Lovely in Her Bones (12 page)

Milo nodded. It seemed to be the only thing to do if he wanted to get back anytime soon. He did wonder, though, if Coltsfoot was better than nothing.

Twenty minutes later Pilot Barnes returned to an empty office. He checked the bathroom, and looked into the holding cells in case Dummyweed had decided to grab a nap while he waited, but there was no sign of him. Pilot had just concluded that Dummyweed had got bored and gone home when he saw the note propped on his coffee cup at the front desk. He read the message three times. “Indian Attack in Sarvice Valley,” it read. “Man fatally tomahawked. Bring help. (Signed) Deputy D. H. Coltsfoot.” Pilot Barnes’ first reaction was one of distrust. Indian attack, indeed! “Bring help.” The Seventh Cavalry, maybe? He continued to stare at the note, trying to decide that it was a prank so that he could throw it away, but the more he studied it, the more he tended to believe that it was a garbled version of the truth. Pilot could well believe that there had been trouble in Sarvice Valley; the Cullowhees were an ornery bunch of folks, and trouble would be no stranger to that hollow of theirs. It seemed feasible that they had bashed somebody’s head in for any number of reasons: poker game, drunk fight, that strip-mining business. He wished Duncan Johnson were back, because he hated to get the coroner out at night on little more than a rumor. He would, though; better safe than sorry.

During the several phone calls that Pilot Barnes made before going out to investigate, he decided to assume an official reticence rather than to admit how
little he knew. “Trouble out your way,” he told Bevel Harkness. “We’re not sure just where. Expect you to find it and report back.” He called the chief of the volunteer fire department to borrow the portable generator, in case there was a death scene requiring night lights.

It was more difficult to be evasive with Dr. Putnam, a tiny septuagenarian. “What do you mean, ‘trouble in Sarvice Valley,’ Pilot Barnes? If you want to get me away from my television, you’ll have to do a lot better than that.”

“I got a note here that there has been a homicide in Sarvice Valley, and I’d like you to come with me and check it out.”

“Can’t it wait till morning?” Dr. Putnam insisted. “Some liquored-up Cullowhee probably shot his cousin, and he’ll be weeping and wailing over the body by the time you get there. Just bring the body back to town, and I’ll do the autopsy first thing in the morning.”

“It doesn’t sound like that kind of a case,” the deputy told him. “My information is that a man was killed with a tomahawk.”

“What’s that? Did you say tomahawk?”

“According to the information I have,” said Pilot Barnes carefully.

“Well, pick me up, boy! I’ll even pass up my
Star Trek
rerun for this!”

Half an hour later, one of the volunteer firemen had come in to man the office, and Pilot Barnes was driving out to Sarvice Valley with Deputy Hamp McKenna and Dr. Putnam.

“Wait till Duncan Johnson hears about this!” the old man chuckled. “As soon as he leaves the county, there’s an Indian uprising.”

“Reckon we ought to notify anybody?” asked Hamp McKenna.

“How about General Custer?” asked Dr. Putnam.

Pilot Barnes, keeping his eyes on the narrow road, was not amused.

    On the dark path to the excavation site, Deputy Coltsfoot was feeling considerably less like Gary Cooper in
High Noon.
It had just occurred to him that there was still a murderer at large in the area, and he had not thought to bring a gun with him. He wasn’t even sure that he could have found the key to the gun case.

“You don’t know who did it, do you?” he asked Milo nervously.

“No. He was dead when I found him. Do you want to take a statement now?”

It was so dark on the path that Coltsfoot couldn’t see his own feet, and in any case, he had forgotten to bring a notepad. “I think that can wait awhile,” he replied. “You didn’t see anybody around, did you?”

“No. Is this your first murder investigation?”

“I guess you could say that,” admitted Coltsfoot, neglecting to mention that it was also his first investigation of any kind.

“Well, Dr. Lerche and I work with the coroner’s office sometimes back at the university, so I can give you a few pointers if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Sure. Fire away.”

“Well, I think you ought to just stand guard until somebody else gets here,” Milo told him. “Don’t go looking for footprints, and don’t touch anything. The people with the crime kits will want the scene as undisturbed as possible. Your best bet is to secure the area until they get here.”

“Secure the area,” repeated Coltsfoot, liking the sound of it. “Right.” Another thought struck him. “You mean,
by myself?”

    “What kind of an idiot would forget to tell you where the death scene was?” mused Hamp McKenna.

“Dummyweed,” grunted Pilot Barnes. “And I was the idiot that left him in charge.”

“Drive up to the church,” said Dr. Putnam from the back seat. “It’s nearly midnight and the lights are on.”

When they saw Bevel Harkness’ patrol car in the dirt parking lot, they knew they had come to the right place. “Get the camera and the crime kit, Hamp,” Pilot ordered, “and follow us up to the church. Those people can tell us where Harkness is.”

Dr. Putnam chuckled. “Hope he hasn’t gone to join the sheriff’s nephew.” He meant the one who had disappeared on patrol duty in 1972. “You know, if the Cullowhees have killed an outsider, the wonder of it is that there’s a body around to be discovered.”

Pilot Barnes sighed. “Bring the rifle too, Hamp.”

    Inside the church, all was quiet. Victor, whose asthma medicine had finally taken effect, was snoring peacefully in a corner, while the others sipped coffee and talked quietly. To Jake’s profound relief, the shock of Lerche’s death had stunned Tessa and Mary Clare into numb civility. They sat quietly, speaking in monosyllables, and sipped their coffee as if it were medicine.

Elizabeth was too confused over Dr. Lerche’s personal life to feel sympathy for anyone except Milo. Her private opinion of the change in Tessa and Mary Clare was that they both realized the futility of fighting over a dead man. She knew that one of them was going to lose him anyway, and she wondered if that one was secretly pleased that her rival had lost him too. Elizabeth kept these thoughts to herself, dispensing coffee and sympathy as unobtrusively as possible. She wondered when Milo was coming back.

Jake had returned around eleven-thirty, when Milo came back with the deputy. Milo told him to wait at the church for the other officers, while the two of them guarded the site. Jake balanced his
coffee mug on his palm and tried to think of something neutral to talk about. He knew Elizabeth wanted to know what was going on up there, but the presence of two mourners prevented them from discussing it.

“He never got to finish his project,” Tessa murmured.

“The discriminate function chart?” asked Elizabeth.

“Yes. It was nearly ready, and he was so excited about it. It would have been such a contribution to the field.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “And he never got to use the riding lawn mower, either!”

“What’s going to become of the project?” asked Elizabeth.

“I think we ought to finish it,” said Mary Clare.

“Yeah, me too,” mumbled Jake. “Sort of a memorial.”

“But, how can we? I mean, do we have the expertise?” Elizabeth protested.

Jake shrugged. “Let’s talk it over with Milo. He may have some ideas on that.” He sat up. “Was that headlights in the parking lot? I think the sheriff has arrived.”

    Pilot Barnes peered past Jake into the common room. “Is this where the homicide is?” he demanded.

“Yes. I mean—no. The body is up at the dig site. Your deputies are up there with one of our people, and they told me to show you the way.”

Dr. Putnam cocked his head and looked appraisingly at Jake. “You’re not a Cullowhee, are you, boy?”

Jake blinked. “No, sir.”

“What’s your last name?”

“Adair.”

The doctor nodded, satisfied. “Ah! So that’s it!” He turned and followed the procession up the trail to the cemetery.

Pilot Barnes spent most of the walk barking questions at Jake, beginning with: “Ain’t you the people whose computer got smashed?”

Jake said that they were, and Pilot digested this information for several minutes, trying to connect it with the homicide. “But you didn’t have a computer up there at the cemetery, did you?”

“No.”

“Did you have any trouble with the Cullowhees? That’s their kin you’re digging up, you know.”

“They asked us to come,” said Jake. He explained the purpose of the dig.

Pilot Barnes frowned. This wasn’t going to be like their usual brand of homicide, which took all of about twenty minutes to solve. This one felt like a needle in a tub of molasses. He wondered how Duncan Johnson managed to be away when it happened: second sight or undeserved good luck? Pilot decided that he would do the essential site investigation tonight—he could hardly do otherwise—but that to continue the case without notifying his superior would be overstepping his authority. Beach or no beach, Duncan Johnson was getting a phone call in the morning.

They threaded their way past empty graves to the tent. In the lantern light, Pilot could see Bevel Harkness and Dummyweed talking to the young man who had come in to report the computer damage.

“It’s just that Indian curse I was a-telling you ’bout,” Harkness was saying in sepulchral tones. “They went and got him for sacrilege.”

“Harkness, that’s not how we expect officers to talk while investigating a homicide,” growled Pilot Barnes. He did not like Harkness at the best of times, and his opinion had scarcely altered with what he had just heard. He turned to the other of his least favorite people. “Coltsfoot, that note you left me wasn’t exactly a wealth of information.”

He took the criticism philosophically. “It was hard
to know what to say. I was pretty reamed out myself by the news, you know?”

“Just remember to tell
where
as well as
what.”
Pilot turned to Hamp McKenna. “I think you can put that generator on the edge of the clearing so the light shines this way. Is the body in there?”

Milo, to whom the question was addressed, opened the tent flap and ushered the deputy in. Pilot Barnes took in the scene with considerably less emotion than that displayed by Coltsfoot. He stared at the body for several minutes without speaking.

“What are you going to do now?” asked Milo softly.

“Usual procedure,” said Pilot, still staring at the body. “Photographs, site investigation. Dr. Putnam out there is the coroner, and he’ll do an examination in situ. We’ll secure the area until sunup; ought to be able to tell more then.”

Milo hesitated. “Well, that’s what I wanted to ask about, really. Who are you planning to leave guarding the scene?”

Sensing that there might be a logical reason for the question, Pilot replied: “Bevel Harkness, I reckon. We’re shorthanded.”

“Uh … I don’t mean to tell you your job, but I don’t think that’s a very good idea, since this is a murder.”

“Oh? And why not?”

In a low voice, Milo told him about Harkness’s appearance at the Cullowhees’ meeting, and about his warnings of “Indian curses” should the project continue. “I don’t think he’d be the most objective of investigators, Mr. Barnes,” Milo concluded.

Pilot Barnes nodded. He wouldn’t have to wait for Duncan’s okay on this one; they were of the same mind about Harkness. “I take your meaning,” he said to Milo. He went back outside, motioning for Dr. Putnam to take over.

“McKenna, how’s your work coming?”

The deputy looked up from his camera. “As well as could be expected,” he said. “We’ll know more in the morning.”

“All right. McKenna, I want you to finish up here, and get these pictures developed, and relieve Harvey Jeffers at the office. He’s sitting in for us right now. Coltsfoot, you’re going to start earning your keep as a deputy of this county. I’m putting you on guard duty here to secure the area—
only
because we’re shorthanded. We’ll be back in the morning to relieve you.”

“What about me?” Harkness demanded.

“I hear you have some opinions about this strip-mining business.”

“Damn right I do. I don’t want this land to be roped off by the federal government like some kind of a people zoo, so—”

“Well, be that as it may, in a murder investigation it’s a conflict of interest, and I’m taking you off the case. You can continue your regular patrols in the valley until further notice, but you are to have nothing to do with this homicide investigation. You got that?”

“I got it, all right,” muttered Harkness, turning to go.

“You want me to stay here all night?” gasped Coltsfoot. “Is
he
still gonna be here?” He gestured toward the tent.

“No. After McKenna takes his photos, we’ll take him on back to town for the autopsy,” said Pilot.

“Well, what about all those skulls in there?”

“They stay here,” said Milo promptly. “They have no bearing on the case, and we need them to continue the project.”

“Oh, you’re going on with it, are you?” asked Pilot Barnes.

“Oh, yes,” said Milo softly. “I’m going on with it.”

“Well, are any of those people planning to leave the area? I need to get statements from everybody,
but it can be left till the morning if they’ll all be around.”

“Well … there’s two of them I’m not sure about. Dr. Lerche’s wife … widow.”

“Oh, Lord! The widow is here?”

“Arrived tonight. I expect she will go back to the university to make arrangements for the funeral and so forth. She may want to speak to you now, so that she can leave in the morning.”

“Who’s the other one?”

Milo hesitated. “Dr. Lerche’s graduate assistant, Mary Clare Gitlin. She was supposed to go off and do research, I think. I haven’t had much time to talk to the group tonight.”

“Come on, I’ll walk back to the church with you,” Barnes offered. “You look like you’re on your last legs. Just let me tell the doc to meet us there when he’s through.”

Milo wished he had brought a jacket. Mountain nights were chilly, even in late summer. He was glad of the cold, though, because it kept him awake despite his tiredness. He hoped that the numbness of fatigue, which was hitting his legs and his shoulders, would seep into his brain sooner or later and allow him to sleep. He didn’t want to face what was left of the night staring into the darkness seeing Alex facedown among the Indian skulls.