Murder Among the OWLS Page 4

  And it might be that something was missing from the bookshelf, as Ruth had pointed out, but Rhodes wasn’t convinced of that. The scratch wasn’t exactly powerful evidence, and there was no other indication that anybody had been in the house. Besides, Rhodes couldn’t imagine what might have been on the shelf to attract anyone’s notice.

  Another problem with the murder theory was that nobody Rhodes had talked to along the block had seen a car at the house, and nobody had seen anyone walking along the sidewalk or in the alley.

  That didn’t prove anything, either. People didn’t keep a watch on the sparse traffic, and the alley was usually concealed by fences, trees, and bushes.

  It would be best for all concerned if the autopsy proved that Mrs. Harris had simply had an unfortunate accident, but Rhodes couldn’t rid himself of the nagging feeling that it hadn’t been that way.

  He heard a noise in the hallway and turned to see Yancey, who had established all kinds of records for keeping silent, peeking around the door facing. Rhodes started to tell Yancey not to worry about the cat, but before Rhodes could get the words out, the cat stretched, and Yancey was gone.

  “You’re a disruptive influence,” Rhodes told the cat, which took no notice of him at all.

  Rhodes smiled. You had to give the cat credit for impudence. Or something like that.

  Rhodes stood up. He’d have to go back to the Harris house and pick up a couple of things.

  Ruth was taking photographs in the kitchen. Rhodes let her know that he was taking the litterbox and the scratching post. She said that would be all right.

  Back at home, Rhodes installed the box and post on his own little inside porch and pointed them out to the cat, who seemed bored with the whole thing.

  “You just be sure you use the facilities I’ve provided instead of the floor or the furniture,” Rhodes said.

  The cat yawned widely.

  Rhodes sometimes wondered about his ability to communicate with humans, though he thought he did all right with dogs. On the other hand, he was absolutely convinced that he had no ability at all to communicate with cats.

  It was time he went to the jail to see what else was going on in the town, so he told the cat to leave Yancey alone, reminded him again about the litterbox, and went out to the county car. He had a feeling it was going to be a long day.

  Chapter 5

  RHODES EXPECTED HACK TO START QUESTIONING HIM THE minute he walked through the door, but the dispatcher surprised him. He didn’t say a word.

  Neither did Lawton. Both men were looking at Hack’s computer monitor and pretending that they didn’t even know that Rhodes had come into the room.

  It was just a question of who would crack first, Rhodes thought as he walked over to his desk. The two men were invariably curious about everything that happened in Clearview, and they usually wanted Rhodes to divulge everything as soon as possible. On the other hand, they preferred to keep Rhodes in the dark as long as possible when they knew something he didn’t. That much, at least, was normal.

  When Rhodes sat down, his chair squeaked, and Hack looked up from the computer.

  “I didn’t think you’d be coming in today,” he said. He ran a finger along one side of his thin mustache, which was mostly white with a little touch of brown. “It’s getting on toward lunchtime.”

  It was only a little after ten thirty, but Rhodes didn’t bother to point that out.

  “Might be a little hard to get lunch, though,” Hack continued.

  “Depends on where you eat,” Lawton said. “Might not be so hard if you went to the Dairy Queen. This is bean day, ain’t it? Beans got a lot of fiber, they say.”

  “Fiber’s good for you,” Hack said. “Cleans out your system.”

  Rhodes didn’t know where the discussion was headed, but that was often the case when Hack and Lawton got started. He knew they’d get to the point sooner or later. Most likely later, since they liked to draw things out as long as possible. It was their way of getting revenge on him for not always telling them all he knew.

  “It’s not bean day at the Dairy Queen,” he said. “That’s tomorrow.”

  “You still oughta go to the DQ if you want to eat anything about now,” Hack said. “You might not be able to get served at McDonald’s.”

  “That’s right,” Lawton said, “not unless Buddy’s got things straightened out down there.”

  Hack glowered at Lawton, and Rhodes suppressed a smile. Lawton had spouted more information than Hack had planned, at least this early in the give-and-take.

  “So there’s a problem at McDonald’s?” Rhodes said.

  Lawton started to speak, but Hack gave him another glare. It was almost as if they were doing an Abbott and Costello routine, and they even resembled the comedians, a pair that Rhodes always liked to watch on cable, especially their movie that had them meeting Frankenstein’s monster, Dracula, and the Wolf Man.

  “Won’t be a problem by now,” Hack said. “Not if Buddy’s on the job.”

  “Right,” Lawton said. “It’s probably all taken care of. Nothing to worry about.”

  Whenever one of them said that, Rhodes automatically began to worry.

  “Tell me about it.” His tone didn’t give them any wiggle room, so Hack gave in.

  “I got a call a little bit ago from the McDonald’s. It was some customer in the drive-through line. He said they wouldn’t serve him.”

  “Why not?” Rhodes said.

  “Bad timin’,” Lawton said. “He wanted a sausage biscuit, but—”

  Hack swiveled his chair, the better to glower at Lawton, who gave him a hard stare right back. Hack, however, always won those contests. Lawton dropped his eyes after only a couple of seconds, and the dispatcher turned around to face Rhodes again.

  “Like I was about to say before I got interrupted, this fella wanted a sausage biscuit. Just a plain one, no cheese, no egg, just sausage and a biscuit.”

  “Nothing wrong with that,” Rhodes said, knowing that there had to be a catch. “Sounds like a reasonable request.”

  “Yeah, if had been made earlier, but it was after ten. They don’t serve breakfast at McDonald’s after ten. The fella complained, and they brought him what he said was an old leftover sausage biscuit with egg on it. They told him it was all they had left. That’s when he called us.”

  “Why?” Rhodes said.

  “’Cause he didn’t get what he wanted,” Lawton said, and before Hack could turn to him, he looked up at the ceiling and started to whistle a tune that Rhodes thought might be “Jesus Loves Me.”

  Hack waited for him to stop, which he did after four or five bars. Then Hack said, “The fella on the phone said that we were the law here and that it was up to us to protect him. ‘Protect and serve,’ that’s what he said. You got a duty to ‘protect and serve.’”

  “What are we supposed to protect him from?” Rhodes asked. “The wrong breakfast?”

  “That’s what I asked him.”

  “Did he have an answer?”

  “Sure he did. He said we had to protect him from idiotic business practices. He wanted a sausage biscuit, plain, with no egg, and they could damn well make him one.”

  “Did you tell him to take off the egg?”

  “He didn’t want to do that. Said it had already contaminated the sausages. Besides, the biscuit was cold. Said he wouldn’t get out of the drive-through line until we came and made them obey the law.”

  “You told him that the law didn’t have anything to do with sausage biscuits, I hope.”

  Hack nodded. “Sure did. Didn’t make any difference, though. I could hear horns honking by that time, so I told him I’d send an officer. That’s when I called Buddy.”

  Buddy had a strong puritanical streak, and Rhodes could just imagine what he told the caller when he arrived on the scene.

  “Have you heard from Buddy?” Rhodes asked.

  “Nope. Soon’s I hung up on the first guy, the manager of McDonald’s called. He wanted us to
send somebody over there to arrest the fella who was blockin’ his drive-through lane. I told him there was already an officer on the way. Kind of surprised him that we were so efficient, I think.”

  “I’ll bet,” Rhodes said. “See if you can get Buddy on the radio.”

  “Won’t need to. I talked to him just before you came in. He’s on his way here.”

  “Good,” Rhodes said, and turned to his desk. He had to write a report on Mrs. Harris’s death, and he was still learning to use the new computer the county commissioners had bought for him recently.

  It was quiet for about ten seconds. Then Lawton said, “You don’t have anything to tell us?”

  Rhodes turned back around and gave him a puzzled look. “Tell you about what?”

  “You know what,” Hack said.

  Rhodes could have toyed with them awhile longer, but instead he told them about the cat and about finding Mrs. Harris’s body.

  “That’s too bad,” Hack said. “Miz Harris was a fine woman. Not afraid of hard work.”

  “Some people wouldn’t see it that way,” Rhodes said, thinking of Francine Oates.

  “They’d be wrong, then,” Lawton said. “I like a woman who’ll get out and do a little work. Shows you she’s got character. How’d it happen?”

  Rhodes told them that it appeared to have been an accident, but that he had his doubts.

  “That’s why you’re the sheriff,” Hack said. “You can see things the rest of us can’t.”

  Rhodes was never quite sure if Hack was kidding when he said things like that.

  “I’m not sure about it,” Rhodes said. “Either of you need a cat?”

  “I like cats, but I don’t need another one,” Lawton said. “I got two already.”

  “I’m allergic,” Hack said.

  “I’ve heard that’s psychological,” Rhodes said.

  Hack shook his head. “Maybe it is, and maybe it ain’t. All I know’s that I sneeze when I’m around ’em, and at my age I don’t like sneezin’.”

  Rhodes wasn’t sure how old Hack was, except that he could have retired years ago if he’d wanted to. He didn’t want to, however. He liked his job at the jail, and Rhodes suspected that he also enjoyed tormenting Rhodes and Lawton.

  Before they could get any further into their discussion of cats and allergies, Buddy came in. Rhodes was glad to see that he didn’t have a prisoner with him.

  “How’d things shake out at the hamburger place?” Hack said. “Have to shoot anybody?”

  Buddy grinned a thin grin. Everything about him was thin, including his hair. He had hardly any hips at all.

  “I wanted to shoot that fella who called,” he said, “but I didn’t think I could get away with it.”

  “Self-defense,” Lawton said. “Tell the judge he attacked you with a sausage biscuit.”

  “With egg on it,” Hack added.

  “I’m a peaceable man,” Buddy said, in what Rhodes thought was a barely passable imitation of John Wayne. “So I just told him to drive on into the parking lot where we could talk. That got the lane unblocked.”

  “What’d you tell him?” Hack asked.

  “I told him that there was no law that regulated when a business served breakfast and that there wasn’t a thing I could do for him. I told him to act like a grown-up and go talk to the manager and get his money back if he didn’t like what he’d been served.” Buddy looked at Rhodes. “I told him that if he didn’t like it, he could come down and talk to the sheriff.”

  “Great,” Rhodes said. “I’m sure I can count on his vote in the next election.”

  “I don’t think so. He told me that talking to you’d be a waste of time because you’d just back up your hirelings.”

  “He said hirelings?” Rhodes didn’t think he’d ever heard the word used before.

  “That’s what he said. He was an educated kind of a guy. Probably teaches English at the community college.”

  “Those English teachers are sensitive,” Lawton said.

  “Anyway, he went in,” Buddy said. “I think he was a little ashamed of himself by that time. I waited outside, and when he came back, I asked him if he’d got it all sorted out. He said he had. He was carrying a little sack.”

  “What’d he have in it?” Hack said.

  “I didn’t ask him.”

  “You mean we went through all of that, and you didn’t even ask him what he bought?”

  “I didn’t think it was any of my business,” Buddy said. “Should I do an incident report, Sheriff?”

  “No crime, no report,” Rhodes said. “You can get back on patrol.”

  As soon as Buddy was out the door, Hack said, “I can’t believe he didn’t even find out what that fella bought. After all that fuss, I’d kinda like to know.”

  “Not any of our business,” Lawton said.

  “It sure is our business. He called here, causin’ a ruckus, and we got a right to know.”

  Rhodes knew they could carry on like that indefinitely. The law enforcement business in Blacklin County might not be quite like it was on a TV show like Law & Order, but it was never dull. Rhodes shut his ears to the office chatter and started to work on his own report, which was considerably more serious than the one Buddy had just made.

  The trouble was that he didn’t know what kind of report to write. He thought it might be best to wait until he heard from Dr. White.

  While he was trying to make up his mind, Ruth Grady came in with the folders from Helen Harris’s desk. Hack and Lawton started to quiz her about the crime scene as she was copying the documents, but she put a stop to their chatter when she opened the folder labeled Last Will and Testament and said, “That’s interesting.”

  “What is?” Rhodes said.

  Ruth held up the folder by the edge and let it flop open for Rhodes to see. It was empty.

  Chapter 6

  “MAYBE SHE DIDN’T HAVE A WILL,” RUTH SAID. “SHE MIGHT have made the folder but never gotten around to writing a will. We could find out if she had a lawyer.”

  “You don’t need a lawyer to make a will,” Hack said. “You can just write one out longhand or get you a form from some computer software. That’s what I did.”

  “Yeah,” Lawton said, “but you don’t have anything to leave anybody.”

  “That’s all you know. I got a house and a savin’s account at the First National Bank.”

  “Nobody to leave it to, though. Not chick nor child.” Lawton rubbed his chin. “There’s always Miz McGee, I guess. She’s prob’ly just waitin’ for you to pass so she can get her hands on that savin’s account.”

  Miz McGee was the woman with whom Hack had been keeping company for a while, and there was no better way to rile him than to make a slighting reference to her.

  Rhodes spoke up before things got out of hand. “Do you have a will, Lawton?”

  Lawton turned the smooth, bland face that belied his age to look at Rhodes. “I sure do. I got a boy lives up in Dallas. He’ll get all my worldly goods.”

  “Such as they are,” Hack said.

  “What about you, Ruth?” Rhodes said, before Lawton could reply.

  “I have one. I didn’t think I needed to at my age, but my parents told me I should have one, just in case.”

  “And I have one, too,” Rhodes said. “That makes it unanimous. So you think a woman as particular as Helen Harris might not have had one?”

  Nobody thought it was likely.

  “There are a lot of reasons the will might not be in the folder, though,” Ruth said. “She could have put it in a safe-deposit box or somewhere like that.”

  “I think she’d have kept a copy,” Rhodes said, knowing Francine had witnessed a will.

  “So you think somebody took the will?”

  Rhodes said he didn’t know what to think, and that was when Jennifer Loam walked in. She was a reporter for the Clearview Herald and, in fact, wrote most of the stories that appeared in the paper except for the ones on the sports page. She was
young, blond, and determined. She was also an excellent writer, and Rhodes was a little surprised that she was still working for the Herald. He thought she’d have moved to a big-city paper by now.

  “What will are you talking about?” she said without bothering to say hello. “Has somebody stolen one?”

  “We don’t know,” Rhodes said. “We were just talking about the possibility.”

  “It wouldn’t have anything to do with Helen Harris, would it?” Jennifer said.

  One of her annoying habits, or at least annoying to Rhodes, was her ability to find out what was going on in town almost as fast as Rhodes did. Sometimes, even faster. He gave Ruth a warning glance, which was probably unnecessary.

  “Mrs. Harris had an accident,” Rhodes said. “We were wondering about her heirs.”

  Jennifer took a tiny digital recorder out of her purse and turned it on.

  “I don’t have anything for the paper,” Rhodes said.

  Jennifer didn’t turn off the recorder. “I heard that there was some suspicion of foul play.”

  Rhodes thought it was no wonder he found her annoying at times. “Who told you that?”

  Jennifer smiled. “You know we reporters never give up our sources.”

  “I bet you’re payin’ off somebody with the ambulance service,” Hack said. “Either that, or you know the justice of the peace.”

  Jennifer just smiled.

  “Mrs. Harris had an accident,” Rhodes said. “But since she was alone in the house, we have to investigate it and make sure. Right, Deputy Grady?”

  “Right,” Ruth said with a nod.

  Jennifer held the recorder a little closer to Rhodes. “So you’re willing to go on the record as having determined that Mrs. Harris’s death was just a household accident?”

  Rhodes wasn’t willing to go on the record about anything. “Not yet. But we don’t have any reason to suspect that it wasn’t.”

  He wasn’t being entirely truthful, but he knew everyone in the office would be happy to back him up.

  “I don’t believe you, Sheriff,” Jennifer said.

  “People seldom do. I think it’s my dishonest face.”

  Jennifer stopped smiling. “You and I haven’t had any problems before, Sheriff. I hope we’re not going to start now.”