Sherlock and Savich exchanged glances. Savich shrugged. “Okay, maybe it’s time we told you about Moses Grace and Claudia, Ruth. You know how you left your cell phone with Connie? Well, she got a call from your snitch Rolly.”
He went on to tell Ruth and the sheriff about the fiasco at Hooter’s Motel, finding Pinky’s body in Arlington National Cemetery, Connie getting shot. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Ruth, but Moses Grace also intimated he’d murdered Rolly.
“We don’t know much about who Moses Grace or Claudia are. We found out he used Pinky’s cell phone to call me. The phone carrier confirmed the call was received through a cell tower in Arlington. We left the account open, in case he uses the phone to call me again. If he even turns it on again, we’ll be able to track him. Despite the drawl he talks in, and all the bad grammar, I think he’s pretty smart. He’s probably dumped Pinky’s phone already.”
“He really tried to shoot Sherlock?”
Savich said, “He wants both me and Sherlock. We left Sean at his grandmother’s before we drove here to Maestro.” He added to Dix, “We’ve been through something like this before.”
“I should have been there, Dillon. You should have called me.”
“Nah, we screwed up things well enough on our own.”
Ruth jumped to her feet and began to pace, Brewster straining in her arms. “I can’t believe you guys came out here looking for me with all this going on back in Washington.”
“Family is family, Ruth. Let it go. You’re right, Moses Grace is a very scary man, I’m quite sure of that from our short acquaintance. He’s targeted me for some reason we don’t know yet—maybe revenge—
so we’ve started a good deal of spade work into my past cases. He’s pretty old, I think, and he sounds sick—hacks a lot, really wet gravel in his voice.”
Sherlock picked it up. “Claudia is young, draws hearts over her i’s, that sort of thing. He calls her his sweetheart. Maybe she’s his daughter, granddaughter, we’re not sure, or maybe she’s a runaway teenager. Sit down, Ruth, you’re making me dizzy.”
Ruth sat, aware that Dix was looking at her. He was realizing he was going to have to adjust to this matter-of-fact cop talk coming out of Ruth’s mouth. Not at all like Madonna. He said, “We’re still trying to find Ruth’s Beemer. I’ll call in the license plate later, but at this point we know it’s been hidden somewhere, or taken out of the area.”
“Her SAV,” Sherlock said, grinning.
Savich turned to the sheriff, who’d been studying each of them for the past few minutes. “I can’t tell you how grateful we are that you found Ruth and kept her safe.”
Dix waved it away. He was studying Savich closely. “I think I recognize your name, Ruth. A couple of months ago you were written up in the Washington Post, weren’t you? You helped locate a math teacher before he was killed by some jealous old nutcase?”
“Good heavens, you remember that?” Ruth grinned. “That was Jimbo Marple. One of my boys saw this old guy take Jimbo right out of a shopping mall parking lot. He called me right away. Savich was so mad when one of the sharpshooters killed the old guy. You’ve got quite a memory.”
“A whole lot of people are involved in every case we’ve handled,” Savich said easily. “Ruth here is known for her snitches. She gathered them all when she was with the D.C. Police Department before she joined the FBI.”
Sherlock said, “And shoots like a champ, Dix. Tells either her SIG or her Glock what she wants to hit and the next instant, it’s dead center.”
“I hid behind a dresser while he was out on that high-speed chase.”
“Well,” Sherlock said easily, “now you’re back with us.”
“A hard-ass,” Ruth agreed, pleased.
Dix smiled a perfunctory smile that didn’t show at all in his stiff voice. “So is the FBI going to take over here?”
Sherlock gave him her sunny smile. “Oh no, Sheriff Noble, we’re simply here to help. After all, Ruth is one of ours. Dillon called our boss, told him what we were doing. Mr. Maitland wants this cleared up as well. He hates it when someone tries to kill one of his agents.”
Savich said clearly, looking Dixon Noble in the eye, “We have no intention of bigfooting you, Sheriff, banish the thought. We can help you with equipment, information, anything you need.”
Dix still didn’t look convinced, but he nodded. “Would you like more tea, Agent Savich?”
DIX PUNCHED OFF his cell phone. He was grinning when he walked back into the living room. “The boys got a better offer than Dad’s leftover stew for dinner. They’re having pizza at the Claussons’ house with a bunch of other kids, bless the Claussons and all their ancestors, so we don’t have to watch what we say. I twisted the truth a bit, told them you FBI big shots weren’t staying long this evening, which meant they wouldn’t be able to get much out of you. That and the ‘Garbage Dump’ pizzas turned the tide.”
After they’d eaten the sheriff’s stew for dinner, Sherlock watched Ruth, as natural as could be, fill the kettle at the sink and put it on the stove, and fetch tea bags from a big messy cupboard. “Hey, we’ve got some cheese and crackers for dessert. They’re closed with a rubber band so they shouldn’t be stale.”
Dix laughed. “Sorry I didn’t have more to offer you for dinner.”
“The stew was excellent,” Sherlock said. “You’re a good cook, Sheriff.”
“I learned,” he said shortly, and put tea bags into two cups. “Ruth, more coffee?”
He was watching her as she nodded. “Ruth—I like that. I suppose it sounds more like you than Madonna. It’s powerful, biblical.”
Ruth smiled at him. “Sorry to switch names on you in the middle of the stream, Sheriff. Where do you think Dillon and Sherlock should stay in Maestro?”
“At Bud Bailey’s B-and-B, right on High Street, half a block from my office. Oh, I forgot, Ruth. Tell me where you were staying. No one recognized your photo.”
“I hadn’t made a reservation anywhere. I thought after I got my treasure, I’d drive back home if it wasn’t too late.”
“Did you get gas anywhere?”
“Sure, in Hamilton.”
The sheriff frowned. “That’s a bit too far up the road for us to have canvassed. Where do you live?”
“In Alexandria.”
Sherlock said, “The men in the truck that blew up—have they done the autopsies yet?”
“We were lucky we could get the county ME to work on Sunday. Even though the men were burned real bad, he managed to pull up some partial prints, and some dental X-rays. They had to come from somewhere. We’re hoping there’ll be missing persons reports on them in the next couple of days. Unless they were brought in, and that would make them professionals. There wasn’t much time for that, so that may mean some sort of local group is behind this, whoever they are and whatever this is. In any case, I’
ve called in all my deputies, and now the FBI is involved. Any ideas you guys can come up with will be appreciated.”
It was grudging, Savich thought, but it was a start, and the sheriff almost meant it. “We’ll plan to head out to Winkel’s Cave with you as our first stop tomorrow morning.” He turned to Ruth. “You want us to bring anything?”
Dix said as he shook his head, “No, I can provide flashlights and head lamps and picks in case we need them. We have a stack of them in the department.”
Savich nodded, and continued to Ruth, “I don’t suppose you got permission from the Park Service to go into that cave on Friday, did you?”
“Good news. Winkel’s Cave is on private land. Mr. Weaver, the owner, and I have already made a deal. He even had a locked gate in there, but no key, so I kind of picked the lock. It’s what Indiana Jones would have done, isn’t it?”