Million Dollar Murder

• Jarin Bahar, Grade 8
• Poetry
• 2008

Hotel Valliant was known for its good reputation, from as far as Detective Lenor knew. A murder was probably the least likely thing expected to happen. The thing that puzzled him even more was not only the place, but the victim. Mr. Jonathan Caraki was not a bad man, from what Lenor could tell. Caraki was extremely rich but at the same time quiet. Not many people came to his acquaintance and those who did, were very well known and rich. Lenor tried to think things over in his head as he sat comfortably in the armchair in his apartment. So far, all he basically knew was the victim’s name, the fact that Caraki was in room 14 of the hotel and a few facts about Caraki’s life. His thoughts wandered, but at that moment, he heard the jingling of keys and his assistant Tullen opened the door, grinning. “I’ve got a tape of the whole thing”, he held up a small package labeled “EVIDENCE”, “Mr. Caraki was a careful man. He had a security camera in almost every corner of his room.”
Lenor smiled, “You got this from the hotel?”
“Security officer at the registration centre gave it to me.”
Tullen put the tape in the VCR and they waited for it to start. A few minutes later, a faintly fuzzy image of Caraki appeared on the screen. He looked as though he was about to turn a light off when another figure appeared on screen. Judging by the shape of her body, Lenor could tell it was a woman, masked, and in her hands was a gun. Caraki looked shocked. He was saying something to the murderess, and then screaming something. Lenor could barely believe his eyes, the man was pleading with what seemed like forgiveness. The murderess gave an odd movement that resembled a laugh, and then it was all over. Caraki was shot in the chest; the murderess threw the gun out of an open window and hurried away. The screen blackened out, indicating the end. Tullen quietly ejected the tape and put it back in the package. Silence unraveled itself between the two friends. Lenor was the one who broke the silence, “I think we should study Mr. Caraki’s relationships with other people more than any other thing. I’ll go through some magazines; you can search on the computer.” Both men went to either side of the apartment and began work. All that could be heard was the clicking and typing of the computer, and flicking of the pages. Not a word was exchanged from the two men until morning.
Morning came soon enough. When it did, Detective Lenor found Tullen slouched over the keyboard of the computer. A small pile of printed sheets lay crisply at his side. Lenor silently cheered his friend for the small victory but shook him anyhow. “Wake up my friend!! It is morning! We have suspects to interview, clues to discover and-”
Tullen got out a hand to cover his friend’s mouth with and made his way to the bathroom.
Half an hour later, Lenor drove his assistant and himself to the scene of the crime, Hotel Valliant. Both were very excited but nervous. As soon as they entered the hotel, several police officers frog marched them to room 14. Lenor was slightly confused but Tullen took him aside to make a brief suggestion. “I’ve been here before. Remember the tape? Anyway... Caraki’s body is in this room, room 14. I’ll do a frisk search on the body and search the grounds for any sign of the gun we saw on tape. You can go to rooms 13 and 15, the people who live on either side of Caraki. They’re our main suspects. I-”, a police man gestured for Tullen to enter the “DANGER DO NOT ENTER ZONE” and before Tullen could offer any other suggestions, he was gone. Lenor walked to room 13 which was opened by an attractive, middle aged woman with a thick Mexican accent, “Ahhh....You must be zee detective. Si?” Lenor nodded and entered the room. A young boy, looking roughly around the age 8 was standing by a sofa, crying. As soon as he saw Lenor look at him, he ran to a different room.
Lenor sat on a stool nearby and began at once with his questions. He did not like to beat around the bush, as that made things more complicated, “Your name madam?”
“Luciana Gracienno”, she answered promptly.
“You are here in Australia because.......?”
“...Holiday. My son Alex vanted to come here.”
“I see. You know there has been a murder?”
“Ovcourse! All zees police iz coming because of zis murder!!”
Lenor smiled and nodded. He made another little note in his notepad, “Do you know anything about this murder other than the fact that police are involved? Like when the murder was?” His voice had a slight hint of humour in it but Ms. Gracienno did not realise. She thought for a moment, and then shook her head, “Ah non! I do not know when. Vaz it morning or night? I do not know”
Lenor gave a nod of understanding, and then continued with his questions, “I believe a very suspicious Miss Guilder accompanies room 15? Do you have any knowledge about this woman? What type of person she is? Her identity? Job?”
Ms. Gracienno gave a disappointed shake of the head, “I am sorry but all I know iz zat she came last night.”
Lenor was very interested with this piece of information, “Last night? Hmmm.... That is very interesting.” He scribbled furiously on his notepad. Then looked up again at Ms. Gracienno
“One last question, Ms. Gracienno, where were you at the time of the murder?”
“I vaz viz Alex. He had a stomach pain.”
Lenor made a note in his pad and then got up to leave, “I thank you very much my dear. Have a nice day and give my salutations to Alex.” With that he left the room and made his way to room 15, Miss Guilder’s.
Lenor considered Miss. Guilder a very friendly woman. Her skin was slightly wrinkled and her hair seemed light but she was only a few years older than Ms. Gracienno. She winked at Lenor, “I see your taking my appearance in. I was a very beautiful girl once you know. Stupid, but beautiful all the same.” She undid the tight bun in which her hair was encased. Lenor gasped. Locks of rich, golden strands of hair were staring at him and he reconsidered his opinion.
Lenor felt his cheeks redden and decided it was a good time to start the questions, “Miss Guilder, your full name please.”
She frowned with surprise, “You are questioning me?? Hmm... Anyway, I’m Florence Roselle Guilder.”
Lenor gave a cough of impatience. He had not time for jokes “You are here because...?”
“I needed a break from the office”, she frowned harder, the puzzled expression not leaving her face.
“Do you know anything about the murder?”
“No, Jesus Christ! No! There was a murder???” a look of horror spread on her face. “I knew nothing, you see I only arrived at dark and barely had time to sleep.”
Lenor nodded and finally understood the woman’s surprise “A man called Jonathan Caraki was killed last night. I am detective Lenor.” He expected her to look relieved and anything but frightened or nervous.
Her face was pale and her eyes huge with what seemed an intense fear, “Caraki got killed...? You-”, her voice was shaking with emotion, “You’re a detective? So that means your going to try and figure this all out?”
Lenor nodded.
“Oh!”
Lenor stood up to leave, “It was a pleasure to meet you Miss. Guilder. Goodbye.”
Tullen half ran to Lenor as soon as he had stepped out of room 15.
“Lenor! You won’t believe it!! My biggest find! On his body!! A mess-”
Lenor pulled Tullen to the car and they drove to their apartment and talked along the way. “So Tullen, you have found a little something for me?”
“Possibly our biggest clue. Caraki had something written on his hand. A message that the police staff and I think was written in his dying moments. The word “garden”. It looked like he was going to write something else because of this odd squiggle near the “n” For some unusual reason we couldn’t find the source of which he wrote it in. The pen, or whatever it was, wasn’t anywhere around his body.”
Lenor just nodded silently and soon they arrived at their apartment.
It was still day and Lenor decided to go through some of the sheets Tullen had printed out, hoping that the clue Tullen had just discovered would lead to any help.
“Mr. Caraki had three wives, Lenor”, Tullen flicked through some printed pages, “The first two died. Both very rich people, leaving Caraki the owner of billions of dollars. Oh my god!! It’s rumoured that he killed them! He seemed a little more desperate and married a third wife who was an actress. His third wife was the sister of his second wife!! Now both Caraki and his third wife are guardians of a child. His second wife’s child. Jeez!”
Lenor chucked, “Interesting. A very tangled love life, I must say! He was rumoured to have killed his previous wives??” Lenor shuddered “what people do for money nowadays!” Both men flicked through more pages of information silently. Minutes crawled by.
Two hours later, Lenor was down to the last sheet and still had found nothing related to gardens. He was exhausted and merely skimmed the last page. But a skim was all it needed and two words stood out to him. “Caraki’s” and “Gardener”. He was completely alert now and made sure he read every letter of the page. He stood up and turned to Tullen. “Do you remember everything I had told you about Miss. Guilder?”
Tullen nodded.
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Tullen frowned “How does Miss. Guilder get caught up in this?”
Lenor gave a triumphant smile, “The gardener was famous for her beautiful golden hair.

One hour later, Miss. Guilder of room 15 had been arrested.
“I’m innocent!!!” she screamed. “You have no proof! You are a cruel man for inflicting something I did not do on me!!”
“I have proof Miss. Guilder.” Lenor answered calmly as two police struggled with her attempts to escape. “You are the gardener Caraki had a long time ago. You, as a form of revenge killed Mr. Jonathan Caraki last night. All clues point to you.”
Miss Guilder hung her head as several police tried shoving her away. Tears were seeping out of her eyes, “It wasn’t me. I swear on the cross. I was the gardener but I did not know Johnny-y” She burst into hysterical sobs which softened as the police officers dragged her to the car.
Lenor watched sadly and looked around Ms. Gracienno was there, a sympathetic face, with Alex, who kept nervously looking up at his mum and squeezing her hand for comfort. All of a sudden, Lenor felt very uncomfortable and knew something was wrong. Something just didn’t fit in. And then it clicked. He gasped and ran forward to the shrieking lady who was being forced into the car. He ignored the confused and shocked expressions Tullen and Ms. Gracienno wore. Lenor knew, at that very moment, small details he had overlooked, how stupid he was! “STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING!!”
The police officers stopped, not with obedience but with surprise. The man who had been kicked in the shins by Miss Guilder was very irritated, “Sir, this woman must be taken to the station at once.”
Lenor looked the man in the eye angrily, “No. She will not.” At that moment, Tullen and Ms. Gracienno as well as a few police and security guards appeared.
“What is the meaning of this Lenor?” Tullen asked
Lenor took the lady away from harm’s way and told the small crowd, “This woman I have accused is innocent.”
Miss Guilder’s eyes welled up in tears Lenor could not tell if anger or gratitude, but continued, “This woman is, or I should say was in the acquaintance of Mr. Caraki. She was his gardener.”
Everybody nodded.
“She has a strong motive but it was pure coincidence that Caraki’s gardener was in the same hotel.”
“But-”, Tullen looked confused. His voice was shaking with anticipation “If Miss. Guilder didn’t kill Caraki...... Who did?”
Lenor smiled “There are many things that I didn’t notice, or rather, I did notice but did not pay attention to them.”
Every face in the small crowd around him was shining with eagerness and fear. “When I interviewed Ms. Gracienno-”
Ms. Gracienno gave a weak cough and a feeble scowl.
Lenor continued, “I had asked her near the beginning of my interview, if she knew anything about the murder other than the fact that police were involved. She had told me she did not. The last question I gave her was where she had been at the time of the murder. She told me she was with her son”
Alex gave a small whimper
“If Ms. Gracienno really had no idea of the crime, how could she tell me where she was at the time? Actually, none of the police staff or I are even sure when the murder took place but she could tell me where she was, with her son.”
Alex shuddered and even his mother could not comfort him. The small crowd of people seemed not convinced, so Lenor continued the story.
“Should I still call you Ms. Gracienno?” he leaned forward and the woman gasped “Ms. Gracienno is not who she says she is. She is not Mexican, did not come here for a holiday and...” Lenor turned to the little boy who was now crying, “She is not the mother of.....Thomas”
Tullen gasped, “But of course!!”
“Ms. Gracienno is a character, make-believe character in a very famous film, “Si, it is I”. It is an extremely popular film played by a very extraordinary actress.”
Ms. Gracienno closed her eyes.
“What? Don’t you think she is, Ms. Caraki#3?”
Everybody gasped as silent tears poured down Ms. Caraki’s eyes.
“Yes, this woman is none other than Ms. Caraki, the third wife of Mr. Jonathan Caraki, lead actress in “Si it is I”, the aunt of this young boy, Thomas and the person not only responsible for the death of Caraki, but also the word on his hand. Of course, she either threw away or pocketed the pen as it would have her fingerprints all over it. Her motive was quite simple. She merely wanted to kill the man who had killed her sister!”
Three police got hold of Ms. Caraki and she was taken away with the young Thomas, sobbing on his hands as he followed. Lenor looked pityingly on the two and turned to Miss. Guilder, who by now, had recovered from her previous shock and was trying to recover from another. “Please forgive my extremely foolish accusation to you my good lady, I am very sorry.” He hung his head but the kind lady chuckled, patted him on the back and made her way back to the hotel.
Tullen clapped his friend on the back and they both exchanged looks of triumph.
“Do you think we’ll get a medal?”
“We should, or there may be another murder coming on.”
Both men grinned and followed Miss. Guilder to the hotel.