Point Blank

Chappy waved his fork at his daughter-in-law. “Fact is, I don’t, either. Cynthia, you’re the one I’d swear old Twister wants to sleep with, given all those lusty looks he tosses your way.”

“Dad, please,” Tony said, but his voice was more resigned than angry or embarrassed.

“All right, all right,” Chappy said. “Mrs. Goss, where’s our lunch?”

“Yours is right here, Chappy.” Mrs. Goss, fiftyish, was blessed with striking, heavy black hair she wore loose and curling down her back, like a gypsy. A long bright yellow velvet skirt swished gracefully around her ankles, a peasant blouse, cut low, the final touch. She leaned down to set a platter of shrimp salad at Chappy’s right hand, her cleavage not three inches from his face.

“Looks good,” Chappy said, “even the salad.”

“Control yourself,” Mrs. Goss said and swished back to the kitchen.

“You’re in for a treat, Agent,” Chappy said to Ruth. “Mrs. Goss makes the best shrimp salad in Virginia, and she knows it.”

“That may be,” Cynthia said. “But she should wear an apron over her ridiculous hippie outfits.”

“She’s a gypsy, not a hippie,” Chappy said, annoyance in his dark eyes if not in his voice. “She doesn’t press her bosom in your face, Cynthia, only mine. Otherwise I wouldn’t see any bosoms at all. Leave her alone.”

Mrs. Goss finished serving, seemingly oblivious, and left them to it, her large silver hoop earrings flashing in the sunlight.

“Cynthia, tell me about Erin Bushnell,” Dix said. “Tony said you two were like sisters.”

Cynthia replied calmly, “Tony is out of date. Erin and I got along nicely until she started eyeing my husband. Her death, well, it’s a great shock, as you can imagine, because at one time we were quite close. I still grieve for her.”

Dix said, “So Tony didn’t know how you felt? He saw your grief and believed you and Erin were still as close as before?”

“Erin never came on to me, Cynthia, never,” Tony said.

“I saw her pull you into the moonlight last Tuesday night at that cocktail party Gloria Stanford threw. It was cold that night, but that didn’t stop either of you.”

Tony speared a shrimp on his fork and stared at it. “I don’t even remember that. I’m surprised you noticed, since you were flirting with Uncle Gordon.”

Chappy set his fork on his plate, leaned back in his chair, and laughed until it was the only sound in the dining room. He said to Ruth on a hiccup, “You look shell-shocked, Agent Warnecki. It’s always a circus between the two of them.”

One of Dix’s black eyebrows shot up. “Add you to the mix, Chappy, and we’ve got the wild animal act.”

“Nah, I’m as tame as your little Brewster.”

“Brewster thinks he’s a Doberman.”

Tony asked Dix, “You find out yet who hired those guys to kill Agent Warnecki on Saturday night?”

The question brought the conversation to a halt. Ruth could hear Mrs. Goss humming in the kitchen. Chappy said into the heart of the silence, “Dix probably doesn’t want to talk about it, Tony. Fact is, identifying them may not be possible. I heard the bodies were badly burned. That right, Dix?”

Dix shrugged. “We’ll see. The FBI forensic lab is using their fingerprint recognition program on the partial prints we have. We’re looking for where the men might have come from. We may have something more to go on soon.”

“But you’ve got no leads now, right, Dix?” Chappy asked him.

“Oh, we’re managing to keep busy,” Dix said easily, sitting back and lacing his fingers over his belly. Chappy suddenly said, “Dix, I heard you found poor old Walt McGuffey murdered in his own house. Another shock like that and you’ll have to bury me. Who would want to kill him? Oh, I see. Someone must have thought Walt saw something he shouldn’t since he lives near the other entrance to Winkel’s Cave.”

“That’s possible,” Dix said. “Walt was a fine gentleman, and Christie really loved him. He was devastated when she disappeared.” He didn’t mention finding Ruth’s Beemer in the shed. He turned to Cynthia. “I find it surprising that you and Erin Bushnell were such good friends. I haven’t seen you make friends with any women in town.”

“I grew up with three women at home, Dix,” Cynthia said, “and they were world-class bitches all, if that gives you some idea of why I never bothered. I believed Erin was different, but she wasn’t. Yes, she made a show of affection for Uncle Gordon, but only to throw me off her real objective, which was my own husband. That’s why she spent so much time with me here, at Tara. She wanted to see you, Tony.”

“Or maybe,” Chappy said, voice sly, “both of you had the hots for old Twister.”

“That’s not funny, Chappy. He’s nearly as old as you are,” Cynthia said. “How much longer before you grow up?”

Dix said quickly, “So you think Ginger’s wrong about Erin loving Dr. Holcombe, Cynthia?”

Cynthia shrugged one of her thin, elegant shoulders under her dark red St. John knit top. “Ginger would say anything to make you happy, wouldn’t she, Dix? Everyone but you knows she’d love to jump your bones. Now, her mother, Gloria Stanford, she’s another matter.”

After dropping that bomb, Cynthia gave her full attention to her shrimp salad. Ruth took a sip of her white wine. “What about you, Chappy, do you know if your brother was sleeping with anyone else?”

Dix shot her a look, a ghost of a smile on his mouth before he speared a water chestnut out of his shrimp salad.

“Gloria and Twister sleeping together? Nah, maybe a long time ago, but she’s way too old for him now,”

Chappy said. “Fact is, Twister likes ’em young. Even Cynthia’s long in the tooth for Twister’s tastes. You best accept the end is in sight, Cynthia.”

Ruth said, “So Erin Bushnell was the right age for him?”

“Early twenties? Yeah, that’s right, but what do I know, Agent Ruth? Really, what do I know? Me and Twister, we haven’t gotten along since before you were born—too much alike, I suppose, and it makes our pots bubble and boil. Sounds like it’s time you ask him, watch him sputter a bit.” His smile was malicious.

After Mrs. Goss had cleared off the table, she brought in a big New York cheesecake and set it with some panache in the middle of the table, and handed Chappy a knife. As he cut them all slices, Ruth said, “I really like your house, Chappy. Why did you name it Tara?”

“Because when I brought Tony and Christie’s mama here I told her she’d never be hungry again.”

Tony said to Ruth, “My mother had a trust fund the size of the Rhode Island State budget.”

Chappy laughed. “Makes a cute story. I like the name Tara. It appeals to something way down deep inside me. The architecture’s real close, except, of course, we’ve got lots of nice big bathrooms.”

Thirty minutes later Dix pulled out onto the long driveway. Ruth said, “We’ve already got fingerprints for those two men and IAFIS is trying to match what we’ve got. Why all that fancy talk about the FBI?”

Dix grunted, shoved on his dark aviator glasses.

“Setting a cat among the pigeons, were you?”

He grinned at her. “Who knows what might come out of that? The three of them always, I repeat, always put on a show for visitors. You start them on a topic and they’ll go with it. I know it’s hard for you to believe, but they were really rather tame today. Erin Bushnell’s death took a lot of the fun out of it for them. Walt’s death, too.”

Ruth nodded. “I agree there were strong feelings about Erin, but I couldn’t figure out who felt what.”

“These folks are good. They’ve had years of practice.”

“I’ve seen dysfunctional families before, and I’m probably part of one myself, but those three are champions.”

Dix laughed. “You might have asked Chappy about him and Erin, to see the looks on their faces.”

“I hate to ask you this, but do you think one of your family could be involved in Erin’s murder?”

He was silent as he turned onto Mount Olive Road. “When Christie disappeared, I thought about every possibility, including someone in the family being involved. And after all these years they’d have to do a whole lot to surprise me. But I don’t see any of them killing somebody. And yes, I’ve been wrong lots of times.”

A short time later, they stood in front of Helen Rafferty’s desk. Dix slipped off his aviator glasses and smiled down at Helen, who looked harried.

Dix said, leaning close, “I need to speak to you, Helen. Five minutes, in the lounge?”

“I—Well, I don’t suppose you’ll take a rain check, Sheriff?”

“I would prefer now. This is very important.”

There were two employees in the Stanislaus administration employee lounge, hunched over a green Formica table, a bag of Fritos between them. Dix flipped out his badge and waved them out. Ruth sat beside Helen and looked at her for several moments, judging her mood. She turned on her FBI interview voice, calm, inviting. “Tell us about Dr. Holcombe and Erin Bushnell, Ms. Rafferty.”

Helen looked from Ruth to Dix, who was standing with his shoulders against the wall, arms crossed over his chest.

She burst into tears.

CHAPTER 20