A Fatal Four-Pack

by P. B. Ryan

  I didn’t know a lot about Bill Russell’s personal life, but I did know he had both Native American and Helena-area collections. I figured that was the best way to approach the situation. I logged onto the web and entered eBay’s address into the browser. Within minutes, a couple of promising items—a brass presentation spear tip and a peace medal—popped onto the screen. I printed them out so I wouldn’t forget the details and flipped through the phone book for Bill’s number. He answered on the second ring.

  I dazzled him with a confusing monologue about wanting to get a Native American collectible for my dad and not knowing what was a good deal and what wasn’t.

  “Did you have a particular piece you wanted to ask me about?” he asked.

  “Yeah.” I described the two items I’d found on eBay.

  “I don’t know about buying over the Internet, but the peace medal sounds like a decent price. You want to be sure you know what you’re buying though.” He went into a long dissertation on the different types of medals, when they were given out, who wore them, and how all this affected value.

  I stared into space as I waited for him to finish. “That’s good to know. Thanks a lot. You may have saved my bacon.” I picked up a pencil and tapped it on the counter. “How is everything else going for you? It’s a real shame you didn’t get those medicine man items at the auction last weekend.”

  “Yeah, well, with everything that happened I think I’m better off not getting them. I had a second chance at them anyway.”

  I sat up a little straighter. “Really? How’s that?”

  “The guy called me Monday and asked if I was still interested. I met him, but he was out of his mind. He only wanted to sell the small pieces, like the whistle or the weasel. He had no idea how to work a trade.” Bill sounded thoroughly disgusted. “I told him flat out no.”

  “Really? I wonder why he wanted to sell off parts when he’d just bought it.” For a while I forgot that I’d called for information for an article. This was just good gossip. “Did you see him again after that?”

  “I wondered about him selling so early too, especially since he approached me. I mean, I already had a chance at the complete set and knew what he’d paid for it. It isn’t unusual for someone to turn around pieces pretty quickly if they know someone who’s willing to pay more, but there was no reason for him to think I would.” Bill paused for a second before continuing. “He acted like he had a couple of other people making bids. I figured he either got some sucker to pay his price or gave up and went home. I was sure floored when I read about you finding his body. I guess that must have been a shock for you too.”

  He had shared his; it was time I shared mine. I gave my well-rehearsed rendition of stumbling over Crandell’s feet.

  I could hear the scrape of Bill’s chair on the floor. “There’s one thing I don’t get. If there were other people interested in buying that medicine man outfit, why weren’t they bidding at the auction? I mean, there was me and that city couple, but who was this other person he acted like he had on the hook? Plus, I got the definite feeling he never meant to keep that set. Like he came here just to buy it and get rid of it. It was strange.”

  “That is strange.” And it was.

  I thanked him again for his help with my mythical eBay purchase and hung up before realizing he hadn’t answered my last question. Had Bill seen Crandell again before the out-of-towner was killed?

  Chapter 11

  Rhonda and Marcy had me doing it now. I was questioning Bill and not just in the reporter-asking-questions way. I was questioning if he could possibly have killed Crandell.

  There was just no good reason to suspect Bill. Well, aside from means, motive, and probably opportunity. I picked the phone up and dialed Rhonda.

  “How about a margarita on the rocks, hold the lime juice?” I greeted her.

  She laughed. “So you’re having a tequila kind of day, huh? I don’t know if I can help you out with that, but I might be talked into a beer at the Bumpy Frog.”

  The Bumpy Frog was a little bar tucked in between the local lumberyard and Helena’s only strip club. The Frog featured a couple of pool tables, a dance floor, and a really good house band that played a mixture of country and old time rock ‘n roll.

  “It’s Wednesday night—no cover charge.”

  “Good enough for me. What time? I have to go home, let Kiska out and feed him.”

  “How’s eight?”

  I did a quick mental rundown of how long it would take me to get home, take care of Kiska, and freshen my look. “I’ll meet you there.”

  My evening was covered, but I needed to get a story written first. I decided to follow up on what Joe told me about seeing Andrew Malone with Crandell before I checked back in with Marcy.

  I looked up the number for the Malones’ hotel. The front desk rang me through, and Marie Malone answered. I identified myself as a reporter from the News.

  “I really don’t have any comment,” she murmured, in a cultured voice that, despite my four-year college degree made me feel horribly uneducated. “I don’t think I should be helping you.”

  Envisioning Ted’s antlers, I forced myself not to reply with a polite “thanks anyway.”

  “I was hoping you could straighten out a few facts for me. I want to make sure you get to give your side of the story. I really don’t want to print anything that isn’t accurate.” I tried to sound caring, unthreatening, and smart.

  “Well, I guess that would be all right.”

  Cooperation. Yay, me.

  I asked if she could give me any background on how she got the feather. She repeated what I’d already heard and printed in today’s paper.

  “Yes, but when did Crandell give you the feather? Did you meet him somewhere?”

  She hesitated. “No, not really. I mean he called me, but… I really think that’s all I can say.”

  I pushed on. “He called you? Was it regarding the medicine man set?”

  “Well, yes. He said he might sell me pieces from the set. We have a museum, you see. I’m trying to preserve ancient customs and rituals.” Her voice grew more confident as she continued. “It is really horrible the way these sacred objects are bought and sold. I want to see them displayed so everyone can learn from them—not have them hidden away, stored in some collector’s basement.” She paused. “I was going to meet him, but he wanted such an extravagant amount, and Andrew, that’s my husband, was afraid I would get too upset if I spoke with him face-to-face.”

  I waited.

  “Anyway, Andrew talked to him. I wasn’t going to see the man at all, but I ran into him on the street. That’s when he gave me the feather. He said that if I wasn’t interested in any of the pieces, he knew other people who were.” She took a breath. “He didn’t know anything about the spiritual past of those items. He just saw them as a way to make money. It made me sick at heart.”

  “So was that after your husband talked to him at Cuppa Joe’s?”

  She hesitated again. “Yes, it was.”

  Interesting. Her husband had left this little meeting out of his conversation with their attorney. “Did you see Crandell again after that?” I was on a roll.

  A male voice sounded from the background. “Marie, who called? Was it Gregor? Can we leave yet?”

  “I need to go.” She hung up.

  So much for my roll. Still, I had done it. I had interrogated an actual, at-the-start unwilling witness. I was a rock star.

  I made a few notes on our conversation. Her story gelled with what Joe and Rhonda had each seen. Based on what Marie Malone and Bill Russell had told me, it sounded like Crandell had definitely been hot to sell pieces of the set.

  Had Crandell bought the set planning on keeping only part of it? Or did he decide afterward to try and make back some of the money he shelled out by selling pieces that weren’t as important to him?

  There were too many holes in my information. I needed to learn more about Crandell. Hoping Marcy had dug up something, I
called the News.

  She had the big goose egg to offer. Crandell’s ex-wife wasn’t home. Marcy had left a message on her machine. The police had issued one of those wordy statements that basically said, “We don’t know anything we didn’t know yesterday, and even if we did we wouldn’t tell you.”

  That would win us all a Pulitzer.

  And it left me only one choice... time to try and charm more info out of George.

  A voice I didn’t recognize answered the phone at the station. I asked for George and was promptly transferred.

  “Hey, George, how’s it going?” Still riding the high from my success with Marie Malone, I was upbeat and confident.

  “I’m a little busy right now.”

  Not quite the helpful George I was expecting.

  “Does it have anything to do with Crandell?” I lowered my voice.

  “I’m not supposed to be discussing Crandell with anyone from the press and especially not you. Blake really had his tail in a knot after he saw your story today. I told him I didn’t give you all that stuff on the feather, and what was missing, but I don’t think he believed me.”

  “I’m sorry, George. I really am. Do you want me to talk to him?” I was sorry George was in trouble—even more so since it seemed to have affected his desire to freely share what he knew. But who was I kidding? I was about as likely to confront Blake as Kiska was to walk by a food bowl that was brimming with steak.

  “No.” George was emphatic. “The last thing I need is for him to think I’m talking to you.”

  I fell silent for a moment. “I...” I knew I needed to push more, but I just couldn’t do it. “Okay, that’s fine. I’ll just tell Ted—”

  George sighed loudly. “What are you fishing for?”

  Unexpected hope bloomed. “Nothing much. Just following up on the keys I found and seeing if there’s anything new. Suspects? Alibis?” Anything.

  “I can’t tell you about anything new.” He grunted, and his chair squeaked. “But the alibis...”

  I could tell he was thinking, deciding my fate. Antlers or no antlers? That was the question.

  He decided to save me for one more season.

  “The Malones were together in their hotel room.” His voice lowered a notch. “They did some sightseeing in the afternoon—over to the history museum by the Capitol. They were back at their room around 3:30. They stayed there until 5:15 when they left to go eat at the Brass Spur. They’d just got inside the restaurant when they heard the sirens.”

  “All that is backed up. They have a receipt from the museum gift shop with three o’clock on it, and about 10 people saw them come into the Spur. Aside from that, it’s just their word they were where they say they were.”

  “How about Bill Russell? I assume you’ve talked to him since he was the only other bidder on the medicine man stuff.” I felt safe asking this. George was back in talk mode and I so wanted him to tell me Bill had a titanium-clad alibi, like maybe trading arrowheads with, say, 50 or so cops at the time.

  “We talked to him.” He dragged out the words, like he was rethinking the wisdom of having this conversation. After a sigh, he continued, “He was at home all afternoon and night. He signed for a package at 3:20, and his wife got home from work around five o’clock. That’s all we’ve been able to confirm.”

  “Oh.” Not the alibi I’d been hoping for.

  ”How about the keys? Did you confirm they were Crandell’s?” I asked.

  George sighed. “They were his.”

  “Were there prints on them?”

  “Well, you know they were from a rental. There were lots of prints on them, but…”

  I kept quiet. I could feel an eye-opener coming. Finally, George continued, “There were two clear sets of prints that looked recent. One was Crandell’s and the others we can’t identify. They’re not from anyone at the rental company, but there are more just like them on the door of Crandell’s car and on the outside of a suitcase that was in the backseat.”

  I opened my mouth to ask a follow-up question, and Blake’s voice sounded in the background. “George, do you have that file? Who are you talking to?”

  The next thing I heard was a dial tone.

  I frowned at the phone. Why did people keep hanging up on me? Didn’t they know it was rude?

  I shrugged off this obvious epidemic in bad behavior and mulled over my most recent discoveries.

  The most intriguing was the prints. If there were prints on the keys that matched ones found in the car, why weren’t they on the knife?

  Definitely something to ponder.

  The information on the alibis wasn’t as tantalizing, but I did learn that neither the Malones nor Bill had a very good one. I wasn’t sure how that helped with a story for Thursday’s paper, but it was interesting.

  The bell on the front door dinged, and Betty twirled into the shop. She did a little Charleston-kick next to the cow horn chair.

  “I can’t wait until Friday. They had an Earl Fuller tape playing at the Queen City Grill. I’m ready to cut a rug.” She did another move, knocking both knees together and crisscrossing her hands in front of them.

  “Oh, by the way, Laney stopped by this morning.” Betty twisted over to the register. “She said you okayed an ad.” She grabbed a piece of paper that was rolled up under the keys and waved it in front of my face.

  I unrolled the page and stared in shock at what I saw. A flapper bent over flashing the world a view of her garter-belt-framed nether lands. Between her knees in bold letters read, Roar back into the 20’s at Dusty Deals…All merchandise half-price!

  “Do you like it?”

  Like it? What was she trying to do? I bought an ad I couldn’t afford, and she handed me this thing featuring half-priced merchandise and downright tacky artwork.

  “When does it run?” I stuttered.

  “Friday. Don’t you like it? I hope so, because they were doing an early press run on the section. Absolutely no changes.”

  I gripped the ad in both hands.

  It wasn’t that bad. Maybe business would be slow, or I could close early.

  “So, do you like it?”

  Maybe I wouldn’t have to open at all. I could hang a black wreath on the door or something.

  “Lucy, do you like it?”

  I blinked at her. “Oh, yeah. It’s great.”

  She stared at me, an enigmatic look in her eye. “So what do you like best, the bare keister or the slashed prices?”

  I didn’t really have a reply to that.

  She tossed her head and plopped her hands onto her hips. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  My eyes widened at her explosion. “What do you mean? I said, I liked it.”

  She grabbed the crumpled ad from my hand and pointed at the exposed flesh. “You like this?”

  I stared back blankly.

  “And you don’t mind that I put everything in your shop on sale half-price?”

  She didn’t wait for a response this time. “It’s bad enough you let that piece of fluff, Laney Washington, push you into buying something you don’t want. But I thought for sure I’d get you to speak up when I flashed you this clinker.” She shook the ad at me. “Get some balls, girl. There’s nothing wrong with saying ‘no’ every now and then. Or even ‘you’re wrong’ or ‘I don’t like that.’ People around you will not wig out just because you assert yourself. Yowza honey, you are not the sax solo in everyone’s day.”

  She flipped around and yanked a second piece of paper from under the register. “And it’s a real drag you think I’d run that trash.”

  She shoved the paper in my hand and backed off a couple of feet, watching me with glittering eyes. I glanced down. It was an ad with the same basics as the first, minus the bare buttocks and bargain buys. Betty took a lot of pride in her graphic designs. I’d hurt her.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t…I mean I didn’t really think you’d…”

  She laughed and dropped her head into her hands. “Lucy, what’
s it take to get you to flip your lid?”

  Not sure what she meant, I didn’t reply.

  “Honey, I handed you the world’s worst ad, stomped up and down, and screamed at you. Shouldn’t you be pushing 98 degrees?”

  I still wasn’t getting it.

  “Hot?” She paused. “Angry with me? Aren’t you ticked off? Pissed? Something?”

  She had a point.

  “You need to break it down every now and then. Stand up for yourself. Somewhere you got the idea that saying what you want is a sin right up there with murder and sour notes, but, honey, you’ve got to get over it. You’re running a business. You can’t make everyone happy. Shouldn’t even want to.” She pointed at me with an inch-long nail. “You have to watch out for you.”

  No one besides Ted had ever told me to stand up for myself, and he was, well, Ted. I hadn’t realized not being pushy in the real world could be seen as such a flaw.

  I tried to picture myself telling Laney: “No, I don’t want that ad.” Or my mother: “I don’t wear wool.” Sweat began to bead on my upper lip, and the knot returned to my stomach.

  The front bell jingled. Betty twisted around to greet the man who entered. I stole back to my office, second ad in hand.

  o0o

  My conversation with Betty had left me drained and confused. I tried to concentrate on my story, but I wasn’t sure where to go with it. I’d talked to just about everybody involved with Crandell, that I knew of anyway. I got some good information from George, a great lead from Susie at the Antebellum, and confirmed information with Bill Russell and Marie Malone. But nothing seemed to be clicking. Marcy still hadn’t called back with word from Crandell’s wife, and I didn’t know where else to go. I was at a stalemate and completely desperate. When the phone rang, I answered it. It was Ted.

  He was in a generous mood. “So, you’re close. Didn’t anyone in J-school ever tell you that talking to an editor’s like shooting a bear? If you don’t hit him right between the eyes, all you’ve done is piss him off.” After those words of wisdom, he hung up.