by Medora Sale
“Did you get him here?” asked Lucas.
She shook her head. “I went over to the spring sales and fell in love with him. Then they told me his name, and I knew it was fate. You should see him move. He’s young yet, though. He’s from Tipperary—the finest bloodstock in the country, they say. I paid a bundle for him by the time I had him shipped over. He was a birthday present for Carl—I wouldn’t spend that much on a horse for myself—but Carl never appreciated him. He was threatening to sell him this spring; it broke my heart to think of it. Eh, baby?” she murmured. “Do you think you could find another carrot? There should be one in my bag—it’s on the chair. Everyone else got a carrot, didn’t they?” she went on softly, rubbing his nose.
Lucas went back into the little office and found her handbag sitting on a chair. He unzipped it. Inside was chaos; everything you might expect to find in a woman’s purse: wallet, keys, lipstick, comb, tissues, pens, pencils, notebook; and, in addition, two large dirty carrots, a plastic bag with sugar lumps in it, and a hoof-pick. “There you go,” he said, and handed her one of the carrots. “Who looks after the stable for you and exercises the horses?” he asked in real curiosity.
“Who looks after it? I do,” she said, surprised, sending Achilles back into his stall with a nudge of the halter and a slap on the rump, and then reaching her hand with the carrot on it over the door to him. “I do everything. Clean it out every morning, give each one a good gallop, work with Hector a bit, groom them, everything. I love it. It gives me something to do. The house is filled already with people tripping over each other to do the work. They don’t need me. Anyway, it means I have an excuse for not traveling all over the place with Carl on business trips. My God! What’s the matter with me?” She sat down on a couple of bales of straw piled up outside Achilles’ stall. “What am I saying? Carl’s dead, and I’m bitching about going on business trips with him. I mean, I could have. Joe down at the riding stable will always look after the beasts for me if I need him.” She shook her head and looked blankly up at Lucas.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “It’s the shock. It takes a while to get used to it.”
“I suppose,” she said, standing up. She walked around the stable and fastened all the doors, picked up her purse, turned off the cassette player, flicked off the light, and headed toward the door. “Come back to the house and we’ll have some tea,” she said. “Mrs. Howard will have it ready.”
She took him in through a small back door and along a short tiled hallway. The room she led him into was as seductive as the stable. It was relatively small, but a set of three windows looked out over the paddock and the stable. The windowsill was deep, with a couple of cushions lying on it: someplace to sit and drowse away an afternoon, he thought. A fire burned in the fireplace, and the comfortable chairs and sofa were covered with dark, countrified material. There was a desk, audio equipment, a small piano, and some book space. The housekeeper stalked in with tea, followed closely by a thin, dark-haired little boy with worried blue eyes, who ran over to his mother’s side and whispered urgently in her ear.
“I don’t know, sweetheart,” she said, gently shaking her head. “He’s around somewhere. Ask Mrs. Howard. Maybe she put him away.” He snatched up a chocolate-covered biscuit and left as quickly as he had come.
“That’s Mark,” she said simply. “He’s eight. I’ll tell him later. When we’re alone.”
“Do you have other children?” asked Lucas, looking down at the tea in his hand as if he had never seen such a thing before.
She shook her head.
He stared at the fire, mesmerized, relaxed. He could sit in this room for hours, beside this elegant, slightly muddy woman, except that he was not here on a social call. He pulled himself together. “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?” he said.
“Not at all,” she said readily. “What do you want to know?”
“Where you were this afternoon?” The cozy atmosphere came apart with a jerk.
“Oh. Of course. It’s the obvious question, isn’t it? Well—I was out on Jasmine. We went for a long ride—all through the woods. Didn’t get back until after four. That’s why I was still rubbing her down when you came in.”
“Do you ride alone?”
“Usually. Very awkward, I suppose.” She smiled and offered him a piece of shortbread. “From your point of view, I mean.”
“Mrs. Neilson,” he began, and hesitated.
“Yes?” She looked entirely composed and unafraid.
“Is there any reason that you know of why a girl, a singer, would have a key to your husband’s apartment?”
“Reason? Do you mean a printable reason? An excuse? Not that I can think of. I mean, only the usual reason—and that seems quite likely.” She seemed to ruminate for a while. “A singer, you said?”
“Mmm. A singer—with a band.”
“With a band?” She seemed surprised. “What’s her name?”
“Jennifer Wilson,” said Lucas without thinking. Oh, Christ, he said to himself. That was bright. “Look, I shouldn’t have given out her name like that,” he said. “I’d appreciate it if you’d forget it, if you can.”
“Oh, that’s all right. I won’t do anything to her, don’t worry. I’m just surprised. I thought that Carl—well—you can’t tell, can you?” She stared into the fire, apparently considering the oddities of life. “May I ask you a question?”
“That depends,” he said. “Actually, you can ask it, but I don’t promise to be able to answer it.”
“Do you know when I can get possession of his private papers—his account books, I mean—and things like that? Not the business ones—they’re the property of the corporation, I assume—just the private ones. I’m afraid that there are bills to pay and that sort of thing, and he was in the habit of locking everything up in his safe unless he was out of town. Then, of course, I looked after the household money.”
“Don’t you have the combination?”
“No.” She shook her head.
“I don’t know. But surely you can have access to anything in the house. Why don’t you call his lawyer?”
“Maybe,” she said unhappily. “I suppose I have to call him anyway.”
“Did your husband have any enemies that you know of?”
“Enemies? What kind of enemies do you mean?” she asked sharply.
“Any kind,” he said.
“Not that I know of. He might have, I suppose. Business enemies. I don’t know anything about his business.” She shook her head and turned to look out the window toward the stable.
Lucas stifled a yawn and couldn’t think of anything else to ask her. “Thank you for your help,” he said lamely. “And for showing me the horses. It’s a long time since I’ve seen such magnificent animals. Do you have someone to stay with you?” he added. “I should be going.”
“Don’t worry, Sergeant. There are enough people in this house to guard me. Anyway, my sister will always come over if I need her.” She sounded very tired now. “I’m all right, really. It was a shock, but Carl and I hadn’t been what you would call close for some time. I’m not surprised about the singer in his apartment. I have Mark and the horses—I guess he needed something, too. Poor Carl.”
With those words Lucas felt that Carl Neilson had all the obituary that he deserved, and he took his leave.
Chapter 2
By the time Rob Lucas was back downtown, it was dark—dark, late, cold—and even people who were supposed to have been working that day were home tucked up cozily in front of their television sets.
“Anything come in on the girl’s fingerprints?” he asked, and sat down to tackle the clutter on his desk.
Patrick Kelleher glanced up. “Yeah. They’re all over the apartment, including on that phone. She was the last person to have used it. And in my book that makes her the one who called in.”
Kelleher’s words were lost in the rustle of paper. “Where in hell are my reports?” said Lucas, sorting rapidly through the mess.
“Baldy came in and got everything,” said Kelleher.
“Why?”
Kelleher shrugged.
“Anybody get anything else from the girl?”
Kelleher shook his head. “Don’t think so. You going to let her go?”
“What do I hold her for? Lying to a cadet?” he said wearily. “Look, I’m leaving as soon as I talk to her again. Tell Baldy if he comes by.”
“Oh,” said Kelleher. His voice turned mock-official. “Inspector Baldwin has requested that you report to him as soon as possible. If you step into the hall, you might bump into him. He’s kind of upset.”
“Thanks,” said Lucas, “a helluva lot,” and headed out the door.
He collided with him as he rounded the corner. “Ah, Lucas. Good. A word with you,” said Baldwin, leading him away from his office. “I’m assuming control of this case. Not anything against you, understand—”
“No need to apologize, sir. It’s not my case. I was supposed to be off this afternoon.”
“Whatever,” he said irritably. “Anyway, you and Patterson—you understand, Neilson was influential. And Mrs. Neilson is very involved—charities, fundraising, horses, opera, you know what I’m talking about. Anyway, you and Patterson just don’t have the clout, or maybe even the tact, to deal with them.”
“I don’t mind, sir.” Lucas yawned. “Patterson might be annoyed, though. He has lots of tact when he needs it.”
Baldwin grunted. “That may be—but he has trouble remembering when to use it. Look, I’ve got Marty Fielding sitting in my office right now, bitching about police harassment of Neilson’s widow. What in hell did you say to her?”
“Not much. We chatted about her horses, I asked her where she was during the relevant time period—”
“You asked Mrs. Neilson where she was?” said Baldwin. He looked incredulous. And then, in spite of himself, he added, “Where was she?”
“Out riding. Alone. She does it all the time.” He paused to let that sink in. “Do you think someone would kill someone to prevent him from getting rid of a favourite horse, sir? Because if that’s possible—”
“Oh, for chrissake, Lucas, leave Neilson’s widow to me. And I want you to check in with me personally before you do anything; and I want reports—detailed reports—on everything you do, say, or find out. Have you got that? I’m going over to the hotel, and I’ll pass the word on to Patterson. What are you doing now?”
“Releasing the witness we found at the hotel—and then going home.”
“Oh—right,” he said vaguely. “Don’t lose track of her.”
“I won’t,” Lucas said and yawned.
Jennifer Wilson was sitting at a table, flipping through the pages of a magazine, when Lucas opened the door of the room she had been stashed in. “Miss Wilson?” he said, and yawned again.
She continued to stare at the page in front of her. Maybe singing in a rock band had deafened her.
“Hey—you,” he said louder. “Jennifer. You can go home now.”
She whirled around. “Sorry—I didn’t hear you. It’s not often you get a chance to read last year’s news. Did you say I could go? Really?”
“Sure. You want a ride home?”
“That’d be nice,” she said. “If I had a home to go to. Maybe you could drive me to a motel. How far out do you go?”
“How far out do you want to go?” he asked. “This time of night, it doesn’t take that long to get anywhere, really.”
“How about around the airport, then?”
He had asked for that one. “Sure. What the hell. I guess you could say it’s on my way—sort of. Get your stuff.” He stopped to think for a second or two. “Right, you don’t have any stuff, do you? Well, then let’s go.” He went first, followed by the quick clicking of her little black half-boots, paused to grab his parka, and headed out to the parking lot.
“Around here is okay,” said the girl suddenly. They had been traveling for twenty minutes or so through light traffic and had reached an area of plazas, parking lots, cheap family restaurants, and motels.
“This is quite a ways from the airport, lady,” said Lucas.
“It’s not as though I was catching a plane. I just want a place to stay for a few days that’s off the beaten track. Off my beaten track, anyway.”
“Have you eaten?” asked Lucas suddenly. “Because I haven’t, and I’m hungry.”
“Not since breakfast,” she said. “Except for that stale muffin.”
A stab of guilt pierced his fatigue. “How about there?” he said, waving to their right. “Italian, with lots of parking.” She made a small sound that might have been assent, and he pulled into the lot.
The waitress stood over them, balancing on one foot, as though the other one hurt too much to use, and waited. “You want something to start with?” she asked. “A cocktail or anything?”
He looked up from the oversize plastic-covered menu. “I’ll have a Blue and she’ll have—what would you like? Beer? Wine? Something?”
“I thought you weren’t supposed to drink—”
“I’m not on duty. What’ll you have?”
“The same,” she said, turning to the waitress.
“And bring us a whole lot of garlic bread to start with,” added Lucas, “unless it’s going to take too long. We’re starving.”
“Won’t take long at all,” she said comfortingly. “I’ll be right back.”
He put the menu down and looked across the table at Jennifer, puzzled. “You look different,” he said.
“They let me use the washroom down at the police station,” she said. “I washed my face.”
That was it. Those great black smudges, the caked white quality of the skin, they were all gone. Now she looked pale and tired, but human. “The bruise looks worse now,” he said, touching the discolored patch on her cheek. Its center was still dark. “It must have been a good one. And this one doesn’t look too healthy, either,” he added, touching her shoulder, where the angry red mark was turning to a purple stain. She winced. “You have a left-handed friend, I take it?” he asked.
“What makes you say that?”
“Because your visible bruises are on your right side. I suspect that’s where the others are, too.”
“What others?”
“I doubt if he only marks you where the world can see. Look, Jennifer, I don’t know who it is you’re mixed up with, but has it ever occurred to you you’d be better off without him? I’ve seen what guys like that can do to a woman, you know, and it isn’t very pretty. Why don’t you get out while you still have some teeth?”
She turned her head back from her study of the parking lot and fixed her eyes steadily on him. “You really know how to make a girl feel good, don’t you? Well, maybe I already know that. Maybe that’s why I’m out here and not downtown,” she said, and shivered.
“You’re shaking,” said Lucas, touching her arm.
“I’m freezing,” she said. “This sweater isn’t very warm, I’m afraid. Neither is the skirt.”
“Jesus,” he said. “I forgot you don’t have a coat. Just a minute.”
When he got back from the car, he was carrying a heavy dark-blue-and-white-patterned sweater in his hand. The beer had arrived and so had the garlic bread. She ripped a piece in two and ate most of the first half as he walked to their booth. “Have some,” she said. “It’s heavenly.”
“Put this on first,” he said. She wiped the butter off her fingers, slipped out of the booth, and dived into the sweater. It covered her skirt almost completely. She carefully folded up the cuffs until her wrists were visible and looked down at the effect.
“It’s beautiful,” she said. “A bit large, but very warm and
beautiful. It must look good on you.” She slipped back into the booth.
“So my stepmother says. She knit it, she claims, and the color is supposed to be the same as my eyes.” He picked up a piece of garlic bread and realized just how hungry he was.
“I ordered lasagna and salad for both of us. She said it was the best thing on the menu.” She looked over at him, holding up her arm in the direction of her face. “Your stepmother’s right. It is the same color as your eyes. Wow. A beautiful cop. It doesn’t seem fair, somehow. How did you break your nose? And why didn’t you have it fixed?”
To his horror, he felt himself blushing. “Playing rugger. And I felt it improved my face. You’ve never been a blue-eyed blond male with a cute little nose in a men’s washroom, or you wouldn’t ask me that.”
“I can’t say I have been. You poor lamb,” she said with a grin of mock sympathy.
He shrugged, as if her tone didn’t matter. “Anyway, life got a bit easier for me after the nose was smashed a couple of times.”
“At your size?” she asked, and then answered herself. “But of course—you weren’t always that size, were you?” She paused to tackle the beer and garlic bread again. “What’s your name? Besides Sergeant Lucas, that is. Since we’re having dinner together.”