The Jade Dragonfly

‘Aha!’ said Constable Lattley as he knelt down to take a closer look. ‘Look at this Detective!’ he said excitedly.

Detective Tom McCloud was just starting to open the pantry door in the kitchen when he sighed and came over to where Johnny was kneeling on the floor peering at something on the ground. ‘What is it?’ he grumbled.

‘Its blood!’ said Johnny.

Thomas sighed again shaking his head, ‘No it isn’t, it’s just wine spilled on the carpet. See, you can see it is all near this little table, right where there is a coaster. The victim was poisoned remember?’

‘Oh, yeah,’ said Johnny looking disappointed.

Detective McCloud was starting to regret having asked Constable Johnny Lattley to come help him with the case.

‘What about this over here, Smokey?’ said Johnny.

Detective McCloud shot Constable Lattley a withering glance. ‘What have I told you about calling me Smokey?’ he growled.

‘Oh, sorry, sir. You said only the other Detectives can.’

‘Right, and you’d do well to remember that’ said McCloud heading back into the kitchen with the victim. Thomas got the nickname when he was a heavy smoker years ago, and having the last name of McCloud didn’t help either. He used to sometimes be called Smoke Cloud, which he hated even more than Smokey.

Constable Lattley followed McCloud into the small kitchen, giving a wide berth to the small round table at which the victim was still sitting, slumped over.

‘So,’ said Detective McCloud, ‘The neighbour who found Mrs. O’Reilly said she had come over to chat to her about what she’d seen recently and wanted to know if Bree, that’s Mrs O’Reilly, was okay.’ McCloud made a note in his notebook of the victim’s name: Brielle O’Reilly. ‘And,’ he continued, ‘Adara, that’s the neighbour,’ he explained to Lattley, ‘came through the back door of the kitchen here and found Mrs. O’Reilly just how you and I see her right now.’

The victim was lying with her face turned to the left, her eyes slightly closed. She was wearing a long skirt and a light flowery summer top. The back door of the house in the kitchen was open due to the warm August weather. Surrounding Mrs. O’Reilly on the small cluttered table was a salt and peppershaker, a half drunk cup of coffee, still slightly warm, a small pile of letters and a beautiful ornate letter opener.

Constable Lattley walked towards the table and was looking at the letter opener. He slowly reached his arm towards the item when McCloud shouted ‘Don’t touch it!’

Johnny yanked his arm away and jumped backwards bumping into the counter behind them.

‘That’s evidence young man! Don’t go getting your dirty prints all over it!’

‘Okay, okay, I just wanted to look at it,’ said Johnny looking a little sheepish.

‘What I was saying,’ continued McCloud, annoyed at the actions of his assistant, ‘was the neighbour, Mrs. Adara Murray, had come by because she wanted to talk to Mrs. O’Reilly about some strange things she’d seen over the last few days. ‘First of all though,’ said McCloud, ‘we have some obvious clues here.

‘Okay…’ said Johnny, not sure where McCloud was going and waiting to hear what obvious clues he must have missed.

‘One of course is the letter opener,’ said McCloud. ‘They’re always strange and dangerous things. And the second is these three letters here on the table. One it looks like from Bree’s neighbour Mr. Ewan MacGillvary, he’s a religious guy, some priest or pastor or some such thing. Then there’s a letter from the victims best friend, Maggie Taylor, an apology. Third is just an envelope without a letter inside it, just the victim’s address on it with no return address or anything else. So first thing’s first…’

‘Get the letter opener examined?’ suggested Lattley hopefully.

‘Yes…’ said McCloud distracted. ‘I mean, no. First thing we need to do is to go speak to the neighbour, Adara Murray, because she noticed some things occurring in the past few days involving the victim.’ McCloud hesitated, and added, ‘And of course also get the letter opener examined too, for any trace of poison,’ he stopped, then added ‘and the empty envelope as well, for prints.’

Heading out the kitchen door McCloud came face-to-face with Adara Murray over the fence separating her property from Brielle’s.

‘Oh!’ said Adara with a start, turning a slight shade of pink at the thought of being caught eavesdropping on the Detective and Constable’s conversation inside the kitchen.

Detective Thomas McCloud got straight to the point, ‘Mrs. Murray, you said you had something to tell us about Mrs. O’Reilly last you saw her? Before coming across her in her kitchen this morning, I mean.’

‘Oh’ said Adara, ‘well, just last night I saw Bree and Mr. MacGillvary arguing. He’s her other neighbour. It seemed pretty vicious. Bree was really annoyed and Ewan slammed his door and went back inside his house.’

‘And…?’ said McCloud.

‘Well, that’s all really. They just were arguing. But Ewan seemed quite angry,’ said Adara.

‘Thanks for your time Mrs. Murray,’ said Johnny as McCloud simply turned away heading towards the other next-door neighbour.

Constable Lattley knocked on the door.

‘Let me do that!’ grumbles McCloud, who banged harshly on the old wooden door. After a long few minutes, the door slowly opened.

‘I’m sorry, I was just…’ said Mr. MacGillvary, who stopped in mid-sentence when he realized who was at his door. ‘I was just praying…for poor Mrs. O’Reilly, such a shame that should happen to her.’

‘Well that’s why we’re here,’ said McCloud gruffly.

Johnny held out his hand and flashed his badge ‘Hello, Mr. MacGillvary,’ he said politely, ‘I’m Constable Johnny Lattley and this is Detective Thomas McCloud.’

Mr. MacGillvary inclined his head in a sort of nod and McCloud just grunted.

‘We’re here to speak to you about Mrs. O’Reilly. We’ve been told…’

‘We’ve been told,’ interjected McCloud, ‘that you had an argument with Mrs. O’Reilly just last night and it seemed to be pretty heated.’

Mr. MacGillvary, stood aside and motioned with his arm inside the house ‘why don’t you come on in and I’ll explain. And please, call me Ewan.’

McCloud stormed past him through the doorway and Constable Lattley followed meekly behind.

‘Would you care for some tea and cookies?’ said Ewan

‘No,’ said McCloud.

‘Yes, please,’ said Johnny simultaneously. ‘Oh, no thanks,’ he said quickly, seeing McCloud glaring at him.

Ewan gestured them to the small couch in the living room, above which hung a large cross, and opposite a large painting of Jesus adorned with a thorned wreath, on the corner of which hung a rosary.

Ewan took a seat in an armchair opposite the sofa and said, ‘You’ve been told that I was seen arguing with Brielle last night?’

McCloud and Lattley both nodded.

Ewan sighed, ‘Well, yes that’s true. But we always have little arguments. More like friendly bickering in my opinion.’

‘What were you arguing about?’ said McCloud.

‘Oh, just the same thing we always argue about. Religion. Mrs. O’Reilly isn’t, or rather wasn’t, religious at all. Not one little bit. Despite her Irish roots. I just wanted her to consider…the possibility… of maybe wanting to take up Catholicism. Just nudging her, you see. But she was stubborn, and always fiery, that’s the Irish in her though. So we always had arguments because I always invited her along to our church services and she always turned me down saying she’d rather be out in her garden. We always argued over our back fence in our yard, which is why the other neighbour,’ Ewan said with disdain, ‘overheard us arguing last night.’

Ewan looked over at McCloud’s serious face writing in his little police notebook and his face turned a shade paler. ‘But I was never angry with her to the extent that I would hurt her! I was just annoyed that she wouldn’t listen to me or ever want to come to church.’

‘We found a letter from you open on her kitchen table this morning,’ said Constable Lattley. ‘It looks like she read it just before she died.’

Ewan’s face drained of any colour it had left. ‘Are you suggesting I had something to do with her death? How did she die anyways?’

‘Poisoned,’ said McCloud gruffly.

‘Oh…’ said Ewan his voice trailing off. ‘Well, if you read my letter, you will have noticed it is simply an invitation to our annual church picnic this Sunday. As usual, I wanted Brielle to come and take part and see if she would be interested in…converting,’ he said with a slight sheepishness.

‘No doubt,’ muttered McCloud. McCloud, Johnny and Ewan sat in silence for what seemed like minutes. Staring at each other, at a loss of what to say.

‘Oh!’ exclaimed Ewan all of a sudden, causing McCloud and Johnny to jump.

‘I almost forgot!’ said Ewan leaning forward excitedly, ‘I saw Ron, that’s Brielle husband, run out of their house this morning in a rush.’

McCloud and Lattley glanced at each other.

‘Anything else?’ said McCloud.

‘Yes, he was holding a letter in his hand,’ said Ewan.

‘Aha!’ said Johnny nearly jumping up off the sofa. ‘I’ll be right back.’

Johnny ran out of the house leaving McCloud and Ewan sitting stunned. Johnny returned shortly waving the empty envelope in his hand.

‘We found an empty envelope on the kitchen table beside the vic-, uh, I mean Mrs. O’Reilly, but there wasn’t a return address on it so we don’t know who sent it. Do you recognize the handwriting?’ said Lattley.

Ewan peered at the envelope with his reading glasses. ‘No sorry.’

‘Okay, thanks,’ said McCloud getting up from the couch.

‘We’ll be back if we have anymore questions,’ said Johnny, as McCloud hurried out the door ahead of him and straight towards Brielle’s front yard. McCloud didn’t go back into the O’Reilly’s house but continued to Adara Murray’s.

McCloud knocked loudly on the door, causing it to shake. The door opened, preceded by the sound of a chain lock sliding back.

‘Oh, it’s just you again!’ said Adara, with relief in her voice.

‘Do you know whose this is?’ said McCloud, unceremoniously thrusting the envelope in Adara’s face. Adara took a step backwards, taking the envelope and looking closely at the writing on the front.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It’s from their son. The O’Reilly’s. His name’s Sam. I sometimes get his letters delivered to me by mistake and have to take them over to Bree. He’s at boarding school, you see,’ Adara explained.

‘Mmm hmm’ murmured McCloud.

‘Yes,’ Adara says nodding vigorously, as if to fill the intimidating silence brought on by McCloud. ‘He’s been there for just over a year already. But he’s really unhappy there. He always writes asking if he can come home and go to school here.’

‘Do you have anything else that might be useful to us?’ said Johnny. ‘Did you see anything else?’

Adara shook her head no.

‘Okay, thanks for your help Mrs. Murray,’ said Johnny, taking the envelope back from her. ‘Evidence,’ he explained apologetically.

‘Thanks,’ mumbled McCloud before turning around and heading straight back in the direction of Ewan MacGillvary’s place. Johnny jogged to catch up to his pace.

‘You know,’ said Johnny, ‘it couldn’t hurt to be a bit more friendly….’

McCloud just glared at Johnny. Johnny sighed, closing his mouth firmly.

‘Mr. MacGillvary!’ McCloud shouted over the gate to the backyard.

A minute or two passed before Ewan’s came into view from behind the house.

‘Yes?’ he said timidly.

‘We just want to ask you a few more questions,’ Johnny was able to get out, before McCloud said bluntly, ‘Have you seen anything else besides the husband rushing off, holding that letter? Just before the vic-, I mean Mrs. O’Reilly was found?’

‘Well…’ said Ewan hesitantly, looking slightly intimidated by McCloud who was standing with his arms crossed. Ewan glanced at Johnny who nodded encouragingly. ‘I remember Rob, that’s the husband, saying he’s in a hurry to meet his son who wrote to him that he’d left boarding school and was staying with a friend.’ He paused, thinking. ‘And, I think…’

‘Yes?’ said Johnny.

‘I think it was about a week ago. I was outside the front of the house here doing some weeding and watering my dahlias. I remember seeing Bree arguing with Maggie.’

McCloud was writing furiously in his notebook.

‘Who…’ Johnny was about to ask who Maggie was when Ewan explained.

‘Maggie Taylor, that’s Bree’s best friend. They’ve been friends for over twenty years. Since childhood.’

‘Mmm hmmm,’ muttered McCloud.

‘Well, I noticed lately they hadn’t been getting along very well. I saw Bree and Maggie standing in Bree’s driveway, and they were screaming at each other. It seemed a very violent argument. Not physically violent, though, just very loud and noisy. I couldn’t help but overhear what they were arguing about. I think the whole block could hear. It was about money. Maggie had loaned Bree some money, a large amount of money by the sounds of it. Some amount around $10,000 or so, I seem to recall. I think because Bree and Ron were having money troubles. That’s why they needed to send their son to boarding school. Did I mention that? They have a son in boarding school.’

‘Mrs. Murray the other neighbour told us that already,’ said Johnny.

‘Well, that’s very interesting,’ said McCloud, and turned on his heel towards the O’Reilly residence. Johnny rolled his eyes and shrugged apologetically at Ewan. ‘Okay, thanks for all your help Mr. MacGillvary.’

When Johnny entered the kitchen, McCloud was just finishing a conversation with another police officer. ‘Okay, thanks for letting me know Bill,’ he was saying as he turned towards Johnny. ‘The letter opener has come back from the lab, and it’s clean. No poison. And it only has the vic’s prints on it. The son’s envelope only has the husband’s prints on it. So we can rule out the letter opener as the cause of the poison.’

‘Next step…’ said Johnny.

‘Go speak to Maggie Taylor,’ McCloud and Johnny said simultaneously.

They hopped into McClouds’ beat up light blue Thunderbird with the crumpled left headlight and headed to an address across town. McCloud took a cigarette from his breast pocket and stuck it in the lighter sticking out of the dash. He took a long drag on the stick and exhaled loudly. Johnny rolled his window down and took a gulp of fresh air. Shortly they pulled into a driveway. They saw a tall slim woman standing staring out of the main living room window directly towards them. Before they had even stepped foot out of the car, the front door opened and the woman stepped outside. She held her arm out as she headed towards them.

McCloud had his hands stuffed in his pockets so Johnny took Mrs. Taylor’s hand.

‘Mrs. Taylor,’ Johnny began.

‘Hello, yes I know who you are,’ she said brusquely. ‘Detective McCloud and Constable Lattley.’

Johnny looked taken aback.

Maggie looked at McCloud when she spoke. ‘Adara called a few minutes ago and said you might be on your way to see me.’ She glanced at Johnny and saw his confused expression. ‘Me and Adara aren’t close friends, but we’ve had the odd conversation when Bree wasn’t in if I’d come around to see her. And seeing how I am Bree’s closest friend, it only makes sense that her neighbour has me as a contact,’ she said, her mouth thinning, as if that was an obvious conclusion.

‘So you know why we’re here,’ said Johnny.

‘Of course. I’m absolutely distraught,’ Maggie said, drawing her cardigan tightly around her as if to emphasize the point. ‘And I’m sure you’ll already have heard that we had an argument.’

McCloud took out his notebook, poised with his pencil.

Johnny nodded, and Maggie continued. ‘Our argument was minor. I wouldn’t really even call it an argument. More a disagreement.’

‘But…’ said Johnny, and McCloud shot him a steely look. Johnny stopped.

‘The neighbour, Mr. MacGillvary said he saw you two on the driveway last week screaming like banshees at each other.’

Maggie snorted a laugh.

‘She owed me a bit of money, that’s all,’ said Maggie.

‘A bit?’ spluttered Johnny.

‘$10,000 to loan to a friend is nothing,’ said Maggie. ‘To me,’ she added. ‘Bree is, was, a good friend.’

‘When did you last see Mrs. O’Reilly?’ said McCloud.

‘Last week. I haven’t seen her since that…disagreement. She has a bit of a temper, that Bree. She even had that letter opener and was waving it about in the air like a crazy person. I can’t believe she still has that silly thing after all these years,’ said Maggie.

‘You mean that jade dragonfly letter opener?’ said Johnny.

‘Yes,’ said Maggie. ‘I gave that to Bree as a birthday present about ten years or so ago, just a silly little thing that I picked up in a market in Marrakech.

‘Mr. MacGillvary said…’ started Johnny.

‘That Mr. MacGillvary is a strange little man,’ Maggie tutted, ‘with his strange overly religious beliefs that he’s always trying to push onto others. I wouldn’t take much of what he says without a big pinch of salt!’

‘We noticed,’ said McCloud, barely looking up from writing in his notebook, ‘that there was a letter from you on the table where we found the…Mrs. O’Reilly.’

‘Yes,’ said Maggie, ‘I’d written her a letter to apologize for my behaviour last week and to say that all was forgiven and could we just forget it ever happened and move on.’

McCloud snapped his notebook closed, which signalled an end to the interrogation.

McCloud and Lattley returned to the scene of the crime and looked around the kitchen. Lattley picked up the mug of coffee and sniffed it gingerly, his nose wrinkling in disgust. McCloud walked past Mrs O’Reilly, catching her long skirt. Something blew out from underneath the chair. A small scrap of paper. McCloud opened up the paper and read it to himself. McCloud said, ‘Okay, this is what happened. The husband opened the son’s letter and then rushed off to find their son. That’s unrelated, just coincidental. Then the victim opened the other two letters with letter opener. She first opens that crazy religious Mr. MacGillvary’s invitation to his church picnic. Then she opens her best friends’ letter, with letter opener last and…’

McCloud stops and puts on some plastic gloves from his pocket. He gently lifts and turns Mrs. O’Reilly’s head to the other side and pushes her hair back. ‘And’ McCloud continues ‘then puts this matching jade dragonfly hairclip in her hair, the same dragonfly as the letter opener Maggie gave the victim years ago, and then reads the letter.’

Johnny waited expectantly holding his breath, an uncomprehending look on his face.

McCloud squinted at him, urging him to give the obvious solution to the case.

‘And…?’ said Johnny, clueless.

McCloud sighed noisily. ‘And then read the letter and died!’ McCloud looked at Johnny expectantly, watching and waiting for the light bulb to go on.

‘How…?’ said Johnny, still not understanding.

‘Here!’ said McCloud angrily stuffing the scrap of paper in Johnny’s hand.

Johnny read aloud ‘Please accept this gift as an apology for our arguing over you owing me $10,000 and lets just forget about it all. I know it will look lovely on you and match your eyes.’

McCloud rolled his eyes and before Johnny could say anything, ‘that Maggie Taylor knew that the victim, Mrs. O’Reilly I mean, would put in the hairclip and then read the letter. And after touching the hairclip, she would lick her fingertips, which would have touched the poisoned jade dragonfly, in order to turn the pages of the letter!’

‘Oh!’ said Johnny finally understanding. ‘So the poison would be on the hairclip and since Mrs. O’Reilly touched it and licked her fingers, she would have ingested the poison and died. So Maggie Taylor did it! But how did you know it was a hairclip?’

‘Well,’ said McCloud, ‘I didn’t notice anything on the victims wrists and she wasn’t wearing earrings, at least not on the ear we could see, so she wouldn’t just be wearing one, and she wasn’t wearing any other jewellery, so I thought it must be on the side of the vic we couldn’t see. And as soon as I turned her over, I noticed the dragonfly, the same one as the letter opener, that Maggie admitted giving Brielle years ago. And that it matched her eyes like the note said.’

In his excitement Johnny forgot the protocol, ‘Well done Smokey!’ he said clapping McCloud on the shoulder.

‘It’s just McCloud’ growled Thomas. ‘Or maybe just Detective to you!’

‘Yes sir, Detective’ said Johnny removing his hand. ‘Sorry sir.’

~~~~

check out story 2 below!