“What a nice thing to say.” Harry blushed.
“Was Fair at the coon hunt?” Susan's curiosity bubbled over.
“He was.”
“And?”
“Pretty much as you'd expect,” Harry said, tossing a package onto the A–B section of the package shelf.
Miranda and Susan looked at one another, then back to Harry.
“Jealous.” Mrs. Murphy stated the obvious, something she usually didn't do but among humans it was often a necessity.
Little Mim drove up to the front of the post office. The rain poured. She sat in her $83,000 Mercedes waiting for the rain to lighten, but it didn't. It only rained harder.
Murphy, eyes sharp, noticed the star was missing from Little Mim's exquisite car. “Aha.”
“What are you aha-ing about?” Pewter grumbled from the bottom of the mail cart.
“The star is missing from Little Mim's silver-mist Mercedes.”
“Really?” Pewter clambered out of the mail cart, sending it rolling about a foot in the opposite direction of her progress. She jumped up next to Murphy. “It is.”
The humans noticed the cats staring out at Little Mim so they looked, too.
“Oh, my gosh, the star is missing from her car!” Miranda noticed first.
“You're right.” Susan giggled.
“Boy, Wesley Partlow will be sliced and diced.” Harry sighed. “Guess I'd better give her this when she comes in.”
“Well, what would you do with it?” Susan wondered.
“Mount it on a block of wood and put it on my bookcase. It's the closest I'll ever come to a Mercedes.” Harry reached for an umbrella in the stand by the front door. “I'll go out and walk her in. You know, that kid must be dumber than snot.”
“Harry, what a vulgar thing to say.”
“Sorry, Miranda.” She opened the door a crack. “I wouldn't want to be in his shoes.”
Truer words were never spoken.
19
Cut him down,” Rick Shaw ordered one of his men.
The photographs had been taken, the body dusted for fingerprints, the ground under the corpse inspected.
Two kids crossing in the rough patch of land behind Crozet Elder Care, a home for the aged, had found Wesley Partlow dangling from a fiddle oak. His tongue hung down on his chest, his face was purple-black, his eyes bugged out, and his feet and hands were swollen from the fluids collecting there. The storms hadn't improved his appearance but they probably saved his eyes from the birds.
Naturally, the gruesome sight scared the bejesus out of the kids, but they had the presence of mind to call the sheriff. Although Rick and Cynthia Cooper had witnessed plenty of unpleasant sights over the years, it didn't mean they liked seeing it.
The body was lowered carefully onto the gurney. If Wesley'd been cut down with a thud the corpse might have been even more damaged. The coroner couldn't save anyone, that's for sure, but he usually had the right answer about someone's health a day late.
As Diana Robb rolled away the mortal remains of a wasted life, Coop examined the bark of the tree. “If he shimmied up the tree, he didn't slough off bark.”
“He would have made a long skid mark. The rains would have taken care of little marks, don't you think?” Rick looked skyward. “And here comes some more.”
“I don't know, boss. He was light. He could have climbed up without much effort, without a lot of scraping and slipping. I looked for tire tracks.”
“Yeah.” Rick, too, had wondered if he'd been hoisted up on a truck bed. “Washed out.”
Wesley Partlow didn't seem like the suicide type.
“I don't get it.”
“Let's find Din Marks.”
They drove out sloshing through ever-deepening mud holes. As they turned onto Route 240 the raindrops fell, fat ones making big splashes on the windshield.
By the time they reached Fashion Mall, some thirty minutes later, it was again pouring. They parked by the side door and made a run for the Sears store. Din Marks worked in the lawnmower section. He blanched when he saw them.
Rick spoke to the other man behind the counter. “Can you hold the fort? I need a minute or two with Mr. Marks.”
“Sure.” The middle-aged man nodded.
Rick motioned for Din to follow him. Together with Cynthia they walked into the center concourse of the mall. Few shoppers milled about, weekday mornings being sparsely populated.
“Would you like to sit?” Rick pointed to a bench.
“No.”
“When you were locked up with Wesley Partlow, did he say anything to you? He was mad at someone or someone was mad at him? Anything?”
Din shook his head. “No.”
“Did he seem depressed?” Cynthia asked.
“Not him.” Din ruefully smiled. “I was drunk but I remember his smart mouth.”
“Did he mention cars, hubcaps?”
“No. Said he didn't do anything. He didn't belong there and he'd get out. I said I slugged a cop and he laughed. I didn't mean to hit Yancy. Didn't mean to—well, I was drunk.”
“We know,” Rick replied. “Did you notice anything unusual about Wesley himself?”
“No.”
“Did Wesley mention doing business with anyone in town?”
“No.”
“Did he mention a truck?”
“No.”
Cooper spoke again. “Would you say he was calm, agitated, surly, afraid?”
“Uh. Watchful. We didn't say too much to one another. He told me if I puked he'd kill me. When I woke up he was gone.”
“By the way,” Rick said, “how'd you get to work this morning?”
“Walked.”
“In the rain?” Coop inquired.
“I'll be walking in the rain for a long time. I'm gonna lose my license for three years.”
“Maybe you should stop drinking.” She handed him an AA number. “Can't hurt to try.”
“Yeah,” he mumbled.
“Call the number, Din,” Coop urged him. “The next time we pick you up it could be in a body bag or you'll have killed someone else.”
“It'll be three years from now. I won't drive.”
“Don't drink. You can't handle it,” she flatly stated.
“Go on back to work,” Rick told him.
Din turned to go, then stopped. “What happened to that kid?”
“Found him hanging from a tree.”
Din blinked. “Shit.”
“If you think of anything, call us.”
“That asshole would have never hung himself,” Din blurted out.
“That's our assessment of the situation, too,” Rick said.
Back in the squad car, Rick and Coop wiped their faces, damp again from the rain.
Rick pulled out a cigarette and lit it. “Never received a report for a stolen truck.”
“The eighty-seven GMC.” She lit up as well. “Maybe it wasn't stolen.”
“That has occurred to me.”
“Who'd lend him a truck?”
“Someone stupid.” Rick inhaled. “Or someone who's a fence.”
“O'Bannons?”
“Thought of that. Tim O'Bannon would have killed his kids if they'd ever pulled a stunt like that. He was as honest as the day is long. He'd never take stolen goods.”
“The old man's dead.”
Rick paused. “Sean's not that stupid. Make a couple of thousand tax-free dollars but jeopardize your whole business by selling stolen goods? He wouldn't do it.”
“Who knows?” Cooper opened the window a crack to let the smoke out but the rain snuck through the crack. Even though she quickly put the window up, her right thigh was wet. “Damn.”
“No point driving until I can see where I'm going.” He sighed. “Coop, apart from drugs, what could bring in big bucks? Moonshine can still make you rich if you're careful,” he noted.
Neither one had to tell the other that they were treating the demise of Wesley Partlow as murder. It's true that people can
harbor deep pain and secret losses and finally do themselves in. And sometimes a surly façade covers pain; but both officers of the law felt that wasn't the case. Someone threw a rope over that fiddle tree and strung up Wesley Partlow just like in the Wild West.
“I searched the computer for a criminal record. Wesley Partlow managed to keep his nose clean. He was smarter than I gave him credit for. I thought he was just a dumb punk.”
“He goes in the ground after that autopsy.” Rick squinted, the rain had let up a little. “How's your appetite?”
“Why?”
“Haven't lost it after this morning?”
“No. Have you lost yours?”
“Takes more than a hanged man to do that. Let's go to the Riverside Café.”
“I'll call Big Mim on the way. The news will be spreading all over Crozet. You know those two kids will tell. They'll have nightmares for months.”
“Yep.” He turned right out of the parking lot, heading for the intersection of High Street and Free Bridge. “Wait a second before calling the Queen of Crozet. Did you check out the number of 1987 GMC half-ton trucks in Virginia?”
“Over twenty thousand, four-wheel drive and two-wheel, still on the road.”
“How about in Albemarle County?”
“Yancy's on that since he has to sit around. Guess he'll be sitting around for a while.”
“Okay.”
“We don't know if the truck is registered here. Could be out of state.”
“I know.”
“Like a jigsaw puzzle,” she said, “all the pieces have been dumped on the table in a heap.”
He turned toward her. “Maybe all the pieces aren't on the table.”
20
The word of the grisly find reached the post office by one-thirty. Big Mim stopped by after her errands.
“I feel terrible.” Miranda meant it, too.
“You didn't know him,” Harry hastened to comfort her. She knew how guilty Miranda could get.
“She's right, Miranda. You simply reported that your hubcaps were stolen and by chance or whatever he was parking cars at my party. And you can believe I have chastised that company. I'll never use their valet service again. Not that he did any harm but still, they ought to scrutinize their help more closely. Their excuse was he had a valid driver's license and they needed all the help they could get due to the dogwood parties.” Big Mim shook out her umbrella. “I've made a mess. Sorry. I didn't think it would be so wet.”
“Don't worry about it. I'll mop up the floor before I leave tonight. It's that kind of day.” Harry scratched Pewter at the base of her tail.
“Do they know how long he was there?” Miranda asked.
“No. The coroner will figure it out,” Big Mim replied. “Did you know our county is getting so populous we have two coroners now, full time?”
“I didn't know that,” Miranda replied.
“I guess I'd better call Cynthia and tell her I found the Mercedes star and gave it back to Marilyn.” Harry headed for the phone while Miranda filled in Big Mim. Big Mim hadn't seen Little Mim since breakfast so she knew nothing of the returned star.
“I wish Mother hadn't found that star.” Mrs. Murphy sighed. The low pressure was getting to her.
“Who cares?” Pewter purred. “Wesley Partlow's nothing to her.”
“She's curious. She'll be especially curious now. You know how she gets,” Tucker agreed with Mrs. Murphy.
“If the kid killed himself, that's that,” Pewter, the hard-boiled, replied. “He didn't have much of a life to look forward to, did he?”
“I can't imagine a dog killing herself,” Tucker mused. “I think it's a peculiar thing to humans. Suicide.”
“If it's suicide we have nothing to worry about.” Mrs. Murphy joined Pewter on the counter. “But if it's not suicide then this will be a stormy spring.”
“Oh, come on,” Pewter said, a touch sarcastically. “Who would risk their own freedom to kill a loser like Wesley?”
21
The sodden ground could suck the shoes right off a horse. It held onto human shoes, too, as Harry and Cynthia Cooper trudged along the deer path not far from Durant Creek. Tucker, up to her knees in the mud, accompanied them. Mrs. Murphy and Pewter, left back at the farm, planned even more retaliatory destruction.
Harry pointed. “Here we connect up to the old farm road. Jeez, it's loud.”
Coop stopped at the crossroads of deer path and farm road. “The ground's soaked. If we get any more rain, the creeks and rivers will jump their banks.”
“Spring.”
“Yep.”
“We were running back. I noticed a gleam. And that's about the size of it. We walked over, I discovered it was the hood ornament. I didn't notice footprints or tire tracks. It started to pour but it had been raining before, as you know. If a car or truck had come back here there would have been deep ruts. There weren't.” She moved over. “About here.”
Tucker, senses much keener, sniffed around. No trace of human scent remained, although a hint of coyote lingered. She was glad her mother couldn't smell it because coyote spelled a great deal of trouble for everyone. The force of the storms beat down small branches, brush, stripped some buds off trees. She couldn't gather any more evidence than the humans.
“Where does the farm road lead?”
“To the creek.”
“Any structures, sheds, anything like that along the way?”
“No. Marcus Durant's shack is the only building and that's back where we parked.”
“Well, let's head back.” Coop stuck her thumbs in her belt. “Whatever might have been on the ground is washed away by now, but”—she looked around again—“I've got to run down every lead I can. I just wonder what the hell he was doing out here, if he was here.”
“Come on, Tucker.”
“I'm coming,” the dog replied, irritated that she couldn't locate more scent.
A sharp breeze picked up as the two women and dog walked back.
“Sure doesn't feel like spring today,” Cooper commented.
“Cuts to the bone. Coop, what's going on? You wouldn't be out here with me if you weren't worried.”
“I don't think Wesley Partlow committed suicide. Marshall Wells can't get to the autopsy until tonight. I'll withhold judgment until I get his results.”
“Isn't it hard to perform an autopsy on an exposed corpse that's been hanging?” Harry grimaced.
“Those guys know what they're doing. They take tissue samples. I couldn't do it. I trust their opinion because they do such a thorough examination of the body, too. Rick and I have trained eyes but we're not doctors.”
“I wouldn't think a kid like Wesley could be hanged without a fight. Surely there are easier ways to kill someone than to hang them.”
“Not if all you have is rope. What if our killer, assuming there was one, didn't have a gun or a knife? Right now I don't know much of anything and I sure don't know why he was out here. I would figure from the time we released him to the time you found the Mercedes star would have been five to six hours.”
“He wouldn't knowingly throw away the star.” Harry was thinking out loud. “He could have lost it running or in a fight. From here to the elder-care home in Crozet is about three miles.”
“Yeah.” Coop opened the door to the squad car.
“Shut the door, Cynthia. Let me wipe off Tucker's paws first.”
“I can wash them,” Tucker grumbled.
Harry had had the presence of mind to throw an old towel in the squad car. She grabbed it, bending down to clean off the corgi's muddy paws. “I'd never know you had white feet, Miss Pooch.”
Coop leaned against the car door. “He wasn't on drugs. That's the first thing I think about. Wesley was clean as far as we know.”
“I'd have thought he'd take anything he could get. Maybe he had more sense than I gave him credit for—what little I saw of him. Some people are life's losers. It sounds harsh but it's true. Miranda gets mad at me when I
say that because she believes everyone can be redeemed through the Lord. I hope she's right.”
“She hasn't been quoting as much scripture lately.” Coop smiled. “Tracy?”
“Yeah, though she was never what I'd call a Bible thumper. Okay, there were times when she came close but she has toned down a little. I actually like it when she quotes the Bible. I'm learning something. I never did memorize much except for Hamlet's soliloquy, which I hate.” Harry, meditatively rubbing Tucker's paws, got lost in thought.
“M-m-m, come on, she's clean enough.”
“All right, Tucker. In you go.”
“I told you I could wash myself.” Tucker sat down on the backseat and began washing her paws.
As they drove down Whitehall Road, Coop asked, “Is there anything unique about the farms out here?”
“Unique? Well, some of them are very beautiful but I can't think of anything unique. Many of them were filled with wounded soldiers during the War Between the States. They'd ship them in by train and folks would pick up soldiers, ours and the Yankees, down at the train station and take them home. God, it must have been a mess. Just about every house in central Virginia had soldiers in it.”
“Hard to imagine.”
“You were in as much danger from the surgeon as you were from the enemy. But no, there's nothing special unless you count architecture.”
“I sure wish I knew what he was doing down here.”
“Did anyone pick him up from the station?”
Coop shook her head. “Walked right out and kept going.”
“Creepy.”
“Wesley?”
“The weekend. Kind of a weekend of death. Roger and then Wesley.”
Cynthia said, “I heard Lottie Pearson hired a lawyer.”
“You're kidding.”
“Just in case we accuse her of poisoning Roger. Now, there's a paranoid woman. No one is accusing her of anything. It was her dumb luck to hand him coffee and cake.”
“Who told you?” Harry could think of a few people who would get the news first.
“Little Mim.”
“Lottie's been shining her on.”
“Oh, well, Little Mim knows it. She said she called BoomBoom to tell her she made the right decision in fixing you up with Diego and not Lottie.”
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