“Everything has a price. Is that right?”
“Yes. It varies according to relative scarcity of the goods or services in question and the size of the consumer audience.”
“And there are trade-offs. You give up something to get something.”
“Of course. I don’t see what this has to do with Trevor.”
“He was the price,” Reed said, his voice taking on a hard edge. “The one you didn’t see coming.”
Stone turned to the dean in confusion. “George, help me out here. What is he talking about?”
“Shut up and listen,” Altman replied.
“Carol Frick had been cleaning your house for about three years at the time of her death and that of your son,” Reed said. “How did you come to hire her?”
Stone appeared incredulous. “That was twenty years ago. You expect me to remember a decades-old interview process for a housekeeper? Teresa and I both worked long hours. We had a small child who liked to track dirt into our house. We needed someone to help out. I don’t recall how we found Carol. She may have been recommended by a friend or we may have called a service. Teresa handled most of our household affairs, so you’d do better to ask her.”
“That’s interesting you would mention Teresa’s role as head of the household.”
“I didn’t say that. I said she managed the household.”
Reed held his gaze. “Is there a difference? You just admitted you have no idea how Carol Frick came to be in your employ.”
Irritated, Stone held up his hands in mock surrender. “Okay, Teresa wore the pants in the family. Is that what you want me to say?”
Reed took out the phone records from the folder in front of him. “So Teresa was the one who coordinated Carol Frick’s schedule. She told her when to come and what you needed done on any particular week, is that right?”
“Yes. I didn’t notice when the silver needed polishing.” He said it like tracking this work was beneath him, but Reed would wager he’d notice if the flatware showed up tarnished on the dinner table.
“The day Trevor died,” Reed said, sliding the phone records across to him, “Teresa didn’t call Carol Frick. Neither did you, it seems. The records indicate that Carol called your office here at the university. Three times, in fact. Do you remember what you talked about?”
Stone did not immediately pick up the paper. He looked at Reed, his gaze assessing, trying to work out the correct answer. He cleared his throat and glanced at the phone records. “I’m afraid I don’t recall. Carol would phone me sometimes if she had a question—did we want her to change the bed linens or that sort of thing.”
“You just said Teresa handled any instructions to Carol.”
“My wife was busy with her surgeries. She wasn’t always reachable.” He gave a thin smile. “My job is comparably more sedate.”
“Carol phoned you three times that afternoon. That’s a lot of questions.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe she got my secretary on her first couple of tries.” He pushed the paper back at Reed. “You were going to tell me about Trevor.”
“Yes, I promise it’s all related.” Reed took out a different piece of evidence, a photo of the gun retrieved from Ethan Stone’s backyard. “Do you recognize this weapon?”
“No. Should I?”
“It was recovered from the shed behind your old house.”
“I’ve never seen it before in my life. It certainly wasn’t ours. Teresa saw too many gunshot wounds in her line of work. She would never abide a gun in the home, and I wasn’t keen, either. Not with Trevor so young and Justin…” He trailed off and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Well, Justin had problems that could only be exacerbated by the presence of a weapon. Let’s leave it at that.”
“Would it surprise you to know it has been linked to a murder?”
He startled. “Murder. But … Trevor wasn’t shot.”
“No, it was used to shoot Vincent Frick.”
“Vincent,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “Carol’s husband.”
“Ah, so you know of him.”
“Just by name. I heard he died, but I didn’t know any details. I was under the impression it was some sort of accident.”
“No, Carol murdered him with this gun. She stole it from one of her clients in Baltimore.”
“What?” Shock colored his features. “She murdered her husband?”
“And collected fifty thousand dollars in life insurance money, which she used to relocate to Philadelphia and put the down payment on the house she shared with her children. You remember her children, don’t you? Beth, the oldest, would have been about fifteen at the time Carol started working for you.”
“I knew she had kids. I didn’t know she’d killed anyone.”
“Beth had a scholarship here. I understand you had a little something to do with that.” He took out a copy of Beth Frick’s senior year portrait, which he’d found in the school yearbook. It showed a young woman with chin-length auburn hair, a shy smile, and silver and mother-of-pearl earrings in the shape of seashells. He showed the portrait to Ethan Stone, who appeared reluctant to look at it.
“I probably helped her with her application—read it over, offered a word of advice here or there to enhance her chances. I do that with my friends’ kids all the time, so I’m sure I would have helped this girl, too, if her mother had asked. But I’m not on the admissions committee.” He pushed the picture back at Reed after barely glancing at it. “If she got a scholarship, she did it under her own merits.”
“Her grades were top-notch,” Reed agreed. “She was captain of the volleyball team.”
Ellery took the picture and looked at it at length. “Those earrings look expensive,” she said. “I know my mother never could have afforded anything like that when I was in high school.”
“Maybe she had a rich boyfriend,” Stone said. He made a show of checking his watch. “Can we skip ahead to the part about Trevor? I have a seminar to deliver.”
“We’ve got your class covered,” Dean Altman informed him, and Stone stopped short. He tapped his fingers on the table and regarded the lawyer as if seeing her for the first time.
“What’s she doing here?” he asked.
“Observing,” she replied, looking up from her notes.
“The thing is,” Reed said to Ellery, “the earrings aren’t that expensive. They look like they could be pricey, but these are mass-produced and probably retailed for around a hundred dollars.” She knew this. They had already discussed the whole case in detail, so this conversation was for Ethan Stone’s benefit. “They’re essentially costume jewelry, well made as such—enough to fool someone young or without a lot of experience with fine jewels.”
“That would be me,” Ellery agreed. “I’m surprised you can tell so much just from this picture.”
“Oh, I can’t.” Reed withdrew another piece of paper. “The insurance company had them appraised. See?”
Stone stretched his neck out like a turtle to see what Reed had handed to Ellery. “What’s that?”