St. Albans Fire (29 page)

About the only time he had ever seen her so on edge was during the days and weeks following the rape.

“No. Of course not. I’m just hoping to put things right.”

Her face darkened. “So far, it doesn’t sound like you’ve done too well. Besides helping to get a girl killed, destroying a man’s otherwise clueless family, and then siccing the same wacko on me, have you gotten any closer to making the world a safer place?”

He was stunned into silence. Never before had she spoken to him with such contempt.

He rose, too, and moved to the door. “I’m going to put you up at a motel, at least for the rest of the night,” he said. “You have any preferences?”

“I want to go home. That’s where I feel safest.”

Joe hesitated.

“Do you have the slightest shred of evidence this man is even in the state, much less watching my house?” she asked him.

“No. But we don’t know he isn’t, either. He’s very upset, Gail, and—”

“I know the feeling,” she interrupted.

He took a breath. “And very determined. The threat he made against you is like a blood oath. We—I—have no reason to think he won’t act on it. I can’t let that happen. I love you too much.”

There was a prolonged stillness between them, punctuated only by the slight humming of the fluorescent lighting overhead.

She scowled suddenly and touched her forehead with her fingertips, as if acknowledging a headache. “I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

“It’s all right.”

“I’m tired, is all.”

“I know. That’s why I suggested a motel.”

“Not that way,” she explained, her eyes sorrowful. “I’m tired of this kind of stress—I’ve got enough of my own. I’m running out of reserves.”

He took a step toward her, gripped by her implication and the fear it ignited within him—one that had grown over the last couple of years. “We will get him, Gail.”

She sighed deeply. “That’s not what I mean.”

He knew what she meant, but he didn’t press her—didn’t want the words out in the open.

“I tell you what,” he said instead. “Let me put you in a safe place for the rest of tonight and tomorrow, while my guys check your place from top to bottom. After that, you can go home. But it’s got to be with twenty-four-hour-a-day protection, both there and at work. Discreet, if you want, but around-the-clock.”

He’d expected resistance, but when it came to personal safety, he should have known better. Both her house in Brattleboro and her Montpelier condo were minifortresses, rigged with locks, lights, and alarms.

“Okay,” was all she said.

· · ·

Gino didn’t linger for long, but he did take the time to gloat a little, at least. He watched as several unmarked cars drove up the street and parked at various locations along the block. A group of casual-appearing men and women, some carrying oversize briefcases, convened on the sidewalk before Gail’s address, hovering like disorganized guests looking for a leader, until one of them worked the front-door combination and let them all in.

With a satisfied backward glance at the small pile of cameras that he’d just removed from the same premises, Gino started his engine and gently pulled away from the curb.

· · ·

Joe pulled into the Cutts farm dooryard and got out of his car, feeling the soft give of black soil beneath his shoes. It was officially mud season by now, when a half year’s worth of subsurface ice finally yields to warmer temperatures and turns all of New England into a soggy sponge for a few weeks. People who think nothing of ice and snow view mud season with loathing for what it does to roads, lawns, and the rugs of front parlors.

“Did you catch who killed my son?”

The voice was loud, sharp, and querulous, as always, but where he’d previously thought of it as an incoming mortar round, Joe was now disposed to consider its complexity. Given what he’d learned since that first snowy day, his presumptions about this family, and certainly about this one member of it, had undergone serious revision.

“How are you, Marie?” he asked, approaching.

“How do you think? You not going to answer the question?”

He put one foot up on the porch and stood looking at her. “We’re a lot closer than we were.”

“What’s that mean?”

“We have a better idea what happened, for one thing.”

She pointed at the remnants of the barn, stark and foreboding. “That doesn’t tell you what happened? It sure as hell tells me.”

He didn’t argue the point. “You see it for what it did. I wonder what brought it about.”

She frowned. “What are you doing here?”

“Did you know a man named John Samuel Gregory?”

“No.” The answer was immediate.

“You get the paper or listen to the news?”

“Why?”

“Because he was found killed in his condo in St. Albans Bay. Murdered.”

Marie’s scowl deepened. “Why would I care about that?”

“He was here, at least once.”

“The hell you say.”

Joe came onto the porch. “Could I come inside for a second? I want to show you something.”

“Inside? What?” she asked, startled.

“It’s something in the kitchen.”

Almost despite herself, Marie stepped back to let him in. He crossed the front room to the kitchen and walked over to the corkboard covered with drawings, postcards, business cards, and whatnot. He scanned the board’s entire surface in vain.

“His business card was stuck here. I saw it last time.”

“So what?”

Joe reached into his pocket and pulled out a card of Gregory’s that he’d gotten from Jonathon earlier. He handed it to Marie. “It looked like this one. Gregory was a young guy, longish hair, fancy dresser, drove a Porsche.”

Marie returned the card. “Stupid car for up here. I remember him. Not the name. I didn’t like him—too stuck on himself.”

“What did he want?”

She turned on her heel disgustedly and crossed to the sink. “If I didn’t dislike you so much, I’d feel some pity for you. You married? I’ll send your wife a get-well card. You want coffee?”

Joe played along. “Sure. Thanks.”

“He was a Realtor. What do you think he wanted?”

“Did he float a price?”

She was busying herself at the stove, having filled a pot with water. “Not to me, he didn’t. I passed him off to Linda.”

“How did that go?”

She turned to glare at him. “What the hell does this have to do with anything? They talked awhile and he left, and that was that. It was a no-sale.”

“How much did he say it was worth?”

Her face closed down, and she returned to the sink, removing two mugs from a row of cup hooks above the window. “I don’t know.”

Joe addressed the back of her head. “Linda didn’t report the conversation?”

“Maybe, I don’t remember.”

“Maybe?”

Her shoulders slumped. “It was three times what the place is worth.”

“That’s quite a figure.”

Slowly, not wanting to turn around, she spooned instant coffee into each mug. “Not really. It’s what the flatlanders are paying nowadays.”

“And you weren’t interested?”

“Nope.”

He didn’t speak for a few moments, watching her ready the coffee, load up a tray, and bring it over to the large, catchall dinner table, which was presently hosting a pile of Lego bricks at its far end.

“No one in the family was interested?” Joe asked as she continued to avoid eye contact.

“You want milk or sugar?”

“No.” Gunther didn’t move to take the coffee, letting his question float in the air.

“We talked about it,” she finally conceded, sitting at the table in front of her mug, which she didn’t touch.

He sat opposite her. “What was the gist of that?”

Marie shrugged. “You’re the detective. Look around.”

“It was never discussed further?”

“Nope.”

“About when did all this happen?”

She picked up her mug, but didn’t drink from it. “Maybe half a year ago. Before the snow. More’n half a year ago, I suppose. I don’t remember exactly.”

“And you never saw Gregory again?”

“No.”

“Did Linda?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Who else was around when he came by?”

Marie rolled her eyes. “Who cares? Why do you always do this? Since the day you showed up, it’s been one damn fool question after another. How the hell did you get your job?”

“John Gregory hired the man who killed your son.”

She stared at him, her mouth open, her eyes wide, as if he’d punched her in the stomach, which he supposed he had, in a fashion.

“What?” she finally managed in a whisper.

“
That’s
why I’m asking these questions.”

Her eyes welled up. “You bastard.”

He stood and leaned forward, propping his hands on the table, looming over her. “How else does anyone get through to you, Marie? We’ve got God knows how many people working on this, trying to find out exactly what you want us to find out, and all you dish out is abuse. Answer the question—
please
: Who else was around when Gregory came by?”

She impatiently wiped at one eye with the back of her hand. “We all were.” Her voice was flat but under control. She had gotten the message. “It was late in the day. Bobby was back from school, but second milking hadn’t started yet. That man drove up in his car, and I went to find out what he wanted. I thought maybe he’d gotten lost. Once I figured what was what, I handed him to Linda. She took him in for some coffee, like you do for folks, and then she showed him out—maybe a half hour later.”

“No one else talked to him?”

“We all did, a little. After he came back out, Bobby was waiting. He’d seen the car and spread the word, so all the men ended up standing around and yammering about it like twelve-year-olds. I let them be. Waste of time.”

Gunther visualized the scene, having seen its facsimile enough times. “How would you describe Gregory’s attitude?”

“Like I said, full of himself. I hate it when men get that way.”

Joe sat back down on the edge of his seat, leaning forward to better make his point. “Marie, now you know why I’m asking. Was there anything at all that stood out that afternoon?”

She put her fingertips against her temples, her elbows on the table. “I’m not being difficult, I swear to you. But there was nothing to it.” She rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. When she spoke next, half her face was still covered. “Why did he do it, Mr. Gunther? Why did he kill my boy?”

It was the first time he’d ever heard her use his name. He reached out and took one of her wrists. She let him lower her hand until he could squeeze its fingers. “We’ll find that out, Marie. We’re close already. You said Bobby was the one who got everybody interested in the car. Did you pick up on anything going on between Gregory and him, good or bad?”

“Nothing,” she repeated.

He sat back, took a sip of his coffee, studied the children’s art decorating the wall for a moment. “Okay. Different questions, then. You’re going to have to bear with me, though, or I’ll leave right now and spare us both.”

“What kind of questions?”

“Personal. The ones you hate.”

She drew her eyebrows down into a scowl. “Why?”

“Put it together,” he told her. “A complete stranger in a fancy car comes by to list your farm with his firm. You turn him down, but there’s nothing unpleasant about it. In fact, everyone comes out to admire his car before he disappears into the sunset, never to be seen or heard from again. That’s your story, right?”

“That’s what happened.”

“Half a year later, he hires a professional arsonist to burn your barn down with everything in it, shortly before he gets murdered himself. You see my point? There’s got to be a connection to something or someone inside this family.”

She nodded without comment.

“All right. Try not to take offense. These are questions only. They don’t necessarily mean anything, but they may suggest some ugly ideas.”

“Get on with it.” A hint of her old edge had returned.

“I asked you a long time ago about how things were in the family. I’ve got a better idea now that I’ve done some digging, especially about Bobby, but how’re relations between Linda and Jeff?”

He hesitated about telling her that he didn’t want another rant against her son-in-law, and so was pleasantly surprised when her response was quiet and measured. “Fine, as far as I know.”

“Linda’s never come to you complaining about how maybe she doesn’t get enough attention from him?”

Marie actually smiled slightly. “If she didn’t, she wouldn’t be a farmer’s wife. That’s one reason women have begun getting out in the fields more, to be with their men. It’s not just feminism and all that political talk. It’s loneliness, too.”

“Is she particularly lonely?”

Marie picked up her coffee and held it in her hands, letting the steam drift by her face. “She’s always been a dreamer, talking about far-off places, wishing she could go there. She used to spend hours reading
National Geographic
as a child, studying the maps they included sometimes. ‘I’m going to travel, Mama,’ she used to tell me. It didn’t last. She grew out of it, like all kids. And when we did travel, going to Boston or Springfield to shop or see the museums, she didn’t like it much. I think that’s what ended it for her, seeing the reality. We got lost once in Boston and ended up in a bad neighborhood, and she was amazed at how people lived. That time, she even made a fuss about coming back home—couldn’t get here fast enough.”

She paused to take a sip. “I don’t like Jeff Padgett. You know that. But she does, and she always did, since the day Cal took him in like some alley cat.”

“And he’s good to her?”

“He’s never given me any reason to think otherwise. I’m probably the only person on the face of the earth who doesn’t like him.”

Joe paused, not sure he wanted to pursue that. She saved him the choice.

“So why’s that?” she asked in his stead. “Because I’m a bitter, disappointed old woman who can’t stand the idea of people being happy.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but stopped. In fact, she might have been right. He didn’t know her well enough to challenge her.

“Is Linda,” he asked instead, “as enthusiastic about the farm as her husband? When she and I spoke, I thought I picked up on a couple of small things that indicated otherwise.”