The Egg at Dumstreet

Think About Quitting

Betty Bossi stared at Art's photograph in the file on Inspector Savage's cluttered desk. Photographed Art glowered back at her.

She shook her head and looked up at her boss. "And Adriana Costello pushed him from the bridge, just like that?"

He nodded. "That comes as a surprise, doesn't it?"

"I..." She hesitated, her finger moving first over Art's face, then along the tabs of the folder. With a last look at the picture, she turned the pages to the section labeled Jake Sander. Here, the photographer's victim smiled broadly but had his eyes half closed—sleepsmiling. "Jake Sander... he was the one who called us?"

"He called the emergency number," Savage answered. "They alerted the mountain patrol and the police."

"To be honest, I wouldn't have expected Adriana Costello to do something like that."

Savage shrugged. "Our kind of work is full of surprises." He reached for another binder and browsed its pages. "Here it is... her confession. She deposited the same day, to our colleagues in Ippenvale. She... admitted not only to pushing Arthur Sharpe... Art as she called him... from that bridge but also to killing Gertrude Knooch."

"Yeah, you've said so." Bossi pulled at her ponytail. "But why did she do that? And why is she confessing now? And what about all the evidence showing Monica Marez was the killer... the DNA and the gloves?"

Savage pushed the binder over to his assistant. "That's all in here. You haven't seen it yet. It contains the protocols of my interviews with Adriana Costello and Jake Sander. I interrogated them yesterday."

"I'm sorry to have missed that."

"No need to apologize." Savage held up a hand. "Everyone's entitled to their days off, even police officers... Do you want a summary?"

She nodded.

"Jake and Adriana..." he said, "they had a... thing going on. A secret affair. It had started some months before Knooch's murder. They had first met at Dumstreet 9 during one of his visits at his Aunt's. So one thing led to another... But with Jake married, they kept it secret. And there was another reason for keeping it secret... Jake was sure that Knooch wouldn't approve of him betraying his wife, in particular because Knooch never liked Adriana. And he was dependent on his Aunt's goodwill because she was giving him money... lots of money... for a project of his."

"Lots of money?" Bossi frowned. "But she didn't have much, we've checked her accounts."

"She did. We've missed that. Jake Sander has filled us in... now. You may remember that Knooch's husband was a mining specialist, and the couple had spent years in various parts of Latin America. At one of the mines he worked for... a diamond mine... he seemed to have struck some deal. Jake didn't know the details, but there was serious money involved... Our colleagues over at economic crime will need to have a closer look at that. Anyway, the deal left her with a stash of black funds in a number of places. All of it was hidden from the authorities. And the account documents, some cash... and even some raw diamonds... they were hoarded away under a loose floorboard in her apartment, where Jake found them."

She huffed. "A classical hiding place. Our people should have discovered it when they checked her rooms."

"Not necessarily," Savage said. "Our people did search the place, sure. But we had no real reason to expect secret stashes of money. She was the victim, not a suspect. So we didn't turn every stone... or floorboard, in that case."

"What did Jake need the money for? You've mentioned some project."

"Jake had bought a hotel in Oberippenberg. That's why these neighbors were up there, last weekend. Anyway, the hotel's in need of a major overhaul. Buying and renovating such a place is expensive. Jake's wife, as well as his Aunt, had contributed money to it. However, Jake's marriage hadn't been going strong for some time, and his wife wanted to get out of it. And, therefore, she also wanted to have her cash back. So Jake had serious problems... he knew his aunt wouldn't approve of a divorce and was unlikely to give him the money to pay his wife."