Murder Talks Turkey (12 page)

“Put ’em up,” Walter said, leveling the shotgun our way.

“It’s Gertie Johnson,” I said through the open window, not getting out of the truck until introductions were over. “This is Kitty and my dog, Fred.”

Walter lowered the weapon but I could tell he hadn’t completely relaxed. I could also see that he hadn’t done any serious grooming in awhile, and hadn’t replaced his two front teeth since I’d seen him last.

“What you doing driving a sheriff’s truck?” he wanted to know.

“Stole it,” I answered truthfully.

He lowered the weapon. “Come on in then. I have a fresh pot of coffee ready.”

Just like a Finn. They’re always ready for company, even if it doesn’t come visiting often. Walter’s kitchen table wasn’t exactly fit for guests—food grime cemented on it, cans of toxic yard chemicals scattered across it, unidentifiable spilled liquids.

Kitty didn’t even notice. She sat right down and shoved a few items away before crossing her arms in the mess. I sat down gingerly beside her, avoiding any contact with the table.

“No brandy today,” I warned Walter after he poured three cups of coffee and picked up a liquor bottle. He shrugged, splashed some in his coffee cup, and held up the bottle, offering it again with an expression on his face like we were missing out on something special if we refused.

“We need our wits about us today,” I said firmly. “No brandy.”

It’s not our way to rush into the main topic without dancing around it for a certain amount of time. The weather is always good for a few minutes, so we did that. Then we had a few minutes of silence while we sipped our coffee.

“Gertie, you’re pert-ner stressed out as a doe delivering a fawn,” Walter finally said, using Kitty’s word for the day. Come to think of it, I hadn’t heard her use it even once. I guess we’d been too busy breaking laws to worry about a silly little word challenge.

“We’re wanted by the law, Walter. We need help.”

“Why didn’t you say so right at the start?”

“I don’t want to get you into trouble.”

Walter snorted. “With that pipsqueak sheriff, Dickey Snell? I’ve buried lead around his feet more than once. He won’t come out here without a death wish.”

“I thought we might be able to hole up in your trailer out back.”

“Help yourself. Stay as long as you want to.”

“And we have to dispose of Dickey’s truck and find new wheels. The Trouble Buster will stick out like a school bus.”

“You two ladies settle in. I’ll get rid of the truck and find transportation for you. Must be something drivable out in my yard.”

Kitty laughed at that, finding a common connection with Walter. Both of them had junky yards filled with rusty old garbage. “For parts,” Kitty would say when I asked her why she kept all that old stuff. “You never know when you’ll need a part.”

Lugging our suitcases, we trudged around the back of the house to the trailer that Walter rented out to hunters during deer hunting season. Fred loped ahead, scouting for squirrels, thinking he was on vacation.

I put the key into the lock, heard it pop, and swung the door open. Kitty and I both gaped. Squirrels had been partying inside the trailer. We hauled the suitcases inside anyway, since we didn’t have any other options.

I don’t know how the rodents gained access, but squirrels had chewed on some of the electrical cords and had stored acorns and seeds in every nook and cranny. Mattress stuffing had been ripped apart as well as part of the insulation in the wall.

We set about putting things in order the best we could, then unpacked. I scooped dog food into a bowl I found in the tiny kitchen and fed Fred.

“We’re going to need food supplies,” Kitty said, looking hungrily at the bag of dog food I’d thought to bring with us. “We may be here awhile.”

“I’m going to use Walter’s phone to call Cora Mae,” I said. Fred trotted along as I made my way back up the short trail.

Cora Mae answered on the first ring. “Mary’s got everything under control,” she said. “Blaze is in jail. They gave him some dollar bills and a pot of coffee and that made him happy. Tomorrow Dickey’s having Blaze’s Glock sent to ballistics, whatever that means.”

Great. The killing shot would be traced right back to my son’s weapon. At least, he’d be able to claim mental incompetence at his murder trial.

“Where are you?” Cora Mae wanted to know.

“In Walter Laakso’s hunting trailer.”

“Oh Gawd, I’d rather be dead.”

“It’s not so bad,” I lied. We’d have to learn to make do from here on in. “We could use some food, for us and more for Fred.”

“You better not go anywhere,” Cora Mae said. “You and Kitty were just on the TV6 news and an alert keeps beeping and running across the bottom of the television screen. You should have thought about the consequences before you busted out of jail.”

Well, that was true enough. “Adrenaline took over,” I replied. “We couldn’t stop ourselves.”

“You’re too impulsive for your own good,” she said.

“Tell George we’re okay and don’t forget to bring food. Oh, and, bring your wigs.”

“Why do you want my wigs?”

“We can’t sit here doing nothing. We have a case to crack before Blaze ends up in prison.”

__________

At three o’clock we had a trailer-full of company. George and Cora Mae brought potato sausages, pasties, sugar doughnuts, and two wigs we’d used in the past for surveillance work. Kitty’s was a black shoulder-length flip. Mine was long and blond. Cora Mae’s favorite, a nifty red highlighted upsweep with a few dangly sexy curls, was already on her head.

Kitty’s shifty cousin showed up, driving a purple sedan and making me more than a little nervous. The two of them went outside, Kitty in her new wig, and I could hear her negotiating with him over something. “I’ll bail you out of jail next time. I promise,” Kitty said. “I’m telling you, I need it right now.”

A camera flash went off, and her cousin left.

I raised an eyebrow, but didn’t want to question her in front of George and Cora Mae.

George went out to his truck and returned with four walkie-talkie handheld radios. After adjusting the frequencies to match on all of them, he distributed them, keeping one for himself.

Cell phone coverage in the Michigan U.P. is spotty at best. I’ve seen tourists standing on top of their cars trying to find signals. Most of us don’t bother with them, preferring the old-fashioned land phones with cords.

“Don’t use your radio unless you have to,” George advised us. “Since anyone close by and on the same channel can hear the exchange, only use it in an emergency situation.”

“What’s the range?” I asked.

“Twelve miles,” he answered, giving me a look like he’d seen more of me recently than the others suspected.

I tried not to blush. “That should be plenty of range as long as we stay close to Stonely.”

We practiced testing, testing, one, two, three until we all had the hang of it. “I’ve got your purse in George’s truck,” Cora Mae said into her radio. That made me squeal with pleasure.

I can’t live without my purse, and I don’t mean that in the same way most women mean it. Mine is stuffed with all the equipment a good investigator needs. I ran to the truck and retrieved it. “All here,” I said, rummaging through it. Handcuffs, whistle, mini recorder, and emergency money. I was set.

Walter came in just as we finished eating the sausages. “I got one of the vehicles running. Blue truck. I pulled it out next to the house. Here are the keys.” He handed me two keys dangling from a key chain made from a loop of hanger wire. “And I took care of the sheriff’s truck.”

“Where did you leave it?” I asked, hoping Walter had moved it someplace where Dickey would stumble over it sooner or later.

“Thunder Lake,” he answered.

“I stifled a screech. “Thunder Lake,” I repeated. “Over by Cooks?”

Walter nodded. “Yup.”

“Please tell me you didn’t run Dickey’s truck into the lake. Did you?”

“That’s what you do, when you don’t want something found,” Walter said, looking at me like I didn’t know the first thing about ditching a truck. “In the lake. On the deep end.”

I was in so much trouble. All through Blaze’s battle with meningitis, I’d wanted him to recover. I wanted my boy back just the way he’d been before he was struck down. Now, considering the latest development, I wished for the first time that he wouldn’t recover anymore than he already had. It was a selfish wish. I knew that. But if Blaze got his job back and found out I was responsible for that truck on the bottom of the lake, there was no telling what he’d do to me.

That was, if Dickey didn’t get to me first.

“I need a ride into Stonely,” Kitty said to George while she adjusted her wig. “I’m working at Herb’s Bar tonight.”

“You’re not expecting to still go to work?” I was shocked. After all that had happened, she wanted to prance around town, risking detection. “Besides, I don’t like the idea of involving the Red and Ed.”

“It’ll be fine,” Kitty said, waving away my concerns. “I’m going to work the bar for information. Once I explain to the boys how I’m trying to help their uncle, they’ll go along. And I’m not going to get caught.”

“Our mugs were spread through the entire U.P. How are you going to manage that?”

“I’m posing as Kitty’s sister. My cousin’s getting me a fake ID. His forgeries are just as good as the real thing. Even if Dickey asks me for identification, he won’t be able to tell the difference.”

So that’s what she was drumming up outside with her cousin. False identification. I wish I’d thought of that. “Can you get me one, too?”

“I had a hard enough time getting the one for me and I’m family. He usually charges a lot of money.”

Cora Mae licked sugar off her fingers and chimed in. “Gertie, I’ll fix you up so no one will recognize you.” She dug in her purse and came up with a cosmetic bag. “Come over here.”

I did what she said. When she was through with me I looked like a big city hooker with…well…never mind.

Chapter 17

THE PLAN WAS SIMPLE. George dropped Kitty at Herb’s Bar after I made a call to warn my grandsons about Korky, the new blond addition to their staff. They must know their grandma wouldn’t put them up to something like this unless it was really important, because they didn’t ask any questions or complain about hiring a wanted woman impersonating someone else. Kitty, I mean Korky, would keep her ears open, stir up conversation, and see what rose to the top.

Fred would stay with Walter, since he was the most recognizable member of the outlaws. An enormous black German shepherd with red, devil eyes would be hard to miss coming at you. Fred seemed to like Walter and especially appreciated the wealth of snacks on Walter’s kitchen floor.

Cora Mae and I decided to do some surveillance work over at Dave and Sue Nenonen’s house. Since Dave was the credit union manager and Sue worked for him, doing the books, they were at the top of the suspect list. And if June was right, Sue had been talking about condos and had been seen wearing expensive jewelry.

Along with counting on gut feelings, an investigator has to know a lot about human behavior, has to zero in on anything out of the ordinary. Any little nuance (one of last week’s words for the day) can be important. Dave and Sue had my full attention at the moment.

We stood next to an old blue truck in Walter’s driveway. It was the rustiest thing I’d ever seen in my life. When I opened the driver’s door, it creaked and resisted, and I thought it might fall off any minute. The bench seat was shredded, probably by the same squirrels that trashed the trailer, and even the floor boards were rusted away.

“Don’t start in on me,” I warned Cora Mae, who was scrunching up her mouth to give me grief about our transportation. “We have to make do with what we’re given.” She slid in without a single word, but her face said it all.

The truck started right up. When we left Walter’s house behind, we could see the road through the holes in the floor.

Dave and Sue had a big house compared to many of Stonely’s homes. That meant they had two living rooms and a dining room. Most of us had kitchen/dining combinations. All-in-one. And their separate family room moved them up to the upper-crust level. They even had a two-car, attached garage. Dave was an important citizen with a responsible position, and I always thought he worked hard for his money, so I wasn’t as offended by his display of wealth as some were.

I knew all about the interior of their home from my part-time seasonal job as census taker. What a dangerous job! Almost more hazardous than the investigation business. I’ve been chased by vicious dogs, had doors slammed in my face, and even faced a few shotguns and threats to my life. I wasn’t sure I’d continue in the position when census time came around again.

“Mortgage must be pretty high,” I said, while we watched the house from the truck.

“Now what are we supposed to do?” Cora Mae wanted to know. “This isn’t going to get us anywhere. What are we waiting for, sitting in this smelly, dirty old truck? Something died in here and I don’t want to know what. I suppose you think someone with orange shoes will come out of Dave and Sue’s house and we’ll walk right up and make a citizen’s arrest?”

I felt like I was with Grandma Johnson.

“The census badge won’t work,” I said, thinking out loud. “It has my name on it.”

Cora Mae’s eyes widened like platters. “You aren’t going up to the door, are you? That would be crazy.” Then she started laughing, easing up a little. “But look at you! Nobody would recognize Gertie Johnson under all that makeup.” She peeled off her black rain jacket, jiggled around in the seat until she had it out from underneath her and handed it over. “The hunting jacket is a dead giveaway. Put this on.”