Page 54 of One Last Goodbye

"Hugo arrived Monday, the day after you arrived, right?"

“Yes.”

“Well, on Friday the prior weekend, he lost fifteen thousand dollars betting on horse and cart races in Brussels. Then he spent ten thousand dollars on first class travel to Geneva.Fast forward to Monday, he arrives at the Jensen’s house. On Tuesday, Frederick Jensen wires forty thousand dollars to his account.”

I blink. “Tuesday?”

“Yes. Let me check something. I’ll call you back.”

He hangs up, and I stand stock still, trying to process this new information.

Frederick didn’t refuse to pay Hugo’s debts? But if that’s true, then Hugo would have no reason to kill him. Well, there’s Catherine, but if he had Catherine’s affection anyway and Frederick was still paying for his lifestyle, then it wouldn’t make sense.

But… he ran off. Isn’t that as good as a confession?

Because you accused him of murder!

Catherine’s voice echoes through my head, along with her stifled jab at my intelligence.

I hate it, but she could be right. He was accused of murder, and his association with Catherine makes him seem very suspicious. It wasn’t wise of him to run into the snow, but he was probably not thinking clearly—guilty or not.

Have I ruined an innocent man’s life?

If not him, though, then who?

I turn and head back the way I came. I’m not sure where I’m going, but I need to move, and I’m no longer convinced that a threat waits for me outside those doors.

But… it seemed so right.

Just like Strauss seemed so right.

A kernel of doubt—or perhaps of understanding—grows in my mind. Sophie is the one who tells me of Doctor Strauss. She hands me notes that she admits to stealing. I am all too ready to believe that Strauss is responsible for driving Frederick to suicide, but when I confront her, I learn that she was talking to the children when he was killed. In fact, she seems to showa great deal of care to the children when she's here. She makes a point to talk to each of them each time she visits. And those notes Sophie gives me are mundane. Everything he confesses in those notes he has also confessed to Catherine, or at least not hidden from her. He's well known to be a rake. Thomas even mentions it, so it's not like he was hiding his reputation from his office. Hell, he was parading his secretary around like a trophy.

And as for Hugo… why wouldn’t she mention his debts earlier? That seems like even more damning evidence than her suspicion of blackmail. Why would she wait until after it was proven that Strauss and Veronica were both innocent? I can believe that she also mistrusted Strauss because I had the same prejudice, but why wouldn’t she have told me both pieces of evidence?

I can’t believe that Sophie is lying to me, but…

But it’s starting to seem like she is. Even before Strauss, she was the one who told me that Catherine and Frederick fought. She told me that Frederick was cheating and that Catherine resented him. She told me that even before Frederick’s death. That was the source of my suspicion of Catherine, a suspicion that lingered throughout my investigation.

These are all suspicions that could be arrived at simply by being nosy or by having worked with them for so long, but…

But she knew I was investigating the case. She claimed to be helping me, but why didshenever step in or speak up? Why did she let me put myself at risk when she had this information all along and remained silent? I can’t believe it’s timidity. She handled Veronica Baines as though she were nothing more than one of the farm animals she grew up with. She scolded Frederick and Catherine to their faces, so I can’t believe she’s afraid of them.

My eyes go back to the night of Frederick’s death. Sophie is, in my experience, constantly in control of herself. But that night,she is frazzled and irritable. When I mention that Catherine has sent me to look for Frederick, she stares at me blankly, then grouses that she doesn’t know where she is. I never ask if she does, but she defends herself anyway.

Again, that could be explained by being stressed about the party, but…

I look up and realize that I’m standing in front of Frederick’s study. Just before I can enter, my phone buzzes again.

“Hello, Sean,” I say numbly.

“Yeah, I’ve confirmed it. I talked to Thomas Keller pretending to be Frederick’s banker and asked him about the transaction. He said that Frederick insisted on helping a friend even though it was more money than his friend needed. I don’t know if this changes things about Hugo, but he definitely didn’t cut the man off.”

I swallow thickly. “Thank you, Sean.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Get to the police station as fast as you can. I need you to tell Dubois everything we’ve been working on. We need to come clean to him and hope that we haven’t ruined everything.”

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