“Are you really okay?” he asked.
“I keep seeing her. Lying there.”
As they moved out of sight of the house, he took hold of her hands and rubbed each of them in turn, letting the friction heat them. “I know. I’m sorry you had to see that, and I’m sorry we had to leave you alone.”
At Warren’s use of the word “alone,” worry crept into Lindsay’s mind. She remembered that she had yet to tell Warren about Sarabelle being at the house, but even as the words began to form, she hesitated. Sarabelle had seemed utterly terrified of going to the police; Lindsay had never seen anyone so scared.
The crackle of static on Warren’s walkie talkie interrupted her train of thought. “Detective Satterwhite, the state boys’ll be here in two minutes to start on the house.”
Warren raised the walkie talkie to his face and replied, “Copy. I’m heading back now.” He turned to Lindsay. “Look, Lins. I’m real sorry about this, but we’re gonna need you to move out for awhile so the crime scene guys can go over the house. It might take a couple of days. If you feel ready to give your statement when we get back, then we can get you packed up and outta here. Where’s your car, by the way?”
“I left it in Corolla.”
“You probably shouldn’t drive right now anyway. You still look a little shaky. I’m sure one of the Duck guys can take you into town. Why don’t you call Anna? I expect they can find some space for you at the Sandpiper. You can rest up for as long as you need to.” He removed his coat and draped it over her shoulders.
“Maybe I should just go back to Mount Moriah,” Lindsay said. She felt deflated, defeated. “I can’t imagine going to Anna’s wedding in less than a week.”
“I can’t let you go back home.”
For a brief moment, Lindsay thought he was making a grand romantic gesture—refusing to leave her side during this terrible crisis. But almost as soon as the thought flickered into her brain, she realized what he really meant. That she had to remain nearby as a witness to the crime. For all she knew, she was a suspect.
“Of course. You need to question me.”
“I can’t be the one to put you through that.”
“It’s okay. I know you have to.”
“No, I’m sorry, but I mean I shouldn’t be the one to question you. It wouldn’t look right. That’s why I asked Claire to get involved. She was one of my instructors at the Academy and now she’s the Deputy Sheriff. She’s an old-school, by-the-book gal. If I can pass muster with her, I can pass muster with anybody. Usually, when a case crosses jurisdictions, it’s a matter of, ‘He who has the body, has the case,’ but this time, I need her to take the lead on some things. I’m just too close. When we catch this guy and the case gets tried, I need everything to be totally above board. No hint that I did anything special because I’m acquainted with you.”
“Acquainted with me?” Lindsay’s voice came out with greater force. “Does that mean you came out here intending to question me? What exactly do you suspect me of doing?” She was no longer a mewling kitten, shivering in his arms. She stopped walking and pulled her hand away from his.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that,” he said.
Lindsay turned from Warren, toward the house. In the distance, a small group of wild horses grazed among the dunes. Aunt Harding’s house lay directly in front of them, and Lindsay took it in completely for the first time in years. It squatted low on the thin, sandy soil, flanked by a few stands of battered beachgrass. Unusually for the Outer Banks, the foundation was raised only a few feet off the ground. The new building codes required homes along the coast to ascend to mind-boggling heights of 10 or 12 feet in order to keep them safe from the storm surges that occasionally engulfed the islands. Despite its non-compliance, the old place had managed to survive decades of gales and hurricanes. Aunt Harding’s house hunkered down obstinately clinging to the ground, refusing to be moved even as the landscape around it shifted.
Warren put his hand on the small of her back, and said in a softer tone, “Please don’t be mad at me. I’m on your side. I promise. We weren’t coming to question you. We were coming to talk to your aunt.”
She nodded. “Why, though? You said there was some connection to Lydia Sikes?”
“Well, I decided to do a little internet searching. I wondered if Lydia Sikes’s killer might be having second thoughts about keeping hold of the murder weapon. Happens a lot. The criminal takes the weapon away with them, but then they start to worry. What if their house gets searched? What if their car gets pulled over? Suddenly, the person starts thinking maybe they should get rid of the evidence. We already know that this killer was too greedy to leave the gun at the scene, so it seemed unlikely that he would suddenly up and chuck it into a river.
“And lo and behold,” he continued, “a man in Alamance County was selling a Smith and Wesson Model 29 on Facebook. You know there are whole groups on there devoted to this kind of stuff.”
“Is that legal?” Lindsay asked. The idea of anonymous strangers exchanging weapons with such ease gave her a chill.
“Usually. Any that aren’t operating above board get shut down pretty quickly, and the moderators are good about reporting anyone whose actions seem questionable. In this case, we decided to pay the seller a call. He was surprised as heck to see us, I can tell you that. He said he’d just bought the gun a few days before from an old woman and her son. Said they seemed anxious to sell it, so he felt like he got a pretty good deal on it. He’d only bought it to turn a profit and was looking to sell it on quickly.”
“Isn’t it a little risky to list a stolen gun on a website?”
“Not if the gun wasn’t stolen. He had all the paperwork, and it was in order. The old woman even showed him her permit and her concealed carry license.”
“So it was legitimate? I don’t understand. Was it just coincidence that it was the same kind of gun in the same area?”
“Well, he showed us a copy of the bill of sale. The gun had been registered to Patricia Harding.” Lindsay’s jaw dropped. Warren held up his hands and continued. “Before you say anything, I think I know what you’re thinking—Patricia Harding doesn’t have a son.”
Lindsay felt the pilot light of her intellect reignite. “Leander Swoopes?”
“Exactly. We showed the gun seller a picture of Swoopes. If you remember, old Leander’s got a pretty unmistakable face.”
Lindsay doubted she’d ever forget that face. The algae-green eyes, the leathery yellow skin, the thinning black hair slicked back from an unnaturally high forehead. “Aunt Harding was in league with Swoopes?”
“Maybe he really is her son. Some of our guys are looking into the records.”
“That just can’t be.” The thought of Aunt Harding being pregnant and giving birth struck Lindsay as a physical impossibility. It was like suggesting that a baby could spring forth out of a slab of granite.
“Stranger things have happened. Anyway, that’s what we came here to find out,” he said.
“Well, there’s another connection,” Lindsay said. Even though she wasn’t sure how her mother could have been involved with Lydia Sikes’s death or Aunt Harding’s disposal of the murder weapon, Sarabelle Harding was clearly the missing link between the two murders.
But Warren had stopped listening to her. Additional police vehicles had arrived while Lindsay and Warren had been out walking, and there seemed to be some commotion coming from the house. Warren held up his hand and strained his ears toward the sound. “Do you hear that barking?” he asked, moving quickly toward the sound. “Is that your aunt’s dog? The one who led you to the body? He wasn’t there when Claire and I went out to the shack.”
“Yeah, that’s Kipper. He was going nuts when the Duck guys got here, so I tied him up in the yard. I suppose I’d better take him with me, unless you want to question him, too?” Try as she might, she couldn’t keep an edge of bitter sarcasm from creeping in.
As Lindsay and Warren circled around the back o
f the house, Lindsay warned, “Now watch out. He hates strangers. He might go for you.” To her astonishment, however, as soon as she and Warren rounded the corner of the house, Kipper immediately fell silent. He sat down and perked his ears up expectantly.
“What in the world?” Warren whispered.
“Yeah, it’s weird. From what I’ve seen, he’s usually pretty ferocious with people he doesn’t know.”
“That’s because Paul knows me.”
“Who’s Paul?”
“Kipper is Paul. He’s the fourth Beatle. Tanner’s missing dog.”
Chapter 12
“Tanner’s dog?! I thought it died during the hurricane last summer,” Lindsay said. Her mind was like a wet sponge, so sodden that it struggled to absorb this new revelation.
“So did everybody,” Warren said, shaking his head in amazement. “Tanner said she last saw him when he got caught up in the creek at the back of their property. Ringo fell in, and Paul went in after him. Tanner managed to pull Ringo out, but Paul got swept downstream. They never found his body.”
“You’re not going to tell me that he somehow got swept all the way out to the Atlantic coast and ended up in Aunt Harding’s backyard, are you? And anyway why is he a Doberman? I assumed that Paul was another of those little orange fluffballs.”
“No. Paul was my dad’s dog. After Dad died, Paul went to live with Tanner and Gibb. My mama didn’t like all the shedding. You know how particular she is about her house. They got the others after that and they all got named after he did.”
Warren crouched down and unhooked the dog from the rope that held him. “Hey, buddy. It’s good to see you.” The Doberman pressed himself against Warren, his whole body wagging with happiness.
“What are we going to do with him?” Lindsay asked.
“Take him back to Tanner and Gibb, I suppose.”
“But he can’t stay tied up out here while you conduct your investigation.”
“Yeah, you’re right. Do you think he could stay with you at the hotel? I could drop him off later, once you get settled.”
Before she could answer, one of the Duck police opened the kitchen door and called out to them. “Detective Satterwhite, could you come in here a minute? We’ve run into a bit of a problem.”
Warren gave the dog one last pat. “Stay,” he commanded as he walked toward the house. Warren made no gesture for Lindsay to follow him, so she was left to assume that the command applied to her, too. She knelt down beside the Doberman, stroking his smooth black fur.
“Paul, eh? Can I still call you Kipper?” The dog lay down in the sand next to her, letting out a heavy sigh. “I can’t believe you were Tanner and Gibb’s dog.” Kipper looked at her with doleful eyes. “It’s not your fault. Tanner and Gibb aren’t your real parents, and those oversized barking hamsters aren’t your real brothers. You know what I find hardest to explain? You might be thinking that it’s the fact that you ended up here, hundreds of miles from home in my aunt’s house. You’re wrong. It’s the fact that you willingly risked your life to try to save Ringo during the hurricane. You’re either very brave, or you’re a complete moron.”
Warren poked his head out the back door. “Lindsay, can you come in here a minute?”
Lindsay clipped Kipper back onto the rope and went inside. Within the short span of time since she left, the house had begun to morph into a full-scale crime scene. She was asked not to move anything in the house without permission and to cover her shoes with little plastic booties to protect any evidence that might be lurking on the floors. Two uniformed officers stood next to the gun safe in the corner of the dining room. Warren pointed to it. “I don’t suppose you know the combination? I expect the walls of this sucker are around about two inches thick. Even with a big drill, it’s gonna take us a mighty long time to get through that.”
“I don’t know it. I doubt she ever told anybody. Don’t policemen know all the tricks for picking locks and cracking safes?”
“I could probably pick a lock, if it came to it, but these dial safes aren’t all that common anymore. In banks and even most private homes, mostly it’s digital or biometric,” Warren said. “And the usual way a criminal opens a safe is to pick the whole thing up, carry it somewhere quiet, and smash the tar out of it ‘til it cracks. I’m not even sure that’s possible with this monster, and since we might need evidence out of here, I’d rather avoid that method altogether.”
A cloudy memory rose to the surface of Lindsay’s mind. “Actually, there is somebody who might be able to get it open. I remember when I was little, there was one time the twirly dial on the combination lock got stuck. A guy from Duck came over and fixed it.”
“Don’t suppose you’ve got a name and address?” Claire asked.
“I don’t even know if he’s still alive. He was old even then. I think he owned an antiques store. He was a High Tider.”
Warren looked confused, but the others instantly knew what she meant. Natives of the far southeast of North Carolina, especially Harker’s Island and Ocracoke, spoke with a distinctive regional accent. The way that they swapped the “I” sound in words for an “oy” had given rise to the nickname “high tiders”—the fishermen in those parts referred to the “hoy toyd” instead of the more customary North Carolina pronunciation “hah tahd.”
“Wynn Butterworth,” said the elder of the two Duck detectives, snapping his fingers in recognition.
“That’s the guy,” Lindsay nodded.
“Do you think you can bring him out here?” Warren asked the Duck policeman. “Let him know it’s urgent. Two of Patricia Harding’s weapons have shown up at the scenes of violent crimes. We’ve gotta find out what else is, or isn’t, in that safe.”
Claire led Lindsay into the spare bedroom to help her pack. Although the deputy sheriff kept up a friendly conversation the entire time, Lindsay got the distinct impression that the purpose of Claire’s presence wasn’t to assist her, but rather to keep an eye on her. When Lindsay had finished collecting the belongings that she needed, Claire said, “Reverend Harding, do you think you’re ready to give a statement now? I’m sorry to ask you when you’ve been through such a terrible ordeal, but we need to move quickly. There’s good reason to believe that someone very dangerous is on the loose.”
The two women settled into the same high-backed wooden chairs next to the pellet stove where Lindsay and Sarabelle had sat only a few hours before. Claire placed a digital recorder on the table between them—as Warren had said, she was clearly a by-the-book gal. She asked Lindsay to recount the discovery of the body as precisely as she could. Meanwhile, Claire made notes and murmured “uh-huh” at regular intervals.
“Now let’s go back to last night. How did you get out here, Reverend? Detective Satterwhite said you left your car in Corolla.”
For some reason, it irked Lindsay to realize that Warren and Claire must have been talking about her behind her back, sharing her evidence. “That’s right. My car’s a two-wheel drive, so I got a ride from Simmy—Chrysanthemum Bennett. She lives in Corolla in the house called ‘Sailor Girl.’ I don’t know the real address. It’s the pink one near the lighthouse.”
“Did Ms. Bennett spend the night here last night?”
“No.”
Claire arched her eyebrows. “Which bedroom did your aunt use? It looks like all the beds have been slept in.” Lindsay realized that she’d waited far too long to mention her mother’s presence in the house. She hadn’t set out to lie, but now there was no way to answer Claire’s question without looking like she’d been purposely withholding the information.
“She slept in the bedroom at the back, off the kitchen. And my mother, Sarabelle Harding, slept in the other one.”
Claire looked at Lindsay over the top of her reading glasses. “Your mother?”
“She’s been living here for the past few months.”
“And she was Patricia’s niece?”
“Um, no. Patricia Harding was my father’s aunt. Sarabelle w
as her niece by marriage, although actually, my parents are divorced now, so I suppose she was her ex-niece by marriage.” Lindsay realized that she was babbling, but there seemed to be no coherent way to describe the living arrangements.
“Sarabelle Harding? As in the Sarabelle Harding that used to date Leander Swoopes, who is wanted for questioning in Lydia Sikes’s murder?”
Lindsay couldn’t meet Claire’s gaze. “Yeah, that’s the one,” she mumbled.
“So your aunt and your mother remained close, after your parents’ divorce?”
“Not exactly. No. I mean, they weren’t really close to begin with, as far as I know.”
“But they lived together?”
“It looks that way.”
Annoyance crept into Claire’s carefully-measured words. “Where is Sarabelle Harding now? Was she here when you woke up this morning?”
“She was, but she left.”
Claire waited for Lindsay to say more, but she couldn’t think how to begin. Should she start with her childhood—the loneliness of the years spent in this house? With her mother’s descent into criminality and her purported redemption? With the events of the previous summer, when her mother led a dangerous criminal smack into the middle of her life? Was it possible to unpick more than 30 years of crossed wires and tightly-bound knots of emotion and lay the whole story of her family flat and straight so another person could understand it?
The detective’s initial warmth and friendliness had frosted over. Her questions now flew at Lindsay like tiny bits of ice. “Reverend Harding, where’s your mother?”
“I honestly don’t know. I don’t have any way to contact her, either. When I told her that Aunt Harding had been killed, she seemed terrified. She threw all her stuff in a suitcase and took off.”
A Death in Duck: Lindsay Harding Cozy Mystery Series (Reverend Lindsay Harding Mystery Book 2) Page 10
