A Steak in Murder (22 page)

"And what about Detwiler?" John asked. "Did you make any progress with that?"

Andy sighed. He pushed away the plate of half-eaten salmon. "Yeah. You sure you want to hear about it?"

"Yes," Quill said.

"It's not pretty. Detwiler wasn't stabbed in the park. He'd been in the trunk of a car—forensics is establishing the make right now, and then dumped under the oaks about seventy-two hours before he died."

"Oh, no!" Quill felt as if she'd been hit in the stomach. "You mean he
was
alive all that time in the park? For three days?"

Andy nodded grimly. "I'm sorry. It's pretty horrible. He died of a combination of dehydration and exsanguination. Blood loss."

Nobody said anything. Quill closed her eyes for a moment.

"Proximate cause of death was a knife wound to the sternum. It was a long, thin, very sharp blade, like a boning knife, as I mentioned at the scene. Whoever delivered the blow had above-average strength. My guess is that it would be a very fit male, but that's a guess."

"My goodness," Meg said. "There's a horrible story."

"It is." Andy got up. "Thanks for the meal. I've got to get back to the hospital." He bent to Meg's ear. "Will I see you tonight?"

Meg nodded. "I refuse to sleep alone after a story like that."

Quill ran her hands through her hair and looked at her watch. "Rats. I've got to make a phone call. Oh! Doreen! Did Nate call and confirm my dinner with the colonel?"

Doreen nodded. "Said he'd be bringin' a guest. Didn't say who."

"Then I've got about an hour to call Myles and change."

She went upstairs and dialed the number Myles had left her in case it was urgent. She hesitated a bit beforehand. She didn't know whether he would think this was important or not. When she had first fallen in love with him, she'd found his detachment, his remoteness from her own life as a painter, as an innkeeper, to be a restful thing in the chaos of her life. But things were righting themselves. It was as if she had been looking at life through an out of focus camera lens. Somehow, she was tuning it, and the way was sharper, clearer, than it had been before.

He answered the phone himself.

"Hey," she said.

"Quill." He sounded tired. She knew better than to ask him why.

"Are you all right?"

"Fine."

"You'd say 'fine' if you were staked on top of an ant hill in the broiling sun."

"Mhm. Some interesting background showed up on Rossiter."

"No kidding?" Quill hadn't known the man very long, but she felt sad. She didn't buy the old bromide. "At least it was quick." Dead was dead.

"First of all, he wasn't a Texan."

Quill sat up. "No! With that drawl?"

"And his first name wasn't Royal, it was just plain Ronald. He had it legally changed when he moved to Texas in the early eighties."

"Where did he come from?"

"Long Island."

"Long Island?!"

"Graduate of Columbia, Ph.D. in genetics. Made quite a bit of money when he patented one of the mediums used to filter genetic material in research, sold out to Pfizer, and became a cattleman."

"For heaven's sake," Quill said faintly. "He seemed so . . . so Texan. Is there anything about bis wife?"

"Diane Rossiter, also a graduate of Columbia. Royal was married in 1965, divorced in 1988. Two children, Joshua and Jennifer. Married again in 1992, to a Shirley Backus, occupation: housewife. Divorce pending."

"Shirley and Royal were getting a divorce?" Quill's mind was racing now. "Myles, how much was Mr. Rossiter worth?"

"In the area of one hundred million."

"Good grief!"

"One hell of a motive," Myles agreed. "Has there been any substantive evidence that his death was—shall we say, encouraged?"

"Andy promised specific autopsy results as soon as they came in. And, Myles. Brady, that's Rossiter's cattle manager, implied that Shirley was, um, a little free with her favors." She heard the
tap tap tap
of his fingers on the computer.

"Nothing here about the bill of particulars. But I can put someone on it."

"If you're not too busy."

"No. I'm not too busy. Christ, surveillance is boring. Nothing much came up on Candy Detwiler. He was a rodeo clown for a number of years, retired with some fairly impressive injuries, and went to work as a cattle handler for Randall Calhoun."

"I don't suppose you have any information on the colonel."

"Well, he's a real colonel. National Guard, but that counts. He's from Oklahoma, a widower, very active churchman. He's been a cattleman all his life."

"He's the real thing, at least," Quill murmured. "Thank you, Myles. I know you don't really approve of my . . . my . . ."

"Meddling?" His voice was teasing, but it stung.

"I was about to say detective work."

"Just keep out of Harris's way."

"Oh." Quill thought a moment and dredged up some jargon. "Is he dirty?"

"Good God, Quill. No, if anything, he's a little too enthusiastic about his job. There're a couple of things I've heard I don't like at all. So don't ask him for anything, avoid him if you can, and manage not to be alone with him."

"He can't be
that
bad, surely."

"Might be. I don't suppose you'll wait until I get home to get involved in all this."

"When are you coming home?"

"Hard to say. A couple of weeks."

She took a deep breath. "Myles? I gave John a call. You know, John Raintree."

"Of course I do. How's the job in Long Island working out?"

"All right, I guess. But I've hired him. As a consultant. I've started talking with Marge about buying the Inn back, and I wanted John to tell me and the bank if there was any way it could be done. I won't go into all the details right now, because you sound so tired, but . . . Myles? Are you there?"

"Still here." He was quiet a long moment. She thought she could hear him breathing. "It's what you want to do."

"I, yes. It is. I've worked out a whole new way to handle things, Myles. So I won't get so involved with irrelevant things."

"I see. Well. Good luck."

"That's it? Good luck?"

"What would you like me to say? That I think you're doing the right thing? I can't answer that for you, Quill. All I can tell you is that it isn't the right thing for the two of us."

"And why is that?" she asked, her voice cool.

"Because no matter how you handle it, it's a full-time job."

"And my relationship with you should be my full-time
job, is that it?"

"You know that's not it." He controlled his impatience with an effort that came clearly over the phone. "Both of us will be involved in work that fully occupies our time. In very separate areas."

"Well, why don't you become an innkeeper?"

No response.

"Okay, then why don't I learn to do what you do?"

"It's too dangerous, dammit."

"I don't care."

"I do. Because I love you. And I'll tell you this, Quill, bottom line, if I'm worried about you, it's going to be a lot more dangerous for me."

And that was the bottom line. The whole of it. Quill
said good-bye, I love you, because she did, then she hung
up the phone.

She sat on the bed for a moment, thinking of the feel of Myles's chest against her breasts, the strength of his cheekbones, the power in his hands. She'd never painted him. She wondered why she'd never painted him.

"Quill?" Meg tapped at her door and stuck her head inside. Max poked his nose through the crack in the door and shoved inside. "The colonel's here."

"Is it that late already?" Dismayed, Quill looked at her watch. "Damn, I wanted to change."

"You'd better change pretty fast. He's brought the Russians with him, and Bjarne's mad as fire."

Quill could hear loud, quarrelsome voices floating up the stairs from down below. "Meg, go talk to them."

"What in heck am I going to say to a bunch of Russians and a teed-off Finn?" She narrowed her eyes. "Hey." She stepped into the room and sat beside Quill on the bed. She put her arm around her. "What's the matter? Are you okay?"

"I just need a minute, okay?"

"Sure." She brushed Quill's hair back from her forehead. "You tell me about it later."

"In a while."

"Okay. I'm always around, you know?" She kissed her ear and jumped up. "C'mon, Max, let's go amuse the Russians."

"Just don't
sing!"
Quill called after her. She got up,
grabbed her bathrobe from the back of the door, and went
down the short hall to the bathroom. She didn't think it would bother her to have to share a bath with Meg and whomever happened to be staying with them that week,
but it did. She always felt as if she should hurry, although she had a good reason to hurry now. She stared at herself
in the mirror, wondering if she could see what Meg had seen in her face. Her red hair was a mess, as usual. Her eyes were still hazel. Maybe there were lines at the corners of her eyes and on her upper lip. She hadn't noticed that before. She showered and changed into a long gauzy dress with a deep V neck. She brushed her hair as fast as she could, wondering for the thousandth time if it would be more convenient to cut it short and have to wrestle with a curling iron. She swept it up onto the top of her head in a knot and raced downstairs.

The colonel hadn't just brought the Russians, he'd brought the Widow Rossiter, too, who looked none the worse for wear after her boozy morning. They were seated at the center table. The other diners, more soberly dressed, cast sidelong glances at the colonel's hat, Shirley's matching jeans and button-down shirt in gold lame, and the Russians sweating in their dark three-piece suits. It wasn't particularly warm for July, but Quill wondered if she should turn on the air-conditioning. If she did, the other diners in their summer wear would freeze.

Leonid jumped to his feet as she came into the room and grabbed both her hands in his. "How I love you when you arrive like this!" he shouted. "You are a wonderful part of this country."

"Thank you," Quill said. She gently withdrew her hands and smiled at everyone in turn. "I'm sorry I wasn't
here to greet you when you came in. If you'll excuse me,
I'll just let the chef know you're all here."

"The Finn?" Leonid's thick eyebrows came together in a scowl. "It is not such a good thing, that a Finn cook for Russians. He has already come out to see us."

"And what happened?" Quill asked, in spite of herself.

"He goes, 'Phuut!' " Leonid made an "o" with his mouth.

"Here, now," the colonel said in alarm.

Leonid shrugged. "I am thinking. It is not against the law in this country to have Finns in the kitchen. Is it?"

"No."

"And if he goes, 'Phuut' in our soup? The thing is, I
was not even born when we in Russia were maybe a little
rude to the Finns. So why should this Finn be mad at me? Or at Vasily? Or Alexi? Me, I am trying to explain to this Finn that we are young, we are not of the same prejudices as our fathers, but you know," he leaned forward and whispered, "Finns are funny that way. Most of them . . ." He twirled his finger around his ear. "Crazy. Very crazy. It is well known in . . ."

"Stop," Quill said. "I'll go check on the meal. In the meantime"—she beckoned to Peter the waiter—"please order yourself drinks." She stalked back to the kitchen. "Bjarne!"

He didn't answer. He was at the stove, stirring some
thing. It may have been black bean soup with sour cream,
which was on the specials menu.

"Bjarne?"

"Yes!"

"Don't spit in the Russians' soup. You look guilty." She advanced on him. "Did you already spit in the Russians' soup?" Her gaze fell on three filled bowls that had been set to one side. "Throw them out," she said.

"They are . . ." and there was that bad Finnish word again. Or maybe it was Swedish.

"Probably," she agreed. "But we'll have the Board of Health after us in two seconds flat if you spit in the soup." She looked around the kitchen. "Where are Meg and John and Doreen?"

"Doreen went home," Bjarne said sulkily. "The others are out back."

Quill stepped outside onto the back porch. Meg and John were sitting on the steps leading to the small little excuse for a vegetable garden, heads tightly together in deep discussion. Max was asleep in his pen. "Meg?" Quill said.

Her sister jumped as if she'd been stung by a bee. "What!"

"I thought you were going to pour balm on troubled waters in there."

"I did. I made Bjarne go back to the kitchen."

"But then you left, too."

"So!?"

"So it would have been better if you'd sat down and chatted them up a bit."

"That's your job. It's my job to make sure we have enough food on hand when a reservation for two turns into a reservation for five."