Catch As Cat Can

28

No.” Lottie frowned as the rain slashed at the windowpane in her office.

“Lottie, no one thinks you killed Donny Clatterbuck. Don't get your nose out of joint.” Cynthia Cooper, tired and frustrated, spoke bluntly. “But you were in his company recently. Anything you noticed might create a major breakthrough.” Cooper thought to herself how onerous it was to butter up people like Lottie.

“Well.” She tapped the desk with a pencil, rose from her ergonomically correct seat, crossed the tidy, attractive office, and closed the door behind Coop. “Of course I want to help. It's just that you put me off coming to my place of work in uniform. I have a position to uphold.” She returned to her seat. “The university would take a dim view of anything incorrect.” She lowered her voice on “incorrect.”

Assistant Director of Major Gifts, Lottie was hypersensitive to social nuance. The job suited her and the day would come when old Vernon Miller retired and she would take over. Patiently she nurtured his social contacts as well as her own.

“I understand but you have to understand two men are dead, Wesley Partlow and Don Clatterbuck. There's a strong possibility that their murders are connected—”

“What?” Alarm registered on Lottie's face. “And who is Wesley Partlow? I read about him being found but the paper didn't say much.”

“Because no one knows much. Partlow was a kid parking cars at Big Mim's fund-raiser.”

“What's someone like that got to do with Donny?”

Coop leaned forward as the rain beat down. “Don Clatterbuck was shot in a truck Partlow had driven before he was killed. Sean O'Bannon described the truck when we— Well, it's a long story involving Mrs. Hogendobber's hubcaps but Sean correctly described the old pickup. We couldn't trace the truck. We had no license plate. We now have a license plate but it's ancient. The stickers are current. Carol Grossman down in Richmond, working on this since this morning, has tracked the old license plates to a Jaguar dealer down in Newport News. They used them as part of the decor.”

“The dealer stole the plates.” Lottie jumped to a conclusion.

“According to the dealer, he didn't. They turn the plates in. By law they must.”

“Well, someone took them.” She liked being right.

“Someone did. Someone also filched new date and month stickers. Dealers don't have those. You can't even peel them off someone's plates intact using a razor blade. As you can see, Lottie, this is becoming more and more interesting.”

“I still don't believe Donny would know anyone like that hanged man.” She stopped herself, regrouped, and continued, “There has to be a reasonable explanation. A coincidence. Maybe Partlow stole the truck and returned it. No one knew.”

“That has occurred to us but what I need from you are details: Don's mood, did he say anything about plans for the future? That sort of thing.”

“Would you like a beverage?” Lottie asked. “I apologize. I should have offered you one when you came through the door.”

“A hot coffee would work wonders.”

“Cream and sugar?”

“Heavy on the cream, light on the sugar.”

Lottie pushed a button on her phone system. “Franny, two cups of coffee. The usual for me and heavy on the cream, light on the sugar for the other. Thanks.” She returned her attention to Coop. Lottie thought Cooper, nice-looking, could look even better. With a bit of luck a tall, lean woman like Cooper could make a decent match in a county like Albemarle, but working as a deputy destroyed her chances of moving too far up in the world. Lottie wondered why women didn't think of those things. Life would always be easier if one was attached to a wealthy man.

They chitchatted until the coffee was placed before them. As Franny withdrew, Lottie took a deep sip, as did Cynthia.

“Thank you. This is just what I needed.”

“For the record, Donald Clatterbuck and I weren't dating. He escorted me to Mim's party. I liked him, of course. Who didn't? You know why I, well, I won't go into that but it still bothers me that BoomBoom didn't allow me to show Diego Aybar the sights. I love doing that sort of thing and Harry already has a beau. It just upset me. That's how I wound up with Donald.” She cast her eyes at Coop but Coop betrayed no feelings of her own so Lottie continued on. “He couldn't have been nicer. You see, I'd not been especially solicitous of him. Well, truthfully I ignored him. You know, he was just a working-class guy. But he actually had some ambition, which surprised me.”

“In what way?”

“He said he was taking his leather-design business on the Internet. He'd been working on a website where he would display techniques. I don't know anything about leather design and repair but I remember he said something about showing the different quality of skins. He thought if he did that he'd get orders for special items like sofas, couch slipcovers, even boots.”

“He was good.” Cooper sighed.

“He also wanted to go on the Internet for his taxidermy business. He said he ought to preserve rich people and call the business Stuffed Shirts. He had a good sense of humor.”

“So he seemed positive?”

“Yes. He mentioned saving to buy his grandfather's farm. Said it had been a good year so he was going to make Mr. Mawyer an offer. He mentioned that no one else in the family was interested. He's lucky there.”

“No clouds on the horizon?”

“No. If there were he didn't mention it. You mean was he afraid of something or someone?”

“Considering he was shot, yes, I'd—”

Lottie interrupted. “What if the murder was a mistake? What if whoever killed him saw the truck and thought he was someone else?”

“Anything is possible.” Coop drained her cup.

“Would you care for some more?”

“Thank you, no. I'm finally warming up. If I hadn't had a change of uniform in my locker I'd be sitting here dripping on your floor. It's not that cold but I took a chill.”

“Don't you just hate that?” Lottie asked sympathetically.

“Did you think Don wanted to go out with you again?”

“We just didn't click on that level. What can I say? No chemistry.” She dabbed her lips with the small napkin Franny had brought with the coffees. “Speaking of chemistry, Harry and Diego!”

Coop smiled. “Who knows?”

“Do you think she's done with Fair forever? I mean I thought that's why BoomBoom set her up. Boom wanted Fair away from Harry. She's like that.”

“I don't know. That was a long time ago, BoomBoom and Fair. Five years . . . or close to it. I don't think she wants him back.”

“She wants them all. She's not happy unless every man is circling around her like a honey pot.”

“Then you would have thought she'd have kept Diego for herself.” Coop shrewdly observed Lottie's reaction.

“Steinmetz is a bigger fish and probably a richer one, too. She doesn't miss a trick. I hate the way men fawn over her.”

“She's beautiful.”

“Artifice.” Lottie sniffed.

“Don evidenced little interest.”

“They grew up together. He saw right through her.”

“But, Lottie, Fair grew up with her, too.”

Not one to appreciate an errant detail in her argument being pointed out to her, Lottie's shoulders froze a bit, then relaxed. “Donald had more sense.” She glanced out at the gloomy day, returning to meet Cooper's eyes. “I'm sorry he's dead. He was a nice person. I can't imagine why anyone would want to kill him.”