Текст книги "The Ghost Wore Yellow Socks "

Автор книги: Josh lanyon

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 5 (всего у книги 12 страниц)

Amazing how much pain you could feel and still keep breathing…

And suddenly Perry had had all he could take for one day. He logged off the computer, told his indifferent coworkers good-bye, and got into his car.

Twilight was falling as he drove through the woods. Usually he loved this time of the evening, the gloaming. Trees towered in inky silhouette against a sky that was coolly and mysteriously absent of color. The lineament of fiery foliage was black and ragged in the failing light.

For the first time, Perry realized just how isolated the Alston Estate was. Witch Hollow Wood separated the mansion and grounds from the nearest farm, and the village of Fox Run was twenty miles away.

Mist rose from stygian water as he drove through the long covered bridge. The car tires thumped in the funereal silence.

* * * * *

Because his thoughts had been on Marcel all day, it surprised Perry to realize that he was missing Nick as he let himself in the front door of the old house.

He wondered again if Nick would take the job in California. He couldn’t imagine that he wouldn’t pass the interview, whatever it was. It was hard to picture anyone more capable than Nick Reno. Of course, it didn’t – shouldn’t – really matter to him, one way or the other, but the thought of Nick leaving was depressing.

He closed the door and turned the deadbolt. Tattered green holiday garland wound haphazardly up the long banister. More garland draped drunkenly from the chandelier. It probably would have constituted a fire hazard, but the chandelier, like most of the original electrical fixtures did not work. Instead, ugly modern lights had been installed. They glared down on the empty room highlighting the dust, the threadbare upholstery of the battered chairs, the discarded ladder still lying next to the staircase.

From down the hall he could hear Mrs. Mac’s television blaring the local evening news: traffic accidents and sports results – sometimes it was difficult to tell the difference. Lights shone beneath Jane’s door, and he briefly considered stopping by for a visit.

The thought of Mr. Fluffy discouraged him, his chest tightening at the thought of all that cat hair and dander. Besides, he really didn’t have the energy for small talk. He continued up the stairway, thinking that before the disastrous weekend he’d had his plans for the future to keep him company.

Now there was nothing to look forward to.

Even as the thought registered, he rejected it impatiently. He would be okay once he started painting again. It was just the house getting to him. It felt quieter, more empty than usual.

As he reached the second level, he heard someone knocking from down the hallway. Peering through the gloom, he spotted Jane, dressed in jeans and a bright blue sweater, banging on David Center’s room. As though she felt his gaze, she turned and visibly jumped.

“I didn’t hear you!” she said accusingly.

“Sorry. I was just going to Wat – my – apartment.” He regarded her doubtfully. She seemed…agitated. Not angry exactly, but…for sure not her usual relaxed, amused self. Maybe calling in sick to work had been a mistake. The atmosphere seemed to be finally getting to her too, although Jane previously seemed impervious to atmosphere.

She gave a final smack to Center’s door and asked, “Where is everybody?”

“Mrs. Mac’s TV is on. I could hear it from the lobby.”

“I meant humans,” Jane retorted nastily. “I haven’t seen Dembecki or Teagle. Stein has been out all day. I suppose David – Mr. Center – is still at work.”

“If you call reading tarot cards work.”

Jane snorted, but she didn’t make the expected joke. Perry had noticed that in the past couple of weeks, Jane’s attitude toward David Center had softened. Jane was so self-reliant and contained he had never considered that she might develop romantic feelings – especially for someone like David Center, whom Perry didn’t like. It made him feel lonelier still.

“It pays the bills, which is more than my crap job does.” Abandoning her post, Jane joined him in front of Watson’s door. “Goddamn this place,” she said with quiet vehemence.

“Is everything okay?” Perry asked. Clearly everything wasn’t okay, but he didn’t like to pry.

She shot him a sideways glance and muttered, “Yes, fine. It’s this place. It gets on my nerves.”

He could understand that. But this tired and tense Jane was so different from the Jane he knew. Everyone seemed different these days. Ever since Perry had returned from his aborted vacation.

Or had he just not noticed how odd everyone was in those weeks he had been happily cocooned in dreams of a future with Marcel?

Jane added, as though it was the last straw, “And Tiny has run away again. When’s your new chum, G.I. Joe, due back?”

“What makes you think Tiny ran away?”

She made a disgusted sound. “He’s gone. Nobody’s seen him since yesterday.”

Yesterday, after he had opened Watson’s rooms, disposed of the dead fish, and ducked out before Jane could recruit him to fix her leaking windows? Could this be relevant to the other mysterious happenings at the house? Perry couldn’t see how. “It’s not the first time he’s taken off,” he pointed out.

“I didn’t say it was unusual; I said it was annoying.”

Jane followed Perry into Watson’s rooms, poking curiously through the dead man’s CD and DVD collection. Perry had already checked both out. Watson enjoyed film classics such as Behind the Green Door and the music of Bread, the Turtles, and the Bee Gees.

Jane asked, “Don’t you think it’s creepy staying here? It even smells creepy.”

“The whole house smells creepy.”

“True.” Jane scrutinized the framed print of a shapely blonde nude riding a smirking dinosaur.

“It’s creepier in my rooms.”

Jane’s gaze swiveled from the wall decor. “Sweetie, you don’t still think you saw a dead man in your bathtub?” She was laughing at him, though not unkindly.

“I don’t believe I saw a ghost.”

“A ghost?” Jane looked thoughtful. “A ghost,” she repeated slowly. Then, shaking off her preoccupation, she said, “So what did you do today?”

Perry shrugged. “Looked through old newspapers. Hung out at the library.”

“If you’re just going to hang out the library, you might as well go back to work.” She was watching him curiously. He had told Jane a little about Marcel, but even Jane didn’t know how much he had pinned on that virtual relationship.

He went into Watson’s kitchenette and shook the box of Froot Loops cereal sitting on the counter. “Did you want some?”

“Is that your dinner?”

“Sure. Fortified with iron.”

“Sweetie, you need to eat properly. This stuff is for people saving up for decoder rings.” She watched Perry splash milk into a bowl. “So the California thing is all over?”

He nodded.

“I’m sorry.”

Perry shrugged.

Jane wandered around, snooping absently through Watson’s belongings. She said, “You should reconsider talking to David – Mr. Center. After all, this is his area of expertise. Maybe he could hold a séance.”

Through a mouthful of cereal, Perry said, “Huh?”

“A séance,” Jane repeated. “Haven’t you ever seen –”

“How would a séance help me with Marcel?”

“Marcel? Oh.” Jane hastily rearranged her expression. “I wasn’t thinking of Marcel. I was thinking about if the house really is haunted…”

“But I don’t think the house is haunted!”

“I do.”

Perry gaped. “You do?”

“Sure,” she said a little defiantly.

Jane had always seemed so down-to-earth. So sensible. He couldn’t get over this. “Why?”

She said – still defensive – “I’ve heard things. I’ve seen things. Why couldn’t it be a ghost?”

“Because there’s no such thing?”

“You’re just being close-minded.” Catching his astonished expression, she seemed to change her mind about saying more, instead heading for the door. “Well, enjoy your dinner.”

“You don’t have to leave.” He didn’t particularly want to be on his own, and the idea of Jane buying into the supernatural was kind of fascinating.

Jane’s smile was vague. “I’d like to hang out, but I’ve got some things to take care of. Nightie-night, sweetie.”

She’s going to try Center again, Perry thought. When had that started? Maybe it had been going on the whole time. He’d been so wrapped up in his own dreams that he hadn’t noticed what was going on under his nose.

Settling in front of the entertainment center with his cereal bowl, he began flicking channels. He didn’t own a television, so this was sort of a luxury. He realized with a mild sense of shock that he hadn’t watched TV since he had left home nine months earlier. He settled at last on 1931’s Little Caesar.

This film would have been made around the start of the Great Depression, around the time that Henry Alston and his Ziegfeld Girl were throwing parties for their rich society friends, while the rest of the country starved. No wonder gangsters like Shane Moran weren’t always viewed as the bad guys.

Absorbed, Perry watched the rise and fall of Rico Bandello as though it were history, laughing aloud as Edward G. Robinson snarled, “Yeah, that’s what I get for liking a guy too much!”

By the time Rico ended in a hail of bullets, Perry was feeling a lot more cheerful. He decided he could use a little fresh air before turning in for the night, and a brisk walk would help tire him out before bed. The last thing he wanted was to lie awake listening to the old house creak and crack under unseen footsteps.

Grabbing his jacket, he went downstairs, letting himself out into the moist and wintry night. High above the soggy garden, white clouds slowly transformed themselves into spectral horses and mountains and dragons, then pulled apart like cotton to show the glitter of faraway stars.

Perry wondered what the stars were like in Los Angeles – could you even see stars in the smoggy L.A. skies? He wondered why he was thinking about L.A. – and Nick – yet again. Probably because he couldn’t bear to think about San Francisco and Marcel.

He followed the narrow brick path through the maze of overgrown hedges and shrubs that had turned to brambles, until the path gave way to broken steps and then dirt and mud.

The old crooked tower of the dovecote stood before him. In the insubstantial starlight it looked like a witch’s house. It was one of his favorite subjects. He had made several sketches of it and painted it twice – even selling one of the paintings. He considered the structure.

It was a pretty good hiding place, really, that relatively small cylindrical tower with its interior walls made up of boulins or pigeonholes – assuming someone didn’t have allergies or asthma. Just the idea of that dank darkness made his chest tighten uncomfortably.

But there was no reason to believe Shane Moran and his gang would have dumped their ill-gotten gains before escaping into the woods – what sense would that make?

The bushes rustled behind him, and he whirled, heart pounding in terror. When his eyes verified that there was, in fact, someone standing there – a bulky black shape in the darkness – he thought he might actually faint.

“What the hell are you doing out here?” Rudy Stein demanded. He sounded as shaken as Perry felt.

Perry’s heart resumed beating as he recognized the other man. “Walking.”

Stein said aggressively, trying to cover his own fright, “Funny time for a walk, if you ask me!”

Perry squared his shoulders. “I could say the same to you.”

There was surprised quality to Stein’s silence. At last he gave a funny laugh. “Yeah, well, you better watch your step,” he said, pointing downward.

Perry looked down and realized he was standing in a puddle.

Stein gave another of those curt laughs. “Have a good night,” he said, and strode off in the direction of the river.

Perry gazed after him, but Stein’s figure was soon swallowed by the shadows.

The night closed around him again and he shivered. That was enough fresh air for one evening.

He made his way back to the house, went up to Watson’s rooms – again conscious of the strained silence within the empty halls – and prepared for bed.

Flossing his teeth, Perry weighed his options for the next day. Running into Stein seemed to confirm his suspicion that something was going on in the old house, and while it wasn’t really his business, the fact that a dead body had been dumped in his bathtub did sort of elicit his interest.

He decided to visit the historical society the next day and see what he could find on the house. He could try church records too. They were always useful in detective novels, although he wasn’t sure what he would be looking for in this case. Records of births and deaths would be the usual thing; perhaps Shane Moran had been a local boy. That would give him possible ideas for where Moran might have stashed his loot.

Perry blinked sleepily at the turn his thoughts had taken.

Shane Moran’s loot? He wasn’t planning to spend the rest of his vacation treasure hunting, was he? How had he gone from curiosity about the history of the house to wondering about Shane Moran’s final heist?

He rinsed and spat water into the sink, turned off the taps, and returned to the unfamiliar bedroom, climbing into the enormous bed. He turned on the electric blanket, snapped out the light and stared up at the ceiling. Shadows flicked across the pale surface as the tree branches outside the house were shaken by gusts of wind.

The next storm front was moving in fast.

For a time he lay in the darkness, listening to the wind and the old house creaking and settling for the night.

Inevitably his thoughts turned to Marcel – Marcel who had probably not given him another thought since e-mailing that apologetic farewell. How could he have been so wrong about Marcel? He had believed they truly knew each other, believed that they might even know each other better because their exchanges were unencumbered by anything physical. Their communications were the open, honest outpourings of mind and heart. For months they had shared everything – from the most mundane things to the most deeply personal. He knew that Marcel felt that he was being sexually discriminated against at work and that he disliked his female “harridan” boss; that he was allergic to shellfish and ragweed; that he loved the apple-raisin bagels at the bakery around the corner but didn’t eat them often because he gained weight easily; that he had been seventeen the first time he’d had sex with a man.

Perry was an expert in all things Marcel. But he hadn’t known the most important thing: that Marcel was still in love with Gerry.

It wasn’t just the embarrassment of all the things he had revealed to Marcel – all those confidences made in the belief that they shared an intimacy unique to them. He had told Marcel things he hadn’t shared with anyone before. Nor was it the realization that he had been a fool – though that hurt plenty.

He was grieving – truly grieving – for the death of that dream. Sometimes holding fast to that dream had been all that kept him afloat. And now it was gone: that foolish little fantasy of cozy domesticity, himself and Marcel living together. It was almost too painful to contemplate now, those snapshots that had previously brought such comfort and joy: grocery shopping together at Whole Foods, brushing against each other in their too-small kitchen as they prepared their wonderful gourmet meals, waking up together…smiling into each other’s eyes as they turned to make love…

He had known from the photos that Marcel would be good-looking, and he was. Tall and boyish, maybe a little plump – but in a cute way – unruly brown hair. True, his hair was thinner in real life, and Marcel had been a little bit older than his photo. He had bright blue eyes – a very different blue from the somber blue of Nick Reno’s. Perry had known he was going to love Marcel from the minute he saw him waiting at the gate looking apologetic and sheepish, in his own good-looking rumpled way.

Perry stared at the Armando Drechsler posters of Mayan princesses and tribal dancers on Watson’s bedroom wall. In the moonlight they looked like giant tarot cards, or travel posters to a mysterious unknown.

It was over now. And though he knew it was silly and melodramatic, Perry felt like his life was over too. He was never going to find anyone. He would live out his days at the Alston Estate just like little Miss Dembecki, until he became one of its ghosts too.

* * * * *

Click. Click. The alarm clock turned over the glowing green numerals of 12:01 a.m. Perry opened his eyes.

Where was he? And then he remembered. He was staying in Mr. Watson’s apartment.

He was drowsily taking stock, deciding if he needed to pee badly enough to make that trip across the unheated room, when he heard it: a low moan.

What the…?

He had to have misheard. Or imagined it entirely. His ears strained the silence.

Nothing but the beat of blood rushing in his ears.

He continued to listen alertly.

He wished he hadn’t awakened. Now he was alive to the sounds of the house: the strange squeaks like floorboards under uncertain feet, the sigh of the wind down the chimney like a whispering voice.

He could imagine what Nick would say of such imaginings. The thought of Nick bolstered his sagging courage. Nick did not believe in ghosts and neither did Perry.

Of course, if some human agent was standing outside his room making spooky noises, it wasn’t so reassuring. Was someone trying to scare him into leaving the Alston Estate?

All they had to do was ask.

Well, not really. He didn’t have any place else to go, and few places were as cheap to rent as his rooms in the isolated old house. And he wasn’t actually that chicken, although he knew no one was ever going to mix him up for a tough guy.

Something moved inside the closet.

Perry went rigid. He told himself it was his imagination.

But then the closet door banged as though someone kicked it. Perry sat bolt upright. He fumbled for the lamp, knocking the clock off the stand.

Scrambling out of bed, his foot tangled in the sheet, and he nearly fell. His eyes never left the white, motionless closet door.

On his feet he reached the closet. His chest rose and fell, his hand shook, and yet something made him reach out, fingers brushing the glass knob.

He yanked open the door.

Chapter Seven

Nick tossed back the rest of his Seven and Seven and handed the plastic cup to the flight attendant as she bumped down the aisle, trash bag in hand. She smiled at him, and Nick gave her a wide, meaningless grin in return.

I must be nuts, he thought, staring out at the black slate of night sky out the little square window.

Roscoe had wanted him to stay and celebrate – and finally he had something to celebrate. After Marie, after his discharge, after the monotony of civilian life with no job, no prospects, finally there was something to celebrate.

And what did Nick do? He grabbed the first available plane back for Vermont – which he hated anyway and couldn’t wait to put behind him once and for all. What the hell was the matter with him?

But he kept thinking of the Foster kid. Perry. There was something not kosher at the estate, and that fragile boy was not equipped to deal with it. Not that it was Nick’s problem – although he was now officially in the P.I. business. Well, soon. After he finished his training.

All around him on the crowded aircraft, other passengers were settling down for sleeping or reading. Nick stretched his long legs out as far as he could beneath the seat in front of him – which wasn’t far. He’d have liked to get up and move around, but there was a woman with a baby in the aisle seat, and he’d have preferred public flogging to the risk of waking that shrieking mouth again. It was amazing the lung power in something that small.

He resettled in his seat, trying to get more comfortable, and glanced at his watch. Another two hours before they landed. He’d have to waste another hour going through baggage claim and finding his truck, and then another hour back to the Kingdom. He sighed and closed his eyes. Might as well get some rest. It would be after midnight before he made it back to Creepsville.

* * * * *

There was a fire truck parked outside the Alston mansion when Nick pulled up. Sheriff’s department cars were angled along the drive and grass. Blue and red lights cut through the misty night like lasers. An ambulance was parked a few feet from the front door.

Nick got out of his pickup, shrugging into his leather jacket. The unease that had dogged him since he’d left the estate bloomed into full consternation.

He strode across the rain-slicked grass. A deputy sheriff tried to stop him. Nick brushed past with a curt word of explanation. His heart was thumping unpleasantly; chill premonition slithered down his spine.

In the drafty front hall, the residents had all gathered in their nightclothes – that motley collection of pajamas and dressing gowns in which people always dressed for disaster.

“What’s happened?” he demanded.

A gray-faced Mrs. MacQueen, looking more like James Cagney than ever in a thick plaid wool robe and men’s style slippers, shook her head.

He looked at the others. Stein was nervously chewing the inside of his cheek. Teagle sat in a chair next to the unlit fireplace, his head shaking, his big, hands white beneath the freckles. That walking cadaver, David Center, stood next to the Bridger woman, his bony hand fastened on the emerald sleeve of her kimono-clad arm. Bridger looked stoic, but Nick knew her type. The sky could be falling; she wouldn’t panic easily.

Paramedics appeared on the second level, wheeling a gurney. The figure on the gurney was covered.

Miss Dembecki whispered, “Perry.”

The world seemed to stop.

Nick had to clear his throat to speak. His voice came out funny and raspy. “Perry’s dead?”

So his hunch had been right. Trouble. Bad trouble.

Jane Bridger broke in. “Perry’s not dead! What are you saying, Miss Dembecki? That’s Tiny. Perry found Tiny dead in Watson’s bedroom closet.”

“Tiny?” Miss Dembecki murmured bewilderedly. She looked around the circle of watching faces. “But then…?”

The gurney and the EMTs were making their precarious way down the narrow stairs, banging loudly against the banister. Tiny’s heavy carcass was no easy load.

“Where’s Perry?” Nick demanded of Jane.

She tore her gaze from the grim sight on the staircase. “Upstairs being questioned, I guess.”

Nick waited until the EMTs had made it safely to the bottom, then he took the stairs two at a time.

A deputy stopped him outside Watson’s apartment. Through the open door he could see Perry talking to an older man in uniform. The sheriff? Perry was seated on the low sofa. He wore jeans and a striped pajama top, his pale hair sticking up in bed-head tufts. He was speaking in voice so low that Nick couldn’t hear what was said. He could see the kid was gripping his inhaler.

“Listen, you’ll have to go back downstairs with the others,” the deputy warned.

Nick considered it, while the deputy bristled. There didn’t seem anything to be gained by insisting on staying – Perry looked shaken but unharmed, and it was doubtful even the local police were dumb enough to think he was a suspect in a homicide.

Nick returned downstairs to wait with the others.

“Just what the hell’s going on up there?” MacQueen demanded, huddled in the chair on the other side of the fireplace. “Shut up!” she screamed suddenly.

There was an astonished silence, and then from down the hall came the sound of her mutts whining and scratching at the closed door of her apartment.

“Are they still questioning Perry?” Jane Bridger asked after a polite few seconds’ pause.

“It looked like it.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” David Center said worriedly. “The spirits would not harm a simple soul like Tiny.”

Speaking of simple souls. Nick studied him bleakly. Center wore an incredible dressing gown of paisley blue and purple, proving, in Nick’s opinion, that he really was blind.

Bridger patted Center’s hand in absent reassurance.

“Well, I’m going back to bed,” Mrs. MacQueen announced, heaving herself to her feet.

Stein laughed. “Good luck with that.”

“Ma’am, the sheriff will want to question everyone in the house,” the deputy stationed at the front door said.

“Then he can wake me up!” Mrs. MacQueen swaggered off, and the deputy looked around helplessly before following her down the hall.

Perry appeared at the top of the landing. “They want you, Janie,” he said hollowly.

“Me? Why am I next?” Bridger protested, and it was Center’s turn to soothe her with murmurs and hand pats.

“They’ll want to talk to everyone,” Stein said knowledgeably, and Dembecki began twittering anxiously.

Muttering under her breath, Jane went up the stairs, silk dressing gown whispering, passing Perry on his way down.

Nick was disconcerted at the flip his heart did as Perry’s heavy eyes met his. Just relief that the kid’s okay, he told himself. He’d have felt guilty as hell if something had happened to Foster on what should have been his watch.

Perry came to stand next to him. “You’re back.” He greeted Nick wanly and managed a twitchy smile.

Nick nodded curtly. “How are you doing?”

“Okay.” He turned the Bambi eyes on Nick. “They said I could go back to my rooms. My rooms. They’re sealing Watson’s apartment.” He swallowed hard.

“You can stay with me,” Nick said. Perry seemed to work to keep his expression stoic, but the ardent gratitude was right below the surface, and if they’d been alone Nick would probably have done something unwise like put an arm around those slender shoulders.

The deputy came back. “That dame has lost her marbles,” he announced.

“No argument here,” Stein said, and Teagle shook off his white-faced preoccupation long enough to make a disapproving noise.

Dembecki twittered some more. Nick wouldn’t have been surprised to see her take flight right out of this cuckoo’s nest.

To the deputy, he said, “I’ve been away for forty-eight hours. Am I a suspect or can I go to bed?”

“Sheriff wants to talk to everyone that lives here.”

Nick handed Perry his keys. “Get some rest.”

Without a word, Perry took the keys and disappeared up the staircase.

Nick watched him go – tight little ass and those long, coltish jeans-clad legs – till Perry vanished around the bend in the staircase.

He leaned back against the wall to wait, unobtrusively watching the others. Jane Bridger came down in a worse temper than she’d been in when she’d gone up. David Center was next. Bridger volunteered to escort him, but he declined brusquely.

Bridger retreated huffily to her own quarters.

Shortly afterward, Nick’s name was called.

He found the sheriff in Watson’s quarters. Sheriff Butler was a short, lean man with a neat silver mustache and piercing green eyes. Nick put him in the fifty-five to sixty-five range; he was the type who aged well.

“Ex-Navy SEAL, huh? That’s a pretty tough outfit.”

Nick’s eyes narrowed. This could go a couple of ways. Some guys admired the dedication and discipline required to be a SEAL. Some guys were intimidated by it and tried to prove otherwise.

Indicating that Nick should sit, Butler proceeded to ask his name, age, occupation, flight details, and purpose of his recent trip before really getting down to it.

“So if I understand you correctly, Mr. Reno, you’ve been out of town since” – he didn’t have to check his notes – “Sunday the eighth.”

Nick said crisply, “You understand correctly.”

“When was the last time you saw Jasper Bryant?”

“Who?”

“The handyman. Tiny.”

“Sunday morning. He let us, Perry Foster and me, into these rooms.”

“And?”

“And what? He took some dead fish out of the fish tank and he left. I haven’t seen him since.”

“Where did he go when he left this apartment?”

Nick said shortly, “You must have me confused with the psychic next door.” He glanced at the sheriff’s notes – Butler kept track in tiny, dark script that could have been printed by a machine. “I have no idea what he did after he left here. I take it he didn’t die from natural causes?”

“He was shot to death.”

Nick thought of the .45 caliber pistol taped – hopefully still taped – to the wall in the cupboard beneath his kitchen sink “He wasn’t shot to death in this apartment, I’ll tell you that right now. He sure as hell wasn’t in the closet when I left here.”

“You know that for a fact, do you?”

“Yeah, I do. I helped the kid carry some things down from his rooms. He hung a couple of shirts in the bedroom closet. I watched him. There was nothing in that closet but clothes and shoes and comic books.”

“How’d you know the deceased was found in the bedroom closet?”

“The Bridger woman mentioned it.” Nick met the sheriff’s bright gaze. He said dryly, “No way do you think that kid knowingly spent the night in this apartment with a corpse in the closet.”

The sheriff’s thin mouth pursed in something that might have been sour humor. “It doesn’t seem likely.”

Nick was silent, thinking about Tiny’s comments about the ghost with yellow socks – thinking about those lost keys. The sheriff was watching him carefully.

“You got a theory?” he asked.

Nick said, “I’m sure Foster told you about the body he found in the bathtub.”

“We all heard about the body in the bathtub,” the sheriff said grimly.

“Maybe now you’ll believe it.”

Butler grimaced. “I don’t see that there’s automatically a connection between this homicide and the kid’s story.”

“Maybe not,” Nick said. “But your victim was blabbing about the ghost with yellow socks shortly before someone decided to take him out.”

The sheriff inspected him with those gleaming eyes. “You don’t say so,” he said finally.

“The kid must have told you this.”

The sheriff sighed. “Yeah, he said something along those lines and offered some garbled story about missing sets of keys. But I don’t know how reliable a witness he is.” He raised his eyebrows. “He’s a little light in the loafers, if you know what I mean.”

“You’re kidding,” Nick drawled. “What I noticed is he’s got a good eye for detail. He’s a painter. He notices things.”

“Maybe,” Sheriff Butler said, unconvinced. “The thing is, it’s the handyman who turned up dead. There’s still no sign of this body from the bathtub.”

When Nick didn’t respond, the sheriff added, “Thanks, Reno. If we have more questions we’ll contact you. Meantime, do me a favor and don’t leave town without letting us know.”