"A plain old cardboard box. No prints on it. I still got the box. I'll show it to you."
"You'll need to voucher it as evidence."
"Oren, you know I can't do that. It's gone too far. What with the search party and all those reporters-"
"Right. And how could you explain leaving all those bones for a grieving old man to find in the dead of night? Why couldn't you work this case the right way?"
"It was a favor to your father." The sheriff almost whined this line, and then he flinched, as if afraid that the younger man was going to strike him.
Oren only folded his arms and kept his silence-waiting.
"I wanted to see what the judge would do when I left that skull on his porch. It was like a test."
Oren saw it as an act of cowardice. The sheriff, a political animal, had not wanted to risk the wrath of an influential man by asking an honest question. "So you stayed to watch. Did my father cry?"
"No, he just sat there on the porch for the longest time. I hoped he'd call me, but he never did. He didn't do anything. A week went by."
"And you left him more of his son's bones. Did you think he wouldn't feel anything?"
"When Josh went missing, your father was a sitting judge, and he had a lot of clout, but he never pushed for results, never once asked me for an update. Not one damn call to my office." The sheriff lifted both hands to stay Oren's next words. "I know he got help from William Swahn. But I figure that man's job ended when he found you an alibi."
"The soil analysis led you to an open grave." Oren rolled one hand, motioning for the older man to continue that thought.
"Yeah. Like I said, the hole was a small one. No sign of digging anywhere near it. Whoever left me that skull knew right where to look and found it on the first try. I had to widen it some to dig up more bones."
"Did you put that sheet of canvas over the grave?"
"Well, yeah. I had to protect my evidence."
Ironical was not the word that Oren was looking for. Clown would fit the sheriff better.
"Son, if you don't happen to find a nicked shovel at my place, I can hold on to this case and see it through."
"Don't call me son." And now-a little payback, a little fear. "You sent my brother home one piece at a time. For six weeks, you drove the judge crazy with those bones. Why should I help you?"
"Because I need more time to clear your father. Just something to think about, Oren. If I lose this case to the state, they'll tear into that old man. He'll be at the top of somebody else's list. You have to help me."
"While I'm thinking that over, I need the name of the woman who gave you my second alibi." He watched the sheriff's eyes as the man weighed a nicked shovel against this old bit of evidence.
Cable Babitt shrugged. And now it was obvious that it had never occurred to this man that one of the false alibis could have been made by a witness to a murder-or a killer.
"I suppose it hardly matters now," said the sheriff. "Nobody in this town would've believed her. I wish she'd never come in. I had Evelyn's story to clear you. But two alibis, well, that just-"
"Alibis you said you never wrote down, statements never signed. You've got nothing. Now you can explain that and the shovel to the reporters… or you can give me a name. Who was my second alibi?"
After being turned away from the gravesite, Ferris Monty was outraged. His bile spilleth over with indignation, and he poured it into the telephone. The California Bureau of Investigation was remarkably nonchalant about homicides north of Sacramento. However, they did have a CBI agent billeted in Saulburg on special assignment.
Ferris drove to the county seat, where he marched into the local headquarters of the Highway Patrol and demanded to speak with Special Agent Polk.
Following a wait of thirty minutes-another outrage-he laid out his case in the office temporarily assigned to the CBI agent. "Oren Hobbs was giving the orders," said Ferris. "I heard him. You know this isn't right. He's a civilian for God's sake. Why would the sheriff let him take charge like that? And another thing-if that grave is on state land, it's your jurisdiction."
Sally-call me Sally-Polk was years younger than Ferris, and yet this investigator reminded him of his mother, though he could not say why. Perhaps it was the rounded maternal shape, the gray in her hair-the plate of warm cookies on the desk.
"Sweetheart, is your tea too hot?" she wanted to know.
It was peppermint tea. Every article ever written about him had mentioned his love of this variety. He would swear this was even his brand.
How preposterous.
He had imagined this scene in advance of his arrival, and nowhere in that scenario did a cop call him sweetheart like she really meant it, and there was no damned tea or cookies. Adding to his disappointment, the atmosphere of Polk's office was all wrong, and it hardly seemed like a temporary accommodation for the visiting CBI agent. Cheery potted plants abounded in this sunlit room. The photographs of relatives were not discreetly placed on the desk. Oh, no. Her devotion to family was advertised on every wall. He had envisioned this meeting with a savvy, hardened detective, a man who would hang on every word of Ferris's theory. Reality was a dumpy hausfrau in a flowered sack that passed for a dress, a woman with a limited attention span, so easily distracted by any small plant that needed watering.
He raised his voice. "Why was Oren running that crime scene when he was always the prime suspect-the only suspect?"
The woman clearly did not care. Her back was turned to him as she stood before the window with a view of the parking lot. "So that's the famous yellow Rolls-Royce. Was it really owned by Al Capone?"
It was all too apparent that he would have to lead this fool woman by the hand. "Oren was the last one to see Joshua alive. I know that for a fact. I've interviewed a lot of people in Coventry. Of course that was twenty years ago."
"When you were writing a book? Isn't that what you said?" She left the window to stand by his chair. "A book about murder in a small town, I suppose." Not waiting for a response, she pressed on. "Well, how prescient. Until recently, Joshua Hobbs was only a missing person. But all those years ago, you decided that he'd been murdered." She placed one soft hand on his shoulder. "That's odd. I mean the boy might just as well have died in a fall out in the woods." Now he had her attention.
"I never said my book was about murder. I said it was about a tragedy in a small town. The effect it had on the-"
"But that's not your style, is it, dear? You write the gossip behind the headline news, and I think you're damned good at it. I make a point of reading your column. Call me a fan."
"Thank you, but I wasn't always a gossip columnist. I began my writing career as a serious novelist. Now here's another point to consider. Oren's father was an active judge in those days. And he came from an old California family-lots of money. He could've used his influence to get Oren out of town and beyond the reach of the sheriff."
This information about Henry Hobbs seemed to make no impression on her. She gave him a kindly smile as she sat down behind her desk. "A novelist? You don't say. Well, I thought all your books were nonfiction- true crime. What sort of novels did you write? Murder mysteries?"
Oh, God. He imagined that crime genre must be her idea of literature.
"I only published one novel," he said, teeth on edge. Stupid woman. "And it didn't have a single murder." And now he intended to lead her back to the matter at hand, the stuff of his current book. "I think it's obvious that Cable Babitt cooperated-no, he conspired to send Oren away."