“Come on in,” I said, patting Roxy reassuringly; her tail was not up and wagging. “You must’ve had a long ride.”
“From the village?” she said dismissively. “I tried and tried to call but your answering machine never stopped beeping. Doesn’t
it work?”
“The tape keeps running out. Would you like a beer or something?”
“Water. From the tap is fine. I was there this morning, you know. When the cops came.”
Running the water, I concluded she couldn’t possibly have meant my front yard. “What sort of things did they ask you?”
“Me? I was in back. Filing.” Her pronunciation of the word spoke volumes. “It was the royal family they interviewed. Minus
its crown prince, who’d found a more fun place to spend the night and was running a little late.”
Willem alone among the family members tried to be friendly, but he was so inept dealing with a woman he couldn’t turn on that
she gave him only grief for his efforts. “How did that go?”
“For you, awful. It started with one of the cops saying Ryan was dead, and then there were these little, you know, noises
and Rodney, with his usual brilliance, asked ‘What do you mean, dead?’ So the cop said, well, he’d been killed last night.
And guess what was the next question was? Kate wanted to know where. I mean, wouldn’t you ask how first?”
Unless you already had both answers. “Probably,” I allowed.
“It was like that sealed it. They let it all out: your yard, you hated Ryan, he was planning to take you to court if you didn’t
do that schlock work. Plus you’ve got this awful temper, they’d had one problem after another with you. Oh, and your thing
for Willem. And finally the biggie: when you were a kid you’d stabbed your stepfather!”
Well, I’d made the mistake of telling Willem, before I realized he was an incurable sharer. “Do you remember which one brought
it up?”
“Eleanor, I think, but they all knew. It was dumb to tell them.”
“It would have been.”
“Why did you stab him?” she asked once she realized it was her turn again. “Your stepfather, I mean,” she added hastily.
I smiled, a rarity in any discussion of Jon Keegan. “This time the first question really should be where. The answer is in
the penis. It was the closest available target.”
“Oh.” I watched her mentally reject several possible responses. “Okay. So, I was positive you’d be in jail by noon. But when
I got back to my room and called that emergency number you have taped on your desk—for your sister?—she said no, she thought
things would be cool. Are they?”
“Well, I didn’t kill Ryan. It looks like a strong maybe that the cops will believe that. I appreciate the alert, though.”
“I almost gagged listening to the Etlingers rave about Ryan. ‘Such an exceptional young man …’ Christ, what galloping phonies.
So what are you going to do?”
“Assuming I’m cleared? Finish Mariah’s garden, I guess. That batch of shrub reorders finally got delivered this morning.”
“What are you, crazy? You want to get the hell away from that operation. After what they said this morning they can’t very
well sue you for taking a hike.”
“They can’t very well start hanging out in Mariah’s garden, either. They’re not speaking to her.”
Sandy shook her head with something less than normal vigor. “God, I’ve got another whole week of this place?”
Taking an immediate hike did have its appeal. However much of the course I elected to stay, Sandy’s parting admonition as
she mounted her bike, “Look, at least watch your tail,” was unquestionably sound. Mulling over ways to go about it pretty
much obliterated the good night’s sleep Sheriff Dye had tried to prescribe. That and the chest-up image of Ryan Jessup as
last I’d seen him, which had taken up residence behind my eyelids.
What did I most want to do? Easy: find out who had murdered Ryan and set me up as the killer. And then? Okay, sic the cops
on them. I could settle for fantasizing any personally delivered violent punishment. Of course he, she, or they weren’t avid
to be unmasked, and had already moved beyond merely fantasized violence. Sometimes Janey’s follow-throughs work too well.
Anyhow, did I truly want to deliver up some or much of Willem’s family as murderers? Maybe even Willem himself, though I was
having difficulty sustaining that possibility. My instinct with him was to protect, to shield him against life’s grittier
realities. Mariah and I both did this, as did his parents, and even Kate in some ways. And the latter three weren’t necessarily
killers because they’d dumped on me this morning.
So what I really wanted was Ryan restored to life, myself departed from the Garden Center retroactive to last spring, and
Willem left unhurt.
Moving on to possibilities, what did I most need to do? For starters, get cleared. On my own, I couldn’t see how else to help
that along. It sounded like I was established as being indoors with the boys from before Ryan could have been killed until
one
A.M.
If I didn’t hear something positive by afternoon, though, I’d give Donna the go-ahead to call in a colleague. The biggest
lesson from the mess with my stepfather: once you’re sucked into the criminal justice system, you do want a lawyer who knows
the rules.
And after I was cleared, or failing that, shielded by big-bucks legal talent? Realistically, my top priority should be the
same as before this all started: to be there for Vicky and the boys. That could become a much bigger deal than it had looked
yesterday, and it emphatically did not suggest nosing after killers.
I hate it when logic strands you where you’d never choose to spend any time.
By morning, though, I was resigned. Mariah’s garden was reasonably out of the way; the work down in the south county should
be definitively out of the way. How I was supposed to watch my tail while maintaining a safe distance from whoever might be
chasing it remained hazy. Nonetheless, I would try for that safe distance.
My short-term conclusion that the boys should skip the rec program seemed sensible enough when I announced it. The early morning
news had more details: Ryan’s and my names. What were the odds none of the other kids would’ve heard? It might be better to
take them along to Mariah’s.
It would not either be better, Alex flared as tears welled in his brother’s eyes. This was the last day, they were going to
have a big picnic and get their prizes. And Miss Dawson had promised he could pitch a couple of innings in the softball game.
If any of the kids said something, he’d set them straight about me having an alibi. They didn’t believe him, they could go
ask the sheriff.
With more confidence in my prospects of reestablishing self-direction, I’d have held out for Mariah’s. But already, at not
even eight o’clock, the road was sounding busy. From my bedroom window I could see a clot of people milling around out at
the end of the driveway. Once I ran that gauntlet, who could say what else my day held in store? The rec program and Sue’s
would at least keep the boys out of the way. “If it’s all right with Mrs. Donnelly,” I capitulated. We called—it would be
fine.
They liked the part about making their escape from that bunch of people out front. Once we were all ready to leave, I showed
myself outside the kitchen door. While attention was focused on me, they were to slip out through the porch, diagonal down
to the creek, and duck into the woods to pick up the path. It was pretty much the route they always took, but dramatically
enhanced. Even if they screwed up, their passage wouldn’t be visible from as far away as the road. I didn’t tell them.
My role wasn’t as much fun. The two deputies on morning duty kept everybody away from the crime scene, but apparently congregating
out by the road was considered legit. Seeing me get into the Bronco, one deputy walked over and removed the sawhorse from
the end of the driveway. That looked like as much help as I was going to get.
As I headed the Bronco wide around the fatal curve, it struck me there were too many people eagerly awaiting my emergence:
two with TV cameras, several with smaller photographic equipment, and close to a dozen who appeared to be unequipped. Did
they know more than I’d expected, that Ryan and I had worked together, that we’d had our differences? That I’d stabbed my
stepfather—clearly the Etlingers weren’t moved to sit on that tidbit. I wondered uneasily what announcements or news reports
I’d missed but wasn’t about to roll down the window to find out.
My strategy was not complex: I intended to keep going— through the crowd, past the crowd, out onto the road and away. Theirs
was simple also: they would block my path. It wasn’t much of a contest. I leaned on the horn and inched forward. Most people
would really rather not get hit by a large vehicle, even a very slow moving one. When it became clear I would not stop they
peeled back. The deputies merely watched. “Thanks, guys,” I muttered, waving for them or the cameras or whatever.
Contemplating the likelihood of pursuit, I’d developed a getaway plan. Pinehaven Township contains one village, also called
Pinehaven, governed by its own elected officials, and several named hamlets that have post offices and fire districts but
are under town rule. Beyond these areas, it’s just country, slashed by north-south arteries toward its east and west edges
and otherwise segmented by many meandering two-lane roads. Wilbur Creek Road, on which my property fronts, is one of these.
Until the previous day, there was nothing much on it anybody would choose to visit.
My road doesn’t connect to either of the two main north-south routes; neither does County Route 26, which I turned on to at
the Donnellys’ corner with several vehicles starting to give chase. It was time to burn a little rubber. I had plenty of lead,
and a few strategic turns later my rearview mirror showed nothing but empty asphalt. When I intersected with Route 5, the
more western of our north-south arteries, there hadn’t been a car behind me for at least a mile.
Across the highway, within township limits, are a couple of hamlets, a lot of country, and, beyond the rise, the Hudson River.
A left onto Route 5 would point me south toward Hudson Heights, about two-thirds of which is in the township. Turning right
instead, I drove north toward and through Pinehaven village. The Garden Center is situated on its northern fringe.
It had occurred to me during the night that I could no longer pop in and pick up anything I might need there. Not that I anticipated
needing much, but there were some papers in my desk, a couple of computer disks, and my time sheets, in case we ended up arguing
about money. I could play it safe and use my keys tonight, after hours, but would everything stay untampered with that long?
It was early enough that only Grant Oldham, who did the paperwork on plant orders, should be there. And maybe Kate, if she
wasn’t playing golf or tennis. Not to worry—Kate and I were good at avoiding one another. With any luck, I should get in and
out cleanly.
But then I was hardly on a roll in the luck department. Pulling in to the parking lot I saw not only Grant’s pickup but also
Rodney’s Mercedes and his secretary’s Tercel.
Getting out of the Bronco and walking toward the side entrance the employees used, I took my customary appreciative look around.
If you’re in the landscaping business, the Etlingers’ theory ran, be your own best advertisement. To me a portfolio of completed
projects is at least as effective and immensely cheaper. This is not to take away from Willem’s design. The Garden Center’s
broad sweep of highway frontage he’d turned into a lush landscape of colorful perennial beds, wonderful accent trees, sinuous
paths, the greenest of grass, elegant garden furniture. One woman had actually come in and said, “Make me a yard just like
that.” He would’ve, too—or an even better one—if economic realities hadn’t intervened.
The first building expansion, six or seven years ago, gave them a simple but pleasant facade and generous spaces behind it.
A couple years later Kate took the then bare-bones garden supply store as her project, with the goal of building it into the
best of its kind in the area. Ever since, things had gotten progressively more crowded. They were running out of space for
inventory, and everybody’s working room had shrunk to the point of being cramped. The Etlingers had visions of expanding again
when things picked up. Many struggling small businesses would have made that “when” an “if” and given serious thought to debt
reduction. This was not the Etlinger mentality.
I let myself in the side door and started toward my desk, nodding at Grant as I passed. The barely perceptible return nod
was a clue I wasn’t going to get much farther unimpeded.
“I can’t believe you had the nerve to show up here!” Rodney had bounded—that’s the only verb to capture it— out of his office
to plunk himself down in my path, arms folded across his chest. I started to give credit for bravery, my having seven inches
and at least forty pounds on him; knowing Rodney, I downgraded to foolhardiness.
“Do you want to tell me what that means?”
“I’m only surprised the police haven’t come for you yet. Phil let me in on what he’s told the
Star-Journal
: an arrest is imminent. For me, he added the name, not that it came as a surprise.”
“Maybe you should check if he told the sheriff, too. Meantime, I need some things from my desk.”
I took a step toward him. He glared. I took another step. He took a smaller one backward. In this basic pattern we worked
our way along to my desk, at which point he executed another bound and ended up sitting on the top, crossed legs blocking
my three-stack of drawers. A fun vision: grab him by the feet and spin him around. Right, and he’d fall off, break an ankle,
and sue the shit out of me. “I think you’ll need to move,” I said regretfully.
“Emma,” he called sharply, “get on the phone to the sheriff’s office.”
I turned. His secretary had come to a halt a few safe feet from me. “Ask if any of the media people are still around. He’s
so picturesque perched there on my desk, guarding all that valuable evidence.”