Dead Hot Mama (4 page)

“Yo,
I smell pizza. Any left?”

A blast of cold air hit the trio in the kitchen. The door to the back porch swung open as something resembling a six-foot-five-inch uncooked bratwurst backed its way into the room. Tipping its head sideways towards the kitchen table, the face was half-hid by a hood rimmed with wolf fur. All you could see were miniature icicles frozen into the auburn curls of a full beard and the gleam in one eye. But it was a gleam in the eye of a very happy man.

“What’s up, Ray?” asked Osborne, unable to resist a tone of irritation in his voice. His neighbor had a knack for commanding attention at just the wrong time.

Lew leaned back against the kitchen counter, crossing her arms as she rolled her eyes. She was not in the mood to be held hostage by any Ray Pradt shenanigans.

“Did you get my message?” asked Osborne.

“Ta da!” The figure, humongous in its gray-green parka, swung around and nearly decked Bruce with a set of fat frozen walleyes. Five luscious fish hung from the stringer that Ray held stretched tight, their bronze bodies glistening in the warm light.

“H-o-o-ly cow,” said Bruce in awe.

Osborne gave a soft whistle. “Beauties … what—five, six pounds each?”

“Limit is three,” said Lew. “What’s the excuse this time, Ray?”

“I got two of Clyde’s here. He needs me to clean ‘em.”

“Clyde? Clyde Schmyde,” said Lew. “And if I buy that, what else will you sell me?” She sighed and shook her head. “But I’m not the game warden, and as long as you let me use that portable fishing shack of yours—you’re off the hook this time.”

“Chief, I’m serious. You know old Clyde—Clyde the Wolf Man? The one who made me this parka? Man
loves
to fish hard water, and does he know the Pelican. We drilled our holes along one edge of this sandbar, y’know? But you gotta know exactly
which
edge—”

“Ray, can you tell us about it later? I’d like you to meet Bruce Peters—he’s new with the Wausau boys.” Lew stepped back as Bruce waved two fingers. He couldn’t shake Ray’s hand, or the fish would fall on the floor.

“O-o-h,” said Ray. eyes widening. “Problems, huh.”

“Yep,” said Lew, giving him a hasty rundown as the walleyes dripped onto Osborne’s floor. “… That’s why I need to borrow your fishing shanty—we’ve got a third victim down on the lake that we can’t move ‘till morning, and I’ve got Terry guarding the scene until Bruce here can work the site after daylight. Too dark to do a thing right now and way too cold.”

“Sure, I got just what you need, Chief. Let me warm up a little, and we’ll get everybody all set.” Ray started to back out the door, then stopped to raise his stringer one more time. “Aren’t they gorgeous?”

“Jeez Louise, Ray, shut the door,” said Osborne. “The temperature in here has dropped forty degrees.”

“Okay, okay—but pretty incredible, huh?” Ray looked around the room as if expecting unending rounds of applause. The looks that greeted him were not happy.

Osborne resisted the urge to boost his neighbor along as he budged his way back out to the porch and through the back door to lay his prizes in the snowbank, arranging each with care. “What a night. Doc, what a night.”

“You can say that again,” said Osborne.

Back in the kitchen, Ray closed the kitchen door behind him, then pushed off his hood. An old leather aviator cap rested on his head, the furred flaps pulled down over his ears. Perched on top and somewhat crumpled from having been stuffed into the hood was a fourteen-inch stuffed brook trout. Draped across the breast of the fish was an old wood and metal lure—the metal sparkling like a Christmas ornament. In fact, it was a Christmas ornament. Ray had rigged up a tiny battery and thrust a miniature flashing light through the lure.

“In case you hadn’t noticed,” said Lew to Bruce without cracking a smile, “the man’s an expert at making an entrance.”

“And ice fishing!” Ray raised a grimy index finger, then lifted his trout hat with both hands, flicked off the battery and placed the hat carefully on the kitchen counter next to the coffeepot. Head down, he raked his fingers through the curls matted down over his forehead. Only then did he extricate himself from the heavy parka.

“How many years have you been wearing that thing?” asked Lew.

A whiff of wood smoke and sweat hit Osborne in the face as Ray plopped his coat in the corner behind Bruce. The interior was as grimy as the exterior.

The look on Bruce’s face as he moved his chair away made it obvious he thought Ray might
live
in the garment.

“This?” Ray looked down at the parka, puzzling. “Well … Old Clyde sold it to me back in my early twenties. I guess maybe … fourteen years.”

“Ever had it cleaned?” Lew was relentless.

“Now why would I do that?” The face that asked the question was ruddy with windburn, the eyes teasing. In his red and black plaid flannel shirt, black turtleneck, and heavy dark brown Filson wool pants, Ray looked the quintessential woodsman—hearty, happy, and healthy. Yep, thought Osborne, if ever a man had a heart that could warm a room—it was wild and crazy Ray.

Lew lifted an eyebrow towards the young forensic specialist who had an amused look on his face. “Never trust a man with a fish on his head, Bruce—or as we say in the department when we discuss friend Ray here: ‘Misdemeanors today, felonies tomorrow.’”

Ray, pleased with all the attention, sat down to pull off a pair of ancient Sorel boots. He stretched out his long legs and wiggled his toes in their heavy socks. Everyone waited. Lew and Osborne knew from experience that the man could not be hurried, particularly not when he had something you needed.

“Spoil sport,” he grinned at Lew as he bent forward to extend a hand to Bruce Peters. “Pleased to meet you.” Ray flashed Bruce a generous grin. Too generous. Osborne did not like what he saw.

“C’mon, Ray, cut the razzbonya behavior.” Lew looked away in disgust.

“Sorry, couldn’t resist.” Ray walked over to Osborne’s sink, reached to pull a coffee cup from the rack by Osborne’s old Mirro coffeepot and, leaning forward, spit half a dozen white worms into the cup.

Bruce was intrigued. “What’s the deal? I see plenty worms in my line of work, but you got me on this one.”

“Waxies,” said Ray, shoving the cup at Bruce who backed away. “I keep ‘em in my cheek so they don’t freeze. Walleyes been hitting on these like crazy—you ice fish?”

“Nope,” said Bruce.

“Good, I’ll get you out there.”

“No, you won’t, Ray—the man’s got a big job ahead. The fishing will just have to wait, I’m afraid.” Lew thrust her hands into the pockets of her unzipped parka. “As soon as you’re warmed up there, let’s get that shack of yours down to Terry.”

“Man,
that guy is hard to work with,” said Terry Donovan, shaking his head as Lew, with Osborne and Bruce close behind, hurried towards him across Kobernot’s dock.

“I told him to wait for me,” said Lew.

“Well, he just drove off, Chief. And I had to force him to shoot the site like you wanted, too. He took plenty of photos of the victim, but try to get him to do any more than that—I practically had to sit on the guy.”

“But he got good body shots?”

“I think so. He brushed all the snow away. You should take a look, Chief. That girl is well endowed. Very well endowed. Pecore said it’s all her, too.”

“He would know,” said Lew.

“Our coroner can be unique in his approach,” said Osborne in answer to a quizzical look from Bruce.

“‘Inept’ is the word, not ‘unique’,” said Lew.

“Ah,” said Bruce, “I’ve heard about him from my colleagues—”

“Yeah? Well, you’ve got a few jabones down there, too,” said Lew. Bruce’s eyes widened, but he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut.

Pecore got no respect from Lewellyn Ferris. He was sloppy and lazy, and she despised him for it. More than once the chain of custody on a key piece of evidence was aborted, effectively destroying the department’s case against a perpetrator, because of his poor record keeping. Worse than that was Pecore’s habit of letting his two golden retreivers accompany him into the autopsy room. More than one Loon Lake resident whose dearly deceased required a postmortem exam made sure to accompany the body just to prevent any unwelcome canine interest.

But the position of coroner in Loon Lake was a political appointment—something about which Lew could do nothing except complain. Pecore had been coroner for twenty-seven years, and he had no intention of giving up until he qualified for his pension, and that was three long years away. Until then, Lew could grouse all she wanted: Pecore and his dogs were nonnegotiable.

Lew walked over to the flat white tent that cocooned the victim. She unzipped it and knelt down. Their interest piqued, Osborne and Bruce edged over. Terry was right. With the snow swept away to expose the entire length and breadth of the victim’s nude body, the effect was startling.

“Still no sign of blood or a wound,” said Lew.

“Her head is tucked down so tight, she looks like she fell asleep reading,” said Osborne.

“Yeah, Pecore tried tipping the head back, but she’s froze solid,” said Terry. “He said he couldn’t tell anything about cause of death until they thaw her out.”

“Doc,” said Lew, straightening up slowly, “you know what I’m thinking?”

“I know exactly what you’re thinking. I’d have Ray take a look. He’s familiar with that crowd.”

The four of them huddled on the ice below Kobernot’s dock to wait for Ray, their backs to the wind off the lake. Osborne brushed at his cheeks with his leather mitts. They were numb. Not even the glow of the full moon helped.

“This wind has to be blowing fifteen to twenty,” he said to no one in particular as he hunched deeper into his parka, pulling the collar up to close the gap near the ear flaps on his racoon hat. “I’ll bet the wind chill is twenty below right now.”

“Feels like a hundred goddam below to me,” said Terry, stomping and slapping at his upper arms with his gloved hands. “Chief, I hope you told Pradt to hurry.”

Lew snorted. “We did our best. He’ll be here in a minute with a setup that’ll keep you warm, I promise.”

“Let’s hope he didn’t get a phone call,” said Osborne.

“O-o-h, Doc, don’t say that,” said Lew with a shiver.

“Speaking of phone calls, I called my wife, and she’s bringing me some sheepskin mitts and a down comforter,” said Terry. As he spoke, the wind gave a long howl through the tops of the pines guarding the shore, and Terry burrowed his chin deeper into the collar of his jacket. “I told her where I keep the will in case I freeze to death.”

Lew gave him a sympathetic pat with her mitt. “Terry, it’s a tough job, and you’re low man on the totem pole. Sorry about that—but you’re doing great.”

Osborne looked around as they waited. The young deputy had been busy over the last hour. Lanterns were lit around the rink and five hundred feet out onto the lake, lighting the way so snowmobilers had plenty of time to stop before reaching the wooden barricades that closed the trail. A detour routed them around the site.

The tent covering the victim was anchored with spikes driven into the ice, and sand-filled pails rested on the spikes. Police tape cordoned off the entire area, including the dock and stairway up to the Kobernot home as well as around the utility shed where the ATV was parked.

“Pradt’s got something in that old heap of his that’s going to keep me warm?” Doubt crowded Terry’s voice at the sight of Ray’s battered blue pickup rocketing towards them across the ice. And rightly so. The only feature of recent vintage and in decent shape on the truck appeared to be the eighteen-inch walleye leaping off the hood, its rainbow hues flashing in the moonlight.

“Patience,” said Osborne. “He’s letting us borrow a prized possession, so be careful what you say.”

Fifteen minutes later and just short a pair of flannel pj’s, Ray had Terry all cozied up for the long winter’s night. The portable ice shanty was a bastardized Alaskan Guide tent jerry-rigged into a vertical shape and sporting foldout walls that could expand to accommodate as many as four fishermen. The whole thing unfolded from an eight-by- four-foot locker that fit flat in the bed of his truck along with a portable generator and two metal boxes.

“Welcome to my chamber of delight, folks,” said Ray, holding the entry flap aside. “As you enter, you will note the state-of-the-art oxford nylon walls featuring 1500 mm-rated polyurethane coating
and
…” he paused for dramatic effect, “an extra-thick floor.” They all crowded in, and Ray zipped the flap shut.

“Now … over in this corner, boys and girls, we have a top-of-the-line Mr. Heater with two—not one but
two,
doncha know—propane gas cylinders guaranteed to keep you warmer than the arms of Patrice Kobernot.”

“S-s-s-h! Voice down, Ray,” said Lew.

“And … in that corner a small cook stove. Terry, note the coffee ready for brewing?” Two fold-up canvas chairs and an inflating air mattress completed the decor.

“Ready to party, man,” said Terry, still a little uncertain.

“Now …” Ray raised both hands, index fingers pointing parallel, “the views … every angle has a view.” He was right. Clear plastic windows ran along the walls, cut in and duct taped at a level that allowed anyone inside to see out easily no matter where they might be sitting. Terry could be warm and toasty near the Mr. Heater, yet able to view the entire cordoned-off area outside with only a minor adjustment of his chair.

“Ah, twelve windows,” said Lew, acting innocent. “One for each tip-up?”

“Could be, though I’m a jiggerman myself, no tip-ups this winter,” said Ray, dodging the trap. “Never more than what I am entitled to by law, Chief.”

“Of course, any extras are for Clyde …”

Long the traditional way to ice fish, the tip-up is a wooden platform rigged with fishing line, a spring, and a red flag. The ice fisherman slips a live minnow on the hook, drops it into the water through a hole cut in the ice, then retires to a nearby fishing shack or a bonfire to wait and watch until the red flag pops up to signal a fresh- caught meal. Easy—but not what a jiggerman does.

A jiggerman fishes hard water the hard way, hovering over his hole, a short fishing rod in hand, which has been armed with an over-accessorized fishhook known as a “jig.” Nominally, a jig is a fishhook with a lump of lead on it, but times have changed. Today’s jig is likely to be artificially enhanced with colorful plastic “bodies,” simulated fish eyes, or live wiggling worms.

And unlike the hook dangling at the end of the tip-up, the jig won’t be static but constantly “jigged” by the attentive fisherman.

“How much does something like this cost?” asked Bruce, checking out the interior of Ray’s ice shanty.

The star of the show grinned and twirled once around, arms open and the fish on his head just clearing a crosshatch of aluminum poles overhead. “You’re looking at 227 graves, my friend—with and without a backhoe.”

Bruce looked confused.

“Ray supplements his income through the summer digging graves for Loon Lake’s Catholic cemetery,” said Osborne.

“Thirty-five bucks a grave,” said Ray with pride.

“Oh … but not now, not when it’s this cold,” said Bruce.

“No-o-o, business slows down just as the lakes freeze, thank the Lord,” said Ray.

“So what do you do then?”

“We keep ‘em on ice—I help with the storage some.”

“Enterprising sort, this guy,” said Lew, shaking her head towards Ray. “Master of the easy buck.” With Terry’s situation under control, she had relaxed. “I’m ready to head out—Terry, you got any questions?”

“Didn’t you want Ray to view the victim, Chief?”

“Oh right, I almost forgot. I think I’m tired. Ray, would you mind?” She glanced over at Terry, “Incidentally, what about Pecore—did he recognize her?”

Terry shook his head, “Not that he mentioned.”

“If you need me to, I’ll take a look,” said Ray. He unzipped the entry flap and waited for Lew to lead the way out, his eyes serious.

Osborne and Bruce stood to the side as Lew unzipped the white plastic cover. The full moon threw shadows across its still and frozen occupant. As Ray knelt, he removed his hat.

Lew handed him her flashlight. The wind had died and the ancient white pines along the shore loomed somber and still. The ice took over, booming a dirge across the hard water.

Ray sat back on his heels. “I know this girl … she had a smile that could give you hope in February.”