Carol took a deep breath, centering herself. Beside her, sitting at a round table, close to the stage area in the home’s ballroom, were Catherine, Geoffrey, and Margaret. Her friends. The first people she could ever really, truly call her friends for the simple reason that they had accepted her for who she was. Not an easy thing to do in her case. They had seen her very depths and stood by her.
Catherine and Geoffrey held hands; both had puffy eyes from crying, the events of less than an hour ago still with them. Geoffrey’s other hand was wrapped in a bandage. Margaret was wired, cleaning her teeth with her tongue, waiting for Carol’s big moment.
Carol checked again that everybody was in the room. She’d contacted all the concerned parties and promised the truth.Karaoke night: be there.If she was going to do a dénouement, she was going to do it right. Time to deliver.
Belinda was on the microphone admirably trying and failing to hit each and every note of “I Will Always Love You.” Her new boyfriend, Marco, looked on from the bar, straining every sinew to give an authentically supportive smile. Tyler was on the decks, going through the scraps of paper that bore requests to sing. Elisa scuttled around the room, pointing at bar staff to do this or that, apparently overwhelmed by the unusually large turnout, no doubt surprised to see so many nonresidents. DS Laura Welsh and DCI Bob Beattie were at a table on the opposite side of the dance floor, Laura nervously watching Carol’s every move, Bob rolling a cigarette. Even Dr. Stephen Turnham, the pathologist, and his bubbly assistant, Gemma, had joined them at the table, not wanting to miss the show. They looked pleased to be on a rare night out. At another table Helen and Shep Newsom, empty cocktail glasses in front of them, stared vacantly into space. Polly’s face flickered in the disco lights, her attention on her knitting, her pupils dilated from being reunited with her hash stash.
Every face in the room grimaced as Belinda went all out for that big, long Whitney Houston note. Tyler took that as his cue to fade her out.
“Let’s hear it for Belinda. So many songs to get through tonight. So many songs.”
Tyler spoke in a kind of imitation DJ voice, reminding Carol of Simon Bates, on that day in the van, all those years ago. The applause was polite but not enthusiastic.
“All right, next up we have Carol Quinn. Carol Quinn to the stage, please. Carol Quinn.”
Carol took another deep breath. Margaret stood up and whispered in her ear, “I have a knife in my handbag. If you need me to use it, just give me the nod.”
“Thank you, Margaret,” said Carol. Everyone had changed that week, in one way or another.
Carol felt the eyes of the room on her as she walked to the microphone. The eyes of Sheldon Oaks had been on her ever since Desmond’s murder.
“Carol’s gonna be singing ‘My Heart Will Go On.’ Let’s give her some support, round of applause for Carol!”
Tyler handed the karaoke mic to Carol. She tentatively took hold of it. She’d never held a microphone before, but tonight she felt ready to take center stage.
“Actually, everybody,” Carol began, “I have something to say. I’d like to speak with you all for a moment about what’s been on all our minds for the last few days. A couple of weeks ago, you all learned about my past as a serial killer. Then, over the course of the last two weeks, people have been murdered. I’m here to tell you that those murders and my presence hereare not connected.Ladies and gentlemen, I know who murdered Sir Desmond Crisp and I know who murdered Giles Temple. If you’ll give me a moment, I’ll tell you.”
The panpipes from the karaoke backing track to “My Heart Will Go On” were still playing, giving Carol’s speech a sentimental undertone.
“Actually, Tyler, would you mind turning the music down? Thank you.” Carol had the room’s attention in a way that no Vera Lynn tribute act ever could. Nothing drags people in like a promise to tell the truth.
“When Desmond died, I knew eyes would fall on me, and so they did. I was starting to love it here at Sheldon Oaks. I was, for the first time in my life, making…” Carol looked to her group and surprised herself with the emotion in her voice. “Friends. I realized that the only way I could stay here was by clearing my name.”
Carol’s only experience in public speaking had been sixty years ago, when she’d been asked to make a contribution to the South London Schools Debating Competition and presented a case for women in the workplace. She approached her dénouement with a similarly methodical outlining of the facts.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Sir Desmond Crisp was killed by poisoning, bludgeoning, strangulation, and by being pushed off the roof of this building. Let’s deal with each of those in turn.”
Carol noticed Margaret get more comfortable in her seat, as if she were watching the opening credits to a good film.
“Poisoning,” said Carol, holding up a thumb, denoting the number one. “Desmond was poisoned but what with and by whom? The autopsy revealed that Desmond’s last meal was shepherd’s pie, a dish that just so happened to be on the lunch menu in the Apple Tree on the day of his death. That led us to consider Marco, a man who could easily have tampered with Desmond’s meal, and incidentally, the new boyfriend of one of our favorite residents, Belinda LaBelle.”
“These accusations must stop!” yelled Belinda with heightened, soap opera–style emotion.
“And they will,” said Carol, “if you’ll let me explain. You see, I found Belinda’s outburst on the evening the police came to talk with us rather over-the-top. I thought she must be hiding something, that perhaps she and her man had tricked Desmond intogiving her his fortune before knocking him off. The truth is, Belinda is just a highly emotional, highly sexed individual. So highly sexed, in fact, that their alibi is the love that they were making in the snooker room at the exact time of Desmond’s murder. As I discovered yesterday, the snooker room is just one of many places in this building Belinda and Marco like to…expresstheir love for each other. They book it out but never think to go to Reception and collect a set of balls. I guess you bring your own, Marco? I’ve checked back through the bookings, and at the time of Desmond’s murder, Belinda and Marco had reserved the snooker room. I wish the pair of you a very happy life together. Oh, I nearly forgot…”
Carol took something from her pocket and threw it at Belinda. “I found your knickers in the green pocket.”
Belinda caught them and put them into her handbag, blushing. Warming to her Poirot moment, Carol moved on to the next piece of the puzzle. “Dr. Turnham?”
The enthralled pathologist looked surprised to be called upon. “Yes?”
“What meat is in shepherd’s pie?”
“Uh…beef.”
Geoffrey gasped and the whole room heard it.
“Geoffrey,” said Carol, “would you like to inform the room what meat is in a shepherd’s pie? You’re a stickler for this sort of thing, aren’t you? I’m confident you know.”
