3 Loosey Goosey

by Rae Davies

  I wasn’t sure where to start, so I dove right in. “I don’t see Ben as much as I used to.”

  She nodded. “We travel a lot. Eric’s goal is to hit all fifty states this year.” She held the peach to one side while considering what she had just said. “Well, maybe not Hawaii and Alaska.”

  “Still, forty-eight. That’s impressive,” I replied, hoping my expression matched my words.

  “Eric is driven.”

  “Yes.” I waited a minute to give the appearance of sharing in the Eric love. “But back to Ben. I was wondering if you could think of any reason the police would connect him to Tiffany.”

  The FriendTime posts were the obvious connection, if Hope herself wasn’t responsible for them.

  “I didn’t think he even knew her, or of her, until we got here.”

  Something about how she worded her response made me think that someone else, herself I guessed, did know or know of Tiffany before arriving in Helena.

  Afraid asking outright would put up her guard, I replied, “Changing the subject, but since meeting all of you and being introduced to your cause by Ben, I’ve really been intrigued by HA! and all the good work it does.” I put on my best adoring face.

  “Thanks! What we do is important. It would be nice if more people recognized it.”

  Feeling that a bond had been established, I moved back toward my goal. “Something you said made me wonder... did you know Tiffany?”

  Hope’s gaze shifted around the room. When she looked back at me, I could tell there was some nugget of information burning to make its way out of her. “Not me, personally, but she was the worst.”

  “The worst? You mean because of the pâté?”

  Hope set her kefir on the table and leaned forward. “Oh, definitely the foie gras. That’s why we went to her restaurant, but it’s even worse than that.” Her voice hushed. “She was a founding member.”

  My mind on foie gras, Hope’s confession didn’t compute. “A founding member?”

  “Of HA! She and Eric were in college together. I think they dated.”

  “Oh.” I could see how Tiffany switching from protesting the deaths of animals to serving their livers up on a platter might be disturbing to Hope and others. “But Ben didn’t know this?”

  Hope shook her head. “I don’t think so. She was gone before he came along, and he isn’t much for... you know... talking.”

  “So, the pictures of Pauline on FriendTime?”

  “You saw those?” A smile flitted across Hope’s face, but she quickly stomped it down. “I should probably take those down, with what happened.”

  “So you’re Pauline Mathews?”

  “Not just me. Pauline is a bit of a mascot. A lot of HA! members update her profile.”

  “But not Ben.” It was a statement, because I knew my brother had been telling the truth when he’d denied knowing about the FriendTime activity.

  Hope’s lip curled. “No, he doesn’t do that either.” As if suddenly remembering my relationship to him, she added, “Not that everyone needs to be on FriendTime. It’s just that it’s such a great low-cost way to get our message out.”

  “You’re using his goose,” I pointed out. Ben could have thrown a fit about that. In retrospect, he should have thrown a fit about that. Actually, I wanted to throw a fit now, but I knew that would just shut my source up.

  “Yes.”

  I could see that she didn’t think the use of Pauline’s image and my last name was much of a gift.

  “So a lot of people post as Pauline. Did a lot of people put the pictures on Tiffany’s wall?”

  Her face turned sly. “No. That was just me.” Quickly though, she held up a hand and said, “But I’ll take those down. It wouldn’t look good for HA! to have stuff like that up after someone died.”

  “No, I can see how that might be a P.R. problem,” I responded, less than impressed with her motivation. “There have to be a lot of restaurants that serve pâté. Do you do that to all of them? Post on their FriendTime pages, I mean?”

  “If we know about it. Like I said, FriendTime is a cheap way to get our message out.”

  “So Tiffany wasn’t a special case?”

  “Well, she used to be a member.” Hope gave me a knowing look. “We couldn’t just let that slide.”

  “Of course you couldn’t.”

  I left wondering what, if anything, Hope could let slide. Honestly, the woman’s dedication to HA! gave me the willies. She had just moved up to the top of my suspect list.

  It was after noon by now. I stopped by a non-organic grocery store for a sandwich for myself and some corn and dog treats for my animal companions.

  The two of them were being bizarrely calm. Both had passed out on the back seat with Pauline using Kiska as a giant pillow.

  It was cute, but also disturbing. I couldn’t shake the suspicion that they had formed some kind of a coalition to force me into a life of goose/malamute servitude.

  Yet another reason to get my brother sprung from jail and out of Helena as quickly as possible.

  o0o

  I was sitting in my vehicle eating my sandwich when my phone rang. I glanced at it with trepidation, but thankfully, it wasn’t my mother checking on my progress.

  It was Jeremy, Peter Blake’s six-year-old son.

  “Do you ride horses?”

  I had ridden a horse in my past, but not since I was eight and that had not been totally of my own free will. However, both Peter and, more importantly, his ex-wife Shelia were excellent riders. I didn’t want to appear totally inept in the area.

  “I have.” Complete truth.

  “Would you like to this weekend?”

  Thinking Jeremy was talking about some nice, easy trail ride, perhaps inside a fenced paddock, I said, “Sure. Will Alphie be there?”

  Alphie was Jeremy’s tri-colored Australian shepherd. The dog and I had bonded a few months earlier, only partially because he had saved my life.

  “He will! That’s why I wanted you to come. He got invited, but dad has to work and mom is going out of town for some rodeo queen thing. If I don’t have an adult to ride along, then Alphie can’t go either.”

  This was sounding suspiciously bigger than a nice, quiet, little trail ride with a nice, quiet, little trail horse.

  “Ride along?”

  “On the big drive!”

  His enthusiasm was contagious, or would have been if I hadn’t known what he was talking about.

  “You mean for the beef ranchers? But isn’t that with cattle? Down the highway?”

  “And into town. They’re starting at the fairgrounds and going to the Capitol. Five dogs got picked to participate, and Alphie is one of them. Since you made him famous, you have to come along.”

  Jeremy was referring to an article I’d written about Alphie and his role in both saving my life and catching a killer. The piece had been picked up and run in dog magazines and on Internet sites around the globe.

  “Well, now, when I said I had ridden, I didn’t mean—”

  “You mean you can’t? But everybody can ride. It’s easy.”

  If you’d been slapped into a saddle at the age of two, maybe. But comfortable as I was with my oversized dogs and even most horses when my feet were latched to the ground, sitting on the back of a horse... that was an entirely different matter.

  “You can ride Pokey.”

  “Pokey?”

  “He’s my pony. I outgrew him a few years ago, but I still ride him to keep him exercised. So he’s in shape and everything.”

  A pony. That wouldn’t be hard... or embarrassing, at all.

  “I don’t know, Jeremy.”

  “Aw, please... If you don’t, then I can’t, and Alphie can’t, and nobody will see how great he is.”

  I closed my eyes and willed my mouth to round into the shape of a “no.”

  “Well, if you can’t find anyone else—”

  “That’s great! I can’t wait to tell Alphie.”

  He wen
t on to list instructions as to what I should wear: blue to match Alphie’s bandanna, and where and when I should meet him: the fairgrounds, Sunday morning.

  I hung up, exhausted by his enthusiasm and already resigned to the fact that a day of humiliation awaited me.

  Chapter 17

  With my stomach full and my animal friends napping, I tried to put my upcoming humiliation out of my mind by again focusing on Ben.

  I decided it was time to be even more direct. Time to visit my jailbird brother.

  As an offering of peace, I brought his bird with me.

  Wishing I’d had the forethought to dress the goose appropriately, perhaps in stripes or maybe the more modern day glow orange, I buckled her harness around her girth, tucked her under my arm and strolled into the police station like asking for visitation with a goose was all kinds of normal.

  And, hell, this was Helena. They’d probably seen weirder.

  Or maybe not. The man behind the desk pointed at a security camera hanging in the corner. “I’ll need stills of that one.”

  He didn’t, however, ask Pauline or me to leave, and a few minutes later, I was sitting at a table waiting for Ben.

  He came in wearing the orange I’d considered for his goose.

  “She’s naked,” he said, noting her lack of T-shirt or dress or even a hat.

  “She’s protesting,” I lobbed back.

  He smiled, and my heart warmed. He was still my little brother.

  “How are things?” I asked, knowing Mom would want to hear every last detail, down to the brand of toothpaste he was given and whether the toilet paper was two-ply.

  “Not bad. Food choices for a vegetarian are a bit limited though.” He looked at Pauline.

  I could tell he wanted to hold her. I glanced at the uniformed officer who stood next to the door. His steady gaze warned me that handing over the goose would be a mistake.

  Still, if the goose acted on her own... I set her on the table.

  “Keep control of the animal, ma’am.”

  My lips pressing together, I wrapped my fingers around the black leather leash that I’d snapped onto Pauline’s harness.

  “It’s okay, Luce. Pauline understands,” Ben murmured.

  And darn if I didn’t think he was right. The goose settled herself onto the table and stared at my brother mournfully.

  “Tell Mom thanks,” he added.

  I raised my eyebrows. “For?”

  “The cell change and the salad. I have a window now, and, like I said, vegetarian food choices were pretty limited.”

  “Mom got your cell changed?”

  “And a salad. She’s friends with one of the cleaning staff.”

  “And the cleaning staff person got you a new room?”

  “I think she talked to someone, or maybe Mom did.” He lifted his shoulders. “Anyway, it was nice.”

  Easy for him to say. He was behind bars. I was out living in the open where my mother and her FriendTime club could stalk me without warning.

  I glanced at the officer, sizing him up as a potential spy.

  “I talked to Gregor.”

  My brother’s comment drew my attention back to him.

  “What did he say?”

  Another shrug. “Not much. Mainly he told me what not to say.”

  “Anything,” I supplied. I knew this from my own experiences with the attorney.

  “Did he tell you anything about the case against you?”

  “I don’t think he knows much, or if he does, he hasn’t told me. He said he’d know more after the arraignment.”

  I nodded my head like this made perfect sense, me being a legal expert and all.

  Besides, I had my own questions to ask. I just didn’t know how to get around to asking them. “So, you take this vegetarian thing pretty seriously. Eating well, staying healthy, all that.”

  He shook his head. “As much as you love animals—”

  Feeling a lecture coming on, I found my courage and blurted, “Do you do drugs?”

  Caught up in what was obviously a favorite topic on the evils of being a carnivore, Ben jerked. “What?”

  “Drugs? You know...” I fluttered my hands. This was almost as bad as the sex talk I’d been forced to endure with my mother when I was fourteen.

  “I know what you mean.” His brows lowered and his face darkened.

  “It’s just... Someone told me they saw Tiffany before she died, and she looked like she was on something.... and... if she died of an overdose and the police maybe found drugs in the Egg...”

  “I didn’t kill anyone,” he replied, his voice tired and hurt.

  He thought I thought he could have killed Tiffany.

  “I...”

  He shook his head. “I don’t do drugs. I don’t sell drugs, and I don’t own drugs.”

  I was slime.

  Pauline fluttered her wings, making me think she agreed with my self-assessment.

  After a minute, Ben sighed. “I know you’re trying to help, but don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Mom’s working on things. She said she just has to nail a few things down.”

  My shame disappeared.

  “Nail a few things down?” As in solve the case? My mother, the woman who begged me to investigate my brother’s arrest, thought she had figured out the crime before me?

  No way.

  I pulled a notebook out of my bag and clicked my pen into write mode. No more guilt from me. I needed information. “Tell me everything you know about HA!” My mother hadn’t talked to Hope, hadn’t seen the crazy in her eyes...

  I wrote down everything Ben told me, not stopping to judge or question. I listed when he joined HA!, who was a member at that time, and what he knew of their protests and membership before that.

  When we got to the night of the protest at Tiffany’s, I hit a pay day.

  Hope had arranged the protest. No surprise there.

  But, covering my bases, I asked about Eric Handle and his notable absence.

  “He wasn’t happy about it to start with. He thought it would dilute our real purpose.”

  “The beef ranchers?” I asked.

  “Yeah, but Hope was hell-bent.”

  “But he was in town?” I clarified.

  “Yeah, he arrived before I did, and it isn’t weird that he didn’t protest. Usually he doesn’t.”

  “He’s the press guy,” I said.

  “Yeah.”

  But they hadn’t had a press guy at Tiffany’s.

  “Was he mad that the rest of you went?” I asked.

  “Eric doesn’t get mad. He just comes up with an alternative plan.”

  “So what was his alternative plan for Tiffany’s?” I asked.

  “I told you. To concentrate on the beef ranchers. He was getting materials and... stuff.” My brother pulled his lips into his mouth, telling me that he was hiding something.

  “Ben. Is there something I need to know?”

  “Nope.” He held my gaze, the little shit.

  I knew he was lying, but HA! and their plans for the beef ranchers weren’t my problem. Still, just to make sure I wouldn’t regret not pushing him more later, I asked, “HA! doesn’t get violent does it?” The brief rundown that Betty and Rhonda had both given me on the group hadn’t included anything any more disturbing than what I had seen at the Capitol the day before, but if Eric was planning something dangerous, I would want to warn people.

  Even in day glow orange, Ben managed to look insulted. “Violence goes against everything HA! stands for.”

  I could see it was the best I was going to get, and it wasn’t like me announcing that HA! had something else planned for the beef ranchers would surprise anyone. It was kind of the whole point of the group being here.

  “Okay, so Eric was busy doing stuff. How about you? After the protest, where did you go?” And was Hope, my little homicidal friend with you? I saved that last question, hoping that Ben would answer it without my prompting.

  “The Lemon wouldn’t s
tart, so I grabbed a ride over to the grocery with Rhonda.”

  “What about everyone else?”

  “They were there. Eric had gone out for salad greens while we were protesting. He got back a little after we did and put what he’d found together while the rest of us checked shelves for expired food.”

  With the reminder that the grocery only let the HA! members eat expired food, I didn’t ask why Eric had gone somewhere else for salad. A day over on a canned good, okay, but black soggy lettuce? No one wanted to eat that.

  “So you all ate together? No one left?” I asked.

  “Not till the next morning, when you got there.”

  “How’d you sleep?”

  His return look was confused. “Like a felled log. Everyone did. Protesting takes a lot out of you.”

  Which meant once Ben was asleep, anyone could have come and gone without him knowing it.

  “Now that you mention it, though, Pauline was fussy.”

  “Fussy?”

  “She got up and was poking at me. It woke me up.”

  “Did you turn on the lights?”

  “No. I didn’t want to wake anyone else up, and I went right back to sleep.”

  Which mean Hope or any of the other members of HA! could have snuck out and back in without Ben knowing.

  I looked at Pauline. If only the goose could speak.

  o0o

  The Detention Center, a nice name for jail, was located on the second floor. I was halfway down the stairs after visiting Ben when I ran into Peter Blake, coming up.

  “Being healthy?” he asked, in obvious reference to my choice to take the stairs.

  “Of course,” I replied, as haughtily as I dared. The truth was that I was a bit afraid of taking the elevator with Pauline in tow. In case of power outage or other catastrophe, I did not want to be trapped in that small space with the goose.

  “I heard you were here.” He held his hand out to the goose, and darned if she didn’t let him stroke her under her long neck.

  “My grandmother had geese,” he explained.

  Of course she did.

  I squeezed Pauline a bit in the middle, succeeding in getting her to jerk her neck around and jab at me with her bill in warning.

  “Maybe you should put her down,” Peter advised. “She’ll make it down the stairs fine.”