“I’d like to work with you. I’m so accustomed to doing the chores alone.”
“When was the last time you stained these fences?”
“Eight years ago.”
He studied the faded boards and posts. “That’s good, Harry. Usually this stuff fades out after two or three years. I pulled five gallons out of the big drum you’ve got there. I’m impressed with your practicality. Had the drum on its side on two wrought-iron supports, drove a faucet in the front just like a cask of wine. You know your stuff, kid. What is this, by the way?”
“Fence coat black. You can only buy it in one place in the U.S., Lexington Paint and Supply in Lexington, Kentucky. They ship it out in fifty-five-gallon drums. I’ve tried everything. This is the only stuff that lasts.”
“Smart girl.” He whistled as he painted, carefully, as he did everything. He was a tidy and organized man. “Is there a connecting link between the two victims?”
“Huh?”
“Leo and Charlie.”
“Well, they graduated in 1980 from Crozet High School. They were both handsome. That’s about it. They weren’t friends. I don’t think they saw one another after high school.”
“Nothing else? Did they play football together or golf or did they ever date sisters or the same woman? Were they involved in financial dealings together?”
Harry was beginning to appreciate Tracy’s ability to construct patterns, to look for the foundation under the building. “No. Charlie wasn’t much of an athlete. He thought he was but he wasn’t. Leo was much better. He played football and basketball in high school and then he played football in college, too.”
“Where’d he go?”
“Uh, Wake Forest.”
“What about Charlie?”
“He went up north. Charlie was always smart in a business way. He went to the University of Pennsylvania. Charlie had a lot of clients. He was an independent stockbroker. I don’t know if Leo was one or not, though I doubt he was.”
“Anything else?”
“They were both senior superlatives. I can’t see that as much of a connection, though. Not for murder, anyway.”
“I saw you had two superlatives.”
“I know you were Most Athletic.”
“Yep. We have that in common.” He smiled at her. “Keep a notebook handy. Has to be little so you can stick it in a pocket. When ideas occur, write them down. No matter how silly. You’d be surprised at what you know that you don’t know.”
“Interesting.” Murphy got up and headed for the barn.
“Where are you going?” Pewter enjoyed eavesdropping.
“Tackroom. I am determined to destroy those mice.” She flicked her tail when she said that.
Tucker laughed. Murphy stopped, fixing the corgi with a stare, a special look employed by Southern women known as “the freeze.” Then she walked off.
“We’ll find the killer or killers before she gets one thieving mouse.” Tucker laughed loudly.
That quick, Murphy turned, leapt over a startled Pewter, bounded in four great strides to the corgi. She flung herself upon the unsuspecting dog, rolling her over. Tucker bumped into the big paint bucket. A bit slopped out, splattering her white stomach.
“Murphy!” Harry yelled at her.
Murphy growled, spit, swatted the dog as she righted herself, then tore toward the barn, an outraged Tucker right after her. Just as Tucker closed the gap, Murphy, the picture of grace, leapt up, and the dog ran right under her. The cat twisted in midair, landed on the earth for one bound, was airborne again as she jumped onto the bumper of the red dually, then hurtled over the side into the bed. She rubbed salt into the wound by hanging over the side of the truck bed as the dog panted underneath.
“Cat got your tongue?”
“Murphy,” Tucker said between pants, “I’ll get you for that.”
“Ha ha.” Murphy jumped onto the dome of the cab.
The truck, parked in front of the barn entrance, gleamed in the rich late-afternoon light.
Harry laid her paintbrush on the side of the can. “Don’t you dare put paw prints on my new truck.” She advanced on the tiger, who glared insolently at her, then chased her tail on the cab hood to leave as many paw prints as possible.
Just as Harry reached the door to open it so she could step inside and gain some height to grab the little stinker, Murphy gathered herself together, hunched down, and then jumped way, way up. She just made it into the open hayloft, digging up the side with her back claws as she hung on with her front paws. Her jet stream rocked the light fixture, which looked like a big Chinaman’s hat poised over the hayloft opening.
She looked down at her audience. “I am the Number One Animal. Don’t you forget it.” Then she sauntered into the hayloft.
Tracy laughed so hard he doubled over. “That’s quite a cat you’ve got there, Harry.”
“Heatstroke,” Tucker grumbled furiously.
“More like the big head,” Pewter replied.
“I still say she won’t catch one lousy mouse.”
“Tucker, if I were you, I wouldn’t say it any too loudly. Who knows what she’ll do next?” Pewter advised.
* * *
25
“—everybody.”
“That’s very edifying.” Rick leaned toward BoomBoom sitting opposite him in her living room. “But I’d like to hear the names from your lips.”
“Well, Leo Burkey of course, Bonnie Baltier, Denny Rablan, Chris Sharpton, Bitsy Valenzuela, Harry, Marcy Wiggins, who mostly stood around, and Susan.”
“Then what?”
She shifted in her seat, irritated at his pickiness. “Have you interviewed everyone else?”
He counted names on his notepad. “No.”
“Are you going to tell me who’s left?”
“No. Now, BoomBoom, get on with it. What did you do, and so forth.”
“We were reshooting the senior superlative which was Wittiest with Bonnie Baltier and Leo Burkey for the reunion. After we finished, everyone went to the Outback to eat. Marcy called her husband, Bill, who met her after work. They’re making a point of spending time together. And Bitsy called her husband, E.R., to invite him. He took a pass, said he was tired. Funny, he was such a quiet guy in high school. To think he’d go out and start a cellular phone company. He has no class spirit, unfortunately. Neither does Bill.”
“No tension at dinner?”
“No, because Harry went home. She doesn’t like me,” BoomBoom flatly stated. “And I have tried very hard to make amends. It’s silly to carry around emotions, negative emotions.”
“I wouldn’t know.” He reached in his pocket for the red Dunhill pack and offered her a cigarette. “Mind?”
“No. Those are expensive.”
“And good. I tried to wean myself off smoking by buying generic brands. Awful stuff.”
“I have some herbal remedies if you decide to stop again.”
“I’ll let you know.”
“Anyway, nothing much happened. We all ate, told tales, bored Marcy and Chris and Bitsy, but they were gracious about it. Denny flirted with Chris. She didn’t seem to mind. Then we went home.”
“Did Leo linger with anyone in the parking lot? Talk to a waitress?”
She put her finger to her chin. “He cornered Bitsy for a minute as we left, but well, you’d have to ask her. I think they were discussing mutual friends and whether E.R. could give Leo a deal on a cell phone.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Do you have any leads? I mean surely you’ve noticed the two victims were killed right after their senior superlative reshoot. That’s what bothers me. That and those offensive, cheap mailings!”
“Yes, we have leads.” He exhaled, then continued his questioning. “Did anyone wear L.L. Bean duck boots that night?”
“What?”
“You know, the boots that made L.L. Bean famous. We call them duck boots but I guess today that means the short rubber shoe. Short, tall, did anyone wear them?”<
br />
“No. That’s an odd question.”
“Did anyone wear heels? Not spike heels, but say about two inches.”
“Do you think I spend my time cruising people’s feet?” She laughed.
“I know you are a woman of fashion. I expect you take in everything, BoomBoom.”
“Let’s see.” She studied a spot at the left-hand corner of the ceiling. “Baltier wore white espadrilles. Susan wore navy blue flats, Pappagallo. Susan loves Pappagallo. Bitsy wore a low heel, Marcy wore sandals, Chris wore a slingback with a bit of heel. Harry wore sneakers, as you would suspect, since it’s summer.”
“Why?”
“Harry wears sneakers in the summer, Bean boots in the rain, or riding boots. Oh yes, and her favorite pair of cowboy boots. That’s the repertoire.”
“Did she wear her Bean boots?”
“No, I just said, she wore sneakers.”
He dropped his eyes to his notes. “So you did.”
“How big are the footprints?” BoomBoom asked.
He crossed his arms over his chest, uncrossed them, picked up his cigarette out of the ashtray, taking another drag. “BoomBoom, you don’t ask me questions. I ask you.”
“I hate to think of Leo like that.” Her eyes brimmed sud-denly with tears, but then it was well known BoomBoom could cry at a telephone commercial. “He was such fun. He—” She shrugged, unable to continue.
Rick waited a moment. “He was an old friend.”
“Yes,” came the quiet reply.
“Did you know he was divorcing his wife?”
“Yes.” She opened her hands, palms upward. “He told us at the Outback. I think he was upset, although Leo always made a joke about everything.”
“Will you go to the funeral?”
“Of course I’ll go.”
“It’s in Richmond, isn’t it?”
“Yes. St. Thomas. The most fashionable church in Richmond.”
“Leo from a good family?” He dropped the verb.
“Yes, but he married higher on the social ladder. His wife is a Smith. The Smiths.”
“And I don’t suppose they’ve named any of their daughters Pocahontas.”
“Uh . . .” The corners of her mouth turned upward. “No.”
“I expected you to be more upset.” He ground his cigarette into the ashtray until tiny brown strands of tobacco popped out of the butt. “You’re the emotional type.”
“I guess I’m in denial. First Charlie. Now Leo. It’s not real yet.”
“Did they ever date the same girl?”
“In high school?”
“Any time that you can recall.”
“No. Not even from grade school.”
“Can you think of anyone who hated Leo?”
“No. His wit could rip like a blade sometimes. But a true enemy? No. And I don’t think his wife hated him either. After all, divorce is such a pedestrian tragedy.”
“That’s poetic.”
“Is it?” She batted her long eyelashes at Rick, not a conventionally handsome man but a very masculine one.
He smiled back. “If you think of anything, give me a call.” He stood up to leave and she rose with him.
“Sheriff, do you think Charlie and Leo were killed by the same person or persons?”
“I don’t know, and I’m not paid by your tax dollars to jump to conclusions.”
She showed him the door and bid him good day.
Later that same day he compared notes with Cynthia Cooper. Between the two of them they had buttonholed everyone who’d been at the shoot that day. Better to catch people as soon after an incident as possible. Rick was a strong believer in that.
They’d found Leo’s car still in the parking lot at the Outback. None of the restaurant staff remembered seeing him get into another car, but they had been inside working. The small gathering of friends didn’t remember him getting into another car either.
They sat in his office drawing up a flow chart for Leo. Each person’s story confirmed what every other person said. There were no glaring omissions, no obvious contradictions.
“Boss, he could have picked someone up after the dinner and gone to wherever they went in their car. Charlottesville is a college town. There’s a semblance of night life.” Not for her. She fell between the college students and the married, which put her in the minority.
“Could have.”
“You think he knew the killer just as Charlie probably did, don’t you?”
“If he didn’t know the killer I’m convinced the killer is innocuous in some fashion. A nonthreatening person or functionary, you know, like a teacher.” He stopped. “Someone you wouldn’t look at twice in terms of physical fear. Leo could have been killed by a woman for that matter.”
“She’d have to be fairly strong to hoist him into the dumpster,” Cynthia said.
“Yes, but it could be done. The man Hunter Hughes saw go into the locker room at Farmington was thin. Average height, but as it was from a distance the man could have been shorter. Doesn’t mean it’s our killer, and it doesn’t mean the same person killed both men. But it’s odd.”
“That it is.”
“Have you talked to Charlie’s ex-wives?”
Cynthia cracked her knuckles. “Yes. Finally reached Tiffany, wife number four—don’t you love it—‘Tiffany,’ in Hawaii. Said she’d heard he was shot and she was sorry she hadn’t done it herself. When I asked for suspects she said, apart from herself, the person who hated him most when she was married to him was Larry Johnson.”
“Larry Johnson? That doesn’t make any sense.” Rick ran his hand over his balding head. “Or maybe it does.”
“Abortions. Does Larry perform abortions?”
“He’s a general practitioner, so no, he doesn’t. But he knows where the bodies are buried, as they say.” He noted the clock on the wall, five-thirty in the afternoon. “The best time to talk to Larry is in the morning. Maybe we should both make this visit. Oh, did you talk to Mim yet?”
“Yes, she’s fine as long as she knows things before anyone else does.”
“I asked BoomBoom about shoes. She remembered everybody’s shoes. Another thing: for BoomBoom she was remarkably self-possessed. No vapors. No lace hankies to the eyes and thence to the bosom. Another oddity.”
“What do you think of Tracy Raz?” Cynthia asked.
“A trained observer and a damned sharp one at that.”
“Ran a check on him. Legit. Korea. A solid Army career, Major when he mustered out and into the CIA.”
“If he hadn’t pointed out those prints in front of the dumpster before more people walked around I might have missed them. He said nothing. He motioned with his eyes and then turned to push the gawkers back. He’s a pro.” He slapped his hand on his thigh. “You know what I’m going to do?” She shook her head and he continued. “Take the wife to the movies.”
“Good for you.” She wished she had someone in her life. She’d go out with a guy but eventually her schedule and work would turn him off. “I’ll see you at Larry’s office. Seven.”
“Yep.”
He stopped at the door. “Two footprints next to each other at the dumpster isn’t much to go on. The Bean footprint is a man’s, size eight and a half or nine. The heel footprint, well, we couldn’t tell, since the toe would have been on a rock.”
“Could have been a man and woman, side by side, heaving in Leo,” Coop said. “He was a short, but stocky man. But then, some of the trash in there was heavier than cartons.”
“Some memories are heavier than others, too.” He opened the door. “I don’t think it’s coincidence that Charlie’s death came now. And now Leo.” He shrugged. “Gotta go.”
* * *
26
Fair measured Poptart around the girth. He’d dropped by to see how Harry was doing after the shock. He glanced at last week’s figures on the chart hanging outside each horse’s stall.
Poptart quietly stood in the center aisle. The horse, a big g
irl, half-closed her eyes.
Mrs. Murphy, sitting on the tack trunk, asked, “Don’t you ever get hungry for meat?”
“No.”
“Not even an eensy piece?”
Pawing Through the Past Page 14