Up in Smoke (29 page)

He studied each picture. Been there, done that. What was it that bothered him about this? Was he missing something? Maybe the poor son of a bitch did check out. Tired of being a burden, when his buddy was trying a bid for candidacy as the first step toward the biggest job in town, Fromm moved himself out of the equation to make life easier for said buddy.

He studied the photos. Staged, the whole thing looked staged. By not looking at the pictures, but staring through them, they no longer had the same impact. Not pictures of a man, just so much garbage.

“What are you thinking?” she asked.

“Sean Donovan.”

“Yes?” she said with a little edge of warning.

Parkhurst took in a long breath and let it out. He might not be much, but he was a good cop and he'd always gone after the answers, no matter what.

“I don't know, Susan.” He took a sip of coffee. “Donovan's business card was found in the trunk of the car with the body of a homicide victim.” Risky business, suggesting this clown she loved so much might be mixed up in a homicide. Good way to get his ass in a sling. “And when Donovan's confronted with prints, he confesses he met her.”

“He explained that. He drove Fromm to Gayle Egelhoff's house because whoever was supposed to do it didn't show.”

“And then,” Parkhurst went on as though she hadn't spoken, “he finds a second homicide victim. He didn't fall over or upchuck like any normal citizen. He looks at all that carnage, bone and brains smeared all over the walls, blood on the floor, and maybe makes some changes in the way it looks, whatever, he messes up the crime scene and then calmly calls the cops.”

“He's been in lots of tight places and seen lots of carnage. He's been in countries you've never heard of, seeing wars so stupid you wouldn't believe it, with people slaughtering each other in creatively horrible ways.”

He thought of Phyllis taking an order, writing it down with her left hand. “Left-handed,” he said.

“What?”

“Wakely Fromm was left-handed.”

Phyllis set a platter of eggs, sausage, and toast in front of Susan.

“If he was planning to off himself, he'd use his left hand.” Parkhurst demonstrated, much to the interest of other diners. “Gun in his left hand, right hand under it for support, sticks the barrel in his mouth, pulls the trigger. Bang. The back of his head's gone. He's dead.”

Parkhurst tapped one finger against a photo. “His left arm should have fallen over the arm of the chair and the gun should have dropped on this side.” He tapped again. “Not the right side, the left. Using his left hand, there's no way that gun could get way over here. Even with a weird circumstance where the recoil might jerk his arm and the gun gets tossed, hits the floor and slides across the tile, it couldn't end up here.”

“How do you know he was left-handed?”

“Haven't you been watching the news? That whole circus has been all over the tube every night.”

“Yeah, so?”

“So watch some of those clips and he uses his left hand. To hold a fork, to pick up a glass—”

“That's barely suggestive,” she said.

“He writes with his left hand. That do it?”

“You've seen him write something?”

“Saw him sign his name to a credit card receipt at The Blind Pig barbeque.”

“You saw him.” Susan took in a breath. “I was hoping for something a little more definite, like a suspect's fingerprints on the gun maybe, or signs of struggle.”

“It's hard to find signs of struggle when half the victim's head is blown all over the wall.” Parkhurst leaned back, picked up his mug and drank lukewarm coffee. He looked around for Phyllis and when he spotted her, held the mug in the air.

“Wakely's prints are on the gun,” he said. “Smudged, like they would be if the gun was put in his hand by somebody else's.”

“Or if he handled it a bit before putting it in his mouth.”

Phyllis came over and topped off both coffee mugs. When she left, Susan said. “Why would anybody kill Wakely Fromm?”

“He was a drunk, and drunks can't keep their mouths shut.”

“What could he say that was so important or damaging that someone would kill to keep him quiet?”

“He was probably also a pain in the ass. Where the governor goes, he goes. With the campaign just heating up that's a lot of places to take him.”

Susan raised a skeptical eyebrow.

“It's not like he's just another person they have to make room for in the limo,” Parkhurst said. “He has special needs. And somebody has to run around and take care of them.”

“Isn't that why Garrett has Murray working for him? So everything Fromm had in the way of needs got taken care of? Throw in some wants and he gets those taken care of too.”

“Come on, Susan, you know you have doubts about this.”

“Yeah, I just don't want to have them.” She sipped at her coffee and made a sour face. “How do you go about investigating a homicide with the governor right there in the middle of it. This is not a good thing to have, Parkhurst. This is a big problem. You are not going to have clear sailing.”

“You're not making any sense.”

“I seldom do these days. If Wakely Fromm was killed—
if
—and if he is left-handed, then that lets out the governor. Garrett would know Wakely was left-handed and wouldn't have made that mistake.”

“They've more or less lived together for the last twenty years or so. Plenty enough time to build up anger and resentment. Maybe Mrs. Garrett got fed up. Can you imagine marrying the man of your dreams and he comes equipped with a crippled and belligerent friend who drinks too much? Think of the resentment that could build. The time and expense in taking care of Fromm for twenty years must have added up to a lot of dollars.”

“Now you want me to beetle in on
Mrs.
Garrett,” Susan said. “You are just a bundle of sunshine, aren't you?”

“She could be fed up with the situation, but wouldn't necessarily have paid attention enough to know Fromm was left-handed.”

“After
twenty
years? With Wakely at her dinner table? What, is she blind and deaf?”

He shook his head. “Just angry and refusing to have him around for every meal and every party and not really looking at him when he was around.”

“You have anything to back this up?”

“No.”

She leaned over the table and gave him an intent look. “I'd be a whole lot happier if we had some concrete evidence. Like footprints in the blood. If somebody did kill him, there has to be something somewhere.” She sent a watch-yourself look at Parkhurst. “And we can't just go trampling all over the Governor and his wife on some half-ass theory about left-handedness.”

“That means we'll have to trample trying to find some.”

“Yeah.” She leaned back. “This isn't good, Parkhurst. You know what it'll turn into, don't you? It's just going to turn into a cluster fuck for the media, aim their cameras on Garrett, and speculate whether he was the shadowy figure stomping on the burning bag of shit.”

He nodded. It was going to be a mess, anyway you looked at it. Shame, too. Near as he could tell, Garrett looked okay. Might even make a pretty good president if he ever got that far, but this would be nearly impossible to handle under the usual damage control.

“There's a connection with the Egelhoff murder,” he said.

“I know.”

“Gayle Egelhoff talked with Fromm.”

Susan nodded. “Yeah, so?”

“What did they talk about?”

“Old friend of dead husband. They talked about old times.”

“She wanted to see Garrett.”

“How do you know?”

“The kid who took care of Fromm. He gathered that from a conversation he overheard.”

“Oh, great. He
gathered.
He could have made it up?”

“Why would he do that?”

Susan nibbled at a piece of toast. “What are you suggesting? The governor offed Gayle Egelhoff and then his old buddy—his old buddy who had nothing but praise for him and called him a hero. Loudly. That old buddy?”

“Yeah, that's what I'm saying.”

“Why kill them? What about resentments on the part of Murray? It must get tiresome dealing with a man who drank too much and got loud and abusive. Maybe there was some pent-up stuff building there over the years.”

“He only worked with him for three years. And I never heard that Fromm was abusive, just belligerent.”

“So what? At least Murray's not the governor, or the governor's wife.”

“Right.”

“Sucks.”

“Yeah.”

“Damn it.” She sighed and touched fingertips to forehead like she had a headache. “Talk to somebody with the Garrett campaign and see if anybody knows whether Fromm was left-handed.”

When Phyllis came by to see if they needed anything else, Susan said, “Only to sneak out the back way.”

Parkhurst said he'd see what he could find out. Susan nodded, not happy. He knew she was just as uncertain about Fromm's death as he was, but didn't want to open that can of worms and stick her hand in it.

“Try not to make anybody mad,” she said.

“I'll be the soul of tact.”

33

Demarco knew he was spending too much time with the girl. If he wasn't careful, Her Ladyship the Chief would say something, order him to step back, or even hand the case over. The hell with it, the kid did better when he was there, she wasn't as restless, so he stayed. Sitting by the side of the bed, legs stretched out, he waited till she drifted off in a restless morning nap before he lit out.

The day was warm, the air soft and the wind easy; over to the west sat a bank of huge cottony clouds. At the shop he turned in the squad, signed out, changed into civvies and picked up his Jeep. To clear his head, he rolled through the countryside with the sun riding over the shallow hills. He drove past a sprawling farm with outbuildings, tractor shed, hay bales being loaded into the barn. A man striding through a field gave him a wave. What would it be like to be a farmer? Hard life, always at the mercy of the elements.

Owning land, being responsible to it. Tilling and planting, coaxing things to grow, watching the sky for rain because there'd been too much, or not enough. Sniffing the air for change, which might mean hail that would wipe out a year's work and a year's profit. No, not for him. There was a certain pride in the man's walk, a strut that said,
all this is mine,
but owning something meant being tied to it, and Demarco didn't want to be tied to anything. That way led to heartbreak.

Getting time to move on? Nobody'd miss him, that was sure. After this thing with the kid was cleared, maybe he should take off. He didn't fit in here. Nothing new, he didn't fit in anywhere.

He got along all right with his partner Yancy. Christ, he nearly shit carpet tacks that time when Yancy got stabbed. The boy was bright and he was eager, but a couple of things rubbed against Demarco's skin a little. Yancy was kind. Kind was okay as long as you could be hard when you needed to, but the worrisome thing about Yancy was, he was developing some hero-worship. Demarco didn't want to be anybody's hero. And for Christ's sake, he sure didn't want to be anybody's mentor. He just wanted to be left alone to do his job. He'd told Her Ladyship the Chief he worked best alone and she went and hooked him up with a green kid who was so sweet bees followed him around. Yancy was a good kid, but Demarco was a lone ranger.

Even with Yancy soft as a kitten and Demarco a horny toad, they got along okay. The kid was honest and trustworthy—made him sound like a boy scout. What he should be, actually. It was an okay department for a small town. There was one old cop, nice guy, knew all the folks in town since they were pups. Parkhurst, lots of experience and a pretty good cop as far as Demarco could see. The problem with Parkhurst was, he had his own ideas about how things should go. They didn't always fit with Demarco's and that was laced with potential trouble. And there was Her Ladyship the Chief. The less said about her, the better. And Parkhurst wanted to jump her bones. He'd probably shoot anybody who said spit to her.

Demarco's neighbor was into Halloween in a big and irritating way. When he got home he found the place next door done up like a witch's den. Pumpkins scattered all over the lawn, black cats with arched backs and red flashing eyes stacked against tied bundles of cornstalks, owls nailed to trees, flying witch wrapped around the telephone pole.

He unlocked his door and let himself in. Home sweet home, bare of seasonal decorations, bare of people, bare of spirit and as empty as when he'd left last night. In the refrigerator, he found a bottle of seltzer and took a slug. He poked around at the spare offerings of food. Leftover pizza, half a ham and cheese sandwich, jar of pickles, block of cheese, something green.

He threw that in the trash and retrieved the sandwich, absently took a bite while he picked up the remote and clicked on the TV to catch the news coming up. Ad showing Governor Garrett at a playground talking with children. He took another swig of seltzer and leaned back with his feet on the footrest. Gayle Egelhoff, innocuous widow of a man who fought fires twenty years ago, was killed.

Laugh track on TV, idiot stumbling into table laden with food. Demarco clicked the remote. Ad showing Governor Garrett in a park talking about preserving our heritage. Demarco hit mute. Wakely Fromm, good friend of Governor Garrett, who also fought fires, died of gunshot wound, maybe self-inflicted, maybe inflicted by another.

He clicked the remote. Watched the weather forecast, then an ad showing the vice president earnestly talking about fighting the war on terrorism. At least, that's what Demarco thought he was talking about. “Who can fight terrorism better?” the ad demanded. The man had been there. The ad didn't say where it was he'd been.