Ghost on the Case (Bailey Ruth #8)(39)

I now understood why Susan spoke so carefully when I’d first asked her about Ben Fitch. No doubt she heard this quarrel, but was convinced—or wanted to believe—that this was simply Wilbur being Wilbur.

“—and I slammed out of his room and yelled I’d get back to the islands and maybe next year I’d see him again.” He looked at me and the shine was clearly tears. “Now my stepbrother and I are arranging his funeral. Got Mom and Hayley, that’s Harry’s mom, on their way. Next Monday. The First Baptist Church. I closed down the offices and the sorting sheds today. Dad would say get on with it. But not today. I couldn’t have everything going on like it always was. We’ll close Monday. Any more than that and he’d probably be yelling from the hereafter. Yelling . . . I told Dad next year. I yelled next year at him. Now I won’t ever see him again.” He hunched forward. “Look, are you getting anywhere? I can’t figure out how it happened. They told me the door to the garden was open. And that the painting was pulled back and the safe was wide open. Why would Dad open the safe? It must have been the middle of the night. The party didn’t end until around midnight. I didn’t spend much time in the ballroom. I was up here”—he gestured with his hand—“getting my stuff packed.” There was a backpack leaning against one wall and a chock-full duffel bag. “I was going to drive down to Dallas and get a flight out. And now—”

“Will you stay in Adelaide?”

He squinted at me as if I spoke Portuguese. “I can’t leave. That would break Dad’s heart. Todd couldn’t run a bake sale. They were old buddies. Dad let Todd run around town, act like a COO, be a big deal, but Dad ran everything. If I left, Fitch Enterprises would crack up. I don’t have a choice. I’ll stay and I’ll make Dad proud of me.” His voice broke a little. “I’ll run it like a son of a bitch.”

“Will you get rid of Todd Garrett?”

An impatient wave of his hand. “I’ll keep him on, let him pretend to be a big deal. Just like Dad did. He was Dad’s oldest friend. Maybe sometimes we can talk about Dad.”

“How about Alan Douglas and the SIMPLE Car?”

He leaned back in the leather chair, his expression thoughtful. “Dad had good instincts. He saw the appeal. A lot of people want the world to be open again, not tethered to a device twenty-four/seven. That’s the kind who end up in Hawaii and they want to see orchids and ride boogie boards and throw rocks in a volcano. But he agreed after we talked about it. SIMPLE isn’t the way of the future. Look what Amazon’s done with Alexa. That’s the future. Everything connected everywhere all the time. I’d already—”

The prospect sounded hideous to me, but happily in Heaven everything is personal. You think of someone and you are with them. There’s no need for cogs and wheels or chips. Joy and love satisfy hearts and souls. Who needs anything else? If you have a question in your mind, the answer comes. No need for Alexa or Siri.

“—told Dad going back isn’t going forward. He was still tempted. I think he just wanted an old-fashioned car for the fun of it. But the concept wasn’t right for Fitch Enterprises. He talked to Alan yesterday.”

Ben spoke as if this was no big deal. A business decision. I wondered how big a deal it was to Alan Douglas.

“Did you see your father after the party?”

“I didn’t see him.” Sharp. Definitive. Sorrowful.

“Were you in the study last night?”

“No.”

“Do you have any idea who might have gone to the study with your father?”

“Gone to the study with him?” He looked puzzled. “I thought the idea was that Dad surprised someone there. I got kind of a garbled story, something about Susan Gilbert getting a threatening call and rushing over here and taking the cash box out of the safe and for some reason coming back later to get the coins. But I understand she explained what happened and returned the cash box and she says she didn’t take the coins. She’s not a crook. She wouldn’t hurt Dad.” He spoke emphatically.

I looked at him in surprise.

There was an odd expression on his face. “Dad thought the world of Susan. I can tell I will, too. I’ve got a knack for people. Just like Dad did.”

Ben Fitch was not lacking in confidence.

He gave me a long stare. “Just like I can look at you and know you wouldn’t hurt anyone. Neither would Susan.”

Since I was a counterfeit police detective, I could speak honestly. “I agree, Mr. Fitch.”

But his quick mind had already moved on. He frowned again. “If you think Dad went to the study with someone, that changes everything. There wasn’t any reason for Dad to be in the study that late.”

I said quietly, “It seems possible that someone came to your father’s door and knocked and persuaded him to go down.”

Ben’s face squeezed in thought. “That person must have known him well enough to go to his bedroom and been confident Dad wouldn’t be shocked at his appearance. That clears Susan Gilbert right there. He would have been astounded if she knocked on his door. Someone who knew Dad well . . . That explains why Susan was tricked into coming here last night.” He thumped a fist into his opposite palm. “I got it. The murderer set the study up to look like a robbery, maybe turned on the light, opened the garden door, pulled back the painting, then knocked on Dad’s door, told him it looks like something’s up in the study. Dad came downstairs, opened the safe, and the murderer hit him. But how did anyone get into the house that late at night?”