Leigh glared. “After what happened today?”
“All right. I’ll look into it.”
Before the two could argue further, Lew jumped in to change the subject. “Is there anyone that either of you know who might be aware that your system has been off?” she asked. Leigh and her husband both shook their heads. “Anyone at your office?”
“Not that I can think of,” said McNeil with another shake of his head.
“Look, Leigh,” he said in a conciliatory tone, “I’m sure I can get someone out here tomorrow, and I’m home for the next ten days. That security firm runs the systems for the clinic. They know who I am, that I approve their invoices, and you can bet they will bend over backward to get this taken care of. Okay?”
Staring at the notepad in front of her, Leigh managed a whisper: “Okay.”
“Mrs. McNeil,” said Lew, “I have some questions for you.”
“Richards,” said Leigh. “Leigh Richards. I’ve never changed my name. When Jim and I got married, I was a vice president for a brokerage firm in Madison and it didn’t make sense to put all my clients through a name change.”
“I see,” said Lew. “You work from home now?”
“Not since Jim went into management,” said Leigh. “I haven’t worked in over six years.”
“Ah,” said Lew as she jotted a note while thinking: Nothing worse than a bright, bored, and lonely housewife. “Before we discuss that list in front of you, can you give me an idea when you were last in that downstairs workroom?”
“Yesterday. I worked on my quilt all morning,” said Leigh. “I do every stitch by hand.”
“One of her quilts is hanging in the state capitol building down in Madison,” said McNeil with pride.
“Nice,” said Lew. “And this morning? You were working down there until what time?”
“No. Today I saw the dermatologist. I didn’t go downstairs until three o’clock or so. That’s when I saw the mess and …” She inhaled harshly and tried to speak but waved one hand as she choked.
“Take your time,” said Lew.
“Umm,” Leigh pushed a Kleenex against her eyes. “Whoever broke in took four squares of the quilt that I was working on. I’ve been working on them for weeks and had laid them on the ironing board and … they’re gone.” She took a deep breath and turned her shoulders away from her husband.
“Jim doesn’t believe me but that’s the kind of thing that’s been happening. Whoever it is—is after me. Not Jim—me. I know it sounds like I’m making all this up.” She raised sad eyes to Lew, “I can’t prove I had my quilt squares there, but I did. I know I did.” A soft sob into the Kleenex.
“When you’re ready,” said Lew, tapping her pen, “I want to hear about all the other times you’ve been convinced someone was here.”
After blowing her nose and wiping at her eyes, Leigh pulled the legal pad closer to her. “Okay,” she said, sniffling, “I’ve made a list. It started last November when Jim was away at a conference in Hawaii. I was watching television one night in the den when I happened to look up and see this awful face in the window. Just for a second then it was gone—but I know I saw someone.”
“A man or a woman?”
“I don’t know. They wore a black mask with bleeding eyes. Jim thought it was kids playing a prank after Halloween.”
“Have you seen the face since?”
“No. But I have seen movement at different windows. Like I’ll look over and get just a glimpse of something or someone. That’s why I want security cameras. All we have is a system that works if a window or door is opened or if there is a vibration from someone trying to enter. We can’t see around the outside of the house if someone is lurking….”
“And does this always happen after dark?”
“Yes, and always when Jim is not home. So the first time it happened was in November. Then, just before Christmas, I went out to my car one night and someone had been in it.
“They had taken one of my favorite cookbooks from the kitchen here,” Leigh pointed over to a shelf holding a dozen or more cookbooks, “cut it up into little tiny pieces and dumped it into the back of my Jeep. Jim thought I had forgotten a book back there and it got wet and shredded—but I know I didn’t.”
“Cut not torn?”
“Cut. With scissors. The pieces were less than a quarter inch,” said Leigh, holding up two fingers to demonstrate. “That took time. And what a nutty thing to do. I know this sounds crazy but I got the message: they wanted to use the scissors on me.”
“Cut you up?”
“Or cut me out.”
That’s interesting, thought Lew. Darn, she wished Doc were there to listen in on this. She would make sure he listened to the tape.
“In February, Jim was traveling, and when I went to take the trash out for pickup the next morning, the door to the garage was open and the motion sensor lights over the driveway had been turned off. I did not turn those off, and they were on just fine after Jim left that week.”
She took a deep breath. “I cannot tell you how many times I find doors left open that I know I closed—the garage door, the door to the garden shed, the door to the boathouse.
“But the worst is what happened to my garden and my boat.”
Lew checked her watch. She hoped Bruce and Ray would show up before she finished talking with Leigh.
“In June, I put in a new bed of daylilies—wonderful varieties I found over in Minneapolis and a very expensive Japanese maple. Destroyed. I woke up one morning and someone had pulled the daylilies right out of the ground and cut off my little tree.”
“Deer,” muttered Jim McNeil.
“Jim,” said Leigh with a tinge of hysteria in her voice, “I put fencing around those. Deer can’t yank up fencing.” McNeil rolled his eyes and shrugged.
“I’ll want you to show my deputy, Ray Pradt, and Bruce Peters from the Wausau Crime Lab where that happened,” said Lew. “They should be here any minute, I hope.”
Lew could understand why McNeil found it difficult to believe his wife. Every thing she had described so far could be blamed on wind, weather, or critters, including raccoons, rabbits, foxes, deer, bears, and coyotes—pests familiar to anyone living in the Northwoods. Her own garden fell victim to prairie dogs so often she kept a sixteen-gauge shotgun by the kitchen door.
As far as the mask in the window—could have been a raccoon, especially if Leigh enjoyed an evening cocktail or two. But the cut-up book. Now that was weird.
“A deer did not desecrate my boat,” said Leigh, glaring at her husband. She turned to Lew saying, “That happened two weeks ago and it’s when I called nine-one-one.
“Someone broke into our boathouse and left a disgusting pile of dog poop in my rowboat. It’s an antique I inherited from my grandfather—a lovely little wooden rowboat. It’s painted green on the outside and beautifully varnished inside and out. Or it was until someone put the dog poop in it, which ate through the varnish and left an ugly stain. Of course, Jim thought it was a raccoon.”
McNeil caught Lew’s eye and nodded.
“What made you think it was dog poop and not left by another animal?” asked Lew.
“My mother had a Yorkie and it looked just like that dog’s poop. I’m not stupid—I know dog poop from deer scat and rabbit droppings—I garden, I know what animals do.
“Plus, plus,” said Leigh waving one finger to emphasize her point, “the damn boat is suspended from the roof of the boathouse and over the water—so how does an animal get in and out without drowning?” She sat back satisfied she had made a key point.
“So what we do know,” said Lew, looking down at her notes, “is that the break-in downstairs has to have occurred sometime yesterday afternoon or evening. But maybe this morning. Is that correct?”
“Yes,” said Leigh.
“Aside from the face in the window that night, have you seen anyone else on your property?”
“Well … no,” said Leigh. “And again I know this s
ounds like I’m nuts, but even though I don’t see anyone—I get the feeling I’m being watched. Last spring I stopped doing any quilting at night because I sensed someone was peering in the basement window.”
“But you didn’t call nine-one-one then?”
Before she could answer, her husband interrupted in a stern voice, “Leigh, I want you to tell Chief Ferris about your medications.”
She threw him a look so angry, Lew wondered how long this marriage was going to last. “I’ve been on antidepressants. Not LSD or crack cocaine. Antidepressants. And so what?” She threw her hands up. “Half the women I know are on antidepressants. I am not hallucinating.”
A knock at the kitchen door prompted Lew to turn around. “Oh, good. That’s probably my team,” she said as Jim McNeil rose from his chair.
Chapter Sixteen
Leaving Bruce and Ray to pick their way through the broken glass and muddy prints left in the laundry room, Lew followed Leigh down to the boathouse, a small building that must have been built years ago, as it rested on timbers allowing it to hover over the water.
“Aren’t you lucky to have an old boathouse like this,” said Lew, amazed to discover one of the antique structures that once dotted Northwoods’ shorelines but have since been outlawed.
“I know people aren’t allowed to build so close to water these days, so we were fortunate to find this place,” said Leigh.
“It’s wonderful the way you’ve restored the boathouse,” said Lew, admiring the small structure with its fresh coat of dark green paint. Crisp white trim outlined the windows, which appeared to contain their original glass from the early 1900s. An upper level hinted of an old-fashioned sleeping porch.
“You know,” said Lew with a shake of her head, “I understand the DNR’s reasoning for their shoreline restrictions but I do miss the old places. My uncle had a boathouse like this, and when I was a kid, I loved the upstairs sleeping porch—listening to the lake all night long.” Lew smiled.
“I know what you mean,” said Leigh. “The boathouse is why we bought the property. It’s all that was left from the original buildings on the land. Thank goodness the developer was smart enough to leave it. It’s grandfathered in, so we were able to restore a certain amount—we painted the exterior and replaced some of the wooden decking.”
She opened the door and they stepped into a dark interior. Two boats and a jet ski were moored inside. Lew walked past a small cabin cruiser to where a petite rowboat, so old it was likely made by hand in the early 1900s, hung suspended shoulder height over open water. The weathered varnish on the exterior gleamed even in the dim light and the oars boasted silver fittings that would be impossible to find today.
“Where did you find this rowboat?” asked Lew. “It’s beautiful.”
“My grandfather made it. He was a doctor by profession and carpentry was his hobby.” Leigh lowered the pulley that was holding the boat down far enough that they had a view of the interior.
“Oh, oh, I see what you mean,” said Lew, peering into the small craft. Whatever the mess made by a critter, the result was a dark stain marring the warm brown finish.
“Chief Ferris, if you look up,” said Leigh, pointing at the cables holding the boat, “you can see that when this boat is raised it has to be impossible for an animal to climb up, over, and into the boat—not without help.”
“You would be surprised,” said Lew. “Your boathouse has plenty of room beneath those lakeside doors. An eagle or other predator could find their way in and drop a dead fish or some other small animal in here. Unless you’re a forensic expert, it can be difficult to tell the smell of decomposing—”
“I know the smell of dog shit.”
Lew shrugged. The woman had made up her mind. She walked over to the speedboat, which sat on an elaborate electric shore station. “No damage to this craft?” she asked as she examined the interior of the speedboat. “Have you checked the interior of that cabin for signs of a break-in or damage?”
“Nothing. The only damage was to my boat. That one is Jim’s pride and joy.” A note of resentment had crept into Leigh’s voice.
“Quite the setup, you have here,” said Lew. “I don’t see many shore stations this fancy. All you have to do is flip that switch and the shore station automatically raises or lowers the boat, right?”
“My husband’s a gear head. Anything you can power up, he has to have. Boats, cars, a motorcycle. Hard to get him to just stay home and take life easy.” Leigh sighed.
Lew smiled in understanding. An aura of sadness around the woman gave her the urge to do or say something that might make her feel better.
“You know, Leigh,” said Lew after a long pause during which she studied the rowboat and the stain on the floor of the little craft, “I could be wrong about your rowboat. Even though I have seen animals accomplish amazing feats, I’ll ask one of the deputies you just met to check this out, too.
“Ray Pradt is an expert on animal behavior—and he has two dogs of his own. Big dogs. Yellow Labs. If anyone knows the damage dog excrement can do, it’ll be Ray. That aside, he’s a skilled tracker who insists he can tell the size and age of an animal from its scat. You didn’t happen to keep a sample of what you found in the boat, did you?”
“Sorry,” said Leigh. “I couldn’t get rid of it fast enough. Is Ray the taller of those two guys? The real good-looking one?”
“Yep, that’s Ray,” said Lew with a grin. Turning away from Leigh, she rolled her eyes: Ray and women. Some things never change.
As they left the boathouse, Lew spotted Ray and Bruce up on the patio, both men on their knees near the broken window.
“Ray? Bruce?” At the sound of her voice they got to their feet and turned toward her.
The two men could not appear less likely to be a working pair.
Ray was a rangy six feet five inches tall and very tan with bare knees exposed beneath a pair of wrinkled khaki shorts. He wore a baggy white T-shirt with the words “Severe Fishing Disorder” stenciled in black and readable from miles away.
His hair—in grave need of a trim and hostage to the August humidity—was an explosion of dark brown ringlets capable of hiding a covey of grouse. A thirty-two-year-old stuck in his teens.
The other guy, Bruce Peters of the Wausau Crime Lab, appeared the consummate professional in pressed gray Dockers and a muted green and tan checked shirt. A disciplined crew cut and a matching black mustache completed the picture.
But while Bruce had proved to be an experienced, diligent forensic scientist, Lew knew from experience that he shared a few too many characteristics with Ray: a love for the outdoors and fishing—and an irreverent sense of humor. Kids at heart, those two.
Granted she had criminal cases to solve—cases that benefited from their skills—Lew was well aware her real challenge was managing those two razzbonyas.
“Chief,” said Bruce, dusting his hands as he walked up, “we’ve bagged shards of glass and other evidence that may be helpful. I will arrange for DNA testing on the bloodstains and run the results against our state and national databases but it may take a week or more.”
“I figured as much,” said Lew, “are you driving back to Wausau tonight?”
Bruce threw a glance at Ray and Lew detected a smothered grin. “Oh, no,” said Bruce, his eyes so serious she knew something was up. “I’m going to camp out here over the weekend. That stolen pickup will take some work, then I need to search the home and office of your victim. I’d like to be here when the pathologist report comes in, too. Never know what might be needed.”
“Bruce, my budget—” Lew started to protest.
“He can stay at my place,” said Ray. “No charge.”
“That’s dangerous,” said Lew. She gave Bruce the dim eye. “Are you sure?”
But bushy eyebrows bounced happily as Bruce said, “Oh yeah. I’m gonna check out Ray’s new fishing kayak while I’m here.
And, Chief, I won’t charge overtime for my work on Saturday and
Sunday….”
Lew gave a cautious nod. “All right, then. But right now let’s talk about the situation here.” The two men glanced at each other, pleased. Shoulders back, they prepared to listen.
“Mr. McNeil and his wife are quite concerned that the intruder may return. They think the individual has trespassed here on several occasions previously.” Lew detailed the instances that Leigh had described earlier. “Ray, did you find any sign of where or how they may have approached the property—recently or earlier?”
“Nope,” said Ray. “There was a lawn crew here this morning and with no rain the last few days—not much for me to work with.”
“I see,” said Lew. “Several weeks ago someone may have broken into their boathouse, too.”
Lew turned to Leigh who was standing nearby. “Tell Ray your concern over the rowboat, would you?”
Leigh perked up and described in detail her theory that someone had deliberately allowed a dog to desecrate her precious antique boat.
“So if you two would check out the boathouse before you leave here this evening,” said Lew, “that would be helpful. Oh, and one more thought, Ray—what are you doing with those webcams of yours?”
“Nothing, why?”
“The security system here is being upgraded but they won’t have security cameras in place for a while. How difficult would it be for you to rig your webcams so Jim and Leigh can see the exterior of their house from indoors?”
“Wait a minute,” said McNeil who had walked onto the patio moments earlier and heard Lew’s question. “How much is this going to cost me?”
“Jim—” said Leigh, turning a threatening eye on her husband.
“Eh,” said Ray with a shrug, “I’m not using the darn things until deer season. Takes five minutes to set the cameras up, and the monitor is wireless. All you do is turn it on and you get a split screen with views from both cameras. Records great in low light by the way. I use it to check nocturnal visitors to my deer stand.”
“Like bears?” said Leigh with a shiver of delight. Lew couldn’t believe how the woman had perked up.
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