by J. R. Ripley
“I suppose you’re right,” I admitted. My voice came out a whisper. I felt like I was standing in a funeral parlor rather than a forest.
We kept our eyes on the ground and circled the clearing, round and round for ten minutes or more, then stopped. “Nothing,” I said glumly. “No camera, no scraps of clothing, blood stains—”
“Yep, none of the things they find on TV.” She kicked the ground. “Plenty of footprints.”
“Too many,” I agreed. Me, the police, the EMS crew, and who knew who else had tramped around the old sycamore. If the killer had left any footprints, there’d be no way to discern them in this mess. Besides, I was sure that the police would have followed any prints that might have been worth following.
I was frustrated. Where was Bessie’s camera and what images might it contain? If I could find her camera would I find a photo of her killer?
“You know, Amy, Bessie’s camera might never have been here at all. She might have left it home the day she was killed.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Why not?”
Kim was right. Why not? “We’ll search her house next.”
“No we won’t!” Kim said, pushing out her chest.
“Fine, I’ll do it myself.” I stuck my tongue out at her.
Kim ignored my antics and rubbed her hands together. “Okay, so we’re done here. I can’t wait to get home and take a long, hot shower. Let’s boogie.”
“No.”
“No?”
“Not yet.” I blew out a breath. “Come on,” I said. “There’s a small cemetery over there. I want to get a look at it.”
“What for?” Kim asked.
“We saw it the other day and, well, you might think it sounds silly, but I thought I saw a fresh grave.”
Kim appeared amused. “The day of your hike?” I nodded. “You do realize that Bessie Hammond was with you that morning?” I nodded again. “Then, you do realize that she can’t possibly be buried in that grave you say you saw?”
“Yes,” I answered slowly, “but what if someone else is?”
The blood drained from Kim’s face. “You mean—” She brought her right hand to her shoulder, then threw it forward.
“Yep.” The body I thought I saw being tossed from the McKutcheon house upstairs window.
Kim wiped her forehead. “Did you ever tell Jerry about it?”
“About the cemetery? No. To tell the truth, it never crossed my mind to. Besides, he’d probably laugh at me.”
Kim grinned. “That’s true.” She turned and waved over her shoulder. “Well, have fun with that. I’ll meet you back at the van.”
“Wait!” I shouted. “Where are you going?”
Kim spun on her heels. “I told you, back to the van. You can lead me out into the forest of death to look for clues but I am not—not, I repeat—going to a cemetery in the middle of a deserted forest.”
She shook her head in a scolding fashion. “You know things like that creep me out. No,” Kim said firmly. “I appreciate you helping me get out of my funk, but I’m not so far out of it as to step foot in a cemetery!”
I gaped at her retreating figure. As she reached the edge of the clearing, she froze in her tracks and shouted. “Hey!”
I stood there with my arms crossed over my chest. I was a little ticked off that she’d abandon me now. When we’d come this far. “What?”
I watched as Kim bent down. As she did, she waved urgently. She had me curious now. I had no choice but to jog to her. “What is it?” I huffed, shocked that such a short jog had left me gasping for breath.
Kim pointed to a thick patch of wild grasses. “That.” Her eyes scanned the ground and her fingers fell over a foot-long stick that she picked up. She used it to spread the slender leaves. “See? That shiny silver and red thing. Do you think that could be Bessie’s camera?”
I bent beside Kim, rubbing shoulders with her. I pushed my hands through the grass for a better look. “No,” I said, unable to hide my disappointment. “It’s only a knife.”
Kim reached in and plucked it from its hiding place. “Too bad.” She sounded as frustrated as me. She bounced the knife in the palm of her hand.
“Hold on,” I said. I snatched the knife from her and turned it over and over in my hand. “Oh, dear . . .”
“What’s wrong?” asked Kim, rising and dusting off her knees.
I grabbed on to her leg and pulled myself up, my knees burning. “The centipede.”
“What?” Kim scratched her head.
“It’s the centipede.” I held it between us. “At least that’s what Ed Quince calls it.”
Kim lowered her face closer to the knife. “Do you mean to say you recognize this particular knife?”
I nodded slowly. “I’d recognize it anywhere. It belongs to Ed Quince.”
“One of your bird-watchers?”
I nodded once again.
“Why does he call it the centipede?”
“Because he claims it’s got over a hundred uses,” I replied. But that wasn’t the question. The question was: What was it doing there?
17
Bessie Hammond hadn’t been stabbed to death, but that didn’t mean one of those hundred uses hadn’t been to threaten her with the knife’s sharp-looking, four-inch blade before brutally snapping the woman’s neck.
I didn’t see any visible signs of blood on the blade, but I knew that didn’t mean much. I slipped the knife into my pocket.
“Are you sure it’s his?”
I patted my pocket, feeling the hard steel against my thigh. “I’m sure. Ed used it when we were out walking the other morning. Did you notice the Red Deer Dairy Farm name and logo on the handle?”
Kim said she had. “So?”
“Ed’s knife had that same logo. How many knives like those do you suppose are in Ruby Lake?” Let alone out lying around in the woods near the sight of a recent murder. Everyone in town knew that Red Deer was a small, locally owned dairy located in the next valley. A knife bearing its name and logo wouldn’t be widespread.
“What are you going to do?” A gray and white stratus cloud edged across the sky, threatening the sun.
“I’m going to ask Ed Quince about it. Come on, you win. We’re getting out of here.” Talking to Ed Quince had taken precedence over poking around an old family cemetery, no matter how curious I was to get a closer look.
Besides, I could always come back later on my own.
“Amy, are you crazy?” Kim struggled to keep pace as I hurried back to the parking lot. “You’ve got to turn that knife over to Jerry. That knife could be evidence.”
I shook my head. “Maybe. But we don’t know that for sure. We’re not even positive that it belongs to Ed. I mean, I’m pretty sure, but you never know.”
“Let the police figure that out.”
I stopped and laid a hand on my friend’s arm. “What if we take this knife to the police,” I conjectured, patting my pocket, “and then we find out that Ed’s still got his knife? Can you imagine how that’s going to make us look?”
Kim pulled a face. “Kennedy will have a field day.”
“We’ll never live it down. Is that what you want?”
“Fine. You go talk to Mr. Quince,” Kim decided. “Personally, I’m going to go soak in a tub till I transform into a raisin.” She grinned. “Then I’ll help myself to a little of the old grape.”
“Deal.” Kim seemed to be doing better. At the very least, helping me look into Bessie Hammond’s murder had gotten her mind off the breakup, at least temporarily. That was the best that could be hoped for. Broken hearts take time to mend. “I’ll drop you off at home and then try to go talk to Ed.”
As we reached the parking lot and climbed in the van, Kim asked, “Can we stop at the five-and-ten before taking me home?”
“What for?”
“I’ve got a picture of Randy next to my bed, but not for long. I thought I’d buy a dartboard for the kitchen so I can put it up there a
nd throw darts at his stupid face.”
I laughed but sped past the five-and-ten and went straight to Kim’s bungalow. The last thing she needed was to be drinking and hurling needle-sharp objects at the walls. I’d only be helping her patch said walls the next day.
* * *
I stopped at Birds & Bees. Cousin Riley sat on the porch bench beneath the front window, sipping a light beer. “Aren’t you supposed to be minding the store, Riley?”
“Aunt Barbara’s inside assisting a customer.” He waved his near-empty bottle toward the store. “I’m on break.”
“I’m not so sure this is a good idea.” Riley appeared flummoxed. “Drinking beer in front of the store.” If he wanted to drink outdoors, he could go next door to Brewer’s Biergarten and buy himself a beer. The bottle in my cousin’s hand looked like one from my fridge.
“Fine.” Riley started to rise. “I’ll go up to your place.”
“Never mind,” I said quickly, one hand on the door. “You’re good where you are.”
Riley shrugged and slumped back against the bench while I went inside.
“Excuse me.” I tapped my mother on the shoulder as she hovered near a man and woman discussing birdbaths. “Any chance you know where the Quinces live, Mom?”
Mom told her customers she’d be back with them in a moment. “Ed and Abby?” Mom asked, stepping away and stuffing her hands in the pocket of her apron.
“Yeah. That’s them. They’re part of my bird-watching group.”
“They live at 1212 Windmere. Why?”
My jaw dropped. “How did you know that?” I’d have settled for a general idea, like the name of their neighborhood, but my mother knew their exact address?
“Your father and I used to socialize with the Quinces when you were little. Don’t you remember?”
I said I didn’t. “Thanks, Mom. You’ve got things under control here, right? Great.” No way was I going to wait for an answer counter to what I needed to hear. I gave her a peck on the cheek. “Bye, Mom.”
“You’re leaving?” She left the again unsaid.
I jiggled the van keys. “Places to go, things to do.”
“Wait, why are you off to see the Quinces?”
“Bird stuff,” I said, vaguely. I stepped back out. Riley had stretched out on the bench and his eyes were shut. I gave his feet a gentle kick. “Back to work, Riley.”
He struggled up. “But you’re back. I thought I was done.”
“Well, I’m gone again. Go help your aunt Barbara.”
Muttering words his mother would wash his mouth out with lye soap for using, Riley headed indoors. The store was in good hands with Mom, and Mom was in relatively good hands with Riley.
I jumped behind the wheel and headed for Ed and Abby’s house. The two-story brick colonial wasn’t hard to find. Their subdivision on the south side of Ruby Lake was a small enclave with one road, Windmere, snaking in one edge of Lake Shore Drive and coming out another.
Ed, dressed in baggy blue overalls and a white T-shirt, stood in the front yard hacking ineffectually at a waist-high firethorn hedge that separated his lawn from his neighbors’.
I watched from the curb for a minute, waiting for the overture to Kiss Me, Kate to wind down, then climbed out. It was curtain time.
“I think those shears of yours need sharpening!” I veered across the lawn toward Ed.
Ed Quince lowered his clippers and stared at me a moment without recognition. He ought to have been wearing leather gloves. They didn’t call that bush fire and thorn for nothing.
“Ms. Simms?” He ran the back of his arm over his damp forehead. “What are you doing here?”
“Hi, Ed.” I reached into my shorts pocket. There was no sense beating around the bush, so to speak. “I wanted to ask you about this.” I held my hand out, palm up, the knife in plain sight.
Ed looked at it a moment, then jerked his head nervously toward the house. His eyes quivered. “Where did you get that?”
“It is your knife, isn’t it?”
Ed gulped. His eyes bulged as the color began rising up his doughy, stubbled face. I was afraid he might be having a heart attack. “Where did you find it?” he managed to spit out.
“The question is, where did you lose it?” Ed reached out for the knife but I closed my fist around it and pulled back.
Ed glanced once more at the house. Whatever he was looking for, I didn’t see. “Come on,” he gestured. “I don’t want to talk out here.”
I hesitated for a moment as I slid Ed’s knife back in my pocket. Where was he taking me? What would he do with me when we got there? Hack me to pieces with those blunt hedge clippers of his? That sounded rather unpleasant. And painful.
Ed was silent as he led me around the side of the house and back to the detached garage. Outside the garage, he paused and took a long drink from the green garden hose curled up in a mulched flower bed beside the screen door. Thirst quenched, or maybe he’d been stalling for time while he thought about what he wanted to say, Ed pushed open the screen door. I stepped inside. The garage smelled of must, mildew, and gasoline. The overhead door was closed.
The dark garage, with its wood-paneled walls, was silent as a tomb.
“You didn’t answer my question,” Ed said, his voice low and thick.
“You didn’t answer mine.” I inspected the garage. There were a million weapons here that I could defend myself with, like that three-tined hoe hanging on a peg or that steel shovel.
Ed scratched behind his ear with his free hand. He hadn’t let go of those shears yet. Had that been intentional? How much danger might I be in?
“I guess I lost it Saturday.”
“On our bird walk.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“Are you sure?”
Ed drew himself up. “That’s right. On our bird walk.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t the day after?”
Ed’s eyes drew closer to his nose. “You mean the day Bessie died?”
“I mean the day Bessie was murdered.”
Ed crossed to the door and looked through the screen toward his house. Was he worried about his wife? “Now, look here, Amy, I’ve had that knife for years. It was a present from our distributor. You give it back to me.” He held out his lumpy palm and took a step in my direction.
I took a step back. “You didn’t return to the lake the next day?” He shook his head no. “You didn’t go there with Bessie, or to meet up with her?”
“No! Of course not!” Ed’s face reddened. “Now give it to me.”
“Why would Bessie go back to the lake the day after we went there, Ed?”
Ed coughed. “I don’t know. Maybe she wanted to do some more bird-watching. You’d have to ask her that question and you can’t very well do that.” Ed paced the small one-car garage.
“No. But I can ask everybody else that knew her.”
Ed glowered. “Why would you want to do that?”
“Because I want to know who killed her,” I retorted. “Don’t you?” He had seemed terribly shaken by her death.
Ed waved the shears around. “Of course, I do. But that’s what the police are for.” To my surprise, Ed suddenly bent over and began sobbing violently.
I softened my tone. “You miss her, don’t you?” I stepped closer and draped a hand across his back.
Ed nodded and sniffled. “I don’t know why anybody would kill her, Amy.” He looked up at me. “Really I don’t. You’ve got to believe me.”
I reached into my pocket and handed Ed his knife. “I found it out by the lake. On McKutcheon’s property. Not far from where Bessie was found.”
For a moment, Ed stopped breathing as he stared at the knife in his hand. I had no idea what he was thinking and only hoped those thoughts didn’t involve contemplating another murder—mine. If the gasoline fumes didn’t kill me, the retired grocer might.
“Are you going to tell Chief Kennedy?” He tapped the trimming shears against the side of the workbench.<
br />
“I don’t know,” I said. I honestly didn’t. I didn’t want to aid and abet a killer, but I didn’t want to humiliate Ed for no good reason. He was a married man and Ruby Lake was a small town.
“Fine,” he answered, glumly.
He seemed resigned to the fates, but I could sense his eyes pleading with me not to tell the police about finding his knife in the woods, and I shifted my feet.
“You and Bessie had been colleagues. But you were more than that, you were close friends,” I declared, softly. “Were you”—I hesitated, but what I was thinking needed to be asked—“more than close friends?”
Ed turned his back to me. “We had a fling. Just once.” His voice dropped even lower. “It was after the company picnic out at the lake. Her husband had died by then and Abby hadn’t wanted to attend.”
Ed spun back around. “We never talked about it again and we never”—he rolled the tip of his tongue over his lips—“did it again.”
“Might Bessie have threatened you in any way?”
Ed rubbed the point of the shears against the back of his knee, then set them on the worktable. “How do you mean?”
“I mean, was Bessie blackmailing you?”
Ed laughed. “Of course not!”
“And what about Abby?” I turned my eyes toward the house. “Did she know?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?” Women had a way of sensing these things.
“I’m sure,” Ed replied, but he suddenly didn’t appear so sure.
I wasn’t so sure myself.
“Besides,” he said, “Walter’s the one you ought to be talking to. Leave me out of this. Bessie was a mistake I made a long time ago.”
“Walter? You mean Walter Kimmel?”
But I got no answer. Ed had said all he was going to say. He snatched up his shears and jammed them onto a rusty hook on the garage wall. A minute later, he disappeared inside his house, leaving me standing in the garage alone.
I glanced at my watch: six o’clock. By now, Esther should be at work. Mom wouldn’t be all alone at Birds & Bees, assuming Riley had left long ago.
