Paul Doiron - Trespasser

“How the hell did you get wrapped up in this investigation?” he demanded before I could squeeze in two words.

“I don’t know, Lieutenant. It just seemed to happen.”

“That’s always the way with you.” He was a chain-smoker, and you could hear the damage to his lungs in his every utterance.

When I mentioned how Charley Stevens had gone with me to the Westergaard house, the lieutenant let loose with a gravelly groan. He and the warden pilot were dear friends, but he believed that Charley and I goaded each other on to deeds of greater recklessness. We were mutually bad influences, in his opinion.

“If it’s any consolation,” I said, “the AAG says she’s pretty much done with me-until she goes to trial.”

“Good, because Frost is back tomorrow. She can be your liaison with the state police going forward. You’ve got enough on your plate.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Just do your job for once.”

That last comment stung. For all my occasional misadventures, I’d begun to consider myself a competent law-enforcement professional. I had a high conviction rate on my arrests. My activity reports were all up-to-date. And the only formal complaint against me-by an obnoxious boater from Massachusetts named Anthony DeSalle, who had accused me of harassing him and his son last summer-had collapsed under its own weight.

Of course, this glowing assessment of my character conveniently failed to take into account my maverick actions during the period of my father’s manhunt. Among the power players at the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, hearing that Warden Mike Bowditch had bumbled his way into another murder investigation would be nobody’s idea of a surprise.

At the Square Deal Diner, heads turned as I walked through the door, and every conversation in the room stopped. The gruesome murder on Parker Point was undoubtedly the topic of the day. And now who should arrive but the man of the hour himself.

Charley had settled down in a corner booth, as far from the lunch counter as possible. I’d expected that Ora would be with him, since the motel was just behind the diner, but he was alone. No one said anything to me as I crossed the room, but you could feel the curiosity quotient rise by ten degrees.

“Goddamn you, Charley,” I said in a hushed voice.

He rose to shake my hand-he always shook my hand when we met-and nearly crushed my metacarpals. “I am here to beg your forgiveness.”

“Granted.”

His expression turned solemn. “How did your interview go?”

“You mean my interrogation?” I unrolled the paper napkin from around the knife, spoon, and fork and spread it across my knee. “I’m assuming Menario brought you in earlier to go over your statement.”

“They showed me some video.”

“Me, too.”

“It’s a bad business, no doubt.” He studied me from beneath his bushy eyebrows. “You seem to have survived your encounter with Mrs. Westergaard with gonads intact.”

“The less said about that, the better.”

Ruth Libby came over with a coffeepot and a down-turned mouth.

“Everyone’s talking about what happened on Parker Point,” she said.

“What are they saying?” asked Charley.

“That a girl got killed in one of them new mansions. And that there was some gross sexual stuff.” She lowered her voice. “So you guys found the body, huh?”

“No comment,” I said.

She glanced at the men seated along the counter. “That’s what I’ve been telling the peanut gallery. I told them that cops are sworn to silence. But you know how those guys are.”

“What else are they saying?” It was predictable that Charley would throw discretion to the wind.

She turned our cups over and poured them full of black coffee. “Everybody’s talking about Erland Jefferts. They said this girl died the same as Nikki Donnatelli. Some people say it’s a copycat. Others say it just proves Erland was wrongfully accused the first time.” Her eyes flitted back and forth between us, looking for confirmation, but neither of us responded, so Ruth decided to take a new tack. “Those Westergaard folks come in pretty regular in the summer.”

Charley raised the cup to his mouth. “Do they now?”

“They always come in Sunday nights for pie and coffee. I guess they think we’re kind of quaint.”

“What makes you say that?” asked Charley.

“They told my mom we’re kind of quaint. That’s OK, though. In Maine, Mom says, being quaint is good for business.”

“How is your mother?” I asked.

Once again, Dot was nowhere to be seen. She was such a constant fixture at the diner that her absence seemed all the more unnerving.

“She’s waiting for the test results. She thinks it’s probably cancer.”

Like her mother, Ruth was one of the most genuine people I’d ever met. But even I was taken aback by her bluntness. I couldn’t imagine Sennebec without Dot Libby’s garrulous, sprightly presence.

“Tell her that I’m thinking about her,” I said.

She nodded but said nothing.

Charley leaped boldly into the void. “I’m curious about those Westergaard folks. How would you describe them, in your uncensored opinion?”

“Well, he’s foreign,” Ruth said. “And they’re very rich, but that’s nothing unusual around here. They both drive Range Rovers the same sandy color, his and hers. And they dress kind of Town amp; Country, if you know what I mean. My mom thinks he’s handsome for an older dude, and his wife is very glamorous. She’s taller than him. I know she bleaches her hair, because she came in once with the roots showing a little. I told her about Wendy at Shear Perfection, but she didn’t thank me or nothing.”

“You’ve got a good eye for details, young lady,” said Charley. “You should consider becoming a detective.”

“I don’t need the hassle. What can I get you?”

I ordered an egg sandwich and a molasses doughnut, since it was still breakfast time by my reckoning. Charley requested the tripe.

“You don’t see it on menus much anymore,” he observed.

“For good reason!” I said.

“When I was a youngster, we had tripe twice a month.”

“Well, you’re the first one who’s ordered it in a while,” Ruth replied with characteristic candor.

Charley shook his head in mock sorrow. “What’s wrong with tripe?” he asked once Ruth had left.

“It’s fallen out of culinary fashion.” I swirled the cream around in my coffee and decided to stop procrastinating. “Jill Westergaard is in total denial about her husband. She told me he’d never cheat on her with a ‘mouse’ like Ashley Kim.”

He dabbed the corner of his mouth with the napkin. “Under the circumstances, I’d cut the woman some slack. She’s had a terrific shock, you know.”

I frowned in disagreement but moved on anyway. “What do you make of the similarities to the Erland Jefferts case?”

“That’s a can of worms no one wants to open.”

We both sipped our coffees. The warm cinnamon smell of baking pies drifted out of the kitchen as Ruth Libby opened and closed a door.

“I thought Ora was going to join us,” I said.

“She’s got a wicked headache.”

“I hope she’s not coming down with something.”

“It’s not that kind of headache.”

The wooden booth creaked as I leaned back against it. Something Sarah had said the night before flashed in my mind. “So how are your daughters doing?”

He winked at me, impressed by my powers of deduction. “Ann’s husband just got a promotion over to Bath Iron Works, making destroyers. As long as people keep blowing each other up, he should be comfortably employed.”

I remembered meeting Ann’s husband at Charley’s hospital bedside: a tubby, neatly barbered guy with an American flag lapel pin and a tone of certainty in his every utterance. My guess was that Charley and I shared the same view of him.