Murder at Fire Bay (13 page)

Martha left first. I dawdled for a few minutes before getting up to pay the bill. When I left the building, I made a quick left-right check for Ralph. If he was there, I didn’t see him. Tomorrow might tell the tale. If Ralph talked, people would be making little remarks and faces at one another and Ashley’s mouth would still be in a straight line, with a line of frost around it for added effect.

I drove back to the High Bluff B & B thinking about Jeanette and how I wished she were here. As I drove into the yard, I noticed Mrs. Mordant huffing and puffing, trying to push the old man up the ramp and through the doorway.
 

She gave me a disapproving glance. “I waited as long as I could before pushing him up to the bluff.”

I gently edged her aside and pushed the old man through the doorway. “Sorry,” I said, “but there were work duties.”

“Uh-huh,” came the response.

Evidently, I was in the doghouse. Never mind that his care was not my job. Pushing him to the bluff was a duty I had acquired by virtue of being younger and stronger than his daughter. The old man smiled at me, which I took to be a good sign. He was slowly getting better. I sincerely hoped he would be able one day to walk up to his favorite place on the bluff. That simple act would be his claim to a life that was worth living. I wished them all a good night and made a hasty departure for my room.

I lay down on the bed and dialed Jeanette. I needed to hear her reassuring me that everything was okay in our world. The phone rang four times before the answering machine picked it up. Crap! She wasn’t home. I wondered where she was. Well, hell. I left a message in my best plaintive voice, the one that said I was feeling sorry for myself and needed attention. I didn’t use it very often since it wasn’t one of my better sides. I despised myself for doing so.

To keep busy, I turned on the small TV and watched Jim Carey and his silly antics. I was hoping he would ease the tension I felt. After five minutes I gave it up and switched to CNN. Maybe somebody’s bad luck would cheer me up. That didn’t help much either. Next, I took down a Reader’s Digest collection of short stories. The first story that fell to hand was “The Perfect Storm.” It proved to be disquieting. I had been on a small boat in a major storm off the coast of Vietnam, and I didn’t like to think how close my death had been.

Finally, I shoved the book aside and turned off the TV. I would wait patiently.
 

* * *

I awoke with a jerk to a ringing phone. Flailing around in the flickering light of the TV, I found the phone right where I’d left it, and managed to pick it up on the third ring.

“Leo?”

“Jeanette? What time is it?”

“Ten o’clock” came the muted answer.

“I called earlier,” I said, still in that self-pitying mood.

“I was at a basketball game” came the even smaller voice.

This was not the way this conversation was supposed to be going. Here I was, giving the only person in the world who truly cared for me a rough time.

“Sorry, Princess, I’m in a bad mood. Did Howes Bluff win?”

“No, they lost by two points.”
 

Uh-oh, there would be no joy in Howes Bluff that night. It was the first game of a long season. Small Alaskan towns take their basketball real serious. The what-ifs would be flying tomorrow at the local restaurant. There would be sighs and pointed looks at the poor guy who didn’t make a particular shot.

“How’s everything else?” I asked.

“Fine.” Another one-word answer.
 

I was not off the hook yet, at least in my own mind.
 

“Well, I wish I could say the same,” I said.

I went on to tell Jeanette about the box and the political problems I saw coming, that the two powerhouses were the new supervisor and the union steward. Each very jealous of her territory. I confessed I had no idea how I was going to walk a tightrope between them. Last of all, I had a mighty wish to be back in Howes Bluff where life was reasonably simple.

“And not to mention about being close to my sweetheart,” I added.

“I know, Leo, but it’s the path you chose, and I agreed to it. I knew there might be risks for you, but you’re too young to stop growing. You had to go.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” I answered. “I just wish life didn’t have to be so darn complicated.”

“I have a feeling you thrive on complications, my husband.”
 

That answer about did me in. It was the “my husband.” I had to stop talking a few seconds to get control of myself.
 

“Well . . . well.” I tried to be gruff, but it wasn’t working. “I guess it’s time to go,” I managed to finally blurt out.

“Good night, Leo,” the sweetest voice in all the world said.

“Goodnight,” I answered, and hung up the phone.
 

I needed a drink and bad. There was none to be had.
No, Bronski,
my little voice said,
you have to do this on your own.
I sighed, got up, and dressed for bed.

Chapter 16

On a Monday morning a week later, I sat at my desk, feet propped up, wondering again what the hell I was doing here. It was a question that seemed to have no answer. I flapped my tie in my face to generate some enthusiasm, but that didn’t help. I put my feet back on the floor and straightened my back. Nope, that didn’t help much either. In point of fact, I was bored. Bored, bored, bored. Since Ashley had arrived on the scene, my workload had decreased somewhat. That should have left me with more time to think about the Gloria mystery, but I was all thought out. I had thought so much that suspects were popping out of the walls. One minute I just knew so-and-so was guilty, but then it would occur to me why that person couldn’t possibly be the murderer.
 

Just as I leaned forward and rested my head in the cup of my hand, the phone rang. I shot straight up to a standing position. At last! Action! Maybe the Boss was calling to move me back to Howes Bluff.
 

I decided to play. I picked up the phone. “Hi, Boss!”
 

There was a chuckle on the other end. “My, my, he does have you trained. I bet you’re even standing up, eh . . . Bronski?”

I slowly sat down into the chair. Crap! It was Crouch.

“Is that you . . . John?”

“Yes, Bronski, it’s me. Who in the hell else did you think it would be, huh?

“By the way, I know you’re the old man’s pet, but don’t try throwing your weight around again, you got that?”

I decided to ignore the last remark and grinned to myself. The Boss must have pushed.

“So, what do you have, John? Did you get around to looking for fingerprints in the box?”

“Yeah, Bronski, we got around to it and the contents were clean. Not one fingerprint. What’s more, the only fingerprints on the outside of the box were all postal people.”

“Damn,” I said. “Any chance of getting the part back to its owner? He still hasn’t received the replacement part he ordered.”

There was a moment’s pause on the other end. “Let’s hang onto it for another week, Bronski. If nothing else happens that involves the part, then I guess we’ll have to give it back.”

“Okay, that sounds fair,” I said.
 

I could hear Crouch chuckle. He knew it hurt me to say the postal inspectors were doing something fair.

“Good. Be seeing you, Bronski,” he said, and hung up.

I put the phone slowly back into its cradle and reflected about there being no fingerprints. Whoever was responsible knew what he was doing. Were there other post offices involved? I hoped the postal inspectors were at least considering the possibility.
 

Just then Ashley walked in without knocking.

“What?” I asked with what I hoped was my “don’t you ever knock” glare.

“There’s a man at the back door with a mean-looking old German Shepherd,” she said with her best honey-dripping Southern belle style.

“Very well. I’ll go see what he wants,” I answered. I walked through the maze of cases and shelves with Ashley in tow, which, of course, drew everyone’s attention. Something was going on. I could feel the anticipation rise in the room. I had a hunch my favorite postal inspector was behind what was about to happen. And for once, I agreed with him.
 

When my parade and I arrived at the back door, I took a quick squint through the peephole. Ashley was right. There stood a dog handler I knew from Anchorage, and sure enough, there stood one mean-looking old German shepherd beside him.
 

I turned to Ashley and gave her my fake friendly smile. “You might want to back up a little. I know this dog. He gets a mite predatory at times in strange places.”

Her face pinched a little, but she did as I ordered.
 

I waited until she was about twenty feet away from the door before opening it.

“Hello, Andy.”

“Hello yourself, Leo,” he said. His blue eyes smiled behind his set of wire-rims. Andy had gotten a little rotund the last few years and was the only guy I knew in the Postal Service who got away with wearing his old Vietnam unit’s baseball cap. He was a good man, a family man, and one you could trust behind your back. We went back a long ways—clear to Vietnam. He had been a dog handler there also. He was one example of how friends’ lives can crisscross from time to time. Never, after Nam, did I expect to see him again. I had first run into him years ago in Anchorage on another drug case. We weren’t close friends, but each of us kept track of the other’s doings in the Postal Service.

“I guess you want to look the place over?” I asked.

He grinned. “Yes, Mr. Crouch wanted me and Zippy to have a look-see.”

I nodded and sighed. “Come on in,” I said, and motioned them to enter. “Has old Zippy been to the bathroom, I hope?”

It was an old joke between the dog handlers and postal people. Nothing can be more trying than a dog thinking he sees a fire hydrant. Andy raised his eyebrow and nodded. Zippy, I swear, glared resentfully at me for a moment. I watched as man and dog walked slowly up and down cases and shelves filled with boxes. I have always marveled how a dog can discern the smell of “weed” or coke from all the other smells. German Shepherds are about the best with noses five hundred times more sensitive than humans.
 

After about twenty minutes of searching, Andy and Zippy wandered over to me by the door. “We haven’t found anything as yet. How about I turn Zippy loose to look around by himself? Sometimes he does better on his own. I call it dog intuition.”

“He won’t bite anybody, will he?” I was feeling good that morning.

Andy just shook his head, and Zippy yawned, showing me his teeth. What that meant I had no idea. I looked at the employees in front of the cases, hoping they weren’t squeamish about a dog sniffing around. But if there were drugs, we needed to find them.

“Sure, go ahead.”

Andy removed the leash, muttered a command, and Zippy started at a fast walk, nose to the floor. We watched as he retraced his steps over the floor. I could tell some of the women were not too happy having a big dog sniffing around their cases, but it was necessary. From across the floor, Martha gave me a glare that would fry an egg.
 

To pretend I wasn’t feeling the heat, I asked, “Can he smell stuff on people if they’ve been handling drugs?”

“Oh yeah. I’ve seen Zippy pull off some great finds. He is so darn smart. But he’s getting older. It won’t be but a year or two before we retire him. He . . . ” An excited yip came from a storage locker by the wall. It was the same place I had found the box with the prop. Zippy was so excited that Andy had to pull him from behind the locker. While Andy patted the dog, I looked. Sure enough, there sat a small box wrapped in brown paper about six inches square. Without further ado, I put on some plastic gloves and carefully extracted it. Naturally, everybody crowded around, wanting to know what was going on.
 

I held it up. “Just a small box, everyone. Please go back to your cases. You’ll no doubt hear in the near future what’s in it.”

There was mumble here and there. Mumbles that meant, “Yeah, sure, just like the post office always does.”

I waited until everyone had drifted back to work and then to motioned Ashley. She came over with the appropriate concerned look on her face.

“Go to the office and give the postal inspectors a call,” I said. “But first, go tell Andy not to leave until I talk with him.”

She nodded and left to do my bidding. That left me standing there with the package. I looked at the return address and, sure enough, it had the address of the parts place in Portland. Presumably, it was addressed to another boat owner here in town. It was interesting to me that another package had come through so quickly after the previous attempt and the fact that it had been left in the same place. Evidently, the suppliers were anxious to make up for lost revenue.

Andy ambled over. “You wanted to see me?”

“Yeah, don’t leave for Anchorage until I find out from Crouch what to do with this package. It may be he’ll want you to bring it back.”