Death in the Secret Garden

by Forrest, Richard;

  Lyon ran his hand along the cot blanket. It was tight enough to bounce a coin. ‘This is a waste of time, Rocco. Spook didn’t kill the girl. Boots may have given him a break on the price of tuna fish, but no way would she go into the state forest alone with him.’

  ‘Probably no girl in town would want to be alone with Spook, even if he is harmless. That’s not the way I see it happening. Spook just happened to be in the forest. Maybe he took a bottle out there, or thought he was on a search-and-destroy mission, I don’t know. He doesn’t just march to a different drummer, he carries a whole marching band in his head. Anyway, he sees Boots and her boyfriend making love. The guy leaves and Spook watches Boots parading around au naturel. He’s turned on. He goes into the clearing. He gives her a First Cav patch as a gift and then when he touches her she screams. He goes berserk. He kills her.’

  ‘Where did the gun come from?’

  ‘He’s had it a long time. We may find it here.’

  ‘If Spook had a handgun he would have sold it long ago for whiskey money.’

  ‘Maybe yes, maybe it’s here. The place has to be tossed. I’d be derelict if I didn’t.’ Rocco began a meticulous search of the small room.

  Lyon opened the first footlocker and lifted out an open shoebox stuffed with dozens of First Cav patches. ‘There’s over a hundred patches here. He must order them by the gross.’

  ‘If we find a handgun there’s no way the poor bastard will ever get out of jail,’ Rocco said as he continued his search.

  Lyon watched the police officer’s efficient movements and began to help. In twenty minutes they had thoroughly gone through the small room containing the man’s meager belongings. Lyon climbed to the roof and carefully examined the top of the structure for possible hiding places.

  ‘Come look at this,’ Rocco said as Lyon climbed down from the roof. Mounted on the wall above the cot was a metal crossbow with a sheaf containing half a dozen bolts.

  ‘Could that have fired a missile that caused the girl’s wound?’ Lyon asked.

  ‘I don’t think so, but this thing has an interesting background. Did you know that in Nam, Spook was known as the Bowman? On clandestine missions he took out sentries and guards with a weapon like this. These things are easy to operate, silent, accurate, and powerful.’

  Lyon hefted the weapon in his hand. ‘It’s called a Cranequin. It uses a rack and pinion system for spanning.’

  ‘How in the hell did you know that?’ Rocco laughed.

  Lyon shrugged. ‘Read it somewhere. This method of spanning is five hundred years old.’

  ‘What’s spanning?’

  ‘Drawing the string back,’ Lyon said.

  Rocco took the bow and remounted it on the wall. ‘Be that as it will. Nothing like this shot Boots Anderson.’

  Now that their search was complete, the stark bareness of the small room was disquieting. It seemed to be a place without corners, maintained so demons would find little to hide behind. Lyon wondered what the emotionally wounded Spook had encountered during his two tours of combat that had rocked his personality to its most primitive roots.

  ‘Chief, you up there?’ the voice of patrolman Jamie Martin called from the base of the tree.

  Rocco stuck his head out the trap door. ‘What’s up, Jamie? I thought you were off duty.’

  ‘I am, sir. I went over to Sarge’s place for a beer and a hamburger.’ He omitted the three shots of whiskey he’d gulped to accompany the beer. ‘We got a problem, Chief.’

  ‘We often have a problem at Sarge’s,’ Rocco answered. ‘What’s Renfroe up to this time, besides sampling his own products too early in the day?’

  Jamie shifted from one foot to another for a moment before blurting out, ‘I told the girl’s father about her killing.’

  ‘Oh, Jesus H. Christ,’ Rocco mumbled under his breath. He forced himself to think positively. ‘Well, thanks for taking on that unpleasant task, Jamie. It shows a growing maturity on your part. Having to break the news to the relatives of the recently deceased is not an easy job. I was going to speak with the Anderson family as soon as I was finished up here. Now, since you have taken care of that little task, I won’t have to.’

  ‘It’s not exactly like you think, Chief. Lister sort of overheard me talking about Boots and Eddy Rashish. When he learned she was dead, he looked real pissed and scratched off in his pickup.’

  ‘Oh, God!’ Rocco climbed down the makeshift ladder quickly followed by Lyon. ‘Lister will blow Eddy away if we don’t get there first.’

  Eddy’s Motors was located north of Murphysville just before the highway reached the bridge across the Connecticut River. The sales lot contained two dozen vehicles of mixed breed and age that were parked nose-out on an open dirt field. The office was in a red striped trailer at the center rear of the property. Multicolored triangular flags were hung from a wire stretched across the front of the lot. They flapped lazily in the breeze above windshields whose white messages announced: A CREAM PUFF, GUARANTEED CREDIT, PAY WEEKLY or PRICE SLASHED.

  Eddy had a live one. The customer hovered over a red pickup. Eddy hovered over the customer. ‘You pay here weekly,’ Eddy said casually. ‘Seventy-five little ones gets you this little buggy,’ he said more exuberantly. ‘You bring in the payment every Friday afternoon. That’s when you get paid at the factory, right?’

  ‘We get paid on Thursday,’ the customer said as he kicked a tire.

  Eddy smiled and clapped the man’s shoulder. ‘Hell, I’m easy to work with. Bring in the payment Thursday or Friday. I don’t care. Every week and no sweat. That way there’s no big payment to pony up each month. And, I don’t give a squiggly damn about your past credit.’

  ‘What if I miss a week?’

  Eddy smiled. It was a grin that would have frightened dragons, but his ‘live one’ was too intent on trying the stereo of the red pickup to notice the skewered grimace. ‘Hell, we can always work something out if you’re up front with me.’ Bull diddle, he thought to himself. You jump a payment and you miss the truck cuz I hold the title until you’re paid off. That means I can drive her away anytime I want.

  ‘Well, I don’t know.’

  ‘She’s a beauty, and you can use her for hunting and fishing. I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to throw in a cap for the truck bed. With a cap on the back you can put an air mattress in there. Dunk in a beer cooler and you got a hunting and fishing camper.’

  ‘That would be nice.’ The customer had already begun to dream of swigging apricot brandy around a campfire peopled with visions of plump fish and swift deer. ‘How much a week again?’

  ‘Only seventy-five.’

  ‘For how long?’

  ‘Two years.’

  ‘That comes to—’

  ‘A little more than the sticker price cuz I’m financing you like a bank would. Your bank would charge you a heavy percentage, wouldn’t they?’

  ‘Sure,’ the customer replied, even though he didn’t have a bank account or credit with any lending institution.

  ‘Want a test spin?’ Eddy counted on the customer’s ignorance of percentages to hide the true cost of the vehicle. The pay-weekly amount for two years nearly doubled the cost of the truck.

  Lister Anderson drove his pickup over the curb and across the lot until he slammed into the side of the office trailer. He jumped from the cab after grabbing a .12 gauge from the gun rack mounted across the rear window. He peered around the lot until he saw Eddy with his customer. As he walked toward them, Lister broke the .12 gauge open to see that shells were seated in both chambers. He snapped it shut and thumbed back the triggers.

  ‘Oh, shit,’ Eddy said as he saw the man with the wispy red hair stalking across the lot. ‘You just look this baby over some more,’ he said to his customer. He smiled and began to walk toward Anderson. ‘Hey, how you doing, Lister?’

  ‘You laid with my daughter.’

  ‘Now wait a minute, Lister. Everything can be explained.’

 
; ‘Sinner!’ Lister Anderson said as he raised the shotgun and fired both barrels directly into Eddy’s abdomen.

  The two shots, fired nearly simultaneously, hit Eddy Rashish directly in the midsection and lifted him bodily off his feet and flung him back against a ’92 Chevy utility wagon.

  Three

  The Millrace Inn was built on the bluff of the third of the Seven Sister hills. It was located almost directly across the river from Nutmeg Hill. Its high perch overlooking the valley demanded broad expanses of window. The recent return to the area of a few eagles provided further amusement for the inn’s customers. These large birds, in their predatory circling over the river, often rode the air currents that swept past the inn. From time to time they would turn to watch the guests with the same curiosity they usually reserved for small scurrying prey.

  Bea Wentworth stood in the entryway of the inn’s Forge Room and waited to be seated. She glanced at her appointment book. It occurred to her that she must be aging. Recently she had formed the habit of making lists of her ‘things to do.’ There were three entries on her calendar for today’s luncheon date with Helena Rabnor of the State Life Committee. Her intern had made one entry, Bea another, and God only knows the author of the third. Inefficient redundancy, she thought.

  This was an important meeting. The outspoken Helena was a heavy-set feisty woman who had manned the feminist barricades for two decades. She could be a close friend or a dedicated enemy. Since they agreed on most issues, Bea considered herself a part of the friendly contingent.

  Bea was not a large woman although her compact figure was too full for her to be called petite. Her close-cropped hair often created a gamine-like appearance. This innocence was quickly dispelled by darting intelligent eyes and an intense manner that revealed itself when she was deeply concerned.

  The inn’s owner, Mike Maresca, presented himself with a slight bow. ‘Senator Wentworth, we have your reservation. A window table?’

  ‘Please, Mike.’ She followed him to a table set for two with a fine view of the river. ‘I’m expecting Helena Rabnor, do you know her?’

  The owner sighed. ‘But, yes. She had the inn picketed in eighty-nine because all the waiters were male.’

  Bea gave him her best political smile. ‘Well, try and not poison her today, please.’

  Maresca pulled out her chair. ‘I have selected a special wine for you. A 1992 Au Bon Climat, a Californian Chardonnay.’

  ‘Not hemlock?’

  Maresca held both palms up in supplication. ‘A promise.’

  ‘I place myself in your trusted hands,’ Bea said with another smile at the departing owner. She looked out over the river. It was a magnificent technicolor day.

  A vague sense of malaise suddenly seeped over her and she wondered at its origin until its genesis jolted her. This day, like so many others at this time of year, reminded her of one years ago when their daughter had died. It had been Sandra’s birthday. They had given her a two-wheeler bike and she had squealed in delight.

  ‘I don’t need training wheels. I can do it! I’ve been practicing at Mandy’s. Watch me!’

  She began her wobbly ride on the sidewalk in front of their home on the Murphysville Green. Suddenly she had run over the curb into the street and lost her balance. Before Lyon could reach her she was struck by a car and killed.

  Bea turned from the window in pain as Helena Rabnor appeared at the table.

  ‘How’s my favorite state senator?’ Helena said as she snatched a chair from the table and plunked into it.

  ‘A moment ago old ghosts were a-haunting, but they’re leaving.’ Bea forced a smile. The remembered horror of witnessing her daughter’s death now changed into concern over her ticking biological clock. She often felt that her internal timepiece was rapidly approaching its last tock. If she and Lyon were to have another child, they would have to begin in the relatively near future. She wasn’t sure if she had the strength to go through with it.

  Bea forced her best political smile toward the woman sitting across the table as menus appeared and wine was poured.

  ‘We have problems at the capital, Wentworth,’ Helena said in her usual forceful manner. ‘I need a bill.’

  Why does that not surprise me? Bea thought. Was it because Helena always needed legislation? ‘What do you have in mind?’ Bea responded casually as she scanned the menu for the fish of the day.

  ‘I want legal teeth!’ Helena demanded. ‘The clinic protestors must be stopped, or at least controlled. They are frightening some of our young women clients.’

  What goes around comes around, Bea thought. Yesterday’s avid protesters want protection from today’s avid protesters. ‘Can you be more specific as to what you had in mind?’ she asked and inwardly sighed as Helena produced a thick sheaf of documents.

  Bea was still making notes over coffee when the inn owner diffidently approached them. He whispered in her ear. ‘Senator, we seem to have a problem of the utmost delicacy. Could I speak with you privately in my office?’

  ‘Of course. I’ll be there in a few moments.’ Bea smiled at the owner and her tablemate. ‘Give me a few days on this,’ she said to Helena. ‘I’ll see what support I can gather in the senate.’

  Helena pushed away from the table with the same vigor she exhibited in most activities. ‘Very good. You always give our needs your best shot, Beatrice. That’s why we support you.’ They shook hands firmly.

  As Helena left for the parking lot, Bea knocked on the office door by the inn entrance. Maresca’s muffled ‘Come in’ sounded depressed. She found the inn owner slumped dejectedly in a deeply upholstered desk chair.

  ‘What is it, Mike? The Restaurant League want a bill banning all fast food introduced in the legislature?’

  ‘Don’t I wish!’ He turned to her, his face wrinkled with worry lines. ‘I believe you are good friends with the governor?’

  ‘Margaret and I have been friends for years. We go back to the days when we were both freshman representatives.’

  ‘Her husband, the congressman, is here.’

  ‘Bill Tallman? Oh, I didn’t see … OK, Mike. What’s the deal?’

  ‘As you know, the inn has a dozen rooms upstairs for our small bed and breakfast clientele. The congressman is presently occupying one and all is not well.’

  ‘Did you call 911?’

  Maresca cleared his throat. ‘It is a matter of a little delicacy, since the congressman had a companion with him and is now dead.’

  ‘Which one is dead?’

  ‘The congressman has left us.’

  ‘Oh, ho.’ Bea slumped into a chair. ‘He is unclothed?’

  ‘But, yes. For amore that is the way.’

  ‘How complicated do we get? Is the companion a man or woman?’

  ‘A girl.’

  ‘Over eighteen?’

  Maresca looked thoughtful. ‘I would say … Yes. Young, but a definite over eighteen. Let us put it this way, I would not card her in my bar. But I must say that she seems to be a young lady of dubious background.’

  ‘This is going to kill Margaret.’

  ‘The publicity will not be good for the inn. I have not built my reputation as an establishment known for matinee performances by older men with dubious younger women.’

  Bea sighed. ‘Let’s see what we can do.’

  Ashley Towers claimed to be an emergency pharmacist to her family and friends. In reality, she was the most requested woman working for the Middleburg Escort Service. While her formal education had ended after an incomplete first year at Middleburg Community College, she claimed to be operating as an emergency pharmacist under a temporary certification.

  She explained to everyone that she was on constant call for a chain of twenty-four-hour drug stores. It was her assignment to temporarily replace sick and absent pharmacists. In reality, her extensive call-outs were due to an erotic education gained during extra-curricular activities experienced that single year in college. She had been considered an outstanding date
for a quick and satisfying evening.

  After two failed marriages to real losers, Ashley had answered a newspaper ad for attractive hostesses. It was her assumption that by working for the Middleburg Escort Service she would be taken to dinner by out-of-town salesmen. She might or might not have a romantic interlude. She quickly learned that there was very little eating done in the escort business, but a great many romantic interludes in a variety of motel rooms.

  Congressman Bill Tallman had been a regular. He always went first class. They drank good champagne and usually stayed in the Clara Barton suite of the Millrace Inn. She enjoyed their sessions and his tips were generous. His only requirement, besides her complete enthusiasm, was discretion.

  She didn’t think it was very discreet of him to die on her. And it didn’t take the brain of a real emergency pharmacist to diagnose that the man on the bed was quite definitely dead.

  The inn had a large man from the grounds crew blocking the outside of the door so she couldn’t leave. They wouldn’t let her telephone Baby Dumpling for advice. She shivered and waited for the owner to return.

  Mike Maresca and Bea entered the Clara Barton suite and firmly closed the door. ‘What happened?’ Bea snapped at the red-haired girl sitting uncomfortably on a Victorian chair.

  ‘We were doing it when he just clutched his chest. Then he said, “Oh, God,” and died.’

  Bea looked at the corpse. Her first thought was that an interim election would be held. She might have hated herself for her uncharitable spirit if the dead man hadn’t been such a bastard. She nodded grimly at Maresca before turning her attention toward the girl. ‘Do I know you?’ she asked the red-haired girl.

  ‘I know who you are, Mrs. Wentworth. I grew up and live in Murphysville.’

  ‘I want you back across the river,’ Bea said. ‘Do not talk to anyone about this. Do you understand? If you speak with a soul, I guarantee you will be in deep trouble.’