Marja McGraw - Bogey Man 03 - They Call Me Ace

by Marja McGraw

  come outside when the police arrived, and they watched the little procession with curiosity, talking among themselves.

  “What do you want me to do?” Max asked. “Do you need me here? Or can I leave?”

  “Why don’t you wait here for a few minutes?” Janet suggested.

  Max shrugged and sat down on the front steps of the house.

  Chris and I followed Janet to the small house next door. It was newer than the place where she’d been killed, but probably not by much. The small porch looked like it had recently been painted a light grey. The house was a darker grey, and the trim had been painted green. There were flower pots lining the edges of the porch, and flowers were in full bloom. There was a hibiscus bush at the end of the porch – it was neatly trimmed. The front door was painted green to match the trim.

  “What was her name?” I asked.

  “Kimberly Rose Hawthorne,” Janet replied, climbing up the two steps to the porch. She pushed the doorbell and waited, listening. “She was twenty-four, and had a birthday coming up in a couple of weeks.”

  Chris and I kept quiet. Janet had to work out whether this was just another case or if it was personal. She once told me she tried to keep her feelings about the victims at a distance, but sometimes it wasn’t possible. Her tone of voice made me feel that for some reason this one might be personal. Maybe she’d tell me why, and maybe she wouldn’t.

  She rang the bell again, and knocked loudly. When there was still no response, she tried the door handle. It was locked.

  Turning, she walked down the steps. “Let’s check the back door,” she said over her shoulder.

  Looking toward the other yard, she saw three coppers looking at something. “Hernandez,” she yelled. “Over here,

  please.”

  He waved at her and headed our way.

  There was no fence, so we walked around the side of the house unimpeded, heading for the back door. Chris and I were talking softly, and as we neared the door Janet held her hand out.

  She pulled her gun out of her shoulder holster. “I want you two to head back to the other house.” She spoke softly and motioned Hernandez to move forward.

  Chris pointed at the back door. It stood wide open.

  Before I could say anything, he took hold of my shoulders and turned me around, pushing me toward the old house next door.

  “Chris – ” I began.

  “Shhh. Let them do their job.”

  I missed the grand entry into the house because the Bogey Man was shushing, pushing and herding me away from the yard. I heard Hernandez holler, “Clear” and pulled away from Chris, turning back to the young woman’s house. Instead of stopping me, he followed along behind. I knew he was as curious as I was.

  We found Janet and Hernandez standing outside the back door, talking. She glanced up and saw us and said something to Hernandez. He turned and reentered the house.

  “It looks like she walked out and left the door open because she thought she’d be right back. The TV was still on and she had a bowl of popcorn sitting on the end table.”

  “Maybe she saw the same light my mother saw and went over to investigate,” Chris said. “The way my mother described it, the light looked like it was floating past the window.”

  Janet looked past us, toward the other house. “Where is your mother?”

  “She and my father-in-law took Mikey for a walk. They decided it would be better to get him away from here for a

  few minutes.” I pointed in the general direction of the street.

  Janet nodded. “I want to talk to her again and find out exactly what she saw. Maybe she heard something while she was in the house.”

  “In the house?” Chris tried to sound innocent, but he’d already given it away.

  “Yes, Junior, in the house. You already told me she was in there last night.” Janet folded her arms across her chest and gave Chris the same look I give Mikey when I think he’s fibbing to me.

  “Don’t call me Junior, and it was worth a try. I didn’t know if you were listening when I mentioned her adventure last night.”

  “I’m not going to mention what you call her adventure. I just want to know what she saw and heard.” Janet let her arms drop to her sides and walked into the house.

  I followed. So did Chris.

  Hernandez gave us a questioning look and Janet shrugged, saying we were okay. She also reminded us not to touch anything.

  “Detective, you might want to come listen to this.” The copper was standing next to a telephone with an answering machine. Janet walked over and stood next to him. He pushed the Play button and stood back.

  There were three messages from someone named Cloene. The first two were just, “Hey, call me back. It’s Cloene.”

  The third one was a bit more frantic. “Kimmie, it’s Cloene. I’m getting worried. You said you’d call me back after you checked out the old house next door. Quit fooling around and call me. Now! Aww, come on. If you’re there, pick up.” There was a pause before she spoke again. “I’ll be over in the morning to check on you.”

  “Okay, this woman knows something about what happened last night. Let’s see if we can find a phone number

  for her.”

  Not knowing if any crime had been committed in the smaller house, Hernandez put on gloves before he picked up a personal phone book from next to the answering machine. He flipped through it. “Here it is, Detective. Cloene Farmer.” He read off a phone number while Janet wrote it down on a piece of paper.

  “I’ll call her right now.” Janet pulled her cell phone out of her purse. “I want to know what Cloene might know.”

  “What’s going on here?” A young woman entered through the back door. Her tanned face had turned pale and she ran her fingers through long, blonde hair. Unlike Kimberly, this young woman didn’t have any tattoos or piercings. She glanced at each of us, and I could see fear in her brown eyes. “Where’s Kimmie?”

  Chapter Eight

  “Who are you?” Janet’s expression said she knew the answer before she asked the question.

  Hernandez stood casually with one hand on the butt of his holstered gun and the other hanging at his side. He seemed to be studying the visitor.

  “I’m Cloene Farmer. Has something happened to Kimmie? Where is she?” She looked at Chris as though she thought he might have an answer. He, in turn, looked to Janet for help.

  “Cloene,” Janet said, “there’s been an incident.”

  Cloene looked into Janet’s eyes, and seeming to anticipate the depth of the incident, a tear ran down her cheek. “What kind of an incident? Something’s happened to Kimmie, hasn’t it?”

  Janet held her hand up, palm facing Cloene, in a just a moment attitude and looked at Chris. “I want to talk to your mother. Would you see if you can find her? Hernandez will go with you.” She nodded at the copper.

  The two men walked out the door without a word, although Hernandez turned back for a last look at the young woman.

  Janet put her arm across Cloene’s shoulders. “Come with me.” She led her into the living room and suggested she sit on the couch.

  I stood in the doorway and watched the two women.

  “Cloene, your friend has died. Can you – ”

  “Kimmie’s dead? How? When? Oh, my God, her parents will freak out. They didn’t want her to move to California. My parents didn’t want me to move here either.” That was as far as she got before she started sobbing.

  Janet sat quietly and let her cry it out for a few minutes. Glancing up, she motioned me into the room. I sat down next to Cloene and began rubbing her back. She turned to me with questions in her eyes. I threw my arms around her and let her cry on my shoulder. She held on tight.

  When the crying subsided and resignation replaced the tears, she sat back and rubbed her eyes. “What happened?”

  “I was hoping you could tell us something. She was found in the old house next door.”

  “Did she fall down the stairs?”

>   “No, she didn’t.” Janet looked uncomfortable. “Someone murdered her.”

  Cloene began crying uncontrollably again, and Janet grimaced.

  I placed my hands on Cloene’s face and turned her toward me. “Cloene, Detective Riley needs to ask you some questions. We heard the messages you left on Kimberly’s answering machine. You may know something that could help.”

  Cloene took a deep breath and looked into Janet’s eyes. “What do you want to know?”

  Janet asked Cloene exactly what happened the night before. “What made you worry about her?”

  Kimberly called Cloene around seven o’clock and said she’d been hearing strange noises coming from the house next door. She carried the cordless phone to the back door with her and looked at the house while the two young women were talking. She told Cloene she could see a light moving around the house, and it looked weird – like it was floating.

  That grabbed my attention and held it. That’s exactly what Mikey and Judith had said.

  Kimberly told Cloene she was going to check it out and she’d call her back. She never did. That was as much as the young woman knew.

  “Had she ever mentioned anything going on at the house next door before?” Janet asked.

  “She’d heard noises before, but she figured it was the old house settling. You know how they make creaking noises. Even this house creaks sometimes.”

  I mentally raised my eyebrow. Creaky old house noises wouldn’t carry all the way to Kimberly’s house.

  Janet asked if Kimberly had ever seen lights at the house before, and Cloene said that as far as she knew, she hadn’t.

  “What time did Judith stop at the house?” Janet asked me.

  “I think it was around eight o’clock, but you’ll have to ask her to be sure.”

  “Judith?” Cloene asked.

  “My mother-in-law. She saw a light, too, and stopped to check it out.”

  “Did she see Kimmie? Was she okay then?”

  I shook my head. Cloene’s gaze fell and she studied her hands. “I’ve got to call Kimberly’s parents.”

  “Please let me talk to them first.” Janet asked for their phone number, and Cloene recited it.

  Chris and his mother walked through the back door and waited near the doorway to the kitchen.

  Cloene’s voice trembled when she said, “Kimmie and I have been BFFs since we were little kids back in Ohio.”

  “BFFs?” Chris asked.

  “Best Friends Forever,” his mother translated. “It’s something kids use for slang.”

  “Oh.” Chris looked like he’d rather be anywhere other than this little house, and I couldn’t blame him. He didn’t handle crying women very well.

  Judith walked into the living room and sat down next to Cloene. “Tell me about Kimberly. What made her so special to you?”

  Janet and I left the two women alone and walked out to the kitchen.

  “Do you need me here?” Chris asked. “I could go talk to my father if you don’t need me.”

  “Get outta here, Junior,” Janet said, taking her life in her hands. Too many people had been calling Chris Junior, and I knew he wasn’t happy with it. However, he ignored it this time.

  “I wonder what kind of noises Kimberly was hearing,” I said, quietly. “They had to be fairly loud to be heard all the way over here.”

  “You’d think so. I’m not done talking to Cloene yet, so I’ll see if she knows anything else. I want to talk to your mother-in-law, but I think I’ll talk to Cloene first. You can head home and I’ll talk to Mrs. Cross later.”

  “Why don’t you come over for dinner and you can talk to her then?”

  “What time?” Janet ate so much fast food because of her job that she enjoyed eating at our house from time to time. And this way she could multitask and take care of two things at once. Eating and talking to Judith.

  When we returned to the old house, Max had left. The coppers had talked to him and sent him on his way. Poor guy. He couldn’t seem to list a house that didn’t have a dead body

  taking up space.

  Hernandez walked back over to Kimberly’s house.

  Chris and his dad left, taking Mikey with them, and Judith and I drove home in my Jeep.

  “Janet is coming over for dinner,” I said. “She wants to talk to you about last night.”

  “Am I in trouble?” She’d asked that question before.

  “I don’t think so. She just wants to know what you saw and heard. So start thinking about it. I know you didn’t see anything because you would have told us, but did you hear anything?”

  Judith was quiet for a few minutes. “You know, I think I might have heard something, but it didn’t sink in at the time.”

  I glanced at her quickly before I turned my attention back to the road. “Okay, so what did you hear?”

  “You’ll think I’m nuts. Well, you probably already think that, but this won’t help my cause.”

  I laughed. “No, I don’t think you’re crazy. But I do want to know what you heard.”

  She didn’t answer me right away, and when she did I thought she was changing the subject. “You know, when Junior – Chris – was a child, he thought I was flighty. I had lots of hobbies and causes. I was always trying something new. I remember once when I made some candles – ”

  “I heard about the exploding candles,” I interrupted.

  “Yes, I’m sure you did, and I’m sure you heard other things, too. But did he bother to tell you that he had more fun with his mother than any of the other kids? He had a well-rounded life with me around. I kept him busy and out of trouble.”

  “Didn’t he have any friends to play with?” I asked.

  “Oh, of course he did. And I entertained them, too. Surprisingly, there was only one set of parents who wouldn’t let their son come over to play at our house. They were

  wound pretty tight to begin with though. The rest of the parents were happy to have me take care of the kids. I never put any of them in danger or anything.”

  “No, just Chris.” I wiggled my eyebrows, making the point that his had burned off.

  Judith laughed. “That was his fault. He wanted to see my candles work and he wouldn’t wait for me. And it wasn’t that big of an explosion. It was just a little phhtt, and then it was over. He was leaning over the candle and he shouldn’t have been. He wouldn’t have been if he’d waited for me. He’s lucky he didn’t lose more than his eyebrows. I suppose he told you about the glue incident, too.”

  I wiggled my eyebrows again. “No, I haven’t heard about that one.”

  “In some ways, Chris was his own worst enemy. He was always rushing into things.” She paused, smiling. “I guess he got that from me. Anyway, I’d found a new hobby. I was going to rummage sales, which are the same as today’s yard sales, and buying things like chairs and old dresses and blouses.”

  I had to admit that Judith had my attention, but I couldn’t figure out what this had to do with what she heard. “What kind of chairs?”

  “Kitchen table chairs. I’d refinish them and use the cloth from the old clothes to create a cover for the seat. I used to sew, so I’d make the cover, stuff it and voila, the old chairs were like new.”

  Thinking back to Chris’s story about the dog hair pillows, I had to ask. “What did you stuff the covers with, Judith.”

  “Call me Mom. I used the remnants from the clothing and old pantyhose.” Her eyes narrowed as she studied me. “Hmm. Chris told you about the dog hair pillows, didn’t he?” It wasn’t a question as much as an accusation.

  “He did.”

  “Well, anyway, I decided I wanted to make the covers permanent, so I found a super strong glue. I put some on the chair, and made a ring around the pillow before I turned it over and stuck the two surfaces together. You probably have at least some idea of what’s coming, but I’ll tell you anyway.”

  “I’m sure it will surprise me.”

  “Okay, so Junior was playing outside. I heard him
yell and I knew he’d hurt himself. It seems he sat down on a pile of firewood, and there was a nail in one of the boards. When he jumped up, the board was nailed to his behind. Before I could run outside to see what happened, he came flying in the back door. The board caught on the doorframe and dislodged itself.”

  “I – ”

  “There’s more. He pulled down the back of his pants and was turning in circles trying to see his rear, and he was crying, and he lost his balance. He fell onto the chair, which I’d just glued, and he stuck. I hadn’t placed the cover on it yet.”

  I started to laugh, picturing the Bogey Man in this awkward position.

  “Because his accident interrupted me, the glue had dried just enough to latch onto him, and he was so surprised he didn’t jump right up. But I’m the eccentric one with the weird hobbies.” She sighed. “We had to take him to the hospital to get the chair removed and he had to have a tetanus shot because of the nail. It wasn’t a red letter day for Junior.”

  After I stopped laughing, I asked, “So what does this have to do with what you heard in that old house?”

  “I just wanted you to know that I’m not really crazy. Sometimes it’s just a matter of circumstances.”

  “Okay, I get it. Now what did you hear?”

  “Someone was whistling very softly. I honestly don’t think it was my imagination. And the tune was Beautiful Dreamer. Doesn’t that strike you as odd?”

  “You bet. If someone had just committed a murder, why would they be nonchalantly whistling in the first place? And it seems kind of twisted to be whistling that particular tune.”

  Chapter Nine

  Judith fixed dinner, which consisted of some mini meatloaves with barbeque sauce in and on them, mashed potatoes and corn on the cob. I put the salad together.

  While she was cooking, Sherlock and Watson followed her around the kitchen, and while we ate dinner they held a vigil, one on each side of her chair. I started to put them outside, but Judith stopped me, saying they were okay where they were. They watched her with adoration in their eyes. For once we ate at the more formal table in the dining room. With the addition of Janet, there wasn’t room for all of us at the kitchen table.