And even nine would come much too early. Assuming she waited till morning. I just hoped she wouldn’t show up tonight. But I’d wanted to stay until Festus arrived.
“And I’m very interested in hearing the answer to Meg’s question,” Festus said. “But first, do you have all the crooks safely in custody?”
“I can’t swear we’ve got all of them,” the chief said. “But we’ve already sent Mr. Wilt and Mr. Hamish Pruitt down to be locked up in Richmond. I don’t want to entrust them to Clay County. Everyone there must have known the ex-mayor was hiding out there for weeks, and not a one of them had the decency to tell us.”
“Maybe we should find a new home for all our prisoners,” Randall said. “The Goochland County sheriff’s a friend, right? We could check with him.”
“We could,” the chief said. “After all, we’ll also need someplace to put Mr. Fisher and Mr. George Pruitt—we just picked them both up for questioning.”
“Were they all in on it?” I asked.
“We might be a while sorting that out,” the chief said. “Right now it looks as if Hamish and Mr. Fisher cooked up the phony contract, either on orders from our ex-mayor or with his full knowledge. We could have a mite of trouble proving that, of course.”
“I doubt it,” Festus said. “I’d be astonished if we don’t find e-mails back and forth, especially after George fled to Mexico.”
“Let’s hope so,” the chief said. “Hamish was definitely the killer. Ms. Brown caught him working on his forgery, and he was terrified she’d blow the whistle on him. He claims he doesn’t remember what happened next, but I think we can guess. He lured Ms. Brown to the basement on some pretext and tried to solve both his problems with one bullet.”
“But how did he get out afterward without being seen?” I asked.
“He didn’t,” the chief said. “He ran up the back stairs and hid in the furnace room until the guard had raced past him into the basement. Then he popped out into the lobby and managed to look so helpless and terrified that one of the guards took pity on him and hustled him out the back door. They all knew him, apparently because he would sneak in regularly to confer with Mr. Fisher.”
“And to work on his forgery,” I said. “Strange that the guard didn’t think to mention it when you questioned him.”
“He thought we already knew,” the chief said. “He said he’d told his superior officer—that would be Mr. Wilt—and assumed Mr. Wilt informed us. A bit short on common sense and long on blind obedience, these guards.”
“And instead of telling you, Wilt dashed off to become an accessory after the fact?” I asked.
“It looks that way,” the chief said. “Supposedly, Hamish skulked down the handicapped ramp while all eyes were focused on the main steps, and hid his bloodstained clothes in the Hamishburger booth, from which we have now retrieved them. And while Hamish may have suggested blowing up the courthouse, it was Mr. Wilt who had the expertise in demolition, according to his military record. Festus is right—with any luck, an examination of their phone, text, and e-mail records will prove enlightening.”
“What baffles me is Mayor George’s return,” Randall said. “He could have holed up in Mexico forever—why would he come back on his own?”
“Because he was worried that the whole phony contract business would blow up in his face,” the chief said. “Evidently, it was making him nervous, watching from afar Hamish’s bumbling efforts to fix things, so he came home to keep a closer eye on the situation.”
“And perhaps to confer with his buddies at FPF,” Festus said. “Some of whom may be indicted themselves on Federal corruption charges.”
“Ah,” the chief said. “I expect that’s why the FBI were so keen on having a chance to interview Mr. George Pruitt.”
“So do you think all of this will be useful?” I asked Festus. “In getting our courthouse back without selling anything to the developer?”
“Useful?” Festus exclaimed. “FPF will be lucky if we don’t end up owning them! Talk about a smoking gun! I confess, for a while I was worried the FBI would offer him a deal to rat on his cronies at FPF. But the closer we can tie him to the murder, the less chance of that. You’ll have your courthouse back, no strings attached, and sooner than expected.”
And with the courthouse safely back in Caerphilly’s hands, our passionately antidevelopment county board would have no reason to cooperate with anyone’s plans to seize our land for a golf course.
“Speaking of FPF,” Randall said. “Did I tell you I got a call back from my contact at the Department of Criminal Justice Services? Apparently the Flying Monkeys were not operating legally in the state of Virginia. It may be minor compared with what the FBI has in store for them, but FPF’s going to have a lot of explaining to do on that front, too.”
“And more legal charges, most likely,” the chief said. “And furthermore—are we keeping you up, Ms. Langslow?”
I hadn’t been able to stifle a particularly broad yawn.
“It’s been a long day,” I said. “I’m delighted to hear that none of our local future felons are still running around loose, and I’ve got a million more questions, but they’ll keep. Michael, let’s grab the boys and go home.”
ALSO BY DONNA ANDREWS
The Real Macaw
Stork Raving Mad
Swan for the Money
Six Geese A-Slaying
Cockatiels at Seven
The Penguin Who Knew Too Much
No Nest for the Wicket
Owls Well That Ends Well
We’ll Always Have Parrots
Crouching Buzzard, Leaping Loon
Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos
Murder with Puffins
Murder with Peacocks
About the Author
DONNA ANDREWS has won the Agatha, Anthony, and Barry Awards, a Romantic Times Award for best first novel, and three Lefty and two Toby Bromberg Awards for funniest mystery. She spends her free time gardening at her home in Reston, Virginia.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
A THOMAS DUNNE BOOK FOR MINOTAUR BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
SOME LIKE IT HAWK. Copyright © 2012 by Donna Andrews. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.thomasdunnebooks.com
www.minotaurbooks.com
Cover art by Maggie Parr
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Andrews, Donna.
Some like it hawk : a Meg Langslow mystery / Donna Andrews. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
“A Thomas Dunne book.”
ISBN 978-1-250-00750-6 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4668-0193-6 (e-book)
1. Langslow, Meg (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Murder—Investigation—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3551.N4165S66 2012
813'.54—dc23
2012005476
eISBN 9781466801936
First Edition: July 2012
Some Like It Hawk Page 29