“That I do.” Des smiled back at him. “Was wondering if I could go over some things with you.”
He swallowed uneasily. “Of course. Why don’t we go out on the porch?”
“Yes, do that,” Bitsy Peck exclaimed. “I have to get to my garden. I have weeds, weeds, everywhere. They are impossible this time of year. Unless, that is, you need me, Lieutenant.”
“No, ma’am, you go right ahead.”
And she did just that, humming.
There were kitchen herbs growing in pots out on the porch. There was wicker furniture. They sat in two armchairs facing the water, Redfield Peck’s manner studiously calm and careful. He put Des in mind of a doctor who was about to give her a gynecological examination-everything about his body language was geared toward putting her at ease, to conveying competence and professionalism. It was a manner he had no doubt cultivated after years of moving through a cabin full of apprehensive air passengers.
Interesting that he would fall back on it now, she reflected, seeing as how it was he who was about to climb into the stirrups and say aaah.
“How may I help you, Lieutenant?” he asked her quietly, folding his large, blunt-fingered hands in his lap. “I’m not a suspect, am I?”
“You’re not a suspect in the murder of Tuck Weems. You were out of the country when his shooting took place. This has been confirmed by your airline. But I do have a question for you.”
His bushy eyebrows raised slightly. “By all means.”
“Mr. Peck, where are you the one week out of every month when you are not where your wife thinks you are?”
Her question did not take him by surprise. He was braced for it. “What do you mean?” he asked coolly, reluctant to volunteer any more than he had to.
“I mean,” Des replied, “that for the past year you’ve been making three flights a month to Tokyo-not four.”
“Please keep your voice down.” He shot a glance in the direction of the garden, where his wife was crouched stoutly in a flowerbed, weeding.
“Wasn’t aware that I was shouting.”
“Look, it’s not what you’re thinking, Lieutenant.”
“I’m not thinking anything, Mr. Peck.”
“I haven’t got some tootsie stashed somewhere that Bits doesn’t know about. It’s a family matter. A private matter. I’ve been in San Francisco, as I’m sure the airline can confirm.”
In fact, he was averaging a half-dozen employee discount flights per month to San Francisco. Some of these flights originated in Tokyo, others in New York. Many were layovers lasting no more than one night.
Redfield Peck sat back in his chair and crossed his short legs. He gazed out at the Sound. “It’s Becca-Rebecca, she’s our eldest. Twenty-four now. She moved out there because of the dance community. She dances, you see.” He paused, sighing heavily. “And she’s gotten herself into some trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“Intravenous drug trouble,” he replied, his voice choking with emotion. “Becca’s a sick, sick girl, Lieutenant. And I’ve been doing everything I possibly can to help her get well again. Getting her treatment, counseling. Making sure she’s using clean needles. God, I am so afraid she’s going to get the AIDS virus… She won’t come home. I can’t talk her into that. But she can’t seem to stay out of trouble either. She seemed to be doing better over the winter but then she got mixed up with some guy and he dropped her and she… I fly planes for a living, Lieutenant. I am trained to believe that there is no problem I can’t solve. Becca I can’t solve. Because there’s no solution. There’s only today and tomorrow. It’s utterly perplexing to me. And it’s humbling. And it’s very, very lonely.” He breathed in and out a moment, wringing his hands. “Her mother doesn’t know about it, you see. Any of it. It would kill Bits if she found out Becca was on drugs. She didn’t want her to move out there in the first place, because Becca was always a bit wild. I talked Bits into it. I thought the girl would be fine-she just needed to grow up a little. And now, well, Bits just wouldn’t be able to understand. Or forgive. She’s always been closer to our boy, Matt. Matt knows. And Evan, who has always been tight with Becca. But I live in constant fear that he’ll tell Jamie, who can be very indiscreet when he drinks. If Jamie were to let it slip to Dolly or Bud, it would immediately get back to her. You can’t keep a secret on this island… I-I’m hoping to get her cleaned up and home before it’s too late. She used to love horses. We could get her one. There was a young man here who was fond of her. And would give anything to see her again. She’s a lovely, lovely girl…” He pulled her picture out of his wallet and held it out to Des.
It was a snapshot of a slim blond girl in a tu-tu and ballet slippers. She was not especially pretty. She had too many of her father’s features. What Des found most remarkable was that it was a picture of her when she was no more than twelve years old.
Redfield Peck had some trouble sliding the photo back in his wallet. His eyes were filling with tears now. “Please don’t say anything to my wife about this, Lieutenant,” he pleaded, a wrenching sob erupting from his chest.
Des did not like to see men cry. She knew how painful it was for them. She knew this because she knew how painful it was for her. She got to her feet and said, “My interest is in the investigation of these killings. Nothing more.”
“Then I-I can count on your silence?”
“I am like money in the bank,” she assured him.
Then she left him to his tears. He would have a much easier time if she were not there.
His wife was still digging up the weeds in her flower garden.
“You have got yourself one lovely garden, Mrs. Peck,” Des said to her.
“Why, thank you, Lieutenant,” she responded gaily. “I do love it so. Every morning when I come out here to play I think to myself just how lucky I am to be around things that are fresh and growing. They make me feel so alive and… Oh, beans, those darned birds!” Her eyes had zeroed in on a clump of weeds under the peony bush next to her. “See those shiny green leaves? That’s poison ivy. No matter what I do it comes back. The darned birds spread the seeds. And I am so allergic to it. Even if I’m wearing gloves I break out like the dickens. Red will have to come pull it out for me.”
“Your husband’s not allergic to it?”
“My husband can roll around in it buck naked and not get a rash. It’s not fair. All of the Pecks are lucky that way. Dolly isn’t allergic. Neither is Evan.”
“And Tuck Weems? Did he ever help you pull it out?”
“Yes, he did, now that you mention it. I asked him to once when Red was in Tokyo. Tuck wasn’t allergic either.”
“You folks out here all go to the same doctor?”
“Why, yes. Shoreline Family Practice. Three doctors, actually. Pretty much everyone in town goes there. They’re right across from the A and P on Big Brook Road.” Bitsy Peck climbed to her feet and brushed herself off. “Do you like rhubarb, Lieutenant?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Well, you must let me give you something to take with you.”
Des dabbed at her runny nose with a tissue. “Totally not necessary, Mrs. Peck.”
“Nonsense. You absolutely cannot leave here empty-handed. Do you care for these?” she asked, waving a chubby arm at a wildflower bed that was bursting with white geraniums. “That’s Geranium Cantabriense Biokovo. It originated in the mountains of Yugoslavia. Aren’t they just the loveliest?”
“Yes, they are. Very much so.”
“Well, that settles it, then.” She went trudging off to her potting shed and came back in a moment with a vase filled with water. “It’s a funny thing about geraniums, Lieutenant,” she said, cutting some for her with a small pair of shears. “They’ll never be as pretty as they are at this very instant. The second they leave the garden they’ll start to wither and die. But if they stay here too long they become overgrown and crowd out the other plants. I have to thin them out,” she explained with a touch of sad resignation. “It’s a law of nature that beautiful things have to be shared with others.”