No Good Deed (23 page)

The living quarters were brightly lit.

They could see a woman through the front windows, plantation shutters wide open, in a room that was a living room, or a study, or a den. The sound of cicadas rose and fell. The porch was wide, wooden plank, and on the right, facing sideways, was a white wicker porch swing.

Sonora was surprised by the open shutters. She had been a cop too long to understand such innocence.

Not innocence, she realized. Freedom, thanks to a buffer of privacy afforded by green velvet acres.

They headed up the porch steps, both of them walking quietly. She could make out a small kitchen alcove on the left, surrounded by a horseshoe of cabinets, the room making a long, sweeping L shape. There was a fireplace on the right, a desk against French windows that ran along the back, a couch and a rocking chair.

A woman reclined on the couch. A small fire glowed in the fireplace; Sonora could smell the smoke. Real logs, not natural gas. A blue oriental rug had been thrown over thick wheat-colored carpet.

Outside looking in, a beautiful room. Books in shelves that were built into the walls. The desk, cherry wood, the chair, more cherry wood and violet cushions. Sonora had to squint here, but it was definitely violet. Startling. Pretty. Eccentric. It made her long to own a violet chair.

Sam knocked, and Sonora had the quick, reflexive clench of her gut she always got when she went to someone's front door. More cops were killed on doorsteps than anywhere else.

Sam and Sonora exchanged looks, waiting with a polite patience and a pretended indifference to the way the woman glanced at her watch, made a note, and put a bookmark in the book she had been leafing through. She took a sip from a glass of wine, stared into space for a moment. Then went to the door, moving slowly, in spite of the open shutters that exposed her every move to Sam and Sonora from a distance of less than six feet.

If the woman had been racing around the room, hiding dirty laundry, flushing used condoms, emptying ashtrays, Sonora might have liked her better.

Maybe Sam was right. Maybe these people had killed Joelle Chauncey. She began her mental list with ‘pretentious'.

The woman opened the door slowly. It was, in fact, a beautiful door, oak with a stained-glass window. Sonora had priced one once. Over a thousand. This one had probably cost more, like everything else on this farm.

Sam had his ID at the ready, so Sonora left hers in her purse. ‘We're Detectives Blair and Delarosa, Cincinnati Police Department.'

The woman looked at them with a mild and unenthusiastic curiosity. She cocked her head to the left, one leg bent, the other toe to the floor, like a ballerina. An odd stance, though she looked comfortable.

‘I'm surprised' – she dragged the word out – ‘that Mr Hoiken didn't announce you. Mr Hoiken is our … se
cur
ity guard.' She cocked her head in the other direction, giving them her full regard. ‘Cliff's not here. But I'm here. Do you want me?'

Sam was smiling, as if he couldn't help himself, and Sonora wondered what he thought was so funny.

‘And you are?' Sonora asked.

The woman looked at her. Languidly. She had, Sonora thought, the largest nostrils she'd ever seen on any living creature who was not also on exhibit at a zoo.

‘It's such a
fun
ny thing, when someone comes to your own doooor, then wants to know who you are.' She had the kind of Southern accent one rarely heard outside of movies like
Gone with the Wind.
The drawl was clearly an ingrained habit, and it slowed conversation. One simply had to wait for her to get the words out. ‘But I don't
mind
introducing myself. I'm Vivian Bisky.' She held out a hand for both of them to shake, which they did.

Her hand once more her own, she ran her fingers through hair that was a flat-looking meld of brown and gray. Sonora wondered why Vivian Bisky did not go to a drug-store and pick a number. On the plus side, the hair was cut short, over the top of her neck, full and soft. Her eyes were brown, deep-socketed and made up with brown eye pencil, eyebrows plucked and filled back in. Her skin looked tissue-thin and fragile, likely oiled by something expensive every night, but her wrinkles were deeply etched into a permanent freckled tan that was, oddly, the most attractive part about her.

‘Why don't the two of you come in, and tell me what it is you're doing on my doorstep this time of night. It must be important for you to come all this way, and not call first.' She waved a hand, and opened the door wide. Sonora half expected her to precede them into the room, and was almost disappointed when the woman's notions of courtesy kept her in the small, well-lit foyer, while the two of them filed inside.

‘Please, sit down, if you want. I was just having a glass of wine before bed. It helps me relax. Can I get you something? I have hot tea, if you don't drink.'

Sonora caught Sam's look.
A tea drinker.

Vivian Bisky left the front door open to the night. Sonora was annoyed. Doors needed to be closed after dark.

The woman paused in front of the kitchen. She was not one of those hostesses who cared whether you drank or not. She would go through the motions – check, checkmate. None of this ‘try my fried chicken or my feelings will be hurt' that seemed common to the Southerners Sonora had met in the past.

But in spite of the accent, which sounded more like affectation than anything else, Sonora recognized a true woman of the South. Though clearly intelligent, she might well pretend otherwise, and there was no way in the world that she would be hurried. Sonora gritted her teeth, and prepared to be patient. Vivian Bisky was a Tennessee Williams character come to life – and if she was aware that she was not in the deep South of the forties and fifties, she did not show it.

Perhaps she had not yet noticed.

Sam and Sonora both declined the woman's hospitality. Sonora chose the couch where the woman had been sitting, and Sam raised an eyebrow at her, but sat beside her, fishing the book up from between the deep cushions and setting it on the coffee table.

The Man Who Listens To Horses,
by Monty Roberts.

Vivian Bisky took her glass of wine and settled into the rocking chair. ‘Have you read that?' she asked, sounding almost human. ‘If you love horses, you have to read this book. Are you just police officers, or are you horse lovers too?'

The question, as Sonora saw it, was are you one of them, or one of us.

‘I have a horse,' she said. Saw Sam roll his eyes, which made her decide to hit him the moment they were alone together in the car. He pulled out the mini-recorder and set up a tape and Vivian Bisky pretended not to notice.

She leaned forward, causing the rocking chair to tip. ‘What kind of horse do you have?'

‘Arabian.'

The woman leaned back in her chair with a smile that was almost friendly. Waved a hand. ‘My brother and I raise saddlebreds.'

And there it was. The ranking. Just how good is your horse?

‘Do you show him?' Bisky asked. Trying hard to control the interview.

‘He's in training,' Sonora said. It was sort of true. The first thing she was going to do was train him to walk quietly when she led him around the barn, and not bolt his food when he ate. But she made a mental note about that book.

Sam leaned forward. ‘I understand you do business with End Point Farm, with a woman named Donna Delaney?'

Vivian Bisky frowned, sighed deeply, leaned back in the rocking chair. ‘I wouldn't put it that way. We do
try
to throw her a little something, from time to time. The horse industry, as you may already know' – this with a little nod toward Sonora – ‘is a bare-knuckle kind of business. So many people start up with nothing, and end up with nothing. More people than you might think.'

‘I got the impression from Ms Delaney that you do more than just a little business.' Sonora did not bother to tamp down the hard edges.

Bisky curled her feet up beneath her knees. ‘I have not one doubt in the world that's the impression she tried to give you.'

‘You mean she was name-dropping?' Sam asked gently.

Bisky gave him her smile, a rare offering. ‘I don't want to say we've never done
any
business with the woman. I'm not trying to make a liar out of her. Let's just say our business is
limited.
Really, the person you need to talk to is Cliff. He takes care of that end.' She waved a hand. ‘I'm more the books and accounting stuff, the boring parts. And the entertaining, which one has to do in this business from time to time, that's more in my line. Clients or associates come into town to check on their horses – it's nice to have a little thing. But now don't think I'm totally boring. I imprint all the babies, that's my particular specialty. It must be the
maternal
instinct.'

Sonora glanced at Sam, wondering if he knew what she meant by ‘imprint' the babies. He was nodding, in that knowledgeable way men have, whether they know what you're talking about or not.

‘What is that, imprinting babies?'

Sam rolled his eyes at her, muttered, ‘You had to ask.'

Sonora ignored him. She had a horse now. These were things she might need to know.

Vivian gave Sonora a smile that was friendly, if indulgent. ‘You just pick them up right after they're born and pet them, so they'll respect that people are powerful – they can pick you up – but they're safe – they pet you. Then they're much easier to deal with, more trusting, for the rest of their lives.'

Sonora thought of the livestock auction. Wondered if horses ought to be encouraged to trust people more than they naturally did. She thought not.

‘Is your husband home?' Sam asked.

Vivian Bisky gave him a little smile. ‘I hope not. He's been dead for fifteen years.' She sighed, and her sigh was state-of-the-art, welling from deep within the diaphragm, swelling the lungs, then escaping through the nose. She breathed the way Sonora's junior high chorus teacher had always told them to. Outside of opera singers, Vivian Bisky was the only person Sonora had met who breathed that way. Not counting the junior high chorus teacher, who breathed that way too.

‘It's a long time ago, Detective, so don't feel the need to apologize for bringing it up, although I do miss him
terribly. Cliff
is my little brother – not so little, but then you'd have to meet him. But he's not here, he's in Saratoga.'

‘When's he due back?' Sonora asked.

‘Day after tomorrow, if not sooner.'

‘Why sooner?' Sonora asked.

‘I beg your pardon?'

‘I said why sooner? Is there a chance he'll be in tomorrow?'

Vivian Bisky smiled but it wasn't pleasant. ‘It's possible he might come home early due to family business, Detective. I probably shouldn't tell you this, but you
are
detectives, and one should co-operate with the police, but Cliff's wife is not what I would call … self-sufficient. Cliff travels a good deal, as you might imagine, and every single time he's gone more than three hours,
she
's on the phone, trying to talk him into coming back home. 'Course, if I had sole charge of those kids of hers, I'd be on the phone too. They
ought
to get a nanny, or something, and keep her around with danger pay.'

‘What is the exact nature of your business with Ms Delaney?'

Vivian Bisky smiled thinly. She was not intimidated by the question or the tape recorder. It was always difficult to convince wealthy people that they were subject to the rules like everybody else, often because they weren't.

‘We might sell Donna a horse now and then, if we had something that just didn't work out. Something we could let go on the cheap. It's a little expensive out here to keep a lot of paddock pets, and it's not fair to the horse. If we have an animal that just doesn't cut it, then we'll sell it for a very reasonable price just so it goes to a good place.'

‘You consider End Point Farm a good place?' Sonora asked.

Vivian Bisky sat sideways, one eye on Sonora, like a crow. ‘I hear you, believe me, I hear what you're saying. Mostly, we've sold Donna horses only when she had a buyer, somebody who might want a horse to show or a mare to breed. But like I said, I don't think Cliff does much business with Donna these days, and if you've been out there, I'm sure you can see why.'

‘You don't, by any chance, send her your overflow? Horses you don't have room to board?'

It was as if all the air had suddenly gone out of the room. Then the moment passed and Vivian Bisky laughed with the enthusiasm she usually gave her sighs. ‘I tell you what, Detective. I'm going to give you a midnight tour of one of our boarding barns, and then you can see how absolutely
ludicrous
that question is. Sit tight, while I get my barn shoes.'

Chapter Forty

Vivian Bisky's barn shoes were a very sturdy pair of knee-high black rubber boots. They looked scuffed, worn, comfortable.

Bisky noticed Sonora looking. ‘Got them right out of the State Line Tack Catalog, dirt cheap. Don't you just love them? Let me just grab my jacket and we'll go.'

She shed the hothouse orchid image as she led them down the front steps to the barns and paddocks. She could have passed for a stable hand, albeit a self-confident one. She walked differently in boots, wearing a rough green jacket over a worn sweatshirt. The sweatshirt had a Bisky Farms logo, an F superimposed over a B, joining in a circle. Sonora noticed Sam looking.

Sonora lifted her chin, looked over her shoulders. She could see no horses in the neat, square paddocks.

‘We keep them up at night.' Bisky waved an arm toward the barns. Her feet made small noises on the asphalt. Sam and Sonora's leather soles were louder.

‘Why is that?'

Bisky stopped in the comfortably wide drive. ‘These are high-dollar horses, Detective. They're
safer
up at night.'