I knelt to slip the necktie from his neck. It was peachcolored silk. Undoubtedly expensive. I could imagine Conrad putting it on him that morning, thinking it looked cool, or thinking it was funny, or thinking God knew what, since Conrad didn’t think like anybody else.
I said, “You had a bad morning, didn’t you? I’m so sorry.”
He lowered his rear end to the floor and sat with his head tilted, his dark eyes looking at me with such intelligence it seemed he might begin to speak. Too bad he couldn’t. He was the only witness who could tell us who had accosted Conrad and killed him.
I washed and dried Reggie’s food bowl and put it where it belonged. I folded the tie and put it on the shelf next to the bag of kibble, all my tidiness to make me feel I was in control of something, the same way Guidry’s fussiness with the coaster had been.
When I went back to the living room, Guidry was gently questioning Stevie, going softly but firmly into personal matters that seemed to rattle and annoy her. She said Reggie slept in the breezeway between house and carport, and that Conrad always got up early and took him to Crescent Beach to run. No, she hadn’t heard his car leave that morning, but she never did because she was asleep. When Conrad came home after running with Reggie on the beach, she was usually up and they had breakfast together unless one of them had an early appointment. No, she hadn’t been worried that he wasn’t home yet because it was still early.
As beautiful and rich as she was, Stevie had a childlike, vulnerable quality, and she looked up at me as if I might rescue her.
I pretended not to know what was happening. A man had been murdered and Guidry had to find the person who’d done it. No matter how irrelevant his questions might seem, he had to ask them.
I said, “Stevie, I fed Reggie and put out fresh water for him. Would you like me to come back tonight?”
She and Guidry both looked surprised, but I knew she would need me, even if she didn’t.
Stevie took a deep breath. “Please.”
I said, “I’ll let myself out.”
I went outside and got in my Bronco and headed for Midnight Pass Road, taking the route that avoided the crime scene. In spite of my horror at what had happened to Conrad, and my empathy for Stevie, I had a schedule to keep and I was already over an hour behind. Cats were waiting to be fed and groomed and played with, a few birds were waiting for fresh paper in their cages and fresh seed in their feeders, a lone guinea pig was waiting for food and fresh cedar shavings.
As I turned onto Midnight Pass Road, I saw two middle-aged female power walkers leaning over a cardboard box on the sidewalk on the Gulf side of the street. The box had a hand-lettered sign saying FREE KITTENS, and the women had the sappy Awwww grins that people get when they see the baby form of anything. I resisted an urge to stop and rant about the stupidity of putting out kittens to broil in the heat. It was still early. Maybe the kittens would be rescued before the sun was fully up. If nobody rescued them, maybe whoever had put them out would take them inside. In my rearview mirror, I saw the women turn and begin their brisk elbow-swinging walk again. They had probably ruined their heartbeat goal by pausing to look at the kittens, but maybe seeing something that makes you say Awwww is better for the heart than exercise.
I was halfway to a Siamese cat’s house when I remembered that Guidry had ridden to Stevie’s house with me. I felt a wicked grin coming on at the thought of him walking back to his own car. In those Italian leather sandals. With his linen jacket getting sweaty across the back, and his forehead getting moist from the heat … .
I slapped the steering wheel. What was wrong with me? I had just witnessed a gruesome homicide scene. I had just learned that a sweet funny man who had shown me kindness had been killed. I had just watched his widow crumble in stunned grief. And yet here I was thinking about Guidry’s body slicked with perspiration.
Then came the thought I’d been avoiding, postponing it with domestic puttering, feeding the dog, washing dishes, grousing about kittens left in the heat, imagining Guidry’s sweat. I couldn’t put it off any longer. Conrad’s killer had been driving the car I’d seen that morning. He had got a good look at me. And because I’d waved and smiled and said “Hey!” he had every reason to think I’d got a good look at him.
For the rest of the morning, I went through the motions like a robot, doing what had to be done and trying to give every pet the attention it needed. But all the time my mind was on the driver of Conrad Ferrelli’s car. He wouldn’t be dumb enough to keep the car. He had probably already parked it in front of some not-yet-open office complex or strip center.
He must have been hiding in the bushes and stepped out as Conrad and Reggie passed by. But Doberman pinschers are highly protective dogs, and Reggie would have attacked anybody hurting Conrad. Unless the killer had lured Conrad into the trees and killed him out of Reggie’s sight. But how could he have done that and then put Reggie into Conrad’s car? And when had he stopped and let Reggie out? Or had Reggie escaped? In either case, the dog would have headed home, cutting through the wooded area to reach his street.
By eleven o’clock, the temperature was climbing toward 100 degrees, and I felt like somebody was sticking the sharp point of a knife into the center of my brain. The lovebird still on my list could wait awhile longer. I needed coffee and food, in that order.
I drove straight to the Village Diner, where I’ve eaten the same breakfast so many times nobody even asks me what I want. When they see me come in, Tanisha, the cook, starts making two eggs over easy with extra-crisp home fries and a biscuit. Judy, the waitress who is a close friend even though she and I never see each other anyplace except the diner, grabs a coffeepot and has a full mug ready for me by the time I sit down. This morning, I hustled to the ladies’ room and splashed cold water on my face and scrubbed animal off my hands before I took the booth where Judy had put my coffee. I drank half of it in one glug, and she was instantly back to refill it.
If Judy were a dog, she’d be a beagle. She’s neat and compact, with golden-brown hair, hazel eyes, and a scattering of gold freckles over her nose. She works efficiently and cheerfully, and she’s ever ready to yap and take off after something that catches her fancy. Unfortunately, she has always gone after the wrong game, because they’ve all turned out to be sorry sons-of-bitches who didn’t appreciate her intelligence or her smart mouth.
She said, “Lord, girl, you’re red as a beet! You been standing in the sun?”
“Now and then.”
“How come?”
I took a deep breath, dreading what she would say when I told her. “A dog I was walking this morning found a dead body, and I was there when they uncovered it.”
Judy frowned and squinted at me, her eyes taking on a suspicious look.
“Terrific. You found another dead body.”
“I didn’t find it, a dog found it. I had to call nine-one-one and hang around until they uncovered it.”
“I hope this time you’ll stay out of it and let the cops handle it.”
“Of course I’m staying out of it!”
“Uh-hunh.”
Tanisha rang the bell to signal that my food was ready, and Judy went off to get it. On her way back, she picked up a Herald-Tribune somebody had left on a table and put it down with my food.
“Here, read the paper and get your mind off that dead body.”
She splashed more coffee in my mug and left me to mutter sweet nothings to my biscuit. I didn’t look at the paper until I’d eaten every last morsel and Judy had filled my mug two more times. Then I skimmed the front page, where some old men in Washington had sent a company of young troops off to die for some ill-defined reason, turned to the inside pages where some old men from other countries had sent their young people off to fight for equally ill-defined reasons, and finally got to the comics, which is about the only thing that makes any sense. If I ran the world—and God knows I could do a better job of it than the yahoos doing it now—any leader who sent troops off to fight would have to march at the head of the ranks. That would bring about world peace in about four weeks.