Aspen Allegations - A Sutton Massachusetts Mystery
Page 13
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There wasn’t really a coffee shop in Sutton – the Honey Dew Donuts on Route 146 South had shut down once they sealed off the cross-over with jersey barriers. That left only the Bagels and Kebobs place in the small strip-mall by the post office. Jason and I sat across from each other, him with a black coffee, me with my orange juice and freshly baked blueberry muffin.
The place was an odd juxtaposition of aromas and sights. The décor was casual New England, with formica tables, a tile floor, and a long counter stretching across the back. One corner held a bookshelf with assorted titles, and the lone female employee stared at the TV in an otherwise empty room.
Jason looked at me across our small table. “So, where do we begin?”
My cheeks warmed at the “we” statement and I dropped my gaze to my muffin. “You do not need to be dragged into my project,” I demurred. “I admit this has become important to me, but I’m sure you have better things to do with your time than to squire me around.”
“I would be happy to do it,” he insisted gently. “Despite what you might believe, rangers don’t discover dead bodies every day. Mostly we move dead trees and occasionally help with a skinned knee or a lost hiker. It’s rare that we have any trouble with hunters in this part of Massachusetts. In fact, I don’t know the last time we had an acc … a situation like this.”
I looked up at him. “So you are not so sure one of Popovich’s shots had a wild ricochet?”
He hesitated for a long moment, then shook his head. “I’ve started wondering about it myself,” he admitted. “That makes it even more important that I accompany you as you look into it. If there really is a person out there capable of shooting someone in cold blood, right now he or she thinks they’ve gotten away with it.”
“It could still be an accident,” I pointed out. “Maybe it was another hunter, he shot John by accident, then fled. Maybe some strange coincidence caused Popovich not to hear it.”
His brows creased, but he nodded. “We should consider every angle. You never know when an unlikely situation could be the truth.”
I took a bite of the muffin. “When I read a memoir or biography, it always starts at the beginning. I think we should find those three friends of his from his youth and see what John was like then. That might help us understand why he volunteered to serve in Vietnam; how he endured the ‘smell of napalm in the morning’ and came out the other end.”
Jason nodded in agreement. “Beginning with his childhood makes sense. Do you know how to find these people?”
“Matthew had said that one of his friends, Sam Sares, went to work for his father’s dairy farm. I would have to guess that was Sares Dairy over on Nipmuc Road. They have a store area which is open daily even this time of year. I was thinking of taking a run over there tomorrow. Maybe we can lure him out for lunch or dinner and see what he has to say.”
“What time would you like me to pick you up?”
I glanced up at that. He gave a soft shrug, spreading his hands. “It doesn’t make sense for two of us to be driving all over Sutton,” he pointed out easily, “and my work hours are flexible. I do most of my ranger work around dawn, in hunting season, to make sure the hunters are following state laws.”
I nodded. “I tend to be a night owl, with the work I do on my websites,” I admitted. “That way my changes are done when most people are asleep. Shall we say seven p.m.?”
“I will be there,” he agreed. “We will see what Sam has to tell us about John, back before he had experienced Vietnam’s thunder.”