Cold Turkey (9 page)

“How about before that?” Sarkisian tried, dragging us back to the investigation.

Adam considered. “I think there was another engine,” he said at last. “Different one. Badly in need of a tune-up.”

Nancy stiffened beside me, but didn’t say anything.

“Thought it was a dream,” he added. “Only one like that around here is that old hippie van of Lowell’s, and there’d be no reason for him to come up this way.”

Sarkisian glanced at Nancy. “Know if Lowell was running around last night?”

She opened her mouth, then closed it again.

“Wait a minute.” Adam’s expression grew thoughtful. “There’s that old barn up the road past Gerda’s. Lowell’s been using it since the spring. He might have been on his way to check his marijuana crop, or whatever it is he grows there.”

“He came by here,” Nancy blurted out.

Adam’s head jerked up, then he groaned and clutched it. “What did he want—or do I have to ask?”

“He wanted Mom’s spaghetti recipe. Said that’s about all he’s capable of cooking.”

Adam snorted. “You’re not to eat any, understand? He’ll probably use an extra brownie ingredient in it.”

Marijuana spaghetti? Well, he might, for all I knew. I’d have to ask Gerda more about Simon Lowell. Or better yet, meet him.

“Anything else?” Sarkisian prompted.

Adam frowned for a minute, then shook his head. “Sorry.”

That seemed to satisfy the sheriff, at least for the moment. He rose to leave, so I did, too. Much to my surprise, he carried the coffee maker out to my car for me. I unlocked the trunk, and he set it in with elaborate—and I’ll swear sarcastic—care.

It didn’t fit. The diameter proved too big for my car, which I’d always thought had impressive trunk room. I stood there staring at the open lid as the drizzle resumed. My poor car was going to get drenched.

“I’ll get some string so you can tie it down,” said Nancy, who had followed us out. She headed back to the house.

Sarkisian leaned against the side of my car, oblivious to the damp. “Hear what you wanted to hear?”

“That’s not why I came,” I reminded him.

“But it’s why you stayed.”

I opened my eyes as wide and innocent as possible. “I just needed help carrying that thing out.”

He gave me a withering look. “You’re not trying to keep tabs on the investigation?”

“It was my husband, not me, who was sheriff.”

“I know that,” snapped Sarkisian. “Not a single goddamn day passes but someone tells me how Sheriff McKinley would have handled even the most routine task.” He shoved away from the car. “Stick to the Thanksgiving festivities, and I’ll handle the murder.” He stalked off, but only as far as Adam’s pickup. He stooped over and examined the bumpers.

Apparently he found no traces of any fresh dents, because when Nancy returned with the string, he came back and tied down my trunk, then drove off in his Jeep. Probably to Simon Lowell’s. I glared after him, still irritated by his comments, though I knew I was being unfair. I really couldn’t blame him for being resentful of the love everyone felt for Tom. It wasn’t easy taking over from a man who had really belonged here. The interim sheriff—Guzman—had also been a native, but it was Tom people still talked about.

As I started up my car, I remembered another bit of information provided by Gerda. Simon Lowell was a real estate agent, the only one in town, in fact. That meant, by tradition, he managed the Grange Hall. And arranging for the use of that hall, and obtaining its key, was the next item on my list. I honestly felt sorry for poor Sarkisian as I set off after him.

Gerda had also pointed out the way to Lowell’s land to me on one of my last visits home. It lay farther down the hill from Adam Fairfield’s, on a side lane that paralleled Fallen Tree Road. I bumped along the rutted dirt track that led to his place, bounced across the narrow bridge over the stream, caught my convertible top as the latches popped, then pulled in relative dryness around the curve and through the gate onto a surprisingly well-kept driveway.

Sure enough, the sheriff’s Jeep stood in front of the dilapidated barn, and Owen Sarkisian himself stood on the porch of the ancient cabin beside a young man all curly brown beard, handlebar mustache, and long hair tied back in a ponytail. He wore a torn flannel shirt, stained overalls, and soft leather boots with fringe just below the knee. Hippiedom, the next generation, I reflected, enjoying the picture he made.

Sarkisian broke off whatever he was saying to glare at me. I gave him a bright smile as I climbed out of Freya. “I’m innocent!” I called to him, and ignored his snort of disbelief as I refastened the car’s top. “I’ve come on Thanksgiving business, but don’t let me interrupt you. I can wait ‘til you’re through.”

Simon Lowell descended the two steps and strode toward me, hand extended to shake mine. He had a firm grasp, and amusement glinted in his hazel eyes. “If that’s your car, you must be Annike McKinley. Glad to finally meet you. Would you care to join us? We’re about to inspect my van.”

Sarkisian glowered and muttered something under his breath. I thought I caught the words “interfering” and “busybody,” but thought it best not to pursue the matter. He looked more than a trifle irritated with me. I couldn’t blame him. But that didn’t mean I was going to go away, either.

They started for the barn, with me trailing behind. It really was the epitome of picturesque, in a rustic, weathered gray, tumbled-down way. It was exactly the sort of thing that got painted on those PBS shows, where an artist showed you how to turn out a masterpiece in half an hour. I stared up at the broken-hinged upper hatchway where a winch and pulley would once have loaded in bales of hay.

“Something else, isn’t it?” called Simon. He grinned at me and threw open one side of the huge sagging double doors. “Got what you’re looking for right here, I’ll bet, sheriff.”

I hurried to join them—and to get out of the drizzle. An old VW van, about the same vintage as my Mustang, stood just within. At some point, some creative soul, undoubtedly under the influence of something illegal, had taken cans of spray paint and gone to town. I think—but honestly couldn’t be certain—that the original color had been red. Now it looked like a flashback to a psychedelic bad trip.

Simon gestured toward his vehicle—to use the term loosely. “
Voilà
. One damaged fender. That’s what you’re after, isn’t it? Evidence I was up at Gerda’s last night?”

Sarkisian’s face gave nothing away. “Why don’t you tell me about it.”

I had to admit, this new sheriff was nothing like a TV cop. He didn’t make accusations—in spite of what Gerda had accused him of last night—he didn’t bully, he just invited people, in a perfectly reasonable tone, to tell their stories. Whether they told the truth or lied their heads off, he didn’t seem to care. He just wanted them to start talking. I waited to see the results.

Such a congenial attitude from an officer of the law threw Simon off balance. With his appearance, his outspoken and unpopular communist politics, and his van, he must have had numerous run-ins, some of them all the way down to the police station, I wagered. He stared at Sarkisian, eyes narrowed, as if trying to penetrate the sheriff’s amiability to the trap he seemed to believe lay beneath. “I didn’t go to her house,” he declared, though Sarkisian had made no such suggestion.

“Just her fencepost?” Sarkisian’s tone held a touch of humor.

Simon eyed him warily. “Yeah, well, I came out beside her driveway. There’re a few new ruts since I used that route last. The one nearest the road ditched me. I was trying to back out, and then suddenly I did, and I was in the post.”

“Just cruising around the back roads to while away a long, rainy evening?”

Simon flushed. “I was leaving the Fairfield’s house in a hurry. I didn’t want to get Nancy in trouble.”

“How would you have done that?” Sarkisian raised his eyebrows a mere fraction of an inch, invitingly.

Simon shrugged. “I’d gone over to see her because she said it was safe, that her father had driven into Meritville to buy more beer or whatever, but apparently he’d only gone down to the Graham’s store. I couldn’t leave until he’d drunk himself into a stupor, or he’d have heard my van.”

“Wouldn’t he have seen it?”

Simon shook his head. “I parked it behind the house, where it can’t be seen from the drive.”

“So you left when her father had fallen asleep? When was that?”

“About five-forty, five-forty-five, somewhere around then. Sorry, can’t be exact. We hadn’t heard a sound from him for awhile, so I thought I’d make a run for it.”

Sarkisian’s eyebrows rose. “But not down the drive?”

“His window looks out over it. No, I cut across the old gravel area and through that empty pasture of Peggy’s.”

“Escape that way often, do you?” the sheriff asked.

Simon shrugged. “A couple times before. Adam Fairfield has a nasty temper, especially when he’s been drinking.”

So both Adam and Simon had been out and about shortly before the murder, and neither one had a solid alibi. Had Adam heard Simon’s van as it left his house? Or had Simon still been out—say, up at Gerda’s—later, when Adam had been parked at the foot of his drive? But as far as I knew, neither one of them had any reason for wanting Clifford Brody dead. If Adam had been the one killed, I might have suspected Simon. And the other way around. But Brody didn’t fit into that little two-man feud.

The sheriff started back toward his Jeep, and Simon and I followed. Simon Lowell seemed nice enough, in spite of his unconventional appearance. But then Upper River Gulch was a town that attracted eccentrics. I ought to know. I’d grown up living with one of the prize exhibits, and I loved her dearly. I only wished I could judge just how far Lowell let his eccentricity take him.

“Coffeepot?” Simon asked as we reached the cars.

Well, it was sort of obvious, with the trunk gaping like that. “Just came from the Fairfields’s house,” I told him.

“How’s Nancy?” His concern sounded genuine, but I couldn’t tell for certain whether his intense interest lay in the girl or what the sheriff and I might have learned from her about his activities.

“She looked tired, but otherwise all right.”

“And what Thanksgiving business brought you here, anyway?” demanded Owen Sarkisian. His affability, so rampant with Simon, evaporated when he turned to me.

“Cindy Brody never arranged to use the Grange Hall.”

Sarkisian regarded Simon with a frown. “You’re a real estate agent, I guess.” He sighed. “All right.” He got into his Jeep and, with a wave for Simon and a glare for me, drove off.

“There’re forms you have to fill out, I suppose,” Simon said as we watched the sheriff vanish around the first bend. “I’ve no idea where you go, though.”

“Don’t you manage it?” That would be just my luck. “You’re the only real estate agent in town.”

“The building is county-owned, and the county officials didn’t approve of me.” He considered. “The key’s probably at the county offices in Meritville. Afraid you’ll have to go there to apply for formal permission to use the building.”

I shook my head. “Never,” I said with feeling, “get involved in any SCOURGE event.” And with that highly inadequate dictum, I climbed into Freya and set off to grovel.

Chapter Six

The rain increased to a steady shower as I steered along the curving road out of Upper River Gulch and onto the two-lane highway that led to Meritville. By the time I pulled into the last remaining parking space on a side street next to the county offices, it had built to a steady, pelting downpour. I climbed out and ran for the cluster of buildings. These had been constructed around the turn of the century, with the traditional small-town look I’ve always associated with the Midwest—brown brick and Victorian white trim. They’d been retrofitted for earthquake safety, but as far as I knew, that was the only modification they’d ever undergone. They really were beautiful, even when seen through the rain. At a dead run.

The offices themselves were amazingly well organized. The first thing you saw when you slipped and skidded through the doors on the muddied tiles was a sign listing departments and sub-departments, and beside it a discreet map. It only took me a few minutes to determine that no heading existed for the borrowing of county-owned Grange Halls. I gave the matter some thought while re-perusing the offerings, and finally settled on building permits, where, as I guessed, there were no lines marked for people wanting to know if they were in the right department.

There was only one window, in fact, but only three people ahead of me. It wouldn’t have been a bad wait except for the fact the elderly gentleman second in the queue became furious at whatever the poor clerk told him. That took nearly twenty minutes and three workers to sort out, but at last he took himself off, still grumbling.

By some miracle I had actually come to the right place. I began with a humble apology for leaving the matter so late, which cut the clerk off before he could begin to lecture me. After a conference with his colleagues, he determined that yes, we could use the building. He then produced a stack of forms half an inch thick and shooed me out of line. By the time I’d finished with them, he was on a coffee break, and I had to begin all over again explaining why we were late. I think they enjoyed making my life difficult.