Head in a Haymow

by Chris Seaton

  Agent Wyatt assessed her mood with reasonable weariness. “He's got a lot of explaining to do. I just hope he's more talkative than he was last night.” He noticed her stance was stubbornly swayed to one hip, her arms crossed. It irked him that he didn't know why.

  “Do you think Jessica knows you identified her in the woods?” Bernice moved her line of sight to the ground, sneaking glances at him from her peripheral vision.

  “For your sake I hope she doesn't, but we've got enough to hold Bernardo until we can piece together their true relationship.” He took a step toward her and watched her stiffen. It was irritating. “And there's all the evidence from the storage unit to sift through in the mean time.”

  “Bernardo might loosen up if you promise to protect his wife.” Bernice rubbed her arms defensively, turning her head toward him but still talking to his feet. “She's expecting.”

  Agent Wyatt took another tentative step. She didn't retreat. He took it as a good sign and stood behind her gently grasping her elbows and giving them a tug. “Hey,” he gently asked. “What's wrong?”

  “You mean, besides the crazy bitch who might try to kill me?” Bernice cringed at the acidity in her voice and sighed to relieve it. “I'm just tired of being rattled all the time. I miss my peace. I just want things to go back to life before the head in the haymow.”

  Agent Wyatt went very still. With a slow and careful touch, he removed his physical contact with her and took a step back. “I'll do my best,” he stated with more bravado than he felt.

  She turned slightly and smirked. “I know. You're very good at your job.” She looked back out at the landscape again, adding, “Things'll be back to normal before we know it.”

  Then, they just stood there, neither admitting nor negating anything.

  Finally Agent Wyatt relented and walked to his driver's door. “I'll call you and let you know when we've made sufficient progress.”

  She turned to watch him go. Bernice's poker face could match him in any game. “Leave a message. I'll most likely be out in the fields. I got a lot of work to catch up on.”

  “Sure thing,” he replied and got into his car. He left without a look back.

  Bernice walked a good five acres from the farmhouse before she let herself cry.

  “We know, Mr. Mescualez.”

  The revelation was delivered to Bernardo with the succinct, undramatic tone that Agent Wyatt was known for. He could have easily gotten a job as an auditor instead of a cop.

  “We have you on tape at the FedEx office in St. Paul.” He began to lay out blurry surveillance photos and other sheets of incriminating evidence, turned for Bernardo to see. However, that would have required Bernardo to look down or forward or anywhere but a fixed point beyond Agent Wyatt's head. His face was a mask of stubborn hostility.

  “We also have your voice matched to the 911 call reporting Cameron Spark's car stolen.”

  The mask remained in place. Agent Wyatt let out a breath of exasperation. He sat back and studied the suspect. Bernardo was reading like a textbook example of a man who'd been through the system. He had probably learned the hard way that Miranda rights were his best friend in an interrogation. The macho stance, the air of arrogant hatred, Agent Wyatt had seen it too many times to expect anything different from this guy.

  Except that Bernardo was different. He had gotten out and away from the prison cycle. He had a wife, a good job and a baby coming. He had every reason not to go back to jail, especially for a manipulator like Jessica.

  “I've read your sheet. Some pretty nasty work, roughing up an old lady for her SSI money, but that's a long way from first degree murder.” Agent Wyatt concentrated his scrutiny on Bernardo's face, looking for the tell. It came in a slight shift of the eyes in his direction followed by a tensing of the jaw as he swallowed. And Agent Wyatt knew. “He didn't do it.”

  “Being some lackey to a smoking-hot bitch like Jessica, I can see how some guys would get off on that. Maybe you were jealous of her boyfriend in the Bahamas. Maybe that's why you poisoned him.” Agent Wyatt stood at that point and walked out of Bernardo's line of sight.

  “I bet if I send a couple of deputies around your property, I'll find the plants you made the cyanide from.” He watched Bernardo's shoulders start to slump. “I just hope you didn't have your wife do the cooking for you.”

  For a moment Agent Wyatt just stood silently. He let the tension in the small room lay on the Bernardo's shoulders like a knowing specter. He knew the conversation taking place in Bernardo's head was much more productive to his cause than anything he could lay out at that point.

  Finally, there was a shaky sigh. “I didn't fuckin' kill nobody.”

  “You're not Annie Oakley, you know.”

  Bernice made the observation while washing down a delectable tuna fish sandwich with her glass of milk. In her self-afflicted despair she had driven her body like a mule. She had finished the netting the blueberries; weeded the three acres of squash, cucumbers, and pumpkins; and tied up all the new shoots of raspberries and blackberries.

  Her clothes were torn and dirty. The scratches on her hands stung like the dickens and the skeeter bites were numerous and itchy. It was all a great if temporary distraction until Darlene hauled out the shotgun.

  “I'm just trying to keep you safe.” Darlene glared at her as she loaded the shells into the chamber. “You're welcome.”

  “What're you gonna do, Lady? Follow me all over the farm with your itchy trigger finger?” Bernice lost her train of thought after taking another bite of her sandwich. She looked at it, letting sight and taste marry together in her mind. “Cam, did you bake this bread yourself?”

  Cameron looked up from his laptop. “I used that cast iron Dutch oven you had in the cupboard and found a recipe online.” He resumed typing before adding, “With all the eggs around here I figured I'd make the mayo from scratch too.”

  “Seriously, Dude, it wouldn't bother me one bit if you never went home.” Bernice wiped her mouth with a paper towel and returned her attention to Darlene. “As long as Bernardo's in custody, I doubt we have anything to worry about.”

  “But that Jessica woman's still out there, isn't she?” Darlene corrected her with authority. She looked down the barrel, aiming it out the sunny kitchen window with the frilly yellow curtains. “I don't want to be cut up in my sleep like poor ol' Herb.”

  Bernice tossed the rest of her sandwich down on her plate. “Could you please refrain from referring to dismembered corpses while I'm eating?” She stood, cursing herself for even coming back to the house. "Well, at least Darlene isn't gushing about Agent Wyatt."

  “If it wasn't for Herb's severed head, you would have never met Agent Wyatt.” Darlene set the gun carefully on the floor in front of the window. “You ask me,” She added, “it was a blessing in disguise.”

  “I think Herb would disagree with you on that one, Hon,” commented Cameron the peanut gallery. He stopped typing and speculatively watched Bernice put the remainder of her meal in the fridge for later. “That has been bothering me though.”

  Darlene walked behind him with a carafe of coffee to give him a warm up. “What has?”

  “The why's about Herb's remains. Why was he frozen? What was the point? If you want someone to disappear, you don't keep the body.”

  “That's right. You get rid of it. You burn it or drop it in a fresh foundation or dissolve it in acid or lye.” Darlene's eyes lit up with her morbid descriptions.

  Bernice closed the fridge and confronted them, talking to Cameron. “You keep her away from that gun. She's seen too many damn movies. Her imagination is getting carried away. I don't want to come back for supper and find some Jehovah's Witness bleeding in the front yard.” She finished with a wave and walked out the door.

  But Cameron's irritating reminder came with her. “Why freeze the body?”

  Bernice found herself back at the strawberry patch not far from the house. Back where it all started. Maybe that was the problem with this
investigation. Maybe they'd been so distracted by the chain of events that followed they forgot to start at the beginning. Herb was strangled, and his body was frozen for five long years. Why?

  She pulled a discarded ice cream bucket from the turned over pile waiting next to the patch. As she knelt down between the rows, she let her fingers go to work while her mind concentrated on the problem with Herb.

  “Why not dispose of the body immediately?” she asked the strawberries, trying to channel Jessica. “You get Herb alone and away from his wife. It's not that hard. Margie was used to him running off to wealth seminars. You get him alone in your hotel room...” She gazed down at the bucket by her knees and realized the mistake in her logic. “Nope, can't get rid of a body in a hotel room.”

  She worked her way up the next row, trying to back track her speculation. “Okay, you get him alone in your little house. You drug his food, strangle him and then cut him up and throw him in the freezer-” Bernice stopped again. “No, because Jessica quit her job and left town. Who's making sure Herb's body stays frozen?”

  She wiggled on her hands and knees to a new spot and picked some more. “Where was the freezer? The obvious answer is Bernardo's house, but that would mean he's been in on it this whole time.” Bernice addressed the overripe strawberry in between her fingers. “I just don't buy that.” She tossed the rotten fruit away with her theory. “Besides, even if he was involved, he would have gotten rid of Herb before his wife found out.”

  The bucket was soon overflowing. She set it aside and grabbed another. She'd let Darlene do the hulling that night. She could already feel the sweat dripping down her back. She straightened up stretching and looked at the patch. She could count a good three buckets easy left to pick. “Never enough time in a day,” Bernice reminded herself and knelt back down to continue her work.

  She stopped mid-pull, leaving a strawberry intact on the stem. Her eyes widened and she stood up. She left her buckets where they lay and slowly walked back to the house. Then the walking turned into a trot. By the time she hit the steps, it was a full bore run. She skipped the first two, and stomped onto the porch.

  “Oh my Lord!” exclaimed Darlene. She threw herself off of her chair to grab for the shotgun by the window.

  “It's me! It's me!” Bernice yelled from the open door way. “Calm down, Scar Face, and put away your little friend. I just figured out something.”

  The couple gaped at her. Bernice didn't care. She just grinned.

  “There wasn't enough time.” Bernice walked in and grabbed her sandwich back out of the fridge. “Burning, burying, acid baths, they all take time.” She sat back down and gestured to Darlene with her sandwich. “How long did it take for Grandpa to string up a hog, slit his throat and cut him up before tossing him in the freezer?”

  “When he was still strong? Maybe an hour.” Darlene noticed Bernice had no problem eating after her own morbid description. It bugged her, but she kept silent.

  “Right, and that was probably with a hand saw. Give Jessica a tarp and the proper power tool, and I bet she could get it done in at least that amount of time.” She took a huge bite and smiled, enjoying her sandwich with more gusto.

  “Well, that explains freezing him to begin with,” Cameron agreed, “but why leave him that way? And why try burying him now?”

  Bernice frowned at her sandwich. “I don't know.” She tossed the last bite in her mouth and stood back up. “Maybe more time in the strawberries will bear it out.” She sent a stink eye over to Darlene. “By the way, it's probably not in your best interest to shoot me. I'm not going to get chores done that way.” Bernice made a face at her and walked back out.

  “Hmph,” Darlene groused at her exit. “She's so slow I doubt I'd notice much of a difference.”

  Chapter 21

  “Almost right after you and Bernice came around the shop I got photos and a text sent to my cell phone.”

  Once Agent Wyatt had pried the admission of innocence out of Bernardo, he changed his tactics. Offering coffee and an attentive ear got him much further into Bernardo's role in Jessica's ever-widening web.

  “How did she get your phone number?”

  “Don't ask me.” Bernardo held his hands up in defense. “I barely spoke two words to the woman and that was years ago, but she had pictures of my wife. She was following her. The text told me to wait for instructions. That was it.”

  Bernardo sipped his coffee. The cuffs had been removed, but his body language was still less than comfortable. He watched Agent Wyatt like a hawk.

  Agent Wyatt scratched the stitches on his head and made a very frustrated face. “Why didn't you report the threat to the police?”

  Bernardo's face went deadpan. “I've got a record. I know what that means when it comes to dealing with cops.”

  Agent Wyatt stood up and walked to the other side of the room, looking out the small window. “If he had told me immediately about the blackmail, it would have saved so much trouble,” he vented to himself, but he understood the reluctance. For most of their adult lives the two men in that small room had opposing perspectives. It was foolish to believe that would change easily. “How long before you started receiving instructions?” he asked.

  “Couldn't have been more than a couple of days,” Bernardo responded. “That's when the weird box showed up on my door step.” He looked at the floor in guilt. “The one I put into Bernice's bedroom.”

  “And you delivered the package to be shipped in St. Paul shortly after that?”

  “Yes, and I felt like a drug mule doing it too.” Bernardo clenched his fists under the table, reflecting his bruised pride. “It was humiliating, but the pictures kept coming, and the requests got worse.”

  “The false police report?” Agent Wyatt returned to his seat.

  Bernardo kept his line of sight on the table top. “She slipped those instructions in an envelope under my windshield wiper. My wife was with me when I found it. I had to tell her it was a warning for bad parking.” He looked Agent Wyatt in the eyes then. “I felt worse about slashing the tires, especially when I had to charge Bernice for new ones.”

  Agent Wyatt reminded him, “Bernice questioned you then about your relationship with Jessica. You could have come clean.”

  “I wish I had,” he admitted emphatically. “Then I wouldn't be sitting here right now.”

  “But you did tell her about the car.”

  Bernardo stopped, looking confused. “You mean the Beemer? I was straight with her on that. I ain't seen hide nor hair of that car since the bitch stopped coming around when Herb took off.”

  Agent Wyatt absorbed the information in silence and fidgeted with his pen before posing his next and final question. “And the fifty grand in your trunk?”

  Bernardo took a long noisy breath. “I had no idea it was in there. That's a lot of money, but it ain't worth my life.” He forcefully yanked the collar down on his shirt, revealing his inked scars from prison. “It sure as hell ain't worth my freedom.”

  “Let's see here. We got goat wormer, cat food, new brooder bulbs,” Darlene read off her efficiently tallied list. She narrowed her gaze at Bernice before continuing, “A new pitchfork, because someone was pissed when they cleaned out the goat pens.”

  Bernice couldn't have cared less. She was in no mood for shopping. “If I knew I was gonna get guff on this trip, I would have made Cameron come instead.”

  “Hey, that would have been fine by me,” Darlene retorted. “Unfortunately, you can't cook your way out of a paper sack.” She humphed as she walked and glared at Bernice to push the cart behind her. “This way at least, you're good for something.”

  Bernice grumbled to the cute cat picture on the bag in the shopping cart, “You'd figure her mood would improve considering she's getting laid.”

  “I could say the same for you, Miss Potty Mouth,” Darlene snidely barked on her way to the checkout.

  Sam's Farm Supply was a staple in the county. The residents of Lollygagger's Acres spent mor
e time and money there than at the grocery store. They knew Sam's family on sight. Darlene probably knew Sam's lineage better than he did.

  They rolled their overloaded shopping cart to the OSB box that served as the checkout counter. Darlene dutifully recited all the items inside. Sam's niece, Nicki, plugged the prices that she knew by heart into the new point of sale computer terminal and read off the total. Darlene dug out her checkbook.

  “I'll meet you out by the truck,” Bernice announced and walked out the door.

  She didn't make it to the truck. Her senses of sight and smell were accosted by the flowers that were hiding out in the seasonal greenhouse around the corner. Bernice gave into the temptation and ventured over.

  The hooped plastic-covered structure was hiding a treasure trove of flora inside. Petunias, Impatiens, Begonias, Marigolds, Hostas, and Lilies were all lined up like obedient soldiers in their plastic green pots, proudly displaying their beauty. Bernice smiled in sublime satisfaction as she walked along the rows of slatted wooden tables and admired each plant.

  Until she got to the end of the row and came upon the shrubs; then her heart sank. Like a painful reminder of her self-absorbed distractions, the roses stood in one gallon pots on the floor. Their huge, showy blooms seemed to be drooping at her as if to silently voice their disappointment.

  “Shit,” she admitted to them, “I forgot to call Margie back.”

  “Bernice!” A cranky Darlene could be heard from outside.

  “In here!” Bernice yelled back, wallowing in her shame.

  Darlene made no effort to hide her disapproval when she stomped in. “Oh no you're not.”

  Bernice glared at her grumpy entrance. “What?”

  “After we practically spent ourselves into the poor house getting that stupid old truck fixed, don't you think for one moment that we're gonna fork over good money for a bunch of useless flowers.”