There was a bobbing motion at the door. Zilla came through the door and around the couch. Hank released his mother and squealed with joy. Zilla bounced ecstatically up and down on her one front leg and Hank slid to the floor so he could throw his chubby arms around the little dog.
“Zilla’s amazing, even by cattle dog standards. She’s fetching us for supper, that’s why my mom sent her in,” Eileen explained to Joe.
Joe had no desire for food, but he knew he had to eat. He stood carefully and slowly, like an old man. Eileen took his arm and made it appear as though he were escorting her, not taking half his weight as he negotiated his way carefully from the room. Howie and Lucy, along with Zilla and a joyful Hank, went ahead. This gave Joe enough of a chance to steal a kiss, his first one, from his future wife.
The kiss was long and deep and wet enough to make him want to forgo supper and head directly upstairs. Eileen grinned at him.
“Down, boy,” she said. “Separate bedrooms in this house, you know. We’re not married yet.”
“Oh, that’s right,” he groaned.
“Old-fashioned they are, but there’s lots of woods around here,” Eileen teased. Then her smile fell away from her face and Joe knew what she was thinking. He was thinking the same thing. There would be no trysts in the woods with a blanket and a picnic basket. There were monsters out there. Murderers.
“I’m sorry—” he started, and she put a finger to his lips.
“Kiss me again,” she said. “Forget everything, for right now. Kiss me again.”
Colorado Springs, Colorado
“Los Angeles,” Ken said. “Why do you want me to stay here while you’re there?”
“Research,” Rene said tersely, folding shirts carefully and packing them into his suitcase. “Wyoming. Find out everything about it. Tell me when Hulett was founded and who founded it. Find out why they named it such a silly name. How many people live there, how long it’s going to take to get there from here, where are the gas stations and the police stations and the speed limits. I need to know everything. Find out about Lucy Giometti. What her neighborhood is like, where she works, everything.”
“I can do better work at my home in Newark,” Ken began, but Rene was already shaking his head.
“I also need to know about Detective Eileen Reed, and that means you stay here. I need to know about the Colorado Springs police. Who is her partner, what does she do, every bit of publicity on her cases. When I get back we’ll need to leave so make sure the Lexus has an oil change and is clean. Go buy some new music and enjoy yourself. Eat that damned fast food I refuse to look upon.”
Ken laughed. He was a good man, Ken, solid and smart and dependable, despite a regrettable taste for fast food. Rene was going to need him badly in the days to come, when he’d gotten through with his business in Los Angeles.
“Is there going to be a problem, not killing Joe Tanner on the first try?” Ken asked. He was sprawled on a comfortable couch in the living room. They were in a Residence Inn close to the Colorado Springs airport, a place where business types spent days or weeks or months. Their long stay would draw no interest from the innkeepers, unlike a more transitory place. Best of all, Ken was free to fill the living room with his elaborate music sound system and his computers. Rene would return in a few days. Another day to recuperate and then it would be off to Wyoming and a nice little murder spree.
“No. If we fail again, then perhaps. But we won’t fail again.” Rene folded a tie in precise thirds and laid it gently in his suitcase. He didn’t tell Ken that the contractor, in this case, was actually Rene himself. Some things Ken didn’t need to know. Rene’s laptop was packed. After his plane took off he would play dozens of games of Free Cell, the computer solitaire game. Free Cell was his way of meditating, of solving problems in the back of his brain while the front of his brain was involved with queens and jacks and red eights.
“Not a chance,” Ken said. He put his hands behind his neck and stretched out on the couch. He was probably already dreaming of the enormous greasy bucket of fried chicken and some low sort of beer to go with it that he would buy after Rene left. Rene could hardly keep himself from shuddering. “I’ll have a Ph.D. in Wyoming trivia by the time you get back, boss,” Ken said confidently. “And I’ll know everything about our little pussycat Eileen and her matron-of-honor girlfriend Lucy.”
“Eileen will be a pussycat when she’s dead,” Rene said. “Until she is, she’s dangerous. Don’t forget that.”
“Okay,” Ken said, unfazed at the rebuke. “I won’t. I’ll drive you to the airport.”
Rene took his briefcase and his bag and left the suite, Ken following behind. The sun was heading towards the range of mountains that lay to the west of Colorado Springs. The day was hot and still. Puffy white clouds floated across the sky. Rene set his bag in the back of the Lexus. Good weather lay ahead. Rene took it as the best kind of omen.
Chapter Nine
The Reed Ranch, Wyoming
“I don’t want to leave,” Howie said calmly, stretching an arm to the cigar humidor.
“You’re a suspect,” Eileen said, not unkindly. She thought Howie was a wonderful man and he could single-handedly launch her parents’ new business into orbit, but he could still be the murderer.
“I know,” he said, removing a cigar and admiring it. “So if I’m the murderer and I’m staying here to fool you, I’ll trip myself up and you can arrest me. If I’m not, which I’m not, maybe I can help.”
“I vote for Howie,” Joe said. His pain pills had worn off during dinner and his eyes were sharp again. The plain aspirin he’d swallowed was working fine, he’d assured Eileen. She knew that was a lie but she let it stand.
Lucy was curled up on one of the big armchairs. Zilla had somehow wormed her way into Lucy’s lap and was watching the proceedings alertly, her head stretched out on Lucy’s knee.
“Zilla says yes, and so do I,” Lucy said. She looked fresh and radiant, her eyes as alert as the little collie dog in her lap. Her hair was still wet from an evening bath she’d taken with Hank, who was sound asleep in the little bedroom they shared. Eileen was grateful Lucy had enough energy to stay up and powwow. She needed her.
“I’m biased, I’m hoping to get his business this coming year,” Paul Reed said quietly. “I’ll leave the decision to you, Eileen.”
“All right then, Howie, you’re in,” Eileen said. “Light up that horrible thing and let’s get on with it.”
Nolan Simmons, the comedian, had left for bed the same time as Hank. He was visibly thinner than when he’d arrived, despite Tracy’s plentiful cooking. Horseback riding and walking at a high altitude were whipping him into shape faster than any fat farm. He was exhausted, and so was Mark Plutt, the software tycoon. Plutt had the opposite problem; he was thin and slight, without any reserves. He, too, was eating huge meals. Despite the murder, or maybe even because of it, they were both having the time of their lives.
Jimmy Arnold, Howie’s brother-in-law, had deftly removed himself after dinner without a single visible signal from Howie. Eileen was sure there had to be one. Jimmy was a mystery. He was general manager of Howie’s extremely successful catalog empire and was therefore a millionaire in his own right. There was a flavor of equals about the two men. In any case, they were friends of such time and depth that they communicated without words. If Jimmy were the murderer, Eileen was convinced Howie would risk his life to help him.
Tracy had gone to bed as soon as Lucy returned from her bath. Tracy carried a paperback book and a glass of cold water. She’d be up at five a.m. again, cooking huge meals that would be devoured to the last scrap.
The two University women, Jorie and Beryl, hadn’t joined them for dinner. Paul and Eileen had walked down to the jump site and made sure they were settled for the evening, which infuriated Jorie, of course. Everything seemed to provoke anger from Jorie. Eileen was tired of it.
There had been, before supper, an interesting conversation in the kitchen of th
e ranch.
“I won’t eat with those men,” Jorie said. “They’re hunters. They love to see dead things. Men love to eat dead things. They’re hunters.”
Tracy sighed audibly and did not say anything, but continued her supper preparations.
“You could eat just the potatoes and the corn,” Eileen said. “Why don’t you stay? We don’t have a problem with your being a vegan. You can stay.” She really wanted to keep Jorie and Beryl at the ranch. She wasn’t sure the jump camp was safe. “Besides, I’m a hunter too, and I’m not a man.”
“Then what do we need men for?” Jorie said, in the same bitter needling tone. She was beginning to give Eileen a headache. “What does anyone need with men? What are they even for?”
“You don’t know, Jorie,” Tracy said in a gentle voice. “I hope none of you girls ever have to find out.”
“I know,” Lucy said, surprised. She was cutting carrots for the evening salad. Hank sat at her feet, chewing messily on a cracker. “Of course. Just look at Hank. He’s why.”
“Men aren’t just sperm producers, Lucy,” Tracy said. “Just as we aren’t baby incubators.”
“Oh, well, I know, but…” Lucy trailed off, chastened.
“I guess making lots of love wouldn’t be the reason, either,” Eileen said with a grin. Lucy felt better. Jorie grimaced. Tracy smiled and shook her head.
“No. Let’s not talk about this now.”
“Ever,” Jorie said in an undertone that reached everyone. Her lovely face was flushed and angry, and she turned and left the kitchen before Eileen could say anything more.
Eileen looked over at Lucy with raised eyebrows, and Lucy nodded in understanding.
“Poor Jorie,” Tracy said, and went to wash her hands in the sink.
“Yeah, poor Jorie,” Lucy said. “She’s going to miss out on barbequed chicken.”
Now with supper consumed and the evening drawn down into night, Eileen sat in her parents’ family room and prepared to think her way to a killer.
“So here’s the murder hunters,” Howie said, lighting his cigar and puffing out a cloud of blue smoke. Lucy rolled her eyes and Eileen smiled. Paul opened a window and turned on the fan. Eileen looked at her companions, missing Dave Rosen, her homicide detective partner, more than she thought she would. He was brilliant but he was in Colorado, more than eight hours away. Joe Tanner sat with her on the couch, his long body draped in unfamiliar clothes. Lucy sat on the chair, Paul returned to his seat on the other armchair and Howie reigned on the other couch. The hot July night outside the screened French doors was black and still. A few moths beat against the screen.
On the mantle, joining their group, the crystal skull grinned at them all. Oddly enough, Eileen was undisturbed by the skull. It was a perfect representation of a human skull, as clear as rock candy. The eye sockets were carved deep and the teeth were perfectly formed in bas-relief in the stone. The overall effect was cheerful, somehow, as though the skull were smiling.
Joe loved the skull. He’d run his hands over it again and again, handling the artifact more than any of them had. The dirty golden circlet with the inset jewels didn’t interest him. He’d removed it and set it on the mantle. When he’d put the skull back on the mantle he’d left the crown off.
“Here we are,” Eileen said. “We explained to Joe what was going on before dinner, Dad. So here’s my first question of the evening. Why did the murderer kill Dr. McBride?”
“For the skull and the crown,” Howie said immediately, pointing at the skull with his cigar. Paul nodded. The skull grinned.
“So why didn’t the killer take it?” Lucy asked. “After he stabbed him with that stone thing, why didn’t he take the stuff?”
“They fought,” Paul said. “And the murderer ran away, not knowing he’d killed McBride.”
“No signs of struggle,” Lucy said, “At the camp. No tables overturned, no collapsed tents or scattered tools.”
“Maybe they fought in the ditch where the skeleton was found,” Eileen said.
“We should look for dirt and marks on Dr. McBride,” Joe said. “Evidence he’d fought someone. Skin under his fingernails, maybe?”
“There were no defensive cuts,” Eileen said, remembering the body when it had been turned over. “Just the one stab wound. If there was a fight, the killer was too quick for Dr. McBride to defend himself.”
“So if the killer was that quick, why didn’t he take the loot?” Joe asked.
“There has to be something else,” Eileen said. “Something we’re not seeing.”
Lucy stroked Zilla’s head and blinked slowly, her eyes unfocussed. “Maybe this murder doesn’t have anything to do with the skull and the crown after all,” she said. “The murderer didn’t care about the jewels. They hated Dr. McBride and wanted to kill him.”
“Okay,” Eileen said. “Why would anyone hate Dr. McBride? Could someone have come up here and killed him for some other reason? Someone that traveled here, killed him, and left?”
Paul frowned, then shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “Someone could come through the woods, sneak past Zilla. But they’d have to be a helluva woodsman to get in and out.”
“A Lakota Sioux could,” Eileen murmured. “One of the warrior types.”
“What do you mean, warrior types?” Lucy asked.
“There’s been several lost generations of Lakota,” Eileen said. She shrugged, feeling uncomfortable with the topic. “Almost all of them seemed to turn to drink or abuse drugs. Lately, though, there seems to be a renewal among the tribes. They’re turning away from booze and apathy, as though they’re finally finding a way. I don’t know how else to describe it, and I haven’t been living up here so I’m not sure if that’s my opinion or—”
“No, you’re right,” Paul said. “Some say it all started after the birth of the white buffalo. If you believe that sort of thing. I don’t, but if the symbol of the white buffalo helped the tribes, I’m all for it.”
“White buffalo?” Lucy asked.
“A real albino buffalo,” Eileen explained. “I’ve seen pictures, he’s a beauty. The prophecy of the Lakota – and other Plains tribes, if you really want to get into legend – is that the birth of a white buffalo means the return of the great buffalo herds and the return of the American tribes.”
“So maybe one of the new generation of White Buffalo Lakota knew Dr. McBride? And disliked him enough to murder him?” Lucy asked.
“Sure, but why would one of the Lakota hate Dr. McBride?” Paul asked.
“We could ask around the reservation,” Eileen said. “Carefully.”
“Maybe one of them heard about the jump and thought his ancestors were being desecrated,” Joe said.
“Nobody knows about the skeleton but us. Dr. McBride found it the day he died. It would be impossible for a Lakota to find out about the skeleton, get here, and kill him.”
“And he’d take the loot, for sure,” Joe said. “It belongs to his ancestors, anyway.”
“Not really,” Lucy said. “It belonged to an Aztec warrior, so technically it belongs to Mexico.”
“Maybe the Aztec was bringing it to the Lakota,” Howie said, and stopped everyone’s breath in an instant. Eileen felt an almost audible click in her brain as her jaw dropped open. Lucy looked like she felt; eyes wide, mouth open. Joe grinned.
“Of course!” he said. “That’s what he was doing way the hell up here. He was an envoy, maybe, or a priest or shaman or something.”
“No wonder Beryl is so thrilled,” Eileen said. She felt a growing excitement. “Whoa, to establish that the Aztec nation and the Lakota nation were in contact more than five hundred years ago. What an incredible link.”
“How do we know this skeleton is really five hundred years old?” Lucy asked. “They don’t have portable carbon-dating kits now, do they?”
“No,” Paul said. “As soon as the Spanish arrived and left horses here, the Plains tribes stopped running buffalo off cliffs. They started hunting them on
horseback.”
“Oh, of course,” Lucy said. “And the Aztec didn’t survive the Spanish invasion, because they had gold and the Spanish had the smallpox virus. So it had to be five hundred years ago.”
“Exactly,” Eileen said. “Too bad we can’t put the murder together that cleanly.”
“So maybe Dr. McBride was killed by a rival archeologist. You know, like that little dude in the Indiana Jones movies that always tried to steal Indy’s stuff,” Joe said.
“Sure, ‘There is nothing you can possess which I cannot take from you,’” Lucy said, with a passable French accent.
“That doesn’t work,” Paul said, as everyone nodded in agreement. He continued anyway, voicing what they all knew. “The skeleton was found the same day he was murdered, or Jorie and Beryl would have known about it. No rival archeologist, just like no vengeful Lakota warrior, could have known about the skull and made his way here in time to kill Dr. McBride.”
“Okay, then, let’s look at the people who were here,” Eileen said. “You and your hunters, Howie. Jorie Rothman, Beryl Penrose, and my parents.”
“And mystery killer X,” Joe said, his face suddenly grave. “Someone that comes out of nowhere and tries to kill you.”
Interest sharpened towards Joe. Eileen opened her mouth but Joe held up a hand, stopping her.
“When we’re finished with Dr. McBride,” he said. “I’ll tell my tale. But one thing at a time.”
“Thanks,” Eileen said. She was a person who liked to focus on one task at a time. She liked to line up problems one by one and knock them down. She even washed dishes that way. “First things first. Dr. McBride. Did you meet him, Howie?”
“Sure,” Howie said, puffing on his cigar. He gazed through the smoke at the ceiling, his blue eyes narrowed in thought. If he was the murderer, he was concealing it incredibly well. “I met him the second day we were here, less than a week ago. He was excited about the buffalo jump. He knew who I was and blinked at me a couple of times while we shook hands. But he was much more interested in his dig. He wanted to talk to Paul about borrowing something.”
The Thirteenth Skull Page 10