Jonathan Kellerman - Rage

“Handyman?” said Milo.

The woman frowned as if he’d never get it. “He fixes things, but it’s more than that. Sometimes I feel like driving into Santa Clarita and seeing a movie, though God knows why, they’re all awful. Barnett looks after the place for me and he does an excellent job. Why’re you asking about him?”

“He live on the premises?”

“Right there.” She pointed to the oak grove.

“In the trees?” said Milo. “We talking Tarzan?”

She conceded a half-smile. “No, he’s got a cabin. You can’t see it from here.”

“But he’s not there, now.”

“Who said?”

“You asked if he was okay- ”

“I meant was he okay cop-wise, not was he okay because he was somewhere out there.” She glanced toward the highway. Her eyes said leaving the homestead was highly overrated.

“Has Barnett ever been in cop trouble, Mrs…”

“Bunny,” she said. “Bunny MacIntyre. The answer is no.”

Milo said, “So you used to live in L.A.”

“We’re making small talk, now? Yeah, I lived in Hollywood. Had an apartment on Cahuenga ’cause I needed to be close to the Burbank studios.” She flipped her hair. “Used to do stunts for the movies. Did a couple body doubles for Miss Kate Hepburn. She was way older than me but she had a great body so they could use me.”

“Ms. MacIntyre- ”

“Back to business, ay? Barnett’s never been in any kind of trouble, but when L.A. cops drive all the way here and ask questions it’s not because they want a nice cold drink from my Coke machine. Which, incidentally, is working just fine. I’ve got nachos and chips and some imported bison jerky.” She eyed Milo’s waistline. “Bison’s good for you, has the saturated fat of skinless chicken.”

He said, “Where’s it imported from?”

“Montana.” She turned and walked back inside. We followed her into a single, dim room with wide plank floors and a hoop rug and the head of a large, stuffed buck mounted on the rear wall. The animal’s antlers were asymmetrical, a gray tongue tip poked from a corner of its mouth, and one glass eye was missing.

“That’s Bullwinkle,” said Bunny MacIntyre. “Idiot used to sneak in and eat my garden. I used to sell fresh produce to the tourists. Now all people want is junk food. I never shot him because he was stupid- you had to take pity. One day he just dropped dead of old age on top of my Swiss chard, so I took him to a taxidermist over in Palmdale.”

She walked over to an old, red Coca-Cola machine flanked by revolving racks of fried stuff in plastic bags. A cash register squatted on an old oak table. Beside it was the jerky- rough-cut, nearly black, stacked in plastic canisters on the counter.

“Ready for that Diet Coke?” she asked Milo.

“Sure.”

“What about you, quiet guy?”

“The same,” I said.

“How much buffalo jerky? It’s a buck a stick.”

“Maybe later, ma’am.”

“You notice what it’s like out there? Damn oil painting, those deadbeats park all day and eat their own junk. Darn portable freezers. I could use the business.”

“I’ll take a stick,” said Milo.

“Three sticks minimum,” said Bunny MacIntyre. “Three for three bucks and with the Diet Cokes that’ll be six and a half.”

Without waiting for an answer, she pressed buttons on the machine and released two cans, wrapped the jerky in paper towels that she bound with rubber bands, and slipped it into a plastic bag. “There’s no grease to speak of.”

Milo paid her. “How long has Barnett worked for you?”

“Four years.”

“Where’d he work before that?”

“Gilbert Grass’s ranch- used to be up a ways, on 7200 Soledad. Gilbert had a stroke and retired his animals. Barnett’s a good boy, I can’t see what business you’d have with him. And I don’t pay attention to his comings and goings.”

“How do we get to his cabin?”

“Walk back behind my house- the one with no sign- and you’ll see the cut in the trees. I built the cabin so I’d have some privacy. It was supposed to be my painting studio but I never got around to painting. I used it for storage. Until Barnett fixed it up nice for himself.”

The path through the trees was a six-foot-wide swath overhung by branches. The black Ford pickup was parked in front of the cabin.

The tiny building was raw cedar with a plank door. One square window in front. As simple as a child’s drawing of a house. Propane gas tanks stood to the left, along with a clothesline and a smaller generator.

The truck’s windows were rolled up and Milo got close and peered through the glass. “He keeps it neat.”

He used a corner of his jacket and tried the handle. “Locked. You wouldn’t think he’d be worried about theft, out here.”

We walked up to the cabin. Green oilskin drapes blocked the window. A square of concrete served as a front patio. A hemp mat said Welcome.

Milo knocked. The plank was solid and barely sounded. But within seconds, the door opened.

Barnett Malley looked out at us. He was taller than he’d appeared on TV- an inch above Milo’s six-three. Still lean and rawboned, he wore his yellow-gray hair long and loose. Fuzzy muttonchops trailed below his jaw before right-angling toward a lipless mouth. Sun exposure had coarsened and splotched his complexion. He wore a gray work shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows. Thick wrists, veined forearms, yellowed nails clipped straight. Dusty jeans, buckskin cowboy boots. A silver-and-turquoise necklace ringed the spot just below a prominent Adam’s apple.

A peace symbol dangled from the central turquoise. More aging hippie than militiaman.

His eyes were silver blue and still.

Milo showed him I.D. Malley barely glanced at it.

“Mr. Malley, I don’t mean to intrude, but there are some questions I’d like to ask you.”

Malley didn’t answer.

“Sir?”

Silence.

Milo said, “Are you aware that Rand Duchay was murdered Saturday night?”

Malley clicked his teeth together. Backed into his cabin. Closed the door.

Milo knocked. Called Malley’s name.

No response.

We walked to the south side of the house. No windows. At the rear a single horizontal pane was set high into the northern wall. Milo stretched upward and rapped the glass.

Bird calls, forest rustles. Then: music.

Honky-tonk piano. A tune I’d always liked- Floyd Cramer’s “Last Date.” Solo piano, a recording I’d never heard.

Momentary hesitation, then the tune repeated. A flubbed note followed by fluidity.

Not a recording. Live.

Malley played the song through, then began again, improvising a basic but decently phrased solo.

The rendition repeated. Ended. Milo took advantage of the silence and knocked on Malley’s window again.

Malley resumed playing. Same tune. Different improv.

Milo turned on his heel, lips moving. I couldn’t make out what he said and knew better than to ask.

On our way out of the campgrounds, we spotted Bunny MacIntyre over by the RVs, talking to one of the elderly couples. Her hand went out and some bills were passed. She saw us, turned away.

“Charming rural folk,” said Milo, as we got back in the unmarked. “Is that the theme from Deliverance I hear wafting through the piney woods?”

“Should’ve brought my guitar.”

“A duet with Barnett the Pianner Man? Was that the reaction of an innocent guy, Alex? I was hoping I could eliminate him, but just the opposite.”

“Wonder why he keeps that welcome mat in front,” I said.

“Maybe some people are welcome.” He turned the ignition key, let the car idle. “The bloodhound part of me is itching to sniff, but the self-styled protector of victims thinks it’s gonna be a shame if Malley turns out to be a murderer. Guy’s life was blown to bits. I don’t read the Bible, but on some level, I get the whole eye-for-an-eye thing.”