The Quibblers stared at Joyce.
Linda Cooper-Logan leaned forward, wide-eyed. “What channel?”
“Seventy-two.”
I cleared my throat. “Getting back to Johnny’s case . . . Hal McConnell might have killed Bethany, true, and he might have even killed Angel. But he never would have hurt Victoria, because, in my opinion, he’s transferred all the affection he felt for Bethany to her younger sister.”
“Hey!” Seymour cried. “Then maybe Victoria isn’t dead or kidnapped. Nobody’s found a corpse or a ransom note. Maybe Angel killed Bethany then Victoria and Hal killed Angel and then ran off.”
“Sounds good, except I spoke to Hal today,” I informed him. “He hasn’t run off. And he said he was on the West Coast interviewing at a grad school. He took the red eye last night and just got in this morning.”
Seymour’s face dropped. “Oh.”
“You just read too many of those damn pulp novels,” said Fiona. “That, or you’re an incurable romantic.”
Seymour snorted. “Forty-five years of bachelorhood has cured me of any residual romanticism, I assure you.”
“Anyway,” said Brainert, “according to Angel’s book, Bethany slept with dozens of men. Any one of them could have been the killer.”
“Yeah,” said Milner, nodding. “I couldn’t tell you the number of crime stories I’ve read that had the victim dying during rough or kinky sex. And Angel wasn’t exactly pure as the driven snow. Maybe she ran afoul of the same pervert.”
Mr. Koh groaned again.
“Take it easy, Dad,” said his daughter. “It’s nothing I haven’t heard on Court TV.” But Joyce’s words did not reassure her father. Once again, he said something in Korean, and she came back at him in the same language. Then they continued arguing back and forth.
“Well, the meeting has finally degenerated, so I move we call it a night,” Brainert declared.
“I second the motion,” said Linda. “Mil and I have to get up early and start baking.”
Brainert slammed the hammer down. “This meeting is adjourned . . . and I’m getting me a real gavel for the next get-together. The damn thing is quite useful.”
“Good God,” I groaned. “I’ve created a monster.”
After everyone left and my aunt climbed the stairs to bed, I turned off the coffeemaker and the lights in the community room. Then I headed to the storage room to fetch the note Johnny left for Mina. I wanted to make sure she found it as soon as she got to work on Sunday, as I wouldn’t be here to give it to her. Tomorrow I was scheduled to take Spencer to the McClure family reunion at Windswept, an outing I would have gladly traded for a more pleasant experience—like a root canal sans novocain.
I found the note in the center of the old desk—a letter, really, sealed in an envelope culled from boxes of stationery, Mina’s name in ink, printed in neat script on the front.
As I picked it up to take it into the store, I spied Johnny’s denim work shirt draped over the back of the metal chair he’d been sitting on. He’d shed the garment earlier in the evening and had apparently forgotten it when he left. I picked up the shirt, and a bundle of keys dropped out of the breast pocket with a loud clatter. The keys to Bud’s store, his home—and the Napp’s Hardware truck concealed in the woods near the highway.
“Jack, are you there?”
Lay it on me, doll.
“Johnny forgot his keys . . . do you think there’s something inside that truck that might back up his story and help to clear him?”
Or incriminate him. Sure. Or there could be nothing but fresh air . . . We’ll find out when we get there.
“What?”
Come on, doll, humor me. Except for this afternoon I’ve been penned in this den since 1949. Let’s broaden my horizon.
IT WAS MIDNIGHT before we got on the road. I’d checked on the sleeping Spencer and told Aunt Sadie I was ducking out to the all-night convenience store for a few things. She raised an eyebrow but didn’t ask any questions.
The heat of the day had given way to a breezy night. With my car windows rolled down, the pungent scent of Quindicott’s saltwater inlet permeated the air. The cloudless sky was jammed with stars, and the roads were virtually deserted as I moved through town and out into the countryside. I didn’t see another pair of headlights until we approached the main highway. Along a wooded stretch without streetlights, I slowed the car.
“The lovers’ lane is along this stretch of road somewhere, if I remember correctly.”
And you know this how?
“Jack, even I was young once . . .”
Hmm. Makes me wonder, babe . . . Just how many smooching parties did you attend?
“None. I was a wallflower. My husband was my first and only real boyfriend. But my late brother Pete was a heart-breaker. He used to talk about this place to his friends, and I eavesdropped.”
I see, baby . . . practicing your surveillance techniques even then.
“Funny, Jack.”
I swerved off the highway, onto the shoulder, then slowly edged my car onto a narrow, unpaved service road consisting of two worn wheel paths with vegetation growing in the middle. As we bumped along, I could hear the tall grasses scraping along the bottom of my car. After rolling along for about a hundred yards, the road was blocked by two concrete posts with a steel cable strung between them.
End of the line, doll.
“Not according to Joyce Koh.”
I stopped the car, threw it into neutral, and popped the door. The interior alarm beeped, informing me I’d left the keys in the ignition. The door only opened about halfway before it hit a wall of scrub weeds and gnarled trees. I had to squeeze my way around it.
Over the purring engine I could hear night sounds—crickets, the buzz of cicadas, and the roar of traffic on the highway, still almost a mile away. In the glare of the headlights, I examined the barrier. Despite Joyce’s assurances, it didn’t seem possible to detach the steel cable and proceed, except on foot. Then I noticed that the ring bolt on one post lacked a nut to hold it in place. I grabbed the cable with both hands and tugged. The ring nut popped out of its hole and the thick steel cable dropped to the ground.
Neat trick, noted Jack. Put the cable back and it looks like a dead end. The patrolling prowl car jockeys who come along think the place is jalopy free, meanwhile half the bobby-soxers in town are using the strip like a hot-sheets motel. How did Johnny-boy find this spot, I wonder?
I smiled. “My guess is that Mina showed it to him.”
Hmm. Still waters run hot, I guess. Wouldn’t be the first time.
Back behind the wheel again, I drove between the concrete poles and onto the road beyond. As we crawled along, the headlights cast bizarre shadows all around us. The brush was so close on either side that it seemed like we were moving through a narrow tunnel. Trees leaned into the roadway like giant hooded sentinels, their branches resembled curling claws that seemed to reach out like hands ready to strangle. I tried to forget the memory of Angel’s corpse, the yellow rope wrapped around her throat; the description of Bethany’s murder, the belt around her throat.
A branch bumped the windshield, startling me.
“Talk to me, Jack, so I don’t feel all alone.”
How far back does this rabbit trail you call a road go, sister?
“Couldn’t say.”
Just when I feared I would have to back all the way out of a dead end, I came to a wide, circular clearing large enough to accommodate a half-dozen vehicles. Though the area seemed remote, I saw twinkling lights through the thick, old tree trunks—a faraway building probably—but I could not make out any details. I circled the area until I spied a gleam of metal in the headlights’ glare. Half-smothered in branches, sat a big red pickup truck with Napp Hardware in black letters on the side. I stopped the car and cut the engine.