A Taste for Murder (20 page)

It seemed to Quill that John's admiration of Marge's business acumen was misplaced, and that the nature of business itself was perverse. Marge's stranglehold on Gil's business was a good thing? She forebore comment and said, "But none of this has to do with Tom Peterson's half."
"No. Although Tom was getting fed up, and looking actively for a new partner. Funny thing was, he wasn't helping Gil get the loan he needed from the bank. They require an audit, and Tom kept ducking me, putting me off, Gil knew this. Gil also knew that Tom could force Marge to call those loans in by threatening to take his profitable side of the business else- where, He was even talking about setting up in competition with Gil, Marge had lent Gil a lot of money, and it'd be a case of her business or his, As I said, Marge is good, She wouldn't let her and Betty's ship go down to save Gil."
"So my theory about Marge and Mavis bringing Mrs, Hallenbeck's millions into Gil's business wasn't all that farfetched."
"No. Although from the little I knew of Mrs. Hallenbeck when I worked for the company, she'd be a hard sell, She was a tough cookie right from the start. Nobody was real surprised when old man Hallenbeck locked himself into the garage and turned the car motor on."
"Oh," said Quill softly. "How terrible!"
"Yes, She's got the life, though, doesn't she? Or she did. Doggone Good Dogs was sold to Armour's, She retired with a tidy sum, to say the least. And she had Mavis to run her errands for her."
"Not anymore," said Quill.
"Will she find someone else?"
"I don't know - it's very difficult. There's very little help for the elderly these days - unless they're willing to accept a nursing home, and I can't see Mrs. Hallenbeck doing that."
"It'd be a heck of a nice nursing home, with her money."
"But none of that explains why Tom Peterson would have a motive to kill Mavis."
'There's something funny going on." John's habitual self-containment kept him on the couch; any other man would have been pacing the room. He allowed himself a slight frown, "I knew Mavis was coming, She called from the gas station in Covert to tell me that we had to discuss what she called a 'rearrangement' of the payments."
"You paid her once a month?"
"Yes. To a post office box in Atlanta, The envelope was addressed to Scarlett O'Hara."
"Good grief," said Quill. "It figures."
"She was..." - John hesitated, searching for the right word - "ebullient. Chattering." He moved his thumb and forefinger together rapidly to indicate mindless babble. "Said the money was rolling in from every side."
"She's got the wrong heroine in Scarlett O'Hara," said Quill. "Behaving much more like the rapacious Evita, don't you think?"
John dismissed this excursion into light-mindedness with a tolerant twitch of his mouth. "I guess. The point is, Quill, she chose Hemlock Falls for a purpose. Not just because I was here. I got the impression that she'd come to some crossroads."
What, thought Quill, would be considered a career milestone t for a professional blackmailer? "She must have come across something that would really feather her nest. Big money," she said aloud. "More than you could afford. And since she obviously came to Hemlock Falls for a reason, it must have to do with people she knows here. Something that Marge is involved with?" Quill guessed. "Something Tom Peterson is involved with?" She jumped to her feet. "John! The matchbook! The memo from the D.O.H. !"
"The mysterious folded-into-threes matchbook?"
Quill waved her arms excitedly. "You said that Tom was ducking an audit. That you couldn't get his personal finance statement out of him. That Gil was getting desperate, because without it the bank wouldn't give him a loan. That's fact one."
John nodded. Quill began to pace around the room. "Fact two is that the matchbook showed up on the balcony. He must have been there. He must have tried to push her over the edge."
"Wouldn't Mrs. Hallenbeck have seen him?"
"She said she was in the bathroom. He's been in our back room any number of times, delivering meat; he'd seen the drum of sulfuric acid. If Mavis called him, like she called you, he'd have a lot of time to set it up. The register's out all the time at the desk; he could have found out what room they were staying in, no problem. And he was here in the Inn while Mrs. Hallenbeck and Mavis were at dinner. And he lives right across from the pond. He said himself he was home alone. And of course, he was right there at the play."
"But what's his motive? And how would he know Mavis before she came to the Falls?"
"Did his brother work for the company?"
"For a while. He was a salesman. Most kids from Hemlock Falls end up either at the paint factory, or working for Doggone Good Dogs."
"And Mavis knew all the dirty secrets." Quill stood still, closed her eyes, and concentrated hard. "Meat..." she said slowly. "Tainted meat. That D.O.H. memo Marge was waving at me said something about tainted meat. E. coli bacteria. I went to Tom's to check on the shipment of beef that Meg said was spoiled. Tom got very weird about it. Doggone Good Dogs is a large customer for meat shipments. Help me out here, John."
Quill opened her eyes and discovered that Indians could turn pale.
"Jesus Christ," said John. "That's it. The beef is delivered directly to the franchise from the slaughterhouse. The franchise is the point of inspection. We had a real run on rejections from the restaurants just before I..." His lips thinned. "I was just about to take our inspector out to an Ohio supplier when..."
"Elaina happened."
"Yes."
"But what would Tom Peterson want with tainted meat?"
"Resale," John said. "Selling meat to third-world countries would give you the biggest money. Reselling to small restaurants and diners wouldn't be worth it. But if you shipped the containers offshore... I don't know, Quill, this is all guesswork."
"We'd need proof," said Quill. "What if we checked out Peterson's warehouse?"
"There'd be no need for him to have the trucks move through here."
"Somehow we got some of it," said Quill. "Isn't there. some indication where the stuff came from? If we could find the truck that had the stuff we got, wouldn't there be some bill of lading, or whatever, that would tell its point of origin?"
"The carcasses are tagged," John said. "But there's all kinds of ways to fake the documentation. Except for the tattoos."
"The tattoos?"
"On the carcasses. They're stamped by the USDA. If they've been rejected, there's a code for that. It's inked onto the carcass. Of course, it can be cut off, but if we could find a whole carcass we'd have proof."
"I'm going over there," said Quill. "Right now. Coming with me?"
John grinned. "Sure. What the hell?"
"What the hell," Quill agreed. "Just give me a few seconds to change into my burglar outfit."
"We'll need a rope, a camera, and a flashlight."
Quill pointed to the credenza. "Camera and flashlight in there. Rope's in the car trunk."
Quill re-emerged from her bedroom minutes later dressed in a black turtleneck, jeans, and running shoes. "Do you think I should black my face?"
"No. But it's a good thing you're not blond."
The July air was soft and still. John and Quill crept to her car. After a fierce whispered discussion about who should drive, Quill started the motor, and kept the lights off until they reached the end of the drive and turned on to Route 96. Quill's heart was beating faster than usual. Her palms were damp. Her sense of time was warped; the ride to the Peterson warehouse seemed endless, but when she pulled into the gravel road to the buildings, it seemed as though no time had passed at all.
"Park behind that shed," said John in a low voice. "We'll I walk up on the grass. It'll be quieter."
In the open air, Quill felt exposed, sure that a floodlight would go on and a siren sound any minute. "Over the top, Ma," she hissed at John's back. She bit her lip to keep the nervous giggles down.
"Only you," John whispered, "would do Jimmy Cagney imitations at a time like this."
The chain-link fence loomed up at them. John put both hands in the wire and leaped lightly upward. The wire chinged in the darkness. John clung for a moment, then moved rapidly toward the top, his feet finding purchase where Quill could see none at all. She grabbed the fence, and the wire bit into her palms. John dropped lightly to the other side. Quill pressed her face close to his. "I don't think I can climb this," she mouthed. "There's a dug-out spot a little farther down. I'm going to go under."
She followed the line of the fence to the hole where the German shepherd had made his escape, and wriggled under. Her long hair caught in the tom wires at the bottom, and she bit her lip to keep from yelling. She rolled free and got to her feet. John was already at the warehouse door.
"Can you pick the lock?" she said into his ear.
He shook his head. "It's bolted from the inside." He pointed up, then motioned her to wait. He unwound the rope at his waist and made a quick lasso, spun it rapidly a few times, and tossed it into the air. It caught on the roof joist. He pulled the rope taut, then rappelled quickly up the side of the building. The thud of his tennis shoes on the metal wall sounded like thunder. He disappeared through a ventilation duct. Quill pressed herself against the building and quivered. The moments before John opened the door seemed endless. She let out her breath, only half-aware that she'd been holding it, when she heard the quiet click of the bar being drawn from the inside door.
Moonlight leaked through the open ventilation shafts in the roof, picking out the cab of a semi truck and four Thermo King refrigeration units. John took her hand, and they made their way carefully across the floor.
"If anyone comes in," John said very quietly, "roll under the cab and stay there."
Quill nodded. "These things are locked, aren't they? How are you going to get in?"
"There's a maintenance door under the roof. Give me leg up."
Quill crouched down and cupped her hands together. John put his hands on her shoulders, stepped into her cupped hands, and sprang up. Quill staggered back; he was unexpectedly heavy.
She waited, searching the darkness. It was quiet. Too quiet. Quill bit back hysterical giggles. Time stretched on. Suddenly, a dark shape appeared at the back of the unit. Adrenalin surged through Quill like a lightning strike. "Safety door," said John. "You can open the units from the inside once you get in."
"God!" said Quill, "did you find anything?"
A low growl cut the air. Quill's breath stopped. John grabbed her hand. The growl rose, fell, and turned into a snarl.
"The dog's back," said Quill.
"Oh hell!" John thrust her behind him. Quill could smell the rank, matted odor of an animal neglected. The snarl spun on, a sinister, mesmerizing purl of sound. John flattened himself against the metal unit and pulled her carefully with him. The snarl died. Quill could hear the dog panting. It wriggled out of the dark, ears pinned against its head, lips pulled back, eyes slits of red in the moonlight. The dog sprang. John hurled himself in front of her. Quill, her lip bloody from the effort not to scream, swung the flashlight hard and connected with the dog's thick furry skull. The animal shrieked and dropped back. The door to the unit was slightly ajar. Quill swung it open, scrabbling frantically in the frigid air. She pulled a box from the unit. It fell to the ground. Packages of hot dogs spilled into the dirt. The dog shook its head and got to its feet.
"Good doggie," said Quill, "nice boy." Moving carefully, eyes on the dog, she bent and picked up the frozen hot dogs, rolling them to the dog like bowling balls. The dog sprang on the meat, both paws protectively over the package. It glared at them. The growl heightened to a snarl, the snarl to a bark which split the air like a hammer.
"Okay," gasped John. "It's not going to charge if it's barking. Back off, slowly. Don't run until we get outside."
He forced Quill behind him. She held on to his arm; he grunted in pain, and she let him go. Her palms were wet and she smelled blood. The dog's barking grew intermittent, interspersed with snarling gulps of the frozen meat.
They reached the warehouse door. Backed out slowly. Quill slammed it shut. Lights in the trailer snapped on.
They ran. John forced Quill under the fence and followed her. Freddie Allbright shouted into the dark. Quill fumbled for the keys to the car, threw herself into the driver's seat, and was out on Route 96 before John had the passenger door closed.
"Good Lord," said Quill, when they were back in her room.
She peeled John's shirt back from his forearm. "He got one good chomp in, didn't he?"
"It was worth it," said John. "There's a carcass there with the reject stamp." He waved the camera. "And I got the pictures. Now, Quill, I have a favor to ask. I'll need until Tuesday at least to go through Tom's financial records. Myles is gone until then, right?"
"Yes."
"I'm going to turn myself in. But not for another forty-eight hours. I'd appreciate it if you gave me some time."
"Gave you some time? You mean, you think I'd turn you in? John, how could you?"
"How could you not?" he said wryly. "You can't harbor a fugitive. I wouldn't let you, anyway."
"Just tell me where you're going to be, so I can report on my progress to you. I'm going down to the Marriott tomorrow, and I'm going to pump Mrs. Hallenbeck for everything that she knew about Mavis' affairs. Peterson's got to be connected with her somehow. And... now, this is the worst sacrifice of all, John." She paused impressively. "I'm going to eat lunch at the Hemlock Hometown Diner-Fine Food and Fast. Are you grateful, or what?"
For the first time that evening, a real smile crossed John's face. "Pretty noble, boss."
" 'Pretty noble'? I'd say that's incredibly noble." There was a hard, imperative knock at the door.
"I didn't lock it," Quill hissed, then loudly, "Just a moment, please."
The door swung open and Mrs. Hallenbeck walked into the room. "So!" she said. "You finally caught him!"
-11-
Mrs. Hallenbeck marched into Quill's quarters frail, rude and triumphant. Quill, astonished, looked at her watch: six-thirty in the morning.
"You didn't answer my phone messages," said Mrs. Hallenbeck. "I thought perhaps you didn't get them. I woke up and Mavis wasn't there to get my coffee. I always have just one cup, cut with hot water before I take my walk. Would you get it for me, please?" She sat down in the straight-back chair near the easel, and frowned at John. "What are you doing in Sarah's room? Have you spent the night here?" She lifted her chin. "If you have, I shall think twice about offering Sarah the opportunity to be in my employ." She smoothed her linen trousers with a precise hand. "Now. Tell me why I shouldn't call the police immediately. Everyone has been looking for this man."