by Gwen Moffat
Edna smiled her fatuous smile and it reached her eyes, obscuring the intelligence. ‘Do I say something now?’
Miss Pink breathed deeply. ‘Byer could blackmail Val,’ she said, ‘because he thought it was she or Jen who had visited Charlie, but it was neither of them. It was you.’
‘I never went to the cabin,’ Edna said in a normal voice.
‘No, of course not. It was Bret who visited Charlie and drank his coffee, but Val didn’t know that when she found the mugs the following morning and washed them and the pot. She thought Jen had been there. But you weren’t there?’ Miss Pink considered this and nodded. ‘You could be speaking the truth’ — Edna’s eyes narrowed — ‘but it was immaterial to Byer. He didn’t know the truth but what he did know was dangerous. He tried blackmail on Val and it worked. And then he tried it on you? And you shot him with his own rifle.’
Edna was amused. ‘So I put him in the river and I left his truck there, and I called a cab to bring me home.’
‘Clyde helped. Maybe he —’
‘Clyde was fishing.’
‘He wasn’t. I’ve been talking to the barman at the hotel. Clyde called the bar asking for Russell that afternoon but it was already late; the barman remembers because the happy hour had begun. He overheard Pat Kramer tell Clyde that Russell was fishing. Clyde may well have started out for the Bobcats but he didn’t spend the afternoon at the Finger Lakes. Russell lied.’
‘So?’
‘Skinner knew about the blackmail because he and Byer were buddies, and Skinner wanted a piece of the action. He came here and demanded the silver horses as the price of his silence, and you caught up with him’ — Miss Pink checked, frowned, then went on firmly — ‘and put his body down the mine shaft. You collapsed the roof by pulling out the timber with a rope.’
Edna put her plump little hands on the table and showed the unmarked palms.
‘Your horse pulled it down,’ Miss Pink amended. ‘And you had to cut the rope because it was trapped under the baulk. I saw you. You didn’t see me.’
‘You saw me.’ It was quiet and flat. Edna topped up her own glass and looked in inquiry at Miss Pink, who shook her head. ‘It isn’t Skinner in the shaft,’ Edna said.
‘Who is it?’
‘No one. It’s my snuff boxes and the little scent bottles and stuff.’
‘What? Byer cached them there?’
‘He never stole them. I took them to incriminate him.’
‘But why put them down the mine? They’ll be smashed.’
‘If they were ever found it would be assumed Byer put them there — but they won’t be found. The police think Byer passed them to Skinner who took them to Seattle.’
Miss Pink stared. ‘You put the Wedgwood pieces in the creek — and the fragment in Byer’s house.’ She was so stunned that it had failed to register that the other was talking sensibly.
‘You have it basically right,’ Edna went on. ‘Where you went wrong was in thinking Clyde helped. You’re right: he did pick me up after I’d put Byer’s truck down there by the river, but he didn’t know what I’d done, why I was there, and since everyone thinks I’m senile, I didn’t have to tell him why, only to say I’d been wandering.’
‘That won’t work.’ Miss Pink was collecting her senses. ‘You must have told him because you had to impress on him that it was essential to provide himself with an alibi — fishing with Russell — so he had to know why one was needed.’
‘Only you and Russell know that.’
You old fox, Miss Pink thought. Aloud she said, ‘And Clyde had to help you put the body in the river. No way could you do that on your own.’
‘Impetus. Byer was shot on the Bear Creek bridge. I convinced him to walk out there because I said my Jeep had broken down, right there on the bridge. I shot him with his own rifle and hoisted him over the rail. He wasn’t heavy.’
‘And you wiped the rifle,’ Miss Pink said, deflated.
‘And I wiped the rifle.’
Miss Pink thought about it. ‘Where’s Skinner?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ Edna looked surprised. ‘I don’t think they’ll catch up with him. You see, he did go to Seattle but like he said, he was only a poacher, selling deer meat. However, Hilton has to find someone for Byer’s murder and Skinner fits the bill, and then, of course, he’s a suspect for Charlie’s murder too.’
‘Only if Hilton were to discover the lies that Charlie told about Jen’s parentage.’
‘There were other lies: that Skinner murdered his wife, for instance, that he stole the silver horses.’
‘Ah, those horses. They were taken yesterday. They were in paper bags in his pick-up. You were quarrelling with Skinner when I came into the kitchen. Why didn’t you mention the horses then?’
‘I didn’t know he’d taken them… I wasn’t myself —’
‘No, you can’t revert now. I know you’re not senile, that you’re not a drunk either, but it was a good act. You knew Skinner had those horses and you said nothing. Why not?’ Light dawned. ‘You gave them to him. And you left the pick-up by his house. You set him up!’
Edna shrugged. ‘Someone had to be the fall guy —’
‘How could you —’
‘— for Byer’s death, because if Hilton suspected me, the whole thing would come unravelled. Byer was killed because he knew one of us was involved in Charlie’s death, so eventually Hilton would come to me and then he’d have to know why I killed my husband.’
The silence stretched. Miss Pink helped herself to bourbon for something to do. Edna was waiting for her to ask the obvious question.
‘Why did you?’
‘Because of what he did to Jen, and Val, and all of us. Jen lost her family and hated her mother for ten years. I shot Charlie before he could do more harm. I was afraid he was about to send Jen away again.’
‘How did you do it?’
‘Why, you guessed. I went fast through the canyon like you said and I was letting the mare have a blow when I heard someone coming, so I got off the trail as Bret passed. By the time I reached the cabin, Charlie was away up the hill after the bear that Bret told him was there in the rocks. I caught up and shot him with his own pistol. I told him why I was doing it and he went for his rifle. He would have shot me — not that I’m excusing myself; I meant to shoot him before I started out, otherwise I wouldn’t have taken his pistol. It was his own, he kept it in his night table. He’d threaten me with it sometimes for fun. I threw it in the river afterwards.’
‘If you knew Charlie had lied to Jen all those years ago why didn’t you do something? You could have found her, Sam could have persuaded her to come home.’
‘You don’t understand what kind of a man my husband was. He would lie and retract; you never knew what was the truth. Ten years ago he said he’d told Jen that Skinner was her father, next thing he said he was only teasing me. Last week he said she’d been pregnant and it wasn’t until then that I put it together: I saw Jen left home because she thought she was about to have a baby by her own daddy. I decided there would be no more of Charlie’s jokes.’
She stopped talking and allowed the other to think about it. After a while Miss Pink asked, ‘When you called Sophie the morning that he left for hunting camp, you told her everything?’
‘No, no, not at all. I meant to’ — Edna smiled ruefully — ‘I was thinking of joining you for the picnic at Mazarine Lake, of our losing you in some way; I’d go down to the cabin: shoot him, push him in the river, anything — and Sophie would cover for me. But as soon as I started to tell her Charlie had known all along that Jen was pregnant, had given her money, she flipped. I let her rave for a while, but I knew that no way could I use her as an alibi. She can’t conceal her feelings. Whatever I did, I had to do it alone, so I let her think that was all there was to it: Jen being pregnant and Charlie keeping quiet about it, and what should we do about this secret meeting at the cabin? When Sophie came back to Ballard I rode to hunting camp.’
&nbs
p; ‘What happens when Skinner is caught? Would you let him hang?’
‘Of course not. Actually, I doubt they’ll ever catch him. I told him to go to Mexico; he can make a reasonable living there and the silver horses will give him a good start in a new life. He can come back when I’m dead because I’m going to leave a full confession with my will, although there’ll be no mention of my true reason for shooting Charlie. However, I’ll think of something, make it sound right.’
‘I suppose one place is as good as another for Skinner to live.’ Miss Pink was grudging. ‘Suppose he were caught in your lifetime. Would you confess then?’
‘“Sufficient unto the day…” but no, I wouldn’t let even the man who seduced my granddaughter hang — and after all, she was seventeen. Girls should know their own mind at seventeen. If I should live that long I’ll put my trust in Jen’s money and a good lawyer.’
‘And a plea of self-defence perhaps; Charlie went for his gun. How would you plead in the case of Byer?’
Edna pondered. ‘Maybe I should plead self-defence there and think of something else for Charlie.’
Miss Pink regarded her with awe. ‘You must have scared the daylights out of Skinner. How many people know of your involvement?’
‘Just you, dear. Clyde had to know about Byer and no doubt the older members of the family suspect the rest, but no one’s going to talk, are they?’
20
Next day, when the evening rush was over, Russell went upstairs to call on those he thought of as his ladies. He found them in party mood, drinking champagne.
‘What are we celebrating?’
‘A new beginning,’ Sophie announced, handing him a glass. ‘Starting over, as Edna has it.’
‘I see. How is Edna? Any improvement?’
‘She’s virtually back to normal.’ Sophie seated herself and splashed champagne in Miss Pink’s glass. ‘By that I mean she’s her old scatty self — like she always was.’
‘It was the shock,’ Miss Pink murmured.
Sophie threw her a glance. ‘Exactly — and then secondary shock kicked in.’
‘Good.’ He beamed at them. ‘I mean good that it isn’t Alzheimer’s or dementia, whatever. What happens at Glenaffric now?’
‘Jen’s full of plans,’ Sophie told him. ‘Like making apartments for herself and Bret, and for Edna. Clyde too, if he wants. It makes sense for the young people to live there; they have all their stock on one ranch and Bret was only renting the property at Benefit. Sam will have to look for a new hand — or two. That would leave him free to help out with the pack-trips and at Glenaffric.’ She giggled. ‘My crazy sister says she’s going to start riding again: at her age!’
‘She isn’t seventy yet,’ Miss Pink protested. ‘You won’t see seventy again, nor me.’
‘That’s different,’ Sophie snapped. ‘Edna hasn’t been on a horse in centuries, and look at her: she couldn’t get a foot in the stirrup, let alone stay on once she was in the saddle.’
‘That’s no way to talk of your sister,’ Russell chided. ‘However, I’m glad she’s staying at Glenaffric; it’s her home, and now that she has Bret and Jen as company and to look after the stock —’ He stopped, his eyes dancing.
‘What?’ Sophie barked.
‘I was wondering where Charlie’s silver horses are at this moment. Melted down or gracing a collector’s mantelpiece in Seattle?’
‘Is there any news of Skinner?’ Miss Pink asked.
‘Not so far.’
‘And Byer?’ Sophie prompted.
‘I didn’t think you’d want to know —’
‘Of course we do. What happened with the autopsy? You know something?’
‘They recovered the bullet, but they have to wait for the forensic report. The bullet and the rifle have gone to the laboratory, but my reporter friend says Hilton is reasonably sure that the rifle — the one the kid took from Byer’s pick-up — has to be the gun that fired the bullet.’
‘It couldn’t have been suicide.’ Miss Pink looked puzzled. ‘Not with a rifle, not to shoot himself in the chest.’
Russell blinked at her. ‘There are no prints on the gun except those left by the kid and his dad. It had been wiped before they handled it. Obviously it wasn’t suicide, it was Skinner. Byer’s truck was mired just below his place and he was about to do a runner when Hilton arrived. He was actually hitching his horse trailer to his pick-up. He said he was going to work for Edna. Did you know she confirmed that?’
‘She didn’t know what she was saying.’ Sophie was dismissive. ‘She knew she needed a hand to replace Byer, so when Cole asked, she assumed she’d engaged Skinner.’
‘Hilton had the guy right there, in his hands, and he let him go. And now he’s vanished.’
Miss Pink’s eyes glazed. Sophie said flatly, ‘He’ll have changed his vehicle.’
‘Hilton’s in a rage,’ Russell said. ‘Here he has two murders, he knows who done both of ‘em — well, accomplice anyway — and no chance of closing the case — cases — until he catches Skinner.’
‘Accomplice?’ Miss Pink surfaced from her reverie.
‘For Charlie’s murder. It needn’t have been the two of them working together but it’s more likely. And Clyde always maintained Byer was unpredictable. He’d be a threat to Skinner, wouldn’t he? Gives Skinner a motive — although shooting Byer could have been no more than the result of a drunken quarrel.’
‘You don’t need motives for that kind of low life.’ Sophie was scathing. ‘They’ll never catch Skinner; the guy’s too terrified of being brought back; we have capital punishment in Montana.’
‘Oh yes,’ Miss Pink echoed. ‘He’ll be terrified.’ But not of hanging or lethal injection; Skinner would be terrified of Edna.
‘She’d blow him away,’ Sophie said.
Miss Pink started. Telepathy? ‘Charlie was her husband,’ Sophie insisted. ‘No matter he could be a prickly bugger on occasions, it was a terrible way to go: dragged over the rocks, dying out there alone.’
‘And they left him there.’ Russell shook his head. ‘And then’ — he waxed indignant — ‘not content with murder they have to start blackmailing — that is, Byer did. That would be another motive to get rid of the guy, he was playing with fire: Byer, a killer, trying to set someone else up for the murder.’
‘Stupid,’ Miss Pink said.
‘Tell me about it. And then the thefts from Glenaffric.’
‘All criminals make mistakes,’ Sophie pointed out. ‘And these two were only amateurs initially: poaching and petty theft —’
‘There was that rumour that Carol Skinner didn’t fall in the river,’ Russell reminded her. They eyed each other speculatively. ‘No,’ he said. ‘That was Charlie’s slander. Forget it.’
‘We have enough without it,’ Sophie told him. ‘More than enough motivation for Skinner to kill Byer.’
‘What would be their motive for killing Charlie?’ Miss Pink asked, all innocence.
‘Oh, that’s simple!’ Sophie cried. ‘He’d caught Byer thieving and was going to fire him —’
‘Had told him he was fired,’ Russell corrected.
‘And Charlie had accused Skinner of killing Carol —’
‘— would never let him forget it —’
‘Motives enough,’ Sophie declared with finality.
Miss Pink subsided, seeing the flaws, trusting that she was the only one to do so, with the exception of these two. They had only Edna’s word for it that any objects had been stolen from Glenaffric and, indeed, that Charlie was about to fire Erik Byer. And what sane killer would have left his victim’s vehicle within half a mile of his own home? She had been listening to a wily team constructing a scenario; they too would spot the flaws in time and work out clever ways round them.
It was ironical that Charlie, head of the family, should have derived so much pleasure out of manipulating its members, without ever dreaming that one of his jokes might misfire. Justice prevailed in the end, however primiti
ve its form, and they’d kept it within the family, all of them, and that included Russell, a kind of honorary member, and Miss Pink: uncertain whether she was bound by a sense of fair play, or friendship, or respect for what was basically a very private concern.
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Extract from An Accidental Shroud by Marjorie Eccles
Prologue
October
He was beginning to wish he’d picked a better night for the murder, but it was too late for that now, though the storm was growing worse. Then he saw how it might work to his advantage, and his mood lifted.
The weathermen had forecast winds of epic proportions, and for once they’d been right. He’d never experienced anything like it; he imagined this was how the Blitz must have been, with the din of bombs and flying debris and the exhilarating smell of danger. The thought of death and destruction excited him. It was the sort of night when chimney-stacks blew down and people were killed by falling trees and flying roof tiles, but it was providing him with perfect cover. Nobody in their right mind would be out who didn’t absolutely have to.
Their right mind! He nearly laughed at that.
He knew that anyone making a calculated decision to kill, as he had done, would be thought evil, or mad, but he wasn’t mad, and he didn’t feel evil: cool and clever was what he felt. Cool and clever and high on his own cleverness and the few drinks he’d had to keep him psyched up.
