The Real MacAw (14 page)

“I told her the funeral can’t be for a few days, but she keeps saying we need to settle what they’re going to put him in for the services.”

“You know Maudie,” I said. “Only woman in town who finishes her Christmas shopping by Valentine’s Day.”

“I think she wraps it up by Twelfth Night,” Clarence said. “So I went over this morning after the chief released the house and took Maudie some of Parker’s clothes, but she says they won’t do and she wants something else.”

“What did you take?” I asked.

“Some new jeans, and a nice Hawaiian shirt,” he said.

“I can see Maudie’s point,” I said. “You can’t have Parker wearing a Hawaiian shirt and blue jeans to his own funeral.”

“I don’t see why not,” Clarence said. “I can’t remember Parker wearing anything else the whole time I knew him.”

“Not suitable,” I said. Perhaps I should bring up the closed-casket idea. Although that probably wouldn’t placate Maudie, who fretted horribly if she had to send any of her customers to their reward in less than perfect fashion.

“I picked the most somber Hawaiian shirt in his closet,” Clarence said. “Black and white flowers. And black jeans.”

I shook my head and frowned at him. I was struggling not to laugh, imagining how Maudie Morton had reacted at being handed a Hawaiian shirt and a pair of jeans to put on one of her charges.

“It’s just not done,” I said.

“So Maudie tells me,” Clarence said, with a sigh. “Which means someone has to drop everything to go over there and get a suit, if he has one. Or figure out what size he wears so we can borrow one.”

“Borrow?” I said. “You think he’s coming back to return it?”

“Buy, then,” Clarence said. “Anyway, it looks as if I’m the one who has to take care of all that. So could you make sure the beagle puppies get their next feeding? And I need for you to pill a couple of the cats. And—”

“You take care of the animals.” I held out my hand. “Give me the key and I’ll work on Parker’s funeral clothes.”

“Are you sure?” He sounded uncertain, but I saw he was already fumbling in his pockets, presumably for Parker’s key.

“Do you really want to face Maudie if you show up with another unsuitable outfit?” I countered. “I probably have a lot better chance of picking out something she’ll approve of.”

“Thanks.” He plucked out an enormous key ring, fumbled with it for a few seconds, and then began sliding one key off.

Interesting. Clarence was Parker’s executor, and had a key to his house, and yet he didn’t exactly seem heartbroken over his friend’s murder. Did that make him a more plausible suspect?

Not to me. And not to anyone who really knew Clarence.

Except, perhaps, the chief. After all, in his years of police work, he’d probably seen more than one friendship that had soured into homicide.

Perhaps that was the reason for the curious formality with which the chief treated everyone when he was in the midst of an investigation. Perhaps it was his way of reminding everyone—including himself—that we were, for the time being, not his friends and neighbors but so many witness and suspects.

Sad that anyone ever had to do that. Sad, but necessary.

I shoved these thoughts aside and took the key from Clarence.

“Back soon,” I said.

But as I turned to go I realized I was about to do something sneaky, and maybe I didn’t have to.

“I gather you and Parker were good friends?” I leaned against the barn door as casually as I could.

“You mean, because he made me executor?” Clarence said. “Surprised me when he asked. We mostly knew each other from our animal welfare work. Of course, once he asked, I realized I probably knew him better than anyone else in town.”

“So you didn’t know what else he was interested in?”

“Animal welfare, and his store and … well, his social life was pretty active.” Clarence was blushing slightly. And he was no prude, which meant Parker’s social life really must have been very active indeed.

“Randall seems to think Parker was investigating some kind of Pruitt sneakiness related to the town beautification project,” I said.

“Randall does have a bit of a bee in his bonnet about the Pruitts,” Clarence said.

“This time he might be onto something,” I said. “Apparently the mayor talked the county into backing a loan for the beautification project. And the payments on that loan are what’s behind the whole county budget crisis.”

“That’s … ridiculous,” he said.

“You think Randall’s got it wrong?” I asked.

“No,” Clarence said. The puppy finished with the bottle, and Clarence cradled it to him as if it needed protection from something. “Randall’s probably right. To think that they were about to kill this little guy and his brothers and sisters, just to pay for a bunch of stupid cobblestones and pretentious gas lamps.”

“So while I’m fetching a suit for Parker’s funeral, do you mind if I poke around a bit to see if I can find any evidence of this investigation Randall thinks Parker was conducting?”

“Mind? I think it’s a great idea. Poke all you like; we’ll hold down the fort here.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I’m taking off now.”

I didn’t set off for another hour. First, I made a pit stop, pumped some milk, called Michael to check on the boys, and gathered some snooping equipment. Just because my visit was okay with Clarence didn’t mean the chief would be happy about it. But I figured as long as I took him anything I found, he couldn’t be that mad. And what would be the harm if I took a few photos of anything that might turn out to be useful in fighting the proposed golf course? So, in addition to a tote large enough to hold file folders, I took along my little digital camera and a couple of spare batteries. By a little past noon, I was on my way.

Chapter 12

Parker had lived in Goose Neck, a neighborhood Michael and I had kept a close eye on back when we were house hunting. The houses dated from the twenties and thirties, all relatively small but charming and set far back on fairly large lots full of mature trees and shrubs. They were originally built by people coming off the farm to work at the Pruitt mills and the other businesses in the town, and most of them were still owned by descendents of their original owners. Try as we might over several years, Michael and I never saw a single “for sale” sign in the whole neighborhood, or found even one listing in our Realtor’s database. I finally realized that when people in Goose Neck wanted to sell their houses, they didn’t put up a sign or call a real-estate agent. They put out the word among their family and friends. Mother would approve.

The house was hidden behind towering hedges and shaded by several enormous cherry and oak trees. It was a squat red-brick bungalow, fronted by a small but substantial brick-framed porch. English ivy was making a good try at covering up the house entirely, and the unkempt boxwood and azalea bushes crowding the outside walls probably kept out what little natural light got past the oaks. It looked as if it would be cool and shady in summer and snug enough to be warm in the winter.

And it had an unsettling air of familiarity. I had spent many childhood hours visiting a great-aunt who’d lived in just such a quiet, tree-shaded little brick bungalow back in Yorktown.

Not what I’d expected of Parker at all.

If the similarity to Great Aunt Felicity’s house continued, I’d find that Parker’s house had a cellar reachable only by an outside entrance, and that the dormers I could see peeking through the ivy gave light to a roomy, old-fashioned attic.

The ancient wooden screen door squeaked as I opened it. The porch was as serene a retreat as it looked from the outside, and the old-fashioned metal chairs and glider looked curiously familiar and inviting.

The porch opened into a small living room. To the left, an archway led into a dining room. Straight ahead of me, a hallway led back, no doubt to the bedrooms. Common sense told me I should go straight to the closets to carry out my primary mission.

I decided to check out the rest of the house first.

The uncanny sense of déjà vu continued. The house was furnished entirely in a pre-war style of furniture that probably had a high-falutin’ name when antique shops sold it and decorators like Mother bought it. I just called it comfortable and old-fashioned.

And the more I looked around, the less I believed that Parker had bought any of it. I peeked behind the dining room sideboard to find, as I expected, that the old-fashioned flower-sprigged wallpaper was bright and unfaded behind it, in a shape that precisely matched the shape of the sideboard.

The books in the glass-fronted bookcases were new. One shelf held paperback thrillers, arranged by author, and the rest of the shelves housed a neatly alphabetized collection of books on zoology and ecology. And in spite of the vintage furniture, the general effect of the rooms wasn’t old-fashioned, mainly because there wasn’t a single knickknack or crochet-edged doily in sight.

I’d bet there had been, though. He’d probably inherited this house and moved in without doing any more redecorating than necessary. The knickknacks and doilies had probably gone to Goodwill or to other, more sentimental relatives. Unless Clarence was right and he didn’t have any. I supposed there was an off chance they were boxed up and stored in the attic.

I felt a curious sense of betrayal. I could shrug off the image I’d had of Parker, the cynical womanizer who’d used the glamour of his animal welfare activities to seduce women. But the Parker who lived in this neat, old-fashioned bungalow—a Parker who was either indifferent to his surroundings or cherished a kind of hominess that so closely matched my own? For some reason the idea of that Parker being a sleazy tomcat bothered me.

But time was wasting.

Nothing unusual in the living room. Or in the dining room, except that there was a furniture-sized empty space in front of the sunniest window. Had he sold a piece of furniture or disposed of a large dead houseplant? It would have to have been rather recent. People tended to fill such large, empty spaces rather quickly, either deliberately, with another plant or piece of furniture, or unintentionally, with the kind of clutter we humans seemed to generate just by existing.

Though I had to admit Parker’s house was as devoid of clutter as any I’d ever seen. What did that say about him?

For that matter, what did it say that a man who owned a furniture store lived in a house filled with comfortably run-down vintage furniture?

The kitchen suggested that Parker didn’t cook much, apart from grilling the occasional steak or microwaving frozen meals.

The first of the two bedrooms was set up as a neat, efficient home office. An old oak table served as the desk, with only a small tray of papers and a few accessories on top. The office equipment and several old wooden file cabinets were concealed in the closet. I sat down in a well-maintained vintage wooden swivel chair and browsed in his files. I envied him his orderly, neatly labeled filing system. Business records for the furniture store were separated from personal financial records and from the files on his animal rescue efforts. I felt a sudden surge of hope—maybe these meticulous files contained information on where he was planning to take all the animals. Maybe somewhere out there we’d find people anxiously fretting over Parker’s failure to bring them a much-anticipated macaw, or Irish wolfhound, or even a litter or two of unweaned puppies or kittens.

Yes, here it was: a file marked “Animal Rescue: Caerphilly Shelter,” with Friday’s date printed beneath. It contained a list of the people to whom he was taking the various animals, complete with addresses, e-mails, and cell phones. The list matched the menagerie we had in the barn, more or less. The macaw and the beagle puppies weren’t there—presumably they were relatively new arrivals to the shelter. But at the bottom of the list were the names of the people who’d agreed to take any unallocated animals. One name for the cats, one for the dogs, and apparently the Willner Wildlife Sanctuary would be harboring any birds, reptiles, exotics, or miscellaneous creatures.

I put the file in my tote and continued searching.

Next I found a small section of files labeled “Pruitt Investigation.” Detailed records on who owned what downtown buildings. If the preponderance of Pruitts in the list surprised him, he was much too naïve. A thick sheaf of articles from the
Caerphilly Clarion
about the beautification project. Not likely to contain state secrets.

The farther I got in his investigation files, the more my spirits lagged. They clearly showed he was obsessed, but gave no proof of the skullduggery he alleged.

Until the next-to-last file. It contained a thick copy of the loan contract between Caerphilly County and something called First Progressive Financial, LLC. It was a bad photocopy, slightly crooked on some pages—probably not acquired in any official way.

I flipped through it briefly. I wasn’t a lawyer, and I didn’t have time to try to decipher the whole document, but even a brief inspection convinced me that it was dynamite.

I looked around. No computer. A mouse, a set of speakers, and various other bits of hardware were scattered around the desk with their cords lying useless instead of being plugged into anything. No doubt the chief had confiscated Parker’s computer.

But he did have a printer like mine, one of those all-in-one machines that also served as a copier, a scanner, and a fax machine. I could make a copy of the contract.

And maybe I should make a copy of the contents of the next file, too. Apparently Parker Blair had been working on an article on his findings.

He’d missed his calling; he’d have been a natural as an investigative reporter. It was all here. Chapter and verse of exactly what the Pruitts and their cronies had been up to, and all the more scathing because he hadn’t used inflammatory language or tricks of rhetoric. He just laid it out, step by step, precise, organized … damning.

I didn’t miss not getting to know Parker the womanizer. But I wouldn’t have minded meeting the Parker who lived in this curiously appealing old-fashioned house, and I knew for sure that the Parker who’d written this article was a major loss to the whole town.