“But undetected? Wouldn’t remnants of the alarm clock be found in Jonas’s shed, for example? Jordy never found anything.”
“Lots of cheap clocks around, Miss Oosterling. A tiny plastic clock would melt and burn to nothing in a big fire. Cheap clocks are everywhere. Everybody has them. In high school, they bought boxes of them because we kids always broke them throwing things around.”
After I got off the phone, I said to Pauline, “Fontana may have unwittingly supplied candles and perfume to the murderer.”
With my grandmother’s key, I unlocked the church door and we slipped inside.
I went up to the choir loft. I opened the piano bench. It had been cleaned.
We looked about the pews in the loft, and around the old organ. There was no blood. If there ever was a mishap here last Saturday night, either the killer or killers had cleaned it up well or Jordy had. I knew my mother hadn’t been back.
Pauline said, “I doubt the investigators cleaned it up, and the church ladies haven’t had time to get here. They may not even know yet the yellow tape is gone.”
“Very good. So the killer did the cleanup. Or killers.”
“Two people involved?”
“Or several.”
I went to the railing overlooking the nave. Last Saturday Pauline and I had peered down on Cherry holding court with a crowd. This time, I scrutinized the open floor below us where a few pews had been removed to allow for programs. Behind a pew, a seam in the flooring appeared darker than the rest.
“Come on, Pauline.”
I trundled down the narrow choir loft stairs, hurrying into the nave to look at the seam.
Pauline crouched down with me. “You think it’s blood?”
I looked back up to the loft, which was only a few feet from us in the small church. “Cherry’s head could have been banged against that choir loft railing, with blood shooting down this way. If John and Marc came in right after that, the killer or one of them might have raced down here from the loft to beat John and Marc over the head with anything, even hymnals. The person may have slipped in Cherry’s blood and that’s why John and Marc got away.”
“Then the blood was cleaned up, or almost. But what about the lights being out?”
“Maybe they’d taken Cherry to the basement to kill him, but he escaped at first. They cut the lights from the circuit breaker box so Cherry couldn’t see where he was going. He stumbled to the loft staircase, too late to find his way to the front door. He tried to hide in the loft, and that was his big mistake.”
“They? Who helped? Jonas?”
“Somebody who liked being up late at night perhaps. Cruising the bars.”
“I’m spooked out. Let’s get out of here.”
“Yeah.” I was getting shivers, too.
I gave a glance to the way the setting sun was coming in the west windows. We had maybe an hour of light left.
We went to the old schoolhouse and climbed in again behind the loose window screen. It was clear to me that if Fontana was upstairs in that bedroom on Saturday night or early Sunday morning, she didn’t see anything, just as she said.
“Go and move my truck for me, P.M.”
“Why, A.M.?”
“To see how an engine sounded when it was backing out versus pulling in. Back out onto the road, then pull into the parking lot. Then pull over here to the schoolhouse. Drive right across the lawn.”
My pickup made quite a bit of noise. Engines in trucks tend to be noisier than in most cars.
I got back into my truck with Pauline, with me behind the driver’s seat. I began steering us back onto Highway DK in front of the church. I turned left, toward Brussels.
Pauline asked, “So, what’d you conclude?”
“If a truck had pulled in, Fontana would have noticed. She said she heard cars.”
“But not all cars sound alike. My car has rocks rattling in it.”
“Good point. I suppose we should consider what everybody’s driving these days.” My head rattled through a list of SUVs owned by Jonas, the Dahlgrens, my parents. The university sent people out in SUVs as well. Nick and Will sometimes drove around in an old clunker with a muffler that rattled, but I made a note to call the university vehicle department to ask if Nick and Will had taken out a company car to drive later on Saturday. The migrant workers used a minivan.
Pauline said, “Fontana probably couldn’t discern between Cherry’s car and the killer’s car when she was in that upstairs back bedroom of the schoolhouse. We’ve already thought that Fontana probably had to drive away the killer’s car. The killer hid Cherry’s car. It’s a circular argument, Poirot.”
“Not really, Hastings. Remember when Fontana said she walked home that night? She might be telling the truth. What if the killer took Cherry’s car and dumped it fairly quickly nearby, then walked back here to get in his car? Or rode a bike back?”
“Jonas’s bike? He murdered Cherry?”
“Or somebody borrowed his bike for the night. Jonas leaves it out. The person rode the bike back to Namur to get his or her car, a car hidden behind Saint Mary of the Snows. It was after midnight, and a lot of people were asleep. Then the killer returned the bike that night, maybe driving without lights.”
“Oh my gosh, you’re saying that maybe Fontana’s still alive because she left before that guy returned to the church for his own car?”
“I think so. She doesn’t realize it.”
“Could she be in danger?”
“I think so. It’s why she’s been sucking up to Jonas and staying where there are a lot of people, like the tours and the winery. She’s savvy enough to keep protection around her.”
“But Mike has to be involved, if your theory is correct.”
“He had the chemicals, though he denies knowing anything. But I don’t think he has the energy needed to travel the countryside at night dumping chemicals on land.”
“Where are we going now?”
“To see about a broken fence. I think I know where the blue car might be, and if I find that, we’ll be able to prove who killed Cherry.” I smiled as I looked in my side mirror. “Maria’s car caught up with us.”
“Thank goodness.”
* * *
When I pulled into Jonas’s farmstead, he was busy out in the pasture to the north herding in his flock. I waved to him; he waved back. I felt uneasy.
Maria’s car drove on down the road.
I steered through the sloping field and up to the new fencing.
Beyond the fence, brush and trees obscured a ravine. “I suspect the bears have a nice blue Ford Fusion to hibernate in this winter.”
“Certainly the Fusion wouldn’t have been driven through here. That ravine is pretty steep.”
I got out of the truck for a closer look. Grass and brush had been disturbed, but that was likely Mike on a tractor taking out the gate. Did he know if there was a car down in the ravine behind him in the deep woods? Maybe. If so, his silence gave me a chill.
I said, “The car was probably driven in through the south end, not here. The terrain levels off behind Mike’s buildings.”
“Where our suspects hid the chemicals in an old chest Mike hadn’t looked in for months.”
“Yes. Mike’s been so busy with his grapes going bust that he probably hasn’t noticed a thing about his acres of woodland back here. And thus, Mike played a role in Cherry’s murder.”
“But is he innocent?”
“I’m not absolutely positive about that.”
“Good thing Maria’s cruising with us. She’s going to make this arrest and solve this murder case handily for Jordy. Big raise for her.”
“You got that right. And we’ll be free of this mess.”
I drove with Pauline back up the slope of Jonas’s field, past his house, then down his lane and onto Highway C. When I turned onto Highway 57, Maria showed up in my mirror again, but at a good distance behind us.
* * *
At the Prevost Winery, a tasting was
going on inside. Mike wouldn’t know we were snooping. The setting sun was beginning to turn the sky tangerine to the west. I grabbed my flashlight from the glove box and the mosquito spray.
I said to Pauline, “Put those in your purse.”
“Maybe we should let Maria do this part.”
“She’ll be right behind us. She doesn’t know the terrain here like we do. Jonas and I used to walk all the deer paths around here as kids. I’ll find the car, and then we’ll come back and get Maria.”
“What about the bears?”
“Good thinking. If only we had some of Fontana’s perfume.” I dug out my pepper spray and handed it to her.
“Why do I have to carry everything?”
“So that I don’t have to.”
She wrinkled up her face. “That’s not an answer.”
I waved my cell phone in the air. “I need both hands to take pictures of the car when we find it. You fend off any bear that charges us.”
“That’s not funny, Ava.”
Behind the stone winery, Mike had cleared about thirty yards of brush where he kept his equipment and mower. Beyond that lay thick forest of cedars, maples, and an understory filled with wild berry vines and ferns. At first, I wondered if I was wrong about the car driving into the thicket. But after wandering the edge of the forest for a bit, I found bent and mashed berry vines where perhaps a vehicle had pushed its way through. The killer had to know this area well, which only cemented my suspicion as to who murdered Cherry.
Dressed in jeans and sweatshirts, we bullied our way through the briars.
Maybe thirty more yards in, the land began to undulate. The forest opened up into pockets filled with ferns. Sumac leaves had turned red for the season, but in the dimming light had begun to look almost black.
We came over a rise, descended, then trudged along the bottom of the ravine. My heart rate was increasing as we saw more signs of disturbance.
We soon discovered a small cave opening not far ahead of us. I retrieved the flashlight from Pauline’s purse, then headed right for the cave, making sure to skirt poison ivy vines lacing the ground.
Pauline stayed back. “There could be a bear in there.”
“Too early to start hibernating.” I flicked on my flashlight. “Whoa. Pauline, come here. Hold the flashlight.”
She sidled up next to me. “Holy cow.”
A cache of chemical containers sat in the cave. With Pauline steadying the flashlight, I snapped photos with my phone. “Same stuff we found in Mike’s freezer.”
Pauline said, “This would contaminate a lot of land and crops.”
“And keep Professor Weaver’s department in business trying to figure out what was wrong on the local farmland.”
“But a bigwig professor at the university in Green Bay? Are you sure? He’s been on your farm a lot over the past few years. Why would he be messing around with chemicals? He’s Mr. Organic, like Cherry was.”
“That’s what we have to think about. It’s why I think Nick and Will are part of this murder plot.”
“There are several people in that department.”
“True,” I said, putting my phone in my pocket. “But it was Weaver and Nick and Will who were always out in this neighborhood. Kjersta said that Fontana had dated Wes Weaver.” I took the flashlight from Pauline. “Cherry knew about the divinity fudge recipe because Fontana blabbed about it.”
“But murdering a colleague all because of your fudge in his test tubes feels beneath a professor.”
“Pauline, murdering a college professor, period, is beneath anybody.”
“Okay. But there’s got to be more to his motives. And to involve Nick and Will? They’re in their twenties and bright, with no reason to murder Cherry.”
My friend was breeding doubts inside me. Professor Weaver wouldn’t risk his career to murder for a recipe, or even for a grant. Certainly Nick and Will didn’t care about the fudge. But maybe dissing my fudge was reason enough to be suspicious of them?
The bottom of the ravine had a few bare areas where it washed out in storms regularly, but it was dry bare ground now. Vines wrapped everywhere. We were focusing so much on not tripping that we almost walked right into the car.
My flashlight illuminated a taillight, which reflected back at me.
The blue car was hidden well under layers of woody brush. I tugged at some of it. A license plate appeared. I handed off the flashlight to Pauline and then snapped a photo.
A rustling in front of the car startled us.
In the beam of my flashlight, Professor Weaver stood up. He’d been hiding.
My stomach did a jerky dance. “What are you doing here?”
“As in why did I kill Cherry?” He said it in a sarcastic way, a confident, conclusive way that told me he was here for the same reason we were—to collect evidence.
I said, “You didn’t do it. I know who did. You do, too. You’re protecting the killer. Why?”
“Let me explain.” The professor’s eyes flashed wider in my beam of light as he came around the car and raised a pistol.
Pauline screamed.
A shot exploded and then Pauline crumpled to the ground.
Chapter 31
When I woke up, it was pitch-black night and my face was mashed against the grass.
My heartbeat pulsated like a bass drum in my ears. Somebody had whacked me on the back of the head.
I shook my head to loosen my fuzziness.
Pauline and I were tied up next to each other with our hands behind us. I couldn’t tell if she was bleeding from the gunshot I recalled. Was I bleeding? It didn’t feel like it. My ankles were encircled maybe a dozen times with masking tape. We were laid out alongside the car on our stomachs. A limb on the ground was poking into my legs.
A person was moving about in the darkness, piling branches on top of us, essentially burying us. Weaver? I tried to speak, but my tongue met with part of my sweatshirt that had been ripped off my person, stuffed in my mouth, and taped. Tape wound around my head and ponytail. My scalp prickled with each movement as the tape pulled my hair.
I shoved my legs enough to nudge Pauline awake. Her eyelids popped open, then went wide with terror. Part of my sweatshirt was taped into her mouth, too.
When I saw that the person was beginning to pour something around us and on the branches, I wiggled madly. I rolled and bucked.
The person’s shoe met my head. I let out a muffled “Ow-mmmph.” I wanted to say, “You idiot asshole.”
He said, “It’ll be over soon.”
It was Nick Stensrud.
He ripped the tape off my mouth and said, “Do you have the recipe on you?”
I spat out my ripped sweatshirt sleeve. “There is no recipe,” I said, feeling like Judas denying my grandfather’s belief in it. “You killed Cherry for no good reason. I thought you didn’t like testing fudge in your test tubes.”
“Sister Adele’s recipe is worth money.”
“Money you need to replace the grant Cherry ruined for you.”
“He was ruining my department.”
“No, he was ruining your thesis and your chances of becoming a newly minted professor. You were afraid pretty Cinderella Pink Fudge in your test tubes would make you a laughingstock by your doctoral committee.”
He tore the brush back, then roughly pulled me up and slammed me back against the car tire. He thrust Pauline against the car door next to me.
I said, “You bought all the goods from my store and tossed them in the chapel to spook me. And Fontana knew it was probably you, though she might have feared it was Professor Weaver. My father saw her poking around the chapel. I bet she wanted to return the stolen goods. She came to your offices to talk to Weaver about it and you.”
I could barely see him in the dark, but his pause told me I was striking the bull’s-eye.
Nick said, “He threatened her, told her to stay out of this. It’s her fault.”
“For being scared? For wanting what’s right? Yo
u were hoping you could blame her.”
“Where’s the recipe?”
I scooted to get my back away from the tire’s hubcap. My face was itching horribly from bug bites that I couldn’t do a thing about. “I don’t have the recipe. I’m sure you’ve been through all my pockets by now.”
“That and your friend’s purse.”
Pauline kicked and gurgled gagged words that were likely the equivalent of “Give me back my pretty purse, you pyro, pukey pervert!”
I said to Nick, “I don’t suppose you left us our phones. I was thinking of calling out for the delivery of marshmallows to roast with our fire.”
“The bears will pick up your phones when they come to dine on the human barbecue. Without marshmallows. Now tell me where the recipe is.”
“I put it in a bank vault. Only my fingerprint can open the vault lock.”
Pauline’s wide-eyed gaze questioned my answer.
Nick squatted down from outside the cage built of branches. “Which finger?” He snapped a Buck knife from its sheath.
I realized my mistake. He was going to cut off my fingers or at least the tips to get my fingerprints. “Looks like you bought your own knife. You took my father’s Buck knife the last time you were at our farm. Did Cherry find it on you or in your lab? Cherry was onto you. Did he take my father’s knife from you so that he could return it? I bet he scolded you. And you hated him for treating you like a dumb kid instead of a nano away from being a faculty member.”
“Nobody can make a living on a teaching assistant’s salary.”
“Salary? You were being paid on the grant, and once it was over, you would lose your job.”
His silence told me I was right.
“So, Nick, you met him last Saturday morning at the church. You were out together doing research before the tour maybe? At some point you stopped by the Dahlgrens’ and borrowed a shovel for digging. It came in handy later at the church.”
“That unused church was a good place to talk. That’s all we did.”
“I’m not a fool. You meant to kill him in the church, didn’t you? You probably heard Jonas come to work on the landscaping and got spooked. But Cherry got cut on the arm with the knife. I bet if we looked at your hands closely or pushed up those long sleeves you’re wearing, we’d find a nick or cut.”
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