The Chocolate Puppy Puzzle (11 page)

Why did that seem familiar?

I caught my breath. I’d seen a red Volkswagen like that one. The night before, right after I discovered Silas Snow’s body, I’d pulled out onto Haven Road in a big hurry. And I’d nearly rear-ended a red VW with a Warner Pier High School bumper sticker in the back window. The sticker hadn’t been on the bumper. It had been inside the back window, just the way Ken’s sticker was, the way people who are picky about their cars’ finishes display bumper stickers.

I hadn’t gasped loudly, but Joe had heard me. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Nothing,” I said. “I just remembered a prone call—I mean, a phone call! I forgot to call the bank. I’ll do it when I get back to the office.”

We walked toward the house, but my mind was racing. Was it Ken McNutt’s VW that I’d seen the night before, close to Silas Snow’s fruit stand? Right after Silas was killed?

If it had been, who had been driving? Ken? Or Maggie? Or was there another red Volkswagen in Warner Pier with a high school bumper sticker in the back window? After all, I hadn’t bothered to look at the license plate.

And why hadn’t I wanted to tell Joe I’d seen it there? The answer to that one wasn’t hard. If I told Joe right at that moment, I’d probably have to tell Aubrey. And I didn’t want to tell Aubrey anything that might involve Maggie.

I realized Joe was looking at me closely. He had said something, and I hadn’t even heard it. I pulled my mind back to my surroundings. Whatever the reason for the VW being near Snow’s fruit stand, I had to forget the whole thing and concentrate on the current moment. I’d decide what to do about the Volkswagen—if anything needed to be done—later.

By the time I gathered my thoughts, Aubrey had parked the SUV again and had taken Monte out of his crate. He pushed a fancy metal stake into the sandy earth near the corner of the cottage and hooked Monte to it by a long leash. I decided Aubrey must have the back of the SUV packed solid with puppy equipment.

Monte seemed content to frisk about, sniffing around under the bushes. Joe, Aunt Nettie, Aubrey, and I began to prowl in much the same way, peeking in the uncurtained windows of the house.

“I don’t have a key,” Aubrey said.

“I don’t think there’s anything inside but a thick layer of dust,” Aunt Nettie said. “We certainly don’t need to go in.”

The cottage originally had only two rooms, or so I guessed. There was a living room, with a kitchenette separated from it by a counter, and there was a bedroom. A bathroom now opened off the bedroom, but the fixtures and linoleum were forties-style. And the bathroom stood on piers made of cement blocks. The main part of the house had a solid foundation.

The views through the windows revealed only a few sticks of furniture, and they all looked too modern to have been used by Dennis Grundy.

“I’m sure this place didn’t have indoor plumbing when Dennis Grundy rented it,” Aunt Nettie said. “The kitchen appliances and that counter you can eat at were added later, too. At least, I never saw a counter like that in a really old house.”

“The hole where the pipe from the wood stove would have been is still there,” I said. “Up there in the corner.”

“It wouldn’t have been a bad little cottage for a cheap vacation,” Joe said. “In the twenties lots of people still had outdoor plumbing and wood stoves.”

“It would have been like camping.” I gestured at the metal cot frame on the porch. “The porch might have been a really nice place to sleep. If you had plenty of blankets.”

“Where did you and Maia find the money buried?” Joe asked.

“Around behind the house.” Aubrey led the way to a little pile of dirt.

“That’s probably where the old fence corner would have been,” Joe said. He pointed to a stick of wood and a bit of wire. “At least, that looks like the remnants of a wire fence.”

“Did you say the money was in a mayonnaise jar?” Aunt Nettie wanted to know.

Aubrey laughed. “I know that’s a cliché. . . .”

“What else would Dennis have had to bury money in?” Aunt Nettie said. “Maybe a syrup tin. But he would have had to use something he could get hold of easily.”

“Burying the money has always sounded crazy to me,” I said. “Why? Why would he bury money anyway? How much was in the jar?”

“Just about a hundred dollars,” Aubrey said.

“That wasn’t much loot from a bank job, even in 1930. And why was the wallet buried with it? It doesn’t make sense.”

Joe answered. “It makes sense if the wallet was just stage dressing for the antique money.”

Aubrey grinned. “I didn’t say that. That’s strictly
your
idea, Joe.”

We kept wandering around, with me keeping a careful lookout for poison ivy, until another car pulled in and Chuck O’Riley got out.

Aubrey went to meet him, sweeping off his wide-brimmed hat, and Monte barked a greeting. Chuck shook hands with Aubrey, but then, to my surprise, he came toward me. “Lee, I want to talk to you.”

“What about?”

“About finding Silas Snow’s body. When I saw you earlier I didn’t realize you were the one who found him.”

I guess I stared. We all took the Warner Pier
Gazette
for granted as a source for local news. But Warner Pier news rarely included crime. The
Gazette
was where I caught up on the school board meeting or the zoning commission. Or about visitors who claimed to be movie producers. I didn’t expect to read about murders there. I’d forgotten Chuck would be writing up Silas Snow’s murder, even though Aubrey had mentioned Chuck’s interviewing Vernon earlier.

I gathered my thoughts and answered Chuck’s questions as briefly as I could. I definitely slurred over my reasons for going to the Snow fruit stand in the first place, of course. And I tried to be matter-offact about finding the body.

“At first,” I said, “I thought the hand and foot must belong to a scarecrow.”

“What made you realize it was a body?”

The recollection of how that foot had wiggled sprang into my mind, and I couldn’t answer. I put my hand over my mouth and shook my head.

Joe moved in and put his arm around me. “I think that’s enough, Chuck.”

But I couldn’t let Joe protect me. I tried to speak. “I knelt down,” I said. “I troweled—I mean, I touched! I touched the boot. It didn’t move like a scarecrow’s boot would move.”

“What did you do then?”

“I ran through those pumpkins like a friend. I mean, a fiend!” I stopped and took a deep breath. “I ran like hell, Chuck.”

That seemed to settle Chuck’s curiosity. He thanked me and moved on to Aubrey, posing him on the porch of the cottage.

I guess I was still a bit shaken; I wanted to get away from Chuck before he thought of any more questions. So I walked away, following the sand lane further, toward wherever Ken McNutt had been. Joe followed me.

To my surprise, the bushes and trees behind the cottage thinned out quickly.

“What’s back there?” I said. Joe and I walked about a hundred feet and came out in an apple orchard.

“McIntosh?” I said.

Joe touched one of the hanging apples. “Looks more like Jonathan.”

“I guess we’ve reached the active part of the Snow farm.”

The trees weren’t too large. Fruit farmers, I’ve come to realize, don’t want their trees to get very tall. They’re easier to prune, spray, and pick if they’re shorter and wider.

This orchard stretched on for a long way, hundreds of trees marching along in straight lines, forming squares and rectangles and diamonds. The ground beneath them, of course, was cleared. Most growers mow around their trees. I wasn’t sure why.

Joe was a native of orchard country. I turned to him. “Why do fruit farmers mow around trees?”

“Most of them believe tall grass takes nutrients from the trees. Besides, they want to keep the area smooth and even so they can run tractors and trailers down the rows without bouncing fruit around and bruising it.”

Now, in October, the fruit trees were still a dull green, but the oaks and maples—the woods around edges of the orchard—were turning brilliant reds and oranges.

“It is beautiful,” I said.

“Silas was a good grower,” Joe said. “Everything looks neat. Spic-and-span. The only thing I see is one ladder out of place.”

He gestured, and I saw it, too. A three-legged ladder, the kind used for picking fruit, was standing beside a tree. But it wasn’t an apple tree. It was a taller maple at the edge of the orchard.

“Lee! Joe!” Aunt Nettie’s voice came from behind us.

“I guess she’s ready to go,” Joe said.

“So am I.”

We called out, then made our way back down the lane and into the yard of the cottage. Aubrey was pulling up Monte’s stake. Aunt Nettie was holding the long leash, and the puppy immediately made for the bathroom “wing,” pulling Aunt Nettie behind. Monte crawled under the bathroom, finding an easy path between the cement blocks that held the room up. He began digging around in the sandy dirt.

“Come on, Monte!” Aubrey sounded exasperated. “You’ll get mud in the car.”

He took the leash and hauled the pup out, over Monte’s loud objections. As predicted, the dog was a mess, his chocolate hide covered with gray dirt. Joe held him by the collar while Aubrey brought a towel and a brush—more puppy gear—from the SUV and cleaned him up. Then he led Monte over to the vehicle, opened the rear end, and spoke to the puppy. “Kennel, Monte.”

Monte jumped right up, leaping into the SUV and going into his big carrying case.

Aubrey was rewarding him with a dog snack when the shot rang out.

I
think I was more conscious of a metallic
clunk
than I was of the shot. Which was logical, I guess. The sound of the shot being fired didn’t have a lot of significance. The shooter could have been firing in any direction.

But that
clunk
was proof that the shot had hit the SUV. The guy with the gun was firing in our direction.

We all yelled at the same time.

“Get down!” That was Joe.

“Aunt Nettie! Duck!” That was me.

“Heavens! Was that a shot?” That was Aunt Nettie.

“What the hell?” That, of course, was Aubrey.

Monte even began to bark.

The next second the four of us had ducked behind the passenger side of the SUV. Aubrey had to have gotten around, over, or under the vehicle’s open rear door, and I’ve never been sure how he did it. But he did. He was right there with the rest of us, cowering.

Nothing else happened for a long moment. Monte gave one last howl and quit barking. We all looked at each other. None of us seemed to have any idea of what to do next. The moment stretched. No more shots came. Finally Joe spoke. “I don’t have my cell phone.”

“I don’t, either,” Aubrey said.

There was another minute of silence before Joe spoke again. “If we had a stick, we could hold Aubrey’s hat up and see if it draws fire, I guess.”

Aubrey gave a weak laugh. “Just like a B western.” “It worked for Clint Eastwood.”

We huddled a few more minutes.

“I don’t hear anybody moving around in the bushes,” I said.

“I think that was a rifle shot,” Joe said. “A guy with a rifle doesn’t have to be close. He’s just got to be able to see through the bushes and trees.”

Aunt Nettie came up with a practical plan, as she usually does. “Do you think we dare open the doors on this side of the SUV and get in?”

“Let’s try it,” Joe said.

Aubrey opened the right front door. Nothing happened. He started to climb in, but Joe stopped him. “That shot seemed to be aimed at you,” he said.

“You stay down. Let me drive. At least you’ve got tinted windows.”

I wasn’t sure the tinted windows were useful. The guy with the rifle wouldn’t be able to see who was in the driver’s seat, true, but he was bound to figure out someone was. He might think it was Aubrey and shoot Joe by mistake.

But Aubrey didn’t argue, and I didn’t, either. Joe got in, followed by Aubrey, who slid in and crouched with his knees on the floor and his elbows in the front passenger seat. I opened the door to the rear bucket seats, and Aunt Nettie and I got in, taking the same prayerful position.

“The back’s still open,” Aubrey said.

“Can it be closed from inside?” Joe asked.

“I don’t think so.”

“I can close the kennel,” I said. I reached around my seat and did it. At least Monte couldn’t jump out.

“Good,” Joe said. “I’ll back out and drive off gently. As soon as we’re a little way up the road, I’ll get out and close up.”

The plan worked. Joe backed the SUV out onto Lake Shore Drive. Monte barked, maybe trying to tell the stupid humans the rear door was still open. Joe shifted into drive and moved forward, driving slowly for about a quarter of a mile before he stopped. Aubrey started to open his door, but I stopped him. “No, Aubrey. You stay down.” I jumped out, slammed the rear door, and was back inside in less than five seconds.

When we moved off again, Joe gunned the motor and dug out. And we all took deep breaths.

“Go to my house,” Aunt Nettie said. “We can call the sheriff from there.”

That gave me nearly a mile to try to absorb what had just happened.

First, why had we all assumed Aubrey was the target of the man with the rifle?

That was easy. Aubrey had been at the back of the SUV. Joe, Aunt Nettie, and I had all been around on the passenger’s side, ready to get into our seats. The shot had come from the driver’s side of the SUV. Aubrey was probably the only person the gunman could have seen clearly enough to aim at.

Besides, I admitted to myself, after what Maggie had told me, I was ready to kill Aubrey myself. It was easy to assume that someone else had a reason. Maggie sure did.

At that thought, my heart leaped to my throat, then dropped to the pit of my stomach. I didn’t want to involve Maggie in this. But Ken had actually been out in the area. Maybe Maggie had been there, too. Ken was worried about Maggie; he’d told me as much that morning. If she’d told him that Aubrey had threatened her . . . I shoved the idea out of my mind. I didn’t want to believe Ken or Maggie could be involved. Besides, how could they have known Aubrey would be there?