“Poor thing,” I said, trying to imagine enduring both a bad headache and Ideen’s well-meant but intrusive sympathy for eight or nine hours.
“And this morning didn’t help—finding out that an old friend had been murdered.”
“Shep Henson was a friend of hers?”
“No, Biff Brown,” Ideen said. “But we first heard it was Biff, and she was that upset—her son was on one of his teams. Not that it was much of a relief when she heard it was Shep instead of Biff. She knew him, too. She wanted to go down to the town square—she seems to have thought it was more of a memorial to Shep.”
“There was a moment of silence,” I said.
“Set her head off again, going down there,” Ideen said. “When’s the funeral happening?” Ideen never missed a funeral.
“No idea,” I said. “I don’t think they can schedule it until they find out when Dad’s releasing the body. But I’ll give you a call if I hear.”
“I’d appreciate it.” Of course, the odds were she’d hear before I did, but my offer seemed to please her. “If they’re having it soon, Edna might just stay over, but if they put it off till after the holiday, she’ll probably just go home as soon as she feels well enough to drive.” She glanced over her shoulder again. “Frankly, I suspect she wants to ask Biff for a job, or at least a reference, and she can’t very well bother him about that at a time like this, now can she?”
“Of course not,” I said.
I noticed that Ideen seemed to be distracted by something down the street. I glanced that way and saw a stout lady I recognized as one of Mother’s garden club cronies trotting briskly down the street and waving to Ideen—and giving me a chance to escape.
“Well, I’ll leave you to your weeding,” I said.
“Thanks,” Ideen said. “And I’ll try to talk Edna into seeing your dad.”
I continued down the street in the direction I’d been traveling—no sense letting Ideen suspect that I’d been shadowing her guest. I was just turning the corner when I heard the garden club lady’s voice. “Ideen, you should have been there for the ceremony!”
I rounded the corner and set out in the direction of the town square.
I made my way back to the town hall, went inside, and took the elevator up to the third floor, where I had a small office not too far from Randall’s.
“Wasn’t expecting to see you quite this soon,” I said to my desk. It declined to reply, so I had no idea whether it resented the interruption to its peaceful four-day weekend or welcomed the company on a day when the town hall was so quiet that dropping a pencil seemed to echo all up and down the corridors.
Though not quiet for long. Outside, in the square, the choir struck up “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” My window looked down over the square so I cracked it open a bit, the better to hear the singing, then went back to my desk and turned on my computer.
While it started up, I noted in the appropriate page in my notebook the date and time of my latest attempt to reach Biff. I had a whole page dedicated to documenting my attempts to reach Biff. Was it insensitive to call about business on a day when he might be busy making funeral arrangements for his brother? Well, if it was inconvenient, he could always ignore it, the way he’d ignored my previous fifty-seven calls.
I noticed something new in my in-basket and found, to my delight, that Phinny had dropped off the information I’d asked for about Biff’s clients. Perhaps I should have chided him for falling back into his workaholic ways, but then again, maybe he’d disobeyed my instructions not to bother until next week because he thought this could be related to the murder. And for that matter, it could well be that he already had most of the information from fulfilling the chief’s earlier request.
I glanced down the report, which showed all the construction permits Brown Construction had filed in Caerphilly County in the last seven years. I made a note to ask Phinny, just out of curiosity, if he’d only gone back seven years for any particular reason. My organized side would have gone for either five or ten. Maybe he felt seven was lucky. Or, more likely, Biff had only been doing business in Caerphilly for seven years.
And it wasn’t a very fat report, actually. Either Brown Construction was a pretty small-time operation or he was doing most of his business someplace else. Clay County, for example—which would make sense, since he was originally from there.
I poked around in the various official databases until I came up with Biff’s home address and jotted it in my notebook. Then I grabbed my file on the town square renovation project. I made sure it contained a copy of the contract and that the contract included the business address of Brown Construction. A quick call to the number Caroline had given me showed that both of the tracking devices she’d planted on Biff were now out at that address. Which didn’t guarantee that Biff was there—he could have other jackets and other vehicles—but I figured the odds were good.
Of course, now I had to find transportation—my car was at home, and Michael was probably on his way there with the Twinmobile.
I pulled out my phone and texted Randall.
“Taking the Behemoth if that’s okay,” I said. “Official business.” The Behemoth was an old but serviceable pickup that Randall kept in the courthouse parking lot for times when he got tired of driving the sedate and respectable sedan he’d adopted as his official mayoral vehicle.
“Keys on the hook,” he texted back.
I entered Biff’s office address into my phone’s GPS program, tucked the file into my tote, and after tidying my desk again—because I suspected it enjoyed being tidy—I picked up the keys from their hook on the wall of Randall’s office and set out.
Of course, Biff’s place of business was about as far from the center of town as it could be and still be in Caerphilly County. Although from what Randall said, most of it wasn’t technically in Caerphilly County at all. When I turned off the Clay Swamp Road onto the driveway beside the Brown Construction Company sign I was only a mile or so from the Clay County line. I was already tired of driving the Behemoth by that time, but the road was in such horrible repair that I was glad not to be risking my own axles. The Behemoth seemed to relish the rough ride. Clearly Biff didn’t want to make it easy for clients to visit his place of business. The road’s mud and grass surface had plainly been slashed out of the swamp not too long ago, and the trees along either side, choked with Virginia creeper and poison ivy, looked as if they were plotting to take it back any time now.
I finally emerged from the woods into a cleared area bisected by a tall chain-link fence topped with razor wire. The placement of the fence seemed somewhat arbitrary, since almost as many ramshackle vehicles and rusty bits of unidentifiable equipment and debris lay outside the fence as inside. The gate was closed with a chain and padlock. There wasn’t anything like a sign to tell you this was Brown Construction, but enough of the equipment had been painted the same color as Biff’s porta-potty, with the word BROWN stenciled on in flaking white paint, that I figured I was at my destination.
I pulled the Behemoth up close to the gate and looked around for something resembling a doorbell or an intercom. I felt curiously reluctant to get out of the truck. I honked the horn and then flinched at the sound and scanned the clearing around me and the edge of the woods, more than half-afraid … of what? Not the distant barking that informed me Biff kept one or more dogs on his property. After life with Spike, our eight-and-a-half-pound furball, the canine world held few terrors for me. In fact, although by the sound of his bark this beast was probably considerably larger than the Small Evil One, the familiar sound of a dog snarling himself into a frenzy added a curiously homey touch to the otherwise forbidding landscape.
“This whole place is as creepy as its owner,” I said aloud. Saying it made me feel slightly better. But it also made my reluctance to leave the safety of the Behemoth seem more reasonable. Biff struck me as the sort of paranoid person who wouldn’t trust dogs alone to protect his domain. There could be well-camouflaged boo
by traps. Or, more sensibly, security cameras that would reveal my presence.
And if they did, so what? I was here on legitimate business.
I spotted what looked like a buzzer of sorts—at least it was a button with a hand-lettered sign saying WAIT HERE FOR ENTRY over it. I pulled the truck closer to it, got out, and pressed the button. A loud buzzing sounded somewhere back in the complex, and the dog’s snarling reached new crescendos of fury. Apart from that, no response. After several minutes, I pressed the button again and held it down longer. Still no response, except from the dog, and a sort of thudding noise that suggested perhaps he was hurling himself against something. Just in case it was something in bad repair that stood between him and freedom, I got back into the truck.
I studied my surroundings through the windshield. I even pulled out my phone and took a few random pictures. If I’d been admitted past the padlocked gate, I’d have crossed half an acre of vehicle- and equipment-littered gravel parking lot to arrive at one of the ugliest and most dilapidated buildings imaginable. It was a huge hulk made of sheet metal, cinder block, and faded wood, and looked as if it had been built hastily and out of spite, and then abandoned to fall apart in well-deserved solitude.
Not exactly a good advertisement for Brown Construction’s building and maintenance skills. Or maybe too accurate an advertisement. Would it hurt to tidy up a bit? Maybe plant a few daffodils to soften the edges?
The chain-link fence disappeared into the woods in either direction, and as far as I could see, on either side of the huge building and behind it, the fenced-in area was filled with untidy piles of building materials, rusted hulks that might be either outdated equipment or scrap metal, abandoned-looking vehicles, and unidentifiable detritus. Well, Randall did say Biff was running a scrapyard along with his construction business. Though it looked more like a graveyard for unwanted machinery and lumber. I spotted a couple of porta-potties in even worse condition than the one he’d brought to the ball field, which I wouldn’t have imagined possible. And a few of the cars or trucks, inside or outside the fence, looked as if they might be capable of running if someone did a little repair work on them instead of leaving them to rust with their older siblings.
At least now I understood how Aida and Vern could have spent several hours searching the premises for Biff’s intruder. They could easily have spent several days.
I pulled out my phone and checked my mail and messages—not that I was expecting anything urgent, but I was stalling my departure. There was always the chance that Biff would return. Or that I’d get up my nerve to stroll along the perimeter and spy on the inside of the junkyard.
Not that I could think of any good reason why peering into the junkyard would be useful. I already knew more than I wanted to about Biff’s business. I’d be spying out of sheer, useless nosiness. That, more than the continued barking of the dog—or dogs, perhaps?—was what kept me inside the Behemoth. As long as the dogs were inside the fence, they couldn’t hurt me, no matter how hard they barked, but in case Biff’s fences were in the same dismal state of disrepair as the rest of his domain, I decided caution was wiser.
I was just about to start the engine and depart when I heard another vehicle. My spirits rose—maybe this trip hadn’t been useless after all. And then a sudden thought struck me—had it been really wise, coming out here into Biff’s territory. Yes, it was broad daylight, but that didn’t mean much out here in the vine-infested woods. I quickly fired off a text to Michael, telling him where I was. And then one to Randall, in case Michael was too busy with the Eagles.
A Caerphilly County police cruiser crept into the clearing. I didn’t know whether to be relieved or annoyed. I recognized Aida Butler at the wheel. She pulled the cruiser to a halt near the gate. I got out of the Behemoth and went to meet her and she rolled down her window.
“What are you doing here?” she said.
“Hoping to catch Biff in,” I said. “Not that I’m ever sorry to see you, but I got all excited, hearing a car coming down the lane. Thought it might be him.”
“Fat chance,” she said. “Have you tried the ball field?”
“Wouldn’t they chase him away if he showed up there?” I asked.
“True,” she said. “But if you’re looking for him…” She pressed a button or two on her radio. “Sammy? Is Brown there at the field?”
“Haven’t seen him since he left for the ceremony,” the radio crackled back.
“He’s probably figured out I’m looking for him,” I said, “and is avoiding all his usual haunts so I can’t catch him.”
“Heaven only knows where he’s got to, then,” she said. “Maybe over in Clayville seeing to the funeral.”
“Definitely in Clayville?” I asked. “The funeral, I mean.”
“Well, Shep lived in Clayville,” Aida said. “And all their people are there. You’d think the Clay County people would take it hard, him changing his address to a Caerphilly County one, but no one seemed to care. Maybe they thought it was a good joke, him pulling the wool over all us Caerphillians. Not that he ever did that much. Everybody already had his number.”
“Not that I’m snooping or anything,” I said. “But what are you doing out here? Anything I should worry about?”
“Just checking on things.” She was getting out of her car. “Apparently after the Opening Day ceremonies Biff got the wind up and made a big fuss. Complained that the chief wasn’t taking last night’s burglary seriously enough. So I get to come out here every few hours and make sure everything’s secure. Not that anyone but him could tell if anything was stolen, and for heaven’s sakes, who’d want any of it?”
“He can’t come check himself?” I fell into step beside her as she approached the gate.
“Scared to, I guess.” She rattled the padlock to make sure it was still secure, causing the distant dog to bark all the more furiously. “He’s panicking. Convinced that whoever killed Shep was actually gunning for him.”
“Not unreasonable,” I said. “From what I’ve heard talking to my fellow baseball parents, Shep wasn’t really liked, on account of his biased umpiring, but everyone knew he was only doing it because he didn’t dare cross Biff.”
“Exactly,” Aida said. “Killing Shep won’t do anyone any good, because Biff will just find another stooge to ump for him. But killing Biff—a lot of people might consider that a good deed for the community. Me included—I have nephews who played in Little League under him. You know they’ll have to learn hard lessons, playing sports, like sometimes even their best efforts won’t be enough to win. What you don’t expect to have them learning is that the fat cats who run the world can do what they like and there’s nothing they or anyone else can do about it. I’d just as soon they didn’t have to learn that lesson quite so young.”
“Maybe this time will be different,” I said. “Because a lot of us are determined not to let things go on like this.”
“Good luck to you,” she said. “Lord, I wish that miserable mutt would stop barking! I know he won’t though. Three and a half hours we were out here the other night, and I don’t think the blasted cur shut up for more than five minutes at a stretch. If I were a better person, I’d walk all the way round the junkyard, but I don’t see any signs of anything amiss. You see anything hinky when you got here?”
I shook my head.
“I’m going to pass on the long walk in the woods.” Although she had returned to her cruiser, she was spraying herself from head to foot with Rose Noire’s all-natural essential-oil mosquito repellant, which actually worked a lot better than most noxious chemical products as long as you remembered that it had a really short half life and you’d pretty much need to respray yourself every hour.
“If you’re not circumnavigating Brown Construction, what’s with the bug repellant?” I asked.
“If there was some way to breed ticks and mosquitoes for profit, Biff would have that market cornered,” she said. “And I figure I should at least walk the fence as far as the
back gate and make sure that’s secure. Then I’ll do something actually useful, like check for tire tracks in all the places people might have hidden their cars if they decided to sneak in the back way last night.”
“What does he need a back gate for?” I asked, looking at the dense woods surrounding the yard. “Does he have much call to dump bodies out there in the swamp?”
“Used to be the front gate,” she said. “He’s still got something that loosely resembles a road back there. Leads straight to Clayville. Nearly all of his employees live over there, and I expect they use the back way to get here. Long as you’ve got four-wheel drive and don’t worry too much about your axles and your shock absorbers, it’s doable.”
“Let me have some of that stuff.” I held out my hand for the bug spray. “And I’ll keep you company.”
I’d be the first to admit that it was sheer curiosity that made me stay—curiosity about Biff’s lair, and also about any other tidbits Aida might drop about the investigation. But the perimeter hike wasn’t conducive to casual conversation. Between climbing over fallen tree trunks and hacking through bushes, avoiding the swampy bits, and warning each other about snakes, we didn’t have time or wind for much else.
“Here we are,” Aida finally said as we stepped out into another clearing. “The original grand entrance to the thriving commercial enterprise that is Brown Construction.”
It looked a lot like the current front entrance, except that a couple of centuries ago someone had painted a word in foot-high brown letters along the rusty corrugated metal side of the building. Enough paint had flaked off that if I hadn’t known Biff’s name I could never have guessed that the letters spelled out “Brown.” The clearing was littered with rusting cars and trucks. The area inside the fence had the same air of neglect and dilapidation I’d already seen, and was filled with the same apparently random piles or clusters of items. A mountain of old car batteries. A front-end loader that appeared to have had a collision with something even larger. Another gaggle of repulsively dilapidated porta-potties.
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