Paddy Plays in Dead Mule Swamp (14 page)

When the dishes were done, I saw Adele
deep in conversation with a large young man, and an older man who
was nearly bald, neither of whom I recognized. I’d met enough new
people for one day, and scooted for my car while I had the
chance.

Paddy was more than happy to see me
when I arrived home. He hadn’t spent such a long time in his kennel
since he’d come to stay with me.

“How about a walk?” I asked him. “I
need some exercise too.” I changed clothes and got us each a fresh
drink of water.

Now that I knew about the former cabin
on my property I was really curious. I wondered if it might be
possible to put a canoe in the river there and paddle up to the
dam. The water wasn’t fast-moving at this time of year, and the
ruined rowboat seemed to indicate that some previous owner might
have visited the island.

Paddy ran free, although I took his
leash along, just in case we encountered a porcupine or something.
We followed the route Sunny had led us on before: take the deer
path to a large cedar, jog to the white birch and then head
straight east to the water.

However, when we got to the white
birch, I felt drawn, instead, to the northeast, toward Angelica’s
grave site. I hadn’t been there since the body had been discovered.
The police seemed to be finished; my driveway provided the closest
vehicle access, and I hadn’t seen an official car since Tuesday. It
was no trouble at all finding the way. The ground was softer here,
and so many officers and technicians had been back here since
Saturday that a path was well trampled.

Nearing the water, I knew I was
getting close because the yellow crime-scene tape was strung
through the trees. I was surprised to see it still in place,
feeling pretty sure that there was no one assigned to guard the
site.

A light wind lifted the leaves, and on
the breeze came the smell of fresh cigarette smoke. Maybe I was
mistaken.

“Hello,” I called. “Anastasia Raven
here. Who’s on duty?” I reached down and grabbed Paddy’s collar,
and clipped him to the leash. If the site was being protected, I
knew they didn’t want a dog disturbing things. Fastening the dog
only took a couple of seconds, but I was surprised when no one
answered.

“Hello!” I tried again, louder this
time. I was also closer by now. Surely the officer had heard me.
But the only sounds were the rustling of leaves and a slight
gurgling from where the river bent and water slapped against a
fallen log.

I reached the grave site. The smell of
burning tobacco was strong here, but there was no one in sight. It
looked to me as if the police were finished, since the grave had
been filled in, leaving a large area of raw dirt but no gaping
hole. Oddly, there were footprints all over the bare area. It took
me a couple of seconds to react to the fact that the prints had
been made by someone wearing high-tech athletic shoes with swirling
patterns and a nipped waist between the ball and heel, and were not
the marks of the dress shoes or work boots the official visitors
wore. The impressions were also very fresh. Suddenly, the quiet in
the woods seemed unfriendly. No birds flitted from branch to
branch, and just then a small cloud moved across the sun, deadening
the sunny day. I shivered involuntarily.

I tried to sort out the tracks. I
hadn’t seen any with this distinctive pattern on the well-used path
I’d taken to this location. Then I realized they both came from and
led toward the water. A blue jay screeched in anger from a distance
upstream and Paddy began barking frantically and tugging against
the leash.

“Who’s there?” I yelled, but I doubted
I could be heard over the din the dog was making. “You’re on
private property.” I was pretty sure whoever it was had crossed
over the boundary line to my land by that time. I released the dog.
“Go get him, Paddy,” I said.

This wasn’t a command we’d worked on,
but I was sure it was what Paddy had in mind anyway. He ran along
the water’s edge, and I followed as fast as I could. A partial shoe
track showed occasionally in areas that weren’t overgrown with
grass. I passed a half-smoked cigarette that had fallen to the
ground, and paused a moment. I wanted to pick it up, but realized
just in time that it might be of interest to the police. Whoever
was in the woods didn’t seem to want to be identified. I compressed
the burning end with a small stone to put it out, left it in the
mud and jogged on. Paddy was barking furiously, as if he’d cornered
something. He was no longer moving away from me.

I rounded a bend and broke into the
clearing where the cabin had once stood. Paddy was there, with his
front feet in the water, gazing at the small island in the river.
The running-shoe tracks were all over the bank here, and I also saw
a straight drag mark in the sandy mud that looked as if someone had
pulled a small boat up on the bank, and then hurriedly pushed off
again.

“OK, you can stop now,” I told Paddy.
“They’re gone.” He directed one last resentful yelp toward the
island and came to me. I patted him on the head and scratched his
ears. “You tried your best, but maybe it’s just as well we didn’t
catch him. Or her. I think we should go call Detective
Milford.”

We hurried home, jogging part of the
way, since a look at my watch told me I’d have to hurry to catch
Detective Milford at the station. Actually, I had no idea if he
worked regular hours or not, but it was worth a try.

Back at the house I called the
Sheriff’s Office. When a woman answered, I asked for Detective
Milford. She told me to hold, but I guessed she only covered the
receiver since I heard a muffled shout, “Dennis, wait up, it’s for
you.”

While I waited, I absently studied the
information I’d posted beside the phone in May, when I learned I
was outside the jurisdiction of Cherry Hill. The Cherry Hill Police
number was easy to remember. It was just the local exchange with
4-4-5-5 (H-I-L-L) at the end. The county number wasn’t memorable at
all; I’d had to read it off the card.

“Milford here,” came his familiar
gruff voice a moment later.

“It’s Ana Raven. I’m not sure if this
is important or not, but someone’s been out at Angelica’s grave
site.”

“What makes you think so?”

A trace of annoyance flickered through
my mind. He made it sound as if I were too stupid to know anything,
but I realized he only wanted details. “I walked out there after
the service today. Someone was smoking, and when I called to him,
he ran off. Paddy chased whoever it was, but it looks as if he left
by canoe from the spot where we found the old rowboat.”

“You saw a man?”

“No, I never actually saw the person.
But there are tracks all over that look like they were made by
expensive running shoes. They seem large for a woman, but it could
be.”

“You saw the boat?”

“No, just the drag mark on the bank.”
I admitted. “I really didn’t see much at all. It could just be
someone who’s curious, but I thought you should know.”

“And you’re correct. Did the tracks go
directly to the grave?”

I felt vindicated. “Yes, there was no
wandering around that I noticed. Oh, they dropped the cigarette
too.”

“Did you pick it up?”

“No, I thought I shouldn’t touch it,
but it was still burning, so I just pressed the hot end into the
mud and left it in place. I didn’t think we needed a forest fire. I
can find it again.”

“Good.” He sighed. “Stay home and wait
for me. I’ll be there as soon as I can scare up a tech.”

I made some iced tea, and sat on the
terrace to await the detective’s arrival, with Paddy dozing at my
feet. About forty minutes later, Detective Milford and a young man
I’d seen the previous weekend, but never met, stepped out of a
county car. The technician was carrying a duffel bag, and was
introduced to me as Cameron Slater.

“Leave the dog home,” Milford
ordered.

I didn’t argue, but took Paddy inside
and shut him in his kennel. “Sorry, boy,” I said. “The detective
isn’t a dog lover.”

The three of us hiked back to the
river once again. I pointed out the lack of unusual tracks on the
path we followed, and then how they appeared and covered the bare
dirt at the roped-off area. Milford grunted, and the technician
went to work, pulling out equipment to take casts.

“Where’s that cigarette?” Milford
asked.

“This way,” I said, and pointed
upstream along the river bank. I found the butt with no problem. It
was lying in the mud, and didn’t seem to have been disturbed since
I had put it out. The detective pulled out a small camera, snapped
several photos, and scooped the cigarette up in an evidence
bag.

“And the tracks go on farther? Your
prints seem to cover some from the running shoes.”

“To the old cabin site.” We continued
upstream and I was careful to stay behind Detective Milford, rather
than chance being reprimanded for destroying any additional tracks.
At the clearing, he took more pictures, long shots, and close-ups
of the drag marks and jumbled footprints. He didn’t speak, and I
kept quiet as well, following his lead. Slater arrived in the
clearing a few minutes later.

“All set?” Milford asked.

“Yes, sir. I got pictures, clear
impressions, and looked around. Someone had been poking around
under several trees. Leaves were disturbed, but no serious
digging.”

“You’ll need to stay here until a
deputy arrives,” he told Slater.

“Yes, sir.” The young man seemed as
intimidated by Milford as I did, and he glanced around nervously. I
suspected staying in the woods alone wasn’t high on his list of
favorite activities.

“Ms. Raven and I are going back to her
house. You’ll be relieved by a deputy who’s scheduled for duty
tonight. Go back to the grave.” He then turned to me and pointed
toward the white birch. I realized he was even more familiar with
this terrain than I was. He’d probably been over it many times in
the past week.

When we reached the house, he first
spent some time on the car radio, while I waited on the terrace.
Finally, he unfolded his meaty frame from the car and approached
me.

“You did the right thing to call.
We’ll have someone here to watch soon. That was no casual
sightseer. We haven’t given out the exact location of the grave.
Did you tell anyone?”

“No, of course not. You told me not to
on Saturday.”

“And don’t be surprised to hear a
motorboat. We need to check out that island.”

“I’ll appreciate knowing no one is
hiding there.”

“Why didn’t you call me right away,
this afternoon?”

“What? I did.”

“You called me from your
house.”

“Where else would I call
from?”

“You don’t have a cell
phone?”

“No, I’ve thought about getting one,
but haven’t yet.”

“Do it. Tomorrow. And keep it with
you. This is a murder case, and someone who knows more about it
thinks you saw them.”

Chapter 22

I hoped the Sheriff’s car in the
driveway would deter anyone from coming to the house, and with a
motorboat being dispatched, access from the water was being
watched. I felt slightly apprehensive, but with Paddy at the foot
of my bed I managed to fall asleep not long after it got
dark.

Adele phoned me while I was eating
breakfast. She was calling a meeting of the committee which had
oversight of the Family Friends program. She said most everyone
else was able to attend, even with the short notice. After I told
her about the events of Wednesday evening, I assured her I’d also
be at the church at ten o’clock. I asked if I could bring Paddy,
and she thought that would be fine.

While I finished my coffee, I tried to
focus my thoughts on the committee’s tasks. With all the disturbing
events of the past week, it was a challenge to think about
day-to-day needs of the Leonard family. My mind kept veering off to
images of DuWayne chatting with his friends rather than his family,
or the deer-in-the-headlights look Sunny had developed. However, I
knew we, as a group, needed to find some ways to help Len and the
girls get back to normal life as quickly as possible.

Adele was waiting at the fellowship
hall when I arrived. She had a large notebook open in front of her
on a long table. Another woman, Geraldine Longcore, was filling a
carafe from the coffeemaker at a side table. A plate of donuts,
some with chocolate and some with pink icing, had been placed on
the conference table already, with sugar and creamer packets.
Geraldine brought over the carafe, cups, and napkins. I very much
wanted to talk with the fourth member of our committee, John Aho,
who had been assaulted by DuWayne’s friend Larry. I hoped he’d be
there, but I knew he only made it to daytime meetings when he felt
things were under control at the service station.

As I was bent over looping Paddy’s
leash around a table leg, I saw a man’s feet enter the room, but
when I straightened up, it was not John, but rather the bald man
Adele had been visiting with the day before. Paddy lay down
quietly; he was really getting used to being good
indoors.