“I said the bathroom was the door on your left,” came a chilly voice from the door.
“What the hell do you have in that cage?” he said, turning on her, pointing a hand at her—that he suddenly realized was bleeding. “Oh, Christ, look at my hand!”
“It’s a crow. And he bites.” She turned away. “This way.”
He bent for a look into the cage—for it was in fact a heavy-duty cage on a sturdy stand—and caught a movement in the dim interior that suddenly morphed into a large, black bird, whose sharp beak was reaching for his eyes. He jerked backward, dropping the blanket.
Betsy had opened the bathroom door, and stood aside as he went in. There was a dispenser of liquid soap, the orange kind that meant it was antibacterial. He scrubbed thoroughly, wincing as the soap stung the two small wounds in his middle and ring fingers.
“What kind of a pet is it that bites when you get anywhere near it?” he demanded.
“He’s not a pet, he’s not even mine. He’s a wild bird, and he’s going to go live in Iowa in a day or two.”
“If he wants to live in Iowa, why doesn’t he fly there his own damn self?”
“Because he can’t fly. He broke a wing and avian wings rarely heal properly. He’s otherwise perfectly healthy, so he’s going to live in a great big cage in a state that doesn’t demand that damaged wild animals be destroyed.”
She said it defiantly, and suddenly a light went on inside Omernic’s head. “So you’re sneaking him out of Minnesota.”
“That’s right.”
“And you’re stuck with him until your own broken bone heals and you can drive.” He smiled, and grabbed a towel to dry his hands.
“Something like that.” She was lying again, he was sure of it. Protecting others in the chain of this scheme, he thought.
“Well, good for you,” he said, because he’d heard of that law and disapproved of it, and thought it commendable that a group of outraged Minnesota citizens had organized a sneaky way around it.
“Don’t let him out of the cage,” he advised.
“Of course not. He’s not housebroken.”
“And you have a cat.”
She smiled wryly. “He’s not afraid of the cat.”
He smiled back. “Yeah, they’re even bigger than they look. But another reason to keep him caged is that they’re thieves.”
“What could he steal? I don’t think he understands money.”
“My uncle had one as a pet, and he had to climb up a tree every month and retrieve the spoons, necklaces, coins, bottle caps, buckles, pens, and anything else shiny left where Blackie could get at it and carry to his nest. And he could open purses, and even drawers. Or so my uncle said.”
She was smiling broadly now. “Thanks for the warning. But he’s confined until he leaves, which will be tomorrow or the day after. If you open the medicine cabinet, you’ll find a box of Band-Aids.”
“Thank you.”
Omernic found the box and while he applied a Band-Aid to each of his injuries, he wondered briefly how widespread this movement was to sneak crippled wildlife out of Minnesota. Then he decided he didn’t want to know. He didn’t approve of killing one-eyed deer, three-legged raccoons, or flightless birds, especially if the effort to save them didn’t cost any taxpayer dollars.
He came out of the bathroom to find Ms. Devonshire again seated in her chair. A lamp with a cocked shade stood behind the chair, looking over her shoulder like a kibitzer. She had gotten her knitting out.
“I want to apologize,” she said on seeing him approach, “for trying to keep you from learning about the crow. But I was actually a little afraid you’d arrest me for harboring a felon.” She cocked her head in a gesture that was a little birdlike itself. “No, that’s not right. Let’s see, aiding a convicted felon to escape justice? Except, of course, he’s not a felon, and I don’t think it’s justice to kill a crow because he broke his wing.”
“Unless he was doing it in the course of committing a crime?” suggested Omernic.
“Oh, well—but you’d have to prove that was the case, wouldn’t you?”
“To some people, just being a crow is a capital offense.”
“Yes, that’s true.” She looked toward the back room. “Poor thing.”
“He doesn’t seem to think he’s lost the game just yet,” said Omernic, displaying his bandaged fingers. “And you seem bent on helping make that be true.”
“Guilty as charged.”
Omernic sat down and took out his notebook, growing serious. “But let’s talk about Mr. Tony Milan.”
Twenty-one
BETSY discovered that Omernic was an excellent interrogator. She was impressed with how he led her, with simple, clear questions, through the whole tangled mess. She told him about how the Embroiderers Guild of America had given the Minneapolis chapter the responsibility of hosting its national convention, and how the chapter had decided to sell a heart pattern and give most of the proceeds to the National Heart Coalition in support of research into women’s heart diseases. About how the sale was more successful than anticipated, raising over twenty-four thousand dollars.
About how Crewel World had been fortunate enough to be chosen as the sole vendor of needlework products for the convention and her strenuous efforts to do the honor justice. About how she had gone horseback riding with a friend just before the convention and how her horse had fallen, tearing tendons in her ankle and breaking both bones in her lower right leg. About how Godwin had set up and run the booth, found employees to help, and gone to the banquet using Betsy’s ticket. And how he later reported that the man who accepted the check to the Heart Coalition had returned Goddy’s flirtatious smile on his way out the door.
Omernic asked, “Is Mr. DuLac inclined to see flirtatious smiles when they are not there?”
“No, I don’t think so. He will initiate the flirtatious look—in fact, he did in this case. And he says his ‘gaydar’ went ‘ping’ when he first saw the man step up to the lectern. But in this case, he also claims the look was returned.”
“What conclusion did you draw from that?”
“I thought he might be mistaken, if the man was Bob Germaine. But perhaps it wasn’t. His wife didn’t believe he stole that money, and when he disappeared she was frightened for him and asked me to find out where he’d gone—and to prove he wasn’t a thief. Godwin came up with the notion that Bob was a closeted gay man and used this opportunity to break with the straight world. He even went to various gay bars and coffeehouses and found some people who said a person matching the description Goddy gave them frequented those places. The man goes by the name Stoney Durand.”
“And you think it is possible these people were talking about another individual than Mr. Germaine?”
“Yes, I’m sure they were. I think this ‘Stoney Durand’ murdered Bob, changed into his clothes, and took his place on the dais at the banquet in order to steal the check.”
“How would he cash the check?”
Betsy gave him a look. Was he testing the depth of her knowledge? “Anyone who reads mystery fiction, or watches crime shows on television, knows that stolen checks can be sold. At a deep discount, of course, but still. What was odd in this case is that no one made an attempt to cash the check.”
“Have you any idea why?”
“Yes. Goddy and I think Stoney Durand is actually Tony Milan, who worked in the mail room of the National Heart Coalition until very recently. And who was in a serious car accident the night the check was stolen. He was in the hospital for over a week, so by the time he got out, the Embroiderers Guild had put a stop payment on the check. So it was useless. I think Tony knew about the check because he worked for the Heart Coalition, and so put himself in a position to intercept—” She stopped, a thoughtful look on her face.
“What?” asked Omernic.
“I think perhaps the original plan wasn’t to take Bob Germaine’s place at all. That would be a terribly risky thing to do. This Tony wouldn’t know how many people
in the place knew Bob, after all. What if someone stood up and wanted to know who this stranger was, and where was Bob? I think that Tony went there to steal the check from Bob—you know, mug him. And after he knocked Bob in the head, he searched the body and realized Bob didn’t have the check. But he did find the speech—that’s why people are remembering the speech right, Tony just read Bob’s speech!” The idea had obviously just come to Betsy and it fit her theory so well!
Omernic was taking some swift notes, nodding as he wrote. “Say, hold on a minute!” he said, lifting his pen and staring into her eyes. “Aren’t you the one who broke the case of that museum curator who was replacing Chinese artifacts with fakes—and who murdered that woman—” It was his turn to stop suddenly.
“Yes.” Betsy nodded, her face gone sad. “The murdered woman was my sister, Margot Berglund.”
“You did some good work back then,” he said, looking at his notes. “You seem damn sharp at this kind of thing.”
“Thank you. I only wish Allie Germaine could have gotten her husband back. I wonder…Was Bob beaten to death?”
“No, he was killed by a single blow to his temple.”
“Ah, then perhaps Tony Milan really didn’t mean to murder him. How awful, what a terrible waste!”
SERGEANT Omernic had barely left when Godwin called. “Betsy, Alice is down here and wants to know if she can come up.”
Betsy smiled. Doubtless Alice was coming to arrange to take the crow away. Wonderful! “Yes, of course.”
“What do you think of Sergeant Omernic?” asked Godwin. “Odd name, Omernic.”
“Yes, I wonder what nationality it is. He looks kind of Slavic, except he has green eyes, and I think Slavic people have gray or blue eyes. Anyway, he seemed extremely competent. What did you think?”
“He asked a lot of questions, but they were all easy to answer.” His voice faded as he turned away from the receiver. “She says come on up,” he said, obviously to Alice.
“A good technique, I think.”
“Yes, it’s easier to answer when the question is like that. I think that’s the way I ask questions.” In an unexpected show of humility, he added, “Or, if it isn’t, it will be from now on.”
“Why, what are you going to investigate now?”
“I don’t know, I was going to ask you what we do next.”
“Nothing, Goddy. We’ve done our part. We found out who murdered Bob Germaine—no, you found it out—and now it’s up to the police to arrest him. I assume you gave his address to Sergeant Omernic.”
“Yes, of course. So we’re done?”
“Yes—excuse me, I think Alice is at my door.”
“Then why don’t I feel like this is over?” persisted Godwin.
“Because this time we’re not going to have that wonderful moment when we watch the culprit confess. But Omernic will go see him, and probably get a confession, sometime in the next hour. Now I have to go let Alice in.” Betsy cut the connection and went to the door.
Alice, tall and mannish in her mud-brown overcoat, was not smiling when Betsy opened the door.
“Uh-oh, is something wrong?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so.”
“Oh, dear. Well, come in and tell me about it.” Betsy stepped back, turned, and went dot-and-go-one back into the living room.
Alice stopped just a step or two into the living room, and stood there rubbing her hands together and not looking at Betsy.
“What is it, what’s wrong?” asked Betsy.
“It’s about the crow.”
“Oh, no, is someone from DNR coming to take it away?” The Department of Natural Resources would be the government agency enforcing the law about crippled wildlife.
“No, no, that’s not the problem. It’s Annie Spence, the woman in Iowa who is going to take the crow. Her family emergency was her mother, who had a heart attack. She had another, right in the hospital, and died. Annie is stuck in Arizona for at least another week, helping her brother straighten things out.”
“So it looks as if you get to babysit a crow after all,” said Betsy, hoping that was true, even though she could see by the look on Alice’s face that it wasn’t.
“No, I can’t do it, at least not right now. I have workmen coming in to remodel my bathroom. It’ll take four or five days, probably. Betsy, I’m so awfully sorry about this. I’ve asked around, but no one else involved in the rescue project can take the crow, and I really don’t want to ask someone who’s not, because once word starts getting out…” Alice saw the look on Betsy’s face. “Oh, dear, who did you tell?”
“A police investigator from Minneapolis.”
“Betsy, no! How could you!” Alice looked and sounded much more frightened than angry.
“I didn’t tell him about you! He came up here to talk to me about the Bob Germaine business, and he asked to use the bathroom and opened the wrong door.” Betsy smiled grimly. “Mr. Crow drew blood on two of his fingers, which served him right!”
“Oh, no—was he mad?”
“More surprised. I told him the crow was going to live in Iowa, and let him think it was all my own doing. And anyway, he approves of the mission to rescue it. I’m sure he won’t tell anyone. But, Alice, you can see how this isn’t going to work. People are going to come up here—the Monday Bunch is coming back, and Jill is coming over—and she’ll bring Emma Beth. I don’t want Emma Beth poking her little hand through the bars—she gets into everything.”
“Why did you invite—Oh, you were thinking the bird would be gone.”
“Yes, and Goddy’s up here a lot with questions about the shop. I don’t want to explain to all these people why I have a crow in the apartment.”
“All right, you’re right. I’ll see what I can do.”
OMERNIC drove to the address Godwin had given him. It was a three-story brick apartment building, probably a hundred years old and looking every day of its age. The basement was built up several feet above ground and had good-size windows, so technically it had four stories of apartments.
And one of the basement windows was broken and there were smoke stains around the cement facing and surrounding bricks. There was only cardboard over the broken panes, so there had been a recent fire—a deduction confirmed as he approached and caught a whiff of the ugly, unmistakable stink of house-fire smoke.
He went up the four steps to the main entrance, found the button for the building manager, and pushed it.
The manager was barely medium height, but with broad shoulders and a belligerent air. His work boots were paint-spattered, his dark work pants were rumpled, and his old green pullover was badly pilled. His scalp shone through his greasy, lank brown hair, and when he saw Omernic, he ran a heavy palm across it. “We’re full up,” he said, “though we’re remodeling a garden apartment, and it’ll be available in about a week.”
“Was the previous tenant named Tony Milan?” asked Omernic, reaching for his ID folder.
The manager froze at the question, then grimaced when he saw the badge. “Yeah, but he took off while the fire department was still here, didn’t say where he was going, and hasn’t come back to give us a forwarding address.”
“When did this happen?”
“Night before last. The idiot was cooking something on the stove and decided to take a nap while it cooked. A neighbor heard the smoke alarm and broke in, hauled him out before he got burned.”
“The fire spread to other apartments?”
“Nah, and it’s mostly smoke damage to the one apartment—but smoke gets into ever’ damn thing. We have to replace the carpet and furniture and paint everything.”
“Who was the person who saved Mr. Milan?”
“A kid name of Gary Schulz. He helped out after Milan got hurt in a car accident, went to the drugstore for him, and grocery store, too, and didn’t get anything but one thin ‘thank you’ for his trouble. His apartment is right across the hall from Milan’s.”
“Is he home?”
“I think
so. He works odd hours, I know that.”
Schulz was at home—asleep in bed, unfortunately for him. Omernic gave him a couple of minutes to go splash water in his face to get his brain unclogged.
He was young, just twenty-two, working in a bakery. He’d graduated from the Le Cordon Bleu School of Culinary Arts—the one in Minneapolis, not the one in France—last spring, and was hoping to get work in a restaurant someday soon. He and Milan weren’t friends, exactly. Milan was gay, but that was okay with Schulz, who wasn’t. Milan had told Schulz he was moving out soon, but then got into a car accident just before the move was to happen.
“He was banged up pretty bad, he had a cast on his whole left arm and one of those black canvas things, like a really serious brace, on his left leg, covered the whole leg so he could hardly bend his knee. And his face was all bruised, and he had a big bandage on his head—I think he said he had a skull fracture. He was in a lot of pain, one of the two prescriptions I picked up for him was Vicodin. I recognized the name because I fractured my elbow in high school, and they gave me Vicodin. Sweet—” He cut himself off.
Omernic only nodded. “I had a bottle of it once. It surely does kill the pain.” He made a little note. “Tell me about the fire.”
Schulz shrugged. “Not much to tell. I heard this sound, and I thought, ‘That sounds like a smoke alarm.’ I went out in the hall and didn’t see flames or smell smoke and then I saw the sound was coming from Tony Milan’s apartment. I just bumped up against it a couple of times and it opened. It didn’t seem to be all that smoky in there, but I took one breath and started coughing and my eyes watered and I fell over a suitcase he left right near the door and over his coffee table getting to him on the couch. He was coughing, which helped me find him. I got him out as fast as I could.”
Schulz began by talking fast, then slowed when he saw Omernic taking notes. He continued, “Next thing I knew squad cars and fire trucks and ambulances are all over the street.”
“Did you see Mr. Milan go back inside the apartment building?”
“No, last time I saw him, he was sitting in the back door of an ambulance with an oxygen mask over his face.”
Knitting Bones Page 16
