The Gift of the Magpie Read online

  I was thankful to get a parking spot near the door. The rain had slowed and then stopped while I was driving over, but it looked as if it would start back up before long. Probably just when I was ready to leave.

  Vern Shiffley was minding the reception desk. Which was unusual. When George, the appendicitis victim, was out the chief usually liked to replace him with someone less plainspoken than Vern. The department must really be hard up for bodies.

  At least they hadn’t neglected to decorate for the holidays. A six-foot artificial tree stood in one corner of the waiting room, decorated with gold and silver ornaments in the form of handcuffs, badges, and guns. In a new touch this year, it was covered with tiny blue Christmas lights and the star-shaped gold badge on top of the tree rested on what looked like a miniature version of the blue beacon that topped the department’s squad cars. And someone had decorated all the walls with garlands and bows made of yellow crime-scene tape and red danger tape braided together.

  “Chief in?” I asked. “I wanted to consult him about something.”

  Vern was already buzzing the chief on the intercom.

  “Hey, Chief—Meg’s here. Shall I—”

  “Send her back.”

  Vern waved in the direction of the chief’s office, although I already knew the way. I was a little worried. I wanted to talk to the chief—but I wasn’t sure it was such a good thing for him to want to talk to me.

  But he didn’t look mad—that was a relief. Just … glum.

  “I’d ask how the case was going,” I said. “But you’d think I was trying to pry, instead of realizing it’s just the polite thing to say when you’re greeting a police chief.”

  “And I’d say ‘great,’ except you’d know it was a lie the minute I said it.”

  “Sorry to hear that.” I took one of his two visitor’s chairs and tried to figure out what he was up to.

  “And if your ears were burning just now, it hasn’t been five minutes since I told Vern that maybe I should figure out some excuse to invite you down here, so I could see if you’d remembered anything else useful. Or heard anything useful around town. Because I know darn well someone in town knows something that will help me solve this murder, but they sure as the dickens haven’t shared it with me.”

  “And here I was trying to figure out a plausible reason for dropping by to see if you already knew some of the stuff people have been saying about Harvey,” I said. “I decided I should come down and ask if any of those people had listened to me when I told them to talk to you.”

  “Not yet.” He reached open and flipped open his trusty notebook. “Just who should I hope comes down to see me so I don’t have to go looking for them?”

  I did a brain dump of what I’d learned about Harvey. What Ms. Ellie had said about Harvey being a reader and his father the real hoarder. What Judge Jane and Mrs. Diamandis reported about the demise of the Dunlop family bank. About Clarence Rutledge helping Harvey with his roof and bringing him kittens and puppies to play with, and knowing what he did for a living but never hearing anything about a girlfriend.

  The chief took a satisfactory number of notes. Satisfactory to me, at least, since it suggested that I was being useful rather than annoying.

  “Interesting,” he said.

  “Oh, and you know that website where Tabitha says she met Harvey,” I said. “A Perfectly Good Place.”

  “Yeah.” He shook his head. “I checked it out. It’s going to take some doing, searching that whole site to see if it has anything to do with the murder. They all use aliases, you know. Of course, I think I would, too, if I were confessing some of the really personal stuff some of them have been sharing. But it’s going to make it very hard to check out her story—much less see whether there might be anyone else on there that he interacted with. And that wretched woman seems to think that telling me the aliases she and Mr. Dunlop used would be the equivalent of a priest breaking the seal of confession. I’ve had to turn that battle over to the town attorney. Of course, I’ve sent Mr. Dunlop’s laptop over to the computer forensics experts at your brother’s company. With any luck that will give us something useful.”

  “Glad to hear the Mutant Wizards are on the case,” I said. The chief winced, and I reminded myself to suggest to Rob that however catchy Mutant Wizards was as the name of a computer game developer, he might get more business from law enforcement if he came up with something else for his forensic division. Even Forensic Wizards might be an improvement.

  “Would it make you feel any better to know that I set my nephew Kevin to work on that website?” I went on. “Because I was dying to find out what Harvey had said there, and I couldn’t make head or tails of it when I checked it out.”

  “I would very much appreciate it if you could share any information young Kevin finds.”

  “It’s been at least an hour since I briefed him,” I said. “In fact, close to two. Maybe I should see what he’s learned.”

  “Please do.”

  The chief leaned back and laced his hands over his belly while I put my phone on speaker and called Kevin—who, as usual, refrained from answering his phone with anything as predictable and conventional as “hello.”

  “What now?” he said. “I’m busy.”

  “Just checking to see there’s anything else you need to investigate that website.”

  “Have you got anything else?”

  “No, but the Mutant Wizards forensic guys are playing with Harvey’s computer. I could have them call you if they find anything of interest.”

  As I could have predicted, Kevin couldn’t resist the challenge of playing cyber one-upmanship.

  “Tell them to look for any email exchanges between Tyre-Guy and BuriedinTreasure33,” Kevin said, and rattled off a couple of email addresses. “So far I haven’t found any signs that they interacted on the site. But I’ll let you know what I find once I’ve figured out the private messaging system.”

  “Did TyreGuy ever say anything that would give away his location?” I asked. “Or anything that suggested he had anything valuable in his house?”

  “He complained a few weeks ago about the Caerphilly building inspector giving him a hard time,” Kevin said. “Someone who was trying to find him could have used that. But as far as valuables—half the people on that site think they’ve got the lost gold of the Incas hidden somewhere in their clutter. Harvey said some stuff about finding family treasures, but nothing all that different from anybody else.”

  “So if you were trolling the forum, looking for someone to knock off for profit, you wouldn’t necessarily pick him?” I asked.

  “No,” he said. “Actually, if I were looking for someone to knock off for profit, I wouldn’t be trolling a hoarder forum. I’d go after the rare coin freaks, and people stashing gold bars in their basements so they have something to spend in case of a zombie apocalypse.”

  “Good point.” I glanced over at the chief and raised an eyebrow, in a silent question. He shook his head. “I owe you one,” I said to Kevin.

  “Big time,” he agreed, and hung up.

  “Very useful,” the chief said. “I wonder—should I have asked you to have him liaise with the Mutant Wizards forensic people?”

  “Pretty sure he will anyway,” I said. “Although it won’t look like anything you or I would think of as liaising. He’ll almost certainly get in touch so he can taunt them with anything he figured out before them, and they’ll all go into a frenzy of competitiveness to see who can find you the most information the soonest.”

  “That sounds even better than liaising,” the chief observed. “I will await the results with great pleasure. And knowing the aliases she and Mr. Dunlop used on the site does potentially give me a lever to use on the very uncooperative Ms. Fillmore. Perhaps I should call her again.”

  “Good,” I said. “But you probably want to use the term ‘screen name’ so she’ll know what you’re talking about. As long as I’m here, there was actually something else I wanted to talk t
o you about—Harvey’s stuff.”

  “If Mr. Haverhill is badgering you about getting access to the house, refer him to me,” the chief said. “And I will explain the situation to him for the tenth or eleventh time. I don’t yet know if there’s anything in that wretched house that will help me solve Mr. Dunlop’s murder, and quite apart from that, I don’t know who inherits it all, so he can just cool his jets.”

  “And meanwhile, there’s the challenge of protecting his stuff,” I said.

  “I wish I had the personnel to put a guard on the house,” he said. “We’ve stepped up patrols in the area. Of course I realize that didn’t do much to protect Mr. Dunlop, but I don’t think his stuff’s likely to unlock the door and wander out to the garage, so maybe there’s hope.”

  “But it’s not just burglars we need to worry about,” I said. “You saw all the tarps on his roof. Clarence said something about the last time he was there helping Harvey add a new tarp. What if they didn’t quite get it right? This latest rain could already be turning all those papers in his house into a sodden mess.”

  “Good point.” He grimaced. “We should probably finish moving Mr. Dunlop’s stuff into the furniture store for safekeeping. Easier to keep an eye on it there, anyway. Only one place to guard. Problem is getting the work done—because no offense, but we can’t just have a random collection of townspeople wandering in and out carrying stuff. Do we have any idea who packed the papers that are already down at the furniture store?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Josh and Jamie. Except for half a dozen boxes I packed myself. And there were only a dozen people working there yesterday—I could give you a list.”

  “That’s something,” he said. “If I wasn’t so shorthanded, I’d get my deputies to do the packing, but we’re already stretched thin. So—”

  “Chief?” Vern’s voice on the intercom. “Randall’s here.”

  “Send him in,” the chief said.

  Randall Shiffley strode in, shaking the rain out of his hair.

  “Meeting of great minds, I see,” he said as he folded his long, lanky torso into the chief’s other guest chair. “What did you want to see me for?”

  “The furniture store,” the chief began. “It has a security system?”

  “Not sure, but if it doesn’t I can have one in by evening,” Randall said. “Are you suggesting poor old Harvey might have had something worth stealing?”

  “No idea,” the chief said. “But I don’t like the way so many people are bound and determined to get their hands on his stuff. So I want to move it all to the furniture store and get some good security on the place before some vital piece of evidence disappears. That’s the other thing.” He sat up a little straighter in his chair and his voice took on a more official tone. “Given the department’s current personnel shortage, I’d like to put in an official request to have you assign some city or county personnel to assist us in transferring the remaining evidence from Mr. Dunlop’s house to a more secure storage area.”

  Randall looked briefly puzzled.

  “You want me to assign government employees to pick up where Meg and her crew left off?” He gave me a sidelong glance.

  “Well,” the chief said. “Since Meg, being your assistant, is a part-time government employee you could recruit her to run the show. And find her a couple of strong backs to help out with the hauling. It was one thing to have a mob of volunteers shoving Mr. Dunlop’s stuff into bags and boxes when we thought it was just clutter. Now that there’s the possibility that it could be evidence—”

  “We need something a little more official.” Randall chuckled. “Okay—Meg, you’re hereby on temporary assignment to the police department. And I’ll get Beau and Osgood—they’re on the county books as part-time staff for when they do the snowplowing, and it’s not like they’ll be doing any of that in the next day or so. Heck, I’ll pitch in myself. I’m about as official as it gets.”

  “Thank you.” The chief looked happier. Well, at least a little less stressed. “I’ll assign at least one deputy to the project, so the whole thing can be done under police supervision.”

  “I’ll head over as soon as I grab some lunch,” I said. I’d just checked my watch and realized that it was nearly one. No wonder the breakfast burrito Michael had given me seemed so long ago.

  “I’m on it,” Randall said. “How soon can you get the deputy over there?”

  The chief punched a button on his intercom.

  “Vern. Head over to the Dunlop house, will you? You’re overseeing the packing.”

  “Right away, Chief.”

  “See you there,” Randall said.

  “I’ll drop by myself to help if I can,” the chief said. “And—”

  “Chief?” Vern again. “Any chance you could come out here for a sec?”

  Chapter 21

  The chief frowned and hurried out. Since I was supposed to be leaving anyway, I followed.

  Two of the Haverhills were standing in the entrance area—Josephine, the sister, and one of the brothers. Probably Ernest. They were both in the same pose—leaning forward with shoulders rounded and both hands resting on the handle of an oversized black umbrella.

  “Good morning,” the chief said. “Thank you for coming in. Ms. Haverhill, perhaps we could start with you.”

  They both stared at him as if puzzled.

  “What do you mean ‘start with me’?” Josephine asked.

  “I assumed you were responding to my request to interview you,” the chief said. “Any information you can provide about your cousin could help us find his killer.”

  “Unfortunately, we didn’t know him very well,” Josephine said. “He cut himself off from the rest of the family years ago, and was resisting our efforts to help with his hoarding problem. I’m not sure what information we could provide that would be useful.”

  “Any family background at all,” the chief began.

  “And no offense intended, but one hears so much about overzealous policing,” Josephine went on. “Innocent people accused of crimes because they are too trusting. I think we’d like to have our attorney accompany us when we talk to you.”

  Evidently Ernest was used to letting her do the talking. He just nodded.

  “That’s your right, of course.” The chief probably sounded calm to them. I could tell he was furious. “If you need an attorney—”

  “I will contact our family attorney to find out when he’s available,” Josephine said.

  “Thank you,” the chief said.

  “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” Ernest said.

  “Be quiet,” his sister told him.

  “We weren’t anywhere near here when Harvey was killed,” Ernest went on. “When Morris got home—”

  “Shut up, Ernest,” Josephine shouted.

  “Why?” Ernest asked. “Why don’t we just tell them about how we spent a quiet evening at home, worrying about Harvey and ordering in Chinese? I bet the delivery guy from the Hunan Palace—”

  “We’ll tell them all that,” Josephine snapped. “But not without our attorney.”

  She lifted her head and straightened her spine slightly—although not quite enough to erase her resemblance to a praying mantis—and strode out.

  “Waste of time and money,” Ernest muttered, and followed her.

  We all watched in silence as the Haverhills got into their car and drove off.

  “I think right now Ernest is my favorite Haverhill,” I said. “Of course, that’s rather like saying Lucrezia is my favorite Borgia.”

  “You’d think they didn’t want their cousin’s killer found,” Vern said. “And—”

  The door opened, and we all turned. I was half expecting to see one or both of the Haverhills back with a lawyer in tow.

  But it was Tabitha Fillmore who walked in and stood dripping copiously onto the linoleum and looking cranky and impatient.

  “What can I do for you, Ms. Fillmore?” the chief asked.

  Instead of answering, she
reached into her sodden black suede purse and drew out a damp folded sheaf of papers, which she handed to the chief.

  He unfolded them and read, frowning slightly. Finally, he looked up.

  “Thank you,” he said. “May I keep this or—”

  “No!” she said. “I don’t have another copy. Not with me.”

  “I’ll have a photocopy made, then.” The chief gestured to the copy machine that stood behind the reception desk. “Vern, if you wouldn’t mind.”

  He handed the paper to Vern, who obediently ambled over to the copy machine. Tabitha watched him as if she expected him to run away with her papers. I could see Vern trying to read the document as he copied. His eyes grew wide.

  “So can I have the key now?” Tabitha asked.

  “The key?” The chief gazed at her placidly.

  “The key to my house. You read the will. It’s mine now.”

  “That’s as may be.”

  Vern returned with the original and the copy and handed both to the chief, who passed the damp original back to Tabitha.

  “It says so in the will,” Tabitha said. “He left it to me. He left everything to me. I want the key to my house!” She stamped her foot and pouted in what would probably have been an adorable expression of girlish petulance if she were still in her early teens.

  “Ms. Fillmore,” the chief said. “It doesn’t work that way. Before I can turn anything of Mr. Dunlop’s over to you, that will would need to be probated—which means that the court would have to authenticate that it was really his will, and moreover that it was the most recent will he’d made. If you want to go down to the courthouse and start the process rolling, go right ahead. An even better idea would be to hire yourself a lawyer to handle the process—including the hassle that’s going to happen when Mr. Dunlop’s family finds out and tries to contest the will. If you don’t know a lawyer, Vern can lend you our copy of the yellow pages.”