Murder at the Art & Craft Fair (10 page)

Chapter
Sixteen

Lou returned just before I finished with Maureen
Eidorn. He stood silently, as he always does when I’m questioning someone. I
picked up the paper with the addresses and phone numbers Mrs. Eidorn gave me,
thanked her for her time, and Lou and I turned to walk away. Once we were far
enough away that she couldn’t hear what Lou had to say, he told me that he had
delivered the messages. He said Mrs. Weddington seemed puzzled as to what we
might want to talk to her about, Mrs. Arrington asked what else we could
possibly have to ask her, and Johnny Delmont said he wasn’t going to wait all
night, that he had a long drive ahead of him. Lou said he had told Delmont that
he would wait or else.

I decided to give Delmont some extra time to fume and
headed to question Lois Weddington first. Lou told me her tent was almost
across from Kincaid’s tent, which meant she had a good vantage point of all
that might have gone on there, although I figured that she wasn’t in her tent
when the worst of it happened. With Frank just across the way and already at
work, she might have more knowledge about what’s going on than I wanted her to
have before I questioned her. As we walked by, I noticed that Frank was working
with the tent flap down, but I was sure vendors were curious as to why there
was crime scene tape in front of the tent, and everyone could see there were
lights on inside the tent and shadows moving back and forth.

I wanted to get Mrs. Weddington’s take on the other
people whose names I mentioned to Mrs. Eidorn, and to find out what kind of
relationship she had had with Kincaid, since she was the one who told him about
the Hilldale event. Was it possible that they were closer than anyone knew?

I walked up and introduced myself.

“Mrs. Weddington, I’m sorry to keep you waiting. I’m
Lt. Dekker with the Hilldale Police Department.”

“What’s this all about, and what are those men doing
in Tom’s tent?”

“That’s why I’ve come to talk to you. When was the
last time you saw Tom Kincaid?”

“Saturday sometime. There were a lot of people here on
Saturday, so it isn’t like I was sitting here all day watching Tom. I was kind
of busy, and I think he was, too.”

“What kind of relationship did you have with him?”

“Relationship. I barely knew the man.”

“I thought you were the one who told him about this
show.”

“I was, but even though we’ve done several shows
together, it’s not like we’ve ever gotten together socially. I’ll see him to
say ‘hi’ sometimes when we’re doing the same show, but we’re both usually busy
getting our booth ready, helping customers, or packing up to go home, so we
don’t have much time to talk.”

“So, you’ve never gone out with him?”

“Of course not. Tom’s married. Joan went to dinner
with him Friday night, but even that’s nothing more than not having to eat
alone, although Joan wishes Tom wasn’t married, because she likes him. But
neither of them has so much as flirted with the other.”

“By Joan, I assume you mean Joan Arrington, the woman
set up next to Tom?”

“That’s right.”

“Are they in the habit of eating together at shows?”

“No, I think this was the first time, but then I think
this is the first time they’ve set up next to each other. I think that Friday
night Tom asked her for a good place to eat around here, and she mentioned a
place, and then she asked Tom if he’d like to go share a table with her. He
said that sounded fine. Then, Saturday, when she was closing up, he asked her
if she’d like to eat together again, but she said she was tired and was just
going to grab a pizza and take it back to her room and eat it.”

“Did he offer to join her?”

“Of course not. Besides, about that time Tom got a
late customer, and that guy was still over there when I left.”

“What can you tell me about that customer?”

“Nothing. He was just a customer.”

“Did they seem to be getting along?”

“Of course! What is this? Did something happen to
Tom?”

“Mrs. Weddington, do you know a vendor named Johnny
Delmont?”

“Yeah, he’s here, over on the next row.”

“Do you know anything about his relationship with Tom
Kincaid?”

“They don’t get along. Everyone knows that.”

“Have they ever had any fights?”

“No, of course not! But Tom did get in a fight with
some local guy on Saturday, got the best of him, too.”

“What happened?”

“Joan said the guy’s kid knocked some things off of
one of Tom’s tables and Tom told the kid to get out and not to come back. Then,
his dad comes charging down here and accusing Tom of beating up his kid. He
attacked Tom twice and Tom put the guy on his back. I saw that guy several more
times on Saturday. He was mad as a wet hen.”

“Anyone else Kincaid had any problems with?”

“Aw, there was this one guy I heard that wanted to
return something he bought from Tom. That happens every now and then. Somebody
buys something and either runs out of money or sees something else that is
cheaper and comes back and wants to return something. Most vendors don’t take
something back after somebody leaves with it. Anyway, this guy got so mad and
held up that Statue of Liberty puzzle he bought from Tom and held it like he
was going to brain Tom with it.”

“Did he swing it at Kincaid?”

“No, but he raised such a ruckus that everybody saw
him do it. That guy with the kid saw it, too. He was standing near my tent, and
I heard him say, “Go, ahead! Hit him with it!”

“So, Kincaid got into it with the guy and his kid
before he had this confrontation with the customer. I thought it was the other
way around.”

“No, the thing with the guy with the kid came first.”

“What was the deal with the guy who left early, the
vendor next to Kincaid?”

“I don’t know. That guy seemed to be in a bad mood all
day yesterday, and then he packed up last night and didn’t come back.”

“Speaking of last night, which of the two vendors next
to Kincaid left first?”

“I don’t know. I know both of them were about to leave
when I did, but I left before either of them, so I’m not sure.”

“What about Johnny Delmont? Any idea if he was still
here when you left?”

“I have no idea. Johnny’s tent is on the row behind
me, and I’m facing this way, so I didn’t pay any attention to anyone back
there. And the parking lot is the other way, so I didn’t have to walk past his
tent to get to my van.”

“And you didn’t see Delmont walk by your tent on the
way to the parking lot?”

“No, but I saw him walk by once earlier. That’s how I
knew he was here.”

“Did he go near Tom Kincaid’s tent?”

“Not that I recollect.”

“Where is it you live?”

“Cadiz.”

“How far is that from here?”

“Five hours. A little less than an hour closer than
where Tom lives. Of course I doubt if Tom would’ve come through Cadiz to get
here. See, if he was going from Murray to Cadiz he’d cut through The Land
Between the Lakes, but coming here he’d have stuck to the interstate, then gone
through Benton to get to Murray.”

I didn’t want directions to either place. I merely
wanted to know their proximity to each other and to Hilldale. I was about to
tell her I didn’t need to hear the rest of her AAA routine, when she stopped
and allowed me to continue.

“So, I assume you stayed in a motel here?”

“That’s right. Same one as Tom and Joan. A lot of the
vendors stay there. They have good rates, give the vendors a discount each
year.”

“Did you see Kincaid’s truck and trailer there last
night or this morning?”

“No, but Joan said his room was near hers. Mine was on
the other side of the motel.”

“I think that’s it for now, Mrs. Weddington, but can I
have your name and number in case we have any more questions?”

“Lieutenant, you’re asking all these questions about
Tom. Is something wrong?”

“I’m afraid it is, Mrs. Weddington. We’ll get in touch
if there’s anything else.”

She reached in her purse, pulled out a card, handed it
to me.

“Here, Lieutenant. My number’s on there. So’s my
e-mail address.”

“Are you heading home tonight, Mrs. Weddington?”

“I’m tired. But I think I’m going to do it anyway. I
should get home around 11:00. This way I don’t have to worry about making the
drive tomorrow. But then I guess it’s six of one, half a dozen of the other.”

Chapter
Seventeen

The distance from one booth to the booth facing it on
the other side of the row was around thirty feet. For the last hour vendors had
been driving up and loading their vehicles. Not only was there room for each
vendor to load his or her vehicle, but the first one in wasn’t trapped until
the last one in was ready to leave. There was plenty of room for someone to
maneuver to get out. Also, when the fair was going on, all that space allowed
anyone room to walk around someone. Lou and I stepped around a couple of
vehicles on our way across the row to speak to Joan Arrington one more time.

“Sorry to hold you up, Mrs. Arrington.”

“So, it’s no longer Joan. Am I now a suspect for
something, Lieutenant?”

“Well, I did find out that you neglected to tell me
that you had dinner with Tom Kincaid on Friday night.”

“Is that a crime, Lieutenant?”

“Not in and of itself.”

“Well, I can assure you, Lieutenant, that dinner was
all there was to it. I’m sometime known to say more than I should, but Friday
night wasn’t one of those times. I don’t know Tom all that well, but we’ve
talked a few times, and I found him quite pleasant company on Friday night.
And, yes, I’m a lonesome widow. But I’m a smart one. I know Tom is married. Not
happily, but married. If he wasn’t married, I would’ve accepted his invitation
of dinner on Saturday night. But I told him the truth. I was tired, and I did
grab a pizza and take it back to my room and eat it. I haven’t seen Tom since I
left here last night and something tells me I’ll never see him again. Under
different circumstances, I would have enjoyed getting to know Tom.”

“So, what are your plans now?”

“If I’m free to go, I’m on my way home. Unlike some of
these people, I don’t have that far to travel. Danville is only a little over
an hour and a half from Hilldale. I’ll probably drive back to Danville, stop
some place to eat, then go home and get ready for my next show. It’s not as
exciting of a life as I’d like, but my husband and I had some happy years
together, and maybe someday I’ll meet another man who’s not married, and fall
in love again. Until then, I’ll try to enjoy life as much as I can.”

“Can I have your address and phone number, in case we
have any more questions?”

“Surely, Lieutenant, and I hope to see you back here
next year, only as a buyer, not someone on the job.”

“I hope so, too. We’ll see what happens.”

She picked up a pad, wrote down her name, address, and
phone number, tore it out, and handed it to me. I thanked her and told her I
might be in touch.

With that, I turned away from the empty space where
Joan Arrington’s tents once stood, and walked over to where Frank was still
hard at work. Joan Arrington, with no one or nothing else to detain her, walked
to the parking lot to get in her vehicle and drive home. She had loaded her
vehicle and then taken it back there to get it out of the way while she waited
to see what else I wanted with her.

+++

“Frank, it’s Cy. You going to be a while longer.”

“Yeah, you going on a food run?”

“No, I’ve got one more guy to talk to, then Lou and I
are out of here, but we’ll stop back and check in with you before we go.”

“We’ll be here.”

+++

I turned around, looked at what was only a handful of
vehicles still left on the grounds, and over at a couple of more still parked
in the lot. The place had changed a lot from the thousands of people and ninety
tents that occupied these grounds just a short while ago.

“Okay, Lou, show me where this Delmont guy is.”

No longer did we have to walk to the end of one row
and up or down the next one, we cut through the row of trees that stood between
one row and the next, and over to what was once considered the middle row of
vendors.

“It all looks different now, Cy. He’s somewhere around
here.”

I looked at one of the somewheres around where we
stood and didn’t see anyone who resembled Johnny Delmont. It wasn’t that I knew
what Delmont looked like. It was that I knew what humans look like, and I
didn’t see a human being anywhere.

“Could it be that Delmont was on the next row, Lou?”

“I don’t think so, but let’s check it out.”

We walked through another row of trees and once we
slipped between them and looked up and down what was once the first row of
vendors’ tents, we saw the same amount of human beings that we spotted on the
previous row.

“Let’s walk down to the Information booth, see if he’s
waiting for us down there.”

We had no trouble finding the Information booth. It
was still where we had left it, and the same two women continued to sit in the
same two chairs, waiting for the last vendors to leave.

“Have either of you seen Johnny Delmont?”

“He pulled out about fifteen or twenty minutes ago.”

“You mean he left.”

“Most people don’t spend the night here, Lieutenant.”

“But most people wait if the police tell them not to
leave.”

“Oh.”

I was mad. Either Delmont had something to hide or he
thought he was above waiting around to be questioned by the police. Either way,
I was going to make an example of him.

“Do you have a description of his vehicle and his
license number?”

“We take that information down for all of our vendors.
Let me find his sheet.”

A couple of minutes later she handed me the sheet. I
told her I would return it, but stepped away where I couldn’t be heard as I
called the state police to stop and apprehend Johnny Delmont. I asked to have
him brought back to Hilldale and held in the jail until I questioned him. We
could hold him overnight, and I planned to do so. If I felt he was the
murderer, I would hold him longer. Much longer.

+++

“Well, Cy, that didn’t take long.”

“Frank, it usually takes me longer when the suspect
hasn’t flown the coop. So, what can you tell me so far?”

“You mean one of your suspects left?”

“He did, even after Lou told him to wait.”

“It sounds like you’ve got your man.”

“Well, not yet, but the state guys are going to pick
him up for me. I thought we might entertain him at the jail for a week or so.
But enough about him. What do you know about the dead man?”

“Well, Cy, the guy’s dead, and he’s not talking. I
won’t know for sure until I’ve completed the autopsy, but I think that a blow
to the head is what killed him. Unless he was hit to disguise how he really
died. Actually, there were several blows to the head, but it appears that the
one I suspect was the first blow is what killed him. At least at this point I
think it was sufficient to have killed him. Going on what I know now; body
temperature, temperature inside the tent, lividity, rigor, etc., my guess is
that he died here, and he died here sometime last night. Let’s say sometime
between 6:00 and midnight. We haven’t found any evidence as to who did this,
and we’re almost through here. As far as I know the murder weapon isn’t here.
There are plenty of possibilities here, and most of them have plenty of prints
on them, but none of them have the victim’s blood and hair on them, and I’m
pretty sure the murder weapon will have. We’ll pack everything up soon and cart
this guy off.”

“Anything else yet, Frank?”

“As a matter of fact there is. One of the most
interesting aspects of this case so far is what we didn’t find.”

“And what didn’t you find, other than the murder
weapon?”

“The guy didn’t have any money. Here he was selling
his wares all weekend and he doesn’t have a penny on him.”

“What about a cashbox? Did you find one of those?”

“No.”

“What about checks? Most vendors accept them. Did you
find any checks?”

“Not a one. I guess whoever did this took them, hoping
we wouldn’t give robbery a second thought. And another thing, Cy, I assume our
corpse stayed somewhere, unless he stayed in whatever it was he used to drive
here. Usually that somewhere is a motel. He doesn’t have a key on him either,
which means he also doesn’t even have a key to what he was driving.”

“Well, I have a key to what he was driving.”

“You mean you have the key. Why do you have the key,
Cy?”

“I don’t have
the
key. I have
a
key,
which means I know what he was driving and where his vehicle is. At least I
think so. Frank, he was staying at the Resting Place Motel and he’s booked
there through tonight, which means no one else is in that room yet. We need to
have someone go over his room, see if they can find anything. My guess is the
maid has cleaned the room since he was last in it, but it never hurts to see if
someone was there and left something behind that might give us a clue as to his
or her identity. And since Kincaid wasn’t checking out until tomorrow, maybe he
left the key there by mistake.”

“And the money too?”

“Whoever killed him robbed him. That is unless some
brave and stupid person happened upon the dead man and stole his money, and
while there are a lot of stupid people in the world my guess is the person who
murdered him robbed him, too. Maybe we’ve gone about this all wrong. Maybe none
of these altercations he had with someone this weekend has anything to do with
his murder. Maybe the only motive is robbery, and the reason he was the one who
was robbed was because he was the last vendor to leave Saturday night. Of
course he didn’t leave, but everyone says he was still here when they left.
Naturally, the murderer would say that, but no one else would have any reason
to say they left before he did if it wasn’t true. Lou and I are without a car,
since we came with our girlfriends. Do you want us to stop by the motel when
they pick us up or will you arrange for someone to do it?”

“We need to see that the room is gone over and dusted
for prints, so I’ll arrange for someone to stop by there. And Cy, I’m glad you
were able to get a date for Hilldale’s big event of the year. However, next
year I’d recommend that you drive separately, just in case someone gets
murdered and you have to go to work.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Lou and I bid Frank goodnight, and walked over to a bench
to sit down and discuss what we’d learned. I looked at my watch. It was 6:23.
We had a little daylight left. We’d talk for a while and then call Jennifer for
a ride.