As a connaisseur of old murder mystery novels Harris was very pleased that Reginald suggested a more suitable room for the final reveal. The sun was already sinking over Gundersson Island, so the fireplace in the very traditional drawing room was lit, making it warm and cozy. The Wallace family and some of their closest friends were present, sitting on vintage furniture that looked like it came straight from the mansion of an English nobleman. Reginald had delivered a round of drinks to everyone - it would help ease the tension a bit. Even Harris took a glass of brandy, though he only took a tiny sip before resting it on a side table in the corner of the room. To his relief Mia Wallace, who was technically still under age, was only drinking ginger ale.
Before he would even begin to speak, he took another look in everyone's face, waiting for them to react to his look, trying to confirm his own feelings about the case. Sometimes the look of a detective can reveal a lot in someone else's face. As usual, Gordon had positioned himself near the door, covering the only exit from this room, just in case things turned ugly. He also didn't drink anything. Reginald stood next to him to be of service if someone needed anything. Harris counted the faces in his head. Callum. Arthur and Marie. Mia. Ocean Creed. Alex Aswell. He hadn't invited the Gilmours to this little meeting, for good reason.
"Ladies and gentlemen," Harris finally spoke. "I thank you all for gathering here. I am aware that this is a difficult time for each and every one of you, so I will try and be brief." During his deliberate pause, he looked at them again, very closely, as he continued: "The good news is that we finally made progress. In fact, we are certain that we have identified the murderer of Anna Wallace."
Those words caused the reaction he had expected. Some of them looked relieved, some of them distrustful. And one of them... exactly the person he was counting on... tried to hide their feelings in that matter.
It would have been a cliché to announce that the murderer was here in this very room, especially with that décor of the drawing room surrounding them and everyone sipping from fancy glasses like it was the 1920s again. Harris fought the urge to do so. Instead he said: "I'm not sure if you are aware of this, but an hour ago we had an incident with one of the hotel staff members..."
"It was that butcher guy, wasn't it?" Alex Aswell readily jumped in. "I knew he was looking suspicious."
Harris turned to him, raising an eyebrow. "Indeed, Mr. Aswell. We identified him as Dustin Hawkins, and he had a history with Mrs. Anna Wallace. Unfortunately... he won't be able to answer to this anymore."
He even could hear Gordon flinch behind him at those words. "So..." Mia spoke up coyly. "He was the killer then?"
Harris shook his head. "I'm afraid not."
There was no point in drawing it out any further. He presented the evidence that they had found so far. The items were put in small seethrough bags. Luckily the hotel staff members who had found them hadn't left any fingerprints themselves. As he dropped the bags onto the table in the middle of the room, he heard a collective gasp.
Ocean Creed had focused on one item in particular. "Is this the murder weapon?" he asked, pointing at the syringe in the bag.
"I think you would know that, sir," Harris suggested with a sharp undertone. "Better than any of us."
A brief moment of dead silence, only interrupted by the crackling of the fireplace. "What is that supposed to mean?" Creed asked with anger in his voice. "What are you implying?"
"We found this in a trash bin in front of your hotel room. In the corridor where the security camera is disabled for some reason. Next to these." Harris pointed at the other bag which had a pair of blue latex gloves in it.
He felt the tension in the room rise. And he was not the only one. Marie Wallace downed her glass of cognac in one swift move and placed it on the table again. Reginald, as the always caring host, stepped forward and took the glass to refill it. But Harris' attention rested with the best man - who in this moment leaned back with his arms crossed. "That is circumstantial evidence at best, detective, and you know it. Anyone could have put those in the bin. It's not like I'm the only person who uses this corridor."
"True," Harris admitted. "Though you might wanna explain what you were actually doing before the body was discovered. Because your whereabouts at the time of the murder are not exactly clear."
"I was in my room," Creed answered calmly. "I forgot my notes for the speech, and I had to clean up my shirt as I spilled some booze on it."
"Will that explain what happened to your handkerchief?" Harris pointed at the breast pocket of Creed's suit which was empty. "The white handkerchief? Which has been absent since the murder?"
"I left it in my room." The calmness of the best man had suffered a little by now. His forehead was gleaming from sweat. He could have used this handkerchief by now.
"In your room?" Harris inquired. "Or as a gag in Anna Gilmour's mouth?"
His train of thought was slightly interrupted by an electronic clicking sound, as Gordon took a photo with his phone. Damn, he could at least turn this sound off, he thought, trying to get back on track. Luckily he didn't have to. Callum picked up on it pretty quick.
"No!" he uttered breathlessly. "Tell me you didn't do this!"
"I did not!" Creed defended himself. "Why would I kill the wife of my best friend?"
"You told me that this wedding would be the biggest mistake of my life," Callum confronted him. "You told me that I would throw my life away for some business venture. That I would only marry her for her family's money."
"And you convinced me otherwise," Creed returned coldly, only to be shot back by the groom:
"You were jealous because I was happy with Anna."
Another brief moment of silence. Nobody else got involved in this discussion. They just listened and waited for the outcome. Creed and Callum stared each other down, almost as if there was a duel taking place between them. It was Creed who then caved in.
"Yes," he admitted. "I was." He looked down on his feet, not daring to look Callum in the eyes anymore. "I never thought I would feel this way - all my life I was convinced that money is everything I need to be happy. That I live the best life possible. Until I saw you and Anna." He looked up again. "But I swear to you, I didn't kill her. I wouldn't do this to my best friend."
"Not even if it meant preventing me from making a mistake?" Callum scoffed. "Because you always think you know better than anyone else."
"Well..." Harris decided it was the right moment to interrupt. "This can be settled quite easily. Mr Creed, would you please hand over your glass to Mr St. Claire here?" He gave Reginald a sign, and the concierge stepped forward. With a puzzled look on his face, Ocean Creed did as he was told. Reginald took the glass from his hand. Now everyone saw that the concierge was wearing gloves of his own.
"This will only take a minute," Gordon declared from his place as he received the glass from Reginald and dusted it with powder. Another click from the phone as he took a photo. Another few seconds during which nobody in the room even dared to breathe loudly. Another few moments of absolute silence in which Harris attentively examined everyone's face. Again, his suspicions were confirmed.
"We have a match," Gordon announced. "The fingerprints on the glass match the ones inside the gloves."
The calmness, coolness of Ocean Creed had found its end. "No!" he uttered desperately. "This isn't possible!"
"You bastard..." Callum hissed between clenched teeth and was already half standing from his seat when Harris put a hand on his sidearm. "Mr. Wallace, please sit and calm down! Losing your temper is not going to solve anything."
"You just caught this asshole with evidence that he killed Anna!" Callum yelled. Mia almost dropped her glass as she covered her ears.
"Son, you need to calm down," Arthur tried to soothe him. "Let the detective finish!" Marie next to her husband said nothing.
"This will be really difficult for you, Mr. Wallace," Harris explained to Callum. Then he looked back at Gordon. "Is it like we expected?"
"I'm afraid so," Gordon confirmed.
"But I didn't do it!" Creed's voice was that of a man who hung from a cliff by a single thread. "I didn't kill her."
"They have your fingerprints, you son of a..." Callum's angry shout was again interrupted by Harris.
"No, Mr. Wallace. Not his fingerprints." He pointed at another person in the room. "Hers."
His index finger pointed like a gun at Marie Wallace.
He could see the gears clicking in her head, the realization happening from heartbeat to heartbeat... the moment when Reginald had picked up her empty glass without prompting. The glass that she hadn't received back yet. The clicking of Gordon's camera app just a minute ago, like he did with Creed's glass.
"Mum?" Callum's anger was gone. He was white as a sheet. "That... can't be true." Arthur and Mia stared at the lady, shocked and in disbelief like him.
All the while Marie Wallace stared back into Harris McNeill's eyes. Standing her ground, facing the music. Nothing else around her seemed to exist. "You dare accuse me of coldblooded murder in front of my husband and my children?" Her voice had a snaring, dangerous tone to it. "And without any solid proof? Because those gloves could be mine, but they could have been used for anything. What makes you think this could connect me to the murder?"
"Oh, the gloves were just the final confirmation I needed," Harris explained. "I had my suspicions about you when you were completely absent from the allergic food reaction of your mother Gwendolyne. While everyone else was at the restaurant, and she ate something that she clearly shouldn't have - and you could have prevented that."
"I needed some time alone after the wedding," Marie explained coldly. "There is nothing wrong about it."
"That's true," Harris answered. "But it got me thinking. And I did some research. Like you are actually qualified to render medical assistance and often take care of your mother, like with her insulin injections. As a matter of fact, we found the same kind of latex gloves and another syringe among several kinds of medicine in your luggage."
"You searched our luggage?" Arthur bristled at this, but Mia and Callum were just staring at their mother, still refusing to believe what they were hearing. "This is outrageous!"
Marie shook her head gently. "Dear detective McNeill, if you found a syringe in my luggage, then why do you think the one in the trash is also mine? Why would I carry two syringes?"
Harris smiled at her. "As a woman who has a lot of experience taking care of family and loved ones, you tend to keep spares of everything important. You even kept a spare handkerchief for your son's attire - the one you used to muffle Anna Gilmour's screams when you murdered her."
"But..." For once Mia tried to defend her mother. "She was with me. She made me change my clothes after the wedding. I mean... she was all for the wedding to begin with."
"Yes, your change of clothes," Harris remembered. "That was another piece of the puzzle. Because while we could not see the entrance to your parents' hotel room, Miss Wallace, we could clearly see yours. And you entered your room alone - carrying the set of clothes that you are wearing right now. So your mother must have given you those while you were in her room. You changed, went down to the restaurant and were running into your brother - while she was still absent. When did you see her again?"
"I saw her..." Mia pondered for a moment. Her eyes widened as she realized it. She became a little pale. "After Sera told us about the body."
"You weren't there to help Grandma Gwen," Callum added. "The vicar had to save her. I didn't see you at all."
With a flash of anger in her eyes Marie looked at her son. "Callum, dear, a minute ago you were convinced that your best friend killed your bride. And now you just believe anything this two-bit detective tells you? He's just out for a paycheck, you know? I have no reason to kill Anna - I wanted this wedding to happen."
"That's right!" Mia confirmed eagerly. "She went out of her way to make sure everything was perfect and nothing disturbed the ceremony."
"Then what made you change your mind?" The question came from Harris in a soft, but cold way. "I would ask if it was your plan all along, but it wasn't. You wouldn't have raided the janitor's closet and used the drain cleaner if it had all been planned from the start."
"Detective, you go too far!" Arthur involved himself in this. His face reddened more and more by the minute. "You can't just go around and accuse my wife of such terrible things without anything but purely circumstantial evidence and assumptions. I will not stand for that."
"Neither will I." Callum had raised from his seat again, but now facing Harris, his hands clenched into fists. "Why would we believe any of this? Maybe you are not smart enough to solve this case, and now you go for a scapegoat, so you can get paid for it. If you were a real cop..."
"I was a cop," Harris responded, turning his attention towards Callum. "And believe me, I follow the ethics of police work as closely as any cop would. If I were a cop, however, you and your family would all be in custody under suspicion of conspiracy to murder."
"What the...?" Callum squinched his eyes, but Harris wasn't finished.
"Now that you have taken the vow and signed the according papers, you stand to inherit some substantial property, don't you?"
If nothing else had caused a reaction, this implication did. With a mad grunt Callum swung his fist, aiming for the face of the older detective. But he missed - Harris had seen the punch coming and dodged it with a quickness nobody would have expected from him. Callum hit empty air, his furious attack made him lose his balance. Before he could swing at Harris again, Creed was on his feet, holding him back. "You bastard!" Callum yelled, completely losing it. "You miserable old fuck!" He struggled to get out of Creed's hold, so Arthur jumped in and helped holding him back.
"Calm down!" he urged his son. "It's not worth it."
"Then what the bloody hell is?" Callum's angry shouts filled the room and were probably audible outside of it as well. Harris worriedly glanced at the door, expecting someone to at least ask what the commotion was. But nothing like this happened - the security outside the door would certainly prevent that. "He comes here and starts accusing anyone who gets in his way, and now he says that I married Anna for her money! That is a bloody awful thing to say to someone who just lost the love of his life."
"Stop it! All of you!" Marie's voice with her no-nonsense attitude ended the fight in an instant and made everyone stand down - showing the authority of a woman who had brought up three children. "Callum, you sit down right now, young man, or else!"
As quickly as things had erupted, they ied down again. The groom finally stopped struggling against the other two men and allowed himself to take his seat again. While Arthur and Creed stayed on their feet, Marie stepped forward, making sure that she had Harris' full attention. "Detective," she said in a raspy voice. "I love my children. All of them - despite what other people might say or think." The side glance she threw was meant for Mia - who avoided eye contact with her.
Harris waited patiently for her to continue, so she did: "Please leave my family out of this! They had nothing to do with it. This was my decision, and it is my responsibility."
"Mum, you..." Mia's protest was cut off by another of Marie's glances. As the mother turned her face back to Harris, he could see a single tear blinking in the corner of her left eye.
"Do you have children, Mr McNeill? Do you know the lengths parents will go to ensure that they will lead the best life possible? The sacrifices they are willing to make to achieve that?"
Harris shook his head. "No, ma'am."
"Then how could you possibly comprehend why I did it?" She ignored the gasps and the horrified looks of the people around her. "How could you understand that I couldn't allow my son to suffer from a miserable marriage with a shallow woman who nearly killed his own sister out of stupidity?" She looked at Mia who just listened with her eyes and mouth wide open. "Yes, Mia, I listened to you. And I realized that I was wrong to push for that wedding - that my daughter-in-law was a careless, self-centered person who was no good for my son. She ran over Molly with her car, and even now she acts like nothing ever happened. I hoped that her family would at least help us pay the medical bills once Callum had married her. But... we would have lost Callum to this ditzy girl, and that is too high a price."
The others had gone very quiet. Nobody else spoke a word as they heard the confession. Marie addressed Callum: "My boy, you don't even realize it, do you? You have changed. Since you've known her, you have become a different person - but not for the better. I saw how she treated you - you may have seen her as your equal, but she did not. You were just another toy for her to play with - someone to brag about in front of those other shallow girls she called her friends. Just another conquest for someone who never hears a No and always gets what she wants. Had I not done what I did... you would have lost your soul."
"Mum!" Callum's voice broke as he spoke up. "Anna had nothing to do with Molly's accident. She had an alibi."
"Oh, Callum!" Marie sighed. "She made you believe that. She played you - with her friends and her money, she had no trouble finding someone who would step up and give her an alibi. You need to see it..."
"No, Mum!" Callum shook his head. His entire body was shaking. "I am her alibi. The night when Molly got hit by that car, she was with me the whole time."
The fireplace crackled gently as the flames consumed the logs of wood and turned them into ash. It was the only sound in the drawing room for a very long time.