by R. L. King
“Which might be the reason for the security guards,” Verity pointed out.
“Well,” Stone said, “We’re not detectives, and it’s not our job to investigate the crime. All I want is to know a bit more about what happened, and figure out if there’s a Forgotten presence in Woodwich. If there is, I’d like to find them and have a chat with them if we can. There’s no reason to believe anything out of the ordinary is going on—as you pointed out, Jason, murders happen all the time, and my friend’s version of ‘horrific’ might be a lot tamer than we’re suspecting. It’s a terrible thing if Eleanor was murdered during a botched robbery attempt, but—” He shook his head ruefully. “—these things do happen, and we move on. Even mages sometimes die in perfectly random, normal ways that have nothing to do with magic.”
Jason nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right. I’ve seen and heard about plenty of pretty awful crimes that are nothing more than somebody getting scared and doing something they regret, or somebody letting their emotions get the better of them—and you also learn real quick when you hang around with cops that people don’t always tell their friends everything that’s going on in their lives. Let’s go look around some more, then hit the library and see what we can find.”
They walked the three blocks of Main Street, up one side and down the other, and found no additional instances of anything that looked like Forgotten symbols. “Let’s check the backs of the buildings, especially on the side Hillerman’s is on,” Stone said when they finished.
What they found there was a narrow alley, wide enough for a large truck to traverse if its driver was careful about minding the dumpsters and piled detritus behind some of the businesses. Its dinginess stood in contrast to the neat appearance of the little Colonial-style storefronts, with dirty drifts of snow melting against the buildings, piles of trash, and soggy, empty boxes.
Again, sharp-eyed Verity spotted the symbols first. The first set was behind Hillerman’s, near the heavy metal back door. Three of the modified “bad place” symbols lined up at knee level, along with two others they didn’t recognize. Stone pulled out a small notebook and a pen from his overcoat pocket and jotted the two new ones down, along with the updated version of the one they knew.
“Curiouser and curiouser...” he murmured. Jason covered his hand with his jacket sleeve and tried the door. It was locked tight.
They found a second set scrawled behind one of the bars a few doors down from the department store. This time, they recognized the familiar triangle-and-rays “good place” sign, along with another collection of several others they didn’t know. Stone dutifully entered them in his book next to the first set, adding a note about where they’d found them and when.
“The ones behind the store look fresher than these,” Jason observed, squatting down to examine the new batch. “These look like they’ve been here awhile. In fact, look—these two have been painted on, not drawn with chalk.”
“Good catch,” Stone agreed. “Let’s nip in here for a moment then, shall we? Maybe we can find out why this is a ‘good place.’”
The back door was open. They headed down a hallway with restroom doors on either side and old-style beer signs on the walls, and out into the bar proper. Unsurprisingly, for a mid-afternoon in a town where they hadn’t seen ten people since they arrived, the place was deserted except for a rangy, bored-looking fiftyish man behind the bar, who looked like he was doing a crossword puzzle in a magazine. He looked startled to see them and hastily stashed the magazine. “Afternoon, folks. Help you?”
Stone sat down at the bar, and Jason and Verity joined him. “Guinness, please, if you have it.”
“’Course I do,” the man said. Jason ordered a local microbrew and Verity got iced tea.
“Not from around here,” the bartender said as he got their drinks together and placed them on the old but scrupulously clean surface in front of them. His voice was gravelly and easygoing: the voice of a man whom it would be very hard to get a rise out of. His words held no suspicion or animosity, simply an observation.
“We’re here for the memorial tomorrow,” Stone said. “Eleanor Pearsall.”
The man nodded, his craggy face clouding. “Yeah, I suspected so. Seen a few new folks in town today—figured that was why.” He shook his head. “Horrible, horrible thing, it was. I didn’t see anything, of course. Too early in the morning for me to be out and about, and the police had the place all covered up by the time I got down here. But those folks who did see—”
Stone raised an eyebrow. “Saw—what?”
He glanced up, surprised. “You didn’t hear, then.”
“No. All we’ve heard is that she was—murdered inside the store. And that the police have a suspect in custody.”
The bartender took a deep breath. “If you were friends of hers, I’m not sure you’ll want to hear this. It wasn’t pretty.”
Jason’s voice was gentle. “I’m guessing if this was as bad as it sounds, we’ll hear about it anyway. Maybe we should just get it over with.”
The bartender thought about that for several seconds, then finally nodded. “All right, then. Fair enough. But don’t say I didn’t warn you. Name’s Bill, by the way. Bill Miller.”
Stone introduced himself and the others. “You—knew Eleanor, then?”
Miller nodded. “Everybody knew Eleanor. She was—kind of a local character. Eccentric, you know? But a lot of people in Woodwich are what you might call eccentric. This is an old town, and it attracts its share of interesting individuals. Odd, but harmless. People who kind of—march to their own drummer, let’s say. But the nice thing about the town is that everybody pretty much gets along. It’s like we all tolerate each other’s eccentricities. It’s one of the things the people around here are proud of.”
Stone smiled a little. “Sounds like just my sort of place.”
“The point is, we don’t have crime in Woodwich. Oh, sure, sometimes a few bored teenagers get together and raise a little hell, or somebody has too much to drink and runs their car into a light pole, but I can’t remember the last time we had a robbery or any kind of violent crime. I know for sure that what happened to Eleanor Pearsall was the first murder around here in—” He thought about it for a few moments. “—a good fifteen years.”
“Indeed?” Stone asked with a raised eyebrow.
Miller nodded. “I know that’s hard to believe—you folks are probably from somewhere a lot bigger, where you just expect you’re gonna see murders in the papers every now and then, especially with the world the way it is lately. But it’s true. That’s what makes this all the more shocking.”
“So you’re saying it was—out of the ordinary?” Jason asked. “Not just a robbery gone wrong or something?”
“Who knew what was in the minds of those boys?” Miller shook his head. “They’re local boys—I’ve known ’em since they were kids. I know their parents—they’re just sick about the whole thing. Dwight and Kurt weren’t saints—liked to smoke a little pot now and then and get drunk, but they were good boys overall, and they took their jobs seriously.” He looked up. “You sure you want to hear this? Last chance to back out.”
“Go ahead,” Stone said softly.
Miller shrugged, as if to say suit yourself. He bent down, began grabbing clean glasses from a rack, and lined them up on shelves along the mirrored back part of the bar. He didn’t look at the three visitors as he continued. “That night—the night it happened, Eleanor was due to fix up the Christmas display at Hillerman’s. She did it every year. Had a key to the store, and spent most of the night before a big event—holiday, big sale, whatever—arranging stuff in those two big front windows. People liked showing up the next morning to see what she’d come up with. It was kind of a town tradition, especially for the Christmas display.
“Sale was set to start at 7 a.m. sharp the next day, and people started showing up a little before that. We don’t exactly have sale rushes like they do in the big city—plenty for everyone, so eve
rybody’s polite. But when they showed up—” He stopped, his back to them, visibly trying to get himself under control. His hand holding one of the glasses shook a little. “When they showed up, they saw her there in the window.”
“She was—already dead then?” Jason asked quietly.
Miller turned around then, and his eyes sparkled with unshed tears. His jaw was set hard. “Oh, she was dead all right. From what I hear, they’d—” He lowered his head, unable to continue.
“Mr. Miller,” Stone said softly, “it’s all right. Don’t do this to yourself.”
“No, it’s—” He looked up, meeting the mage’s eyes, and swallowed. “It was like the aftermath of some kind of—Satanic ritual. They’d—tied her up in the window, and—” He breathed hard now, leaned over the bar. When he spoke again it was in a rush, like that was the only way he’d be able to get it out. “They’d gutted her with a knife, and splayed her out on this table, right there in the window. There was—blood and—other stuff—everywhere, they said. All over the window, all over the inside of the display area, and—to make it worse, they’d posed her display pieces around her. Made it look like—” His voice dropped to a whisper. “—like Santa had done this to her.”
Nobody spoke. Stone, Jason, and Verity simply stared at Miller, all of them struck speechless by his words. “Oh, God...” Verity finally whispered. Jason merely nodded. Stone didn’t move at all.
When a full minute passed, and Stone still showed no signs of moving or speaking, Jason ventured, “We—talked to a policeman before, outside Hillerman’s. He told us that—one of the suspected murderers was in custody, and the other one was dead. Do—do you know anything about that?”
Miller nodded, looking almost relieved to be able to move beyond the crux of the horrific topic. “Yeah. That’s—well, I won’t say it’s the weirdest part of the whole thing, but it’s certainly one of them.” He noticed that Stone’s glass was empty; he got the mage a fresh Guinness before continuing. “When people arrived that next morning and found—what they found—obviously they called the police. And when they got here, they found Dwight and Kurt inside, near the—scene of the crime.” He took another deep breath. “Kurt had—hanged himself with a drape cord on one of the light fixtures, or at least that’s what it looked like happened. Dwight—they found Dwight kneeling near the display, nearly catatonic, from what I heard. Before the police ran everybody off, Mrs. Meeks’s daughter Bonnie said she’d thought she heard him sobbing, saying something about how he was sorry, he hadn’t meant to do it, and he just wanted to die.”
Jason and Verity exchanged glances. “Where’s Dwight now?” Jason asked. “He’s in custody, right?”
Miller nodded. “They took him over to Helmford. The county police have a station there. They’re holding him there for the time being. I think they’ve got a couple of shrinks over there, evaluating him to see if he’s fit to stand trial.”
Stone looked up, finally taking interest in his surroundings again. “Mr. Miller, may I ask you a question?”
“Sure.” The bartender tilted his head.
“Do you have homeless people here in Woodwich?”
Miller looked like that was not anywhere close to what he’d expected to be asked. “Uh—a few,” he said. “Mostly drifters passing through, since we don’t have a shelter here in town. Why?”
“How do you feel about them?”
“How do I feel about them? I don’t understand. What are you getting at?”
Stone shrugged. “Some people are more—accommodating to homeless people than others. Giving them food, helping them out, that sort of thing, rather than trying to get out of sight of them as fast as possible.”
Miller nodded. “I don’t have a problem with them. Things are bad all over and have been for a long time. I believe it’s our Christian duty to try to help folks out when you can.”
“And you do? Try to help them, I mean.”
The bartender looked at him oddly. “I’m not sure what you’re after, Mr. Stone. But yes, sometimes I do, when I can. Sometimes they come by the back door and I give them a little food—bar nibbles and such—and sometimes if I’m feeling generous I’ll give old Ted a beer.”
“Old Ted?”
“Yeah. He’s one of the few who hang around town. Most of them move on after a short time, but Ted’s kind of a fixture around Woodwich. Harmless old guy, little touched in the head, but always friendly and polite.” He sighed. “I hear he was the one who first found Eleanor. The cops found him on the sidewalk outside the store that morning, in tears. They took him in just to be thorough, but they released him right away. Old Ted wouldn’t hurt a fly. Of course,” he added, “before a few days ago I didn’t think Dwight or Kurt would, either.”
Stone nodded. “If we wanted to talk to Ted, where might we find him?”
For the first time Miller looked suspicious. “Why would you want to talk to Ted?”
Jason raised his hands in an ‘it’s all good’ gesture. “We just want to ask him a couple of things about Eleanor. That’s all.”
Stone nodded. “Don’t you worry, Mr. Miller. I know we’re strangers here, but we mean no harm. Eleanor was a friend of mine, and I just wanted to talk to the people who knew her. I hope you understand. We’ll be leaving tomorrow after the memorial, so we don’t have a lot of time.”
Miller paused, looking them over for a long time, as if gauging the trustworthiness of their words. Finally he sighed. “Okay. Ted usually hangs out in the park down at the end of Main Street. The groundskeeper looks the other way when he sets up shop in the shed there in the cold months. He makes rounds to collect cans and panhandle a little, but not as often this time of year. If he’s not at the park he might be at the library, but old Beatrice doesn’t usually let him stay unless it’s really cold out. Says the smell puts off the customers.”
Stone nodded, standing up. “Thank you, Mr. Miller. You’ve been very helpful. Please accept our condolences for the loss of your friend. It certainly sounds like Eleanor made quite an impression around here.”
“That she did, Mr. Stone. And condolences to you as well. Safe trip home.”
They left the bar through the front door. As soon as it closed behind them, Verity stopped. “My God,” she murmured. “What a horrible way to die.”
“I can’t believe this isn’t all over the papers,” Jason said. “Not just around here, I mean.”
Stone shook his head. “I can. Remember, things like this are happening all over the country these days—don’t you remember a somewhat less ritualistic but every bit as horrific murder in Sunnyvale a couple of months ago? People are getting inured to it, sad to say.”
“You think it was the Evil?” Verity asked. “Possessing those guys?”
“That’s why I want to talk to Ted,” Stone said. “I want to find out if he’s Forgotten, or if he can point us to whoever left those symbols. I wish we could talk to this Dwight, but I doubt we can manage that.”
“Maybe he can have visitors,” Verity suggested.
“Probably not,” Jason said. “If they’re holding him to find out if he’s mentally fit, I doubt they’ll let him have visitors who aren’t relatives, or his doctors or lawyers.” He thought a moment. “You know, there’s a small chance I might be able to help with that. Don’t get your hopes up, but let me make a phone call after we find Ted.”
As they talked, they walked down Main Street in the direction of the park. “If it was the Evil,” Verity said, “that explains how they were able to—get to her without her suspecting anything until it was too late. She probably knew them, and trusted them.”
Jason nodded. “If they didn’t have a regular police patrol around here, it sounds like those guys were it for security. So even if she suspected anything was wrong, she probably called them to check it out.”
“But the important question is: why would they kill her at all, let alone in such a visible and horrible way?” Stone asked. “You heard Mr. Miller: this is an area
free of violent crimes. On the surface, anyway, it appears to be an idyllic little town full of charming eccentrics who tolerate each other’s foibles as some kind of badge of honor. The Evil would starve here. Eleanor’s murder would certainly provide them with ample sustenance, but unless they’re planning on continuing their killing spree, things would settle down again quickly and they’d be back where they started. Unlike in a large city, a string of messy murders would gather quite a lot of attention here.”
“So you’re thinking they had a reason to specifically kill Eleanor?” Jason asked.
“I don’t know,” Stone said, shrugging. “And I’m not sure we ever will know. But keep your eyes and ears open.”
They reached the park, a large expanse of forested land at the north end of Main Street. The area comprising the large block nearest the road was flat, with only a few snow-strewn trees. Several sheltered areas with picnic tables and barbecue pits dotted it at regular intervals. The park was deserted except for two bundled-up children running gleefully around flinging snowballs at each other under the watchful eye of their mother sitting on one of the picnic tables. She glanced up at the newcomers, but they were far enough away that she apparently didn’t consider them a threat.
It didn’t take long to find the groundskeeper’s shed, which was set back on the other side of a rise near the tree line, out of view of the road. An unremarkable looking, blocky wooden structure the size of a small cabin, it had a roll-up door on one side and two small windows and a normal-sized door on another. The two doors were closed, and shutters covered the windows.
Stone tried the smaller door; it wasn’t locked. Pushing it open, he called tentatively, “Ted? Are you in there?”
There was no answer. The shed was dark, and faint smells of oil, old grass clippings, cigarette smoke, and unwashed clothes hung in the air inside. The looming, covered shape of what looked like a riding lawn mower crouched next to uncovered implements such as chainsaws and trimmers—the latter locked with a chain and heavy padlock to large metal ring set into the concrete floor. In the back corner a small area had obviously been cleared and was decked out with a pile of old clothes, a ratty sleeping bag, and some shopping bags.