“Come on!”
“Or maybe Zack Delwood.” I left that one alone.
“Hey,” said the chief, “look at it from the outside. Who-ever offed him apparently did it on the spur of the moment, taking advantage of a random opportunity. Who could have known that he’d be down there on the beach? And nobody could have known that there wouldn’t be any other people around, so nobody could have planned to kill him there. It was just a chance meeting that the killer took advantage of.
“And you fit the bill. One day you and him punch each other up in Gay Head. Two days later he’s alone and alive on South Beach when the Skyes go by. At Wasque, you tell John Skye that you saw his truck but not him. Nobody else comes driving by Wasque. You drive back along the beach. You say you found him dead, but maybe you find him alive and the two of you go at it again and you do him in. Probably it’s an accident, but maybe not. You panic and put in a call for the cops. No wonder Olive Otero has you in her sights.”
“And the sheriff, too. Don’t forget about him.”
“Well, maybe him not so much, although there is an election coming up. But Olive Otero for certain.”
I rocked Joshua. “Yeah. I just happened to have a pistol with me that nobody’s ever seen me with, and afterward I toss it out in the ocean. Sure.”
“Maybe it was his pistol and you used it on him. Maybe you were struggling for the gun and it went off.”
“Maybe the moon is green cheese. If I used his pistol and threw it into the ocean, what’s it doing lying there on your desk?”
He removed the pipe from his mouth and admired it. “What a keen thinker you are. Look, there’s not enough to nail you for this, but there’s enough to keep a lot of noses to the ground, sniffing at your heels.”
“Including yours.”
He nodded. “Naturally including mine. This is my town. You and I may be friends, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop doing my job. I’m going to have my detectives looking wherever they have to look.”
“Yeah, well, I can understand that.” I could, too.
“There’s another thing . . .”
“What?”
“Since it’s an ongoing investigation, I’ve told my people to keep what they find out to themselves. I’m afraid you’re out of the loop. It won’t do for a suspect to know everything the police are doing.”
He stuck his pipe in his mouth and looked at me.
A suspect. Of course I was a suspect, but the word made me angry, although I knew it shouldn’t. “You won’t tell me anything, but you won’t mind me spilling my guts to you,” I snapped.
“Won’t mind at all,” he said, nodding. “You can talk to us any time you want. Right now, for instance. You have anything you want to say?”
Joshua, perhaps feeling the tension in the air, moaned and got one eye partly open.
“I do have something to say,” I said, keeping my voice low so as to lull Joshua back to sleep. “I won’t miss Ingalls, but I didn’t kill him. I figure that vehicle I saw off to the west probably belonged to whoever did it, because I came from the east and didn’t see anybody that direction. You find the guy in the vehicle, and you’ll find the shooter.”
“If there was a vehicle,” said the chief calmly.
“There was a vehicle!”
“That’s one of the things we’ll be checking out.”
His cool voice was in sharp contrast to my hot one.
“While you’re checking, check Ingalls’s background,” I said. “Victims have stories, too. Maybe his will tell you who did him in, and why.”
“That’s being done.”
“And what have you found?”
“Like I just told you, it’s an ongoing investigation. No news yet to report to the public. When we’ve got something to say, you’ll get it the same time as everybody else. No sooner.”
Joshua’s eyes were fluttering and he was making noises. He then produced a familiar fragrance.
Terrific. His diapers were in the Land Cruiser, which was parked in back of the station.
“I gotta go,” I said, turning in that direction.
“Maybe you should get yourself a lawyer,” said the chief as I walked away. “And if you see Moonbeam, tell him I want to see him.”
I paused. “Moonbeam? Why Moonbeam?”
“Because Moonbeam worked for Ingalls, and nobody’s seen him since the killing.”
So I wasn’t the only suspect, it seemed. “I haven’t seen Moonbeam,” I said.
“Well, if you do, tell him I’d appreciate it if he’d come by the station for a chat. Same goes for Zack Delwood.”
“Moonbeam, Zack, and I don’t socialize much,” I said, and headed outside.
At the Land Cruiser, I changed Joshua and gave him his plug, and he seemed content as he watched me with his bright eyes.
A lawyer. I didn’t know any lawyers. At least I didn’t know any lawyers that I wanted to know.
I put Joshua into his car seat and drove home. As I unloaded him into his crib, put his dirty diapers to soak, and washed out his bottles, I was glad that he took up so much time, because it gave me something to do while I thought about my situation. I had never been a murder suspect before, and I didn’t like it.
I wondered who would know a good lawyer that I could afford. I wondered if there was such a thing as a good lawyer I could afford. The lawyers I’d read about made more in an hour than I was likely to make in a day or even a week.
I switched gears and thought about Lawrence Ingalls. Unless the chief was right and he had been killed by a random murderer who just happened to be passing by on South Beach, somebody had deliberately followed him and killed him.
I needed to know more about him. I could start with Beth Harper, who had been so incensed by Ingalls’s death that she had hunted me down with malice aforethought. It was a pretty extreme act for someone who had only been his assistant, since assistants don’t usually go around avenging their bosses.
Where was she now? In jail, awaiting arraignment for assault or attempted murder or whatever? Out on bail?
I called the jail. Beth Harper was there. I said I’d be right down.
But before I could get Joshua and his gear ready for departure, the phone rang. It was Drew Mondry, who sounded more cheerful than anyone should.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m looking for locations for some interior shots. A big old house of some kind, and a large study or library. One of the leads in the film is a scholar. The brains behind the big treasure hunt. I need a house he’s living in and a room that looks like where he does his work. You know: lots of books, a desk piled with papers, maps on the walls, an old Persian rug on the floor. That sort of thing. You know of any place like that?”
He had described John Skye’s house so well, he might have been standing in John’s library. I thought of the twins and their antics on the beach that morning.
“I do know a place like that,” I said. “There might be a couple of problems for you to solve, but I’ll take you there.”
“Great.” He paused. “Say, let me talk to Zee for a minute.” I may have paused, myself. “She isn’t here,” I said. “She’s working.”
“Oh. Well, it isn’t important.” “You want to leave a message?”
“No, no.” He hesitated, then: “Well, I’ll see you in the morning.” “I’ll be here.”
“Great.” The phone buzzed in my ear. I looked at it, hung it up, gathered Joshua and his traveling gear, and drove down to the county jail.
— 12 —
The Dukes County jail is in downtown Edgartown, across the street from Cannonball Park. Unless you’re paying attention, you might not even know it’s a jail, since it looks pretty much like an ordinary house until you go around back and see the police vehicles and the caged exercise areas.
Inside are a foyer, an office, and several cells, mostly used to house drunks overnight or hold people without bail money until they can go before a judge at the court-house down the street.
>
For several years now, one of the Vineyard’s sustained arguments has been whether or not Dukes County should have a new, modern jail.
Proponents of this idea, led by the sheriff, point out that the current jail is too old and too small and should be more centrally located on the island, out by the airport, for example, so up-island cops could more easily get their prisoners behind bars, and so those sometimes noisy and feisty prisoners would be farther away from the busy streets of Edgartown, thus decreasing the level of danger to the community.
Opponents, led by the sheriff’s oldest and most stead-fast political enemy, say the jail isn’t too old or too small, and that if a new one is built it will cost a fortune and pretty soon the county will be getting a bunch of imported, off-island jailbirds as prisoners, thus raising the level of danger to the community.
Proponents say this is nonsense. Opponents say it isn’t.
So it goes. And probably will keep right on going, since Edgartown, a village dependent on tourists, nevertheless took forty-five years to build public toilets for its tour bus traffic.
Meanwhile, the old jail, built over a hundred years ago, does its duty as best it can. Part of its duty today was keeping Beth Harper locked up until she was either bailed out or otherwise released or sent elsewhere.
I pushed the button at the locked visitors’ door and after a bit the buzzer buzzed and Joshua and I went into the little foyer. Clyde Duarte, the ever mild, noncombative jail keeper, was in the doorway of his small office. Behind him were a paper-stocked desk and several TV screens showing various parts of the building. “Hi, J.W.,” said Clyde. “How are things?”
“Things could be worse. I want to talk with Beth Harper.”
Clyde raised a brow. “I heard she tried to take a shot at you. You sure you want to see her?” He looked at Joshua, who was staring around at his very first jail. “Your new boy, eh? Doesn’t look a bit like you, I’m glad to say.” He grinned. He had four children at home and another on the way.
How many times was I going to hear how lucky Josh was not to look like me? “Yeah, I want to see her,” I said.
“Well, I’ll find out if she wants to see you.” He started toward the cells.
“Tell her I’m considering dropping all charges,” I said.
“That should get her attention,” said Clyde. “I’ll be right back.”
There’s a room where lawyers can meet privately with their clients. Clyde took me there, then went to get Beth Harper. I took one of the chairs and put Joshua in my lap. Clyde came in with Beth and pointed her to another chair. She sat down.
“You need me, let me know,” he said, and went back to his office.
Beth Harper nervously rubbed her wrists, which possibly had been cuffed not long before. Her face was sullen, and she looked pale in spite of her tan. Her voice was jerky. She spat out short sentences.
“What do you want? I know my rights. I don’t have to say anything. My lawyer is on his way.”
I got up. “Okay. See you later. In court.” I went to the door.
“Wait,” she said. “Wait.” I turned and looked at her. Her eyes met mine, then fell away. Her hands rubbed each other. “That man said you might drop all charges.”
“That’s right. But it depends on what you tell me.”
“How can I trust you? You killed Larry! Even if I tell you what you want to know, you might not drop the charges at all!”
I went back to my chair and sat down. Joshua stared around the room. I put my eyes on Beth Harper’s face.
“The first thing is, I didn’t kill Ingalls. I found him already dead.”
“You’re lying! You said you’d get even with him! I heard you!”
People often remember what they want to remember or what they think they should have seen or heard, which is why eyewitnesses are often of so little help in criminal cases.
“No,” I said, “you heard him say that to me. There were two other people there, Joe Begay and Drew Mondry. You ask them who started that fight and who threatened who.”
“I don’t believe you! You hated him! All you damned fishermen hated him!”
“You don’t have to believe me. Talk with Joe Begay and Drew Mondry.”
“How am I going to talk with them? I’m in jail, for God’s sake!”
“Your lawyer’s coming, remember? You’ll be out of here in no time. You can talk with them then.” She stared at the floor.
I tried combining the stick and the carrot. “The second thing is this,” I said. “No one saw Ingalls get killed, but a lot of people saw you point that gun at me. That means that you’re the one who’s in real trouble. But if I don’t press charges, most of that trouble will go away.”
Those hands of hers rubbed each other and massaged her wrists. “What do you want from me?”
“Information. You may know something that will help me find out who really shot your boss.”
“I already know who did that.”
“No, you don’t. Why did you decide to kill me?”
She stared at the floor. “It was stupid. I know that.”
“People don’t usually go around avenging their bosses.”
Her eyes lifted and flared at me. “We were going to be married! Soon!” She started sobbing.
I waited until it passed. “So you were engaged. I’m sorry. He was quite a bit older than you are, wasn’t he?”
“He was forty-five. So what? It didn’t make any difference. We loved each other!” More sobs.
I looked down at Joshua, who smiled up at me, unaware of human tragedy. When the sobs stopped, I said, “Where’d you get the gun?”
“It was his. I went up to his house and got it.”
“Why did he have a gun?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know anything about guns.” And a good thing, too, else I’d probably not be sitting here.
“How’d you know where it was?”
“We were engaged. I’ve been in his house. He kept it in a drawer by the bed.”
Terrific. The first place a burglar would look. Like most people, Ingalls might have been smart about some things, but he had been dumb about others. Most of us are like that: good and bad, smart and stupid, dark and light.
“Tell me about Ingalls.”
She brushed at her face with her hands. “What do you mean? What about him? What do you want to know?”
I didn’t really know what I wanted to know. I said, “He probably got killed by somebody who knew him. Did he have any enemies?”
“Yes! You and all those fishermen!”
I had to admit that I’d walked into that one. “I mean besides me and all those fishermen. Anyone at work, maybe?”
She lifted her chin. “Larry was very well respected by his colleagues. Everyone admired him.”
That was probably not the case, since no one is immune from the petty and not-so-petty bickerings, envies, and rivalries that occur in almost all organizations. Even Jesus had a betrayer, after all. But Beth Harper, in her grief, probably believed what she was saying.
“Anyone in his family, then, or his social circle?”
Her words came in a rush, like angry water. “How dare you mention his family! They’re wonderful people. Larry didn’t have to work, you know. He had plenty of money. He worked for the environment because he loved it! He could have stayed up there in Hamilton and played polo like everybody else, but he didn’t. And he wasn’t just a biologist, you know. He was an Orientalist, too. He could have kept taking those trips to India and Indonesia every year, and been a scholar, but he didn’t. Instead, he stopped doing that and stayed right here in Massachusetts, so he could work for the Department of Environmental Protection. He loved this island most of all; that’s why he built a house here! Everyone loved him!”
“Not quite everyone.”
“What a filthy thing to say! You’re disgusting!”
I felt a little dot of anger. “Keep in mind that I’m also the guy who can drop charges against you. T
ell me about his friends. Start with the ones up in Hamilton. That was his hometown, I take it.”
She may have noticed my irritation because she unknotted her fists, took a breath or two, and told me next to nothing about Ingalls’s Hamilton friends. They were polo players, riders to the hounds, yachtsmen, investment brokers, lawyers, the North Shore rich who lived in Hamilton and Wenham, Manchester and Prides Crossing, Beverly Farms and Marblehead.
They were prep school, Ivy League, and old-Boston-firms types; Beth seemed to know that about them and not much more. Ingalls, unlike most of them, had taken a different professional path and gone to work for the DEP.
Lawrence Ingalls, halo wearer.
“How about his Boston friends, then? And the people he worked with there.”
She knew these people better, for his working colleagues were hers as well, and she had come to know his friends.
“I used to see him in his office when I first went to work for the department. He and some of the rest of us would go out to a local pub after work sometimes, and that’s where we got to know each other. He split his time between Beacon Hill and the field, and he was good in both places. We were all really focused on our work. It was almost like a revolutionary call. When we joked about it, we called ourselves the Greenies, and said that our plans to seize control were almost complete; that all we needed now was some capital.”
The Greenies.
“And what did all the wives and husbands think about what their spouses were doing? Were there any romances that broke up marriages?”
She brushed back her hair. “Maybe that happened. But I didn’t do anything like that, and neither did Larry. He wasn’t married, and he didn’t have a steady girl.”
“He never put any moves on anyone else’s woman?”
“No! He didn’t do things like that.”
“Because if he did, the woman’s man might hold a grudge. It wouldn’t be the first time.”
“There was nothing like that. Larry dated some of the single girls, but he wasn’t a womanizer. He was a bachelor, and work took up all his time. He wore himself out working, in fact, and had to get clear away from it on his vacations, so he could get some rest. He was still taking his holidays in the Far East when I first knew him. Then for a few years he took them down in the Caribbean, and then he built his house in Chilmark and would come down here and not tell anyone where he was. All of the rest of us were in on the conspiracy. None of us would say where he was. When he came back, he’d be full of zip again, and ready to go.
A Shoot on Martha's Vineyard Page 9
