“Not now.” Ben knew that some of the kids were aflutter from hysteria, despite the efforts of Knute, Bill, Amy, Bunny, and the other girls. “Did any of them see anything unusual?”
“No.”
Charlie Thompson, chaperone for the Miller School, quietly approached.“Sheriff, three of my boys strung up the mannequin. They were alone. I guess you’d like to interrogate them.”
“Well, that might be too strong a word. Mr. Thompson, take them back to school. I’ll ring you first and then talk to the boys. Right now, these kids need your attention. You can all leave. I’ll be in touch.”
Charlotte looked to her husband, then back at Ben.“Should we tell his wife?”
“No, I’ll do it. I hope no one has called her,” Ben responded.
“No, I made that clear to all,” Charlotte firmly replied.
“It’s the worst part of this job,” Ben flatly stated. “You all can go as well.”
As the Custis Hall people and the Miller School people left, Ben asked Sister,“Hear anyone come up on your side of the ridge?”
“No, nothing. I was in the kennel whelping room. I would have heard a car or truck.”
As the buses and cars dipped over the ridge onto the rutted road, Ben’s eyes followed the receding red dots of light. “You have an opinion on Al Perez?”
“He was pleasant, competent, very upbeat. I knew him from serving on the board of directors.”
“Enemies?”
“I don’t know. Charlotte would know better than I. Custis Hall is her bailiwick.” She hesitated a moment. “He didn’t get along with Amy Childers—old romance—but we all have a few of those. We don’t usually hang for it.”
“One hopes.”
Ben, not a country boy, learned to ride when he came to Jefferson County four years ago. He discovered that riding wasn’t easy, but he enjoyed the challenge. He’d reached the point where he rode with the Hilltoppers. He was working toward riding up with first flight, taking all those exciting jumps.
He had keen powers of observation, trained powers. He also had a sense of people’s character, having heard every lie known to man, so he particularly valued an honest person. Sister Jane was rock-solid honest. Her powers of observation were also highly trained. She proved a shrewd judge of character, too, where humans were concerned.
Sister raised her eyes to Al’s darkening face. “Hanging is a definite form of suicide. Anyone who hangs himself truly wants to die, but you’ve seen the stepladder prints, as did I. Al Perez didn’t hang himself. Whoever killed him wants to tie the past to the present, to scare the hell out of all of us. This is the place of public execution.”
Ty, twenty-nine, in thrall to his work, drank in every word. He’d not thought of that.
“A warning?” Ben thought out loud.
“Yes, but to whom? This is just a feeling, but the warning involves the school.”
“Why do you say that?”
Sister paused.“If this person only wanted to warn and warn publicly, he could have hung Al somewhere else, or shot him, dumping him in a public place or a well-traveled spot. But it seems you’ve got a fevered imagination at work.”
Ben felt the cold slice of breeze from the northwest. He reached in his pocket for a small round hard candy. He offered Sister one, then Ty.“In charge of alumnae affairs. Important post. Financially critical.”
Sister folded her arms over her chest.“I doubt very much Al Perez is an innocent victim.”
“M-m-m.” Ben was thinking the same thing.
As Sister walked back to her truck, Inky shadowed her. Inky liked Sister. It was mutual.
Sister put her hand on the door handle, stopped to call back to Ben.“Shrouds have no pockets.”
“What?”
“Shrouds have no pockets. I don’t know why that popped into my mind, except that a lot of money flowed through his hands.”
C H A P T E R 8
Hounds ate at six-thirty this Sunday to the sound of the power washer cleaning the kennels. The jets of water hit the walls and floors with such force, every speck of debris and dirt was dislodged, swirling into a huge central drain, a big trap underneath it. Shaker cut off the washer.
Sister, who had slept fitfully, walked into the feeding room. Raleigh and Rooster remained in the kennel office. They got along with the hounds but it wasn’t wise to allow them into the feeding room. They hated being separated from Sister, grumbling whenever they were left.
Shaker walked back into the feeding room just as Sister did. He took one look at her face.“What’s wrong?”
“Al Perez was hanged last night at Hangman’s Ridge.” She gave him the details as she knew them.
“Jesus, there are sickos out there. Why didn’t you call me?”
“You rarely get time to yourself. I figured after the firehouse party you spent the night out.”
“Yep.” He paused. “Gruesome end, gruesome. I liked Al. He was a nice guy.”
“It wasn’t clear whether he was hung to death or dead before he was hung. I studied the body as best I could under the circumstances. I didn’t smell blood or powder burns. And my nose is pretty good.” She then apologized to her hounds. “For a human my nose is good, but no one is as good as you all.”
Trident, a lovely young hound, smiled at Sister before diving back into the feed trough.
“Why’d you go up there, or did Ben come for you?”
“Forgot to tell you that. I heard the screams. Woke me up. I didn’t think too much of it since I knew the boys had planned their Halloween surprise. Then I heard the sirens.”
“You would have heard someone drive through here.”
She replied,“No one did.” She switched gears. “How are the puppies?”
“Nursing. Delia’s a good mother. Even if you’d been sound asleep next to her, she would have warned you if someone drove through the farm. You would have known. It’s a crazy thing, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
“Sooner or later, they’ll catch ’em.”
“One hopes.” She reached for a gallon of corn oil.
Shaker opened the door for the fed group of young hounds to return to their runs. He then washed out the troughs, refilling them with kibble. Sister poured a line of corn oil over the feed as Shaker opened another run door for older hounds to enter. They rushed up to Sister in greeting, then dove for the chow.
“It’s supposed to rain Tuesday, temperature’s supposed to drop, too.” Shaker checked with the Weather Channel constantly.
“Yeah, I saw that, too. But I’m betting the rain will come in after we wrap it up at Mud Fence.” She named that day’s fixture, an old estate whose fences in the mid-eighteenth century were made of mud. The first settlers lacked the money for nails. They could fell trees and plane boards butnails were very expensive. Eventually they built snake fences once the work of clearing began in earnest. One didn’t need nails for that. Some folks had to make do with a mud fence until they could clear more land, get more timber.
“Want to bet?”
“Five dollars.”
“Bet.” He held out his hand and she shook it. “Boss, ever consider murder?”
“You mean me killing someone or someone killing me?”
He laughed.“Ever consider what drives someone to it?”
“Sure.”
“I expect any of us can kill. Just need the right or wrong circumstances.”
“We might be mad enough to kill yet we don’t. We don’t step over the line.” She listened to the hounds chewing their kibble, a comforting sound. “If one of these hounds kills another hound, why does it happen?”
“Sometimes they know a hound is weak, sickening. They take him out. Maybe that’s canine mercy killing. Doesn’t happen often.” He thought a bit more. “If there’s a fight, it’s a challenge, a top-dog thing.”
“Same with horses. They rarely kill but they can sure kick the powder out of one another if they take a notion.”
“You’re saying we murder, they don’t.” Shaker kept an eye on Dragon, growling. “That’s enough, Dragon, shut up.”