Tomb With a View

I’d made the 911 emergency call right after I told Ella the news, and just like I hoped they would, the cops were taking care of the details. They’d already gone up to the balcony to check things out up there, and they’d talked to me about what I did and what I saw when I got to the memorial. I’d heard one of them make a call and assumed they were having someone come over from the nearby coroner’s office to cart away Marjorie’s body.

I was expecting them to close the memorial until all that was done and everything (and by this, yes, I do mean all the blood) was cleaned up, but I wasn’t expecting them to pull out their yellow crime scene tape and cordon off not only the rotunda, but the stairway leading up to the balcony, and a wide swath of the grassy hillside outside the memorial.

Since the cops had already told me not to touch anything, and not to get in the way, and not to bother them with questions, and not to leave the building, I knew I wouldn’t get anywhere asking them why they were being so careful about investigating Marjorie’s death. When I looked toward the winding marble staircase that led down into the president’s crypt and saw the light that poured in from a small stained-glass window shimmer and shift, I knew it didn’t matter. I told Ella to keep breathing, and headed to the staircase to talk to the one person who might have actually seen Marjorie take that tumble over the railing.

“What exactly has transpired here?” President Garfield asked the question before I could, only I never would have used a word as stuffy as transpire. “More commotion! Precisely what I do not need. My cabinet is convening in exactly . . .” He pulled a gold watch from a little pocket in his vest. It wasn’t ticking. “We are scheduled to meet in less than fifteen minutes. I simply will not tolerate so many people coming and going when we have important business of state to discuss. What has happened here?”

“I was hoping you could tell me.” I stepped to the side so that the paramedics and cops couldn’t see me and kept my voice down. “Marjorie Klinker, you know, the volunteer who thinks you’re the greatest president ever? She’s dead.”

“Dead?” The president was honestly surprised. And me? I was honestly disappointed. I was hoping to get the inside track on the accident.

“You didn’t see anything?” I asked him. “You didn’t hear anything? She took a header over the railing. You’d think she would have screamed or something.”

“I neither saw nor heard a thing. But then, I have more important things to do than worry about what goes on here.”

“But you are worried about it. You said you didn’t like the comings and the goings.”

The president threw back his shoulders and I was reminded of the photo I’d seen of him in his Army uniform. He sniffed. “I should not be discommoded in any way. I have a country to run!”

“Only you’re not running it. You’re dead.” I leaned in as close as I dared and looked at him hard. “You know that, right?”

“Of course I do,” he muttered, and he might have said more if the door to the memorial hadn’t swung open. A streak of morning sunshine poured inside. Quinn Harrison wasn’t far behind.

“Shit.” It was my turn to grumble, and it wasn’t just because the one man I didn’t want to deal with happened to be standing not ten feet away. If Quinn had been called in, it could only mean one thing: Marjorie wasn’t just dead. The cops thought she’d been murdered.

If I was going to get any answers that might help with the investigation, I knew I needed to do it quick, before Quinn cornered me and started asking the same boring questions his brothers in blue had already asked.

“All right, so you didn’t see what happened to Marjorie,” I whispered though I guess I didn’t have to. By that time, Quinn was already in the rotunda and talking to the patrol officers. “Did you hear anything? I mean, after the cops arrived?”

“One of the police officers mentioned signs of a scuffle.” The president looked toward the stairway that led to the balcony. “Up there.”

“Which means . . .” I groaned and checked on Ella. She was finally sitting up and looking just a little less pale than the ghost at my side. It was bad enough that she’d have to face the media and explain a death in the cemetery. It would be worse when she found out that the death wasn’t accidental.

I knew I had to be with her when she heard the news. I turned to the president before I went into the office. “Why don’t you just float on up there and check things out,” I suggested. “You know, listen to what they’re saying. I have no doubt Mr. High-and-Mighty Quinn is going to be heading up there to look around. Follow him and let me know what he says.”

President Garfield’s eyes flashed blue lightning and he pulled himself up to his full, imposing height. “Young lady,” he snarled, “I do not do such things. I am, after all, the president.”