A Question of Fire

by Karen McCullough

  Marilyn was a bleached blonde who wore flashy red lipstick, recently refurbished, and inch-long false eyelashes in need of readjustment. She examined Cathy from top to bottom, but the gaze was too friendly to be offensive. Still, the full impact of her smile was reserved for Peter Lowell. "I suppose I'll forgive you this time, since you've brought a new customer, but you won't get off so lightly next time, I warn you."

  "My knees are knocking," he returned. "I need a cup of your wonderful, freshly brewed coffee to restore me. A cinnamon roll would probably also have a beneficial effect."

  Marilyn looked at the coffee pot. An inch of muddy brown liquid sat in the bottom. "It'll be a minute while I make a new pot. Have a seat and I'll bring you a roll. What would you like, Cathy?"

  "The same."

  Lowell led her to a table in the corner. She liked the shop; it was comfortable, neat, and unpretentious. They sat quietly a moment in uneasy silence, but she hesitated to break his light mood by bringing up business. When she finally did speak, she said the wrong thing anyway.

  "You accused me of being a flirt?" She meant it lightly, as a teasing sort of joke.

  He didn't take it that way, staring at her sharply, green eyes dark, and his face resumed its controlled reserve. "I apologized for that earlier. I admit I allowed prejudice to color my judgement and jumped to conclusions on insufficient evidence. It was a mistake, I'm sorry for it, and I hope you won't remind me again."

  "I won't," she assured him.

  Marilyn appeared with the cinnamon rolls. "Coffee shortly," she said as she put a roll in front of each of them. Chagrined, Cathy ate hers quietly. The roll was better than promised. She tasted whole wheat flour, brown sugar, and lots of cinnamon.

  Lowell had withdrawn into his own thoughts and he ate part of the roll without paying attention. A waste, Cathy thought, but kept it to herself. He remained submerged in his funk even when Marilyn appeared with two steaming cups of coffee. She looked at him sourly. "Gone broody on you, has he?" the woman asked Cathy. "He does that, you know." She smiled ironically. "You gotta jolt him out of it."

  "Any suggestions how?"

  "Sorry, honey, I can't do all your work for you."

  Cathy was astonished by the abrupt mood changes in a man she'd thought cold, or at least firmly in control of his emotions. A small jolt might not be a bad idea. There was a question she wanted to ask, and since she'd already put her foot in it, she might as well jump in all the way.

  "Lowell?" His head came up and his eyes turned in her direction, but she could tell she didn't have his complete attention. "Are you married?"

  His gaze changed, grew sharper and harder, and now she did have his entire regard. The silence stretched for a long time. "Not now," he answered, with a finality that made clear he had no intention of saying anything further on the subject.

  She'd discovered what she wanted to know; and it did serve to pull him out of his distraction. In an obvious ploy to head off further questions, he turned the conversation back to business. "Have you got paper and pencil?" he asked.

  "Of course." She pulled a pen and small note pad out of her purse and placed them on the table. The coffee had had sufficient time to cool. She took an experimental sip and found that, like the roll, it was better than average.

  Lowell's expression eased into thoughtful concentration. "As I see it," he mused out loud, "there are three ways to approach this case, and we'd do well to pursue them all. First, we try to pin down where Bobby hid whatever proof he found. That means finding out where he went Wednesday, and the best bet on that front is to talk to the people Patty mentioned: his employer, the friend, and the character at the junkyard. Maybe one of them can give us some kind of lead. I'd like you to follow that line, if you would.

  "The second is your friend, Hammond. Do you think you could call him and try to set up an appointment for us to meet? Just set a time and I'll do my best to get there."

  Cathy agreed to both of those suggestions.

  "The third approach is through Bobby's contacts. Danny knows who some of them are; if we can get one of them to talk, we might find out what Bobby knew, or at least how he got the lead. I'll handle that part."

  "How are you going to get anybody to talk?" she wondered. "They all know what happened to Bobby. I should think they'd want to keep pretty quiet."

  "Very likely. I hope the inducement I offer will tempt someone to take a chance."

  "Financial inducement?"

  "Of course. With adequate arrangements for secrecy and anonymity."

  "And you're going to use Danny to spread the word? That seems dangerous."

  Lowell sighed. "I don't like it any better than you, but Danny's our only in with this crowd. I'll see that he has protection and try to keep him from doing anything really dangerous."

  "From what I've heard so far, that could be a tall order."

  "Keeping Danny out of trouble? You're probably right. But I have to try—he's my client—and this way I can channel his energy into something constructive."

  "Does he have a job or go to school?" she asked, trying to scoop the last crumbs remaining from the cinnamon roll.

  "Danny? He dropped out of school at sixteen. Actually his body stopped going; everything else had checked out long before. He has a job repairing motorcycles. I've talked to his boss; Danny's a good worker. He wants him back."

  "When do you plan to start your campaign?" Cathy asked.

  "Tonight," he answered. "We'll check a couple of places and try again on Monday, too. I know you have a strange work schedule, but for most of us, this is a weekend."

  "I have tomorrow off." Why did she feel defensive about her crazy schedule? She liked it.

  "Good," he said. "Take it easy and carefully."

  "Take it easy?" She laughed. "Sunday's my day to clean the apartment, catch up on laundry, buy groceries, write letters, run errands, and do everything else I haven't finished during the week."

  "Good Lord." Lowell looked shocked. "Don't you take any time off?"

  "That is a day off. It's different, anyway. Tomorrow night, I'll try to catch up on reading. What's your idea of a real day off?"

  "Tomorrow, I'm going to sleep until ten, have a slow breakfast, read the paper, have a leisurely lunch, play in a racquetball tournament, have a leisurely dinner, read a book, and go to bed. That's a real day off."

  She was late getting to work, but no one mentioned it. All that day, and Sunday as well, she kept watch for a blue Toyota following her. She never saw it, though, and wasn't sure if that was a good sign or not.

  She did try the telephone number Hammond had given her and found herself talking to the switchboard operator at a local hotel. Mr. Hammond wasn't in, so she left a message.

  He returned the call two hours later. "Have you learned anything?"

  "No, I'm afraid there's nothing to report," she answered. "I called because Peter Lowell, Danny Stark's lawyer, would like to talk with you. He asked me to arrange a meeting."

  "I see. I really don't think that would be a good idea," Ed replied. "There's nothing I could tell him that would be any help. As I told you earlier, I have to treat everything about this case as confidential."

  "Still, it might be a good idea to get together with him. Between the two of you, you might come up with some ideas."

  There was a pause at the other end. "Look, I've got to go now," he said at last. "I'll check my schedule and call you back later. Okay?" The connection was broken before she had a chance to reply.

  Sunday wasn't so hard after all. The apartment wasn't in terrible shape, the errands went quickly, and there wasn't much laundry. Everything was done by mid-afternoon, so Cathy settled in with a novel she'd had sitting on her desk for weeks. The book didn't live up to the hype on the back cover, but she was so relaxed by the time she finished, she forgave it the sin of anticlimax.

  Monday morning started off clear, bright, and cool, but the sunshine suggested the day would turn out warm. Cathy woke before the alarm wen
t off at seven-thirty, roused by the sunlight and birds singing outside her windows. Since you had to start a day by waking up and getting out of bed, this was the best way to do it. With such good omens at the outset, she had high hopes for the day.

  She arrived at the body shop shortly after nine. It was an unprepossessing concrete block building with awkward proportions: long, low, and squat. Its mournful air sympathized with the owners of the injured and damaged cars brought here for healing. Most of the front of the building was lined with the large bay doors that allowed cars to roll in, but an entrance at the far end was proportioned for the humans who paid the bill.

  A hallway stretched in front of her when she entered, with a small office to one side with a reception window. The whine of power tools running and the occasional screech of metal against metal suggested the day's surgery was already underway. A powerful chemical smell clung unpleasantly to her mouth and nostrils.

  A nervous young man appeared at the window to ask what she wanted. She explained her request, and wasn't at all sure he understood. He stood there a moment, looking around the room, as though the walls or floor might feed him an answer. Finally, he came to a decision. "Reckon you want to talk to Mr. Kingman," he said, and picked up the phone. He spoke into it for a minute, words she couldn't hear, then put it down and turned back to her. "Wanta come with me, ma'am?"

  Cathy nodded, and he emerged from a door a short way down the hall. He limped slightly, she noted, following him down the corridor and around a bend. She smiled encouragingly when he knocked on a door.

  "Come in!" The bellow roared out of the room and down the hall where it would still be heard for a considerable distance—not irritated or unfriendly—merely emphatic.

  - 11-

  Monday

  She wasn't disappointed on meeting the owner of that bellow. J.C. Kingman was one of the largest men she'd ever seen: at least six foot five, massively built, and accumulating a second spare tire around the middle. His red face was relaxed and genial, the hand he extended scrupulously clean and well-kept.

  His office was just the opposite. No bigger then eight foot square, almost half of which was taken up by a large desk and a set of filing cabinets, every available flat space was covered with piles of papers, tools, cans, bottles, and spare parts. Kingman suggested she take a seat, then removed a pile of notebooks from the only extra chair and a set of wrenches from the arm. He looked around for a place to put the books and wrenches, considered his disastrously-littered desk, then thought better of it and deposited them on the floor. No harm done there; he'd already have to move a pile of stuff to get to the bottom file drawer, anyway. A window behind the desk looked out over the main work area of the shop. Kingman glanced out briefly, then sat down.

  "You're with the newspaper, young lady?" he asked. "What can I do for you?"

  "I'd like to ask some questions about Bobby Stark, if I might."

  Light dawned on his face. "You're writing a story about the murder?"

  "I am. And trying to find out who killed him."

  "Cops think they know who killed him. Said it was a drug connection, didn't they?" Kingman shook his head.

  "That's what they think. You don't agree?"

  "I suppose they know their business, but they're off-target thinking Bobby was involved in drugs again."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "Bobby worked for me for more than two years. When he first came to me for a job, I asked him if he'd ever been arrested and he didn't lie to me, just said things had changed since then, he was getting his act together. Well, I knew I was taking a risk with him, but I believe in giving a man a chance. How's a person ever going to get straightened out if everybody's always holding past mistakes against him?

  "So I gave Bobby a job. Didn't regret it either. But you better believe I watched him pretty close for a while. He didn't let me down: showed up for work on time, did his job and did it well, didn't cause no trouble."

  Kingman picked up a screwdriver and tapped the end against his desk. "I've had men here who were into booze or drugs or other things I don't want to name. May not show right at first, but after a while I know. You can't keep things like that secret from the guys you work with. Bobby was a good kid, and he was clean. Be willing to swear to it."

  Another testimonial; nice, but it wasn't what Cathy was after. "Mr. Kingman, did you know that Bobby's brother had been arrested and charged with arson?"

  "Yeah, I remember him saying his kid brother was in jail for setting a building on fire. Bobby didn't believe it. Got my doubts, though. The way Bobby talked about him, I had an idea the brother could be trouble. Too much like Bobby was before he got turned around."

  "You may be right," Cathy admitted, "but Bobby thought he found proof that his brother was framed. Something pretty convincing. He was trying to get that proof to Danny's lawyer when he was killed and, unfortunately, he died before he could tell anyone what he'd found or where it was hidden."

  Kingman looked surprised, as though all this was news to him. Probably he wasn't much for reading the papers.

  She continued. "It seems like a safe bet Bobby was killed to prevent him from disclosing that proof, which suggests somebody knew Bobby had exactly what he claimed, and it would be just as damaging as he thought. We'd very much like to find that proof because it wouldn't just clear Bobby's brother, it would probably point to who killed him."

  Kingman nodded agreement.

  "Did Bobby come into work last Wednesday?" Cathy asked.

  "Was that the day he died?"

  "Yes."

  "The police asked that, too," he said. "I checked the time cards. Bobby didn't punch in on Wednesday. Doesn't mean he wasn't here, but nobody remembers seeing him."

  "How about on Tuesday?" she asked. "Did anybody see him then?"

  "Yeah, he was here Tuesday. All day."

  "Does anybody remember how he seemed on Tuesday? Was he upset, unhappy, excited, anything?"

  "Best I recall, he seemed kind of discouraged and depressed. But you got to remember Bobby wasn't the real outgoing sort. Kept a lot of things to himself. We all liked him, but he didn't have a lot of close friends, and he wasn't one to talk."

  "I understand he was friendly with a man named Dave Jackson?"

  "Yeah, I guess Dave was the closest friend he had here."

  "Would it be possible to talk with him?" Cathy asked.

  "Dave's off on Mondays. You can probably catch him at home; I doubt he'd mind."

  "Do you have his phone number?"

  He searched through a pile of papers on the desk, didn't find what he was looking for; pulled open the top, left-hand drawer and brought out a small book. He copied the number onto a piece of paper which he handed to Cathy. She thanked him for it.

  "One more thing, and I won't take up any more of your time, Mr. Kingman. You said the police came and asked about Bobby. Has anyone else been asking about him?"

  "A couple of other reporters were here Thursday. They wanted to know what he was like and all."

  "No one else?"

  "Not that I can re— Wait a minute." He picked up the phone, dialed a three digit extension.

  "Tim?" he said into the phone. "Page Steve and ask him to come to my office."

  He put the phone down and tuned back to her. A few seconds later, she heard the pager calling for Steve.

  "This guy," Kingman explained, "came in, Friday morning, I think it was, asking for something Bobby was supposed to have for him."

  Cathy sat up straighter. A tap on the door preceded the entrance of the same limping young man who'd escorted her to the office.

  "Close the door," Kingman directed. "Steve, do you remember that guy who came in Friday asking for something Bobby left for him?"

  "That Andrew Williams guy? Yeah, I remember him."

  "You know Bobby was murdered," Kingman said. Steve nodded. "Well, this is real important; it could have something to do with why Bobby was killed. Tell us everything you can remember about th
is guy and what he said and did."

  Steve looked worried and his hands shook. "It was about nine-fifteen Friday—I remember it wasn't long after I got here—when this guy comes in, says his name is Andrew Williams and he's looking for Bobby Stark. So I told him Bobby was dead, and he said, 'Oh'; only thinking back on it, I don't think he was really surprised. He already knew that.

  "Then he asked if Bobby had left a package here. He said Bobby had worked on his car last week, and had taken something out of the car and forgotten to put it back in. Said Bobby'd called him and told him it was here, he just needed to come pick it up."

  Steve swallowed. "It sounded kinda strange; I mean why would Bobby take a package out of some guy's car? He wasn't the kind would try to steal something. The guy was pretty intense, like, so I looked around a bit, but I couldn't find anything.

  "Well, I told him that and he got real bent out of shape and nasty about it. He insisted on looking around Bobby's work station and all, and was making threats about suing the shop. I asked Mr. Kingman, and he said I could let him look over Bobby's work area as long as I stayed with him."

  Steve swallowed again, hard. "I took him down there, and the guy looked the place over real thorough. I mean he was taking things apart, searching, but he didn't find what he was looking for. Got real irritated about it, too. He looked the whole building around, like he wanted to take the place apart, but he didn't try. Finally, just left without a word."

  "He didn't leave a telephone number so you could get back to him?" Cathy asked.

  "No ma'am," he answered.

  "Can you describe the man?”

  "I reckon. Not much taller than me, but bigger across the shoulder. Dark hair, dark eyes, and an ugly bad-tempered expression."

  "Nothing else to distinguish him?"

  "No, ma'am."

  "How about the package? Did he describe what he was looking for?"

  He glanced around the room thoughtfully. "Can't rightly remember what he said about it. I know he asked for a package Bobby had left. He said it had been sitting on the back seat of the car. That's all I remember."