Meadowlark (11 page)

"No sweat."

Jay smoothed his moustache. "Mrs. Phuoc is a leader in that
community. She's not the type to use casual violence."

Bianca frowned. "How do you know Mei?"

"There were rumors of Asian gangs from Portland
intimidating local people last winter. The sheriff asked me to sit on a
task force."

"Oh. And you interviewed Mei?"

"Mrs. Phuoc was on the committee," Jay said drily. He would
see that the Vietnamese women weren't railroaded either. I cheered
up a little.

Del snorted. "She's a peasant. Illiterate."

Jay ignored him. "She's foreman of your work crew, isn't she,
Bianca?"

She nodded. "Hugo and Mei got along. She speaks a little
English, and he spoke a little Vietnamese. God, how am I going to
work with those people? I always let Hugo deal with them." She
plunked down on one of the armchairs, muttering something about
broccoli.

Del smirked. "I'll handle 'em." Har, har.

Bianca rounded on him. "No, you will not. You will not go
near my harvest crew. Do you understand me, or are you too drunk
to hear?"

Del blinked.

"Go feel up a sheep," she snarled.

Del flushed. "Now lissen--"

"No, you listen. I'm tired of your sexual innuendoes. One
more crack and you're out of here. One more--"

"Now, Bee--"

She turned on Keith. "'Now, Bee.' You, too, Humbert
Humbert. So you sent little Carol home, did you? I'm surprised you
didn't drive her yourself."

A delicate silence ensued. Jay looked at his shoes. I admired
the painting over the mantle. It depicted Kayport harbor in slashing
abstraction. Del burped.

Angie Martini stalked into the silence. She was wearing
jeans and a sweatshirt, but she managed to look like a leopard
defending its cub. I remembered that Mary Sadat was her
protegé.

"Where is that damned deputy?"

Bianca sniffed. "I put him in the conference room. He and the
woman the sheriff brought out are interviewing Bill."

Jay said, "Lisa Colman?"

Bianca nodded.

That made sense. Lisa Colman was a detective lieutenant.
Dale's supervisor. She would coordinate the investigation. Since
Bianca's prominence made the process ticklish, Lisa would probably
keep a closer eye on Dale than in an ordinary case. Still, the
department was understaffed. Dale would have a lot of
autonomy.

Angie was muttering rude words.

I decided it was time for a distraction. "About the workshop,
Bianca."

Bianca glowered. "I'm not going to cancel it."

"Isn't that a little disrespectful? After all, Hugo was an old
friend."

"Hugo would want me to go on with it. He Believed in
Ecology." She was back to speaking in capitals. She also dabbed at
her eyes, which was unfair.

I sighed. "Then consider the practicalities. You'll have half a
dozen experienced journalists interviewing Carol Bascombe."

Bianca blinked. Angie snorted. Keith cleared his throat as if
he had meant to speak but thought better of it.

"And Del," I added, bringing up the heavy guns.

I could see that I had given Bianca pause.

Del stared into his glass and finished off the contents. It was
very quiet. I didn't look at Jay.

Marianne said, "I don't want them poking around in my
kitchen."

Bianca glanced from me to Marianne to Del, like a wild
creature at bay.

I almost had her. Unfortunately, the detectives had finished
with Bill.

The kid was wearing sneakers so we didn't hear him
coming. He popped out into the living room from the tiled hallway
and stopped short, blushing, when he caught sight of all those adults
staring at him.

"You must be Bill Johnson." Jay introduced himself and
mentioned the Dean. "Are you okay?"

Bill nodded, blushes fading. "They just asked me a bunch of
questions about the ice house. I didn't see Mr. Groth, honest. The
lady said I could have a lawyer, but that costs a lot of money, so I said
no. They told me I could go home."

"Have they talked to Jason Thirkell?"

"Yeah. The guy, Nelson, talked to him first thing. Now him
and the lady are at it again."

"Okay. Well, don't worry, Bill. The killing is probably nothing
to do with you."

"I told them that," Bill muttered. "Uh, guess I'll go. Where's
Mike?"

"In the kitchen," Marianne said. "If you want a
sandwich..."

Bill brightened. "Yeah. I'm real hungry."

Marianne went with him. I supposed she was one of those
women who look on food as the universal panacea. In Bill's case, she
was probably right. Maybe in Mike's, too.

Bill's entrance had given Bianca time to regroup.

"I'll hold a news conference," she announced.

All of us stared at her.

The brown eyes gleamed. "When the workshop participants
get here Sunday, I'll hold a formal news conference, give them the
facts and maybe some...some color. Then I'll lay down guidelines. No
interviews with the staff, no photos, no intrusions."

I thought that was almost heroically naÏve. It was so
naÏve I could think of no way to say so without gross
rudeness.

"Besides," she added, "Nelson's bound to solve the case by
then. He has a whole week."

Jay cleared his throat.

Keith McDonald said, "You're out of your mind." He sounded
weary.

"No, no, really, Keith. They want a story, I'll give them a
story. Then we can go on with the workshop. I can't cancel. Not with
Eric Spielman and Francis Hrubek coming." She was wheedling.
Keith shook his head.

Marianne reentered on noiseless feet. For a large woman
she moved quietly.

Bianca leaned forward, hugging her knees. "It'll work, Keith.
You'll see." She exuded conviction.

I said, "What if Dale arrests you?"

Bianca stared. Keith tugged at his beard.

Jay was frowning at me, the spousal 'pipe down' signal.

"But he won't do that," Bianca said with absolute confidence.
"I loved Hugo. I didn't have any reason to kill him. We all loved
Hugo."

Dead silence.

Angie said, "Uh, Bianca, listen. Hugo was a great gardener.
I'm sure we all respected him. But--"

"Where's Bill?" Jason Thirkell, like his sidekick, was wearing
sneakers. He strolled into the room as if he owned it. "Where's Bill? I
told him to wait for me." Jason was probably not sneering. His mouth
just tilted that way.

"He's in the kitchen," Marianne said.

Jason headed for the kitchen. Jay and I exchanged glances,
and Jay followed him.

"I don't like that young man," Bianca muttered.

"Huh? Whazzat? Jason's a good kid!" Del lapsed into stupor. I
wondered if he were really drunk or faking it. He was a little too
obnoxious. I have a hard time calculating the effects of hard liquor.
One glass gives me a buzz.

A clacking on the tiles and low voices resolved into Dale and
Lisa Colman, Lisa in high-heeled pumps. She was a short, square
woman, about fifty, who had come into the department via dispatch
and stayed on doing scutwork until affirmative action caught up with
her. Jay thought she was sharp but a bit unimaginative. She shook
hands briskly all the way around and took her leave, turning to Dale
at the last moment.

"My office. Seven. Get something to eat first."

He nodded.

Marianne led her out through the kitchen. I heard her greet
Jay as the door swung shut.

Dale looked at me. "Got the shoes?"

"In Jay's car."

"Don't forget to give them to me before you leave." He
sounded as if my departure were imminent. That was okay with
me.

Bianca said, "We want to know where we stand,
deputy."

Dale said politely, "I appreciate your cooperation, Ms.
Fiedler. When I get the results of the autopsy I'll know a lot
more."

Keith pulled a chair. "Sit down, Nelson. Would you like a
drink?"

"Coffee, if you've got it." Dale didn't sit.

Keith went off to the kitchen. Del was watching the deputy
through half-lidded eyes.

Bianca leaned forward. "When is it scheduled?"

"The autopsy? Tomorrow morning. We're rushing it. The
M.E. had three others slated, but he'll do this one first."

"But what about the Vietnamese?"

"Lt. Colman and I are going to see Mrs. Phuoc tonight. The
lieutenant found a translator."

Bianca leaned back, expelling a long breath. "Good. That's
good. It was probably some...some old quarrel we don't know
about."

Dale raised an eyebrow. "And Mrs. Phuoc settled it with an
axe?"

Bianca flushed a little. Her chin lifted. "Mei is a fine woman.
I'm not accusing her. But she has a big crew, and all of those women
interacted with Hugo. And they do use the machetes. They like the
machetes."

Jay and Marianne reentered, followed closely by Keith with
a coffee mug. We heard the distant slamming of a car door and a
muted roar as Jason's high-wheeler pulled away.

Jay and Dale exchanged greetings. Dale gulped hot coffee. I
made another attempt to persuade Bianca to cancel the conference,
but she liked her own plan too well to listen. It was time to go. Past
time.

I started making noises of disengagement and Jay, bless him,
followed my lead. He asked Angie about Mary Sadat. Rather to my
surprise, Angie didn't use the opportunity to attack Dale. She just
said that Mary had been very upset to discover she was the last of
the group to see Hugo alive. Angie had given her a mild tranquilizer.
That may have been pharmaceutically incorrect but it was sensible.
Dale said nothing.

He did follow us out, however, ostensibly to get my boots.
Bianca came as far as the mudroom. As we said goodbye she looked
me straight in the eye. "Don't desert me, Lark. I need you."

"I'll be here for the workshop," I heard myself saying, "but I
still think you should cancel it."

She nodded, solemn. "I respect your opinion."

Right. I gave myself a swift mental kick.

Jay and Dale had gone on out to the cars and were already
deep in police technicalities when I got there. The door to the
mudroom closed. I could see Bianca watching us from the
porch.

I gave a little wave. She waved back and disappeared.

"And there's not enough blood," Dale was saying.

My ears pricked. "How much do you need?"

He gave me a wry smile. "Goddamn, Lark, don't you start
pumping me. I've had enough of that from Ms. Fiedler
McDonald."

"I'll be good. Want my boots?"

He took them. I watched the two men in my rearview mirror
as I left. They were still deep in conversation.

As I drove homeward, I tried to think up ways to persuade
Bianca to abandon the workshop. I also thought about Hugo. And I
thought about Hugo and Bianca. Her reaction to his death was so
muddled I didn't know how much of it to trust. "He would have
wanted us to go on with it." Anytime somebody performs that kind of
ventriloquism for the dead I get very uneasy. If I were murdered I'd
want everyone to drop everything.

And why had Bianca insisted that everybody loved Hugo
when she knew it wasn't the truth? Hugo had been a hard man to
know, and it was clear that Del and Angie, to name two, had found
him maddening. To say Bianca was in denial was simply to label a
response that in this case was inexplicable. I was beginning to think
Bianca was at least as strange as Hugo, that I didn't understand her
at all.

The honk of an indignant motorist pulled me back on my
own side of the road, and I gave up analyzing Bianca.
Psychopathology is not my strong suit.

Jay was a good hour behind me. By the time he got home, I
had zapped a packet of frozen soup base in the microwave, taken
some bits of leftover seafood out to thaw, and made toast and a
salad.

I fed him cioppino. When he looked as if his petals were
reviving, I said, "Okay, open up. What did Dale mean by not enough
blood?"

He dipped toast in his chowder. "Dale thinks the lacerations
may be post mortem."

Inflicted after death. I digested that, not comfortably.

"Of course, the body was on ice for a whole week." Jay
chewed, his tone vague as if he were thinking of something else.
"That complicates everything."

We had good sex that night of the sort calculated to offend
the Pope, e.g. with no thought of generating a baby, at least on my
part. Possibly I was just Affirming Life. When I woke from the second
nightmare, I thought of that--in capitals.

Jay was sleeping deeply. I gave him a prod with my toe but
he didn't respond. I wondered how many times he had wakened
with a dry mouth and accelerated pulse to find me snorting away in
oblivious insensitivity. As the idea crossed my mind, he rolled over
and gave me a pat. He didn't wake up, but he wasn't oblivious.

I leaned back on my pillow, half afraid to fall asleep again,
but I did without incident. When I woke at seven I went for a short
run, and that improved my mood.

Jay had classes that morning, so I fixed him breakfast, and
we talked a little. I told him Bianca was determined to go on with the
workshop.

He swallowed orange juice. "And you agreed to abet
her?"

"Abet!"

He smiled. "You have to say no a lot to that kind of
personality. Usually they don't resent it."

"I'm sorry for her. She's in a terrible situation."

He considered that over a last bit of toast. He sipped herb
tea. He finished off the orange juice. Then he said, "I'm sure she's
grieved and worried. Still, at some level, she's enjoying the
drama."

That made sense. Bianca was the daughter of an actress,
after all. And of the director of any number of detective flicks. I
envisioned the ill-omened press conference. It wouldn't do a damned
bit of good, but it was bound to be dramatic. I had once held a press
conference.

Jay wiped his moustache on a paper napkin and got up. He
leaned across the table and kissed me. "Just say no."