Twenty-Seven Bones

2

Pender’s new neighbors had helped him drag a foam pad and a sleeping bag from the skip-rent shed up to the loft of the A-frame Saturday night, and given him a mosquito coil to set up on a saucer beside the bed. He slept soundly after his turn on watch, and when he awoke Sunday morning the coil had burned to ash and the sky was gray with false dawn. He propped himself on his elbows and watched the stars reappear, then fade on the horizon as the meadow materialized, broad, wet, and green, with its rain tree centerpiece sparkling like cut glass.

He could smell the dawn through the screen walls. This was like camping out, only without the dew problem. I could get used to it, he thought, as he lay back down and tried to punch a little softness into the round meditation cushion he was using for a pillow. Throw in a good woman-say, Dawson-and a satellite dish, I could get used to this easy.

Pender fell asleep again. His bladder awoke him the second time. Indoor plumbing would also be a plus, he decided. He pulled on the bathrobe he’d borrowed from Julian, grabbed his travel bag and one of the towels Ziggy had loaned him, and strolled up to the Crapaud.

The man who’d introduced himself as Roger the Dodger yesterday was at one of the sinks. He might have just finished brushing his teeth, thought Pender-judging by that Captain Katzenjammer beard, he sure hadn’t been shaving.

“You’ll get used to the smell,” Roger called, as Pender let himself into one of the stalls. “And don’t worry about the shit eels: there’s not one in a hundred can make it all the way up the side.”

There’s no such thing as shit eels, Pender assured himself as he lowered himself onto the cold wooden toilet seat, but his testicles were not entirely convinced.

According to the plaque on the outside of the building, the First Lutheran Church had been built in 1750, while the white Georgian steeple with the mahogany siding and the open cupola had been added in 1798.

“Do I look okay?” whispered Holly, as she and Pender joined the crowd filing inside. She was wearing a short, tight-fitting black cocktail dress-the only black item in her wardrobe-and had borrowed a black sweater to cover her bare arms and shoulders.

Julian and Ziggy were close to the front. Pender took off his Panama and slipped into the last pew-he was more interested in the mourners than the minister. “You look spectacular,” he told Holly, as she slid in next to him.

She tugged the hem of her dress as far down her thigh as it would reach. “I meant appropriate.”

“Stick with me, nobody’ll notice.” Dawson had “borrowed” Andy Arena’s black jacket for Pender to wear to the funeral; it didn’t fit too badly, as long as he didn’t try to button it. He’d never worn one victim’s clothes to the funeral of another before, but down here, he was starting to learn, all bets were off.

It was eleven in the morning. The church was already sweltering. The casket was closed. A few white women sniffled; a big black woman sobbed into her handkerchief. Pender craned his neck, saw Apgard’s bandaged blond head in the front pew. Suddenly Apgard turned-that old eyes-in-the-back-of-the-head reflex. Caught you looking!

Pender nodded solemnly, his lips pressed tightly together in wordless condolence. Apgard nodded back, mouthed thanks for coming, then looked up and to his left, past Pender’s right shoulder. His face registered something-surprise? distaste? maybe even fear? — but he turned away before Pender, who read faces the way stockbrokers read tickers, could get a fix on it.

Oh-ho, thought Pender, crossing his legs and turning casually to the right. A white couple was making their way down the aisle. The man was tall, late sixties, with long dangling arms and a graying beard, the woman shorter and younger, early forties, with an untamed nest of bushy, ginger-colored hair and a dumpy figure, except for a bosom not even her dowdy black dress could hide.

“Who are they?” he whispered to Holly; the service had just begun.

“Phil and Emily Epp,” she whispered back.

The name registered immediately-but only as a name that registered. It took Pender a few seconds to rummage through the case file in his head before he placed them as Apgard’s nearest neighbors, the ones who’d hadn’t seen or heard anything the night Hokey Apgard died. “What do you know about them?”

“Sshh, be quiet. I’ll tell you later.” Holly was always a little self-conscious in a church. No matter how nice the people were, she could never quite shake the feeling that somebody might stand up at any minute, point an accusing finger in her direction, and yell, Get the hell out of here, you killed Christ.

The two detectives, Felix and Hamilton, were already waiting in the chief’s office when Pender and Julian arrived after the funeral service. There was a copy of that morning’s San Juan Star on the desk. Pender picked it up and read the lead story under the headline Serial Killer Stalks St. Luke. They had it all, the count, the MO, even the nickname Machete Man.

“Perry Faartoft says he’s going to print everything he’s got tomorrow. I can’t blame him-he’s been scooped on his own reporter’s murder. I’m afraid it’s all coming out in the wash, gentlemen. I spent half the morning closeted with the governor, assuring him that everything was under control. My nose grew three inches.”

“Everybody I talk to t’inks it’s a down-islander, Chief,” said Arthur Felix, the skinny, jumpy junior detective.

“Everybody always thinks it’s a down-islander, Arthur-you’re going to have to narrow it down a little further than that. How about you, Edgar? Picked up anything at the Core?”

“No, but I noticed something at the church today. What do you know about a couple named Epps, live next door to Apgard?”

“That’s Epp-no s. Philip and Emily. Anthropologists. Moved to St. Luke around six years ago, along with their houseman, an Indonesian named Bennie something. They’re studying Carib remains. Why?”

“I happened to be looking at Apgard’s face when they showed up for the funeral. He looked away before I could get a read on it-but whatever he was thinking, it wasn’t thanks for coming.”

Detective Hamilton looked up-as slow at reading as he was at everything else, he’d just finished the newspaper article. “I questioned dem a’ready. Dey ain’ know shit.”

“Might be worth going back, ask them where they were Friday night.”

“Way ahead a ya, G-mon,” said Hamilton. He told them what Mrs. Dr. Epp, as he called her, had said about going to Puerto Rico for some convention this weekend.

“Check it out, verify they were there,” said Coffee. “But don’t ask them directly-we don’t want to alert them. Just ascertain whether they were on the boat, maybe call San Juan, see where the convention was held, find out where they stayed, get check-in and check-out times. If we can’t rule them out as suspects, we’ll bring them in and question them separately.”

“Waste of time,” muttered Hamilton.

“Let’s rule them out anyway.” Coffee turned back to Felix. “Any luck with that picture of the German girl yet?”

“Just came in dis mornin’, Chief-we’re printin’ it up now.”

“When it’s done, I want all available officers canvassing the island with it. Anyone who’s working anything else, pull them off it. Anyone on leave, call them in: all days off are canceled until further notice. If anyone on this island saw that woman even briefly, I want to hear about it. Edgar, do you have anything to add?”

“Just that I’m not at all comfortable with the direction this thing is taking. Our killer has gone from hiding his victims to dropping them off to leaving them at the crime scene. He even left the hand behind this time, which he’s never done before. Plus his cycle seems to be shortening. We had three murders in the last two years, that we know about, and two, possibly three, in the last week. As for your down-islander, Artie: our man is obviously mobile, and he obviously knows St. Luke like the back of his hand, so if he is a down-islander, he’s a down-islander with a vehicle who’s lived here long enough to know his way around like a native.”

“Tell me somet’in I don’ know,” replied Detective Felix.

Sure thing, thought Pender: you’re an incompetent asshole. But Hamilton was worse-apparently Julian busted him down to uniform two, three times a year, but hadn’t yet found anybody better to replace him. It was a ramshackle department, underpaid, and except for Julian and Layla, undertrained.

So after the meeting, alone with Coffee, Pender conceded that it might be time to blow the Garry Owen and call in the cavalry.

“The Bureau, you mean?”

Pender nodded.

“I already did.”

“You asked for help from the Bureau?”

“Yesterday.”

“Without telling me?”

“I didn’t want you to think I’d lost faith in you. Sherbridge said they have every available agent working counterterrorism. He put us on the list-perhaps by November, he said.”

“By November, the bodies are going to be stacked up like cord-wood,” said Pender. “Any chance of getting some help from Puerto Rico or the Virgin Islands?”

“There’s no tradition of reciprocity-they look upon tourism as a finite pie. No, Edgar, I’m afraid this one is all ours.”

“Their loss,” said Pender, as if the flop sweat weren’t already flowing again. “We’ll just have to hog all the glory for ourselves.”