Wash Her Guilt Away (Quill Gordon Mystery Book 2)

by Michael Wallace

  Peter whistled. “You don’t say. And does he have a motive for me, or don’t they teach detectives to look for that sort of thing any more?”

  “No motive, which is why you’re merely on the list, instead of being the main person of interest.”

  “Then why am I even on the list?”

  Gordon took a deep breath. “Go on,” Peter said. “It can’t be anything worse than my ex-wives have said to me.”

  “It’s several things, really. But mainly it’s that you’ve figured in the situations so much. You, we, went to the cabin right away when Wendy was found; you’re the one who saw the light go off in her cabin at a time that screws up the medical evidence; you’re the one who discovered the scene of the witches’ Sabbath. He thinks that’s all too much of a coincidence. He’s even suspicious about your bladder.”

  Peter took it in calmly. “There’s something else you’re not telling me, isn’t there?”

  “Plus he just doesn’t like you. But you probably knew that.”

  Peter picked up the coffee cup, took a big swallow and set it down on the table, looking at it disapprovingly.

  “You should have let me have another beer if we were going to be having this conversation, Gordon. Between you and me, I think Rogers is frustrated because he isn’t getting anywhere on this case, and I don’t blame him. He’s dealing with a killer who has some intelligence, which is unusual to begin with, and who’s lucky to boot. I know I’ve been saying he should give up and go home, but I don’t really mean it. A killer who gets away with murder once is an exceptionally dangerous individual because he, or she, I guess, is likely to start thinking that murder might be the answer to the next problem. So I do sincerely hope he catches this killer. If Rogers wants to talk to me about this case instead of going through you, bring him on. I’ll tell him what I’m going to tell you now.

  “Let’s start with going to the cabin that morning. You’ve probably figured out by now that I don’t believe in much, but there is one thing I believe in completely, and that’s my professional responsibility. When I was younger and working in the emergency room, I doubted even that. Somebody would come in with gunshot wounds or stab wounds, and I’d wonder why I was bothering to save them. Because there was a pretty good chance most of them would do one of two things: They’d go out and repeat the behavior that got them stabbed or shot in the first place, or they’d be quicker on the draw the next time and be the stabber or the shooter themselves and end up behind bars.

  “Somewhere along the way, I stopped worrying about that. I realized I had a gift for surgery and trauma care, and that I couldn’t play God with that gift. I had to use it, and at least give the people I was treating a chance, even though only one out of 20 would do anything with it. I have no way of knowing who that one is going to be, so I have to treat everybody as if they could be the one. That ethic is instinctual and automatic now, which is why I immediately rushed out to the cabin when we knew what had happened. If I’d been able to do anything for her, Wendy probably would have joined the Club of Nineteen, but I had a solemn obligation to her anyway. The obligation to at least give her a chance.”

  He paused for another swallow of coffee.

  “Now we skip ahead to the find in the forest. I can see how that looks suspicious because it was dumb luck and coincidence. Some people don’t believe in coincidence, but I do.”

  “So does Rogers.”

  “Well then he should let up. I mean, listen, Gordon, if I’d stopped to go into the woods a minute earlier or a minute later, I wouldn’t have seen that large, cut-off boulder. That’s what made me go over for a closer look. I saw it through that slight opening in the trees, and I imagine you did, too once you got off the trail. And once I saw the scene in the clearing, I knew there was something going on. Hell, even Alan would have put down his trout fly and seen that much. After that, I had to call you over and share it. Besides which, does Rogers think I went out there and set up the scene? I’ve hardly been away from your side since we got here. When would I have the time?”

  “Calm down, Peter. I’m not the one you have to convince.”

  “All right, fine. I’m just saying. Finally, getting up in the middle of the night and seeing the light go off in the next cabin. All I can say is that Rogers is plenty old enough to understand the getting up part, and I know what I saw. I noticed that light on when I rolled out of bed, and I stopped to look at it when I came back. That’s when it switched off, and I looked at the clock on the nightstand ten seconds later. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.”

  April appeared at the table.

  “Ah, the angel of mercy,” Peter said. “Could you get me a beer, my love?”

  “Sure thing. You boys ready to order yet?”

  They hadn’t looked at the menu yet, but Peter picked his up and handed it to her.

  “I’ll have the New York steak with mushrooms, medium rare.”

  “The same,” Gordon said, “but cook mine medium.”

  “Coming right up,” she said, and bounced off. Peter followed her with his eyes.

  “Ah, to be 40 again,” he said.

  Gordon laughed. “I’d hardly say she was your type, Peter.”

  “I don’t know who is, and I’ve tried five times. But mark my words: April’s going to be a good mother.”

  Gordon shot him a quizzical look.

  “She has two of the most important attributes for that job. She’s efficient, and she doesn’t take crap from anybody. Neither do I. Maybe that’s why Rogers doesn’t like me, but he’s hardly in the minority.”

  Peter finished his coffee and looked toward the window. The rain was still falling steadily and periodically a gust of wind would blow a sheet of water against the dining room windows. Inside, it was warm and convivial, the room filled with the sounds of laughter, conversation, drinking and eating. It would have been utterly comforting if not for the fact that almost certainly one of the people in the lodge was a cold-blooded killer.

  April returned with the beer. Peter picked it up and held it to the light, enjoying its color, then tipped the glass slightly in Gordon’s direction.

  “Here’s to us,” he said, taking a swallow. “I’m glad you asked me to come along on this trip, and your friendship means a lot to me. Tomorrow’s our last full day here, so let’s make the most of it.”

  Gordon lifted his water glass to return the toast.

  “I’ll drink to that,” he said.

  7

  IT WAS NINE O’CLOCK when they were finished with dinner, and the crowd in the dining room had thinned out. Rogers, whose meal had been delayed by his meeting with the press, was at a corner table with Lilly, both of them halfway through their dinner. Several people were having after-dinner drinks in the lounge, but Gordon recognized only Stuart and Charles, alone and sullen at different ends of the room. He decided not to join them.

  When they opened the front door of Harry’s, rain was falling steadily outside, with the wind gusting from time to time. They started down the path to the cabins, but when they reached the point where it forked toward the parking lot, Peter stopped.

  “I need to get something from the car,” he said. “Go ahead to the cabin if you want.”

  “I’m wet already,” Gordon said. “I may as well come with you.”

  Gordon’s Cherokee was parked near the middle of the lot, and most of the other cars were parked as close to the lodge as possible. When they reached the Cherokee, Peter began fumbling for the spare set of keys Gordon had given him at the beginning of the trip, finally finding them and opening the rear passenger’s side door. As he was doing this, Gordon looked to the back corner of the parking lot, where one car stood by itself.

  “That’s funny.” Gordon said. “That looks like Cynthia’s car.”

  “I think you’re right, but so what. She’s here, isn’t she?”

  “I’m not so sure. It seems to me she would have left after talking to Rogers, and that was an hour ago.”


  “She’s probably inside writing her story somewhere. And it’s pouring rain out here. Let’s get back to the cabin.”

  He started in that direction, and Gordon followed him for a few steps, then stopped.

  “No, Peter. This doesn’t feel right. Humor me. I’m going to take a quick look.

  With a sigh, Peter followed Gordon, who was trudging toward the car at the back of the parking lot. It was dark, and there were no lights in the parking area, just a faint illumination from the distant lodge. But as they got close to the car, Gordon saw something white near the far rear corner of it. He took a small flashlight out of his parka pocket and aimed it in that direction.

  A white running shoe with pink markings protruded from behind the right rear tire of the car. Gordon ran the last ten feet to the car and shone his light behind it.

  Cynthia Henley lay face-down on the ground, sprawled as if she had dropped suddenly and unguardedly, a sodden reporter’s notebook by her side. When Gordon pointed the beam at the back of her head, they could see a large, bloody gash through her soaked hair.

  Peter sprang into action, kneeling by the body.

  “She still has a pulse, but it’s weak,” he said. Run back to the lodge and get Rogers.”

  Gordon turned.

  “But call an ambulance first. I’ll do everything I can, but she needs to be in a hospital pronto. The bigger and more sophisticated, the better. Go!”

  Gordon ran as fast as he could.

  8

  IT WAS 11:30, and Gordon, Rogers and Lilly were seated in front of the fireplace in the lounge, Rogers in the middle couch with Lilly and Gordon in the chairs at each side. The bar had closed for the evening, but Don allowed them to remain to tend to business. They were wet and weary, but Gordon had carefully added two large logs to the fire, which burned intensely and threw out a reassuring light and warmth. Peter had gone back to the cabin, and Gordon surmised that he was having a generous whisky or brandy from his personal stash. This time, Gordon couldn’t hold it against him.

  “She’s at Muirfield Memorial right now, being treated and stabilized,” Rogers said. “As soon as they can, they’re going to ship her to Red Gulch Community, which has the best trauma unit in the five-county area.”

  “Is she … ” Gordon’s voice trailed off.

  “They think she’ll live, but she’s damn lucky you found her when you did. Another half hour in the cold and rain and she’d have been in a lot worse shape. As it is, it was good she was wearing a heavy coat.” Don had poured a generous double of Hennessey for Rogers and Gordon before leaving; Lilly was dipping a bag of Lipton tea in a large, steaming mug. Rogers took an approving sip of his cognac and continued.

  “No telling when she’ll come around, and of course complications are still possible. Frankly I’m not putting much hope in her being able to help us when she does come to. She was hit from behind in a dark parking area, and with the noise of the wind and rain, I doubt she heard her attacker coming at all. This isn’t going to be easy.”

  “Surely you can trace people’s movements,” Gordon said.

  “Not as much as you might think. A room full of people, with everybody moving around and going in and out all night long is as close to anonymous as you can get. It would have been a lot easier a couple of nights ago when the dining hall was half full. In a big, crowded room, people narrow their environment to what’s right in front of them. They hardly notice anything else.”

  “He’s right, Mr. Gordon,” said Lilly. “I’ve talked to most of the guests and called a couple of the locals who were here for dinner. Most of them don’t remember if they left the dining room to go to the bar or the bathroom, and they sure don’t remember what anyone else was doing.”

  “Take yourself,” Rogers said. “You were at a table with just your friend, the good doctor. Did you leave the dining room at all?”

  “No, I was there the whole time. Wait, I did go out to clean up for a minute right after we gave our order.”

  “See. You almost forgot. How about Dr. Delaney?”

  “He got up once, right after they brought dinner, but he was only out a couple of minutes. He wouldn’t have had time to go to the parking lot and back.”

  “Are you sure about that? Most people are lousy judges of time. If you ask ten people about something that took ten minutes, only one will be close on the time. The rest will either say it took two or three minutes or fifteen to twenty minutes.”

  “I’m pretty sure. Peter isn’t in very good shape. He wasn’t gone long enough.”

  “Still, he tried to talk you out of checking her car, didn’t he?”

  “That’s true, but it was cold and wet out there, and there was no real reason to look. If anything, my insisting on checking out her car was more suspicious than Peter being reluctant to do it.”

  Rogers took another sip of the cognac.

  “Don’t give me any ideas,” he said. “This case is just about the biggest mess I’ve ever handled. About all I can say for sure is this:

  “The three of us got back to the lounge right around 7:30, and she waylaid me on the spot. I talked to her for almost half an hour. She was pressing me about whether or not we were close to an arrest, and she was asking a lot of questions about the medical evidence and the time of death, but I was trying to deflect her, and I’m not sure what she was getting at. We finished the conversation at exactly 7:58 p.m.”

  “You’re sure about the time?” Gordon asked.

  “I was on overtime, so I looked at my watch to note when work stopped. After that, it appears she didn’t leave right away. April said that after I left, she saw our Lois Lane talking to a few people in the lounge, then at some point in the next half hour, she was gone. April was crazy-busy making drinks and helping with the tables, so I’m surprised we got that much out of her. And until you came running back in the middle of my dinner, that’s all we know. We got bupkes, Gordon. You know what bupkes is?”

  “It’s a lot of nothing.”

  “Damn right. We got a lot of nothing, And nowhere I can see to start looking for something.”

  The three men looked silently into the fire for a minute, then Lilly spoke.

  “Could I make a suggestion, sir? I’m assuming that we’re working on the theory that whoever killed Mrs. Van Holland also attacked Miss Henley.” Rogers nodded. “In that case, maybe the question we should be asking is what did she know that the killer was afraid of? She was asking about the medical evidence, so maybe he thought she was on to something. Or getting too close to something. I don’t know.”

  Rogers downed the last of his Hennessey and gave Lilly an approving look.

  “Good point, deputy. Let’s sleep on it and start down that path tomorrow morning.”

  9

  PETER WAS DOZING IN A CHAIR with a whisky glass on the table next to him. It had an ounce or so left in it. He woke up when Gordon came in.

  “Sorry,” Peter said. “I was going to wait up for you.”

  “No problem.” Gordon took off his parka and stood by the heater. “Rogers said it looks like she’ll pull through.”

  “That’s what I would have said. Dammit, Gordon, I’ve been too busy for a vacation.”

  “A regular busman’s holiday.”

  Peter sat up and tried to shake the cobwebs from his head.

  “You realize, of course, that this changes everything.”

  “Meaning?” Gordon said.

  “Meaning that up to now we could look at Wendy’s murder with a bit of distance. Too bad for her, but we could believe that she brought it on herself, to some extent, through the force of her lovely personality, and that the rest of us weren’t in any danger.”

  “We can’t say that now.”

  “No, we can’t. Remember what I said earlier about the danger of a killer who’s murdered successfully? That’s what we have to worry about now. Our killer thought Cynthia figured something out, and he, maybe she, was willing to kill again to stop her. A better placed blow
, another hour in the rain for Cynthia, and this is a double murder case. It’s a bad business all around.”

  “It is. But I can’t help feeling that I’m starting to come to some idea about all this. Like there’s one connection I need to make and the puzzle will suddenly become a picture.”

  Peter downed half the whisky in his glass.

  “I’d be careful if I were you, Gordon. Everybody here knows you’ve been spending a lot of time with Rogers and sharing ideas with him. If Cynthia was almost killed for nosing around, you could be next.”

  Gordon laughed. “Come on, Peter.”

  “I’m serious. Nobody saw tonight’s attack coming, and it may not be the last one. And the next victim may not be so lucky.”

  He finished the last of the whisky.

  “Do me a favor, Gordon. Lock the chain bolt tonight. We’ll both sleep better if you do.”

  Saturday May 13

  1

  GORDON SLEPT POORLY, his dreams punctuated by vivid and incoherent images involving witches, headless boatmen, and stealthy faceless figures lunging to attack in the dark. He was in the middle of one of those dreams when the alarm clock came on, and it took him a minute to turn it off. He remained groggy after a shave and shower.

  “Last full day,” Peter said, as they left for breakfast at the lodge. “I’ve got to hand it to you, Gordon. You gave us a fishing trip to remember.”

  There was no rain as they walked to the main building, but the cloud cover remained dense, and a chilling breeze cut through their clothes. Even by the standard of the past few days, it was a dismal morning.

  “I want you to stick around a while,” Rogers said as they arrived. “I may have more questions.”

  “How is she?” Gordon asked.

  “Still unconscious, but better. They’re pretty sure she’ll pull through.”

  Rachel and Stuart were sitting at a window table, eating a tense and wordless breakfast. Charles arrived shortly after Gordon and Peter, and they invited him to join them for breakfast. He followed them to the buffet and took a small scoop of scrambled eggs, a single sausage link, and a slice of whole wheat toast to go with his cup of coffee.