Circles in the Snow

by Patrick F. McManus

  Tully nodded. “As a matter of fact, I have, Sasha. I’ve seen starlings do just that sort of thing in the fall, getting ready to fly south. It was out near Moses Lake, in the wheatlands of Washington State. Saw it three years ago, driving to Seattle.”

  Sasha seemed to sigh in relief. “Well, okay then. How do you suppose each of those little birds knows what to do for his tiny part in the performance?”

  “I haven’t a clue. As a matter of fact, I’ve wondered about that myself, although not for very long.”

  “Do you think maybe the head bird says to the bird next to him, ‘First we’re going to take off, make ourselves into a big flat ribbon, twist and turn and make a big loop, shoot straight up into the air, then dive down and make a huge rolling wave. Pass it along!’”

  Tully burst out laughing. He shook his head and said, “No, I don’t think it happens like that. But I don’t have a clue how they manage it. Do you, Sasha?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I was afraid you would.”

  She smiled. “It’s like I said. I think maybe when all the individual birds gather into a large flock, the flock becomes a single organism, each of the birds a single cell in the organism. And they share an overall intelligence.”

  Tully took a sip of his coffee and popped the last piece of cinnamon roll into his mouth. “Well, I can’t say you’ve convinced me, but you’ve certainly made me think. I have to leave now. You’ve given me a headache, and I have a hard day tomorrow. Oh, by the way, what kind of vehicle do you drive when you’re running around in the woods looking for birds and stuff?”

  “A pickup. Why?”

  “No particular reason. A three-quarter-ton four-wheel-drive, by any chance?”

  “Yeah. Is there any other kind?”

  “Apparently not in Blight County. Anyway, the Sheriff’s Department is running a little study. Would you mind if a deputy in my department came by and checked your tires? He’s making a study of Blight County three-quarter-ton pickup truck tires and we might as well get you eliminated from our investigation.”

  “I bet this has something to do with your investigation of Morg Fester’s murder, doesn’t it?”

  Tully tried to think of a lie but none came to mind. “Yeah, it does.”

  Sasha was quiet for a moment, apparently thinking the request through. After a bit she said, “There were times if I ever caught Morg killing eagles, I would have shot him. But sure, my pickup truck is the blue Ford out in the employees’ parking lot.” She gave him her license number.

  “Thanks, Sasha. I hated to ask. Just part of my job.”

  “I know, Bo. Don’t worry about it.”

  Chapter 13

  “Pull harder on that left oar, Pap!” Tully shouted at the old man. “Try to bring us into that slack water between the knoll and the island. Now! Row harder! Otherwise, we’re gonna miss the island altogether!”

  Pap yelled back. “If you know so much about rowing a drift boat, Bo, mebby you should crawl back here and do it!”

  “Can’t, Pap! One of us has to stay here in the bow and be captain, to figure out how to get where we’re going! So follow my directions!”

  The old man muttered something under his breath and pulled back hard on the oar.

  “Pull harder, Pap! We’re missing the island!”

  Tully stood up and stared off toward the middle of the island as they swept on by. “I can’t even see the circle from here!”

  “Mebby you’ll have to float over it in a balloon, because I ain’t fighting this current in a drift boat again!”

  “Try to make it back to shore! Otherwise we’ll have to shoot the Narrows and take out down at Henry’s Landing! You ever shoot those rapids?”

  “Only in my worst nightmares! Never occurred to me I’d ever be stupid enough to shoot them when I was awake!”

  Minutes later they were swept into the mouth of the Narrows. Halfway through they climbed a wall of water so steep the drift boat kept slipping back down. Tully stretched out over the bow as far as he could and jammed an oar down into the boiling current. Instantly they were pulled over the crest and plunged into a deep, dark, watery hole. The roaring was so intense both Tully and Pap were hoarse for days afterward. When they finally popped out of the Narrows, Pap somehow managed to maneuver the drift boat onto the takeout ramp at Henry’s Landing. Then he called his girlfriend on his cell phone, asking her to drive over to the river, retrieve his truck and boat trailer, and bring them down to Henry’s Landing.

  Tully asked, “You recovered yet from the Narrows, Pap?”

  The old man seemed to turn the question over in his mind. “All I can say, Bo, those rapids would make a fine cure for constipation.”

  “Worked for me,” Tully said.

  Pap stared at him. “You better be kidding. Otherwise, you ain’t ridin’ back in my truck.”

  “Yeah, I’m kidding. But just barely.”

  Back at Pap’s place, Tully got into his Explorer and drove to the office. The whole staff seemed busy, even Herb Eliot, his undersheriff, whose chief talent was avoiding work and anything that might put him in the way of it. Daisy was typing up a form of some kind, and Lurch was hunched over his computer. Tully looked around and said, “So you all heard me coming down the hallway. One of these days I’m going to switch from boots to shoes and catch you in your normal state of fun and games.”

  “No way, Boss,” Daisy said. “We were all buried in work, just like always.”

  “Ha!” Tully said. “Lurch, get your butt over to my office. I want to know what you’ve found out about our murder.”

  Lurch strolled over, shut the office door behind him, and flopped into a chair. “You catching a cold, Boss? You sound hoarse.”

  Tully stared at him. “No. Just the strain of the job. So what have you found out about Fester’s murder?”

  “The same thing I told you up at the crime scene. The pickup tracks on the skid trail showed that one vehicle had driven in a short ways and then backed out. The tracks indicated it was a three-quarter-ton and probably a four-wheel-drive, which is what most pickups that size are around here. Its tread didn’t match the other treads on the skid trail. I think it must have just been turning around. The snow in the other tire tracks, the ones that went in thirty yards or so, indicates they were made the same time as the new snow started, when Fester was shot. It was Pap who pointed that out to me. I found size-six or maybe size-eight boot tracks in the woods that appear to have been made at the same time the victim was killed. I got a good cast of one of those, and if we ever find a pair of boots belonging to a suspect, we might get a match. Finally, I checked the pickup trucks at the Fester ranch and the one at Silver Tip you wanted me to check and didn’t get a match.”

  Tully leaned forward and rested his arms on the desk. “I’m glad to hear that about Silver Tip. I was worried Sasha might somehow be involved in this, mostly because of her fascination with birds, eagles in particular. Fester used to tease her about how he loved killing eagles. So you didn’t find any treads on the pickups at Fester’s ranch that matched the tracks on the skid trail?”

  “Nothing. I checked every pickup there, and Jeff Sheridan said all the hands were at the ranch at the time and so were their pickups. He could have been lying, of course. He was flying down to the ranch in Mexico the next day.”

  “Really? Maybe he’s meeting up with Hillory Fester, who should be flying back for the funeral. Who’s in charge up here?”

  “A young guy by the name of Wiggens. We may have trouble with him, if we need to check the ranch for anything more. Oh, he did tell me one pickup from the ranch was missing. He said Mrs. Fester probably drove it to Cabo. I don’t know why he told me that but he did. Anyway, that would explain why there’s no airline record of a Mrs. Fester having flown down there by plane.”

  “Wiggens!” Tully said. “You leave him to me, Lurch. How about the pickups owned by the ranch?”

  “Jeff said they all were there, including the rig Fester drov
e.”

  Tully sighed and leaned back in his chair. “So where does that leave us now, as to who shot Morg?”

  Lurch shook his head. “I don’t know. I measured the distance from where the tracks out of the woods stopped to where we found Fester’s body. It was almost exactly twenty yards. I figure an arrow traveling that far wouldn’t lose much force before hitting the target. So it seems to me we would be looking for a bow with at least a forty-pound pull.”

  “Pretty good, Lurch. That’s about what I figured.”

  Chapter 14

  Daisy walked into his office and sat down across the desk from him. She was studying her stenography pad. “You want to hear what’s been going on here at the sheriff’s office, Bo?”

  “Not really. But shoot.”

  “You got a call from your fortune-teller. She says it’s very important that you see her as soon as possible. Apparently your life is in danger again.”

  So Etta was back in town. Etta Gorsich was very attractive, except for being a fortune-teller and a few years older than Tully. “She mention any particulars about my life being in danger?”

  “No, I think she was withholding those in the hope of getting you over to that creepy place of hers as soon as possible.”

  “You have to remember, Daisy, that Etta has always been right-on in the past about persons intent on killing me.”

  “Bo, you always have persons intent on killing you. I could predict that, and I’m not even a psychic.”

  “I know, but some persons are more intent on killing me than others. I’ll drop in on her after lunch. Speaking of lunch, how would you like to grab a bite over at Crabbs?”

  “Sounds like fun. Can we drink?”

  “Only a glass of wine each. We’ll be working, you know.”

  “Aren’t we always.”

  “There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you, but I keep forgetting what it is.”

  “You probably want the rap sheet on some criminal.”

  “Maybe,” Tully said. “Oh, I know something. Get me Hank Schmitt on the phone. He’s the boss up at Pine Flats sawmill.”

  “You know the number?”

  “No. I’ll look it up. I haven’t needed a board in years.”

  Daisy went back to her desk, shutting his door a little louder than necessary, he thought. That’s what he got for being too friendly with the help, not to mention having had an affair with this one in particular. Bad! Bad! He picked up his phone and dialed a number. A woman answered.

  “Hi, Etta. It’s Bo. I was tickled pink to hear you’re back in town.”

  “Oh, Bo, it’s so good to hear your voice! As usual, I’ve been sensing some sort of violence hovering around you.”

  “You know that’s part of my job, sweetheart. Don’t pay any attention to it. I’ll swing by after work. Seems as if you’ve been gone practically forever this time.”

  “That’s so nice of you to say, Bo. It’s only been a couple of months. I have to make a living, you know.”

  “I’m pretty sure you’re independently wealthy by now, Etta, with all those giants of industry you have as clients back east.”

  “Oh, they’re not giants by any measure, Bo. They’re simply older little boys and girls in need of some psychic reinforcement. Some of the boys are gray and bald and a bit overweight, but they still need someone to lean on from time to time.”

  “How about the little girls?”

  “They’re all trim and fit and pretty and a bit flinty about the eyes. I can soften them up, though. Everybody needs somebody, and I try to be that somebody.”

  “I’m sure they need all the help you give them, Etta. As a matter of fact, I could use a little of that myself.”

  Daisy stuck her head in the door. “As soon as you’re done with your fortune-teller, Hank Schmitt is on line two.”

  He nodded at her, then said into the phone, “Got to run, Etta. Crime waits for no one.”

  “Just be careful, Bo.”

  “I will.” Even though he didn’t believe in fortune-telling, Etta had a way of setting his nerves on edge. He punched line two.

  “Hank, thanks for getting back to me. I just wanted to check on our three young criminals.”

  “They’re doing great, Bo. Oh, their first few days on the green chain, I wasn’t sure they were going to make it, but they hung in there. Now they’re hardening up muscles they never knew they had.”

  “Great, Hank. I’ve been worried about them. Men have dropped dead pulling off the green chain.”

  “Yeah, after the boys showed up for work the first few days we had to check them for signs of life ever so often, but now they’re settling in and working hard. It doesn’t hurt that I’m paying them twenty dollars an hour, either. I don’t think one of them has ever had this much money before, money he earned himself, and they’re too tired at the end of the day to go out and spend any of it. As a matter of fact, I don’t think they’ll ever spend it. They’ve worked too hard for every dime. If you have any more criminals you’d like to send my way, Bo, I’d appreciate it, as long as they’re under the age of thirty.”

  Tully laughed. “Well, just so the three criminals hold out through the spring and summer, I’ll look for some additional green-chain folks for you. I’d like to get all three of these back to college in the fall.”

  Schmitt said, “After pulling off the green chain, Bo, everything in life is up from there. I’m sure they’ll love college as never before.”

  “Hank, the next time I turn up any young healthy criminals I will definitely send them your way.”

  Chapter 15

  Lester Cline, the headwaiter at Crabbs, broke into a beaming smile at the sight of Tully and Daisy walking through the restaurant’s front door. One of his aims in life seemed to be getting Bo and Daisy married. He swept two menus off the counter and rushed them over. “Oh, what a pleasure to see you two together once again. I’ll show you to your special table. I keep it reserved just for the two of you.”

  “Thanks, Lester, but this is strictly a business luncheon. It’s Daisy’s turn and she’s paying.”

  Daisy said, “It is not my turn, Lester, and I’m not paying. We’re here for a business lunch, as Bo says, so the county is paying.”

  “Even better. The tip is always really good when the county pays.” He showed them to their table and spread a large linen napkin on each of their laps.

  “What’s the special today?” Tully asked.

  “You know what the special is today, Bo. It’s what the special is every day at Crabbs for lunch.”

  “In that case, I’ll take the special. It’s always good.”

  Daisy said, “I’ll take the special, too, Lester. And two glasses of wine. White zinfandel, if you please. I don’t know if Bo wants any.”

  “That’s okay, Lester. I’ll just drink one of hers.”

  Lester looked confused.

  Daisy laughed. “Don’t worry about it, Lester. I’ll give one of mine to Bo.”

  The waiter wandered off, rather aimlessly, Tully thought. Daisy could be an extremely confusing person when she was in the mood. He had long ago given up trying to understand her moments of whimsy.

  Daisy said, “Hard to believe you once sent Lester up for five years. What was that for again?”

  “Boosting cars. He only did three, though—years, not cars. Got out on good behavior.”

  “And gave up on a life of crime?”

  “As far as we know, Daisy. Can’t say the same for the chef here at Crabbs.”

  “What! I didn’t know he had a criminal history!”

  “You eat here and can say that!”

  “Bo, it isn’t that bad. Hush, here comes Lester.”

  Lester came mincing up, a white linen napkin over his arm, two glasses of white wine and the remainder in a bottle on the tray. He served them with elaborate gestures, something that caused Tully to think of a French waiter, even though he hadn’t actually been to France.

  “Lovely, Lester,”
Daisy said, while Tully frowned up at him.

  “Thank you, Daisy. It’s so nice to hear words of appreciation from time to time.” He rolled his eyes in Tully’s direction. “So is it the lunch special for both of you, or are you going to try your luck?”

  “Let me think, Lester,” Tully said. “Hmm. I think we’ll both have the lunch special.”

  “Very good choice, sir. It hasn’t produced any fatalities in over a week.” He minced back toward the kitchen. Tully guessed it was an act. Lester really wasn’t the mincing type.

  He sipped his wine. “Not bad.”

  Daisy frowned at him. “Bo, you know the wine here is always good. Anyway, while Lester is gone, what do you think about us getting back together? I’ve dated a couple of guys since we broke up, and I have to tell you, the pickings are very thin out there when it comes to men.”

  “Daisy, this is Blight City in the middle of Blight County. I take it you’ve never read ‘The Cave.’”

  “‘The Cave?’ No, I can’t say I have.”

  “That’s because it was written by Socrates, who was a bit before your time. Also because Socrates never wrote anything. All he did was talk. Plato wrote down what he said, and that’s how we know about ‘The Cave.’”

  “I hate philosophy, Bo.”

  “I hate it, too, and would never have read Plato if it hadn’t been forced on me by a professor in college. The guy was a monster. Take another shot of wine, because you’re going to need it.”

  “Oh, no! Please don’t tell me about ‘The Cave’ when I’m about to have lunch.”

  “I’ll just give you the gist of my version. You see, there was this band of people who were born into a cave and lived their whole lives there. The master of the cave—I forget what he was called—somehow projected images up on the wall, perhaps with a stone projector of some kind, and those images were all the cave people knew about the world outside the cave, if there was a world out there. So here’s my point. I think Socrates meant that if people never leave the tiny culture of people they are born into, that is all they know of the world. They may get images on the wall from outside, like in newspapers and magazines and television and movies nowadays, but they never have firsthand knowledge of it. Are you following me, Daisy? I’m working on your education here.”