The Alpine Nemesis (10 page)

“So thanks for listening,” Tim concluded. “And thanks to Spencer Fleetwood for allowing me to get this off my chest over the air. Tiffany thanks you, too. This is Tim Rafferty, live and direct from the studios of KSKY.”

I waited to see how Spence would follow up this startling story. But after a canned commercial for Safeway, Spence merely thanked Tim for his heartrending revelation and added, “Remember, you heard the news first on KSKY—every day, every hour, every minute of late-breaking local, national, and international events.”

As soon as I got in the house, I called Milo at his office. He was still there, as I had hoped he would be.

“Did you hear Tim Rafferty on the radio just now?” I asked, slightly breathless.

“No,” Milo replied. “When do I have time to listen to the radio around here?”

“Tim says he found Brian Conley up on the Ridge,” I said.

“What?”

“You heard me. Tim also said he was so panicked that he put Brian in the meat locker with the O'Neills. Whom, I might add, he had followed down from Second Hill.”

“The O'Neills drove to Alpine Meats?” Milo sounded bewildered.

“No, no,” I clarified. “The Hartquists were driving the O'Neills. At least I guess it was the Hartquists. I don't think Tim ever identified them on the air.”

“Sweet Christ.” Milo went silent for a moment. “This was on the radio just now?”

“Yes,” I responded. “I sat out in the car to listen to the end of it. I came in and called you right away.”

“Damn.” Milo sounded angry. “I'd better get over to KSKY right now. I'll have to call Tara and tell her I'll be late. She's making me her special veal dish tonight.”

“Yum,” I said. “Will you let me know what you find out from Tim?”

“I'll try,” Milo said. “You don't need it right away, do you? I mean, it must be too late to make the paper.” The sheriff didn't need to remind me.

I
SAT BY
the phone. I was in a quandary. If Tim Rafferty had worked for anyone in the world except Spencer Fleetwood, I would have been off like a shot to interview him. But I wasn't going to show up at KSKY like some poor beggar asking for alms. I'd have to rely on Milo for now, and catch Tim later, away from the station. Since going to work for Spence, Tim only moonlighted occasionally at the Venison Inn. I wasn't sure how he got by, because I was convinced that Spence paid him in gift certificates and coupons from the local merchants who advertised on the radio station. Then again, I'd heard that Tim was e-trading on the Internet, so maybe he was cleaning up in the stock market.

I had to alert my staff, however. I called Scott first, but he wasn't home yet. Perhaps he was romancing Ta-mara Rostova. Then I phoned Vida, not because she was second in importance, but because I knew the call to her would take some time.

Vida claims she never listens to KSKY, but I know better. She would never reject a news source, even from an archrival. There isn't much that Vida misses, but just in case, she tunes in to Spence's station. This is a fact, because at least twice she has caught him in mistakes. Unable to contain her glee, Vida had to pass these erroneous bits of news on to me.

“I heard all but the very start,” Vida said in an excited voice. “What did I miss?”

“Not much,” I replied, propping the phone between my chin and shoulder as I reached for the bourbon bottle. “Tim Rafferty was just setting the scene.”

“Ridiculous,” Vida huffed. “How could Tim and Tiffany have found that body? It's too much of a coincidence.”

“I thought so at first,” I said, plunking ice cubes into a glass, “but then I visualized the scene. The rain starts pouring down, they seek shelter, and who knows what they were really doing under that ledge?”

“True,” Vida responded, then switched to a tone of reproach. “Is that ice I hear?”

“Yes,” I said, knowing what was coming next. Vida was antialcohol, except on those very rare occasions when she felt it absolutely necessary to have a drink, usually a Tom Collins.

“Are you making an adult beverage?” she demanded, still in that critical tone.

“Yes.”

“Are you drinking alone?”

“Vida,” I said with a big sigh, “you know perfectly well that I often have a drink after I get home from work. Usually, I am alone at that time. Do you really think I'm becoming a hopeless sot?”

“It can sneak up on you,” Vida said. “Look at Ernest's brother, Edwin. And Elmo Runkel. Not to mention his father, Rufus, in his later years.”

As far as I could tell, all of the Runkel men had been raging drunkards. Except, perhaps, for Vida's late husband, Ernest. Either he hadn't dared to take a drink, or he was very good at keeping secrets, even from his wife.

“I'm merely thinking of your welfare, Emma,” Vida said, then paused and turned away from the phone.

“You're back, Roger dear. Did you get the ice cream that Grandmums forgot?”

I heard a grunt in the background, apparently signifying that Roger had indeed brought home the gallon or tub or truckload of ice cream his fat stomach desired.

“But it's the rest of the story that bothers me,” I said, giving Roger the heave-ho from my mind's eye. “Maybe I can buy the part about following the Hartquists down from Second Hill. Maybe I believe that they got as far as Alpine Meats. But why sit around and watch what they were up to? And especially, why decide to dump poor Brian in with the O'Neills?”

“Exactly,” Vida said. “It doesn't make sense. If I had a corpse in the back of my car, I wouldn't want to sightsee. I'd go directly to … Roger dear, don't pour out so much of that chocolate syrup. And really, you might consider taking the ice cream out of the carton first. Yes,” she went on, now speaking into the phone again, “I'd go to the sheriff straightaway.”

I'd gone back into the living room with my drink, and plopped onto the sofa. “There's something else that bothers me, now that I think about it. If Tim and Tiffany took Brian to the walk-in after the Hartquists were there, why was he—Brian—on the bottom instead of on top?”

“An excellent point,” Vida said. “Does Milo know all this?”

“Yes, I told him,” I replied. “I made him late for dinner at Tara Peebles's house.”

“That's too bad,” Vida said absently, then added, “I certainly hope this isn't some sort of hoax.”

“I wondered, too,” I said. “But it wouldn't explain the body.”

“No,” Vida agreed. “It'll certainly be interesting to find out what Milo learns when he interrogates Tim Raf-ferty. I've had one question to put to that young man for quite awhile.”

“Which is what?” I asked.

“Why doesn't he marry Tiffany Eriks? They've been going together for years.”

That wasn't a bad question, but not exactly Milo's line of inquiry.

I'd just finished my dinner of pasta, prawns, and a green salad when I heard someone at the door. It was a few minutes after seven o'clock and still broad daylight. Through the peephole, I could see Milo gazing up into the roof that covered my small front porch.

“What's up?” I asked, letting him in.

“That damned Rafferty,” Milo cursed. “Screwing around with a crime scene. Not once but twice. I'd like to kick him from here to Everett.”

It took me a moment to understand what Milo was talking about. “Oh—you mean at the meat warehouse and up on the Ridge.”

“Right.” Milo sat down heavily in the armchair that matched my sofa. “I've got him and Jack and Dwight on their way up there to comb the place under the ledge where the body was found. The rain's stopped; they'll have daylight for a couple of hours.”

“Do you think Tim's lying?” I asked.

“About what?” Milo removed his hat and punched in the high crown. “Finding Conley or the rest of it?” He took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and proceeded to light up.

It was apparent that Milo was settling in. “Do you want a drink?” I inquired.

“Sounds good,” Milo replied, finding the ashtray I kept in the drawer of the side table next to the chair.

“What happened to your dinner date?” I asked, halfway to the kitchen.

“Tara had to go into Seattle with Dan,” Milo said. “They're taking Conley's body to the airport.”

“Tonight?” I was surprised.

“They had to catch a certain flight,” Milo responded, “and the sooner the better. Even Conley won't keep forever, unless we put him back in the meat locker.”

I supposed that was true enough. I put several ice cubes in a glass and poured out a measure of Scotch for the sheriff. “So you haven't eaten, I take it?”

Milo accepted the drink with a grateful look. “No. I'll stop at the Venison Inn on my way back to the office. I've got to stick around there to see if Jack and Dwight come up with anything from the Ridge.”

“Anything new on the Hartquists?” I asked, sitting back down on the sofa.

Milo shook his head. “Just what you'd expect. A lot of cussing and complaining from their jail cells. Protests of innocence. The usual crap.”

“What's the charge?”

“Rosie's thinking second-degree homicide for all three Hartquists,” Milo said, referring to our relatively new prosecuting attorney, Rosemary Bourgette.

“That sounds about right,” I remarked, “unless it was a gangland-style killing.”

Milo wrinkled his long face at me. “The Hartquists aren't the Norwegian Mafia.”

“You know what I mean,” I responded, getting on my feet again. “Wasn't at least one of them shot in the back of the head?”

“Right,” Milo allowed. “The other two were shot in the chest. That doesn't necessarily mean they were assassinated. Hey, where are you going?” he asked as I started toward the kitchen.

“To feed you and freshen my drink,” I replied. “Want to join me?”

“Come on, Emma,” Milo protested, though he was already out of the chair, “you don't have to do that.”

“I know I don't,” I said, searching the freezer for a
steak. “But you've had a long, hard day, and you're not finished yet.”

“You've had a tough day yourself,” Milo said, leaning against the kitchen counter. “Want a cigarette?”

“Of course I do,” I replied crossly, “but I'm not going to have one. T-bone or rib steak?”

Milo shrugged. “Whatever's easier.”

I put the T-bone in the microwave to thaw. “You went outtoKSKY?”

Milo sat down at the kitchen table. “I listened to a transcript of Tim's statement first. Then I questioned both him and Fleetwood.”

I readied a large potato to zap in the microwave when the steak came out. “Did Tim omit anything on the radio?”

“Not really. He was more specific about the details, but it didn't tell me much.”

Steak out; potato in. “Did Tim explain why Brian Conley was on the bottom of the pile?”

“He said he couldn't remember much about being in the warehouse. It was all a daze. Oh,” Milo added in a disinterested manner, “Tim mentioned the meat. You know, pork chops, lamb steaks, pigs' feet. He said he'd never seen so much meat, especially whole carcasses.”

Milo's chunk of meat was sizzling in the skillet. “Do you believe him?”

“I don't know what to think,” Milo answered slowly. “Put yourself in Tim's place. He's out for a nice spring evening with his girlfriend. They go up on the Ridge—it's not really that much of a hike to Spark Plug Lake, not for folks who've been raised around here—and they get caught in the rain. They go under a ledge to keep dry, and they find a corpse. That'd shake up most people, and if I remember right, Tiffany's the hysterical type. For whatever reason, Tim decides not to go for help, but to bring the body down the mountain. Then he spots the pickup
on the Icicle Creek Road. Oh …” Milo stopped for a moment. “I forgot, Tim didn't mention this on the air, but he said the lights were out on the truck, which made him suspicious.”

I was putting a small green salad together—romaine, tomato, scallions, cucumber. “Do you think that's true?”

“It makes sense from the Hartquists' point of view. The bodies were in the back, covered with a tarp. It was dark, and they wouldn't want to be spotted if they could help it. I haven't asked them about this yet, but I will. Anyway, I can see that might be how it was.”

I turned the steak over. “So Tim and Tiffany are following a vehicle with no lights. That would arouse curiosity.”

“I agree,” Milo said. “Say, that smells good. I'm hungrier than I thought.”

“It'll be about five more minutes,” I said, setting a place at the table. “You insist on medium well when it comes to meat.”

“Not too well done,” Milo cautioned. “I just don't want it to get up and walk out the door.”

“What about Spence?” I inquired. “Was he preening all over the place?”

Milo grimaced. “Well … not exactly. I mean, there's nobody around to preen for at the station.”

“You didn't get any hint that this was a publicity stunt?”

Milo shook his head. “No. How could it be?”

“I'm not sure,” I admitted.

“You and Spence may wind up killing each other one of these days,” Milo said with a crooked grin. “I take it you don't much like competition.”

“Mainly, it's cut into our revenue,” I replied, removing the baked potato from the microwave. “Oh, I realize that when you put out a weekly, you're going to get scooped. But it's the big stories—like Brian Conley disappearing in the first place—that really bother me.