A Catered Fourth of July

by Isis Crawford

  “I’ll tell them I’m visiting.”

  “And if they find you in the evidence locker?”

  “I’ll tell them I got lost.”

  “I don’t know.” Marvin was thinking about the time he’d let Libby’s father drive his Taurus and Sean had taken off with it. He’d never seen Libby so mad. “You know, you don’t have to do this.”

  “I think I do. Unless you want to go to jail, that is. We need to find out if the musket that blew up was marked or not.”

  Marvin couldn’t think of anything else to say except thanks so that’s what he said.

  “You’re welcome.”

  Five minutes later, Marvin pulled up into the back lot of the Longely Police Station. The building had been built as an afterthought about thirty years ago and looked it. Law enforcement was not a priority in a community where the police mostly dealt with DWIs, teenage beer parties, and domestic disturbances of a garden variety nature.

  “You stay here.” Sean indicated the parking lot with a wave of his hand. “I’ll be in and out in ten minutes tops.”

  “You said five,” Marvin pointed out.

  “I meant ten.” Sean started to get out of the hearse and stopped. “But if I’m not out in fifteen minutes, I want you to take off.”

  “What about you?” Marvin asked.

  “I can take care of myself.”

  “I can’t do that,” Marvin told him, a pleading tone in his voice. “You know I can’t.”

  Sean sighed and thought of what his eldest daughter would do if Marvin did what he was requesting. “I suppose not,” he allowed. He rubbed his chin in thought. “I’ll tell you what. If I’m not out of there in fifteen minutes, I want you to come in and ask me if I’m all right.”

  “I don’t get it,” Marvin said.

  “That’s okay. You don’t have to. Just say those words.” Sean had Marvin repeat them. “Good,” he said as he got out of the hearse.

  He ground his cigarette out in the dirt and began walking across the parking lot. He reflected that he had made this walk thousands of times before as he headed toward the police station’s back door. It had been what? Almost ten years since he’d been forced to resign from the police force. Ten years. Amazing. But everything still looked the same. The parking lot macadam was still pitted, the paint was still peeling from the back wall bricks, the garbage cans stilled smelled of old fast food.

  Of course, Sean thought, I’m walking a little slower now. But that was okay. He was thankful he was walking at all. Two years ago, he was in a wheelchair half the time and the other half he was hobbling around with a cane. God had granted him a remission. No one knew why. The doctors certainly didn’t, but he didn’t care. All he knew was that he could get from point A to point B without anyone’s help and that was good enough for him.

  He pushed on the back door. It swung open. He turned, gave Marvin a brief wave, and went inside. The locker room was empty, although he could hear people talking out front. The place where everyone was gathered was on the other side of the building, but the walls were thin and sounds tended to carry. He smelled the familiar scents of Pine-Sol, Febreeze, dirty socks, and sweat as he noted that the walls in the locker room were still a drab shade of tan, half the lockers were still dented, and the floor and benches still had spatters of paint and plaster on them from when the leak in the ceiling had been fixed.

  He took a left, walked twelve feet, made a right and found himself in the place where the evidence was kept. Big cities had property rooms that were gated and had metal shelving and filing systems, but Longely was a small town so its evidence room was more like a cubbyhole. Its shelves were from The Home Depot, and its filing system consisted of a log book resting on a table that was supposed to be manned, but usually wasn’t. Sean stepped around the table and went inside. He didn’t need to consult the book to tell him where the muskets were because he could see them lying on the middle shelf.

  He took a quick look around to make sure no one was coming in, even though he was positive he would hear them before they did, then slipped on the rubber gloves he’d brought with him, and walked toward the muskets. There were eight of them altogether and they had been divided into two groups. One group contained seven muskets, while the other one contained the musket that had killed Jack Devlin.

  Sean began with the larger group. He picked up each musket and examined it from top to bottom before going on to the next one. They all looked the same to him. If there was a mark on any of them, he didn’t see it. Then he got to the musket that had killed Jack Devlin. As soon as he picked it up, he noticed that it was slightly heavier. His eye traveled down the barrel to the stock.

  Outside of the difference in weight, he couldn’t see anything that might have passed as a mark. Then he held the musket up to the light. There. A thin line circled the bottom half of the gunstock, but it was so faint it was hard to see. Was that a mark or a scratch? It was possible to scratch steel. So maybe that’s what happened. On the other hand, the line was straight and it circled the stock. What would have done that? It looked as if someone had etched the line with an etching pen, which was easy to come by.

  It was highly probable that the scratch he was looking at had been made on purpose. Someone had marked the musket. If it had indeed been marked, that led to the next question. What purpose did the line serve?

  Someone had to have picked out the gun and handed it to Devlin, but exactly how had they done that? From what Sean understood, Marvin had deposited the muskets on the bench and told everyone to take one. So how had the person handing the gun to Devlin picked out the doctored one? The line on the stock was so faint it would have been impossible to see unless it had been held up to the light. Maybe there was some other sort of mark on the barrel, but that had probably—almost definitely—been obliterated by the force of the explosion.

  Sean turned the musket to check the barrel anyway. A small ping sounded as a piece of shot fell out and landed on the floor. He picked it up, put it in his pocket, and went back to examining the muzzle. The force of the blast had bent the metal outward. If there had been some sort of mark, it was gone now. He was thinking about where else a mark might be when he realized that the quality of the voices he’d been hearing in the background had changed.

  More people were talking and the voices seemed closer, especially Lucy’s. He could hear Clyde asking Lucy a question and Lucy telling him he’d take care of it—whatever it was—after he returned from the restroom. This was not good.

  Sean quickly replaced the musket, taking care to put it back exactly as he had found it. He peeled off his gloves, stuffed them in his pants pockets, and hurried out of the property locker. He was almost at the back door when Lucy entered the room. This will be interesting, Sean decided as he saw Lucy’s eyes widened, then narrow.

  The flesh on Lucy’s neck began to redden. “What the hell are you doing here?” he growled.

  Sean smiled his most benign smile and patted his stomach. “I had to make a pit stop and this was the closest pit I could think of.”

  Lucy crossed his arms over his chest. “Are you saying this place is a pit?” he demanded.

  Sean watched the flush on Lucy’s neck rise to his face. “Heaven forefend,” he replied, still smiling. “All I’m saying is when you gotta go, you gotta go.”

  “And you just happened to be passing by?” Lucy’s tone was sarcastic.

  Sean’s smile got even bigger if that were possible. “As a matter of fact I was.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m running an errand for Libby.”

  “If I call her up and ask her what errand that would be?” Lucy demanded.

  “Go ahead,” Sean challenged. “Call her. I don’t mind.”

  “I didn’t ask if you minded or not,” Lucy retorted.

  The two men locked eyes. A minute passed.

  Lucy laced his fingers together and cracked his knuckles. His face was a lovely shade of rose. “What’s the point?” he finally said. “S
he’d just lie for you anyway.”

  Sean didn’t say anything.

  “How’d you get in?” Lucy asked, changing the subject.

  Sean jerked his head in the direction of the back door. “Through there . . . obviously.”

  “That door is always locked.”

  “Not this time.” Sean shrugged. “I guess someone forgot.”

  Lucy unlaced his fingers and brought his hands down to his sides. “Amazing.”

  “Isn’t it, though?” Sean replied, his face a mask of innocence. “You sound as if you don’t believe me.”

  “That’s because I don’t.” Lucy took a step toward Sean. “In fact, I have a good mind to arrest you.”

  “For what? Unauthorized peeing?”

  “Ha-ha. You always did think you were funny. I guess that’s where your daughters get it from. No. For trespassing,” Lucy said just as Marvin came barreling through the door.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, repeating the line Sean had given him.

  “Better now,” Sean said. “Thanks for asking. We’d better get going. Don’t want the butter to get rancid.”

  Lucy’s eyes went from Sean to Marvin to Sean again. “You were in the property room, weren’t you?”

  “I wouldn’t call it a room. It’s more like a nook, really. But no. I wasn’t. Why would I be since you seem to have the matter so well in hand.”

  Lucy shook a finger at Sean. “Those muskets better be exactly where they’re supposed to be.”

  “I’m sure they are.” Sean pushed Marvin through the door and said, “Not that he’d be able to tell.” Once they were outside and the door had closed behind them, Sean patted his pockets. He wanted to get out of there before Lucy changed his mind.

  Chapter 31

  It was a little before nine in the morning. The sun had just come out and was burning through the morning haze. Brandon and Bernie were on their way to Sanford Aiken’s shop when Bernie spotted Monica Lewis’s green Miata tootling along Main Street on the opposite side of the road.

  “Looky, looky who I see,” Bernie said, pointing in the Miata’s direction.

  Brandon squinted. “Ah, Monica out for an early morning spin. Must be something important. If I remember rightly, she’s still a night person.”

  Bernie tapped her fingers on the dashboard.

  “What’s up?” Brandon asked her.

  “I’ve changed my mind. Let’s go talk to Miss Monica now.”

  “And leave poor Sanford Aiken in the lurch?”

  “You know what they say. Gather ye rosebuds while ye may.”

  “Yeah, but this little rosebud wasn’t at the reenactment,” Brandon pointed out.

  “True, but her brother was.”

  “You’ve already talked to him.”

  “Also true,” Bernie replied. “Now I want to speak to her and see if their stories agree.”

  “Okeydokey.” Brandon took one hand off the wheel and touched it to his head. “Oui, mon capitaine. I am here but to serve.”

  Bernie grinned. “Exactly.”

  “I was being sarcastic.” Brandon executed a quick U-turn on Main Street.

  “Really? Fancy that. I would never have known.” Bernie watched Monica Lewis glancing in her rearview mirror. The next thing she knew the Miata put on a burst of speed.

  “I think she saw us,” Brandon said.

  “I think she doesn’t want to speak to us,” Bernie added.

  “Good guess, Sherlock.”

  “That makes me want to speak to her even more.”

  “I got to admit, her reaction is suggestive.”

  “But of what?” Bernie mused. “That’s the question.”

  “How about guilt?”

  “I suppose she could have rigged the rifle,” Bernie said.

  “Or maybe she has errands to do and doesn’t feel like talking to you now,” Brandon suggested, proposing an alternate scenario.

  “She doesn’t know I want to talk to her,” Bernie objected.

  “Of course, she knows. How could she not? You talked to her brother and her sister-in-law, didn’t you?”

  Bernie allowed that she had.

  “Or maybe she just doesn’t like you.”

  “She doesn’t know me,” Bernie shot back. “Anyway, what’s there not to love?”

  Brandon laughed. “True. You are a paragon of virtue.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Bernie told him.

  The Miata was putting more distance between them.

  Bernie groaned. “Go faster. We’re going to lose her.”

  “I’m going as fast as I can,” Brandon snapped. The speed limit was twenty miles an hour and they were already going thirty-eight. “Unless you’d like me to hit someone, that is.”

  Bernie bit her lip, hunched forward, and concentrated on keeping the Miata in sight. The next moment, a minivan switched lanes, pulling out in front of them and blocking the view of the Miata. When the minivan changed lanes again, the Miata was gone.

  Bernie cursed. “Where did she go?”

  “Well, she’s got to be around here someplace,” Brandon answered. “There are just two possibilities. She turned off on Ash or Gifford. I’ll just circle around and we’ll see if we can spot her. At least, she doesn’t have a Honda Civic.”

  Bernie nodded. Brandon went down Gifford while she kept a careful lookout.

  “Nothing,” she said when they’d come to the end of the street.

  Brandon started up Ash next. He’d gone three blocks when Bernie spotted the Miata in the parking lot of Good Eats, a health food store.

  “There,” she said, pointing to it.

  “I know. I see.” Brandon pulled into the lot, parked in back of the Miata, and turned off the motor, but left the key in the ignition. “We are here, my lady.”

  Bernie opened the truck door. “This is going to be an interesting chat.”

  “If Monica talks to you.”

  “She will.”

  “Why should she?”

  Bernie smiled. “My innate charm. Coming in?”

  Brandon shook his head. “You go ahead. I’m going to sit here and take a little nap.” At which point, he put his seat back. “Call me if you need me,” he said as he closed his eyes.

  “I will,” Bernie promised as she got out of the truck. Not that she thought she would. After all, what could happen in a fancy-schmancy grocery store like Good Eats where everyone thought pure and peaceful thoughts and only put healthy, organic foods into their bodies?

  Usually the store was crowded, but it was still early enough in the day to be fairly empty. The place was large. It had been a sporting goods store previously, and was laid out with lots of space between the aisles, which were set on a diagonal, making it easy to see between them.

  Bernie spotted Monica in the gluten-free aisle studying boxes of gluten-free crackers. She supposed that eventually she and Libby would have to offer some sort of gluten-free cupcake, although she’d been resisting the fad, hoping that it would die down before too long. It’s not that she and Libby couldn’t make gluten-free stuff, she just thought it was mostly a load of hokum.

  “Are you really gluten-intolerant?” she asked Monica when she was about a foot away from her.

  Monica spun around. When she saw who it was, she started to say something then caught herself and stopped.

  “Were you, by any chance, going to say, ‘I thought I lost you?’ ” Bernie asked as she advanced on her.

  “Go away,” Monica told her.

  “I must say you look very fetching. Your year in India has done wonders for your weight, and I like the hair. You’re a good blonde. I almost didn’t recognize you. Tell me, do blondes really have more fun?”

  “I said go away,” Monica repeated as she replaced the box of crackers on the shelf. She turned and started to walk away.

  Bernie followed her. “Oh, dear. Did your brother tell you not to talk to me? I bet he did, didn’t he?”

  Monica kept walking.

&
nbsp; Bernie, undeterred, followed. “Hey, my sister and I have a dollar bet. She says Jack Devlin didn’t recognize you, but you know what I think? I think he did. I bet he was surprised to see you.”

  Monica spun around. “I don’t care what you think. You’re not the police, which means I don’t have to talk to you, and I’m not going to.”

  “Of course you’re not,” Bernie said in her most soothing voice as she drew closer. “This must be very stressful for you.” She pointed to the filigree silver earrings that were dangling from Monica’s earlobes. “Nice. Did you get those in India?”

  Monica reached up and touched them. “So?”

  “So I like them. They frame your face very nicely. How much weight did you lose?”

  “About fifty pounds,” Monica couldn’t prevent herself from saying.

  Bernie nodded approvingly. “Good job.”

  “It was easier there,” Monica explained.

  “I bet,” Bernie replied. “You know, I understand completely why you don’t want to speak to me. If I were you, I’d want to protect my brother, too, especially after what he did for me.”

  Monica furrowed her brow. “Like what?”

  “Surely you know.”

  Monica licked her lips. “No, I don’t. What are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about the fact that your brother rigged the rifle that killed Jack Devlin.”

  “You really are absurd,” Monica protested with a flutter of her hands. “Why would he do that?”

  Bernie’s smile was compassionate. “Obviously, because of what Jack Devlin did to you. It must be nice to have a sibling that cares that much. I’m not sure that my sister does. She certainly would never do something like that for my sake. I can’t even get her to exchange a pair of shoes for me at Barney’s when she’s going to be in the city.”

  Monica gave a strangled laugh. “Now that’s funny. Do you think my brother actually cares about that?”

  “I was under that impression, yes.”

  “My brother doesn’t care about anyone or anything except himself. He certainly never cared about me. He hated me from the moment my mother married his father and that hasn’t changed at all. He resented any attention I got.”