Doug Allyn - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 125, No. 6. Whole No. 766, June 2005

“Until they started shooting at me.”

“To be honest, I never thought they’d go that far.”

“Because they’re all such fine people?”

“No, damn it, because it’s stupid! Half the folks in town must know what Stegman and his loggers are doing. Nobody rats ‘em out because they’re local and they’re risking their necks for every log they salvage. I can understand them trying to run you off to protect their living. But a killing would be crazy. It’d bring the state police down on ‘em and their secret wouldn’t last ten minutes. Folks won’t lie to the law to cover a murder.”

“Not even mine?”

“Hell no! You don’t think much of these people, do you, Mr. Raven?”

“Let’s just say we’ve had different life experiences. If your tan was a little darker, maybe you’d have a clue.”

“Ever occur to you when you show up packing an attitude and an automatic, folks won’t roll out no red carpet no matter what color you are?”

“What’s wrong with my attitude, Paquette? Too uppity for you?”

“Put a lid on it, both of you!” Shea snapped. “We’re all in the same crapper now and barking at each other won’t help.”

“Not exactly the same,” Raven countered. “Nobody’s shooting at you.”

“They were yesterday and they might try again tomorrow unless we come up with something. Puck, if you had this thing figured, why the hell didn’t you say so?”

“I thought Raven squared things away out at the sawmill. These guys are loggers, not gangsters. He put the fear of God into ‘em. I figured they’d talk it over and try to cut a deal.”

“What kind of a deal?” Raven asked.

“Your place has a perfect view of the bay. You’d spot their operation sooner or later and they know it. When running you off didn’t work, I expected ‘em to offer you a piece of the action to keep quiet. I never thought they’d try to kill you. It doesn’t make sense.”

“Maybe they’re dumber than you think.”

“No,” Shea frowned, “he’s right. Why risk murder when you can solve the problem for a few bucks? The constable took you for a lowlife because of your arrest record, and anything that kid knows, the Stegmans know, too. They should have tried to buy you off.”

“Maybe they figured a bullet would be cheaper. Especially for a half-breed.”

“I don’t believe that,” Puck said stubbornly. “I’m a logger, a cedar savage like those boys. I don’t feel that way and don’t think they do, either. We got no royalty up here, nobody gives a damn about your pedigree. A man’s measured by what he does, not who his daddy was.”

“Okay, Mr. Paquette, let’s say your logger pals are all stand-up guys, not a racist prick in the bunch. I don’t think so, but for the sake of argument, if the color of my skin isn’t the problem, then what is?”

“I don’t know,” Puck said slowly. “The only thing that killing you would change is this house. It would go back to being a museum, the way they wanted in the first place.”

“That can’t be it,” Shea argued. “Nobody shoots anybody over dinosaur bones or old arrowheads.”

“But as a museum it would have stayed pretty much as it was,” Puck mused. “Maybe it’s something about the way we’re remodeling it—”

“No, the trouble started even before they knew what my plans were.”

“But they could have made things a lot tougher,” Shea said. “Why didn’t they?”

“How do you mean?”

“That building inspector could have stopped us cold. If he’d condemned the supports, an appeal to the state would’ve taken months and cost a bundle. He even admitted he wanted to jack us around—”

“—but he had his orders,” Raven finished. “You’re right. If they’re trying to run me out, why did Donakowski give us a pass?”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Puck said. “Unless... ”

“What?”

“Maybe he wasn’t giving us a break. Maybe he just didn’t want us digging around those timbers.”

“Why would he care?”

“I don’t know. Unless there’s something down there they don’t want us to see?”

Raven eyed the older man a moment, then both men nodded.

“Dig them out,” Raven said. “Every damned one of them.”

They didn’t have to. Shea pulled the men off their jobs, passed out shovels, and set them to digging. Intersecting circles around each support base beneath the building, four feet deep. At the sixth column, halfway back, one of the men called Shea over.

“Is this what we’re looking for?” A bone angled up through the soil about thirty inches down. A femur. Possibly human.

“We’ll need to see more of it to be sure,” Shea said grimly. “But be very careful.”

Using spoons and a whisk broom, they cleared away more soil, revealing a rib cage, still wrapped in a rotted blanket. And a cheap red plastic purse tucked beside the remains.

Shea fished it out gingerly, checked inside. A few loose coins, lipstick tube, a wallet with three dollars. And a thirty-five-year-old driver’s license. A faded photo ID of a young dark-haired woman smiling shyly at the camera

Mary Beth Raven.

Swallowing, Shea turned to hand the purse to Beau. But he was gone.

He found him in the inner office, his weapons case open on the display table. An AR-15 assault rifle, matte black. A blunt, Benelli Tactical pump shotgun with a rear pistol grip. Two Glock handguns, both automatics. Checking the retainer spring on a magazine, Beau slid it into the pistol butt and slammed it home.

“What are you going to do?” Shea asked.

“What I do best. Collect what’s owed.”

“From whom? You don’t know who did this.”

“The hell I don’t—”

A hard rap on the door. Erin Mullaney stepped in.

“Puck called me, told me what you’d found. I’m so sorry—”

“We both know who’s been pushing me since I got here,” Beau continued, ignoring her. “That inspector who wanted to jack us around said he had his orders. I thought maybe Erin cut us a break but she didn’t. I only know one other person in this town with enough juice to order an inspector to give us a pass.”

Shoving the automatic into his belt in the small of his back, he picked up the short-barreled shotgun. Holding the slide, he racked the action one-handed, then began loading the magazine, pushing blunt red shells into the tube with a solid thunk.

“You can’t really believe Mr. Stegman caused your mother’s death,” Erin said.

“I don’t know. Neither do you. But I’m sure as hell going to ask him.” He racked the shotgun again, chambering a round.

“With that?” Erin asked.

“Lady, it’s a tool of my trade. Never shot anybody with it. Never had to. You’d be surprised how talkative people get when they’re starin’ down a barrel, seeing their future.”

“If that young punk constable spots you with that thing, he’ll panic and start shooting,” Puck said.

“Then he’d better not miss.”

“Or what?” Erin asked. “You’ll kill him? You don’t want that.”

“Don’t tell me what I want! That’s my mother down there! Thrown away like garbage, all these years. I’m gonna settle up for that, so you’d better decide which side you’re on.”

“You know I’m with you,” Erin said. “All the way. That’s why I won’t let you screw up like this. You had a gun in Iowa. It didn’t solve anything there. It won’t here, either. What do you want, Beau? To know the truth? Or just to get even?”

“Both,” he said. But he left the shotgun in the case when he snapped it closed.

A handful of townspeople were already gathered in the parking lot as word of the discovery spread. Beau stalked out of the fish house amid a buzz of murmurs and whispers, but no one asked him anything. One look at his eyes and people stepped aside.