Рита Браун - Whisker Of Evil

“I helped, you know.” Pewter puffed out her chest, as did the jay. They looked like odd mirrors of each other.

“Queedle, queedle,” the jay’s beak clacked.

“I did!”

“Pewter, you’d run the other way if you saw a dead anything.”

“Bull! I picked up a dead pileated woodpecker, and I’ve seen plenty of dead old things.” She stopped for a moment as she inched a tad closer. “The smell. Hate the smell. Tucker, of course, loves it, but dogs are—well, I don’t have to explain.”

As birds have a sharp sense of smell, the jay shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me one way or t’other. I’m not a carrion eater so I don’t much care, but the crows, now, they’ll tell you that the eyes and the tongue are the greatest delicacy. Whenever a large mammal dies, they hurry to get there before the buzzards.” He slicked down his handsome crest for a moment. “I love acorns and seeds. I bury them, you know.”

“You don’t remember where you buried them.”

He cocked his head. “Sometimes I do forget. Tell you what, whoever planted Mary Pat up there on that high ridge didn’t forget.”

“Don’t know if it’s Mary Pat for sure.” Pewter scooted a tiny bit closer.

“It is. We birds can get the word out faster than you guys. And I’ll tell you something else, fatty: No Ziggy Flame up there. I bet you Ziggy was right under the human noses all the time.”

A thin tongue of breeze licked the distinctive pin-oak leaves.

“That was before my time, but everyone says that Ziggy was charismatic and bright, a bright chestnut. I don’t think anyone could hide him. Not for long. He wasn’t under their noses.” Pewter refuted the jay.

“You know, if you fly over those high pastures there are old trails, and some will take you east, some west. But the most interesting one, considering what’s going on, is the one that will take you right down into Greenwood and Route 250. Whoever killed Mary Pat could have hidden Ziggy, then walked him down to Greenwood, loaded him on a trailer, and been out of town before you can say ‘caterpillar.’ ”

“Guess that’s one of the reasons—the disappearance of Ziggy Flame—that Alicia wasn’t as solid a suspect as the cops hoped she was.” Pewter swished her tail. Since the caterpillar had crawled on it, she felt like other things were crawling over her. “I mean, the woman inherited everything but a couple of broodmares. Ziggy Flame was hers. Why steal him?”

The jay gurgled, then spoke clearly. “Throw everyone off the track.”

“Do you think Alicia Palmer killed Mary Pat?”

He shrugged, fluffed out his feathers. “I don’t know Alicia, but one human’s pretty much like any other. They’re killers by nature.”

Pewter didn’t dispute this. The human predatory drive seemed out of proportion to their needs. “Harry’s different.”

The bluejay liked to needle Pewter, but Harry did seem closer to animals than most humans. He decided not to disparage Pewter’s favorite human. He watched as Blair opened the back door of his farmhouse. “Aren’t you going to join them?”

“No.”

“What if a whole bag of tent caterpillars fell on you?”

Pewter shuddered. “Ugh.” Then she leapt at the bluejay, who simply flew straight up, circled, and dive-bombed her.

“Fat cat!”

“I will get you,” Pewter spat as he circled her one more time, then sped away.

Harry, like the Sanburnes, recognized that Blair was from other parts. But much as it cut against the grain, she decided to come straight to the point with him. This denied her the pleasure of coming to the point by those decreasing concentric circles that gathered in a wealth of information. That information might appear extraneous, but in good time it was always money in the bank. The other reason she shied away from this was she would go straight to the point only with a dear friend. Such communication was a sign of love and respect. Much as she liked Blair, he wasn’t as close to Harry as Susan, Miranda, or Herb.

After Harry and Blair exchanged ideas about Carmen’s disappearance, the strange events going on, Amy Wade’s settling in at the post office, and other sundry things, Harry thought she might as well get to it.

“More tea?” Blair offered.

“No, thank you. I’ve overstayed my welcome as it is. I know you’ve got a lot to do.”

“Not as much as you.” He smiled.

“The shed is wonderful. I can’t thank you enough for your help, and the fence posts are a godsend.”

“Harry, you’ve bailed me out of so many things. If it weren’t for you, I don’t think my cattle would be looking as good as they do.”

“Oh, Blair, you would have learned sooner or later.”

Harry had built him a cattle chute, which made worming, giving shots, and tagging so much easier. Blair had been trying to catch his cattle one by one in the field.

“I hope you will forgive me for being direct.”

He leaned forward, his sensitive eyes welcoming. “You know I think it saves time.” Saving time is quite a virtue among Northerners.

“That it does. As you know, this is the old Jones place, and you’ve done a beautiful job restoring the cemetery. Herb can’t keep up with that and his duties, too.”

“Thank you.”

“Actually, I should tell you that he and I have spoken and he’s asked me to broach this subject.” She took a deep breath. “Blair, should you sell this place for any reason, Herbie and I would like to buy it together. We’d work with you any way we can because, as you know, neither one of us is exactly cash heavy.”

A broad smile crossed Blair’s face, a face instantly recognizable to anyone who read magazines or looked through clothing catalogs. “No kidding.”

“We celebrate his thirty years at St. Luke’s next month on the seventeenth. I reckon he’ll retire sometime in the next ten years, maybe even the next five. He’d like to live in the farmhouse. And I’d like to farm the bottomland.”

“I see. Is the next question about my intentions regarding Little Mim?” Blair, in his sweet way, tried to be Southern by saying intentions.

“Actually, no.” Harry exhaled, relieved that she had spoken about the land. “I don’t think that’s my business.”

“Harry, you really are different, you know that?”

“No.”

“Trust me. You are. You are the strangest combination of curiosity and rectitude. You can’t resist being a detective, but you don’t want to pry into someone’s personal life.”

She flashed her crooked smile. “If I thought you were a murderer, I’d pry.”

“Oh, Harry.” He tapped the table with his knife. “I didn’t want to fall in love with Little Mim. I thought she was just another spoiled, empty, rich snob, but I was wrong. She’s not. And becoming vice-mayor has brought her out of herself and out from under her mother’s shadow. She’s a remarkable lady.”

“She is.” Harry, while not feeling especially close to Little Mim, could appreciate her good qualities.

“Aunt Tally is for me. Jim and I get along great, but the mother—oh, she’s not thrilled about my line of work, and she thinks I’ll fall prey to temptation. All those female models. Since most of them are anorexic or bulimic, I’m not attracted one bit!” He laughed.

“Big Mim’s much better about you than she used to be.”