Just then Jupe’s stomach growled again. So Bob drove him to a supermarket to pick up another ten pounds’ worth of watermelon. Then he dropped Jupe off at The Jones Salvage Yard and drove on to work. From there Bob called Pete at the hospital and gave him the assignment: Check out Juliet’s ex-boyfriend, Sean Fellows.
But by the time Pete pulled himself away from Kelly, it was dark — too dark to find Sean’s address. So it wasn’t until Sunday that Pete pulled up in front of 23 Laurel Street, where Sean lived.
Sean Fellows’ house was in a quiet and pretty neighborhood of Melton, a few miles north of Rocky Beach. The street was lined with small white wooden houses that had wide front porches and small front yards.
There was an old Bonneville convertible parked in front of Sean Fellows’ house. And sitting on the porch railing was a guy with a blond flattop. He wore faded blue jeans and a white T-shirt with a leather vest. He jumped to his feet the moment Pete stepped into his yard.
“Come on!” he shouted, motioning with one hand to Pete and holding the other behind his back. “Make my day!” As soon as Pete was close to the porch, the hidden hand came out — holding a motorcycle chain!
What was going on? Pete’s mind raced as his heart started thumping. Suddenly, for no reason, some maniac was coming at him with a vengeance. The guy had the motorcycle chain wrapped a couple of times around his hand, but its long tail swung freely. Pete froze in his tracks. Should he try some of his new karate moves? Or back off?
“Just you and me this time,” the guy called to Pete. “That’s what you want, isn’t it?” His arm swung, and the tail of the vicious chain clattered and ripped into the wooden porch railing.
Forget the karate, thought Pete. He started to back away.
“I’m going to tear you open!” the guy yelled, jumping off the porch. He wasn’t very big. In fact, he was much shorter and smaller built than Pete. But his voice was full of anger and he was swinging the chain wildly.
“You’re making a big mistake,” Pete said as he backed farther away. The guy kept coming, his black leather boots eating up the ground between them. His shoulders hulked like a gorilla’s.
“I don’t know what you think, but I’m looking for Sean Fellows,” Pete said desperately. “I’m a friend of Juliet Coop’s.”
The black boots stopped walking, the chain stopped swinging.
“For real?” asked the guy.
Pete nodded his head but kept his fist clenched, ready to fight.
“Oh, well, uh, sorry,” the guy said, letting out his breath. His whole body seemed to relax. “I’m Sean Fellows. I’ve been having some trouble here with a bunch of punk vandals. One of them just called and threatened to steal my car.”
Sean motioned to the old beat-up Bonneville parked on the street. Pete stared at it.
“Maybe you should let him have it,” Pete finally said with a laugh. “I mean, the tires are flat, it’s leaking oil all over the ground. ”
“Yeah, and besides that, the battery’s been dead for two weeks!” Sean said, laughing too. “But I’m just sick of taking it from punks, you know what I mean?” Then he noticed his porch railing. “Don’t tell me I destroyed my porch for nothing. Hey — how do you know Juliet?”
“Well, I don’t really,” Pete admitted. “She’s in the hospital bed next to my girlfriend, Kelly.”
“Oh, yeah,” Sean said as he led Pete into his house. Now that he wasn’t swinging a chain, Sean just seemed like a nice, average college student whose apartment had more posters than furniture.
“So why were you at the hospital so late Friday night?” Pete asked.
“Maria — Juliet’s roommate in college — called me and said Juliet had been in an accident,” Sean said.
“We only broke up a few months ago, Julie and I. I guess I’m not over her yet. I had to see if she was okay. Is she? Did she wake up yet?”
“Still out,” Pete said. “At least, she’s sleeping most of the time. The doctors say she needs a lot of rest.”
Sean eyed Pete sideways for a moment. “Tell me something,” Sean said, suddenly realizing that Pete was a complete stranger. “If you don’t even know Juliet, what are you doing here, asking questions?”
“Kelly, my girlfriend, thinks something strange is going on,” Pete said. “So I’m just checking it out. What do you know about Big Barney?”
“Big Barney? We’d still be going together if it weren’t for him.”
“What’s that mean?” Pete asked.
“Her dad and I argued all the time,” Sean said. “I’m a vegetarian, you know. No meat, no fish, no chicken. I don’t believe in going around killing animals — or in anybody getting rich from slaughtering them. Barney hated my guts and he wasn’t quiet about it. After a while, Juliet and I started fighting about it too. So when she said she was going to work for her father after graduation, that was about it.”
“One last question and then I’ll get outta here,” Pete said. “How’d you get into the hospital at four A.M.?”
“I lied to the nurse, told her Julie and I were engaged,” Sean admitted. “Wishful thinking, I guess.”
Later that afternoon in The Jones Salvage Yard, Pete retold Sean Fellows’ story to Jupe and Bob. As he talked, Pete stooped down into the engine in the back of Bob’s VW. The fan belt was ancient and needed replacing. Pete was putting a new one on. Once the belt was positioned on the pulleys, he checked the tension by pressing on it with his thumb.
“It’s got to give about a half inch,” Pete explained. “And we’ll have to tighten it up again after two hundred miles, ’cause these suckers stretch.”
Ignoring the fan belt, Jupe said, “To me, the most interesting thing in Pete’s account is that Sean Fellows owns a car.”
“Jupe,” Bob said, “sometimes I don’t get you. Pete just told us a tragic story of love destroyed because of. of. dietary differences! And you shoot back with an off-the-wall comment like that.”
“Remember our goal,” Jupe said. “We are pursuing a suspect who was chasing Juliet Coop in a car.”
“Forget Sean’s car,” Pete said. “The tires are flat and the battery has been dead for two weeks.”
“How do you know?” Jupe demanded.
“I checked with the neighbors,” Pete answered. “They confirmed his story.”
“Ah.” Jupe sighed. “Proof — there’s no substitute for it. Still, he sounds like a fairly violent person, with that chain.”
Pete shrugged as he turned the ignition on to test the engine throttle. It hummed for a minute and then made a sound something like huppa-huppa-gak.
“What does it mean when it makes that sound, Pete?” Bob asked.
“It’s car talk for ‘Trade me — I’m falling apart,’ ” Pete said, laughing.
Bob was used to being teased about his antique car, and he laughed too. “Could you be a little more specific?” he asked.
“All I can say is there’s more wrong than I have time to fix right now. I’ll have to work on it. Maybe next week. Now, what about Maria Gonzales and Michael Argenti?” Pete asked Jupe.
Jupe smiled. “I called Maria and she’s got an unbreakable alibi for the time of the accident — she was trapped in an elevator with six other people. But Michael Argenti is another story. As you know, he’s Big Barney’s main rival. But according to The Wall Street Journal, Argenti recently tried to buy out Big Barney and take over the Chicken Coop restaurants.”
“So the Roast Roost wants to take over the Chicken Coops!” Bob said. “Amazing! But why would Argenti try to run Juliet Coop off the road?”
“I don’t know,” Jupe replied. “Perhaps he was trying to get to Big Barney with a little brutal persuasion.”
“Do you think he’s the one who’s trying to poison Big Barney’s chicken?” Bob asked. “I mean, he’s our only suspect.”
“No — there’s still Big Barney himself, and of course Mr. Sweetness, if he ever surfaces again,” Jupe said.
Just then the telephone rang in Headquarters. Pete reached it first.
“Three Investigators. Pete Crenshaw,” he said, flipping on the speaker phone.