long ago already!” Charlotte smiled, remembering the old crowd, some of whom were still at Corton, but most had moved on within a few years. To her eyes, Gani—short for Isagani—Serapio didn’t look a day older than he did back then, and even still had his Filipino accent.
“Good.” Barnes had his hands in his coat pockets. He squinted from the bright snow and sunshine, which made him look as if he had Gani under a microscope. “I assume you’ve given a full report of the damage and the stolen items?” Gani nodded, and he went on. “What about the computers? Any tampering or data missing?”
“Not at first glance. If your CSI team doesn’t find anyone’s fingerprints other than mine or Alonzo’s, then it is highly unlikely. I believe someone thought the Texas buckeyes were cannabis, and Alonzo—” he paused a moment to find the words, a fond, wistful smile emerging through the sadness. “Alonzo could be a bit of a cowboy when he was pissed off. Probably thought he could take on whoever it was, only they had a gun and he didn’t.”
“Texas buckeyes, you said?” asked Barnes. “Aren’t those trees?”
Gani nodded. “Basically, yes. Their fruit contains biochemicals called saponins, which are commonly used as foaming agents in products like shampoo, soap, and cleansers. Saponins are also being researched for use in treatments for cystic fibrosis and cancer. A lot of plants have saponins, but certain kinds are better than others, depending on what you want to achieve. Alonzo was contracted with a pharmaceutical company to develop a buckeye hybrid that would grow well in a controlled, greenhouse environment, and produce fruit with a consistently high percentage of desirable saponins for their research laboratories.”
“And those were the plants that were stolen?” asked Charlotte. “The ones that looked like marijuana?”
“Yes. We bred them to remain the size of a large shrub, and in the course of things, the leaves narrowed, resulting in its resemblance to cannabis.”
Barnes began walking toward the lab; Gani and Charlotte followed. She asked, “Any chance of this being corporate shenanigans? Stealing prize plants, and such?”
Gani shrugged. “In my opinion, no, because the real money is in the drugs that a company develops. We’re at the early part of that process, hybridizing the plants from which they would get the chemical they need, the saponins, to create the drug—and that’s only if the chemical works better than anything else they’ve tried. So we’re a long way from a valuable proprietary drug.”
They were at the door of the lab, and Barnes said he couldn’t authorize her to enter a crime scene that was still being processed, but she could join Alexa at the house. Gani seemed to steel himself before going back in. “Have you lost all your work, then?” she asked.
He took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh. “No. The computer files and data appear to be intact. We also have a seed bank, and it hasn’t been tampered with. I’ll be able to carry on Alonzo’s work.”
The glare of the sun off the snow just added to the surreality of suddenly having another crime in her life, and of having not one, but two people from her former life in Elm Grove involved. She was warm enough in her wool coat and boots as she walked up to the house, but she shivered anyway.
It was no surprise that Gani would be working with Dr. Garibaldi, as they were both biologists, but he would long since be overqualified for a lab assistant. Perhaps he was a partner in the research, or even in the company? She supposed by now he was an American citizen, and perhaps fully out of the closet, as well; Corton was a don’t ask/don’t tell campus years ago.
Gani and Dr. Garibaldi seemed like an odd pairing to Charlotte. She didn’t know Alonzo well—and had never wanted to, finding herself nervous around an older alpha male who was brilliant (and knew it), sensually handsome (and knew it), and assertive (some would say aggressive). Gani, on the other hand, wasn’t abrasive in the least. His manners were impeccable, as was his work ethic. He was a devout Roman Catholic, while Alonzo was an outspoken atheist. But, thought Charlotte, perhaps that has changed. Perhaps ambition had seized Gani, or perhaps Alonzo had mellowed with age. She wondered if Gani still sent money home to his mother and sisters, or if he had brought them over to America.
The steps up to the porch were cleared of snow, and the front door was standing open, with the cold barely kept out by a full-length glass storm door. Charlotte had been to the Garibaldi home two or three times before, but not since Alexa’s graduation party. She stomped the snow off her boots and entered the foyer, where there was a beautiful staircase, and next to it a massive carved hall tree. Charlotte remembered seeing this antique for the first time, and hanging her jacket on the upper-right hook, only to discover it was loose and twisted downward when anything was hung on it, sending her jacket to the floor. Janice Garibaldi had laughed and said it was a newcomer’s rite of passage. Back then, Charlotte remembered, the house smelled of spices and curries, incense and eucalyptus. Today, the scent was more subdued, of recently baking bread, damp leather from boots in a tray on the floor, and long-ago cigarettes.
The foyer had two doorways. She didn’t recall the smaller doorway on the right, which turned out to lead into what was clearly a studio. It was cluttered with papers and paints, and two large tables arranged in an L on which there were collages in progress. She recognized the style of the work as Janice Garibaldi’s—charming, but a bit sentimental for her tastes.
The wide archway to the left opened into a long living room flooded with sunlight from the many tall windows along its length.
The decor hadn’t changed since Charlotte last saw it, a style that was fresh about twenty years ago but which still suited the room. The fireplace mantle and all the woodwork were painted white, and the walls light yellow, which intensified the effect of the sunlight. There were chintz slipcovers on the two matching love seats flanking the fireplace. Several white-painted bookcases ran across the room under the windowsills; on top of them was a collection of carved folk-art birds of various kinds and sizes, creating an aviary of silhouettes against the light. It had, Charlotte thought, little evidence of a masculine presence or personality.
Charlotte found Alexa in the kitchen, looking through drawers and countertop clutter for the keys to her mother’s car. It was a pleasant, if somewhat outdated kitchen, with mismatched appliances, pretty wallpaper featuring botanical renderings of various herbs, and a large window over the sink. As in the past, there were still glass shelves between the two wall cabinets on either side of the window, where Janice grew herbs and started roots in small glasses of water. Charlotte walked over to the window to see if the huge kitchen garden was still out there, but it was invisible in the deep snow. Or perhaps Janice was now too old to care for one.
She turned toward Alexa, who was leaning against the counter with her arms folded close to her chest, staring at nothing on the floor. “No luck?”
Alexa shook her head.
The kitchen table was partially covered with yesterday’s newspaper, coffee cups, and what looked like crumbs of spice cake on small plates. Charlotte lifted the newspapers, and found the car keys.
Alexa was happy to see them, but puzzled. “She was so careful about the keys, because she used to lose them all the time and my father would get so angry with her for not having them at hand on the hooks by the back door. Always made putting them back where they belonged a top priority.” The circles under her eyes had darkened, and her shoulders sagged.
“Alexa, are you okay? Do you need to see a doctor, yourself?
Alexa shook her head and took a deep breath. “No, I can manage. Probably should have taken you up on having breakfast before coming out here, but I’ll grab something in the hospital cafeteria. Glass of water should help.” She turned and rummaged in the cabinet for a glass, and filled it up from the tap.
Alexa still had to collect a change of clothes for her mother. Charlotte took the keys and went out to start up the Garibaldi’s SUV. She was cleaning the snow off the windshield when Barnes and Gani came out of the laboratory as Alexa left the house and approached the car. She watched as Gani expressed his condolences for Alexa’s loss, and Alexa just nodded, looking at him with a wary expression.
Barnes approached Charlotte. “Good of you to help your friend, Charlotte. Did you get another flight booked?”
“No—I haven’t had time, Detective. Now that Alexa is able to drive herself around, I’m going to have breakfast, and then sit back and see what my options are.” She shrugged in resignation. “Bad luck, all this happening just when I finally get a chance to see my daughter.”
Barnes looked at her as if he were sizing her up. “You know what I think about coincidences.”
Charlotte was confused. “You don’t trust them?”
He chuckled, and turned to leave, then turned back. “I haven’t had breakfast yet, either.”
Betty Sue’s Diner might have been in a strip mall on the highway, but it did a valiant job imitating a classic mid-20th century eatery, from the red and white checkerboard floor to the big slices of homemade pie in the display case. The waitress, whose name tag said “Judee,” topped up the coffee in Charlotte’s mug, but left the other mug on the table unfilled. Barnes was five minutes late, but Charlotte had been ten minutes early.
His remark about coincidences was characteristic of the man: he didn’t like them. In her own case, Barnes would wonder if Charlotte’s missing her flight to Aspen due to being caught up in the Garibaldi murder meant that somewhere along the line she didn’t really want to go to Aspen, even after laying out the money for the costly ticket. It wasn’t that she had any foresight that a murder would be discovered so much as that she left the door open for things to go wrong by getting involved in Alexa’s problems at the last minute.
And did they ever.
Barnes’ black unmarked sedan pulled into the lot and he got out of the car in his usual manner, hoisting up his trousers a bit and straightening his tie, slightly revealing his shoulder holster. He looked almost as tired as she felt, but he probably had better reason to do so than she did.
He nodded hello with a smile at Judee, who seemed to know him from way back, asking after his wife and kids and his wife’s sister. She took their breakfast order and left the pot of coffee on the table for them. He set his phone down, then helped himself to coffee, adding plenty of sugar and cream.
“Thanks for meeting me here. I know you like The Coffee Grove, but this is on the highway, so if I get called out, I can be on my way faster.”
“No problem. Suits me fine.”
“Thought you might want to know about Dr. Garibaldi’s death. He was shot with a twenty-two rifle at very close range, between noon and three pm, shortly before you found him.”
Charlotte shivered at the thought of it happening a mere hour before she and Alexa got there. “I don’t know much about guns, I’m afraid. What does it indicate or suggest?”
“A twenty-two caliber LR bullet is the most common. It’s inexpensive, and fits both handguns and rifles. The close range suggests he was present during the robbery, possibly held at gunpoint. There were no signs of an altercation. Either he was shot because he recognized someone committing the crime, or, given my understanding of the man’s personality, he might have angered whoever held the gun. There is no evidence that any other shot was fired. Given the small amount of blood around his body, he was likely moved from where he was shot. He was either moved very quickly after he died, or he actually died there in his office, in that position.”
“So Hewey Sawyer didn’t witness anything, not even the robbery?”
Barnes sighed. “He claims he didn’t. We asked him where he was with Mrs. Garibaldi—you recall how they came out from behind one of the outbuildings, and he says he found her wandering around in the woods, looking for him.”
“What did she say she was doing?”
“She says she was looking for Hewey.”
“What was he doing in the woods?”
“Looking for a dog that has been hanging around the place, that Mrs. Garibaldi was hoping to rescue. He found it, but the dog had died. I checked. There was a dead dog out there. It’s being analyzed to see if it supports his story, that it hadn’t been dead for a week or something, but hard to say with this cold weather.”
“So that was why she looked so upset coming up with him? The dog was dead?” When Barnes affirmed this, she asked, “So she didn’t yet know Alonzo was dead, nor did Hewey?”
“That’s what they say.”
“Then why in the world would Hewey accuse Alexa of killing her father?”
“By that point, the way I see it, he knew what was going on, that Garibaldi was dead, the circumstances were suspicious, and everyone was being questioned as if they were suspects. He’s not quite as dumb as he looks.”
“Alexa told me that he’s devoted to her mother, and maybe in his mind she’s the enemy, because of her estrangement from her parents for the past several years. She never cared for Hewey, even as a child.”
Judee brought over their breakfasts then: a full plate with eggs, bacon, hash browns, and toast for Charlotte, and, to her surprise, a veggie omelet and bran muffin for the detective.
“Just give it a few years,” he grumbled when he caught her expression, “and you’ll be ordering the Senior Health special, too.”
“You’re not that old!” she exclaimed, truly believing that.
Barnes smiled at her gratefully, as if she had told him he was the most handsome man she’d ever laid eyes on. “You’ve just made my day.”
They ate for a bit, and Charlotte thought more about the crime scene.
“But surely someone would have noticed the plants being stolen?”
“The tire prints in the snow and evidence in the greenhouse show that a truck, something bigger than a van but smaller than a semi, was backed right up to the big barn doors on the front, and it wouldn’t have taken long to load it that way. But apart from Dr. Garibaldi, no one would realize it wasn’t a legitimate shipment, since that was the standard routine. From the outside, it could have been a delivery that Garibaldi was supervising, or perhaps he was shipping an order. Only Professor Serapio would have known whether or not something was wrong, and he was not at the lab that afternoon, but in his university office, grading papers. It is my understanding that neither Janice Garibaldi nor Hewey Sawyer was involved with the workings of the lab.”
She took a sip of coffee, thinking that everything about this situation was still pretty fuzzy.
“Do you have any suspects?”
He shrugged. “Well, the spouse is always a candidate, all the more so when the victim has a personality and reputation like Dr. Garibaldi’s. We’re looking at his colleague, too; Gani Serapio’s alibi seems solid, and so far there’s no strong motivation, but workplace aggravations can suddenly escalate. The daughter—and I know she’s a friend of yours, but you know we are obliged to look into her—the daughter seems to have a good alibi, being seen with you at Penn House, but there again there’s the estrangement, and the extreme emotional potential of her health situation. The handyman is an odd bird. He’s been working for them for years and years, but he seems unusually devoted to Mrs. Garibaldi, and maybe there’s some jealousy. We also have to look at the local drug trade, and also happenstance. How would anyone know what was being grown in that greenhouse, unless they actually entered the barn—or were told? According to Professor Serapio, no one other than himself and Garibaldi has been inside of it in months, and certainly not anyone who would mistake the plants they were growing for actual cannabis.”
His phone went off, and he picked up quickly, rising and moving away from the table in one fluid movement to take the call in confidence. It was a short call, and he didn’t sit back down, but waved at Judee.
“Sorry, Charlotte, got a call out,” he gulped down his coffee and wrapped the muffin in the napkin. “Talk more soon?”
Judee came over with a coffee to go. “Already sweet and white, Detective. I put it on your tab.”
“Thanks, ladies.” He was out the door, in his car, and on the highway with his dash lights flashing in about forty-five seconds.