Death Climbs a Tree (18 page)

A couple of people shushed him, and Margaret, standing beside him, spoke quietly into his ear. He looked at Joan and quickly looked away again.

But he was right. Why would someone go after a man who did nothing more than make a speech, and not Andrew? Or had Vint gone into the woods at the wrong moment and perhaps seen the killer getting ready to go after Andrew? Or seen something that linked him to Sylvia's death? Another Petoskey stone, perhaps? Would Vint have known one, if he'd even been able to see it? A slingshot? That would be easier to see and to recognize than a little rock. Matt Skirvin had been in the woods on Sunday. Had Vint seen him? Had killing Vint distracted him from his anger at Andrew? If so, for how long?

Or had Tom Walcher gone after both Sylvia and Herschel Vint? Walcher was plenty angry at Sylvia when he poked Andrew in the chest for supporting her. The way he'd seen it, she was endangering his livelihood. And Vint had accused the whole construction job of raping precious natural resources. Just how explosive was Walcher?

An unusual noise jerked her out of her thoughts. Someone was shouting downstairs. People generally didn't raise their voices at the senior center unless someone's hearing aid battery needed replacing, but these shouts sounded angry. She'd better find out.

The man in work clothes towering over Mabel and Annie with clenched fists wasn't especially tall, but he made up in decibels what he lacked in inches. He was twenty or thirty years younger than most of the center's regulars. Could he be the son of someone who usually participated in its activities? Or in the adult day care next door?

“Don't tell me she's not here! I got a right to see her!”

Joan, coming down the stairs, was at less of a disadvantage than the women sitting at the table. She said more calmly than she felt, “Can I help you, sir?”

“You damn well better! These—these women tell me my wife's not here, and I don't believe it for a minute!”

Annie shook her head and spread her hands to say, “I don't know anything about it.”

“Who is your wife?” Joan asked.

“Diane Barnhart. Where are you hiding her?”

Diane—who cleaned for Annie and who needed the work the new construction would bring her. Then this must be Bert, the unemployed husband with a reputation for flying off the handle.

Joan drew herself up to her full five feet four and wished she hadn't shed her professional-looking jacket. The bridge players had fallen silent. She hoped Ora Galloway wouldn't try to jump to her defense.

“Mr. Barnhart, I'm Joan Spencer, the director of the Oliver Senior Citizens' Center. I assure you we're not hiding your wife.”

“That Annie Jordan”—he jerked a thumb in her direction—“Diane said she'd be here working for Annie.”

“Nobody works for Annie here. When Diane works for Annie, it's at Annie's house, not here.” Inspiration hit, and she went on as if it were the most natural thing in the world, “I assume you came to pick up her paycheck.” On Monday? Could be. Annie probably paid Diane every time she worked.

“She tell you that?” he growled.

“No. I haven't seen her.” Never met her, for that matter. “And I don't know where she's working today.” Or whether she's working at all. Maybe the poor woman told him some story to get out of the house and away from him. “But if you could use a little ready cash, we might have a job for you.”

Suspicion was written all over his face. “What kind of job?”

“It's not much, and I'm sure it wouldn't take you very long, but it would help us. The railings on the stairs and the ramp to the front door have rusted. They need to be sanded and painted with that paint that turns rust into metal. Then tomorrow, a coat of green paint to match the outside trim. Actually, we have several small jobs that need doing. It's hard to get someone to do that kind of upkeep. Of course, if you don't have time…”

“I wouldn't mind taking a look. Since I'm here 'n' all.”

“Wonderful. Let me get my jacket, and I'll show you the railings and where we keep the things you'll need. I think we still have enough paint.” If not, she could send him to pick up some more. That would give her time to think of the other jobs she'd just invented. But it was true about the railings, and from what Annie had said, Diane and her husband were willing enough if they could find work. The center could afford it, she knew, even though she found volunteer labor when she could.

When she came out of her office with her jacket, Bert was leaning against the wall watching the card players, and the buzz of conversation in the room had returned to its usual level. He was clean and sober; she gave him that. Needed a haircut, but so did half the men on the college campus. His denim jacket and jeans were less frayed than most students' clothes. He straightened and came toward her.

“I appreciate this, Miz—what did you say your name was?”

“Spencer, Mr. Barnhart.”

“Sounds like my old man. I go by Bert.”

“Bert, you can call me Joan. We're pretty informal around here.” She turned to Annie and Mabel. “If Fred needs me for anything, I'll be checking the railings and then down in the basement getting paint. Back in a few minutes.” Not that she was afraid of him, but it couldn't hurt.

Annie nodded emphatically. “I'll be sure he knows.” And she'd be counting the minutes, Joan was sure.

She didn't care whether Bert got the point of that exchange. He followed her outside and ran his hand along the rusted spots as if he'd done that kind of work before.

“Not too bad,” he pronounced, and eyed the length of the railing. “I ought to be able to do it this afternoon and finish the green in the morning.”

She led him down the basement stairs, where he checked the paint like a pro and found the wire brush and scraper for the rust. “I have what I need for today,” he said. “But there's not enough green paint. You want me to pick some up, or will you do it?”

Joan had walked to work, as usual, but she could buy it on the way into work the next morning. The only paint store in Oliver wasn't far from the center. “I'll do it.”

She left him to it, transformed from the man who had raged into the center only a few minutes earlier. Could Bert in his fury have attacked someone he thought threatened his livelihood? She supposed he could, but it was hard to imagine him doing it from a distance. Still, what choice would he have with someone seventy feet up in a tree?

18

When Fred arrived at the station house, Johnny Ketcham was waiting for him and followed him into his office.

“There's good news and bad news.” He leaned against the door.

Fred sat in the old swivel chair, willing it not to dump him. “I'll bite. What's the good news?”

“We got a match on the prints they lifted from Vint's car. They match the partials from the stone that hit Sylvia.”

“Great.” Fred waited.

“Name's Ward Utterback. Arrested in Benzie County, Michigan, fifteen years ago and charged with assault, but he got off and seems to have kept his nose clean since. Not so much as a parking ticket.”

“So where is he now?”

“That's the bad news. Vanished. No sign of him in Michigan or Indiana—and not in any of the other states we've been able to check so far. No driver's license, nada.”

“Could have changed his name. What does he look like?”

“Hard to tell. The photo is blurry—seems they had a leaky roof right over where a lot of those old records were filed. And he's sporting a full beard that hides most of his face.”

“Scars, tattoos?”

Ketcham shook his head gloomily. “Caucasian, five nine, brown hair, brown eyes, and that damn beard.”

“How old is he?”

“Forty this year.”

“He could look like half the men in this town, not counting the students.”

Ketcham nodded.

“And he may have it in for tree people, or we may have a serial killer on our hands, just getting started.”

“The other good news—”

“There's more?”

Ketcham grinned. “Captain Altschuler wants you to report to him ASAP. That's why I called you.”

“That's good news?”

“Yeah, because it's you he wants, not me.”

“Very funny.” Fred sighed. “Keep on it. See what else you can dig up about this Utterback character.” Ketcham would already have people working on it, he knew. Fred stood up and girded himself to face his chief of detectives.

Altschuler, his face as rumpled as his shirt, waved Fred into his office. His desk and the table behind it were piled high with papers. “Fred, just the man I wanted to see. Pull up a chair.”

Might as well be comfortable while Altschuler flew off the handle. Fred eased himself into the twin of the leather chair in his own office, the one Altschuler liked.

“How did the stakeout go last night?”

Last night felt like years ago. “It was a meth lab, all right, but they'd already taken off. In some hurry. We found enough to suggest that they'd been there that day. So the best we can say is that we closed that one down. Sheriff Inman's coordinating with the state police. He'll keep an eye on it from here on. Easiest access is from the county side of the woods.”

“Good, good.”

“He'll probably take credit for it, of course.”

“Let him. We'll get out the word that we're cooperating. Make us all look good.”

“I agree.” And we won't tie our people up, hiking in and out of those woods.

“So where do we stand on Purcell and Vint?”

“We finally have an ID on the prints from Vint's car, and they match the partials we had on the stone we think hit Sylvia Purcell.”

“And?”

“It's a man with an arrest record for assault in Michigan, but he wasn't convicted and hasn't been seen since. White male, age forty, brown hair and eyes, five nine, no distinguishing marks. The photo's fifteen years old, water damaged. And his face is hidden by a full beard.”

“Name?”

“Fifteen years ago he went by Ward Utterback, but there's no recent record of him by that name in Michigan or Indiana. Ketcham's keeping on it.”

“Could be anybody. Could be Ketcham.”

Now Fred grinned. “If we didn't know he'd lived here all his life. Or Newt Inman. Not you or me—I'm too tall, and you're too old.”

“Thank God for small favors.”

Fred crossed his legs. And that Altschuler was feeling so mellow today.

“Keep me informed,” the captain said.

“I will. You want to release the name?” Fred hoped not, but if Altschuler was going to do it, he'd rather know than be blindsided.

“I don't see any reason to. Do you?”

“No. At this point, he doesn't know we know it. So far it hasn't occurred to him to wear gloves. We can only hope he'll continue to be that confident—or that stupid.”

“Nobody who's covered his tracks that well is stupid.”

“We don't know that he changed his identity. He could have been anywhere. We haven't had time to check all the other states, much less Canada. It's a quick hop from Detroit to Windsor, Ontario, and you don't need a passport.”

“That where he was arrested? Detroit?”

“No, Benzie County, over by Lake Michigan, pretty far north in the Lower Peninsula.” Why did he remember where Benzie County was? One more bit of usually useless information stashed in his brain. “That figures, if he used a Petoskey stone. I just meant that Canada was close to Michigan. Who knows where else he's been?”

“Or who'll get it next.”

“Yeah.” That was the damnable part of it, Fred thought when he was back in his own office. With so little to go on, they might not find out anything more until he killed again, if he did. Unless Mr. Utterback became overconfident. He was a good shot, that was for sure.

He'd been in Michigan long enough to establish an identity there when he was arrested. But it made more sense to change his identity after he had a record than before.

Trouble was, plenty of people moved around in this day and age, and residents of college towns were more mobile than most. Fred checked his watch. Late enough to try the elusive Matt Skirvin in his shop. He wondered how old the man was. Joan would know. He picked up the phone.

For a change, she answered her own phone. “I'm glad you called,” she said, but she sounded more anxious than glad.

“You all right?”

“Now I am.”

“What does that mean?”

“We had a firsthand demonstration of Bert Barnhart's temper. For a little while there, I thought he was going to tear the place apart.”

“Who's Bert Barnhart?”

“I thought I told you about him. His wife cleans for Annie Jordan, and Bert's run out of unemployment. They were counting on getting the contract to clean those apartments, but of course that's been delayed. They're really up against it, Annie says.”

“That's rough, but why was he mad at the senior center?”

“He got the idea somehow that his wife was working here, and when we told him she wasn't, he thought we were lying. I'd heard he had a hot temper and a short fuse, and it's true.”

“You threatened to sic me on him?” He wouldn't put it past her.

“No, I offered him a job.” No longer anxious, she sounded amused.

“You what?”

“He's outside now scraping the rust off our railings before he paints them. I figure I'll pay him by the day. I can cover this job out of petty cash, and then, if he does good work, I'll ask the board to consider hiring him on a regular basis as our handyman. I'll admit I was a little nervous at first, but the minute he saw I was serious, he turned from nasty to businesslike. And I signaled Annie to call you if I got in trouble.”

A soft touch, but with a practical side to her, that was his wife. “Do you need a handyman?”