Beignets and Broomsticks

by J. R. Ripley

  ‘Perfect.’ Brad slowed once more and pulled onto the same track where we’d first come across Herman, who had appeared to pop up out of nowhere.

  ‘I’m still wondering why Herman decided to come see you, Maggie. He barely knows you. Why didn’t he choose to come see me instead if he wanted to talk about Nancy Alverson’s murder?’

  Brad sounded a trifle hurt that Herman had chosen me over him. ‘I am a reporter and he knows me.’

  ‘He told me last night that Nancy gave me something.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean he didn’t ask me, he told me.’

  Brad turned off the main road. ‘That is weird. I can’t wait to hear what Herman has to say. I hope he’s near his camp. If he’s off prospecting somewhere, we may never find him.’

  It would be even worse if Herman didn’t want to be found. Looking at the rugged landscape, I knew that a man could hide practically forever out here if he chose to.

  Before long, Brad pulled over to the side. I felt and heard the underside of his sedan scrape the uneven ground. ‘This is as close as we can get in the car. Too bad I don’t have a four-wheel-drive truck.’

  We climbed out. The sun was high in the sky and the weather was warm. November in this part of Arizona wasn’t bad at all. I held my hand up to my forehead, wishing I had brought a hat.

  Brad started walking. ‘It’s this way, I think.’

  I stumbled after him, glad that I had worn sneakers to work. ‘You didn’t tell me this was going to involve a hike,’ I complained, dodging past a cactus twice my height with stickers three times the length of my longest finger.

  ‘You knew what it was going to be like out here.’ Sure, he was wearing sturdy brown high hiking boots, thick jeans and a long-sleeved chambray shirt. I had on my café clothes, thin khaki slacks and a polo shirt.

  We walked for a solid twenty minutes over the rough terrain, past boulders large and small. I only fell twice, skinning my knees the first time because Brad had failed to catch me. The second time, he had been prepared and caught me before I hit the ground.

  I hoped we didn’t run into any ticked-off javelinas or hungry coyotes.

  I recognized the hills that Brad had described the other day as the ones where Herman had pitched his camp. ‘Please tell me we are getting close,’ I complained.

  ‘It’s just around this rock formation,’ Brad panted.

  We were both tired and thirsty. Neither of us had thought to bring a water bottle.

  As we rounded the house-sized reddish brown boulder, I saw a low beige tent a hundred yards off.

  I stopped. My eyes widened. ‘That’s Nancy’s truck.’ I pointed, though it was completely unnecessary. There was no other vehicle present.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Positive.’ I began walking toward the ancient Land Rover. It was definitely Nancy’s. ‘What the devil is it doing here?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  We came within thirty feet of it and Brad stopped.

  He cupped his hands around his mouth. ‘Herman! Herman, are you here? It’s me, Brad Smith. I’ve got Maggie Miller with me!’

  There was no movement from the low tent.

  I walked over to the Land Rover and peered inside. Brad followed me. ‘It’s empty,’ I said. ‘But it’s definitely hers. I recognize it down to the Route 66 bumper sticker.’

  ‘Let’s go check out the tent.’ Brad started walking. ‘Maybe he’s sleeping.’

  ‘Or waiting to slit our throats,’ I replied. I clung to Brad’s side as we made our approach. We saw a few scattered footprints and animal tracks. I was hoping they were deer prints and not coyote. Deer I could cope with.

  Deer are cute.

  We stopped again a dozen yards from Herman’s camp. Besides the tent, there was a small ring of stones with a cold campfire in its center. A half-dozen five-gallon plastic jugs sat outside the tent on the right.

  There was no sign of Herman the Swede. I checked the hills for any sign of him. Nothing.

  Not a sound came from anywhere around.

  ‘Herman?’ It was my turn to call. ‘It’s me, Maggie.’ I stepped slowly toward the tent. The flap hung loose and partially open. A couple steps from the tent sat a lone, olive-green, canvas-backed folding chair. ‘You wanted to see me?’

  Brad moved toward a small cairn on the left, near which sat several tools including a shovel, a pickax and a sledgehammer.

  I hovered over the circle of stones. The fire had long gone out. All that remained were a few unburned twigs, a scorched stump the thickness of my wrist and … something. I reached into the ashes. It was the charred remains of some sort of report. I held the document lightly in my fingers, gingerly turning it right side up for fear it would disintegrate.

  What was it?

  I skimmed the pages. It was a financial report, a Security and Exchange Commission financial report, to be precise. And the subject of the report was ASK Financial Services.

  I shivered. What had Herman been doing with a financial report on a company out of Las Vegas? What interest would he have had in a financial services company?

  Was he looking for a company to manage his riches? Had he found his treasure?

  I laid the scorched document gently on the ground and approached the tent once more.

  ‘Herman?’ I wrapped my fingers around the edge of the tent flap and bent to peer inside.

  Sunlight spilled into the musty space. The tent was cluttered with everything the modern treasure hunter could need except a toilet and a shower. The interior smelled of sweat. I saw a big chest cooler, a selection of freeze-dried foods and other foodstuffs, including a paper sack from Mother Earth/Father Sun.

  There was a solar-powered lantern atop a small folding table. An empty leather sheath and a handful of change sat beside it.

  The table also contained an assortment of books and maps, most related to history, geography and minerology, and a compass. Beside the low table was a cot with an unzipped sleeping bag rolled over it. The cot was empty. There was no sign of Herman.

  I exited the tent. Brad looked over, his hands wrapped around the pickax, probably dreaming of life as a gold prospector. ‘Anything?’

  I shook my head. ‘Nothing.’ I let go of the flap.

  ‘I’ll take a look up this way.’ Brad pointed up a path that looked regularly travelled.

  ‘OK. I’ll look around here some more. Maybe Herman will come back.’

  ‘Good idea.’ Brad waved and trudged between some scrub brush.

  I strolled past the cold fire, stopped and looked again at the Land Rover. It all made no sense. A quick glance at the hill overhead still revealed no lurking killer coyotes or crazy Swedes.

  I kicked one of the big plastic containers with my toe, listened to it slosh and unscrewed the cap. I took a sniff. ‘Water,’ I said aloud. ‘That makes sense.’

  I cupped my hands and tilted my head toward the looming hill behind the tent. ‘Herman?’

  All I got in reply was the echo of my call.

  I ambled around the corner of the tent to see what else I might find that could give us a clue as to where Herman had gone to for the day. Why couldn’t he have left behind a day planner stating something like: Gone to X marks the spot. Follow the red arrow to the one-armed cactus, then turn left and walk twenty paces to the rock that looks like Snoopy.

  It would have made things so much easier.

  A scream caught in my throat as I rounded the backside of the tent.

  Herman was stretched out on the ground, dressed much like I had seen him the night before. He stared up at the sun without complaint.

  Because his throat had been cut.

  TWENTY-ONE

  ‘Brad!’ I stumbled backward, tripping over myself. ‘Brad!’ I turned and ran as fast as I could, running in the direction he had disappeared. ‘Brad!’

  Brad’s head appeared on the horizon and then the rest of him. Seeing my agitation, he raced forward. ‘Maggie! What�
��s wrong?’

  I stopped, planted my hands on my knees, and gasped for breath. ‘It’s – it’s Herman. B-back there!’

  ‘OK.’ Brad wrapped his arm over my back to support me. ‘Let’s go see him.’ He gave me a gentle squeeze. ‘You OK? I want to find out what this is all about.’

  ‘N-no!’ I yanked at his arm. ‘Call the police!’

  ‘What?’ Brad pulled me upright and cupped his hands around my face. ‘What is it? Breathe, Maggie.’

  I nodded and complied. Breathing was exactly what I needed to do. I took several lurching breaths with Brad watching me like a hawk. ‘OK.’ I nodded. Finally able to speak. ‘Herman is behind his tent. He’s dead.’

  The frown line between Brad’s eyes deepened. ‘Dead? Are you sure?’

  ‘I’m sure. His throat has been cut.’ And I had seen the empty sheath on a table in his tent. Had someone used his own knife to murder him?

  Brad lowered his hands to my shoulders. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Yeah, I guess.’

  We walked quickly back to the tent.

  Brad stopped in front. ‘Why don’t you wait here? I’ll go check.’

  ‘Not a problem,’ I replied. I had no intention of revisiting the scene.

  Brad pulled his phone from his pocket and handed it to me. ‘Call the police, Maggie.’

  I nodded. Brad was only gone a minute. When he returned, his face was white and he looked about as good as I felt. I had a hunch he had never seen such a gruesome scene before either.

  ‘The police are on their way,’ I said, handing him back his cellphone.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘I gave them the best directions I could. I hope they don’t have trouble finding this place.’

  ‘They should be able to follow our tracks,’ Brad assured me. ‘If they don’t show up soon, we can go back up the road a ways and wait for them.’

  ‘Good idea.’

  Brad looked at his phone. ‘I’ll be right back.’

  ‘Where are you going?’ I cried.

  He held up the camera. ‘I want to get some pictures.’

  ‘Pictures? At a time like this?’

  Brad shrugged an apology. ‘I’m a news reporter. This is a story. I’ll be right back.’

  I moved further from the tent, wanting to put as much distance between myself and Herman’s corpse as I could. As I walked, I noticed a mottled impression in the ground with footsteps all around. The impression was rectangular and maybe five foot wide and eight foot long. Three faint lines, equally spaced, ran the length of it.

  I studied the impression, wondering what on earth it could be.

  Brad came up from behind, startling me.

  ‘What are you looking at?’

  ‘This.’ I pointed to the ground.

  Brad bent for a closer look. ‘What is it?’

  ‘You tell me.’

  Brad straightened and took a couple of photos of the impression.

  ‘Maybe it was from some alien spacecraft,’ I joked, despite the somberness of the occasion. Table Rockers were big on aliens. For all I knew, Brad was a believer.

  Brad lowered his phone and tilted his head. ‘You know,’ he stooped and ran his hand along the edge of the ground, ‘I think you’re right.’

  I raised my brow. ‘You do?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He waved his hand at me. ‘I don’t mean I think this is an alien spacecraft.’ He straightened once more and rubbed his hands to remove the dirt from his fingers. ‘I think this was an earthly spacecraft.’

  I angled my eyes at him. ‘An earthly spacecraft?’

  Brad pointed at the ground. ‘Yeah. Those are human footprints, not alien.’

  I looked at the few impressions that were visible. The ground here was patchy, sometimes soft, sometimes hard. There were definitely some other footprints and they weren’t all mine.

  Brad smiled. ‘I think this was made by a hot-air balloon. More precisely, by a hot-air balloon basket.’

  We heard the sound of sirens in the distance.

  ‘A hot-air balloon?’ I looked at the area in question. I’d never been in a hot-air balloon and it wasn’t high on my bucket list – why anybody would want to leave the ground with nothing but a balloon full of hot air between themselves and death was beyond me – but I could see how that could have been made by a balloon’s basket.

  ‘Didn’t you recently do a story about a missing hot-air balloon?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Brad said, his voice tight. ‘I think we might just have found it.’

  ‘Or at least where it’s been.’

  ‘Come on,’ said Brad. ‘The cops are here.’

  Detective Highsmith arrived first, followed by two Table Rock squad cars and an ambulance.

  Detective Mark Highsmith unfolded himself from his unmarked blue sedan and approached us stiffly. ‘Mr Smith, Ms Miller,’ he said grimly. ‘Where’s this body?’

  ‘Over here,’ I said. ‘Behind the tent. There’s something else I think you should see, though.’

  ‘Let’s see the body first,’ Highsmith replied.

  The three of us approached the tent.

  ‘You two wait here,’ Highsmith ordered.

  Officers Singh and Collins accompanied the detective while Officer Kurkov remained with us.

  Detective Highsmith reappeared alone a minute or two later, his face set. ‘There’s no ID on the body. Do either of you two know who he is?’

  ‘His name is Herman,’ Brad offered. ‘I did a story on him for the paper. He’s a prospector.’

  ‘What’s his last name?’

  ‘He didn’t want to tell me and I didn’t push him on it.’

  Highsmith’s mouth tightened into a line. ‘The medical examiner is on her way.’ He turned to the EMTs and told them to stand by. Then he turned his attention to me and Brad. ‘Let’s talk.’

  ‘Detective, there is something we think you should see first,’ I said.

  ‘Maggie’s right,’ said Brad.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘We’ll have to show you. It’s over there.’

  Highsmith groaned but complied, following at my side as we headed toward the odd depression in the ground.

  When we reached the spot, some thirty yards from the campsite, I pointed at the mottled earth. ‘There.’

  Highsmith worked his jaw side to side. ‘What is it?’

  ‘We think it’s the indentation from a hot-air balloon, Detective,’ answered Brad.

  The detective’s brow went up. ‘A hot-air balloon?’

  ‘A hot-air balloon basket, to be precise,’ I added.

  ‘And you are showing me this in the middle of a crime scene investigation, why?’ His gaze went from one to the other of us.

  ‘You tell us,’ Brad said.

  Highsmith huffed a bit. ‘Fine. Consider it off limits.’ He waved his arm. ‘Consider this entire area off limits. Follow me.’ He walked us to Brad’s car. ‘What were you two doing out here, anyway?’

  ‘We came to see Herman,’ Brad replied.

  ‘Was he expecting you?’

  ‘No.’ I took this one. ‘He came by my apartment last night wanting to talk. Then Brad came and scared him off. So we thought we would come see him today. I don’t close the shop until three and—’

  Detective Highsmith held up his hand. ‘Stop.’ He turned to Brad. ‘Why did you scare Herman off? Did you two have an argument?’

  Brad shook his head. ‘Give me a break.’

  ‘It was nothing like that,’ I interjected. ‘When I got home from yoga class last night—’

  Both men looked at me in surprise. I chose to ignore them. ‘When I got home from yoga class, Herman was waiting on my patio. He said he wanted to talk. Then Brad showed up at the front door and I think Herman got scared, not knowing who it was, I guess.’

  ‘And that’s the only time you saw him?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I ran into him earlier on the street last night.’

  ‘Where exactly was this?’
Highsmith asked.

  ‘On Laredo. Near my café.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Right before my class. I signed up for a class with Rob Gregory at his upstairs studio. Herman had been in Karma Koffee. Lee, the man that works there, told me Herman had been asking for me. Then he saw me on the street.’

  ‘Why didn’t he just talk to you then rather than wait for you on your patio?’

  I pushed my brows together, trying to remember. ‘I think he wanted to. Then he saw a police car and I think it spooked him.’

  Highsmith leaned up against Brad’s car and pulled out his notebook. Brad and I watched in silence as he wrote. Finally, he looked up and started up with the questions once more. ‘What time did you get home last night?’

  I shrugged. ‘Tennish?’ I looked at Brad for help.

  ‘Yeah.’ He ran a hand across his scalp. ‘Something like that. Listen, Detective, it happened just like Maggie says.’

  ‘I’m sure it did.’ Highsmith looked back at the crime scene, now crawling with official personnel. ‘Do you know what this Herman fellow wanted to talk to you about, Ms Miller?’

  ‘Yes.’ I folded my arms over my chest. ‘He wanted to talk to me about Nancy Alverson’s murder.’

  The way the detective’s brow shot up, I knew I had gotten his attention. ‘Why would he want to talk to you about Nancy Alverson’s murder?’

  ‘I honestly don’t know.’ And probably never would.

  Detective Highsmith turned to Brad. ‘What was your relationship to the victim, Mr Smith? Did you know this Herman fellow?’

  Brad frowned. ‘Like I explained, I wrote a human interest piece on him for the Table Rock Reader.’ His voice rose in annoyance. ‘Doesn’t anybody read the paper?’

  ‘Sorry,’ the detective said, not at all ruffled. ‘I guess I missed that. A human interest piece, you say?’

  Brad nodded. ‘Herman was a treasure hunter. He was looking for one of the lost cities of gold.’

  ‘Another one of those, eh?’ Highsmith jotted something down in his notebook. ‘In this interview of yours, Mr Smith, did Herman ever mention Nancy Alverson?’

  ‘Not once.’

  ‘That’s her Land Rover, by the way.’ I nodded in the direction of the dusty SUV.