“Kathleen’s working on the contract,” Davis said, “trying to pick up the trail.” Kathleen Ray, the newest of the three detectives, had brought with her a fine expertise in the world of computers, and both older detectives were more than happy to see her take on that annoying aspect of their work. Davis said, “She’s found other purchases for James, so we’ll see where that leads. Looks like Ryan and Clyde, and Hanni, are stuck with those places for a while. Besides the economic slump, no one wants to buy near a meth house.”
Max said, “Hanni’s nearly done with her renovation. Ryan and Clyde mean to go ahead, too, and then wait it out.” He tilted back in his chair. “The meth house isn’t the only problem up there. The papers on some of those places are in a hell of a tangle. City attorney’s beginning to see illegal foreclosures, false documents, the works. Could keep that area depressed for some long time.”
“Anywhere else,” Davis said, “I’d worry. But land’s too valuable in Molena Point, city council’s too concerned, city attorney rides too close when these things begin to happen.”
Joe thought about the cats that the rescue group had trapped in that neighborhood. Many members of their local CatFriends group had taken three or four cats apiece into their homes, to shelter on a temporary basis. He thought some of them would turn out to be so charming they’d end up as permanent family members. Juana had already told Charlie she’d take another young cat, that her orange kitten was growing bored, home all day alone, that he was clawing and chewing up the furniture. Davis hoped that two cats, if they were compatible, would chase each other, climb the cat trees, play tag, rather than spend their energy as a two-cat demolition crew.
“Anything more on the burn?” Max asked.
“We lifted three sets of prints from the whiskey bottles and the carton, besides Hesmerra’s. Sent the whole thing for contents analysis to the lab, along with the shattered remains of the bottle she had in bed. The few dishes, glasses, pans, knives and forks were melted, but we sent a collection of that to the lab. I’m guessing, even with the new methods, they won’t be able to lift much. The rest of the burn, Dallas and I lifted four sets of prints besides hers.”
Joe had taken a good look at those transformed blobs of glass, smoky and milky and as weird as artifacts from an alien planet. The pots and pans, too, the knives and forks, all were melted into misshapen monstrosities that might have been turned out by some misguided, first-year art student.
As for the wood alcohol that had killed Hesmerra, that was as common as bargain brand cat food; a person could buy the stuff anywhere, any grocery or drugstore. Slip into Hesmerra’s cave, ease off one of the little plastic cap covers, remove the lid. Pour out some of the whiskey, replace it with denatured alcohol. Slip the plastic back on, and wait for her to retrieve that particular bottle and suck it down. The hitch was, the killer couldn’t be sure of the timing; it might be months before she picked up the poisoned offering—unless he’d doctored all the bottles.
Or had the killer slipped into the shack, maybe when Hesmerra was sleeping or passed out? Added the wood alcohol to her already open whiskey?
Davis said, “Billy told you that Erik Kraft and Hesmerra were friends?”
Max nodded. “Billy thought that was because Debbie, herself, never went to see her. Neither sister did, Billy said it’s been like that since his mother died. Greta was the youngest, maybe her sisters felt protective, felt Hesmerra was remiss in letting her go out in the storm that night. Though that doesn’t really explain such rigid, long-standing anger.”
“Doesn’t explain a lot of things,” Davis said. “Doesn’t explain Hesmerra’s maneuvering for jobs that gave her access to the Kraft offices, and to Alain Bent’s house.”
Max said, “I asked Emmylou Warren to come in for prints, I want to talk with her, maybe she can fill us in. Up at the burn this morning, she was pretty nervous. Billy said she and Hesmerra had a falling-out when she was evicted.”
“You want a BOL on her?”
“Not at this point. If she doesn’t show, have the patrols watch for her, give her a little nudge.”
Of course she was nervous, Joe thought, if she lifted that file box from the crime scene. It had sure smelled, and looked, as if it had been buried in the earth beneath the fire. Question was, would she bring the box to the chief? And, a more worrisome question, how much had Max seen in the backseat of her car when he grabbed one guilty tomcat and tossed him out?
Joe thought he must have seen the box. But before he grabbed Joe, did he see the letterheads that were barely sticking out, had he seen enough so that when he did have the box, he’d focus right in on the gray tomcat pawing through the evidence—if that was some kind of evidence?
Or would Emmylou decide to keep those papers to herself, maybe hide them, and not get involved? He was wondering if he should make a call, fill Max in on the letterheads in case she didn’t give the papers to him, when a woman’s querulous voice cut loudly down the hall. “I’ll see him now! He left three very curt calls on my machine, when one polite message would have done, and I don’t expect to be kept waiting.”
The dispatcher mumbled an answer Joe couldn’t make out. The woman said, “I’ve been out of town. Now that I’m home, I have better things to do than waste my time in this place, with the implication that if I don’t show up I’m under some kind of arrest. I’m not in the habit of being summoned by the police, by a public servant, and then kept waiting.”
With a look of sorely tried patience, Max rose from his desk and headed up the hall. Davis was slower to rise. Limping, she moved out close behind him. Silently Joe followed them, his claws itching for action. MPPD was his second home, and he didn’t take kindly to rude humans throwing their weight around.
13
Three hundred miles north of Molena Point, the red tabby tomcat sat in the cab of a U-Haul truck as it roared down Highway 101. Perched comfortably atop the driver’s duffel bag, he watched the pine-wooded hills race by, broken now and then by green pastures. For most of the trip, the sky had been clear, the sea to their right sparkling blue, but then as they neared the Oregon paper mills they’d hit that area’s overcast, as thick as curdled milk, the sky hanging low and gray, the sea as unappealing as a smear of mud.
Whatever the weather, though, hitchhiking was a blast—if you chose your mark with care, if you didn’t hook up with some nutcase who had no respect for a lone tomcat. Lazily washing his paws and whiskers, he glanced at his hefty driver. She was a big, square woman dressed comfortably in faded jeans, a khaki shirt, a soft brown leather jacket, high brown boots that could stand a good polish if one cared about such matters. Her U-Haul rental agreement, tucked carelessly into the visor above her head, gave her name as Denise Woolsey. She was maybe sixty-some, though he had trouble discerning the exact age of a human. Cats were easier, advancing age providing the clear signs, lengthening chin, graying muzzle, spreading toes and dropped belly; and of course the changing smell of old age.
Denise had told him, conversationally, that she was moving house; she talked to him as she might to any hitchhiker, and he liked that. She was hauling her furniture, all her worldly goods, from Astoria to her new home in Stockton. She said she’d given away half of what she owned, meaning to simplify her life. She seemed hungry for conversation, even if it was one-sided. Maybe she’d taken him aboard simply for someone to talk to, imagining that he couldn’t repeat any of her shared secrets. She hadn’t a clue he could have contributed to the conversation, could have entertained her, himself, with tales of his own travels. The cab smelled of ancient dust, fresh coffee from her thermos, and the stink of the southern Oregon paper mills, the sour, acid smell of ground-up wood pulp trapped beneath an increasingly heavy fog that hugged the coast.