Mangrove Bayou (13 page)

“Ahem, well that is hardly sufficient,” Duell said. “We didn't hire you to stand around and stare at corpses. We hired you to do something about them.”

“What would you have me do?”

“I hardly know. That's not my department. This,” he gestured around at the walls, “is not my department.”

“That's right. It's mine. On probation, of course.”

“We hardly need your levity.”

“You need
someone's
levity. I have taken all the steps a policeman normally takes when coming upon a dead body. There may be additional steps to take, but I don't know that yet or, if so, what steps to take. I await events.”

“Thing is,” Reed said, “word's going around that you are acting as if the man was murdered.”

“Really? Who said that?”

“Oh, come on. Mangrove Bayou is one huge gossip club. You sealed up the boat. You took things away in evidence bags. The autopsy. Searching the widow's house.”

Troy nodded. “The medical examiner does autopsies on anyone dying under unusual circumstances. I didn't search the widow's house, she asked me if I wanted to look in the garage for some tools and I did so. When did she call you to complain?”

“Last…how did you know Katie called me?”

“I'm the police chief of Mangrove Bayou. I know everything.”

“Director of public safety, technically,” Duell said. “By the way, did you know that your title is misspelled on your office door?”

“Yes. I do. Was there anything else, gentlemen?”

Mayor Groud shifted a little and sat forward. “Thing is, if it
is
a murder, we need to get the sheriff's investigators in on it.”

“Why?”

“Well. You know.” Groud looked around the office. “This is sort of a small department. I mean, we expect you to mostly hand out parking tickets and keep tourists from peeing on the beach.”

“Perhaps you need to expect more of your police force. I certainly do.”

“Humm. I see. So if it is a murder, you plan to solve the case yourself?”

“It is. And I already have.”

Groud and Reed looked astonished. Duell looked slightly pained. “If it's murder, and you know who did it,” Duell said, “why aren't you out making an arrest?”

“Ah. The answer to that requires lengthy review of hundreds of years of English common law,” Troy said. “But, to summarize, I need proof. I don't have that yet.”

“You have nothing whatever,” Duell said. “You're just waffling, trying to keep a job you are clearly not qualified to have.”

“Or,” Troy said, “It could just be that.”

“You're keeping something close to your vest,” Groud said. “The walls have ears here. Even some of the ears here have ears, if you get my drift.”

Troy nodded. His hands were still clasped in front of him on the desk. He was still trying to look friendly and alert but he was growing weary of it.

“I'm inclined to give you more rope,” Groud said. “But not much. You screw the pooch on this and you're outta here.”

“And you still have the wall-eyed one-tooth guy who also applied. Good to have bench strength.”

Groud struggled not to grin. “Well. Can we count on you telling us as much as you can tell us
when
you can tell us?”

“Absolutely.”

The trio tramped out. Troy took the extra chair back to the lobby. He suspected that Lester Groud would be back alone, or calling on the phone, soon. He also assumed that Katie Barrymore would have a full report soon. She would be disappointed that he hadn't spilled all his information to Max Reed.

Since all the court system was in Naples, Troy got on the phone to the state attorney's office and tried to talk them into getting a search warrant for Kathleen Barrymore's house. They weren't having it. He was still on his own.

An hour later he did receive some useful news. The autopsy on John Barrymore had concluded that he had died of accidental electrocution. Case closed.

“So sayeth the experts,” Troy said to his empty office. He shook his head and added the report to the file.

He walked up to the lobby. June was explaining to some tourists, an elderly man and wife, that no, there was no bus service in town.

“How about a taxi?” the man asked.

“No taxi,” Troy said. “Why are you needing one?” It occurred to Troy that the town really needed a taxi service, even a part-time one.

“I wanted to go to the museum. The one by the Calusa shell mound. And look at the mound too, of course. I used to teach archaeology. Up in Ohio.”

“How did you get here without a car?”

“Friends brought us over from Miami for the week. I'm Richard Patterson, this is my wife Rachael. We're staying here on Barron Key with them. But they left today to go back to Miami for some business.” He chuckled. “We're sort of on shanks mare today.”

“There's an expression I've not heard in a long time,” June said.

“Tell you what,” Troy said. “Wait a few minutes and I'll take you up there. To the museum.”

“That would be very kind of you. Who are you?”

“I'm the police chief. Troy Adam.”

“Don't you have a badge or something?”

Troy fished it out of his shirt pocket. The man peered at it from a distance of about a foot. “Well, that's good. How would we get back from the museum?”

What I get
, Troy thought to himself.
No good deed goes unpunished
. “Call June, here, and she'll send someone. But that's a this-day-only offer and only seeing as how you are an archaeologist and my degree is in history.”

Rachael Patterson laughed. Richard smiled. “We'll await your chariot,” he said.

“June, how often do people call or stop by looking for a taxi?”

June thought. “In here? Maybe once a month off-season, a few times a day in-season. But I think mostly they ask in front, at the town hall office. Why?”

“Seems like this town needs a couple guys to run a taxi service.”

“No argument from me. Who did you have in mind?”

“Had in mind Bob, your husband. And maybe one other to spell him. Two cars. Easy enough to set up. Buy a couple used vans. Repaint them. Dispatch by cell phone, just like we do here sometimes. Maybe run a limo service up to Naples shopping every other day. Keeps Bob out of your hair and you can actually take Mondays off instead of coming in here to avoid him.”

“I like it. I'll ask Bob about it.”

Troy turned to the Pattersons. “Richard, Rachael, come out the back way with me.”

He drove the Pattersons over to Airfield Key and then east to the end of Airport Road and the small museum and large shell mound.

“How come you don't have a police car?” Rachael asked as they got out in front of the museum.”

“It's like this, Rachael. I'm new and was only hired on six months' probation.”

“Oh, I see. So after that they give you a real car?”

“I don't think so.”

Chapter 21

Thursday, July 25

After dropping off the Pattersons, Troy drove back west on Airfield Road to Côte d'Or, the Barrymore manse. Both cars were in the garage and the garage door was still open because the workmen were still adding to it. Troy did not enter the garage. He stood in front of it and stared. There was one bicycle hanging from a ceiling hook. There were two hooks.

Thomas Dolfe, the foreman, came to stand beside him. “She decided to keep on with the expansion,” he said to Troy. “I mean, what else? Can't walk off and leave a half-built addition.”

“And it also keeps up that all-important resale value,” Troy said.

“Well, these people can afford it anyway. Maybe she can use it for something else. Twenty-by-twenty space and it's got a stall with toilet and shower in one corner.”

“You do much work on Airfield Key?”

“Sure,” Dolfe said. “Economy stinks but the rich always get richer. They always got something new to add, or repair. I make good money off work over here. Snake Key folks, not so much.”

Troy laughed. “I imagine not. Got a question. Have you ever seen Kathleen Barrymore riding a bicycle?”

“They got a couple in the garage, I think,” Dolfe said. He stepped to one side to look in. “Guess I was wrong. One bicycle.”

“But there are two hooks in the ceiling,” Troy said.

“Well, people put up stuff like that, hooks for various things. And they never take them down. You ought to look in some of the older houses here. Gas wall sconces converted to electric. Seen knob-and-tube wiring still in the attics of some. Scary. So what?”

“Maybe. But have you ever seen her actually riding a bicycle?”

“No, can't say as I have. But only been on this job site a few days. Actually, can't recall ever seeing her before at all, anywhere. And I work on Airfield Key a lot. But that doesn't mean much. Most people here stay to themselves behind all these bushes.”

“Ah well. Just curious.”

“You get my prints off my drill yet?” Dolfe asked.

Troy nodded. “Yours and Con Lohen's. He's the dockmaster at the yacht club. He had unplugged it. Didn't get anything else useful.”

“So am I a suspect?”

“In your dreams. Autopsy says it was an accident.”

“Well, swell. And yet you don't look like a police chief who believes that.”

Troy looked at Dolfe. He shook his head. “You're plenty smart for a guy wearing a painter's overall. The number of things I believe about a possible homicide are very small. There are a few things I'd like to clear up.”

“Well, at least the fingerprints are clear now.”

“Not entirely.”

“What's the problem?”

“Don't worry about it,” Troy said. “You guys come up short anything else besides that drill?”

“Hard to tell, usually. We always order a few extra blocks, 'cause we occasionally break one. No way to tell there. We did come up short some plumbing pipe. We had measured and bought just enough. My plumbing guy had to go back to the store to get another piece. Piece about three feet long. He was sort of annoyed about that. Couldn't of mis-measured by that much.”

“Pipe was PVC?”

“Yeah, 'course.”

“Don't you guys just buy it in long lengths and then cut and join it yourself, with those sleeves they sell?” Troy said. “Done it myself with that purple goop you put in to weld it all together.”

“Actually there are several colors of goop, as you call it. Prep and then glue. Simple jobs like this we already know how long each pipe needs to be and we get only exactly that amount. We had already cut it up to work with it. That's why we noticed a missing piece.”

“Can I see one from the same batch?”

“Suppose so. It's all put together now but you can look at it. We haven't walled it up yet.”

Troy took out his iPhone and photographed the pipe markings on one pipe where he could see those. “Anything else odd happen around here?” he asked.

“Hell, even that ain't odd,” Dolfe said. “Every hardware or plumbing supplier in this part of the country probably sells the same pipe.”

“Fascinating,” Troy said. “Well, excuse me.” He walked around to the entry door and rang the bell. Kathleen Barrymore answered. She did not look pleased.

“I already filed a complaint about you,” she said. “I want the boat released. I want my husband's body back so I can have him cremated. He wanted his ashes scattered out over the Gulf of Mexico.”

“Working on the boat issue. The autopsy's done. Surprised they haven't called you. But if you call the county medical examiner's office they can tell you when they release the body and someone can pick it up. Mind if I come in and look around a little?”

“What did they say…what do you mean, come in? No, of course not. You got some sort of warrant? My lawyer says you need that.”

“The autopsy said your husband died of accidental electrocution. But, truth to tell, not all lawyers actually know about police entry and warrants. Only some have the specialized background. What's your lawyer's name; I could check the list to see if he's qualified.”

“Bullshit. My lawyer's one of the best. Paul Pindar. If he needs some special qualification then he's got it.”

“Ah, well. Perhaps I was wrong about that.”

“You're pretty much wrong about everything, I think. Now get out.”

“I
am
out. Where's the second bicycle?”

“Hunh?”

“The second bicycle. Last time I was here you had two in the garage. Now I see only one. Your garage door is open and I happened to notice as I was walking up to your door.”