Chapter 14. Suspect List Narrows

As soon as the board members are gathered around the dining room table for the following Wednesday’s session Pam asks, “Sam, did you call Professor Tidwell? Did you learn anything about his possible connection with the pioneer letters?”

“Yes, I called him. I asked if George had given him a tour. He said George gave him a brief tour. I asked if George showed him any of our letter collections. He said yes and he is interested in studying them. I asked if he had been back. He said no, he planned to come back in the summer but got too busy. He decided to wait until the letter collections are digitized and he can have access to digital copies. Then I asked if he knew Brother Thomas. He said only by their phone conversation. Brother Thomas contacted him to see if CMU had any collections of letters from pioneers on America’s frontiers. He told Brother Thomas CMU had a couple of collections of such letters that were donated to the university’s library. He had used them in his research so he was able to describe them in some detail to Brother Thomas. Brother Thomas asked if he could have access to the letters for research for his dissertation. Brother Thomas told Professor Tidwell that he was using our collection. but Sturgeonville is so far from Lansing it makes his research difficult to complete on time. He said since Mount Pleasant is much closer to him he would be able to go there more often than he could come here. Professor Tidwell told Brother Thomas CMU’s letters are digitized and he access the digital copies online. He gave Brother Thomas instructions on how to access the letters and that’s the last they talked. Professor Tidwell sounded sincere to me so I think neither he nor Brother Thomas has any motive to steal our letters, or to kill George for that matter.”

Pam replies, “I agree, Sam. Your conversation with Professor Tidwell does eliminate both of them as possible suspects. Mary, were you able to get Lois Taylor’s fingerprints?”

“Yes, I brought a printout of her prints,” Mary replied as she hands Pam a sheet of paper.

“Thank you, Mary. Now let’s see if we have a match to the unknown print from the file drawer and Buddy Ericsson’s file folder.”

Pam gets the magnifying glass and compares Lois Taylor’s fingerprints with the unknown prints. The rest of the board members hover over her expectantly for the four or five minutes that she takes in her careful comparison. Finally Sam can’t wait and says, “Well, Pam, do we have a match?”

Pam answers, “Yes, I am confident the unknown print is Lois Taylor’s.”

Peter says, “Now we have solid evidence that Lois Taylor must have taken her file and probably killed George to cover it up.”

“Don’t jump to too many conclusions, Peter. We now know Lois touched the file drawer and Buddy’s folder but that’s all we can prove. The rest is speculation,” Pam replies.

Peter states, “It may be speculation but what other explanation can it be?”

“I agree, Peter but we have to think this through carefully. Lois may tell a different story and we can’t refute it,” Pam says.

Joe offers, “Let’s examine some ‘what if’s’. Maybe we can think of a way to trap Lois into confessing, or determine she isn’t the killer.”

Pam states, “Good idea, Joe, we need a plan and that may give us one.”

“What if we just confront her with the fact of our finding her fingerprint?” Peter asks.

Pam answers, “If she’s guilty she will have made up a plausible story. She could say she needed her old medical file for her current doctor. She asked George for it and he asked her to come and help him find it. They found it, she took it and George was fine when she left. Since she would know the time he was killed she can say she came and left hours earlier.”

Peter interjects, “But how can she explain the file drawer being wiped for prints?”

 “She could say she got something on the file and wiped it to clean it,” Joe offers.

Pam says, “It’s too hard to confront her by phone. We need a story to get her here. A story that is plausible but doesn’t warn her we suspect her.”

Mary says, “If we can do that aren’t we still stuck with needing a way to get her to confess or at least to connect her to the murder some way?”

Pam answers, “Yes, Mary, we need something to surprise her with.”

Joe says, “Didn’t the sheriff withhold details about the killing that only the killer and we know about?”

“Oh, you’re right, Joe. He told us not to mention George being found on top of the elevator. Outside of the sheriff and us only the killer knows that,” Pam replies.

“Wouldn’t that be in the medical examiner’s report?” asks Sam.

“Good point, Sam. Mary, would you be able to read the medical examiner’s report?” asks Pam.

“Yes, I can and so can some of the others working in the Court House.”

“I think the chances of others being interested enough to read the report is pretty small. Why don’t you check it tomorrow?” asks Pam.”

“Okay, I will.”

Joe says, “Suppose we ask Lois Taylor to come to the museum the next time she is in our area. We can tell her we are almost ready to open the museum to the public. We might say we want to make her visit publicity for the museum and to promote her candidacy for governor.”

Pam answers, “If we asked her to come for a tour to see what the museum offers before attending the public open house it might get her here alone. We need to think of how to make it even more appealing to her.”

Mary offers, “If we tell her we have come across some copies of her old medical records and think she should have them she might come for sure if her records contained what we think they do.”

Pam replies, “Now we’re getting closer to bait she can’t resist. Let’s continue to think while we do our regular work tonight. We can compare our thoughts before we go home.”

When they gather in the dining room before going home Pam says, “I went through the rest of the doc’s desk to see if there was anything else that George might have put there as he did with her phone call reminders. And guess what? I found the missing collection of pioneer letters in one of the bottom drawers. It looks like we were right when we thought George left them someplace after using them during one of the tours he conducted. He probably intended to put them back where they belonged but forgot. I wish we had found them earlier, it would have saved us from suspecting Brother Thomas and Professor Tidwell.”

“What a relief that you found them,” Sam exclaims.

 Then Pam continues “Did anyone think of more ideas for getting Lois Taylor here?’

 Mary says, “I have an even better idea than claiming we found copies of her medical records. She might be suspicious about there being copies. A better claim is Maxine’s notes in the old appointment book. Lois can’t know what Maxine might have written but I’ll bet she’ll remember Maxine’s behavior. I can’t imagine Maxine didn’t telegraph what she thought of Lois’s relationship with the doctor.

Pam replies, “Good idea, Mary. As we discussed earlier we can make claims about the appointment book since she doesn’t know what’s in it. Let’s think about that approach carefully over the next week. We have to consider a lot of possibilities before we settle on our plan.”

“That approach can be made to get her here, although it will make her suspicious and on guard if we aren’t careful how we present it. We still need a plan to entrap her or to get her to confess,” Joe says.

“That gives us some more things to think about over the week. Let’s go home, we’ve made some real progress tonight by eliminating all suspects except Lois and learning the unknown fingerprint is hers,” Pam says.