The Hunt Chronicles: Volume 1

by Leo Bonanno

  “You mean I can talk now?”

  “Oh, sorry, was I rambling? I’m sorry, Myron. You’re a stand-up Sheriff. I’m sure all of this has crossed your mind already.” Myron smiled and slapped me on the shoulder.

  “Just joshing ya, Professor. We’re working on his bank records to check for any suspicious activity. In fact, they might be back at the office by the time we get there.” Myron reached for his radio and pulled it to his lips. “Tuttle to Base, Tuttle to Base, come on back - over.”

  “Base to Tuttle, whatcha got boss – over.” A female replied.

  “Hey Jeannie, what’s the news on those Medley statements - over?”

  “Bank faxed ‘em over as soon as we delivered the warrant. They’re sitting on your desk. Bruce wants you to call him asap - over.”

  “Great, thanks Jeannie - Tuttle out.”

  “Base clear.”

  “Ugh, just awful.” I said.

  “What is it?” Myron said, surprised.

  “I can’t believe they’re letting Bruce Chancey run the show over there at Pendleton National.”

  “Oh, yeah. What a butt-head, right?”

  “If you think he’s a butt-head now, you should have seen him in English Lit. Picture a younger, more full of himself Bruce Chancey with more hormones, less fashion sense and crooked teeth.”

  “Ugh!” Myron said with a shudder. “And I thought police work was an ugly business.” The rest of the ride was draped in silence only broken by the occasional snicker.

  Our timing couldn’t have been better, or worse, depending on how you looked at it. Apparently Leon thought it would be easier on everyone to stick together during this tragic time, so he suggested everyone go to the precinct together to give their statements. It was a good idea considering Myron could have all of his statements inside an hour if he played his cards right and kept them talking. Of course, the down side was clearly noticeable after Carol Sykora and Dennis Trago were forced to spend considerable time near each other. “You jealous bastard! You fat jealous bastard!”

  “Oh please, Carol, jealous of what? Your lost career or your affair with the crypt keeper! The job was always mine!”

  “We’ll see Dennis. When Ruskin chooses, then we’ll see.”

  “You don’t sound so sure any more, Carol. Maybe you should have boinked the Mayor instead of your dead sugar daddy!” This entire scene was unfolding before our very eyes right in the middle of the waiting area, so of course every cop in the precinct sauntered to the counter to eavesdrop. Myron and I had just walked in when the volcano erupted. Surprise kept us frozen on the doormats. The glass doors behind us kept sliding open and closed, open and closed.

  “Please stop! Please stop!” Dolores Tilson cried from a chair against the wall. She took off her glasses and wiped them clean with a tissue. I watched as her eyes watered. Leon rushed to her side and sat next to her. She buried her face in his shoulder.

  “For God’s sake, Dennis, calm yourself. Both of you, just calm down.”

  “Watch yourself, Kinney,” Dennis said, pointing a finger. “You might have been his favorite but you’re sure as hell not mine!” Carol’s mouth dropped open. Tears were streaming down her face. Leon shot up and got nose-to-nose with the screaming oaf.

  “If I was his favorite it was because I treated him with the respect he deserved. You might have noticed that if you took your lips off his ass every now and then you loud-mouthed hippo!” Myron and I rocked back on our feet, our eyes open wide. I don’t think I ever heard Leon Kinney speak in that tone in all the years we’ve known each other. I don’t think anyone ever has.

  Myron finally snapped out of the initial shock and rushed into the eye of the storm, plowing himself between Carol, Leon and Dennis. He towered over all of them and spoke in a voice that would make God himself tremble. “You!” He bellowed, pointing over Carol’s head to an officer behind the counter. “Take this one into Room One,” he ordered, pointing at Carol. “You take this one into Room Two,” he ordered, pointing to Dennis. The precinct fell silent, but no one moved. “Now!” He screamed, and I saw the precinct windows shake in their panes. The two officers finally got moving. They rushed from around the counter, grabbed their charges and hustled them in separate directions.

  Myron turned to Leon, who was breathing very fast. I shuffled forward and grabbed him on the shoulder. Leon jumped a little, but then sighed with relief when he recognized me. I guided him back to the chair next to Dolores, who was sobbing into a handful of tissues. Myron turned again to face his troops. All at once, they stood up straight as arrows and stared at the top of his head. “Back to work!” With that, the troops backed up, stumbled about, and pretended to go back to whatever they were doing before we arrived.

  Myron kneeled in front of us and took a handkerchief out of his back pocket. His face was red and covered with moisture. He wiped his brow and took a deep breath. “Sorry ‘bout that, folks. Believe it or not, the anger management classes have really mellowed me.” Dolores giggled under her sobs and weeps. She pulled her face out of her hands to reveal two very red and wet eyes.

  “Oh jeez, I’m sorry,” she said, sniffling. “I’ve been crying all day.”

  “It’s alright, ma’am,” Myron said, now speaking in a voice that was soft and comforting, especially for a man that just shook the foundation of the building. “Mr. Kinney, can I talk to you for a minute?” Leon looked at me, and I nodded. He stood up, as did Myron. They walked over the counter and spoke softly.

  I moved into Leon’s chair and put a hand on Dolores’ shoulder. She wiped her glasses again and put them on. “This is so terrible, Mr. Hunt,” she said, staring at Leon and Myron. “Who could do such a thing? He was a good man. I was his assistant for over seven years. He was one of the best.”

  “I didn’t know him very well, but he definitely seemed like a fine man. I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to know him as well as you did.”

  “He liked you too, Mr. Hunt. He went on and on about you last night.” I shifted in my seat, my curiosity peaked.

  “When was that?”

  “After the party. A few miles away from the museum, I remembered that I pass the caterers everyday on my way to work. I turned around and went back for the dessert cart. I figured I would swing by the caterers on Monday morning and drop the cart off. When I went in, I was surprised to see Arnold still there, but there he was in his office combing through some papers. That’s when we started talking about you.” Dolores finally turned to look at me. “He liked you very much. I’m glad he had such a good time before he…he-”

  “It’s alright, Dolores. Breathe, just breathe.” She took two deep breaths and looked back into my eyes. “Oh, what’s that, Dolores?” I asked, pointing to her glasses. I saw her eyes shift behind the lenses. Her right eyeglass lens was warped and sticking out of the frame, and a very pronounced crack streaked across it.

  “Oh, that,” she said, pulling them off her face and holding them up to the light. “Accidentally sat on them last night after I got home. This is actually the third pair I’ve crushed.”

  “That’s a shame. Dolores, what time did you get back to the museum?” She replaced her glasses on her face and looked back up at Myron and Leon.

  “It was about a quarter after eleven, I guess.”

  “And he was okay when you left?”

  “Yes, he was fine. We were talking about you, and then I grabbed the cart and rolled it outside to the car. Couldn’t have been later than eleven-thirty when I left the second time.”

  “You got that cart into your car all by yourself?”

  “Well, now that you mention it, he did offer. He was reaching for his overcoat when the phone rang, so I told him not to bother. He was still on the phone when I came in to say goodnight, so I just left.”

  “Someone called the museum at eleven-thirty at night? How did they know he was there?”

  “Beats me. I didn’t hear who it was or what it was about. Do you think that’s important? I
didn’t think about most of this until just now. I didn’t know he was going to…going to…” Her eyes watered up again.

  “It’s okay, it’s okay. Make sure you tell all of this to Sheriff Tuttle.” She nodded and sat back in her chair, took another deep breath and turned towards the window. A moment later, Myron and Leon came back.

  “Ms. Tilson? I’m going to start with you so Leon can get you home. Thanks for coming in Mr. Kinney. I’ll have two of my boys drop the others home when I’m through with them. Ms. Tilson, please come with me.” He outstretched a massive hand. Dolores took it and stood, as did I. They walked behind the counter together into a forest of deputies and secretaries and disappeared.

  Leon and I sat down and he once again resembled the man with whom I’ve spent half of my career. “You alright?” I asked him.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry you had to see that.”

  “See what? You get upset or see a hippo in business casual wear?” He laughed and leaned back in his chair. “So, what did you tell Myron?”

  “The truth of course. I got us home a little after eleven, went to bed. I didn’t kill my boss and I don’t know who did.”

  “Carol and Dennis don’t seem to have a very good relationship. They were fighting last night at the party too.”

  “Ah, so you did hear that?” Leon asked. I nodded. “Well, it’s no secret that Dennis has been eyeing Arnold’s job for a while. He figured all of his butt-kissing would get him a recommendation for the promotion when Arnold retired.”

  “So what’s that got to do with Carol?” I asked.

  “Well, I’m not in the habit of repeating office claptrap, but word around the water cooler says Carol and Arnold had a, well…”

  “A thing?” I asked.

  “Yeah, sure. Don’t ask me when it started or when it ended or if there’s any proof of it at all because I haven’t got any.”

  “Well if it’s not true, how did the rumor start?”

  “Hard to say,” Leon said, standing up. He turned and looked down at me. “Maybe Dennis found out who Arnold was recommending. Maybe it was Carol instead of him. Maybe he started it. Carol and Arnold were working together on a budget amendment to fund some new exhibits. Started spending a lot of time together over in Town Hall. For all I know, a lonely secretary over there started it.” I stood up and began walking with Leon towards the door.

  “Leon, would anyone really know who Arnold was going to recommend?” Leon stopped walking abruptly and turned to me. His eyes then shot right to his feet and he began walking again. He wiped under his nose with the side of his hand. “No, Reevan. No one knows, and I guess no one ever will.”

  “Hey, where’s Emily?” I asked, finally noticing that she wasn’t in the precinct with the rest of us. Leon sat on the bench nearest the precinct entrance as I stood, shoving my hands into my pockets.

  “She turned down the ride,” he said. “Said she’d come in her own time. Hope she’s alright.”

  “Yeah, me too.” I said.

  “You know I can’t go giving out statements during a murder investigation, Professor. Frankly, I’m surprised that you would ask.” Embarrassed, I looked down into my lap as Myron turned onto Bires Road and headed for Town Hall. “However,” he added, and I felt the beginnings of a smile twitch on my lips. “I keep all of my notes in that pad there,” he said, and nodded to his right. In between us on the tan leather of the front seat lay his small notepad. “I can’t be held liable if that book fell into the wrong hands.” The car stopped at Bires Road and Old Route 9. With a red light in front of us, Myron turned to his left and gazed out the window up at the sky. “Looks like rain,” he said aloud.

  “Oh, does it?” I asked, too nervous to move a muscle.

  “Yessir, those are rain clouds. I’m no weather man, but I know one thing…” I looked up at him and watched as his right hand left the steering wheel, fingered his notepad and flicked it in my direction. “…I can’t be watching that pad every minute of every day.”

  “As I suspected, everyone went to sleep while their boss was being bludgeoned to death by a golden rhino.” I said as we walked into Town Hall.

  “Everyone except Dolores,” Myron added. “Haven’t gotten an official statement from Dr. Sellars yet, or that Scribbs woman, but-”

  “You can’t possibly think Emily had anything to do with this, Myron?” I said, stopping dead in my tracks at the entrance to Human Resources. “She’s a doctor.”

  “She’s a suspect, Professor. Their all suspects until this murder is under wraps.” Myron looked into the office and back at me. “Why are we here anyway?”

  “Listen Myron, why don’t you go and get your statements from Dr. Sellars or Ida Scribbs? I’ll find my own way home when I’m done here.” Myron cocked his head sideways, looking at me the way Niki looks at me when I say the words cookie or sausage.

  “You sure?” He finally said. “You want to share anything with me, Professor?”

  “Nothing to share, Sheriff.” With that, he turned and headed back the way we had come.

  I walked into the Human Resources office and stood at the counter for ten minutes as the woman behind it sat at her desk balancing her checkbook. Around minute eleven, she finally acknowledged my presence and slowly hoisted her large rump off her chair and up to the counter. “Can I help you?” She said, chomping on a wad of gum and rolling her eyes up towards the ceiling. After a minute of silence, I finally answered her.

  “I’m sorry. I was busy watching my tax dollars at work.” Her head cocked sideways, her eyes looking at me the way Niki looks at me when I say the words cookie or sausage.

  “What?” She finally asked.

  “I’d like to make a public records request.”

  “For what?” After a moment of thought, I smiled and stood on my tiptoes. I peered over the large, lazy mass in front of me to a row of filing cabinets behind her desk. They were labeled PERSONNEL FILES. She turned around slowly to see what I was looking at, and when she turned back to face me I was holding out a pen.

  “You’re going to need something to write on, Sunshine.”

  That night, for the first time in months, I did not turn on Law & Order, or PBS, or any of my other staple time killers. I pulled the coffee table up to my chair and dropped all of my photocopies on top of it. I spread them out into several piles: TRAGO, SYKORA, KINNEY, TILSON, SELLARS, MEDLEY. Niki seemed confused and restless, as though she couldn’t sleep without the television spitting out its brain cell-killing entertainment. “I’m about to do some research, Niki. You know what that means, don’t you?” She finally sat directly across from me, staring into my eyes over the buried table. “Ginger ale and saltines!” I said, clapping my hands. Niki did not react. “Well, go get it, girl! Saltines! Go get it!” I waived my hand towards the kitchen. Still my canine companion didn’t budge. “Fine, sausage…” I mumbled, and her head cocked sideways. I laughed and headed for the kitchen, Niki in toe. “A sausage for you, a ginger ale for me.” My little voice piped up for the first time in quite a while. Some people never change he said. “Baby steps,” I said aloud. “Baby steps.”

  I sat it my living room until 2:00 a.m. combing through memos and emails and correspondence from six different files. I fell asleep halfway through Leon’s file and lay there all night with my head on paper pillows.

  I had a dream that night. Its relevance to the murder investigation was probably nonexistent, but its relevance to my state of mind was most obvious.

  I was twelve years old again and back in Owl Creek. The school bus had just dropped me and Charlie Billington at our stop, a good mile from home. We stood there and watched as the school bus grew smaller and smaller until it was nothing but a yellow spec in the distance. Charlie and I turned and looked west, towards home. We had smiles on our faces. It was our favorite part of the day.

  The bus dropped us off, had always dropped us off, at the top of Naddler’s Hill. During the winter, kids from all over town would converge here to slide
down the icy slope on garbage can lids and pieces of cardboard, but then, in the middle of April, there was no snow. There was just Charlie Billington and Reevan Hunt atop the mountainous Naddler’s Hill. We were rolling in the cool grass all the way down. Life was good.

  We lay on the cool grass staring up at the sky. You’d have to wait a few minutes before the fluid in your brain would let you get up, never mind walk in a straight line. I could feel the cool grass on the back of my neck and earlobes. I could see the cumulonimbi billowing across their blue canvas. I could hear Charlie’s laughter and the whistling of the wind through the trees around us.

  We got up together, wobbly and giggling. We determined who had the best trip down Naddler’s Hill by rating each others’ grass stains and knee scrapes. We strolled on together for a short time. Charlie turned into his walkway and headed for his front door. I still had six more houses to go. Not a long ways, but long enough to find the phone is the ringing. What? The phone is ringing. What? Get up get up the phone is ringing!

  As fast as it had begun it was over. The scents of clean air and freshly cut grass faded. The smells of dog hair and bachelorhood rolled into consciousness, and the phone was ringing.

  My head shot up too fast, giving me an instant migraine. My drool and night sweat had caused a piece of paper to stick to my face like a huge white sticky note. I stood up and yanked it off as I ran for the phone. Niki lay in the middle of the living twitching her feet and whimpering. Chasing rabbits I thought to myself as I stepped over her.

  “What!” I barked into the receiver. I pulled the phone away from my ear momentarily, as if my voice came from the phone instead of my own mouth. “Hello? Hello!”

  “Reevan? Reevan, are you alright?” A soft voice asked. A woman’s voice.

  “What? Yeah, what? I’m fine. Who is this? What time is it?”

  “It’s almost ten. Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I said I was fine, didn’t I? Who is this?”