Not least because his alibi was Sergeant Jim Chopin, with whom he'd been visiting over a latte at the Riverside Cafe at the time of the murder, in full view of cafe owner Laurel Meganack, Old Sam Dementieff, and half a dozen other Park rats, all with excellent memories.
"What is it you want me to do, Bernie?"
"Your job."
Well, he'd done his job. He'd maintained the peace and the public order.
One of the principal core values of the Alaska State Troopers was loyalty, first to the state of Alaska, then to the highest ideals of law enforcement, and, in third place, to the truth, although as stated "the truth, regardless of outcome."
Jim had been thinking a lot about that particular core value lately. The truth was he liked working in law enforcement. The truth was he didn't like the messes people got themselves into and he liked using what ability he had to step in and straighten those messes out. The truth was he was good at his job, and he knew it.
He'd opened the Alaska State Troopers' forty-fourth post in Niniltna going on three years ago, and if he had been a Park fixture before, by now he was a full-fledged Park rat. He was well aware of the dangers of being so dug in. A cop was always going to be a little bit on the outside looking in, or he should be if he was going to function effectively. If he was regarded as a member of his community, then it followed that other members in that community might feel comfortable enough with his presence to approach him with suggestions they wouldn't have dared to propose to the cop perceived to be Other.
"What is it you want me to do, Bernie?"
"Your job."
He had not allowed himself any preconceptions as to the identity of the killer of Louis Deem. He had conducted a by-the-book investigation into his death, reconstructing Deem's movements as minutely as was possible in an area as vast and as unpopulated as the Park, extensively interviewing the people closest to Louis as well as all the people who had last seen him alive, and, as near as he was able, keeping his prior knowledge of the character of the dead man from coloring his work.
He'd been thorough and conscientious enough to have discovered a missing piece of evidence and tracked it down to Park ranger Dan O'Brien. Dan had found the body and removed the piece of evidence before fetching Jim to the scene. Jim should have charged Dan with evidence tampering and obstruction of justice. He hadn't.
Since any list of Louis Deem's enemies included pretty much the entire population of the Park, all this had taken some time. Meanwhile, there had been pressure from his boss in Fairbanks to either close the case or move on. In the end, he'd come up empty, and obedient to authority, he'd moved on. Louis Deem's murder was a cold case now, and there wasn't a soul in the Park who would want it reopened.
Howie had not confessed to Louis's murder. It was the one thing he had stopped short of doing this morning, and though Jim had poked and prodded and tried to provoke him into admitting to it, he remained obdurate. He would only reiterate that the aunties had hired the job done on Louis, and he wasn't going to say any more until Jim gave him immunity, a fine word everyone in the Park with a television had picked up from goddamn Law and Order or goddamn CSI. Fictional crime fighters made life so much harder on the real ones.
Howie was obviously afraid that Jim was right, that whoever had shot and killed Mac Devlin had thought he was aiming at Howie.
Which led to another thought: Maybe that was why Howie had taken on his first gainful employment in years, and from what Jim had heard, possibly in Howie's life. Maybe the job was isolated enough for him to feel safe. Though, of course, being Howie, he had lost no time in turning the location to his advantage. That had been a caribou hunt of wholesale proportions.
The question remained. Who was Howie so afraid of that he'd ask to be taken into protective custody?
The aunties were at their corner table when he walked into the Roadhouse, and he went directly to them, pulling up a chair and straddling it. He put his arms across the back and leaned his chin on them and stared at the aunties in turn, calling out their names as he did so. "Auntie Vi. Auntie Joy. Auntie Balasha. Auntie Edna."
"Jim," Auntie Vi said, a little mystified by this formal greeting and a little suspicious because of it. "Where Kate?"
"She's doing a job for me downriver," he said.
Auntie Vi gave this statement her cautious approbation. "Always good to make some money."
Normally he would have talked to them individually. Some instinct had urged him to take this to the aunties head on. It might not have had as much to do with good police work as it did with self-preservation. No matter. Either he'd carry the barricades or they would repulse his attack, and he'd have to live with that.
He'd chosen here, in public, in a venue in which they felt comfortable and where they were in a position of authority, however unofficial it was. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Bernie coming toward him. He shook his head. Bernie altered course for the table around which the four Grosdidiers were celebrating something monumental, as evidenced by the number of dead soldiers on the table. Matt had a black eye, Luke a fat lip, and the knuckles of the hand Mark used to reach for his beer were swollen double, so probably a fight in which one or all were victorious. Or maybe just a fight. The Grosdidier boys were rabble-rousers of the first water. One of the smartest things the Niniltna Native Association had ever done was to harness all that energy in an EMT program and put it to good use.
Quit stalling, he told himself, and faced the aunties again and took a deep breath. "Aunties," he said, "I just talked to Howie. He told me that you hired him to kill Louis Deem."
It felt as if time stopped, which was ridiculous. He could still hear the clink of glasses, laughter, a heated argument over drift net regulations, the squeak of sneakers on wood on television. Life continued, of course it did. But here, at this moment, at this table, it was as if everyone was holding their breath, as if the intake of oxygen had been suspended, and depending on the answers he got here, as if the world might begin spinning backward when time resumed.
He looked at their faces again, one at a time. Tears gathered and fell down Auntie Balasha's face. Auntie Edna looked pissed off, but then she always did. Auntie Joy's needle froze halfway into the fabric square she was working on. She didn't meet his eyes.
Auntie Vi alone did not so much as blink, her needle flashing in and out steadily, rhythmically, a straight line of even stitches progressing steadily across the quilt. "Such nonsense, Jim," she said, in a chiding voice. "You smarter than that."
"So you didn't hire him to kill Louis?" Jim said.
She paused in her sewing to give him an impatient look. "Of course not. Silliness. Surprised I am that you would believe him enough to ask us. Howie!" She snorted. "Nobody believe a word that out of his mouth come. Why you now?"
"Auntie Balasha?"
Her smile was wavering. "Silliness," she said, echoing Auntie Vi.
"Auntie Edna?"
Auntie Edna snorted her reply and without moving gave the distinct impression of turning her back on him.
"Auntie Joy?"
Auntie Joy's hands trembled. She still wouldn't look up. "What Vi says, Jim. Silliness."
Auntie Vi jumped. "Aycheewah!" She put her finger in her mouth, and stared down at the perfect circle of bright red blood staining the cloth.
When he walked into the house that evening, Kate was frying moose liver rolled in flour, salt, and pepper in olive oil with a dab of butter and mashing potatoes with butter and cream in what looked like proportions equal to the potatoes. She was mashing the potatoes by hand, and she was mashing with vigor. She didn't look up when Jim came in. "Johnny," she said, "would you go out to the cache for me and find a package of peas and onions?"