by Joan Hess
“What about this campout at Flat Rock?” Sarah continued. “If that woman was there, maybe Tuck planned to meet her. It’s a five-minute walk through Will’s blueberry field. We used to go there to swim.” She put her hand to her mouth and stared at me. “Do you think she…?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Whatever happened could have taken place anytime after dark. The campers would have been asleep well before midnight, freeing Tricia to sneak away to meet Tuck. That doesn’t explain why they were in the barn—with a shotgun.” Or why Colonel Mustard was in the billiards room with a lead pipe when Miss Scarlet was in the ballroom with a wrench. Or why Sarah didn’t hear the shotgun discharge.
“No,” she said, “it doesn’t. Can’t you make this woman talk?”
“Evan can subpoena her. It’s sheer speculation, unless someone saw her in the field or at your house. I did my best to get the teenagers to tell me what took place, but they were threatened with eternal damnation if they said a word.”
“Evan can subpoena them.”
“I don’t think Judge Priestly will allow that blatant a fishing trip. There’s no evidence to link the two incidents.” I leaned forward, my elbows on the table, and gave her a hard look. “I have another question for you, and I want the truth. Did Tuck tell you that he wanted to turn himself in to the FBI so he could see his family before he died?”
“Who told you that?”
“That’s irrelevant. Answer the question.”
“If he did, I ignored it.” She tried to look at me, but her eyes shifted away. “He was always saying crazy things. I stopped paying attention to him years ago.”
“You weren’t worried that after he turned himself in, you’d end up in prison, too? That should have caught your attention in the same way a semi thundering down the highway toward you would. Once the FBI had your assumed identity, they’d hunt you down. How long do you think you’d last without access to your bank account and credit cards? You couldn’t get a decent job without a Social Security number.”
“Okay, so we talked about it. He promised not to do anything until I made plans. I had to trust him.”
“What kind of plans?”
“Going back underground. There are still communal farms run by gray-haired hippies.” She gave me a rueful smile. “It didn’t sound all that bad after forty years of living with Tuck.”
“It might have been simpler to kill him,” I said.
“Don’t be silly. If I were going to murder him, I would have done a much better job. Do you know how many poisonous plants grow in a hundred-foot radius of my house? Larkspurs, belladonna, lupines, mushrooms, and dozens more. His death would have been attributed to heart failure.”
An experience at the beginning of the summer confirmed that. In that instance, the medical examiner and the state lab had failed to identify the cause of death until I brought it to their attention. Accolades had not showered upon me like the gentle rain from heaven, alas.
“Don’t share that with the jury,” I said. “Take this stuff back to your cell and read it carefully. There may be phrases in the letters that sound oddly familiar. See if any faces pop into your mind.”
“Darn, I made plans to go on a picnic in the park this afternoon and catch a movie this evening.” She gathered up the clippings and letters. “Reading letters from my husband’s lover while in a cell doesn’t sound nearly as pleasant. Maybe I can do some editing and come up with a bestseller titled Fifty Shades of Icky. I’ll drop your name in the acknowledgments.”
“Please don’t,” I said as rose. “I’ll be back later.”
“And I’ll be here.”
* * *
After I walked back to Evan’s office building, I debated going inside to tell him what Sarah had said. It would be a symbolic gesture, since she hadn’t revealed anything. I sat in my car and took out my cell phone. I had no messages from my beloved husband or from Caron. Fuming, I called Luanne. “What are you doing?” I demanded when she answered.
“Fine, thank you.”
“You’re welcome. What are you doing?”
“Marinating steaks and watching game shows. What are you doing, besides calling me with unnecessary brusqueness?”
“Sorry,” I said insincerely. “Can you leave the steaks long enough to help me find an escaped prisoner?”
“Did that woman break out of the county jail?”
“Not unless she did so in the last five minutes. I’ll pick you up in front of your store in the next five minutes.” I cut off the call and drove to Thurber Street. Because the bars were closed, there were few cars and scant pedestrian traffic. I pulled into a parking space and honked. Luanne lives in an apartment on the second floor and claims to enjoy the loud music and nightlife. If I were forced to live there, I’d have been boiling oil at two o’clock in the morning.
Minutes later Luanne got in the passenger’s side. “I wasn’t sure what to wear for the occasion. It’s been forever since I tracked down an escapee. Are we going to borrow bloodhounds from the state troopers? They’re cute, but they drool.”
“The state troopers?” I said as I headed for County 107.
“I have to be home by seven. Sweetie’s coming for dinner and a movie.”
I politely disregarded the nickname, although I did tuck it away in a corner of my already overloaded mind. “Let me tell you a story about an antiwar demonstration, false identities, a weasel, and other fancy things.” During the next ten minutes I gave her a disjointed account of everything that I’d found out since Friday morning. When I described the prison breakout, I realized I should have kept the sketch of Roderick James, but I’d left it with Sarah. I asked Luanne if she could take a photo with her cell phone. She assured me that any idiot could. If Oliver Goldsmith was hanging out at Zachery’s house, then I might be able to capture him, in a sense. Assuming he didn’t drown us in the pond.
“That’s Sarah Swift’s house,” I announced as we drove past it. “Will and Juniper Lund live across the unpaved road. These are their fields, and this is the river downstream from Flat Rock.”
“Fascinating.” Luanne took a nail file out of her purse.
“You’re a worse assistant than Evan Toffle, and that’s saying a lot. Okay, this is Pinkie Sheer Road. We’re just going to stop at Zachery’s shack and look for any indication that someone’s living there.”
“A southern-fried zombie?”
I swatted at her with my right hand. “This is serious. The trial begins Tuesday morning. Right now Evan has no alternative suspects, no mitigating circumstances, no witnesses. All he has is a client who refuses to cooperate with her own defense. Wessel will win, and Sarah will be in prison for the rest of her life.”
“You know that Wessell’s aware of your involvement, don’t you? He’s going to chortle from his high and mighty pulpit.”
“Which is precisely why I have to find the killer.”
“What if Sarah Swift turns out to be that person?” Luanne said quietly. “Are you going to move to Newport and sleep in the Rosen boathouse?”
I winced. “I wish you hadn’t mentioned that. Remind me to tell you about the wedding present, which isn’t present. Okay, that’s the shack. Look for any kind of movement or anomaly. I’m convinced Oliver Goldsmith is staying in the vicinity. When I called out that I was a friend of Sarah’s, he appeared within seconds.”
The shack was as desolate as it had been earlier. No weeds had been trampled. Zachery’s truck had not moved. A flock of cowbirds took flight in an amorphous cloud when I cut off the engine and opened the car door. I heard nothing but vehicles on the county road and chirps from the woods.
“Nobody’s home,” Luanne said.
“That doesn’t mean Oliver isn’t hiding in the outhouse.”
“Our friendship does have its limits.”
“I would never impinge on your common sense and refined sensibility,” I said, putting a foot on the ground. “All I request is that when you hear my blood-curdling scream
, you call the sheriff’s department and report it.”
“No problem.”
I approached the shack with caution. The door was ajar. I rapped on it loudly and said, “Anybody home?”
“Mr. Goldsmith!” called Luanne, who was right behind me. “We need to talk to you about Sarah Swift!” She lowered her voice. “It worked last time, right? I have my phone. If he looms in the doorway, I’ll take a photo and then we’ll bound away like cheetahs. I will, anyway; I was on the high school track team.”
It was as good a plan as any. I rapped again, but no one loomed. I pushed open the door and looked inside. The front room had a worn, saggy sofa, a small TV set, and a kitchen area with an old refrigerator and a stove coated with grease. Empty whiskey bottles and beer cans were scattered on the floor and counters. Zachery’s diet seemed to have consisted of canned beans, crackers, eggshells, and moldy bread. Beyond that room were a bedroom and bathroom. I was pondering my next move when Luanne shoved me into the room.
“Well?” she whispered.
“Are you asking me if there is one?” I whispered back. “If there is, it’s outside.” I tiptoed across the room and peered into the bedroom. The mattress on the floor was stained, the blanket of army surplus origin. Oddments of clothing were in piles on the floor. Based on the droppings along the baseboards, rodents had shared the room for years. I continued to the bathroom. The toilet and sink were filthy, and the bathtub was cracked. If there had been running water, it had not been utilized for personal hygiene.
“As I said, nobody’s home,” Luanne said cheerfully. “Let’s get ice cream on the way back.”
I bit back a shriek as leaves scuttled across the floor. “I don’t have time for trivial indulgences,” I said as I backed out of the bathroom. “Maybe he’s hiding outside.”
“You’re going to beat the bushes for a prison escapee who was convicted of murder?”
“Any better ideas?”
“Caramel swirl with pecans.”
“Did I mention what a lousy assistant you are?” I went outside and looked around, although I had no intention of beating bushes or anything else. Plastic garbage bags were piled behind the shed, and broken glass littered a faint path and glittered in the stark sunlight. I waded through the weeds to look inside the dubious structure. My eyes rounded when I saw a green van.
“Over here,” I yelled at Luanne.
“If that’s an oversized outhouse, forget it.” She was texting as she walked to the car. “I’m letting Sweetie know where we are in case your fugitive lurches out of the woods with a machete. I do not intend to be carrion. I want a proper funeral with a horse-drawn hearse and the lonely wail of bagpipes from the distant moors.”
I pulled open the door, alarming a variety of indigenous species, and waited for a moment before I went inside. The license plate was daubed with mud. I squatted down and scratched it until I could see the details. It had been issued in Arizona and had expired two years ago. I wiped the dust off the back window and made sure no one was crouched inside it, thus avoiding what might have been an ungainly scramble to my car. I opened the driver’s door. The only incriminating evidence I saw was an empty soda bottle. The key was not in the ignition. I climbed into the driver’s seat and discovered I could barely touch the pedals. Zachery Barnard was much shorter than I; he had not been the last driver. I leaned over to open the glove compartment. There was no packet with the obligatory registration and insurance papers. I pulled out a collection of maps, a crumpled cigarette pack, and matchbooks, and found myself staring at a handgun. It was hard to imagine that its owner was a member of a well-regulated militia. I searched the back of the van and found an eclectic array of paperback books, a sleeping bag, dirty clothes, and a disposable plastic bag with basic toiletries.
I went back to my car and took out my cell phone. Luanne glanced up but resumed texting. I called Peter. He had the decency to answer. “What’s going on with Caron and Inez?” I asked.
“I liberated them from the dungeon and took them back to the theater to get Caron’s car. They said they had to go by the grocery store but would be home soon.”
“Did they explain?” I asked.
“Caron gave me some garbled story about the play and the props. Inez said she thought she’d left her purse there. Caron said it was all Inez’s fault. Inez insisted that it was all Caron’s fault because of the long line to use the ladies’ room at intermission. Caron replied that she was not a plumber.” Peter sighed. “They swore they’d gone back for Inez’s purse and gotten locked in somehow. I have no inkling what they were actually doing there. Those two could have talked their way out of Abu Ghraib.”
“Less than a year until college,” I said, relieved they’d concocted a convoluted explanation that did not include the Ming Thing. “I need you to run a license plate, if it’s not too much trouble.”
“Why?”
“It’s way too complicated to go into now. I need to know who owns a particular vehicle.”
“Then enlighten me. I have all the time in the world.”
I didn’t, but I launched into an account of my encounter with the faux Zachery Barnard, the morgue, Tuck’s clippings, and my theory about Roderick James, a.k.a. Oliver Goldsmith. Luanne was giggling by the time I told Peter why I wanted him to run the license plate. I had to admit it sounded fanciful.
“Where are you now?” Peter demanded. When I told him, he harrumphed and said, “Leave immediately, right this minute. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, dear, but you have to promise to call me back about the license plate.” I started the engine. “Did you hear that? I am backing up as we speak. I’m not very good at it, so I’d better concentrate on avoiding the ditch. I’ll be waiting for your call, dear.” I dropped the cell phone in my purse.
Luanne finally stopped giggling. “Isn’t it possible the van belongs to Zachery’s brother or nephew, or he stole it from a tourist? He hasn’t been driving his pickup in a long while.”
“Yes, it’s possible.” I managed to get turned around and drove to the county highway. “It’s also possible that Sarah shot Tuck, Tricia Yates is a Wiccan and was dancing naked on the rocks, and the Weasel is madly in love with me but has poor communication skills. The possibilities are limitless. Peter’s mother won’t notice that her wedding gift isn’t on the mantel. Evan Toffle will end up on the Supreme Court. Caron will get a Ph.D. in astrophysics, and Inez will own a chain of striptease joints.”
“Are some of us feeling testy?”
“Some of us are in danger of being left on the side of the road,” I muttered, “and it’s a long walk back to Thurber Street. We can wait at Sarah’s house until Peter calls. He’ll have the information about the van within a matter of minutes.”
“Didn’t Deputy Dawg tell you to stay away?”
“I’m going to park in the yard. That doesn’t count as trespassing,” I said loftily. When I turned on the unpaved road, I spotted several vehicles in front of the house. “Deputy Dawg didn’t waste any time notifying the FBI, darn it, and his car is by the barn. I don’t have time to chat with them.”
“Nor do I,” Luanne said. “Take me home so I can poke the steaks and take a shower before Sweetie arrives. There’s no reason for you to hang around for Peter to call. If the van’s registered to Roderick James, the FBI will be on it like ticks on a warthog. If it’s stolen, what are you going to do? The man has a gun in the glove compartment. That doesn’t mean it’s the only weapon he has. He could be lurking in the vicinity with a rifle or a big knife.”
“True. Take my phone while I drive back to town. I can do it on autopilot by now, but I refuse to answer calls while I’m driving.”
Once we were headed in the right direction, Luanne asked me about the wedding present. I related the sad story of my negligence. She found it much more amusing than I did, and was still snorting when I dumped her on the sidewalk in front of her store.
“Are we having hamburgers for dinner tomorrow night?” she
asked. “Shall I add a splash of cognac to the baked beans and serve them flambé?”
I stuck out my lower lip, imitating Caron. “You are Not Funny.”
“Call me when you can.”
She disappeared into the store. I stared at the cell phone, puzzled that Peter hadn’t yet called. From my limited knowledge gained by reading police procedurals, I knew the information was available on an easily accessed database. I stopped at a convenience store for a small bag of chips and a cup of iced tea. It was not my ideal menu for lunch. Of course, this reminded me that I would be serving lunch tomorrow to Peter’s mother, and peanut butter sandwiches would not impress her, even if I cut off the crusts.
I made it to the parking lot in front of Evan’s office before I embedded my fingernails in the steering wheel. I dug a tissue out of my purse and wiped my face. My reflection in the rearview mirror was not comforting. I resembled Billy’s worst nightmare. I stuffed chips in my mouth and tried not to think about anything whatsoever. My blouse was covered with crumbs when the cell phone rang.
“What?” I said, spewing crumbs on the dashboard.
“Where are you?” asked Peter in a more dulcet tone.
“In front of the Legal Aid office. What did you find out about the van?”
“It belonged to a woman named Emma Peru, who resided in Tucson. She reported it stolen three years ago. She died two years ago.”
“And?” I said as I wiped frantically at the salty dandruff.
“The shed was empty.”
I dropped my hand. “How long did it take the FBI to get there? Never mind, that’s a dumb question. Oliver Goldsmith was hanging around, watching us, and as soon as we left, he did, too. Did they take fingerprints in the house?”
“They will, but they were sidetracked by a report of burglars in Sarah’s house. Deputy Norton reported it earlier.”
“Good for him. The FBI needs to be checking out Zachery’s place. Oliver was there.” Not that I would have touched anything without plastic gloves.
