He looked over at the table. “If you want to wash up, looks like we’re ready.”
I gave Boris one last scratch. He made a soft noise that sounded a lot like a sigh.
“Go lie down,” Harry said to the dog. He padded over and lay down next to the old man’s chair, head on his paws.
I washed my hands at the sink and took the seat Harrison indicated at the table.
Over shepherd’s pie and Mary’s apple crisp—which was delicious, no surprise—we talked about the library and the problems with the roof at the community center. After Harry poured me a second cup of coffee, I leaned back in my chair, crossed my legs and fixed my gaze on the old man.
“So, why did you invite me to dinner?” I asked. “It wasn’t just to tell me you’d already done an end run around me with that check.”
“I can’t just enjoy the pleasure of your company?” he said.
I folded one arm over my chest and behind me Harry Junior gave a quiet snort of disbelief.
I smiled. “You can,” I said. “And I think you know I enjoy your company or else I would have said no to the invitation, but I also know when I’m being played like a five-string banjo.”
Harrison laughed, which made his resemblance to Kris Kringle even more pronounced. “I figured you’d like to know more about Burtis and his ex-wife,” he said.
I studied the old man. He might have been in his eighties, but he didn’t miss anything. “Why do you think that?” I asked.
I wasn’t going to admit he was right, even though he was. As I’d told Owen and Hercules, the Mayville Heights grapevine could be just as good a source of information as the Internet.
His expression grew serious. “Just because you and Marcus Gordon are keeping company doesn’t mean you’re going to sit around on your hands when your friends are in trouble.” He studied my face for a moment. “Burtis Chapman is your friend, isn’t he?” It was more of a challenge than a question.
That was really what it all hinged on. Was Burtis Chapman my friend? After a long moment I nodded.
Harrison leaned against the back of his chair and folded both his arms over his midsection, his eyes fixed on my face. “Good,” he said. “Then you’d better get to work and find out who killed his ex-wife before your fella arrests him.”
13
We moved back to the chairs by the fire. Boris got up, stretched and padded out to the kitchen.
“So, what do you know about Burtis?” Harrison asked me.
I turned sideways toward him, pulling one leg up underneath me so I could see his face. “Not a lot,” I said. “I know Burtis worked for Idris Blackthorne.”
Harrison nodded. “The Chapmans didn’t have a pot to piss in,” he said. “Excuse my language. A pile of kids and not a lot of money. Burtis grew up poor and hard.” He ran his fingers through his beard. “He quit school to work full-time for Idris and put food on the table for his younger brothers and sisters. That’s not to say there weren’t other jobs around here then—there were, good ones, but not if you didn’t have an education.”
I nodded.
“Everything Burtis has he worked for. I know what people say, but most of his enterprises are legal.”
Harry gave another snort.
“Well, close to,” his father amended.
“Dayna came here with her parents, on vacation,” I said.
“That’s right.” Harrison rubbed his hand absently over the chair arm. “She was seventeen. Pretty as all get out. Every teenage boy in town noticed her and every teenage girl wanted to run her out of town. You know how kids can be.”
Boris wandered back into the room, nails clicking on the floor, and settled at the old man’s feet, head against his legs. “I think the girl was smitten with Burtis the first moment she saw him, which was when she fell off the dock at the old marina and he fished her out of the water.”
He narrowed his gaze at me. “Would it surprise you to know that Burtis wouldn’t go out alone with her because she was just seventeen?”
I shook my head. “No, not really.” As I’d told Maggie and Roma, Burtis seemed to follow his old code of ethics—like a knight during the crusades—or a Klingon warrior.
Harry Junior got to his feet, reached for my cup and inclined his head toward the kitchen—and the coffeepot—without saying a word.
I nodded. “Please,” I said softly.
“It was late in the fall,” Harrison continued, “right before Thanksgiving. Dayna’s eighteenth birthday. She arrived in town on the bus and showed up where Burtis was working.” He shrugged. “They were married four days later.”
Harry handed me a fresh cup of coffee. “Thank you,” I said. “I’m surprised. Burtis doesn’t seem the type to be so impulsive.”
“Probably the only time in his life he was,” the younger Taylor said.
Harrison shifted again in his chair. Boris lifted his head and waited until the old man was settled again.
“They were happy. At least they looked like they were. Didn’t last.” He exhaled with a soft sigh. “After a time I think Dayna just got overwhelmed with the reality of bein’ married. She had little kids, no friends or family, damn little money and a husband whose livelihood was a little sketchy. Not to mention parents who were pressuring her to come home.”
I thought about what life must have been like for Dayna Chapman back then and felt a twinge of sympathy for her.
“One day she was just gone,” Harrison said. “You can imagine the kind of loose talk that went around town.”
I nodded.
“Burtis wouldn’t talk about her and it wasn’t long before people learned to stop fishing for information.”
I took a drink, then balanced my cup on one knee. Harry made a good cup of coffee. “She never came back to see her children?” I asked.
Harrison smoothed a veined hand over his head. “Never. In the beginning Burtis took the boys to see her in the summer and a couple of times at Christmas, but pretty soon that stopped.”
I took another sip of my coffee and saw a look pass between the two men.
“What aren’t you telling me?” I asked.
Boris was asleep. Caught in a dream, he moved his back legs and made a low whining noise. With a bit of difficulty, Harrison leaned forward and patted the dog’s back. The movement stopped. The dog sighed and settled back into sleep.
Harrison looked at me as he straightened up, and his mouth twisted to one side. His gaze moved to his son again.
“Dayna used to send gifts at Christmas and for the boys’ birthdays. Dad’s always been skeptical anything actually came from Dayna,” Harry said, stretching his legs out in front of him.
I eyed the old man and after a moment his eyes met mine. “You think it was Burtis doing all that,” I said.
He nodded and let out a soft sigh. “I may as well say it as think it. I do. Say whatever you want about the man, he’s a damn good father.”
Harry nodded his agreement. “He’d protect those kids with his life.”
Harrison eyes locked with mine. “You can’t fault a man for that,” he said, and it seemed to me that there was a bit of a challenge in the words.
“No, you can’t,” I said.
“I don’t want to see Burtis railroaded for something he didn’t do.”
I exhaled softly. “Neither do I.”
Boris moved again then. His back feet scrambled as if he were chasing something and he yelped a couple of times.
Harrison leaned over again and gave the dog a couple more reassuring pats on the back. “He chases more things in his sleep than he does in real life,” he said with a grin. “That reminds me, what about those two cats of yours? How are they?”
So we were changing the subject. “Spoiled,” I said, smiling back at him. “I made sardine crackers for them yesterday and my house still smells like fish.”
At the word “fish” Boris lifted his head, looked around and gave an enthusiastic bark. “Hush, Kathleen’s not making treats for you,” Harry said.