“It’s okay. Did the detectives recover a syringe that night?”
“You mean with insulin in it? No. They found fresh supplies in the kitchen. Nothing already prepared for injection though, and nothing recently used.”
“Did you hear anything about an open roll of LifeSavers in her coat pocket?”
His shoulders dropped, and he frowned. “No, nobody mentioned LifeSavers to me. It wasn’t in any of the reports.”
“It was there; I saw it. The package was open, the wrapper was curly-cueing out of her pocket.”
Scott appeared perplexed. “She must have thought her sugar was low. Considering her normal levels, though, that’s odd.”
“It is odd. Did you collect her… that night?” I skipped a word intentionally. The omitted word could have been “body” or “remains.”
He filled in the blank and said that he had. One of the tasks of coroner’s investigators is to visit death scenes to begin collecting data, and to prepare bodies for transport to the morgue.
I said, “Her shirttail was tucked up under the front of her bra when I found her.”
“When I got there, too. Same.”
“Ever run across that before at a death scene?”
“Never,” he said.
“A good friend of hers just told me that Hannah did that when she was preparing to do an insulin injection in her abdomen. To get her shirt up out of the way.”
Scott crossed his arms and sat back. “I didn’t consider that, but I should have. Slocum was already thinking homicide when I arrived.” He made a sound with his tongue and the roof of his mouth. “You’ll make a statement about the LifeSavers?”
“Of course; I bet the crime-scene photos will show that wrapper.”
“I’ll take a look. Will her friend give a statement about the shirt tail?”
“Can’t see why not. Why would a diabetic be eating sugar one minute and preparing to take insulin the next?”
“It makes no sense to me. That’s one of the things I’m going to have to think about.”
We said good-bye. I bundled Grace back up. On the way out to the car she asked, “What are LifeSavers?”
We stopped at a convenience store on the way home and I bought her a roll. I guessed she was a Butter Rum kid.
It turned out that I guessed right.
When we finally weaved across the valley Viv was almost done cooking up a pot of macaroni and cheese. As the three of us were finishing lunch, Virginia Danna, the Realtor whom I’d tricked into showing me the interior of Doyle’s house, phoned me on my cell.
After reintroducing herself she proceeded without any further niceties, her tone full of conspiracy. “The rules have changed. They always seem to in situations like this, don’t they? With Mr. Chandler dead, buyers are going to come out of the hills looking for a fire sale. Act fast and you might be able to get that house for a…”
Song? What house?
I walked out of the kitchen. “Mr. Chandler is dead?” I said.
“Yes! Can you believe it? This world! Sometimes…” She sighed. “A detective called me today to find out when I’d last spoken with him. You could have knocked me over with a feather when he told me Mr. Chandler was dead, maybe even murdered. Who knows what happened to him? The poor man! Murdered? It gives me gooseflesh, right up my thighs. Now, I will admit that I’m not privy to the estate situation in this particular circumstance, but sometimes people-heirs-at times like this are truly eager to settle things after a… especially after a… So if I could persuade you to make…”
An offer?
She went on. “Even a lowball offer would be…”
Acceptable? Delectable?
I asked, “Ms. Danna, who exactly is Mr. Chandler?”
“What? The owner of the house I showed you on Twelfth. The one with the water features and that yummy media center downstairs? I’m sorry, I thought you knew.”
“Doyle?”
“Yes, Doyle Chandler.”
“He’s dead?”
She was growing impatient with me. “Mm-hmmm,” was all she said in reply to my last question. Then she waited while I caught up.
“What detective phoned you?” I asked. I was thinking Sam.
“I don’t recall exactly. Mr. Chandler’s body was found up near Allenspark. Maybe it was an Allenspark detective.”
Allenspark is a small town in the mountains about thirty minutes from Boulder by car, not far from the eastern boundaries of Rocky Mountain National Park. When not swollen with summer tourists, Allenspark’s population typically hovered-guessing-somewhere around two hundred people. The village was as likely to have its own homicide detective as it was to have its own traffic helicopter. Any investigator involved in a homicide inquiry in Allenspark would be part of the County Sheriff’s department, on loan from a bigger city, like Boulder, or someone assigned from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
Rather than argue the point, I said, “I’ll talk it over with my wife and get back to you. The house is still a little small for us.”
“One word: cantilever. My mobile number is on the card I gave you. Call any time. When news gets out about this… situation, there will be other offers, certainly by close of business tomorrow. You can count on it. There have been four showings of that property this week alone and I don’t have to tell you how slow the beginning of January usually is. And that screen in the basement? Remember? Of course you do. I checked. It’s a Stewart Filmscreen. I told you, the best. Think hard-a house like that, a location like that, circumstances like…”
These.
“I understand,” I said. But, of course, I didn’t.
I called Lauren. She didn’t return my call until midafternoon during a break in her trial. She’d already heard through the law enforcement grapevine about the discovery of the body of an unidentified male in a shallow grave not far from a trail that meandered off Highway 7 in northern Boulder County. She said she thought the location was east of Allenspark, actually closer to Lyons and Hygiene. I asked her to get me whatever information she could and to call me right back.
“Why are you interested in this?” she asked, of course. The tone of her question made it clear she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear my reply.
“It might be related to Diane,” I said.
“Two minutes,” she said.
It took her four. “We don’t have much yet. Pending a post, it appears to be a homicide. Animals had gotten to the body. ID found at the scene indicates it may be a man named-”
“Doyle Chandler.”
“How did you know? Is he one of your patients?”
I could have said, probably should have said, “You know I can’t answer that.” Instead, I said, “No.” Were the answer yes I would have answered with stony silence. Lauren and I both knew that the silent yes would have been just as declarative as the spoken no had been.
“One of Diane’s patients?”
Well, that was a thought. What if Diane had treated Doyle? I didn’t think so. I said, “No.”
“But you know him?” she asked.
“Personally, I don’t. Doyle Chandler owned the house that’s next door to Mallory Miller’s house on the Hill. When she disappeared he’d already moved away and put the place on the market.”
“I don’t think the police mentioned that this afternoon. Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Is this related to Mallory’s disappearance?”
“I don’t know. You have to wonder.”
“Diane’s disappearance?”
“I don’t know that either.”
“But you have reasons to be suspicious?”
“Yes.”
“Then this might be important to you: Sam’s up there. He asked the sheriff for permission.”
“He’s up where they found the body?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll call him.”
“Have you heard from Raoul?” Lauren asked.
“No. I’m still worried.”