File M For Murder

“Hamlet,” Laura and I said in unison. I smiled and deferred to the actor in the family. Laura supplied the whole quotation. “I’ll have grounds / More relative than this—the play’s the thing / Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King.”

“That was Hamlet talking about his uncle, right?” Sean pulled into the garage and shut the motor off.

“Yes,” Laura said. “Hamlet wanted a way to test his uncle Claudius to see if he was guilty of killing his father, who was also Claudius’s brother.”

When Laura paused, I added to her comment. “He wrote a play and put in some lines about regicide to see if Claudius reacted.”

Sean opened Laura’s door and offered her his arm. She accepted the gesture with a smile, and I followed them into the house.

Diesel met us a few feet inside the kitchen door, and he warbled up a storm at all of us. He went straight to Laura, though, and rubbed himself against her legs. She cooed at him, telling him what a wonderful kitty he was and how much she adored him. He kept talking to her, ignoring Sean and me.

Sean led his sister to the table and pulled out a chair for her. When Laura sat, Diesel moved in front of her and put both his front paws on her legs. He gazed up into her face and meowed. She scratched his head. “I’m doing okay, sweet kitty.”

I glanced at the clock and was amazed to note that the time was only seven minutes past noon. The morning seemed a day long because so much had happened.

“I’ll fix lunch.” Something fast and easy, I decided. “How about tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches?” Strictly comfort food. Sean and Laura had both, as children and as adolescents, asked for the combination whenever they were sick, and comfort seemed a good idea now.

“Yes, please,” Laura said with a big smile, and Sean nodded. Diesel finally stopped talking and settled down by Laura’s chair. He still hadn’t acknowledged my presence.

“Sean, why don’t you make Laura some hot tea while I get started?” I went to work preparing our lunch.

As I worked and Laura sipped at her tea, we resumed our conversation about Connor Lawton’s quoting from Hamlet.

Sean stirred his tea as he spoke. “The question is, I guess, was Lawton writing about a real murder in his play?”

“And if he was, was he trying to ‘catch the conscience’ of someone he thought was a killer?” I added some heavy cream to the soup before I started on the grilled cheese sandwiches.

“Good questions,” Laura said. She sipped at her tea. “That’s why I wanted to keep the thumb drive, at least for a short time. With the laptop missing, the only complete copy of what Connor had written is on that drive. I’m sure of that. We have some pages we’ve been using for the workshopping, but we don’t have that many.”

“If it turns out that he was murdered,” Sean said, “then there could be a strong connection between the play and the killer.”

“That sounds reasonable to me.” I buttered bread while I waited for the skillet to heat. “And it would mean the killer is someone who saw the workshopping or somehow managed to read as much of the play as Lawton had written.”

“The problem for me is that, based on the bits of the play we workshopped, I can’t remember anything in it that had anything to do with a murder. Though there were elements that made it seem like a mystery novel.” Laura scowled before she drank more of her tea. “It just doesn’t make sense.”

“Then maybe the incriminating bit is in some part of the play you didn’t workshop,” Sean said. “We’ll just have to read it and see what we can find.”

My cell phone rang, forestalling conversation for the moment. I set down the knife and the piece of bread I was buttering and pulled out my phone. I recognized the number that came up on the screen. “Hello,” I said, and Kanesha Berry responded with a quick greeting.

“What can I do for you, Deputy Berry?” I asked.

“I’d like to ask your daughter some questions, as I told you earlier.” Kanesha’s tone was brisk. “I can be there in about fifteen minutes. Will that work?”

“We’re getting ready to eat lunch. Let me check with Laura and see how she feels.” I muted the phone and explained what Kanesha wanted.

Laura looked alarmed for a moment, then she shrugged. “Might as well get it over with.”

I relayed her assent to Kanesha and added, “We might still be eating lunch when you get here.”

“No problem. I’ll be there in fifteen.” Kanesha ended the call.

I tucked my phone away and went back to the grilled cheese. “She’ll be here in fifteen minutes.”

“Then I’d better go copy the files off that thumb drive right now.” Laura made a move to stand, but winced and subsided into her chair. “Maybe Sean could do it.”

“Make me an accessory, eh?” Sean grinned as he stood. “I expect you to come up with all the bail money. Where is it? I’ll just copy it onto my laptop for now.”

“On the dresser next to my makeup bag,” Laura replied.

Sean headed out of the kitchen.

“I’ll feel better when we’ve turned it over to Kanesha.” I flipped the grilled cheeses over, one after the other. Then I began to ladle up the soup.