Bill shrugged. “What I don’t know you can teach me.”
“I do know one thing,” I said as I gathered my half-filled coffee cup and stood. “I want to add a New Age section.” I looked at Nancy and smiled.
She returned my smile from the sink and rolled her eyes. “And you could host some readings. You could give the first author reading in Bookmarks.”
I laughed. “I’ve only written short stories.”
“That’s more than anyone else around here. I bet they’d come in droves. You’re fresh meat,” she said mischievously. “Get Joan and Muriel to spread the word. You’ll have a packed house.”
Bill followed me into the bookstore. “You’re a writer?”
I shook my head. “Just private stuff. Short stories and a few poems. Nothing major.” Yet. Not until I have some time to relax, sort myself out, and generate a good idea. When will that happen now that I’m trying to spring Uncle Barney?
I sighed pensively and Bill shot me a concerned glance.
“I’d come if you gave a reading,” he said, smiling. His look was crushingly warm and honest. I felt a blush coming on and turned away.
“We’ll see,” I said. “I suppose I’ll have to start somewhere.”
“I bet all the regulars would show up. You’d have a crowd.”
“Right,” I said doubtfully. I set my cup on the Bookmarks sales counter and turned towards him. “Bill,” I said tentatively, “there’s something that’s been bothering me. Can I ask you about Mrs. Podeski?”
Bill’s smile vanished. “I’ll help if I can.”
Before I could ask, a quote from The Invisible Woman popped into my head. “The Idiot Guide for detectives says that you are supposed to ask questions.” I was a little stymied. I knew what I had to ask but I didn’t quite know how to do it delicately. I suspected Bill wouldn’t respond if it wasn’t done that way. I mentally put on my soft gloves and began.
“You said Uncle Barney and Mrs. Podeski had been seeing each other for quite a while. But she didn’t seem like a very nice person. I can’t believe he’d like her in a private way. It’d be even more surprising if that was intimate. What do you think attracted my uncle to her?”
Bill sucked in air like his lungs were empty. He looked me in the eye with the same sort of uncertainty I’d seen him show in The Grind only moments earlier. I was right about his reaction. “She was different with him and he was nice to her. Like he knew she wasn’t really a bad person deep down. All I can say is they seemed to get along. Maybe there were other reasons. I don’t know.” He looked away, embarrassed.
"I know,” I said wearily. “They were having an affair and the reasons for that are obvious. But I still don’t understand how Barney could get along with someone who was obviously a mean ...” I didn’t finish the sentence.
Bill gave me a brief smile and shrugged. “Guys can act different when they’re around a person they like,” he said, suddenly feeling an urge to examine his boots. “Sometimes guys feel shy. Sometimes they feel like they aren’t quite good enough so they try harder to be friendly. Barney was always doing things for her.” He looked into my eyes. It was pretty obvious what he was saying had a double meaning. I refused to acknowledge that fact. Touchy feely isn’t working. Damn the torpedoes! I planted my hands on my hips and blurted, “Sex.”
Bill looked shocked.
“It’s what affairs are all about,” I said with matter-of-fact bluntness. “She didn’t leave her husband for him, did she? You say they carried on for years. Maybe their relationship was all about sex.”
Bill cleared his throat. “Maybe Barney liked Mrs. Podeski for other reasons. Like I said, with him she was nice but with everybody else she was …” He paused as well. “Maybe she made Barney feel special.”
“Sex,” I repeated. “He’s a guy.”
“People get together for other reasons. It’s not the only thing on a guy’s mind,” Bill answered with mild annoyance.
“Not in my experience.” I sipped my now cold coffee. “I understand why you didn’t get along with her, what with the accident and everything.”
Bill seemed relieved I’d changed the subject. “That was really no big deal. It was what happened afterwards that made me angry.”
I waited for him to continue. Waiting was something I’d picked up in the mystery novels I read. Detectives would create an empty space in the conversation that the suspects usually felt impelled to fill with words. After a moment of silence it worked with Bill.
“She told the judge she hurt her neck. She wore a brace to court and everything. She even had a report from Dr. Phillips saying she might have whiplash. The judge believed her though she didn’t prove it. That was baloney and I knew. My truck hardly bumped her car.”
“But you didn’t prove otherwise either.”
He shook his head. “I could have asked for another doctor’s opinion, I guess, but I didn’t see the point. It was obvious the judge was on her side and was going to take a strip off me no matter what. She lied about what happened and said I was staggering drunk which wasn’t true either.”
“What did the chief testify? He arrested you, didn’t he?”
“The judge said the police report was all the information he needed. He ruled in her favor and decided to make me pay her every month as compensation until she turned sixty-five.”
“How awful and unfair!”
“It had a good side. I got to keep my license and I only had to pay one hundred dollars a month. But then she asked the judge to make sure my payments were in cash in case my checks bounced. Like I was untrustworthy. The judge agreed and said if I ever missed a payment I’d forfeit my license for a year. That’d mean I’d lose my job.”
“So you went along with it.”
“Had to. And the worst of it was she made me grovel every time I paid her. She’d keep me waiting around on her porch while she wrote out a receipt. She took an hour to do that once. That was what made me angry. I couldn’t stand being near her.”
“I can understand that,” I said.
“There’s something else I have to tell you,” he said softly. He rubbed his forehead, brushing away brown locks of hair. “And it’s embarrassing.”
I reached over and squeezed his arm. “How bad could it be?” Every nerve in my body was on high alert.
“I sort of lied to you and the police,” he mumbled. “When I told you I didn’t see her that night it wasn’t a lie but it wasn’t all the truth either. I went over to pay her the night she died but I didn’t see her. Allan came to the door and took my money but he didn’t give me a receipt like usual and I didn’t ask for one.”
I squinted, trying to understand what he was saying and what it all meant.
“Because I didn’t have any proof that all I did was show up to pay her and didn’t even see her when I did, I was afraid to tell you or the chief.”
I held my breath, trying to absorb the enormity of what he was saying. He was admitting he had been there the night she died. It was the first evidence that Barney wasn’t her only visitor. I stared at him in silence. My heart told me he was telling the truth about not seeing Mrs. Podeski, but could I trust those feelings? After all, he’d admitted to lying to me once already.
“Did you see Barney? Did you see his car?”
Bill indicated he had not with a shake of his head.
I put my cup down on the sales counter again with a nervous rattle. “What time was that? Maybe Barney had already left. The fact Allan was there would mean there was nothing wrong with Mrs. Podeski when he left.”
“It was early. Around supper time.”
“Before Barney went over. Darn it all!”
“I’m sorry I lied,” Bill repeated. “I was scared the chief might get some crazy ideas.”
“That’s okay, but you have to tell the chief now.”
Bill’s dismay at what I said was palpable. “Won’t that make me a suspect?”
“Why? You saw Allan at the door. It proves
Allan was there around supper time. The fact you saw him may even blow his alibi.”
“What is his alibi?”
“I have no idea,” I said, sighing.
“Okay,” Bill said. His shoulders drooped and he stared at the ground. “I don’t want to lie anymore. Not to you.”
11
After the CSI team uncovered their new evidence, visiting hours at the police station were limited to once a day before lunch, if at all. There didn’t seem any rhyme or reason to whether the police let Barney have visitors. As I got dressed for my next meeting, I was feeling overwhelmed. Bill said he’d talk to the chief, but how could I be sure he would? Somehow, I had to verify he’d met Allan without giving away the fact I knew.
When I got to the station, Chief McCaffrey was missing in action. One of his deputies, a young man barely in his twenties with a fuzzy upper lip, guided me to the interview room and asked me to sit while he retrieved my uncle. I was still tense and uneasy about Bill and knew I had to put on a positive face for my uncle, which made me feel even more uneasy. Barney arrived dressed in a sloppy orange jumpsuit, his hands shackled to his waist. Another chain dropped from his waist to shackles at his ankles. The sight of him was horrifying, but I did my best to smile.
“It’s good to see you,” Barney said with a sigh as he sat on the opposite side of a small table. “How’s The Grind? Is Su okay?”
I nodded once to both questions. We sat staring at each other in silence for a moment. “Bill was at her house too. He went around supper time to pay her blood money. He saw Allan. Was Allan there when you went over?”
He shook his head. “She was alone,” he said.
“Where was Allan?”
“I don’t know. Out.”
I leaned forward to hold my uncle’s hands but the deputy, standing in the corner of the room, immediately stepped forward. “No touching.”
I nodded and withdrew.
“Any news from your lawyer? Can’t you get bail or something?”
My uncle shook his head again. “The judge isn’t coming until next week. I’m stuck here until he grants bail. And now there’s a hot-shot prosecutor from Eugene who wants to charge me with murder before that can happen.”
“But why? What evidence can they have?”
Barney held up his right arm. It had a white gauze bandage. “Scratches. She scratched me that day in The Grind but they don’t believe me.”
“Then I’ll tell them she did!”
Barney remained looking dejected.
“I’m trying to find out who did this, Uncle Barney. We’ll find out. I know we will, and it will all be okay.”
“Sure.” Barney stood then. I’ve never seen him look so defeated. He turned to the deputy. “Can I give her a kiss?”
“No contact,” the deputy answered, opening the door.
Barney shuffled away without looking back and I broke into tears. My heart was shattered by what I’d seen and I became even more certain I wouldn’t let Uncle Barney stay in jail if there was anything I could do.
After I’d had a chance to recover, I went into the police station foyer and sat down to wait for Chief McCaffrey. Staring at the clock above the counter, I watched the seconds tick and the minutes pass. Chief McCaffrey didn’t show for thirty-five minutes. Thirty-five long, torturous, silent minutes.
He entered the police station alone and saw me sitting there immediately. He paused for a moment, dropping his Stetson hat on the counter, and then turned to me. “Hi, Miss Willoughby,” he said. “You waiting for me?”
I stood up and walked towards him. “Can we talk privately?”
“Will my desk do?”
I nodded and followed him behind the counter to his desk, sitting down on one of the black plastic chairs he had facing his own. I didn’t know whether to tell him about what Bill had said, but all I could see in my memory was the defeat on Uncle Barney’s face. I decided I had to speak up. “Bill came to The Grind yesterday and he told me that he had gone over to Mrs. Podeski’s house that day. He said he met Allan at the door.”
“I know all about that,” said Chief McCaffrey. “Bill and I had a chat.”
“So you know Allan could’ve been there when Uncle Barney went over?”
Chief McCaffrey shook his head. “Bill says he went there at suppertime. Barney didn’t go over until about when The Grind was closing and that’s after supper. Allan had already left. His alibi confirms that.”
“What is his alibi?”
Chief McCaffrey smiled sadly. “You know I can’t tell you that.”
“But what if he didn’t leave until after Barney had? Have you considered that? Maybe his alibi isn’t true. Maybe he’s lying.”
“His alibi is solid,” Chief McCaffrey answered. He sighed and folded his hands on the desk. “You can’t keep sticking your nose in, Miss Willoughby. We’ve got this investigation under control and we’ve got a witness who can tell exactly when Barney left. We’ve got an estimated time of death that could very well match up. We’ve got new evidence that shows there was a struggle.”
“The scratches? She scratched him in The Grind after Bill pushed her over.”
The chief’s stare was cold and yet sympathetic. “That will have to be decided at the trial.”
“So you’re charging my uncle with murder?”
“A prosecutor has been assigned from Eugene. The CSI boys have put together a pretty solid case against your uncle. Yes. He’s going to be charged.”
It took me most of that afternoon to settle down. I knew in my heart I couldn’t stand by and let the police find a convenient way to blame Barney. To them it was an open and shut case. Barney and Mrs. Podeski had been having an affair. They fought and she died. End of story.
I walked home from the police station, replaying everything I knew about the murder in my chaotically confused mind. We knew Barney had been at her house but he hadn’t hurt her. I was certain of that. Someone else must’ve come in after the neighbor saw him leave and killed her. But why put her in the freezer? That made no sense at all. I had to find out who that person was. And figure out why. I knew that was the only solution. But while plenty of people disliked her and there were motives galore, no reason seemed strong enough. Nothing I’d heard about her or the way she treated people jumped out at me. Nothing seemed bad enough. Why kill her? Why?
I asked myself what every mystery novel I’d ever read had boiled down to. Motive and opportunity. To catch a killer one must think like a killer. Who had the motive? What were the details of the opportunity? What are the most common motives? Money. Love. Revenge. So far, I hadn’t found a financial angle. Barney and Utta Podeski were having an affair though and if her husband found out, he may have wanted revenge. He had to be someone I concentrated on.
I called Barney’s lawyer when I got back to The Grind and my emotions were promptly deflated even more when he gave me his bad news. “The case is definitely going to trial,” he said with plain indifference, “and it doesn’t look good for Barney.”
I shouted into the telephone. “How is that even possible? The evidence is slim and circumstantial.”
Barney’s lawyer talked back at me calmly, like he was talking to a child. “He was there at about the time she died. The police have a witness. He admits to his affair. He admits to having an argument with her. His skin was found under her nails. Now admittedly, there were other things under her nails too, but she definitely scratched him.”
“She did that at The Grind! The woman had painted claws, for heaven’s sake.”
“We can obviously call the skin cell evidence questionable, but there’s all the other stuff. He went to the bar afterwards and got blind drunk. That was totally out of character. Would he do that because he had a spat? He’s been on the wagon for years. To be honest, I think a jury may not believe they just argued or that he left and decided to forget he was an alcoholic for the night.”
“What about her son or her husband as suspects?”
�
�Her son hooked up with friends at supper time for beer and pizza and he spent the night with them. She died sometime later and certainly after he was gone. Admittedly, there are some questions about the time of death. Her being in the freezer mucks up estimates, but they know how long it takes a body to freeze and they’re working it back from there. They seem pretty sure about the time.”
“Her husband,” I said. “Maybe …”
“Her husband wasn’t even in town when it happened and he has motel receipts to prove it.”
“But if they can’t be certain about when she died …”
“Barney looks good for this one, Melanie, but the timing thing will be our best defense. We have to convince a jury she died later, sometime later. At least while Barney was in the bar. I’m sure there’ll be lots of folks willing to testify he was drinking that evening, so if we can stretch the time of death a bit or even raise some questions about it, there will be reasonable doubt. There’s got to be an expert witness whose testimony can cloud things up, and I’ll find him. Trust me.”
I couldn’t help but have a sudden spurt of hope but the lawyer doused those flames fast.
“Don’t make bets on the outcome, Mel. It’s a close one. I still have to review the medical reports and the autopsy results. It looks like she was hit over the head and then put into the freezer to hide her body. The prosecution will say Barney did that to confuse the time of death and boost his bar alibi. Giving the jury that thought in their minds weakens our defense.”
“Do you think that’s why the killer did that?”
“It’s the only thing I can come up with at this point.” He sighed. “And all those timing notions aside, it still comes down to one basic fact. Everyone with a possible beef with the deceased has an alibi. Everyone except Barney. A witness saw that he was there. Barney admitted to having an argument with her. He had scratches and she had his skin under her nails. It’s pretty damning stuff.”
“I know,” I answered sadly. “But we both know he wouldn’t have done it too. Not Uncle Barney.” I choked back a sob. “And everyone seems to have forgotten about the button. Whose was it? Was Barney’s shirt missing a button when he was arrested? I’m sure he had the same clothes on the next day. If he had all his buttons that has to help, doesn’t it?”
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