The Wrong Hill to Die On: An Alafair Tucker Mystery #6 (Alafair Tucker Mysteries)

by Donis Casey

  On the Kemp side of the property the tree trunks had been whitewashed. On the Carrizal side each tree was encased its own chicken wire enclosure. The goats would destroy them otherwise. Alafair admired the rounded shape of the pretty little tree. It was covered with glossy, dark green leaves and tight, pea-like flower buds interspersed with tiny, star-shaped flowers at the ends of the branches.

  Cindy trailed her fingers through the small white blossoms, little bouquets that were hardly visible from a distance. “You would think that as big as that odor is the flowers would be as showy as hydrangea.”

  Elizabeth pointed. “Look yonder, Alafair. There are a couple of oranges that did not get picked last month. They ripen around Christmas and New Year. Why, I don’t believe Christmas is coming unless the orange trees put on their decorations.”

  “Well, I declare! I never have seen an orange on the branch. Look at that, Blanche! ”

  Blanche had already been distracted by her father and cousin who were petting the two curious little goats whose noses were stuck through the wire fence in hopes of a treat.

  Elizabeth made an exasperated noise. “Those goats started out as young Artie Carrizal’s Cooperative Extension project. But then he got attached to them and his papa allowed as he could keep them. Miz Carrizal likes them for their milk, and she makes a lot of cheese, too. Chase loves them, but I think they’re a menace. They should not be out of their pen. They’ll eat the bark right off the trees and everything else they come across.”

  “Once one of them got into my yard and ate up half my beautiful bougainvillea, thorns or no thorns, before I knew what was what,” Cindy said. “They are smart little imps. They figured out how to lift the gate latch a long time ago. Artie ought to fix it up with a lock or tie it with a rope or something. They would probably teach themselves how to untie a rope, though.”

  Alafair knew a thing or two about goats. “Or just eat it, most likely.”

  Chase was buzzing around their knees, running from adult to adult grabbing skirts and trousers, trying for attention. He jerked up a handful of grass and waved it about before tossing it over the fence. The goats ignored it in favor of Blanche’s less frantic blandishments but Chase did not seem to notice. “This one is called Chica and this one is Nina. I like her the best. Sometimes I can’t tell which one is which. Artie lets me feed them. He gives them food right from his dinner after he’s done with it.”

  Shaw put his hand on the boy’s crown to stop him from spinning like a top. “Slow down there, partner. We can’t understand a word you’re saying! Aunt Elizabeth, how about if I take Blanche and Chase and go on up to Miz Carrizal’s house and tell her that the goats are out? Maybe she’ll let the young’uns help her put these fugitives back in their pen.”

  Blanche seized her mother’s skirt. “Oh, yes, Ma,” she breathed. “Please let us go visit Miz Carrizal.”

  Alafair looked down at her, amused. She was quite aware that there was someone besides Mrs. Carrizal Blanche wished to visit.

  Artie

  Blanche had been very much taken with Artie Carrizal when she met him for the first time at the pot luck. He was a tall, handsome, black-eyed boy, a couple of years older than Blanche. He had been dressed up for the party in a light-colored suit of knickerbockers and a belted, pinch-back jacket. Mrs. Carrizal had turned in her chair and beckoned across Elizabeth’s parlor for Artie to come and meet Blanche, and the boy had ambled over and put a hand on his mother’s shoulder. He looked at Alafair with a straightforward, friendly gaze. Alafair would have known who he was without an introduction. He was a perfect image of Mr. Carrizal, minus forty years.

  “This is my son Arturo,” Mrs. Carrizal said. “Arturo, this is Miz Kemp’s sister Miz Tucker and her daughter Blanche, come to visit all the way from Oklahoma.”

  Arturo put his hand on his chest in a courtly gesture. “Pleased to meet you, Miz Tucker.”

  “Hello, Arturo,” Alafair said. “Glad to meet you, too.”

  His gaze shifted from Alafair’s face to Blanche’s and he smiled. “Howdy, Blanche. Call me Artie. Everybody else does but my ma.”

  His mother was unchastened. “Arturo, Miz Tucker was just telling me that Blanche has never seen an orange tree before. Why do you not take Blanche out back and show her ours? This is the perfect time for it. It is in bloom right now and there are still a few oranges left after the harvest.”

  Most boys of his age might obey sulkily if their mothers told them to entertain a strange little girl, but Artie seemed to think this was a capital idea. He held out a hand. “Okay! Come on, Blanche. How about a fig tree? You ever seen a fig tree?”

  Alafair could feel the electric jolt that went through Blanche’s body when Arturo took her hand. Had the two children been five years older she would have been alarmed, but as it was Blanche’s reaction amused her and made her happy. Artie’s touch had infused Blanche with more energy than Alafair had seen in the girl in months. She hopped down off her mother’s lap, still clutching her new friend’s hand. “All right, Mama?” She asked the question without taking her eyes off Artie’s face.

  Alafair noticed the sudden pink tinge on Blanche’s cheekbones. She did not attribute it to the return of her fever. “That is a fine idea, honey. Go on. Just don’t get too tired and be sure and come back inside if you get to coughing again.”

  Blanche made an obedient sound and the children were gone out the front screen door. Alafair looked at Mrs. Carrizal. “I declare! That is the perkiest I have seen that child in an age,” Alafair said. “Thank you.”

  Mrs. Carrizal had been watching the children as they dashed out of the room, but when Alafair spoke to her her attention shifted to the younger woman. “Sometimes one gets in the habit of sickness, I think, and only needs something or someone to take her mind to another place for awhile.”

  Interrogation

  If it would give her an opportunity to see Artie again, Blanche was only too eager to let Chase drag her away to the Carrizal’s to report the goats’ escape. Alafair watched with a smile as the children left and Shaw followed.

  Elizabeth was relieved to see them go. “I declare that boy wears me to a frazzle, Alafair! Blanche is mighty patient with him.”

  “She has had plenty of practice dealing with overexcited little ones, what with all the brothers and sisters she has. It’s not good for Chase to be an only child, Elizabeth. He needs a brother or sister of his own to calm him down. You got any plans in that area?” Alafair did not feel the need to be tactful or discreet. Elizabeth was her sister after all, and who else but kin was going to come right out and say to you what you need to hear?

  Unused to such straightforward talk, Cindy gasped. But Elizabeth was a Gunn and made of sterner stuff. She bit her lip to forestall a guffaw. “Well, you don’t beat around the bush, do you, sister? The answer is no, I have no plans. I’ve got my hands full with that one.” She hesitated, then added, “Truth is I haven’t been exposed lately, so I don’t expect to get the condition any time soon.”

  Elizabeth’s forthright comment did not surprise Alafair overmuch. It had not taken Alafair five minutes after her arrival to see that there was something disagreeable going on between her sister and her brother-in-law.

  Before Alafair could pursue Elizabeth’s comment, a rangy man in a suit and Stetson came around the corner of the house and the women turned to face him.

  He removed his hat as he strode across the yard toward them. “Is one of you ladies Miz Webster Kemp? I am Marshal Joe Dillon. I want to talk to y’all about the death of Bernie Arruda.”

  ***

  The clean, crisp, sunny day was too beautiful for anyone to undertake unpleasant business indoors. They situated themselves around the table under the grapevine-covered ramada, the marshal at the head with Shaw and Webster next to him on his left, Elizabeth and Cindy on his right, and Alafair at the opposite end of the table. By hasty agreement the children were still with Mrs. Carrizal. Cindy Stewart hunched down in her chair beside Eliz
abeth, looking perfectly miserable. She had tried to excuse herself, but the marshal had told her that since he was going to interrogate her anyway she might as well stay and save him a special trip to her house.

  Alafair was surprised that he was not questioning them one at a time, but he did not seem to be concerned that they might influence one another’s recollection of events. They had already filled him in on who the Tuckers were and why they were visiting, though he already knew much of their story from the newspaper.

  “How did you come to find the body, Miz Tucker?” This was his first direct question about the murder.

  Alafair closed her eyes before she answered, conjuring a memory she would rather not revisit.

  ***

  Alafair had arisen that morning to a cool, pink, cloudless dawn, feeling more rested and content than she had in months. She left Shaw getting dressed and Blanche still asleep and made her way out onto the veranda and through the back door into the kitchen. She found Elizabeth frying eggs at her little gas stove and Web and Chase sitting at the table, each with a big goblet of milk before him and a look of anticipation on his face.

  “Morning, all,” she said.

  Chase catapulted out of his chair and flung himself at her, wrapping his arms around her knees with a cheery greeting. Alafair attributed his impulsive hug more to an excess of energy than to an excess of affection and patted him on the head, amused. “Well, good morning, sugar-pie.”

  “Chase, sit down,” Elizabeth ordered. “How did y’all sleep, Alafair?”

  She could not help but smile. “Like a bunch of logs. I will tell you I had my doubts about spending an evening with a passel of strangers after Blanche being sick for so long and all. But I have to admit you were right, Elizabeth. We admired your neighbors all to pieces and I think it did us good. Web, I can’t thank y’all enough for what you have done for us.”

  Elizabeth did not give Webster time to respond. “I’m so pleased to hear it, sister! I knew it would perk you up.”

  “You sure were right about that. Now, what can I do to help with breakfast?”

  Elizabeth turned back to her frying pan. “Well, I’m low on fresh eggs and I haven’t been out to the hen house this morning.”

  Alafair accepted the egg basket Elizabeth held out to her. “It would be my pleasure,” she said.

  Elizabeth’s little chicken coop was tucked up behind a screen of shrubbery at the far side of the yard, behind the garage. She only had a handful of hens and no rooster, which Alafair thought was odd. But with only three people to feed she supposed it was less trouble for Elizabeth to simply buy more chicks if one of her hens stopped laying. She opened the gate to the small fenced chicken yard and slipped into the coop, where she robbed the indignant hens of half-a-dozen eggs before slipping out again.

  She walked a few steps back toward the house and stopped to take in a deep breath. The air was cool and scented by citrus blossoms and the pleasant acrid odor of burning wood. The dawn was so pretty, so bracing and quiet, that she was loath to go back inside.

  In order to make her excursion last another couple of minutes she walked around to the front of the house to get a better look at the blush of light on the eastern horizon.

  She went up to the fence that surrounded the yard and looked up and down the street to see if anyone else in the neighborhood was stirring. She did not see any neighbors.

  But there was something in the ditch.

  ***

  Alafair opened her eyes and looked at Dillon. “I came outside to gather some eggs for breakfast.” She nodded toward Elizabeth’s chicken yard just visible at the far side of the property. “I had slept good, which has not been usual lately, and it was such a fair dawn that morning that I walked around to the front of the house to get a better look to the east.”

  “You went out the front gate to the street?”

  “Not right away. I just went up to the fence and looked up and down the street to see if anyone was stirring. That is when I saw something in the ditch. The light was still shadowy so I could not tell what it was. But the size and shape of it gave me the shivers. So I went around and out the gate to get a better look.”

  The marshal looked up from his notes. “Later, you can show me right where you were standing when first you saw the body. Did you recognize him?”

  “Well, I didn’t remember his name but I recognized right off that he was one of the lads who had played music at the party last night.”

  “Did you touch him?”

  “I felt his neck for a pulse, but nothing else. Then I fetched Shaw and Web and Elizabeth to see.”

  Elizabeth continued the tale. “We pondered the sad sight for a spell. Then I went back in the house and wrapped some bacon in a tortilla for Web to take with him to work, and he drove his Hupmobile to the constable’s office to report the tragedy.”

  “Which I did,” Web added.

  “What did y’all do until Nettles arrived?”

  “Nothing,” Elizabeth told him. “Me and Alafair made breakfast for the children while Shaw stood watch over the body to make sure nothing got disturbed before the law got there.”

  Dillon looked at Shaw, but Shaw anticipated his question. “I didn’t touch anything, either, Marshal. Just stood there and jawed with Mr. Carrizal when he showed up directly.”

  This interested Dillon. “Carrizal? His house faces out on the next street. How did he know to come over?”

  “Chase run over there and told them as soon as he could escape,” Elizabeth said. “But I corralled the little hyena before he could get out front to see the body.”

  Web leaned back in his chair. “Have you interviewed Geoff Stewart yet, Marshal?”

  “Not yet. I expect to directly.”

  “Have you spoken to the poor dead man’s family?” Alafair had her own notions about the proper order of investigation.

  “First thing, Miz Tucker.”

  “Now as best I remember, Bernie left the shindig a little before his brothers did,” Shaw said. “One of the others packed up Bernie’s guitar and they took it with them when they finally went home. What did the brothers say happened after they left? Do they know where Bernie went?”

  Dillon flipped his notebook closed and flashed a tobacco-stained grin at the curious faces around the table. “Now, who is questioning who, folks? Don’t y’all worry about it. Everybody in town will know what we find out soon enough.”

  If he expected the Kemps or the Tuckers to look abashed he was disappointed. He cast a speculative glance at the one person who had had nothing to say. “When did you go home, Miz Stewart?”

  Cindy shrank even further when Dillon looked at her, but answered readily enough. “Later than most. Maybe eight o’clock. I stayed for a bit afterwards to help Elizabeth and Miz Carrizal clean up.”

  “See anything odd when you left?”

  “No, sir. I left out the back and went into my house through the back door, so I didn’t pass by the street at all. But everything seemed normal as far as I could tell.”

  “When did you first hear that a body had been found?”

  “A little after dawn. I heard the commotion in the street and looked out the front door to see what was going on. I was still in my dressing gown so did not care to go outside. I called to young Ellen Piper from across the street and asked her what was happening and she told me that Bernie Arruda had drowned in the canal.”

  “What did you do then?”

  She blinked at him. Though her face was ashen she was composed when she answered. “I felt so awful. He was a nice man. He repaired my front fence just last month.”

  “When did you learn he had been killed and not drowned?”

  “Elizabeth told me yesterday after Doctor Moeur left. I was shocked, of course. I do not know of anyone who could do such a thing.”

  “Did your husband stay late to the party, too?”

  Cindy’s eyes shifted away from the marshal’s face and back again. “No, he left an hour or so earlie
r than me.”

  Elizabeth jumped in. “Lots of people left out the front way after he did, and I can promise you that no one saw a body in the canal.”

  Dillon cast her a glance but continued questioning Cindy. “So was Mr. Stewart asleep when you finally made your way home?”

  Cindy bit her lip and flushed, but said nothing. There was an instant of silence before all four of the others leaned forward and propped their elbows on the table. “Where was your husband, Miz Stewart?” Dillon’s tone was neutral.

  For a moment Cindy looked as though she was going to cry. “Well…after he left the party, he went back to his office to catch up on some work.”

  High Feelings

  The marshal laced his fingers together. “When did your husband finally get home that night, Miz Stewart?”

  Cindy looked away again, an embarrassed expression on her face, and did not answer. Dillon asked, “He didn’t come home? He ain’t home now?”

  “He has a big filing deadline coming up directly. He often spends the night at his office, Marshal. That’s where he is right now.” Cindy’s expression was earnest. “He has a cot in the back. It is way easier on him than making his way back here on foot in the wee hours of morning.”

  The marshal’s eyes narrowed.

  Web spoke up in Cindy’s defense. “Both me and Geoff do that sometimes—stay over to catch up work. There is a cot and a washstand in a little room behind the offices.”

  Dillon did not comment. He turned back to Elizabeth. “I hear Matt Carrizal and Bernie got into a scrape.”

  Elizabeth drew back as if she had been slapped. “What? I was not aware of any such of a thing.”

  “Me, neither.” Cindy and Alafair spoke at once.

  “There were some high feelings expressed that night about the situation on the border, Marshal,” Shaw said. He hesitated, oddly unwilling to mention Matt’s reaction to the way Geoff Stewart had treated his wife. “But I didn’t see Matt Carrizal get tangled up in any ‘scrape.’”