Chapter 7: The Security Log Paradox
Vance walked slowly toward them, his heavy boots crunching faintly on the gravel paths beneath the staging trays. He pulled a small digital tablet from his overcoat pocket, tapping the screen twice before turning it toward Ethan and Julian. The low light of the conservatory illuminated the high-contrast grayscale image.
The timestamp in the corner read 11:58 PM. The grainy photograph showed a slender figure in a dark, high-collared coat walking away from the open front door toward the sweeping staircase. The hood was pulled low, casting the face in deep shadow, but the distinctive silver-handled cane resting in the person's left hand was unmistakable. It was Eleanor’s cane—the one carved from polished ebony with a silver falcon’s head handle.
"Mrs. Vance told me she hadn't left her bedroom since nine o'clock last evening," Vance said, his eyes fixed on Ethan’s face. "Yet her private cane and her physical security override were used at midnight to open the front door for someone. Or perhaps to let someone out."
Ethan looked at the tablet, feeling a cold numbness spread outward from his chest. "Where is Eleanor now?"
"She’s in the drawing-room with two officers, waiting for me to finish my sweep of the lower level," Vance replied, pocketing the tablet. "Mr. Vance, your flight logs check out. You were in London. But you arrived back here with a fierce need to know what happened to your wife, almost as if you already suspected her death wasn't natural. Why is that?"
Ethan hesitated. If he produced the black leather ledger now, he would implicate Julian in the embezzlement scheme, effectively destroying the entire family and giving Vance an open-and-shut motive for a violent family dispute. But if he stayed silent, he risked being framed as an accessory to a cover-up engineered by his own mother-in-law.
"My wife and I spoke every evening, Detective," Ethan said carefully, choosing his words with surgical precision. "She mentioned feeling uneasy about the estate's accounting discrepancies. When I heard she had fallen down the stairs, my instincts told me it wasn't a coincidence."
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Vance studied him for a long moment, his gaze sharp and analytical. "Instincts are useful in business, Mr. Vance, but in homicide investigations, we rely on physical evidence. And right now, every piece of physical evidence points inward."
As Vance turned to walk back toward the main house, Julian grabbed Ethan’s arm, his fingers digging in with desperate urgency. "We have to find the rest of the ledger pages. If Eleanor realizes we have the financial records, she’ll pin the whole thing on us before the sun comes up."
