Bone Harvest (17 page)

He said, “I heard you used to work for the Minneapolis police department.”

“Seems like a long time ago, but yes, I was an officer there.”

“That’s a big agency. Nearly the size of Milwaukee. I’ve done some work with them. Quite a change to come here.”

She had expected a note of condescension in his voice, but was surprised to find a bit of envy. “Yes. I’ve enjoyed having more of a life.”

“I hear you. I like working for the DCI, but I enjoy the traveling less and less. My idea of fun is not sleeping in the Durand Hotel without air-conditioning. Like I had to do last night.”

“I’m sorry. What happened?”

“My air-conditioning unit didn’t work. I ended up bunking in with Phil. We get along, but too much togetherness is not good. Neither of us was too happy about the sleeping arrangement. But it gave me some time to go over the file on the Schuler murders. Man, that’s some grisly reading.”

“You find anything up at the Danielses’?”

Her question caught him in midbite. He carefully took his time finishing chewing and then patted his mouth with his napkin before answering. He looked at her and then said, “No. But what occurred to me was that there is a good chance this man walked over there. I mean, he might have had a truck tucked into the weeds on a side road. But maybe he’s a neighbor, just waiting for an opportunity to teach everybody a lesson.”

CHAPTER 20

Bridget stretched out on the lounge chair on the screened-in porch. Even though it was going into the eighties today, there was a slight breeze from the east and it was cool. She patted her belly. She had almost lost all the weight she had gained with the baby. She had ridden Joker this morning before her husband went to work. Rachel had just gone down for a nap and would probably sleep for a couple of hours. Bridget thought of all the things she should do while she had the chance.

First she wanted to call her sister. Bridget hadn’t heard from her since Claire had called asking about the pesticides.

The fact that she hadn’t heard from Claire in three days made her nervous. They usually talked every day or two. She picked up the cordless phone and punched in her sister’s work number.

“Watkins here.” Her sister’s voice was crisp and so sharp that Bridget wondered how many cups of coffee she had had so far this morning.

“This is your darling sister. I haven’t heard from you in a few days. What’s going on over there? I read about the poisonings.”

“Sorry, I’ve been busy. I should have called you. The man who stole the pesticides is wreaking havoc.”

“Mom used to use that phrase—
wreaking havoc
—but as I recall it was about the way your room looked.”

“Thanks for that reminder.”

“So are you working nonstop?”

“Yes.”

“What about Meg? Do you want her to come and stay with me for a few days?” Bridget didn’t know how Claire managed on her own, trying to raise a daughter with the hours her work required.

“Thanks, but she’s taken care of. She went to stay at Steven’s parents. They’re happy to have her. She’s having a good time. They dote on her.”

“I bet. How are you and Rich doing?”

Claire didn’t say anything for a moment; then her voice sounded lower. “What, do you have extrasensory perception or something? Why do you ask?”

Something was going on. Bridget had felt that those two were ready to take another step forward. They had moved up to spending nearly every other day together. She wouldn’t be surprised to hear they were going to move in together. “I don’t know. Just wondering how he handles it when you get so busy.”

“Not great.” Claire took a deep breath and then confessed, “Bridge, he asked me to marry him.”

“Oh, a wedding. I love it.” When Claire had married Steven, they had done the justice-of-the-peace route. Bridget had been so disappointed. This time she would insist on more and offer her help. Maybe a simple church wedding, early fall, great flowers, and a buffet dinner. They could do it at her house in Wabasha. It would be perfect. Too bad Rachel wasn’t old enough to be a flower girl.

“Slow down, Bridget. I haven’t said yes yet.”

“And why not?” Bridget thought Rich was perfect for her sister. A little on the quiet side, but he had a real solid sense of humor that would get them through the tough times. And he loved Meg.

“I’m not sure I want to get married again.”

Don’t argue with her,
Bridget coached herself.
Whenever you argue with Claire she gets stubborn.
“I can understand that. Losing a husband the way you did might make a woman jumpy.”

“Maybe that’s it.”

“How do you feel about Rich?”

“I think he’s great. He’s one of the kindest men I’ve ever met. So considerate. Solid.”

“Boring?” Bridget asked, wondering what could be wrong. It might be the sex. Claire had her needs.

“No, I wouldn’t say that. But certainly traditional. I think that’s one of the reasons he has such a hard time when I’m not available to him, when I have to work such long hours. He has this image of the good woman by his side. Not necessarily doing everything for him, but available.”

“The man can go out into the world and the little wife is supposed to be home with dinner ready whenever he arrives, but it can’t be the other way around.”

“In all fairness to Rich, I think he wouldn’t mind having dinner ready. It isn’t that he wants me to take care of him. I actually think he’d rather take care of me. But he wants me to be there. His idea of a relationship doesn’t allow for much room to move. He’s surprisingly needy.”

“So what did you tell him?”

“I told him I needed time to think.”

“How much time?”

“Well, I wasn’t specific.”

Bridget knew she had pushed as far as Claire was comfortable. They needed to have a longer talk. Maybe it was time for Rachel and her to go visit Auntie Claire. “Take your time. This is a big decision.”

“Bridget, I gotta go. I can’t think about anything else but this pesticide guy. It might be over tomorrow; it might be starting tomorrow. It depends on if I can figure out what is going on. It’s hard to think about love when people are in danger.”

Ray Sorenson walked into the sheriff’s department and asked to see Claire Watkins. “Do you want to go back? Her desk is right in the main room,” the woman receptionist told him.

“I’d like to see her out here, if that’s okay,” he said. He didn’t want to talk about Folger with a whole room listening. “Could you go get her?”

It took a minute, but then Claire appeared. She had her hair pulled back from her face and the top button on her uniform undone. She looked tired and preoccupied, but when she saw Ray she smiled. It made him feel worse.

“Ray,” she said. “What can I do for you?”

“Can we go outside?”

“Sure, that sounds good.” She followed him outside. She looked around like she hadn’t seen the day yet. “I can use a break.”

“My pickup’s over there. In the shade. I left the windows open, so it shouldn’t be too hot. We could sit in there.”

“Fine.”

When they got to his Ford Ranger pickup truck, Ray walked around and opened the passenger-side door for her. She thanked him and climbed in. He circled the truck, jumped in his side, and pushed back the seat. He didn’t know where to start. She was looking at him, waiting.

“This is hard,” he said.

She didn’t say anything. He took a deep breath, then started. “I’m kinda being blackmailed.”

“Really?” she said, and waited.

“You remember about Tiffany,” he said, making it half a question.

She nodded.

“Well, once she came to see me at the co-op.”

This time she asked, “At the co-op?”

“Things got out of hand.”

She waited.

“It was Tiffany’s idea.”

“What did you do?”

“We kinda did it in the storage area.”

“Oh.” The deputy turned and looked out the windshield.

He thought maybe it would have gone easier if they were driving. They could have driven down to the river or anyplace. If they were moving, they would have something else to look at while he told his story. “Someone saw us.”

“Who?” she asked.

“Mr. Folger.”

“The agronomist.”

“Yeah.”

“He’s blackmailing you?”

“I guess.”

“What does he want?”

“He said that if I told him about what’s going on in this investigation about the stolen pesticides and everything—anything that I could get out of my dad he wants to know—that he wouldn’t tell my father about what I did with Tiffany.”

As he spoke, Ray couldn’t help remembering what he and Tiffany had done. She had wanted to do it like the animals, she said. Being in with the feed and all, she wanted him to take her like a horse, from behind. She had dropped her jeans and offered her white buttocks to him. He had been unable to resist. He hated to be thinking about it with this woman deputy in the car with him. He felt like she, in her quiet way, would be able to read his thoughts.

Claire sat for a moment, then asked, “Why is he so interested in all of this?”

“He’s got an obsession with the Schulers.”

Claire turned and looked at him. “Really? How do you know that?”

“It’s gone on forever with him. He’s shown me the newspaper clippings. He has a whole file on the murders. I think it was the most important thing that happened in his life.”

“That’s interesting.”

“What am I going to do?”

“I think you’ve already done it. You’ve come and talked to me, reported Folger. What he’s doing is against the law. I’ll take it from here.”

“Are you going to let my dad know?”

“No, but I think you should. You don’t need to lay it all out for him. But I think you should let him know that you did something inappropriate with Tiffany at work and that you’re really sorry. Assure him it won’t happen again. That way if Folger does tell him, it won’t be as big a shock. But I think I’ll take care of Folger for you. I don’t think he’ll be divulging anything to anybody.”

“Tell my dad?” It was the last thing in the world Ray wanted to do. The thought of having his dad know anything about Tiffany made him want to gag. Maybe it would have been better to let Folger tell him. Then he wouldn’t need to see his father’s face when he heard the news of his son’s bad behavior.

“Give him a heads-up. Don’t go into gory detail. He was young once, too. He might even understand.”

“Oh, God.”

Claire touched him on the shoulder and made him look at her. “You need to pull in the reins on this young woman you’re seeing.”

Wearing plastic gloves, Claire lined up and counted the ivory-colored objects. Eight. Then she counted them again. Still only eight. The number didn’t seem right to her. There were seven people killed at the Schulers’—two adults and five children. Seven baby fingers cut off. There were three bones in each finger. That should make twenty-one bones. They had found seven bones when the pesticides were stolen, one by the dead flowers, one by the chickens, and one with the lemonade. That made ten bones they had found. That left eleven, but all she had was eight.

There was one whole finger still missing.

“You need to get those ready to send off to the crime lab,” Tyrone told her when he walked into the back room.

“I know. I want to take some pictures of them. Some close-ups. They are like pieces of a puzzle. I think one of the fingers is missing.”

“What do you mean?”

Claire explained to him what she had realized. “I’d like to figure out whose finger is missing.”

“How can you do that?”

“By trying to match up the bones we have found and see what size they are. We might be able to figure out whose finger isn’t there.” She pointed out two very small bones. “These are obviously the baby’s. However, even if we puzzle this out, it might not tell us much. Maybe some of the bones were lost. Maybe the pesticide guy still has some. But it’s worth a try.”

“Do you have pictures of the other bones?”

“Yes, but they’re not exactly to size. It might be hard to match them up.”

“What about the pipe tobacco can?”

“That’s ready to go.” She lifted up a Polaroid. “I have a picture of that. I talked to an antique dealer in town, and she said this particular tin was being made in the late forties, early fifties. Fairly common, she said. Worth about ten bucks now. I wonder if it would be worthwhile to ask around and see if anyone remembers who used this particular brand. It was so long ago, it’s hard to say what someone might remember. I might call Harold Peabody at the paper. He seems to have a mind like a steel trap.”

“The sheriff just stationed someone at the water tower to watch it until we catch this guy. He said he was going to poison the water, and that might well be where he would plan on doing it.”

“Good thought.”

CHAPTER 21

Earl Lowman had forgotten the lush green beauty of the Iowa farmland in midsummer. He had pulled over at a rest stop to relieve himself and stretch his legs. The fields around him were in full growth and the grass leaned in the wind like the plush nap of green velvet. Tucson was brittle and dry this time of year, and he avoided going outside in the middle of the day.

The sun was still quite high, but it was getting toward the end of the afternoon. He had been driving for ten hours already. He had gotten up at five and left by six. He had another six hours to go before he drove into Wisconsin.

He didn’t know how he was going to do it. His head felt like it was full of water and if he leaned to one side it all sloshed over, pulling him that way. Sleep was what he needed. Just a short nap. An hour or so and he would still get into Durand before midnight.

When he had talked to Marie this morning before he left, she had said that Andy was holding his own, but hadn’t come around yet. He was stirring, she said, and all the nurses had been encouraged, saying it was a good sign. Earl was worried that his son would not wake from this coma, but he worried more that Andy would come around and not be able to function in the world. How hard it would be to see his healthy, strong son turned into an invalid.

Marie had also said something about a deputy coming around, wanting to talk to him about the Schuler murders. Would he never be rid of that family? Would he sleep with their bones the rest of his life?

Earl lumbered back to his car. He pushed the driver’s seat away from the steering wheel and tipped it as far back as it would go. To catch the breeze and let it blow through the car, he opened all the windows. He was facing north, so he would be sitting in shadow.

When he closed his eyes, he saw the Schuler farm as it had been the night he went to return the saw he had borrowed. He had called when he got to the house, trying to raise someone, but no one answered. It struck him as very odd, seeing as the front door was wide open and it was dinnertime. He stuck his head inside the kitchen door, and that was when he had seen Bertha. She was lying on the floor. He couldn’t figure out why she would be doing that. The oddest thing he had seen. He took one more step and he understood. She had a bloodred corsage on her housedress. A pool of blood circled her hand. The baby was partly under the table. He hadn’t even looked at her.

He had to force himself to walk through the kitchen to pick up the phone that was attached to the wall. His hands were shaking so hard he could hardly even dial, but he called the sheriff.

“They’re murdered out at the Schuler farm,” he had said. “I’m afraid they might all be murdered. Please send help.”

Then he had gone to sit on the steps. He knew he should walk through the house and see if anyone was still alive, but he didn’t think he could even force himself back into the same room with Bertha.

As he sat there, trying to get up his courage and find the rest of the family, someone had come out of the house to talk to him. He had never told anyone about that person being there alive. He had decided not to, and he had lived with that decision. It might be time to tell what had really happened that long-ago summer night.

He would do anything to bring Andy back. Whoever was threatening the county with the pesticides wanted the truth; he could give it to them. The more he thought about it, he might do it no matter what.

He clung to the steering wheel with his hands and slept. In his dreams, he was heading north, trying to find his way home.

Claire decided she had someone else she had to talk to—Charles W. Folger, born seventy-one years ago. Claire remembered him telling her he was that old, bragging about it. Claire decided to look through the databases to see if she could pull up anything on Charles Folger, but she found nothing. He might be a weirdo, but he was a quiet, prudent weirdo. Possibly until now.

Thinking back to her first interview with Folger, she remembered how antagonistic he was. Maybe he just didn’t like women law-enforcement officers, but maybe he didn’t like women. Maybe he didn’t like authority figures. She wanted someone else there to watch how this man handled himself. Because she was going to push him hard to find out what he knew.

This might be the break they’d been waiting for.

Tyrone was on the phone in the conference room. He and Singer had set up in there. He thanked someone, then hung up. Looking up at her, he asked, “What can I do for you?”

“You want to take a run with me?” she asked him.

“Sure. Where we going?”

“Check on an agronomist.”

She pointed out a patrol car to him and he climbed into the passenger seat. After they drove out of town, he wrinkled his nose. “Something smells around here.”

“Good fertilizer,” she told him as she waved her hand.

“So that’s what’s been coming off the fields as we drive through this county.” He laughed.

They drove a while in silence, and then she asked him where he was from. “Chicago. The Big Chi town.”

“How do you like Madison?”

“I dig it. For a smallish city, there’s a lot going on. The university saves it from just being another dairy town.”

“Do you miss Chicago?” she asked.

“Do you miss Minneapolis?” he returned.

“Yes,” she said. “But not as much as I would have when I was younger.”

“How old are you?”

She looked at him, surprised at his question, not sure what to do with it. “Are you serious?”

“Want me to guess?” he said.

“Absolutely not. That might ruin any chances we might have of getting along. I’m slightly past forty.”

“My, my, but you’re holding your own against time.”

“And what about you?”

“Thirty-five and climbing.” Tyrone looked out the window and said, “This is beautiful country. I didn’t realize Wisconsin could be so hilly.”

“Yes, this bluff country is gorgeous.”

Again, they drove a ways in silence. He shifted in his seat and asked her, “How do you get treated as the only woman in the sheriff’s office?”

“How do you get treated as an African American at DCI?”

“Touché,” he said.

“To answer your question—mainly fine. I think the younger guys—Billy, Scott—are easier with me. The older deputies don’t like it that I’ve jumped over them as the investigator for the office. They might grumble, but they do it softly, not so’s I can hear.”

“Yeah, I’ve had one or two problems, but I actually think some of the guys think it’s cool to work with a black guy. I’m more apt to run into problems out in the field.”

“How’ve you been doing in Pepin County so far?”

He gave it a thought, then turned and smiled at her. “Fine.”

Dinner had been good fresh green beans from the garden, homemade bread, and meat loaf. With just the two of them, they finished only half the meat loaf. That would be good, since his wife might not be up to cooking for a while. He knew what he had to do tonight. He wouldn’t wait too long to get it done, but he felt like sitting another moment or two and allowing his meal to digest.

“That was a good dinner,” he told her.

She looked over at him, surprised. He didn’t often praise her cooking.

“We should be getting some of the new corn any day now,” he said just to say something.

“That’ll be nice.” She started to clear the table.

There had never been enough fingers. There should have been seven and there had been only six. The sheriff’s office would know that by now. He had decided he needed to give them one more. The numbers had to be right. Maybe that was what had been wrong all along. Maybe that was why the truth had never come out. The numbers hadn’t added up. The more he had thought about it last night, the more clearly he saw what he had to do.

“You want some dessert?” she asked.

“What’ve we got?”

“I could offer you a bowl of ice cream or some peanut butter cookies.”

“How about both?” he asked.

“My, but you’ve worked up an appetite today. What about your cholesterol?” she reminded him.

“I’m not sure I want to live that long anyway. Especially not without ice cream and cookies.”

She gave a nervous little laugh. An odd sound in the house. This house had never heard much laughter. She pulled the ice cream out of the fridge, ran the scoop under the hot water, and dug out three nice round scoops for him. Then she put two cookies next to the ice cream in a bowl and handed it to him. She gave herself one scoop and stood up at the counter, eating it.

“Come and sit down,” he told her.

“Naw,” she said. “If I sit down it’s just that much harder to get up again. I want to get this kitchen clean before I go in and watch my show.”

She liked to watch the quiz shows on TV. Normally he would go out into the barn and putter around, but tonight he had different plans.

She grabbed his bowl away from him as soon as he was finished and put it in the soapy water in the sink.

He stood up and walked to the window. Clouding up a bit. Tomorrow was the big day. It would have been fifty years ago the Schulers were killed. His wife didn’t know a thing about it. He had never talked to her about it. He had never talked to anyone except his mother. He wondered what his wife would say if she knew what he had been doing. Soon she might get an inkling of what he was made of.

“There’s something I’d like to show you in the basement,” he told her.

Turning from the sink, she gave him an odd look. “In the basement?”

“Wipe your hands and come on down.”

“Can’t you bring it up?” she asked. “My show’s almost on.”

Firmly he took her arm. She resisted for a moment, then gave in as she always did. He walked her over to the basement door and opened it.

She looked wild-eyed at him. She hated the basement. As he started her down the stairs, he said soothingly, “I’ll help you down. Don’t worry. What I want to do won’t take a minute.”