Саманта Сильвер - Busy As A Beaver

Chapter 16

That afternoon I only had a couple of patients, which were relatively painless to deal with. Just a couple of checkups of happy and healthy animals.

My mind was still preoccupied with the beaver problem. Beavers were important in Oregon, and they were actually somewhat protected by the law. If they caused significant issues, it was possible to trap and relocate them—some beavers had chosen unfortunate locations that led to houses being fully flooded by their dams—but that was definitely not the case here. This was a case of a man being angry that the size of his already large backyard had been reduced by a single foot, and he seemingly wasn’t willing to make any concessions.

By the end of the day, I knew what I was going to do.

In Oregon, the beaver was actually an important and celebrated animal. They were not only the official state animal, but in 1849, when the Oregon territory defied the federal government and created its own mint, the coins created by Oregon had featured a beaver on them. To this day, the state of Oregon still has a beaver on the state flag.

I was very aware that at the moment the US Wildlife Services was in the midst of a legal battle with a number of environmental protection groups when it came to what had to be done about beavers. However, I also knew someone at the Wildlife Services that I thought could help.

I gave her a call, and a few minutes later, I had a solution to my problem. One that was going to make everybody happy, I hoped.

I had received a text from Jason telling me that he was going to attend the local council meeting that night and asking me not to wait up for him. Sophie decided to come over for dinner once more, and as the two of us ate leftover pasta with some wine, we began to complain about just how hard it really was to solve this crime.

“I just don’t know where we can go from here,” I said, taking a big gulp of Chardonnay.

“I totally hear you,” Sophie said. “I spent half the day today when I was in the back trying to think about what we have to be missing, and I can’t think of anything.”

“I did speak to Betty at lunch,” I said. “She told me a lot about Francis as a boy, but I don’t think it’s anything that we can use, and she had definitely never heard the name Michael Carlton before he was killed.”

“Well, personally, I’m extremely disappointed in the both of you,” Bee said from her spot on top of the couch. “Buster is the world’s most important cat—well, next to me, of course—and I take your inability to find the person who attacked him as an immense failure in both your personalities.”

“Thanks for your input, Bee,” I said, giving my cat a sly glance. “I haven’t seen you throw out any miraculous suggestions.”

“Unlike you, I realize that my position as a cat means that detective work isn’t in the cards for me. My role is that of a motivator.”

“Yes, the promise that this is a failure of my personality is just super inspiring.”

“We all have our methods. I assume that you will be so devastated in failing me that you will redouble your efforts to find the person who attacked Buster.”

Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, I turned back to Sophie. “Betty says she hasn’t seen Francis Romano in about a dozen years. She says he was a bit of a troublemaker back when they were in school, but she thinks he would’ve been a good teacher.”

“That sucks,” Sophie said. “I seriously wish we knew why the killer thought Gloria, and presumably Michael, had any money. I think that’s the link we’re missing right now. Why would two retired public servants, a group of people known for being underpaid and overworked, have so much money?”

Suddenly, my eyes widened. Everything clicked. It all made sense.

“Hand me my iPad,” I said to Sophie, holding my hand out. She passed it over to me.

“What is it?”

I ignored her as I opened the screen and tapped away. “You know how Jason said the building underneath the school district workers’ building was a bank?”

“Yeah, Oregon People’s Credit Union,” Sophie nodded. “What about it?”

“Remember twelve years ago? What happened there?”

Sophie frowned. “Not really. But twelve years ago, we were in high school.”

“Right. And while you were busy partying every weekend and hooking up with the worst guys, I actually kept up with the news.”

“This story isn’t exactly making you out to be the coolest person ever.”

“Maybe not, but one of us remembers exactly what happened twelve years ago,” I said triumphantly as I opened up a news article from back then and handed the iPad over to Sophie.

“ Arrest Made in Biggest Bank Robbery in Oregon History, ” she read from the headline before scrolling down and continuing. “ The Portland County District Attorney’s Office has released a statement confirming the arrest of Charles Green in the robbery of the Oregon People’s Credit Union two weeks ago. The brazen middle-of-the-night robbery allegedly committed by Mr. Green, a longtime resident of Portland, ended with the Oregon People’s Credit Union vault being robbed of over $5 million worth of cash. ”

Sophie looked up at me and raised her eyebrows. “That’s not a small figure.”

“That’s for sure,” I nodded.

“What does that have to do with Michael Carlton, though? I mean, yeah, he worked above where that robbery took place, but presumably so did hundreds of other people. And how would Gloria’s husband have been involved?”

“If you keep reading, it says the police suspect Charles Green wasn’t working alone, but that he won’t tell police who his accomplices were.”

“Did Michael Carlton know Charles Green?”

“I think he did. And I think we do, too.”

Sophie’s eyes widened as she realized what I was talking about. “Chuck, the guy from the coffee shop who said he had moved away from Portland for a while.”

“Exactly. Who came back to town right when Charles Green was released from prison.”

“So he didn’t meet Michael Carlton while playing golf.”

“No, he didn’t. Thinking about it, there wasn’t anything in Michael Carlton’s house that indicated he played any sports at all. There certainly wasn’t any golf gear there.”

“Agreed,” Sophie said. “So Michael Carlton was Charles Green’s partner in crime.”

“And Francis Romano,” I added. “The three of them must have gotten together and committed the crime somehow.”

“We need to tell Chief Gary,” Sophie said, and I nodded in agreement.

“Absolutely.”

“I thought I told you girls to stay out of this,” Chief Gary said grumpily, obviously not happy to have been called into the station at eight p.m. on a Wednesday.

“I know, and we sort of did. We haven’t gone to see the guy himself,” Sophie said. “Besides, Gloria asked us to look into it. We couldn’t say no to her, not after everything she had gone through.”

“That’s no reason to get involved in yet another police investigation,” Chief Gary said, raising an eyebrow.

“Fine, well, we can always keep this information to ourselves and confront the suspect on our own,” Sophie said, crossing her arms. I hid a smile; I would have definitely not been nearly so aggressive with the Chief of Police in town. Sophie was acting like she’d forgotten this guy could throw her in jail for a while if he wanted to.

However, he obviously didn’t want to. Chief Gary sighed. “Fine. What do you know?”

Sophie and I explained everything we had figured out, and when we finished, he leaned back into his chair and sighed.

“You know, this isn’t nearly enough to go on.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.