by Kate Flora
“Nope.” He said it smugly, in an “I know something you don’t know” tone, and yawned again.
We were on the verge of losing him. “You think he is the father?”
“It doesn’t matter now, does it?”
“Why not, Ted?”
“Told you. Out of the picture. Told him. Stay away. My little girl, right?”
He wasn’t going to make things any clearer. “So we should focus on Dee or Dum?”
Another smug “Nope.” Then, “Dee is out of the picture, too. For…” A hesitation so long I thought he’d gone to sleep, but apparently he was just organizing his words, because eventually he said, “for a different reason. Man’s gotta do…my little girl ’n all that.”
He trailed off and went silent. When I looked back, his eyes were closed.
We were losing him. As weariness and his last drink overtook him, he was morphing into the stupidly wily, game-playing, maudlin drunk. We’d probably lost our moment. I looked at Amad, who gave a slight shake of his head. I didn’t know if he meant “give up” or whether he wanted to ask a question himself.
He turned onto a side road and drove more slowly. “Mr. Basham, your daughter Heidi cared very much for this music teacher, this man named Will?”
Basham made an affirmative sound.
“So if he is, as you say, ‘out of the picture,’ this will make her very sad, yes?”
Another affirmative sound.
“And this man cares for your daughter, just as she cares for him? Is this right?”
A slurred “right” from the back seat.
“So why, if I may ask, are you pleased he is out of the picture at a time when Heidi needs people who care about her most?”
Basham was silent. I held my breath, wondering if he would reply. There were sounds of him moving around on the seat, and some sighs.
Finally he said, “Oh shit. I don’t know. I thought I was doing the best thing for Heidi. Her dad and all that.”
“And what thing was that?” Amad again.
He seemed to be doing a good job of getting responses from Basham, so I let him take the lead. Maybe, as intoxication crept over him, Basham stopped responding to the female voice, a ploy he’d likely mastered dealing with his ex-wife.
We slowed to pass a woman walking her dog. Dark clothes, wooded area, dark dog, walking with her back to traffic. Some people, I am convinced, either have a death wish or are totally oblivious of their surroundings.
I was so busy being judgmental I almost missed Basham’s reply.
“I told the damned fool not to come. Stay away from…Heidi. My daughter. Not his.”
It wasn’t what I was expecting. “You knew William McKenzie was coming here?” I said.
“Yup.”
“How? Heidi told you?”
“Nope.”
He sure liked saying “Nope.” I hoped that wasn’t all he planned to say. Amad and I held our breaths in sync, like we’d been doing this for years, waiting.
“It was that boy. He told me.”
This was like pulling teeth. “What boy?”
“That one who is Heidi’s friend. The one who called me.”
I racked my brain, trying to recall which of Heidi’s friends had called her father. Bella had. And one of the boys. “Was it Ronnie? Or Jaden?”
Silence. Some rustling. An extremely loud yawn.
Come on, I thought. Answer the question before you fall asleep.
“Ronnie.”
“And Ronnie told you that he’d also called Will McKenzie?”
“That…Heidi…called him. Well, damn! I wasn’t gonna have my place ush…uh…surped…by some goddamned music…musician. I’m uh goddamned father, aren’t I.”
Biologically. Jeez. First his disappearance and now this. But he had been calling her. I was in an emotional rocking chair, swayed back and forth as the conversation progressed. My initial impression had been of a loving but ineffectual father who’d tried to come through when his daughter needed him. Now I wasn’t sure what to think. This sounded more like a pissing contest.
Evidently, neither was Amad. “Mr. Basham,” he said. “Are you telling us you came here not because Heidi needed you but because she called Mr. McKenzie instead of you?”
“Nope.”
“Then why did you come?”
“Friends…girl with that squeaky little voice…and that boy. Thought. Ought to be family here. Said Heidi had asked for me. I think. Uh. Dunno.” A little chuckle. “I am family. Sorta. I guess. Got turfed out, but…Then Lorena’s bitchy little sister said what kind of a father was I anyway and did I want the goddamn general handling things instead. That…” A long pause while he assembled his words. “Got me. Don’t wanna goddamned General Norris acting like father to my girl. Not the way he wants to act like a father. Is there uh…” Another pause while Basham sorted his words. “Funny father like funny uncle?”
He laughed hysterically at his own joke. “Heidi already…hash…uh…has…funny uncle. Not really funny though.”
I was still struggling to square the father who called often, the one his daughter confided in, with this guy, who seemed to be saying he’d come partly because people told him he should, and partly because he was engaged in a “who has the right” contest with General Norris and his ex-wife. And the music teacher. I asked for some clarity.
“So, Ted…you said you talk to Heidi often on the phone. That the two of you are close, right? So why would you hesitate about coming if she needed you?”
I sensed Amad didn’t like my question and was about to intervene, but Basham answered before he could. “Phone…is…easy.”
“Heidi didn’t want General Norris to come, right?”
“Ri…”
“Do you know if he brought Dee or Dum with him?”
Probably I was jumping the gun. Asking the question without laying any groundwork first. Amad thought so. He shot me a disapproving look.
“Dunno,” Basham said. “Dunno whether Dee came because…general asked…or just such a suck up. He’s…” There was rustling in the back as Basham rearranged himself on the seat. ”…not okay. Not near my daughter. Not…a problem anymore.” More rustling, then Basham said, “Oops. Not meant to say that.” He fell silent. Then, “You’re not the cops anyway, are you?”
“No. We work for the school, Ted.”
“Good. So forget what…I said. K?”
“I think I have taken a wrong turn,” Amad said. “Excuse me while I turn us around.” He pulled into what looked like the entrance to a small park, but didn’t reverse and change direction.
“Mr. Basham,” he said, “do you know where your daughter is?”
Basham didn’t reply.
“Were you involved in her disappearance?”
“Not really,” Basham said.
Not really? I clenched my hands together to keep from turning around and whacking him. Whacking is not part of my job, and is normally frowned upon in independent school circles.
“What does that mean, please?”
“I was going to meet her. Down by the river. Take her away somewhere. My daughter. My baby. Then her goddamned mother and that jerk showed up with Dee trailing behind them like a little poop. I guess I was upset. There was a struggle. Heidi ran. And I left.”
I had one more question. Well. No. I had dozens of questions, but this was about getting a clearer picture of who was in the picnic grove. “What about William McKenzie? Was he there?”
“Not for long.”
“Was Heidi involved in what happened to Lt. Crosby? Uh…to Dee?”
He heaved a huge sigh, then uttered his favorite word. “Nope.”
“Someone hit him. Crosby, I mean. Was that you?”
He yawned. “That…is all…I am going to say. Maybe…already…said too much. Can we go now, please? I’m badly…need nap.”
He didn’t wait to reach Gareth’s house. Only a moment later, the car was filled with bubbling snores.
Amad h
eaded back to Simmons.
“It is all very unclear,” Amad said. “He must be questioned again when he is sober. But somehow he is involved in what happened where we found that body and Heidi’s coat.”
I absolutely agreed. Questioned for sure, and not by me. If my own interviews with Basham were any guide, whoever questioned him would have a job of it.
I was racking my brain, trying to recall if his crutch was wet and muddy when he was in Gareth’s office this morning. If he seemed unsurprised by her disappearance when we went to the infirmary early this morning after learning that Heidi was missing. I just didn’t know. He only had one crutch with him. Was there a second one somewhere that might show evidence of a struggle? Did I remember correctly that when he first appeared in Gareth’s office, he had had two?
Why had everyone been down there in the picnic grove last night? I could imagine Heidi, in the midst of her distress, asking her father for help leaving Simmons, where she felt judged, or to escape from The General, who she believed presented a threat. He was a wimp, but pretty much all she had. But then why had General and Mrs. Norris shown up in such an obscure place? How could they have known? And why Dee? Uh, Lt. Sandy Crosby? Was there more information available from the innkeeper about the Norrises’ coming and goings?
Too many questions on too many fronts. It all made my head hurt. Those questions needed answers and sorting it out would need staff. This was a job for supercops, not for a mere consultant.
As the landscape flew past, I puzzled about the timeline. When had all of this taken place? If what he was saying was true, how had Basham gotten out of Gareth’s house without anyone noticing? What the heck had happened in that clearing? Had Basham assaulted Lt. Crosby or had someone else? What the heck did he mean by “I was upset” and “there was a struggle? Was there some disturbing significance to his remark “my daughter. My baby?”
And why, in the midst of all he’d said, had there not been a single word of concern about his daughter? Because he was so self-involved? Or because he had her hidden somewhere and knew she was safe?
What a sordid mess.
Twenty-Four
It took two of us to wrestle our nearly comatose passenger out of the vehicle and up the three steps into Gareth’s guest wing. A guest wing with its own entrance that made it clear Basham’s nocturnal escape—assuming he was telling the truth—was far easier than I’d imagined. We half carried him into the guestroom, pulled off his overcoat and shoes, and covered him with a fluffy duvet. He didn’t rouse enough to say thanks, just rolled onto his side, burrowed into the pillows, and completed his journey to dreamland.
I took a quick look around, but didn’t see another crutch anywhere, and if there were dirty or bloody clothes somewhere, they weren’t visible. Plenty of other tossed clothing and papers were strewn about, though, and there was a half empty bottle of Scotch on the bedside table. He really hadn’t needed to go out and get himself drunk in town. He could have done it right here.
It was a beautiful room, cozy and inviting, done in rich forest green and burgundy, with a gas fireplace and comfy armchair beside it. All of which, given the careless mess he’d made, seemed completely lost on Ted Basham.
We stepped outside and Amad said, “I will drive you back to the Administration Building, then come back here to keep an eye on Mr. Basham.”
As he drove, Amad said, “What are you thinking about this, Miss Thea?”
“I am thinking that this is a job for the police and that Basham’s crutches have suddenly become objects of great interest.” I sighed. “I am wondering how did everyone know that Heidi would be down there in the picnic woods?”
“These are good questions,” he said. “And what about this person called ‘Dee?’ Is he the one that has been found dead?”
I sighed again. I was very tired. A meal and a nap would be awfully welcome. “I believe that Dee, or Lt. Sandy Crosby, is the victim down there in the woods. He works for General Norris, but there is no logical reason for him to be here.”
“How it is they say? The plot thickens? Is that it?”
“That’s it, Amad.”
I was sure we had more things to discuss, but he had to get back to guarding Basham, who had proved himself utterly untrustworthy, and I had to get back to Gareth. “Thanks for coming along,” I said. “I could never have done this without you.”
“I cannot say ‘my pleasure’ as this is not a pleasant business, but I do think that together we got some most disturbing information from Heidi’s father. Will you be sharing it with Dr. Wilson, or should I pass it along to Chief Greenberg?”
I could tell passing information to the chief was not a possibility that appealed to him. Just from my brief contact with the man, I knew he’d likely be dismissive. Anyway, I was the one who’d recorded it.
“I’ll tell Gareth.”
“Thank you,” he said.
I longed to stay in the warm car and be driven about, free from the tasks of parsing Basham’s ramblings and helping Gareth handle his crisis. When Amad stopped, though, I hopped out, and he drove away. I headed for Gareth’s office, and the sandwiches I hoped were not too stale.
The food trolley was untouched. I didn’t know if Gareth had been too busy to eat, or had politely waited for me. “Eat something,” I muttered as I fell on a slightly dried out tuna sandwich. The first half disappeared quickly. There wasn’t time for the kind of ladylike eating that my mother had raised me to do. It was more like Andre’s cop-practical “eat when you can.”
Gareth shook his head. “I can’t eat,” he said. He was practically tearing his hair out as he waited for my report. I gave it between bites and sips of lukewarm coffee. The half sandwich kept hunger at bay for a moment, while we caught up, but I needed to eat more. MOC was hungry. And there were lovely cookies, too.
“He was pretty fuzzy on details…slurred speech and a lot of rambling, but it sounded like he was there in the picnic grove with Heidi last night, that The General was there, too, and that Basham may have tangled with Lt. Crosby.”
Gareth was staring at me like I’d taken leave of my senses. “Impossible. He’s fantasizing,” he said. “Basham was in my house, asleep, all night.”
“He was in the guest wing, wasn’t he?”
Gareth nodded.
“And doesn’t it have a private entrance?”
Another nod.
“So it is possible that he slipped out, whatever took place down there happened, and then he slipped back in?”
Gareth threw up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Possible,” he said. “So are we to think that Basham arranged this with Heidi when he visited her? That that scheme was what led to her asking Jaden to tamper with the alarm?”
“Or they arranged it in a phone call. But what was Heidi’s mother doing there? And The General? Even if Heidi wanted to get away from Simmons, she would never make a plan that involved him.”
“Unless in her emotional state, she confided the plan to her mother, who swore not to involve General Norris and went back on her word. Or unless everything we’ve been told, and everything we think we know about Heidi is untrue. Which I would need a lot more evidence to believe. And how would we get that?”
I brushed crumbs off my face and the front of my sweater, feeling fearfully far from sartorial splendor. “Talk to…”
“Dammit, Thea. I know we have to talk to her friends.” His hands clenched. “I am trying to run a school committed to openness, honesty, and responsibility, yet I am forced to deal with a set of parents who wouldn’t know the truth if it bit them.”
I started to speak but he cut me off. “A man has been murdered. Much as I dislike doing so, we have to tell Miller and Flynn about your conversation with Ted Basham.” He went behind his desk and threw himself into his chair. I half-expected the chair would crumple under his weight, but it was a sturdy oak and leather number more than half a century old. A chair as rugged and sturdy as Gareth himself. It only tilted and groaned.
He waved a fistful of pink message slips. “With all this damned interviewing, when do I get time to run the school?”
“Bit by bit,” I said.
“Which bit shall we start with?” he said. “Miller and Flynn?”
I nodded.
He was reaching for the phone and I was reaching for the second half of my sandwich when there was knock on the door and his assistant stuck her head in.
“There are four students out here who insist on speaking with you, Dr. Wilson. They say they won’t leave until they do.”
Twenty-Five
Gareth spread his hands in a gesture of resignation. He was supposed to be in charge, but circumstances were out of his control today. “Give us a minute,” he said, “and then send them in.”
I stared regretfully at the sandwich I’d been about to eat. Better to get this interview over with first. MOC didn’t think that was a good idea, though, and gave me a couple of vigorous kicks to underscore the point. Mothers-to-be are supposed to pay attention to nutrition, and I’ve always been awful about eating regular meals. Obviously, this child was well aware of that.
I sent a quick text to Miller, saying we had some information to share. I wanted to offload my memories of the conversation with Basham while it was still fresh, though I expected he and Flynn would still be tied up at the scene. Then the students came in.
Interview was absolutely the wrong word for what happened next. It was an invasion. We’d barely had time to draw a breath before there was a knock on the door and Bella, Jaden, Ronnie, and a girl I hadn’t met, I assumed she was probably Tiverton, tumbled into the room, a jumble of voices filled with urgency and demands. Four distressed teenagers can create a lot of commotion. From the cacophony, the words “Heidi,” “body,” and “alive?” were clearest.
Gareth simply stood and held up his hand—the school meeting signal for coming to order.