by Jess Lourey
I played dumb. The role was feeling particularly well cast this weekend. “Clive has a daughter?”
“Her name is Missy. I graduated Battle Lake High with her.”
“Where’s she live now?”
“Alexandria. She’s a home health nurse. Makes sense, since she grew up taking care of Clive. I heard talk that she’s planning an intervention to get him into treatment. He hasn’t been right since the accident.”
I was trying to absorb the information Kennie was throwing at me. “Who’s Missy’s mom?”
Kennie cocked her head to glance backward along the time continuum. “I’m not sure anyone knows except Clive. Missy just showed up in kindergarten one day. He kept her clothed and fed, but I never saw a woman around, except those he’d date for awhile. Like Carla. Those two have been going strong for a few months now.”
“You ever heard of the Four Musketeers?”
“The candy bar?”
“No, a Battle Lake gang back in the late fifties, early sixties.”
She laughed, and then looked offended. “I’m not that old, and Battle Lake doesn’t have gangs.”
“I need a nap.”
She watched me walk out the door. “A hairbrush wouldn’t kill you either.”
Needing to self-medicate, I stopped at the Apothecary to purchase a fistful of Nut Goodies and a Chia pet herb pig. Sugar and gardening, I thought. I’ll get through this with sugar and gardening. I went home and got ugly.
Thirty-one
Monday found me three pounds heavier and no wiser. I also realized that Hallie deserved to know what was going on. I was not unclear on that point. I just didn’t possess the cojones to tell her all the bad news. I rationalized my cowardice by convincing myself that I only knew part of the story. She would naturally have questions, and she deserved answers. I needed the whole mess straight before I told her that her dear departed father had been murdered for a horrible crime he’d been a part of decades earlier, and that the murderer may not be through yet.
So I’d find her some answers. At least that was the plan. My first attempt was foiled when I visited the Fergus Falls nursing home to discover that Julius had been transported to the hospital to treat a recent case of pneumonia. He was currently in an oxygen chamber and not allowed visitors. I stopped by the hospital anyways to send up some flowers and a box of donuts. I was certain he wouldn’t be able to eat them, but I hoped they’d give him a smile.
My next stop was the office of Jason Paul. I recognized him as the young African American who had attended the Love-Your-Library event. It turned out he was new to town and had never been to Battle Lake before or since the library celebration. I thanked him for his time and drove to Margery Flax’s office. I had not forgotten the initials written on Lyle’s calendar—FCM and a dollar sign. Clive had received a windfall from a Fergus Falls attorney. Lyle was possibly expecting money from someone with the initials “FCM.” Two of the Fergus Falls attorneys on my list had the initials “F” and “M” in their names. I didn’t need to be Nancy Drew to know that either my meeting with Margery or my meeting with Frederick was going to be very illuminating, and my money was on Frederick.
Margery turned out to be a busy woman who was in a constant state of motion, alternating between texting, searching on her computer, and writing on a notepad the whole time we were talking. She quickly established that I wasn’t here as a potential client and got me straight to my point in an uncharacteristically—for Minnesota—straightforward manner.
“You were at the Love-Your-Library event, right?” She’d been on the guest list, but I didn’t recognize her face.
She nodded while scribbling something on her desk pad and keeping one eye on her computer screen. “Briefly.”
“Were you there at the end when a large donation was made to the library?”
“I came around 7:40 and left at 8:00. I had a dinner engagement with friends. Is that all?”
“You didn’t write Clive Majors a check for $5,000?”
She snorted. “Not unless he’s the guy who holds the mortgage on my house.”
I felt embarrassed. I was obviously barking up the wrong tree. “Your middle name doesn’t happen to start with a “C,” does it?”
“My middle name is Jean. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” She glanced suggestively at the door.
I didn’t see anybody waiting to break it down but I had no doubt her time was worth more than mine. I thanked her for it and drove to the office of Frederick Milton. According to the name on the sign, he was the senior partner in a law office of four. The thick carpeting and dark wood of the lobby suggested that they were doing just fine.
“I’m here to see Mr. Milton.”
The pleasant-faced secretary smiled from behind the counter. “Do you have an appointment?”
“No, but he’s expecting me.”
Her nose wrinkled with puzzlement, but her smile stayed intact. “I’m afraid he’s in court today.”
“I’ll wait.” Before leaving Battle Lake, I’d called Hallie’s attorney from the Litchfield Law Firm. I’d ostensibly called to turn in my billing for the week, but I’d also asked him about the three attorneys on my list. He’d heard of Margery and Frederick, but not Paul. He’d informed me that Margery specialized in family law and that Frederick was a business lawyer who rarely took a case these days. His focus was on running for county commissioner.
“Can I ask who’s waiting?”
“Mira James. I’m a reporter with the Battle Lake Recall.”
She nodded as if that made sense and typed on her computer. She looked up a few minutes later. “He’ll be back within the hour. I might be able to squeeze you in, but he’d only have a minute or two.”
“That’s all I’ll need.” I spent the next two hours reading the Fergus Falls Daily Journal, then American Lawyer, and then New American. I was ready to slice my eyes out by the time I was finally ushered into a back office. I was unsurprised to find that I immediately recognized Frederick Milton as the lip-muff-sporting gentleman who had been chatting with Mitchell and retired Sheriff Mike at the library event, the one who couldn’t take his eyes off of Clive. Pieces were falling into place.
“Ms. James. So nice to see you again. Were you waiting long?” He had stood to greet me, but the handshake he offered was little more than a mildly obscene brushing of his warm, flaccid palm.
“No,” I lied. “I’m here to ask you some questions.” We both sat. His suit wasn’t cheap, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that it hid scabs and scars underneath. It was a combination of his arrogant manner and greasy eyes.
“I assume for an article on my bid for county commissioner?”
“Okay. When did you throw your hat in the ring?”
He sat forward, stroking his mouth pelt like an old-school villain. “This past summer. You sure you don’t want something to write with?”
“Memory like a steel trap.” I tapped my noggin. “Do you know Clive Majors?”
Frederick’s eyes narrowed. “I went to high school with a person with that name.”
“Did you recently give him a chunk of cash?”
To my surprise, Frederick laughed. It was a rich, friendly sound.
It almost made me want to smile, and I had a glimpse into the personal charisma that might get him elected to public office. “I’ve been donating money to a lot of charities lately. It’s hard to keep track of them all. If you’re looking for a scandal, though, I’m afraid you won’t find one here. I did know Clive. Not well, but Battle Lake isn’t so big that anyone’s a stranger. He sold me a piece of land back in October. The deed just went through. The land is undeveloped, right on Bass Lake outside of town. I hope to build a summer cabin there, time willing.”
I was sniffing around his corners, looking for the lie in his words, but they made sense on the surface. “What’s your middle name?”
“My, you get around a conversation. It’s Craig. What’s yours?”
“Rayn.” I stood and
turned toward the door. “I’ll show myself out.” I was mad that I’d revealed my real middle name and even angrier that he’d had a smug answer, but I’d gotten my information. He was tied to this, no doubt, and a quick search of my bionic database would reveal the truth about his supposed land purchase. In the meantime, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d just disturbed a rattlesnake.
Thirty-two
When I returned to Battle Lake, I found Peggy had done a nice job with the library. In fact, she seemed entirely in her element helping people locate what they needed. Maybe she hadn’t yet tapped into the type of inspiration she was looking for, but she seemed a lot happier than when I first met her. She asked to stay on until close. Together we shut down the library, but not before I went online to search land tract sales and confirm that Clive Majors had not sold and Frederick Craig Milton had not bought any land in the past ten years. Frederick was a slimy liar. That fact, combined with the check he’d written Tom’s killer, on top of his initials placing him at the scene of Lyle’s murder, strongly suggested that he was one of the original Musketeers. But why start killing off those tied to the rape after all these years? I had no answers.
When I got home after work, I discovered a phone bill and a postcard in my mailbox, the latter from Mrs. Berns:
Arizona is crap. Everyone around here says it’s the grandest state in America, but calling your ass a turkey doesn’t make it Thanksgiving. And there’s old people everywhere you look. It’s disturbing. Do you believe someone asked me to golf ? Do I look like I’m dead? I’m coming home next Wednesday. Pick me up at the airport at 2:00, and you better have the case solved so you can tell me all about it.
—Your friend, Mrs. Berns
p.s. I got you a t-shirt.
I smiled. Inside, I gave Tiger Pop and Luna a strong dose of attention before tending to the blinking red dot on my answering machine.
Mira. It’s Hallie. Call me. It’s urgent.
Her voice sounded as if she had been exercising or crying or both. The record indicated she’d called a half an hour ago. I rang her up immediately.
“Mira.”
Boy, caller ID was unnerving. “What’s wrong?”
“Everybody at work is talking about a mechanic in Parkers Prairie who was shot last night. Was it the one my dad brought his car to? Lyle?”
I cursed my stupidity. Of course she would hear of Lyle’s death. Small towns, small county. “Yeah. It was Lyle.”
“I knew it!” She exhaled deeply on the other end, and her voice, when it came back on the line, contained a tremor. “It’s connected to my dad’s death. There’s something else going on. What have you found out?”
“Nothing for sure,” I said carefully. “I spoke with Julius, the man you were concerned had the original idea for Battle Sacks. There’s no axe to grind there. Your dad actually visited Julius regularly. They were friends. Your stepmom had nothing but good to say about Tom, as well.”
“Did you find out why my dad brought his car all the way out to Lyle to get it fixed?”
“Lyle believed that your dad owed him, although he never said exactly what for. I’m still looking into that.” I measured my options and decided to come at it from the side. “Would you know anything about the Four Musketeers of Battle Lake, a group of friends your dad would have hung out with in high school or right after?”
There was a pause at the other end of the line, then a laugh. The scoff in it was irritating. “Well, not just high school. They were lifelong friends. Mitch Courier, Fred Milton, and my dad were thick as thieves. He never called them the Musketeers, but I heard others refer to the group and put two and two together. My dad always tried to include Clive, too, but he never quite fit in. My dad didn’t give up on him, though. He said they grew up together, went to school together, and would take care of each other until the end. Do you think Clive killing my dad had anything to do with the Musketeers? Jealousy over their connection, maybe?”
I slapped my forehead. All this running around to discover for her what she already knew. The best-laid plans of detectives and women … “It’s a possibility. Why didn’t you tell me about the Musketeers?”
“You asked me for a list of people who might have it out for my dad. They were his friends.”
Of course. “Can you think of anything else your dad was stressed about before he died, anything he said or something unusual he did?”
“He was stressed about my health. That’s all we talked about the weeks leading up to his death.”
“Ach. I’m an ass for not even asking. How are you feeling?”
“Pretty good, for someone with chronic kidney failure.”
“Failure? I’m so sorry.”
She made a dismissive sound. “It’s not nearly as bad as it sounds. I’m in the early stages. The doctors say I could live for decades like this, with regular dialysis. I just need to manage my stress and diet. Of course, my dad didn’t live long enough to hear that good news. He just knew my kidneys were failing. It was driving him crazy. I suppose that’s another reason I feel like I need to uncover what happened. I was responsible for so much stress in his life. If it wasn’t for Fred, Clive, and Mitch hunting and fishing with him and making sure he relaxed, he probably would have died of a heart attack any day now. The irony, right?”
The click in my brain was as loud as a femur snapping. The three letters that Lyle had written on his calendar right before he’d been shot in the chest were not the initials of a single person. They were the initials of the remaining Musketeers. FCM: Frederick, Clive, and Mitchell.
Thirty-three
Any day that starts with me driving to Alexandria, Minnesota, to buy sheer black nylons and a $14.99 pair of black pleather heels isn’t going to end well. Or can only get better, if you prefer that your empty-headed clichés have rosy cheeks. On the drive to Alex, I’d contemplated what solving the FCM initials did for my case. If I was right, the three men had been on their way to pay off Lyle, but why now, so many decades after the crime? And why had they killed him instead? He’d already done the time. There was nothing new he could tell anyone. And how was Carla and Clive’s relationship tied up with all of it?
I considered going to the police with what I knew, but they wouldn’t believe my far-out accusations that an upstanding attorney who was now running for county commissioner, a wealthy hunt club owner with sterling connections to the law, and the owner of the most successful business in the county had raped a woman four decades earlier, framed another man for the crime, and intended to bribe him but then killed him instead. Oh, and that the fourth sometimes-member of the gang was now coincidentally dating the victim? Even if they believed all that, the circumstances still wouldn’t connect to Tom’s death, a connection which I couldn’t even see clearly myself.
The problem was, the killers might not realize that I was still without answers, which placed me in the direct line of danger until I solved this crime. The men clearly weren’t picky about offing anyone who stood in the way of their goal, whatever it was. Those pleasant thoughts carried me all the way through the shoe store, to the front counter to purchase my little iron maidens, and back to the hunt club, which was so busy that I had instructions to park in a plowed field across the road, from which point I would be shuttled to the main lodge.
When I’d first poked into the main lobby, I was worried that I was going to run into Mitchell and be kicked out on my bumper, but the place was humming like a hive and it was easy to blend in. That left me time for a new worry: the skanky “uniform” that I’d been handed as I entered the changing room, a large closet designated as our private area, my new shoes and nylons in a plastic bag dangling from my hand. When I unfolded the uniform, I realized that the skirt that was supposed to reach my knees would have, if I were five. The tight red sweater was a fake-fur-trimmed and low cut v-neck designed to display cleavage, but here the joke was on them: I didn’t have any. Ha.
The Fates intervened before I got too cocky, though, revealin
g that I’d accidentally bought control top nylons. I’m not saying that I didn’t have a top to control. I’m saying that the top of these nylons was better suited to choking a snake than supporting my lady parts. Once I’d slid the nylon vise grip over my belly, did the knees-out wedgie bend to align the pantyhose so they weren’t cutting off all the blood to any one area, and yanked on the sweater and the skirt, I had only to slide into the two-inch heels and walk out to get my serving directions. Easy peasy.
“Whoa, have you been drinking?”
I stabbed a look at the woman who’d spoken. She was short, maybe 5'2", but she had enough boobage for the both of us. “No. Why?”
“Weak ankles, then?” She pointed at my feet, her expression sympathetic.
“I don’t understand.”
“Honey, you’re walking like a dog with shit on its feet.”
I took in the ridiculousness of my body from the neck down.
If 13-year-old boys ruled the universe, this is what we’d all be required to wear. The women, anyhow. The guys would be in t-shirts, blue jeans, and laser-gun belts. “It’s been a while since I wore heels.”
“When you say ‘a while,’ what do you mean?”
I thought. “Maybe since the fifth of Never.”
“That’s what I figured. Here. Let me show you how.”
I spent the next ten minutes receiving a crash course in stilt walking. The woman, Connie was her name, started out with big, “heel-toe, heel-toe” aspirations for me, but it turned out she was a realist, too. She ended up showing me how to keep everything stiff from the knee down and shuffling forward. It wasn’t pretty, but it was an improvement from my Frankenstein stomp.
“That looks fine, honey. No one is going to look at your feet anyhow, not with those legs and that face. And I have one more thing.”
Before I could object, she pressed a shot glass against my lips. I smelled peppermint and felt the hot liquid brushing my mouth like a lover, and damn if I didn’t take it in one swallow. It burned on the way down and brought its heat all the way to the edge of my toes. I smiled.