Don't Sweat the Small Stuff (12 page)

“He’s the perfect match.”

“So no one else could have done it?” I asked.

“Well, I think that Bo and Charlie are persons of interest.”

James watched way too many movies. “James, you really just said that? Persons of interest?”

“You hear it on TV,
Law and Order
and stuff, and anyway, yes. I said it. Okay? Bo and Charlie, they’ve got access. They are persons of interest, but Skip, we don’t know what their motive would be. They’d have an idea how to do it, but with Pugh, we’ve got a motive. And this Linda, his girlfriend, she thinks we’re investigating him. As soon as you asked Pugh about the accidents, she figured you were trying to pin them on her boyfriend. So she’s afraid we’re going to figure it all out. That’s why she’s pissed off at you. It all makes sense, Skip.”

I stopped and shook my head. Now he was telling me that we had to watch out for Linda Reilly and Winston Pugh. “What the hell are you talking about? How do you know it’s an inside job? And Pugh? That’s impossible. I told you, he was working the zoo when you got pushed out of the Fun House.”

He took one more step, turned, and said, “Makes no difference. He could have put someone up to it.” James was pushing hard. “You told me this guy feels threatened. Winston Pugh thinks that everyone is against him. Now that sounds to me like a guy who is out to protect his world.”

“Well, he does, he does think that people are out to get him, but I don’t think he’s out to protect his world. I just think he’s paranoid.”

A young couple dressed in shorts and T-shirts approached us, staring at each other and holding hands, paying no attention to their surroundings, lost in only themselves. They almost ran into us, then split, the girl in tight shorts walking around James, the guy walking around me.

James turned his head and watched them for a second.
Either he was staring at the girl, or thinking it was another threat. Turning back to me he said, “You told me Pugh is worried about keeping a position with the Moe Show. He thinks they are going to let him go. Am I right?”

“Yeah. So what?” I was shouting. There were at least three songs blaring over the loudspeakers and it was next to impossible for us to hear each other talk. Barenaked Ladies were singing
Brian Wilson
. I could make that much out. “And if you want to find me, I’ll be out in the sandbox …”

“Pugh
is
paranoid, James. He thinks Disney is after him. He thinks that Moe is after him. The ride guys too. But it’s just his personality. The guy is paranoid. I’m sure of it. But come on, he’s not a killer.” I was trying to be heard over the music.

“The rides, the threat of new rides coming to the Show, he’s concerned about losing his job because of the rides.” James gave me a smug look. “Think about it, amigo, it makes perfect sense.”

I’d explained it all to James, even though his involvement in the clue department was minimal. But he’d grasped it all.

And there was Green Day, singing “Wake Me Up, When September Ends.” A song about the lead singer’s father. I didn’t need this, remembering my father’s hasty exit from our family.

“So, this Winston Pugh,” James continued, talking above the music, “he sabotaged the rides. He attacked us in the Fun House. It has to be him. I was right. I
am
right. We have a suspect and given two days we should be able to—”

“Two days? Winston Pugh? No way. James, you are totally wrong, man. This little guy is a …” I paused, trying to remember the word, “a Munchkin.” That was the perfect description of Pugh. A Munchkin. A little guy from the
Wizard Of Oz
. “He wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

“Then we’re going to follow the yellow brick road, pard. In two days or however much time is left, we can prove that your little short buddy is responsible for the accidents and for the deaths.
It’s the perfect answer. He’s the perfect villain. I feel this, Skip. In my bones. Let’s go with it.”

I took a breath, trying to clear my head. “You’re only saying this because you promised Ken Clemens a suspect. That’s it, isn’t it?”

“An emphatic no.”

“You haven’t even met the guy. You don’t know either of them.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter. I don’t believe you. You’ve lost your mind.”

“Skip, I’m only saying it because it makes the most sense. You know it does. Now, we just have to prove it. The short guy thinks the rides are driving him out. He sabotages the rides.”

“Someone was killed.”

“Maybe he didn’t mean for that to happen. The injuries, the death, they were collateral damage.”

I could smell the tangy barbecue and smoke coming from the pig wagon, and got a whiff of hot buttered popcorn as we passed by. The guy in the stained apron was ladling on the sauce for three young kids. He looked up and gave me a frown.

“The air rifle guy finds out about it and threatens to turn him in. Winston Pugh kills the air rifle guy.”

“Kevin Cross.”

“Who?”

“The air rifle guy,” I said.

“Whatever. Perfect solution.”

“You forget that I was with Pugh when he found the body in the little camper.”

“Pugh shot him, then went to get you. Skip, don’t you see? It is so perfect. And think how happy detective Bob Stanton will be. Our first case and we turn over the murderer to him.”

“Not to mention how happy Ken Clemens and the sisters will be.”

“Let’s not forget Moe.”

“James, you’re crazy.”

“We’ll call Jody, get some recording equipment, bug Pugh and Linda’s trailer and we’ll solve the case.”

He was brighter than that. Nothing was that easy. However, it was a place to start. I had no better idea. In fact, I had no ideas at all and James actually made some sense, in a crazy, perverted way.

“Are you with me, pally?”

“Sure, James. If for no other reason than to prove to you that it couldn’t possibly be Pugh.”

“Oh, it’s Pugh. And we’re going to make that money, pardner. It’s as good as in our pockets.”

I drove to Delray in the late afternoon, windows down and the hot humid air rushing in. The air conditioner was on the blink and this was as good as it could be. Jody Stacy has a shop that sells retail spy stuff over on West Atlantic Avenue, and even though I didn’t have a clue what we needed, I figured that he’d give me some idea of what to look for.

The rusted yellow Taurus struggled, the engine coughing every once in a while and if I floored the thing, it still only got up to about fifty-five. Any money I made on this deal was going into a newer automobile. Then, if there was anything else left, James could get his used box truck.

Seeing the cop car, lights flashing in the rearview mirror, I instinctively braked. No need. I couldn’t speed if I wanted. The car went screaming by, obviously concerned with something far ahead of where I was.

I thought about Kevin Cross and the lady who’d been mangled by the Cat’s Pajamas. There was some nasty stuff going down and we were just floundering around, trying to tie up a
bunch of loose ends. And then I noticed the black Escalade, lagging back about six cars.

Occasionally the elegant Cadillac would pull out into a passing lane, move up a car, then drop back. And I remembered very clearly that I’d seen Moe Bradley, the two sisters, and Ken Clemens all sitting in a black Escalade. They’d been parked out by Kevin Cross’s trailer after his body had been found.

There must be thousands of black Escalades, but this one seemed to be hanging around a little longer than it should. Any self-respecting driver would have passed me by now.

And then I started to wonder if it was Ken Clemens. Or was it the sisters? Or just one of the sisters? Or was it Moe, checking up on me? The mind plays strange tricks when you’re in over your head.

I pulled off at the exit and slowed down, watching the rearview mirror to see if the Escalade followed, but I never saw it.

When I entered the shop, Jody was on the phone so I browsed, checking out the flat screen monitor with ten different camera shots of me. Then it was a game to see where the ten cameras were.

The big fuzzy teddy bear was easy. The lens was in the bear’s eye. That was the original nanny-cam, where parents would set the stuffed animal up in a child’s room and monitor what the nanny was up to. And I figured out the camera in the wall calendar, the fake motion detector, the sprinkler overhead, and a couple others, but the one that kept moving had me confused.

On the monitor, my head was jerking all over the place even though I was standing perfectly still, then for a moment I was gone from that section of the screen, replaced by the store window, then a wall. I looked over the entire room, trying to figure out where the camera was located. Nothing was moving.

“Confused?”

I spun around, and he was looking over my shoulder, staring at the same monitor that I was.

“Yeah. I am. Where do you keep the moving camera?” I turned and he stepped back. Jody is an ex-cop, with the tough-guy physique, a square jaw, and looks the girls used to drool over in high school. The last time I’d been in the store, Em had been with me, and Jody had made it very clear that he was interested in her. I had a brief moment, wondering if she’d seen him at all during our break.

“First of all, congrats to you and James. I mean now that you guys are official.” He gave me a broad smile. “Real private investigators.”

I thought there might be a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

“Thanks to you.”

“Glad to help.”

“We may take jobs from you.”

Our high school classmate smiled. “Plenty of room for competition, Skip. Plenty of room.”

“Jody, where is the camera?”

“Camera? The one that moves? Not just a camera, Skip. An audio recorder, too. Pretty cool, right?”

“You’re not going to tell me?” I stared at him. “Remember, I’m a paying customer. If you want to sell it, you’ve got to show me how it works.”

He nodded. “Speaking of selling it, you guys still owe me seventy-nine bucks, Skip. Seventy-nine.”

“I thought James—”

“James? You should know better.” He screwed up his face in disbelief. “It’s for the smoke alarm video cam. You guys never finished paying it off. You do remember the smoke alarm cam?”

We’d used it for a job at a software company. It helped solve
the case, but our client never paid us. Maybe that’s the reason James stalled the payments to Jody. Still—“I’ll make sure you get it.”

Jody nodded. “I know
you
will. It’s James I’m concerned about.”

I had firsthand knowledge of how it worked. Jody would suggest equipment, vaguely hint at a price and a possible return of undamaged goods, then do whatever he wanted to do. He and James would have made a good pair.

“Look, Jody, we’re in kind of a tight spot. I think I need another hidden camera, something that could be put in a small camper. Where the heck is that camera that keeps moving?” I was getting frustrated watching the bobbing image on the screen. Now the video image was a close up of my shirt.

“You’re looking at it, Skip.”

What I was looking at was Jody. Front and center. I checked out the buttons on his shirt. That seemed possible. Maybe it was his eyeball. I remembered the scene from the movie
Angels and Demons
where they scanned eyeballs as a security process and the bad guys had carved out someone’s eyeball and used it to gain access to a secure room. It couldn’t be. An eyeball camera? There were a lot of weird things in The Spy Store, but even Jody wouldn’t go so far as to—

“Right here.”

He pulled a gray ballpoint pen from his shirt pocket.

“Three hours of video and audio, and it downloads to your computer. Very simple to operate.”

“Wow.”

“The quality is superb, man. I mean top-notch.” He was showing off. Proud of his equipment, proud of his knowledge.

“So I could walk into someone’s home—”

“Have this baby in your pocket, and you’d get it all. Or, you could leave it. Set it on their kitchen counter or table, then call
them and say you’d pick it up later. Chances are they would leave it there. You come back in, pick it up and download the video and audio.”

“Yeah. I like that.” I did. “But what if they try to—”

“Write with it? Here.” He moved to the counter, clicked the top of the pen and started scribbling on a pad of paper.

“It really works.”

“Well, of course, it does.” He sounded offended. “Everything in here is pretty much what it appears to be. Except that it’s not.”

I worked that around in my head.

“Take the pen. Pay me when you get the bill.”

“Oh yeah? How much?”

“I’ll get you a price later, okay?”

Damn. He was doing it again. Dodging the question. But what was I going to say? I needed equipment.

Jody pulled a box with a new pen from the shelf and dropped it into a bag.

“And then there’s the Cell Sleuth.”

“The what?”

“Look, if you want to pick up on what’s going on in a guy’s life, you need to know what’s happening on his cell phone. This is the Cell Sleuth. You can track all of his phone calls and text messages.”

I’d met Linda and Winston. My guess was that they didn’t even own a cell phone, but I could be wrong.

“Hey, don’t worry about this. If you don’t need any of these things, send them back, Skip. I’m just making suggestions.” And as he walked behind the counter and I watched him punch in some keys on his computer, I did worry. I had no idea how we were going to pay for any of this, but if we didn’t have the equipment, we couldn’t complete the job. He walked back out, stepped to a counter, and pulled another box from the shelf.

“Finally, you need the EMT. I’m telling you, it will help solve the crime. I don’t care what the case is, chances are excellent that the people you’re watching are keeping some sort of record on their computer. And e-mailing information you need.”

That was it. I waited for an explanation, but he kept punching keys on his computer. He seemed to think I knew exactly what the EMT was for. I said, “Jody?”

“Yeah.”

“What the hell is an EMT?”

“E-mail Trap.”