Chain of Fools - Stevenson Richard - Страница 27

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Arlene screamed. Everybody else jumped, and when they'd collected themselves, I said, "It's a precaution. I've had the NRA firearms safety course—and the United States Army's—and there's no need to be concerned."

Dan said, "I've spent some time around people who found themselves in a position where it was necessary for them to carry weapons, and I understand that this is sometimes unfortunately the case. So if you want to arm yourself, Strachey, and turn this house into a fortified position, that's up to you and Janet. But I can't see that anybody is going to be stupid enough to come after a member of the Osborne family right here in Edensburg. Arlene and I will be safe enough in our apartment. And while I can see the point in keeping an eye on Mom, I think you're in danger of overreacting quite badly otherwise. For what little my opinion is worth, of course."

Arlene gawked at him and said, "Speak for yourself, Dan. I'm scared shitless. I think we should all stay here together where we can take

care of each other and share our thoughts and concerns. And, hey, it could even be fun. Corn is in, and we could get some ears and make a big batch of corn chowder. Brownies too. Come on, Dan, let's do it. Don't be such a big drag."

Dan looked directly into Arlene's face and said coldly, "I am not staying here overnight. We've all got more important matters on our minds than some goddamn corn roast."

Arlene sneered and snapped, "Asshole!" Then she shrugged and said, "Well, I'm staying."

"That's up to you," Dan said sourly, but he made no move to depart without Arlene.

While I had them all in one place—and to help get our unruly little band focused on the big picture—I summed up my investigation as it had progressed over the previous thirty-six hours. I described my encounter with June and Parson Bates; my conversation with Ruth Osborne in which she revealed Chester's warning that "somebody else might have to get hurt" to keep the Heraldfrom being sold to Griscomb; my visit with Chester, during which he threatened me with legal action for spreading slurs against the Osbornes, and he threatened to have Ruth Osborne declared legally incompetent and removed from the Her-aldboard of directors; my meeting with Bill Stankie, where he cast new doubt on the supposed guilt of Gordon Grubb in Eric's murder, and at the same time revealed that Chester had twice visited Craig in prison (again I left out Craig's remarks to the snitch concerning Eric's murder); and my meeting with Chester and Stu Torkildson, where Tor-kildson kept referring to my suspicions of a conspiracy to commit murder when I had not mentioned these suspicions to either Torkildson or Chester Osborne at all.

As I laid out my findings, everyone on the porch listened with great interest, even Dan. He seemed at several points to be breathing heavily and erratically—particularly when I mentioned Chester's visits to Craig in prison. And as I concluded my remarks, Dan got up quickly and made for the first-floor bathroom just down the hall from the porch.

I was about to ask Arlene why Dan vomited every time the subject of an Osborne violent conspiracy came up, but just then the front doorbell rang and seconds later June was inside the house with a deputy sheriff.

15

How did we ever get mixed up in this?" Timmy said morosely.

I said, "Let me think."

He was laid out on the four-poster in June's old room, and I was at the desk nearby updating my notes. Lunch was to be served in another ten minutes. June had departed an hour earlier, after watching her mother be served with an order to appear for a court proceeding the following Monday, four days away. June and Chester contended that Ruth Osborne was mentally incapable of carrying out her duties as a Herald Corporation board member, and Mrs. Osborne would be expected to demonstrate that she was of sound mind. When she accepted the papers, Mrs. Osborne had looked at her daughter and asked pleasantly, "Are you wearing your retainer, June?"

Timmy said, "My foot is hot and it itches."

"Sorry."

"I don't mean to whine. I realize there are people in this house with bigger problems than a broken foot."

"Go ahead and whine. I would."

"No, you wouldn't. Anyway, we've got enough whiners in this house. What a jerk Dan Osborne is. And Janet is perfectly rational except when she and Dan are in the same room together. Then both of them sound like a couple of twelve-year-olds."

"Dan can bring that out in anybody," I said. "But it's not his pomposity that's the most interest to me. It's his sensitive stomach. Every time the subject of an Osborne family conspiracy to commit murder comes up, Dan heaves."

"I couldn't help noticing that too. Bui; you don't suspect Dan of killing Eric, do you? Why would he?"

"Right. Why would he?"

"I can't think of any reason having to do with the sale of the Herald, " Timmy said. "Or any other reason, either."

"According to Janet, the Osborne household harbored more than the average amount of emotional deprivation when she and her brothers and sister were growing up. Emotional deprivation led to emotional warfare, and emotional warfare sometimes leads to physical violence. Still, fratricide is extreme and extremely rare, I know. So, no. I don't have any real reason at this point to suspect Dan. But I do plan on gleaning his whereabouts on the afternoon Eric was murdered. And I'd sure like to find out why Dan vomits at the mention of his brother's death. Is it the shock and terrible loss that hits him hard all over again? Is he squeamish? Or does he have some guilty knowledge of the event?"

"Why don't you just ask him?"

"I'm considering doing that, Timothy. I need to get him alone first. I also need to come up with a sufficiently delicate way of phrasing my interrogatory. It won't do to ask, 'Why does mention of your brother's bludgeoning make you puke your guts out, Dan?' "

"That sounds good enough to me, Don. Euphemisms for vomiting are for kindergarten teachers to use, and euphemisms for murder are for heads of state. Just ask him directly, is my advice. Dan's a grownup."

"He's a grown-up, but he's also a grown-up who acts like he's got some guilty secret that's eating away at his insides. When I confront Dan, I don't want him to clam up even tighter than he is now, and I don't want him to bolt."

"He's highly indignant over being stuck here, he says, but he's not making any move to leave either. I wonder if he wants you to find out something important he knows. Maybe he's trying to work up the courage to tell you something, and it's when he gets close to saying it that he throws up."

"Possibly."

"On the other hand, maybe Dan is simply scared to death he's going to be attacked and killed, and that makes him heave. Having somebody try to run your car over a cliff is bound to unsettle your break-

fast. I know I'm nervous about all this, and I'm not even on the Herald's board. Here we are, like Chinese Gordon at Khartoum, the Mahdi's turbaned hordes out there just beyond the perimeter tightening the noose, getting ready to come charging in for the coup de grace. It is frightening."

"That's a little overly vivid, Timothy. But I get your point."

"And then there's Dale," he said, throwing his arms back in a gesture of despair. The pom-poms on June's snowy white bedspread trembled.

"Aren't you glad she's on our side?" I said.

"I'll say. I'd hate to have her across the Nile in Omdurman sharpening her panga."

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