The Claudia Hershey Mysteries - Box Set: Three Claudia Hershey Mysteries

by Laura Belgrave

  “If you’re joking, Emory, now’s a good time to say so.”

  But he wasn’t, and for the next fifteen minutes Claudia took notes without lifting her pen from the page. After they hung up she stretched, threw water on her face, and then tried to make sense of what he’d told her.

  * * *

  Wiles was seventy-three years old, which hardly made him older than dirt but did put him past an age when most people held full-time jobs. Even so, not counting one gap in his work history with Indian Run, he’d served as the town’s sole building inspector for an astonishing thirty-eight years—longer than most marriages, he’d boasted to Carella. If a new store went up in town, Wiles was there. New house? There again. Wiles signed off on permits for foundations and framing, plumbing, insulation, heating and more, and most importantly, he eventually signed off on permits for occupancy. He took his job seriously. Build your structure to code and you’d have no problem. But if at any point in the process standards weren’t met you could kiss your project goodbye until you made things right—period, end of story.

  Wiles’s hard-line attitude didn’t make him particularly popular with builders because to save a buck here and there they sometimes cut corners, and Wiles was a pain in the ass when it came to shortcuts. Even so, he mostly got along with the construction trades and his stubborn adherence to standards never became an issue, which why his face still flamed red when asked about that one gap in his work history.

  Claudia understood. Wiles fully expected to live to a hundred and get a centenarian birthday card from the White House. He was healthier than men half his age and, he told Carella, still sharp enough to cut paper with his brain. But he was of a time when certification to be a building inspector wasn’t necessary, and so he wasn’t certified; and he was of a generation that pooh-poohed technology, and so he balked at getting building records onto computers. For those reasons he was asked to retire at the age of seventy, and at the time was so taken aback that he didn’t resist. He went gently into that good night and stayed there for two years.

  A man named Frank Tinnerman took Wiles’s place. Tinnerman was certified, and he had a degree in computer science. For a town lock-stepping into growth, he seemed an ideal replacement, especially with Willow Whisper about to break ground. He wasn’t much liked by the office staff, but then, apparently they weren’t much liked by Tinnerman, either. Wiles kept up on office gossip and told Carella that Tinnerman was perceived as moody and secretive, and when one day he upped and quit, no one felt anything but gratitude. It was Wiles’s favorite part of the story, because after Tinnerman’s abrupt departure he was asked—begged, according to Wiles—to come out of retirement and take his old job back. He got a big party and more money, and loved to tell anyone who would listen that Tinnerman never did get any of the department’s records on computer. So there.

  Claudia abruptly looked up from her notes, distracted from reading by a small movement to her right. She squinted toward her coffee cup. Was that a . . . ? It was. An ant. She flicked it off her desk and scanned the surface for others. None waved a flag and said hello, but that meant nothing. Everyone knew the little bastards left invisible trails for their buddies to follow, and she checked her bottom desk drawer just to make sure she still had a can of Raid inside. There it was, beside an unopened package of knee-high hose. Satisfied, she went back to her reading.

  Tinnerman was a little like that ant, she thought. He’d come out of nowhere and if Wiles was right he’d faded into nowhere, too. One late afternoon he went out to a job site and simply never returned. He mailed a thin package with reports to the office along with a kiss-my-ass letter of resignation that said he’d had it with the hours, the heat and an uncooperative staff. A final check sent to the address he had on file was returned as undeliverable. Gossips speculated that Tinnerman had girlfriend or gambling troubles. They favored the latter explanation because no one could imagine Tinnerman with a woman, but discarded lottery tickets had been spotted in his office trash can more than once. And anyway, who cared? No one liked him and Wiles was back.

  When Carella recounted Wiles’s story, Claudia flashed to the body in the field. Tinnerman? Not Santiago, but Tinnerman? The inspector had quit right about the same time that Santiago stopped paying off his boots, so the timing was good for both. But no. Before she could even ask, Carella told her that Tinnerman was middle aged and stood six feet tall, and he didn’t show on their missing persons report. So that was that.

  Except . . .

  The building department’s permits on Hemmer’s house were missing.

  Except . . .

  The mayor hired and fired department heads. He was the one who booted Wiles out and brought Tinnerman in, then rehired Wiles when Tinnerman quit.

  Except . . .

  The timeline for everything ran suspiciously close to the development of Willow Whisper. Claudia needed more specific dates to be sure, but it appeared that Tinnerman quit right after issuing a certificate of occupancy on Hemmer’s house. It also looked like Tinnerman and Santiago both went missing at about the same time, perhaps within days of each other. The vexing reality, however, showed that their histories abruptly stopped nearly a month before Hemmer moved into his house. So where was the connection?

  Still, there was one more except . . .

  Hemmer had quietly visited the building department once, three weeks prior to his death. He’d come in to photocopy all records relating to the construction of his house. He’d signed for the records, copied them on the department’s machine, paid a nickel for every page—more for oversized pages—and then handed the records back and signed out again. That was procedure, and no one was more surprised than Wiles to discover that the original files had subsequently vanished. It just didn’t happen, not on his watch, and by golly, heads were gonna roll when he figured out who misplaced those dern things.

  Claudia distractedly brushed away another ant, then another. Ideas were coming at her fast now, so fast they were colliding before she could assemble them into one coherent whole. She reached for a fresh legal pad and started writing them down. By the time she looked up it was four-thirty and ants were streaming across her desk as if they owned it. She could vanquish them with one blast of Raid or walk away and salvage the rest of her day—and maybe something more. She closed her legal pad and chose more.

  Chapter 31

  For a while when Robin was little, her terror of thunder was so great that Claudia had to hold and rock her until the sound diminished to a barely discernible rumble in the distance. Claudia fumbled for simple explanations that would lessen her daughter’s fear: angels bowling in heaven; skies with fierce belly aches; trains with heavy loads. Robin bought into none of them, and if anything, showed keen disappointment that her mother would try to trick her with such lame invention.

  Claudia smiled at the recollection and handed her ticket to a woman at the entrance to the bluegrass festival. Thunder boomed in the distance, and surely it was raining somewhere, but not here. Then again, that meant nothing. In Florida it could rain on one side of the street and not on the other.

  The woman handed Claudia a red-and-white checked bandanna. She looked at it, puzzled.

  “Your first time here?” the woman said.

  Claudia could barely hear her over the thunder and country music thumping from the festival grounds. She pointed to her ear, and shrugged apologetically.

  “It’s part of the ticket price,” the woman shouted. “The women’s club does them up every year, just for the festival. Better souvenir than a hand stamp, don’t you think?”

  Claudia agreed that it was, then moved onto the festival grounds, which sprawled from the town’s central park onto two streets blocked off for the occasion. She paused to get her bearings beneath a colorful banner proclaiming “Dog Day Summer Bluegrass Festival.” Some of the festival-goers had wrapped the bandannas around their foreheads or necks. Others had tucked them through a belt loop. Claudia tried to knot hers around her head, but co
uldn’t make it work. She stuffed it into a jeans pocket, making sure the tail spilled out enough to show her community spirit, then began to amble.

  People jostled good-naturedly in every direction—throngs of them, hordes of them, all of them slick with sweat and insect repellant. Claudia let herself be swept along, ignoring half a dozen alcohol violations as she moved past game booths, food vendors, and kiddy rides lining the circumference of the park. A young girl in clown make-up flapped her bandanna at Claudia. She smiled and flapped hers back, feeling the weight of the day begin to lift.

  Indian Run did things its own way, and the bluegrass festival was more carnival than music event. Claudia lost two dollars on the ring toss, another five on a shell game that couldn’t possibly be legal, then meandered toward a vendor selling fried dough. Her cholesterol level always ran high-normal, but never mind; Robin wasn’t around to push her guilt buttons.

  Later, after she had satisfied the craving and washed it down with a lemonade, the kind with chunks of real lemon floating at the top, she fell back in with the crowd. The optometrist she’d met from Hemmer’s client list spotted her once and waved her down. He introduced her to his family—three round kids and a round wife, none of whom wore glasses. Claudia wondered if they’d had laser vision surgery, and shuddered to imagine it. But she held up her end of the conversation and when the optometrist said he looked forward to their appointment she smiled pleasantly and lied that she did, too.

  If there were others at the festival unaccompanied by friends or family, she didn’t see them. But she wandered on, her eyes on the crowd, scanning faces, always scanning faces.

  * * *

  As the hour drew closer to night and still no rain fell, the crowds increased, blocking what little hot breeze might have wheedled through. Claudia stood at the side of the bandstand and watched two fiddle players duke out a version of “Dueling Banjos.” She glanced at her watch. She’d made a circuit of the festival grounds three times and gorged on so much junk food that her stomach felt queasy. She’d run into Suggs and Carella, both of whom attended the festival every year. Carella had his wife and two daughters with him and didn’t linger. Suggs didn’t linger, either, but for different reason. His mind was on crowd control, because with the inky night came boisterous drunks, pickpockets, and teenagers feeling each other up in dark corners. He told her to keep her eyes out and she said that she would.

  Later, she’d bumped into Moody, too. He was with a date, which for some reason surprised her, but he politely excused himself long enough to tell her that Santiago had to be their John Doe.

  “Everything points to it,” he’d said. “The people in his neighborhood weren’t exactly eager to talk to me, but they opened up a little once they understood I wasn’t from INS.”

  Claudia had nodded. The Immigration and Naturalization Service held far more sway over their lives than the local police, and little of it positive.

  “Santiago evidently shared an apartment with a few other guys. Some were legal. Some weren’t. They came and went, mostly working the fields and odd jobs.”

  “Just like Dunn figured it,” said Claudia.

  “Yeah, but get this. The last few months before he disappeared, Santiago got hooked up with a subcontractor that handles local jobs. The work wasn’t steady, but it paid better than anything else he’d done. One day he went out a job with them. He never came back.”

  “What kind of subcontractor? What kind of job?”

  But Moody was already shaking his head. “I don’t know, Lieutenant. Santiago had a girlfriend in the apartment complex. She doesn’t live there anymore, but one guy said he knew another guy who might know where she went. The second guy wasn’t around, but the thinking is that he will be tomorrow.”

  Claudia had told Moody to forget about it until then, and it annoyed her that even in the midst of the festival she couldn’t manage to do that herself. She shifted her weight and tried to clear her head. Cloggers in impossibly heavy shoes were taking the stage. A ripple of applause went up. When they began pounding their feet to the zip of a guitar, the bandstand shook visibly. Taiko drummers made less noise.

  “It’s like tap dancing in concrete slippers,” a voice said into her ear.

  Claudia turned slowly. “I wondered if you’d show,” she said.

  “I was wondering the same thing about you.”

  “Here.” Claudia pulled a festival ticket from her rear pocket. “You left this on my counter.”

  “I know. I had to buy another one to get in.” Sydney wore khaki shorts and a photographer’s vest over a black T-shirt. A camera with a long lens hung from her shoulder. “You owe me twelve bucks.”

  “I hope you can wait. I’m tapped out from buying junk food.”

  “It’s killer, isn’t it?”

  “Deadly. Especially the fried dough.”

  “You go with the powdered sugar and cinnamon?”

  “Like there’s any other way?”

  “Right.”

  They turned their attention to the stage for a minute, letting the cloggers fill the awkward spots. Claudia idly wondered if their legs tingled for hours after a performance. She asked Sydney her opinion.

  “My guess? Their legs will throb clear into next week. Look, are we gonna have to try this hard every time we see each other?” She waited. “Claudia?”

  “I looked at your coffee table book.”

  “Oh, boy. Here we go. I should’ve—”

  “No, no. No.” She sought Sydney’s eyes. “I’m all right with it. I don’t get it, but I’m all right with not getting it, so let’s just let it go.”

  “You’re all right with it,” Sydney repeated.

  Claudia shrugged. “Fifty percent all right with it, okay? Maybe sixty. It’s where I am.”

  “You came here to tell me that?”

  “I’ve been sweating here for two and a half hours. I’m bloated from fried dough. What do you think?”

  Sydney swung her camera to her other shoulder. “I think you should’ve worn shorts. You’re the only one here in long pants.”

  “Robin tells me I have no fashion sense.”

  “This isn’t about fashion sense. This is about common sense.”

  Claudia took a tentative moved in and gave her a playful cuff on the head.

  “Hey, hey! My black eye is just starting to fade.” But Sydney laughed. “We used to wrestle, remember? We were both such tomboys.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m too tired to wrestle now.”

  Sydney sobered. “Claudia, I should’ve told you about the book before I did it. At least before I mailed a copy to you.” She smiled. “Well, I’m fifty percent sure I should’ve, anyway.”

  “We’re not very good at this, are we?”

  “So maybe we don’t have to be, not all at once. What do you say we get out of here before someone realizes we’re twins. I hate that fawning shit, don’t you?”

  “Can’t stand it.”

  They walked out of range of the cloggers.

  “I can almost hear again,” said Sydney. “Got any cold beer at home?”

  “I don’t have cold anything at home, not even the house. The A/C went south this morning.”

  “Plan B, then. I’m in a Holiday Inn outside town. It’s got two double beds.” Sydney pawed through a vest pocket and pulled out a key card for the door. “Here. I’ve got maybe another half hour of shooting to do and then I’m history. Go on ahead of me. You can turn the A/C to high, shower and collapse.”

  “Syd, I don’t have any clothes with me, never mind a toothbrush.”

  “So buy one on your way there. You can wrap yourself in a sheet, call your home machine for messages, talk to Robin . . . whatever you want. It’s got to beat sweltering.”

  Claudia took the key card. She touched Sydney’s hand for a second, then pulled back. “I . . . you know, I think the 7-Eleven’s on the way to the Holiday Inn.”

  “Right. You might be right. Good. Now go. Let me work.”

 
They parted, but like the mirror images that they were, they reflected each other when they turned simultaneously to sneak one look back.

  Sydney rolled her eyes. “Film at eleven,” she mouthed.

  Claudia laughed out loud. She wiped her face with her bandanna and scouted for her car. As festivals went, Indian Run’s was all right. Next year she’d bring Robin.

  * * *

  The shower—excellent. The air conditioning—divine. Claudia reveled in both, running the hotel’s A/C at maximum speed, and leaving it there even when goose bumps stood out on her arms and legs. She took Sydney’s advice and wrapped herself in a sheet, then snickered and rooted through her sister’s clothes until she found a nightshirt instead. It was a nice one, too; one hundred percent cotton. She slipped it over her head, plumped pillows on the second bed, then climbed aboard with her cell phone. Bliss.

  Out of habit she punched her speed dial for the station. No messages, and not much going on. Most of the guys were still working the festival, which wouldn’t end until eleven o’clock. Claudia glanced at the hotel’s clock radio. It was only nine-thirty, not exactly late-late, but nevertheless too late to call Robin. She drew her knees toward her chest and pulled the sheet over them. She thought through the sequence for accessing messages from her machine at home, then poked the speed dial for her house. The phone rang once, twice, and then a man answered.

  “Whoops. I’m sorry,” said Claudia. “I’m afraid I misdialed.”

  “No, you didn’t. Not if you’re Claudia Hershey.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “This is Tom Dixon.”

  Claudia had once viewed a TV special on people who supposedly self-combusted. They might be sitting in a chair and then, for no scientific reason, poof! They just went up in flames. She wondered if she could achieve that. Her face felt hot as a lit match.

  “Hello? Claudia?”

  The boot maker’s grandmother. Of course.

  “You still there?”

  “I’m here,” said Claudia. “Well, this certainly is awkward as hell.” But she felt another kind of sizzle now and hoped Sydney wouldn’t trash it by walking in the door. “Mae Dunn played with my cell phone today.”