Laura turned to me in surprise. “Not a lot, no. Daddy spouted off some—you know how he is. But Ben didn’t fight. He’s—” She seemed to be searching for the word.
“A totem pole?” I suggested.
I was both surprised and delighted when she laughed. “Exactly.” She drew herself up, scrunched herself together at the sides, and spoke without moving her lips. “All wood with an expressive face.” She relaxed and gave me an impish smile. “It was three months after I got here before he would reply when I said hello. It took a year before he’d speak to me first, and it’s just recently that he’ll come to me with a question before he’s tried everyone else in the place. I’ve been back from grad school two and a half years, and I don’t think we have exchanged more than three sentences about anything except the business. But I’d trust him with my life. He’s honest, reliable, loyal, patient with his men—”
“A real Boy Scout.”
“Yeah. A Boy Scout totem pole.” She splashed water on her face and grabbed a paper towel to dry it.
I nodded toward the mirror. “Friday, when I was in here washing my hands, I heard your daddy and Ben through that wall. It sure sounded to me like a fight. Ben was fixing Perez’s brakes and your daddy wanted him to finish Joe Riddley’s tune-up first.”
“They argued some,” she admitted. She unfastened her hair clasp, ran her hands through each side, and dragged the hair back again. “Daddy liked to micromanage. Wanted to run every little thing himself. Ben likes to make his own decisions. I kept telling Daddy to let him run the service department as he sees fit—Ben always gets cars ready for folks close to the time he’s promised them, and people are real satisfied with his work. But Daddy couldn’t help meddling from time to time, just to show he owned the place.” She gave a watery little laugh. “I don’t mean to criticize him, or anything—”
“I knew your Daddy before you were born,” I reminded her. “You don’t have to explain him to me.”
As we left, she looked back toward the sink with a thoughtful expression. “We ought to insulate that wall”—she huffed a sad little sigh—“if Skell doesn’t decide to sell the place.”
“He wouldn’t.” I stood still, shocked.
“He might. He’s never liked selling cars, and Daddy always said he was going to leave the place to Skell.” Her voice was gruff and dreary in the dim hall. As we stepped into the showroom, her eyes roamed around all its shiny cars with a look I’d seen in Joe Riddley’s when he stood in Yarbrough’s. Laura might sleep across town, but this was home.
I couldn’t think of a single comforting thing to say.
We’d barely rejoined Joe Riddley in the chairs out front when a siren wailed up the street and a police cruiser skidded into the small no-parking zone right in front of the door, ignoring empty parking places on each side. Chief Muggins himself climbed from the cruiser, settled his hat on his head, stuffed his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket, and swaggered up the walk. His intent, I guess, was to terrify any burglar who might still be lurking around. Heck, he almost terrified me. Laura shuddered. “I’m so glad you all are here. I couldn’t have stood talking to him by myself.” She moved forward to open the door for him.
He was walking in when the courthouse clock chimed three. As the carillon followed, a half-minute late as usual, I muttered, “That’s the perkiest rendition of ‘Come, Labor On’ I ever heard.”
Joe Riddley grunted. “It’s a lot more likely to inspire folks to join God’s workforce than the usual tempo.” I looked at him in surprise. Maybe the speed of those chimes wasn’t accidental. Could the church, like Laura, be trying to appeal to a younger customer?
“Didja hear we know who killed Mr. MacDonald?” Chief Muggins greeted us, wiggling his hips a little to show he was the man in charge.
Laura, who had been locking the door behind him, turned white and grew still.
Joe Riddley asked, “Who was it?”
“Garcia fellow—the one who opened that new restaurant.”
“No!” I exclaimed.
Charlie ignored me. “We got a tip this morning that he got lit at the end of his opening night, and bragged, ‘If that MacDonald lays a hand on my daughter, I will kill him.’ ”
“No.” Laura’s face was screwed up in the same disgust I felt. “Daddy wouldn’t . . .”
Charlie shrugged. “Probably not, but you know how those people are—hotheaded, always shooting somebody.”
“Those people,” I said, emphasizing each word just like he had, “are just like everybody else. Some have hot tempers and some don’t. And Skye wasn’t shot, he was run over.”
“You wear blinders, Judge. That’s one of your problems. It’s him, all right. We’ve talked to several witnesses who heard him threaten MacDonald. I’ve got men out right now looking for him. He killed in cold blood, and he’ll pay for it—if he hasn’t already escaped back to Mexico.”
I counted to ten to control my temper, and gave it up as a lost cause. “Do you have any real evidence against Mr. Garcia?”
“Not yet, but we’ll get it. When the paper comes out with its annual crime report in two weeks, we won’t have an unsolved violent crime in Hope County for these past six months.”
So that’s what his hurry was.
I wanted to say, “By all means, then, let’s arrest somebody—just anybody—to make that report look good,” but Laura was looking real queasy, and I didn’t want to prolong the conversation.
Joe Riddley asked in a mild voice, “Has Mr. Garcia disappeared?”
“Folks say he’s gone down the road to church, for what that’s worth.”
“He’s probably Catholic,” I said, a mite tartly. “It’s a good thirty miles to the nearest Catholic church. They aren’t real thick on the ground around here, you know.” Joe Riddley reached over and poked me between my ribs.
“We’ll find him,” Chief Muggins assured me. He gave what he may have thought was a lordly wave. Looked more like a polecat swatting flies. “So, what’s going on down here
now?”
You’d have thought Laura was creating a crime a day just to annoy him.
With admirable clarity and restraint she explained.
“I see.” He strolled into Skye’s office. We all followed. “You all stay back, now. Don’t contaminate the crime scene.” As if he weren’t doing that very thing. “What was in the safe?” He peered inside.
“Just those papers and checks on the desk. The cash was gone.” Laura didn’t mention the little white box. I only thought of it because she touched her pocket as she spoke.
“How much money was stolen?” Chief Muggins was peering into the safe like that empty hole could say anything at all to his naked eye.
Laura explained again about throwing the money in uncounted both Friday night and Saturday. I could tell he didn’t believe her. “You got records of sales, haven’t you?”
“Sure, but it will take time to compare them with the register receipts, and I’ll have to call the bank tomorrow to find out how much Skell withdrew on Friday.”
He stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and stomped around peering at plaques and pictures. “You think maybe the burglar left a photograph of himself on the wall?” I suggested.
Joe Riddley pinched me where the shoulder meets the neck. I glared at him, but he shook his head. I knew what he was saying: “Don’t antagonize him.”
I pulled away and went over to examine a green convertible. Maybe I ought to get me a convertible. Some sporty sunglasses, too. Maybe I ought to look for a man who wouldn’t pinch or poke me, somebody who would respect my opinions and give me credit when I deserved it. Maybe I ought to find a man who would be willing to admit that Charlie Muggins was a—
“Jackass,” muttered a voice at my shoulder. “Little Bit, that man doesn’t know a crime scene from a hole in the ground. You stay here with Laura. I’m going to talk to Isaac and see if they’ve really got anything on Mr. Garcia.” I hoped he’d remember where he was going long enough to get there.
“Where’s he off to?” Charlie demanded, coming to the door of the office.
I shrugged. “You know how men are. They take all sorts of notions and just leave.”
“What I don’t understand,” he said in that smarmy too-friendly voice he uses when he’s about to say something nasty, “is what
you
are doing here, Judge. Returning to the scene of the crime?” He threw back his head and emitted the gargle that passes for his laugh.
“I asked her to be with me while I spoke to you,” Laura informed him.
“Laura’s had a rough weekend and doesn’t need to be badgered,” I added. He narrowed his eyes, but before he could think of a good reply, I jerked my head toward the chairs. “Is it okay if we sit over there while you call your deputies to come look for fingerprints?”
He stared at me for the several seconds it took him to process that reasonable suggestion, then nodded. “Sure.” He pulled out his cell phone and punched in a number, keeping one eye on us the whole time to make sure we didn’t attempt a quick getaway.
14
Before we sat down, I turned our chairs so they faced outside. Scudding clouds and debris hurtling down the street before the wind were a marked improvement over Charlie Muggins’s face. As Laura and I watched, a fine hard rain began spitting against the window.
My spirits were as cold and gray as the view. I liked Humberto Garcia. Had he really killed Skye in the middle of hosting his grand opening? And why had he thought Skye would be interested in his daughter? Sure, Skye often hugged women, but he didn’t mean anything by it. He was a big teddy bear, a born flirt.
Mr. Garcia might not understand that, of course. And he could have slipped out while people in the restaurant thought he was in the kitchen and vice versa. But I couldn’t picture that plump man moving fast enough to dash through his back door, drive to a rendezvous, go with Skye to that deserted place, run over Skye, get the car back to the church, and return before a single soul noticed he was gone.
I was pulled from those useless ruminations by Laura’s voice, full of misery and frustration. “Seems like there ought to be something I could be doing.”
“I’ve got one suggestion. Ask Chief Muggins if you ought to call employees who have been in your daddy’s office this past week to come here to be fingerprinted. The police will need their prints to compare with any they find, and it’s a lot faster to get them all down here today than for them to go individually by the police station. We’ve been through this once ourselves. That’s how I know.”
She pulled a hank of hair to her mouth, then thrust it away angrily. “I don’t know why I keep doing that. I haven’t sucked my hair since I was a kid.”
“Losing a parent makes a kid out of all of us, honey. It’s normal to revert to childhood patterns.”
Her wide mouth curved in a grin. “And now, Dr. Yarbrough, for your next psychological question . . . But seriously, Mac, who would rob us in the middle of all this?”
I shrugged. “Thieves seldom pick a time to rob based on consideration of what else their victims may be going through.” I didn’t point out that if Skell had killed his daddy, he wouldn’t have feared retribution from Skye for taking the money. He might even have considered the money his.
Her thoughts had been roaming in another direction. “You think it’s Ben, don’t you? But he wouldn’t. He’s the most honest, loyal, considerate person—” She turned pink and stopped, a puzzled look in her eyes.
“A Scout,” I reminded her. “But Scouts can do bad things, you know.”
She turned her head and looked up the street. “He didn’t do it,” she repeated.
“I never said he did,” I pointed out mildly. “But speak of the devil . . .”
Ben’s truck had just pulled in behind Chief Muggins’s cruiser. His long legs swung down; then he stopped to wait for a half-grown golden retriever to climb awkwardly from the cab. Ben hurried to the door with the pup frolicking at his knee. He tested the door, and when it opened, rushed in. “What’s going on?” he demanded of Chief Muggins and Laura equally.
Chief Muggins, who still had his cell phone at his ear, waved Ben toward Laura. He headed our way, calling again, “What’s going on?”
Laura stood. Her face was flushed, but when she spoke, both her voice and her posture were those of Laura MacDonald, competent vice president of MacDonald Motors addressing her manager. “The safe’s been robbed. I didn’t make a deposit yesterday, and somebody took the cash.”
Ben’s dog was at that awkward stage when it still thought of itself as small but was, in fact, almost grown. While its master was absorbing the news, it knocked over a wastebasket and brushed brochures off a low table with its tail. Ben bent to retrieve the brochures, muttering, “Sorry about that.”
Laura bent to scratch the dog behind the ears. “No harm done. Good boy.”
The good boy raised his head and uttered a series of sharp barks. “That’s how he says ‘hello,’ ” Ben explained, and now it was his turn to flush. “Hush, Scout.”
“Scout?” Laura looked down at me, eyes dancing. “As in Boy Scout?”
I looked out the window so Ben wouldn’t see my face.
The pup pranced around, wagged his tail, and toppled a potted dracaena, spilling dirt all over the gray rug. “No, Scout!” Ben said sharply. The pup ran and cowered behind the nearest car. “I’m so sorry.” Even more red-faced, Ben began to brush up the dirt with his hands.
Laura squatted and whistled softly. Scout peered around a fender. When she held out her hands, the pup came right to her. She cradled its muzzle between her hands. “You are a pretty boy. Yes, you are. A beautiful fellow. You just aren’t ready to work in a grown-ups’ place, are you?” She twisted his head gently, in fun. Scout, delighted, lunged to lick her on the nose. She wasn’t expecting it, and toppled backwards. Laughing, she rolled over to dodge his caresses, then sat up and roughed his ears with both hands. “You got past the goalie and scored, big dog.”
If Ben’s face got any redder, we could hang him over Oglethorpe street and save the cost of a new stoplight. He offered her a hand, but she climbed to her feet unaided. Then she said, “Mac here says you worked late again last night. You didn’t have to do that.” She sounded gruff.