Paddy Plays in Dead Mule Swamp (20 page)

“I’ve been all around your house, and
partway down the trail into the swamp. There doesn’t seem to be
anyone around now. No one has tried to approach the grave site
either. We’ve kept in touch with the deputy out there.”

“Thank you for looking. It wasn’t
really very frightening. I mean, whoever it was didn’t seem to want
to threaten me, but so many strange things have happened here this
week, I thought I should report it.”

“Exactly. Things seem calm enough.
I’ll leave now, but I’m going to be driving this road occasionally
the rest of the night, so don’t be alarmed if you hear me go by.”
He handed me a card. “And if you see anything else tonight, call
this number directly. It’s my cell. I’ll be within three miles of
you until daylight.”

“I’m really all right. Sorry to make
you come on duty.” I knew that in Forest County there weren’t a lot
of extra law enforcement people.

“Not a problem, Ms. Raven. We’d like
to solve this one soon. Old murders really rankle.”

Chapter 29

After the detective left, my stomach
started rumbling loud enough to rival Paddy’s growls. I was
ravenous; I hadn’t eaten since noon. There wasn’t much in the
refrigerator, but I opened a can of soup and made a grilled cheese
sandwich, after trimming the mold off the edges of the cheese. I
really needed to buy groceries. Paddy asked to go out, which gave
me a moment’s pause. I had told both officers that I was fine, but
I hadn’t been thinking about going outside myself. However, I
realized if someone was still out there, Paddy would tell me about
it, loudly. However, I decided not to let him loose. I clipped him
on the leash and ventured only a few steps beyond the kitchen
stoop. He was completely unconcerned about the woods or any noises
he might be hearing. That was reassuring.

My stomach wasn’t full yet, and I
rummaged around and found a wrinkled apple in the bottom tub of the
refrigerator. Even better, there was one square of dark chocolate
wrapped in foil. It must have fallen out of the bag I’d finished
off last month. I gave Paddy a couple of extra dog biscuits, then
unwrapped the chocolate, closed my eyes, and let the luscious treat
melt on my tongue. Amazing, how one small piece of chocolate could
calm the nerves.

My arm was sticking to the bandage in
a couple of spots, so I unwound the gauze and was glad to see the
road rash forming dotted lines of scabs the length of my forearm.
None of the wounds had been deep, but they had bled and oozed,
making it too messy to leave uncovered. I’m a great believer in
fresh air to promote healing, so I chose to cover only the few
spots that were still open with non-stick pads and gauze. I
switched to a short-sleeved t-shirt, got a clean pillowcase from
the bathroom shelves, laid it across the top of my blanket, and
crawled back in bed. Resting my arm on the cool, clean, smooth
fabric, I opened my book.

I thought I had slept enough for the
night, even though it was only three in the morning. However, after
a couple of chapters, my eyelids were heavy. I turned out the light
and fell asleep again.

When I awoke, it was late morning, too
late to get cleaned up and make it to church. I was feeling a lot
better though, and I dressed in jeans and a fresh t-shirt. The
scabs on my arm were now quite dry, and I expected the two areas
that were still covered wouldn’t need bandages very much longer.
Except that the skin felt tight, it didn’t really hurt, and there
was no sign of infection.

It seemed like a good day to mow the
lawn and accomplish some other chores. Eating without buying food
was going to be a challenge, but I wanted to support Adele and shop
at Volger’s Grocery, which wasn’t open on Sundays. There was always
peanut butter, and I still had eggs and bread. There was a jar of
pickle relish and some mustard, but I’d need mayo to make egg
salad. If I felt motivated, I could run over to Fairgrove Road and
buy some vegetables at Bidwell’s roadside stand. However, the truth
was, I’d had enough adventures and people for a while, and I just
wanted to spend the day alone. I almost succeeded, until Adele
called.

I’d mowed the lawn and gone in the
kitchen to get some iced tea when the phone rang. I thought about
ignoring it, but old training made me pick it up.

“We missed you in church today,” Adele
began with no introduction. I didn’t mind. I’d gotten used to
Adele; I even liked her. She made sure she knew everything that was
happening in Cherry Hill, but her heart was pure gold, and she was
always ready to help people.

“I know. I overslept.”

“I can understand that. I thought you
might not be feeling well, or that something else might have
happened out there.”

I suspected Adele already knew about
my shadowy visitor, so there was no point in trying to keep that a
secret. “There was someone prowling around in the trees in the
middle of the night, and Paul Peters came out, but the person had
already left.”

“Could you tell who it
was?”

“Not at all. It was a really dark
night.”

“What did they want?”

“How should I know?” Sometimes Adele’s
questions were annoying.

“Well, somebody seems to be afraid of
you.”

“How do you figure that?”

“They ran away from you the other
night, and now they’re watching you. Maybe you were supposed to see
the intruder last night. Maybe it’s like a warning for you to stay
away.”

One thing Adele didn’t know about was
that I had been crowded off the road by a truck. I hadn’t thought
of that incident as part of a plan to intimidate me. But that was a
ridiculous idea. How would anyone have known I was going to be
walking along that back road? I hadn’t even known it myself until
just before I’d left the house, and I hadn’t told anyone where I
was going.

“Ana, are you still there?” Adele
pulled me back to the conversation.

“I’m here. Sorry. Stay away from what?
I don’t know any more about this case than you do.”

“You must,” she insisted. “Actually
there’s one thing you don’t know yet. That’s why I
called.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m so glad you told me about those
footprints, otherwise I wouldn’t have understood the information on
the scanner. They weren’t discussing details. Anyway, everyone has
been working on this, Tracy and the Sheriff’s Department. They even
got the State crime lab involved.”

“What did they do?”

“That tread pattern must have been
pretty unusual.”

“I thought it was. I’d never seen
anything like it, but styles change all the time.”

“Apparently they identified the shoe
type and size on Friday morning. Those are $500 shoes!”

“Who around here buys shoes like
that?”

“Exactly. They’ve been trying to match
them ever since. They’re so expensive it’s unlikely someone walked
around in them and then discarded them, or bought them just to make
tracks as some sort of fake lead.”

“Do they know whose they are? It seems
as if they’d pull that person in, at least as a material witness,
if they found the shoes.”

“I know it! Nothing like that seems to
have happened, though. But I know a few people they checked
on.”

“Who?”

“Frank Garis, for one.”

“His name keeps coming up, doesn’t
it?”

“It does, and I’m not sure why, except
that Ralph has been shooting his mouth off a lot. Maybe Frank and
DuWayne did more than play football together, even if no one saw
him hanging out with the drug crowd.”

“Anybody else?”

“I think they got the Illinois State
Police to look for DuWayne and check his shoes. There were
conversations about Chicago, and there’s no one else involved in
this case who lives there.”

“What did they find?”

“No matches were reported on the
scanner. I’m not sure they even found DuWayne. Right now, they
sound really frustrated whenever the topic comes up. They don’t
know who else to check, unless they start trying to match any
people who happen to be Angelica’s age.”

“They’ll never get warrants for
connections that thin, will they?”

“Probably not, but I think they’re
getting desperate.”

“What about Pablo Ybarra? His sister
told me he lives in Emily City.” I remembered Juanita reminding me
of this when she had stopped to help me. What was she doing on that
back road? I thought she had said something about Mulberry Hill,
but I couldn’t remember her exact words.

“I wonder if they can get a warrant on
someone just for being DuWayne’s friend. I haven’t heard them
mention Pablo. There’s always Larry Louama. No one knows where he’s
living.”

“Adele! How do you find out these
things?”

“I talked with his mother in the store
yesterday. He hasn’t been home, but they’ve already been calling
her because he hasn’t checked in with his parole officer either.
She’s really tired of having her life disrupted because of the
shenanigans that boy pulls. She and Marko are fine people. Larry
just went off the rails somewhere.”

“He’s probably not anywhere around
here. He knows they’d look for him near his old home.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“Adele, I need to go. I’ve got to
figure out something to eat.”

“Is that difficult?”

“Well, I don’t have much in the house.
I might need to run over to Bidwell’s for some veggies.”

“Do you want company for a while? I
could bring the food. You’ve got a grill don’t you?”

I thought of the small tabletop one
I’d purchased in May. “I have that little one I bought from you.
And charcoal.”

“That will be perfect. You get some
coals going. Leave everything else to me.”

What could I say? Adele was generous,
but slightly lonely since her husband had died the previous year. I
decided that spending the rest of the day with her could be
fun.

“All right,” I conceded with a laugh.
“Come on out.”

After we ate our fill of kielbasa in
buns, broccoli salad, and ice cream, the rest of the day was spent
in light pursuits. We chatted about things as insignificant as the
colors of my walls or as important as Star and Sunny, and played
“knick-knack-Paddy-WHACK” with Paddy. Adele wasn’t much of a
walker, but we strolled some distance out and back on my trail at a
leisurely pace. The only thing that kept us in mind of the unsolved
murder was the Sheriff’s car parked in my driveway. The shift of
watchers changed once during the afternoon. A cruiser pulled in the
driveway; a deputy emerged, nodded to us and walked toward the
grave site. In a few minutes, the one who had been on duty
appeared, jockeyed the cars around so as not to block my access to
the driveway, and drove away. We were so used to it, Paddy didn’t
even wake up from his nap.

Chapter 30

One thing Adele and I did accomplish
was to make some decisions about my painting project. We decided
the screen porch should be teal and white, with bamboo flooring,
and white wicker furniture, when I could afford it. That gave me
something positive to work on, so first thing Monday morning I
drove to Jouppi’s for paint. While I was in town I stopped at
Volger’s for groceries, making sure I stocked up on enough food to
last for at least a week.

Justin was in the office, tapping away
on a computer keyboard, and Adele was working the checkout lane.
When I reached her with my full cart, she said, “I’ve been thinking
about the person who left the footprints.”

“Did you figure something out?” I
asked. It seemed as though we’d worried this topic like a weathered
bone.

“He—I heard the prints were size
twelve so let’s assume it’s a man—had to have known where the body
was.”

“Right. The police figured that out
immediately. They hadn’t released the location.”

“So, he was involved in the death
somehow.”

“Yes, nothing new there.”

“But what did he want? There must have
been something with or near the body he was looking for,” Adele
insisted.

“Maybe. He’d have to believe that the
police hadn’t found it, whatever it was. Could there have been a
clue that would incriminate him?”

“That makes some sense. But it would
have to be something that wouldn’t rot. Even her clothes were gone.
I could see that much. So, it can’t be paper or something
organic.”

“Could be jewelry—maybe he lost a ring
while burying her.”

“That’s an idea.”

My groceries were rung up, and I had
bagged them as we talked. “I’ll keep thinking about it, but I’m off
to do some painting now.”

“Keep in touch,” Adele said. Her eyes
were darkly inquisitive, like those of a predatory bird.

After one more stop, to buy cucumbers,
green beans and summer squash at Bidwell’s, I was glad to be done
with the errands. Paddy was outside on his lead line, the food was
put away, and I was ready to paint, which is how I spent the middle
portion of the day.