“Mac understood this, I say.” She spoke as if tremors rose in her bones. “I consider him a writer in the best sense, a good writer. We didn’t work together because we were weak apart, but because we were stronger together. And I tell you plainly that he did not have sex with your wife in order to measure himself against you. Nor did he have sex with her in order to measure her against me.
“That is why I have no motive. There was no contest between Lara and me—or between Mac himself and me. Nothing that either of them did reduced me in any way. But you, Mr. Hardhouse—you perceive a contest. Any motive here is yours, just as any failure is yours.”
I wanted to applaud. It was a wonderful speech. Queenie’s eyes shone with appreciation, and Sam nodded approval. Maryanne’s face had gone all soft and childlike, and even Rock and Buffy looked like they’d felt the brief butterfly kiss of grace. But you had to give Hardhouse credit. He wasn’t an easy man to get around.
He didn’t try to argue. Instead he simply bowed to Connie and grinned. “I surrender,” he said humorously. Then he looked across at me. “Since I’m the only one with means, opportunity, and motive, you’d better lock me up. In fact, you’d better put handcuffs on me. That way I’ll be safe.” His eyes flashed. “Just like Simon.”
Just like that, he paralyzed me. With one insidious little remark, he made me realize what was wrong with my theory about Simon being alive.
Who broke Simon out of the wine cellar? Mac’s killer, presumably. Why? To make Simon look guilty. And to get at the rat poison. But if Mac’s killer did all that, he couldn’t afford to let Simon live. Simon knew who he was. So if the killer was still outside, being chased by Ginny—which was impossible, how could he have killed Mac?—Simon was dead. And if the killer was here—which was also impossible, who else could’ve left that trail into the hills?—Simon was still dead.
If I did anything to imprison Hardhouse and turned out to be wrong, he might become the next victim.
None of this made any sense.
I didn’t turn away from the problem. I didn’t even wince. But in the back of my brain, panic began to gibber.
I was out of my depth.
I needed Ginny.
19
“What are we going to do?” Buffy asked.
She spoke to Rock, not to me. That was a good thing, because I had no idea. The effect of Sam’s miracle drugs faded by the moment, and fever left my brain flopping around loose in my skull. Simon was dead, innocent Simon, and Hardhouse couldn’t have killed Cat because he was with Ginny at the time, yet he was the only obvious candidate for Mac’s murderer.
“I don’t know,” Rock said like a shrug. “It’s up to Axbrewder.”
I should’ve paid attention, but I didn’t. I didn’t hear the threat gathering in the room. Instead I made a positively heroic effort to face Hardhouse’s grin.
He could only be the killer if he and Ginny worked together.
Wonderful. The perfect solution. It all fit. Together they could’ve shot Cat and planted the rifle and broken Simon out of the wine cellar and hidden his body and stuffed rat poison down the chimney and killed Mac. People can do amazing things when they work together.
Without her I wasn’t even a whole person.
“Brew”—Queenie echoed Buffy’s question—“what’re we going to do?”
“All of a sudden,” Mile growled, “you don’t look so good, do you, boy?”
That brought me back. Until then I hadn’t grasped how much my credibility depended on the idea that I was the intended victim. But if I were irrelevant to Cat’s death—a deduction which followed logically from the angle of Mac’s neck—I was irrelevant to everything. My relationship to the whole group changed. And Houston Mile, for one, had no more use for me.
“You like to strut, don’t you?” he continued. He didn’t appear to notice as Maryanne shifted away from him. Pain still marked his face, leaving hints of congested crimson around his bad teeth, but he’d had enough time to recover his natural charm. “You like to wave that cannon around, and punch innocent folks in the back when they ain’t lookin’, and carry on like the almighty law of God. But you been wrong about everythin’ so far, ain’t you, boy?
“You and that fuckin’ partner of yours, issuin’ orders, thinks she a man, and she ain’t got better sense than to go off huntin’ a boy who ain’t killed his first horsefly yet, never mind an actual woman. Unless she’s on the run herself, leavin’ us to get picked off one at a time while you stand there refusin’ to let us defend ourself.”
Rock nodded as if he agreed with all this.
“You’re a pitiful excuse for a detective, boy, and you’re finished.” Mile’s anger gave him confidence. “Ah ain’t takin’ your orders no more, and the rest of us ain’t either.” He waggled a pudgy hand at me. “You pass over that cannon before anybody else gets killed, and Ah’ll show you how to do your job.”
“What would you do with it, Houston?” Sam put in, at the limit of his patience. “Shoot Joseph?”
“For a start,” Mile retorted. “The way Ah got this thin’ figured, there’s only two possibilities, and givin’ him a little ol’ third eye in the middle of that nice face eliminates one of ’em.”
Lara made a small noise that might’ve been a giggle before she swallowed it.
Hardhouse glanced at her, back at me. “In that case,” he said equably, “I think I’ll vote to leave Brew in charge.”
Mile ignored him. “After that, pretty boy,” he snarled at Sam, “Ah’ll make you and this flouncin’ bitch”—he meant Queenie—“tell us what you’re really doin’ here.”
Just for a second, I thought Sam might haul off and deck Mile. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking. In any case, he didn’t do it. Instead he tightened his grip on his wife. “I think,” he said between his teeth, “you had better explain that before I make you eat it.”
No. Absolutely not. I felt sure that I knew what Mile was about to say, and I didn’t want to hear it. Deliberately I picked up the .45. I meant to cock it—I meant to fire it, if I had to, to shut him up.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t. I lacked the strength to work the slide. The room had started into a lazy spin, and there wasn’t enough air, and as soon as Mile said anything about Ginny and Hardhouse working together I’d cackle my brains out.
Fortunately something else interrupted him.
A muffled pounding.
A distant sound like a doorknob being rattled.
More pounding.
Maybe a voice. I couldn’t be sure.
But everyone else heard it, too. The whole room went still, as stiff as a corpse. Maryanne covered her mouth. Buffy’s face turned as pale as her eyes. Sam and Mile cut off their argument. Lara jerked around.
The sound seemed to come from one of the bedroom wings.
“Somebody is at the back door,” Hardhouse said clearly. He was already on his way to answer the pounding.
From somewhere I dredged up the energy to shout at him. “No!” When he paused and turned, he saw the .45 in my fist, aimed right at him.
No one else moved a muscle.
I pushed away from the mantel, leaned into motion. Locking my knees so that I wouldn’t fall, I went around the furniture and the tree to Hardhouse. He studied me in an intense but noncommittal way, almost disinterested, as if for purely scientific reasons he wanted to know how much farther I could go.
“It’s still my job,” I said past the muzzle of the gun. “The rest of you, stay here. If you want something to do, watch each other. You’re all safe as long as you watch each other.”
I waited for a reaction, not from anyone else, but from Hardhouse.
“Don’t worry,” he said in a friendly tone. “I’ll make sure they don’t hurt themselves.”
Instead of jamming the .45 up one of his nostrils, I stumbled away into the hall.
I couldn’t actually tell which hall the pounding came from. But I’d entered the one Hardhouse had headed toward. Down an ai
sle of tight floorboards padded by an expensive runner. Past bedrooms and the parlor. If I’d been in better shape, I would’ve seen immediately that this was the right hall. A shape showed through the panes of the door ahead, and the knob rattled again. I was halfway there, however, before I registered any of this information. And I’d nearly reached the door before I recognized Ginny’s coat under its camouflage of snow.
I didn’t hurry. The gibber of panic in my head had grown louder. Manic and lucid, it informed me that anyone could wear a coat.
Shattered by alarm and fever, I had to brace the .45 against my leg to cock it. Then, as if this were the scariest moment of my whole life, I twisted the dead bolt and let the door open.
Ginny staggered inside.
Details which I didn’t notice immediately slipped past me. She’d obviously spent a fair amount of time stretched out in the snow. It still clung to her coat and hair. Clots of it packed the prongs of her claw. Her face had the particular pallor underlined with blue that comes from intense cold. She seemed too frozen to shiver. Her eyes were glazed, almost blind.
But all of that was secondary. Instead my attention jumped into focus on the wound on her left temple.
Snow and hair and coagulated blood disguised the injury, but it looked like a bullet mark—the kind of furrow a slug leaves in your skin as it skims past you.
Oh, Ginny. My gun weighed too much. Ginny. I managed to uncock it. Then I left it dangling from the end of my arm and leaned my weight against the wall. I couldn’t speak. Even simple words refused to come out.
“Brew,” she breathed in a soft, empty voice, as if all her blood had gone to ice. “He almost got me.”
It was like magic. As soon as I heard the need in her voice, I forgot about being weak. Quickly I picked myself off the wall, put the .45 away. Wrapping an arm around her, I drew her back from the door.
“Sam!” I called. “Queenie!”
We only went as far as the parlor. A fire crackled in the hearth, so I steered Ginny inside, toward the nearest heat.
At the same time everyone from the den poured into the hallway like I’d uncorked a bottle.
Hardhouse led the way, of course, but Sam and Queenie followed close behind. While I fumbled at the sash of Ginny’s coat, they rushed into the parlor. One glance at Ginny, and Sam wheeled away, fighting the press of people to go get his medical bag. I didn’t see Hardhouse’s reaction, Ginny’s coat gave me too much trouble. Fortunately Queenie came straight over and helped. In a moment Rock and Buffy, with Connie and Maryanne and Lara, reached the parlor, and Mile filled the door, and the Carbones and Faith stood outside. Queenie shoved Ginny’s coat off, urged her closer to the hearth.
A faint aftersmell of port and blood tinged the air. They’d soaked into the rug, marking the place where Cat died. Luckily Truchi or Reeson had moved her body somewhere. And the fireplace sucked most of the odor away.
I looked around for something to warm Ginny. The decanter of port still stood on the wet bar, but I knew she hated port, so I opened the liquor cabinet. Like everything else in Deerskin Lodge, it was well stocked. I spotted a bottle of Black Bush, but I didn’t touch it—I didn’t think I could stand the smell of that much heaven. Instead I grabbed some vodka and a glass, poured a healthy shot, and took it to her.
Sam had already returned, shouldering Mile aside to reenter the parlor. When he saw the glass in my hand, he snapped, “That’s not a good idea.
“Get her something hot,” he instructed Faith or Ama, “tea, coffee, cocoa, I don’t care, something with sugar in it.” Then he hurried to examine Ginny.
Faith and Ama left together. Truchi stayed behind Mile, guarding all of us.
Now I had time to remember vodka. My stomach knotted, and I nearly dropped the glass. With an effort I put it down beside the port.
Sam poked a thermometer into Ginny’s mouth, checked her pulse and blood pressure. Then he tore open a Betadine swab and started on her forehead. “What happened?”
Around the thermometer, she mumbled, “I got shot.”
I could hardly hear myself think through the gabble of panic in my head. Apparently she’d been shot at approximately the same time that Mac got killed.
Hardhouse noticed the same problem. “You know,” he said conversationally, “this is as good as one of those ‘locked room’ puzzles. The facts are impossible. The killer must be outside, but he can’t be because he’s in here with us. He must be in here with us, but he can’t be because he’s outside.
“Congratulations.” He bowed to Buffy and Rock. “This has to be the best mystery you’ve ever put on.”
Lara gazed at him as if she contemplated eviscerating him in his sleep.
Maybe Ginny wasn’t as close to hypothermia as she looked. Or maybe she was too stubborn to quit. Something in Hardhouse’s tone or words snagged her attention. She looked around the room, then took the thermometer out of her mouth and asked harshly, “Where’s Mac?”
Sam took the thermometer and studied it, frowning hard. He didn’t answer her question. Instead he said, “You and Brew have one thing in common anyway. You’re both lucky as hell. Whatever hit your head doesn’t appear to have done any structural damage, and your temperature is only a little low. What you have to worry about now is shock. You need fluids. Force down as much as you can stand. And stay awake. Let me know if you feel drowsy.
“How long were you down in the snow? Do you know? Did you lose consciousness?”
Ginny was in no mood for medical details, however. Already I could see the difference in her, the recovered snap and fire. That more than anything else helped me believe her wound wasn’t serious. Stiffly she repeated, “Where’s Mac?”
“Sit down,” Sam commanded as if he wanted to hit her. “Head injuries are always dangerous. You can make this worse than it has to be if you don’t take care of yourself.”
“Brew.”Ginny caught me with her gray gaze so hard that I almost saluted. “Where’s Mac?”
Panic suddenly filled my throat. I forced out one word, “Dead,” and stopped.
“He was killed,” Sam rasped in a kind of fury. “Someone broke his neck. Sit down.”
She sat down.
Obediently Lara, Connie, and Maryanne sat down as well.
Ama and Faith had returned, but Mile didn’t move to let them in. Truchi solved this problem with a gentle nudge that shifted Mile’s position by several feet. At once Faith carried a steaming electric coffeepot and some cups into the parlor. She probably kept coffee for the guests ready all the time.
Promptly, but without any obvious hurry or concern, she filled a cup, stirred in some sugar, and handed it to Sam in its saucer.
He pushed it at Ginny. “Drink this.”
One thing a prosthetic device doesn’t do well is hold a cup and saucer. Just for a second, a look of naked helplessness crossed Ginny’s face. Then Queenie saw the problem and intervened. She took the cup and saucer from Sam, kept the saucer, and turned the handle of the cup toward Ginny.
Ginny accepted it and hid her face over the coffee to recover her balance.
Calm as a saint, Faith put the coffeepot down on the wet bar and plugged it into an outlet.
“I don’t understand,” Maryanne said as if she thought everyone else did. “How could the same person shoot Ginny and kill Mac?”
Rock had been watching Sam and Ginny with a blank look that resembled catatonia. Now, however, he roused himself enough to murmur, “Depends on how long ago she was shot. He could’ve hidden a hundred yards away. It’s less than that up into the trees. He could’ve shot her and come back inside while we ate lunch. Then he could’ve hidden in Mac’s room and waited.” Dully he finished, “He could still be here.”
This novel idea made the guests flinch.
“Let me see if I understand you,” Hardhouse said. “You think the killer isn’t one of us. You’re back to Axbrewder’s theory about a hired gun—an outsider who wants to get rid of one or all of us for some unknown reason.?
??
Rock accepted this interpretation without blinking.
“There’s only one problem,” Hardhouse continued. “We locked all the doors from the inside. If our killer did what you’re suggesting, he would have to have a key.”
Unless he came in through my window. I hadn’t latched it. Queenie did that for me some time after Ginny left—after Sam and I returned from looking at the wine cellar.
In which case, why wasn’t I dead?
So what other possibilities were there? Who had keys?
By the time I thought of an answer, Sam, Lara, and Connie had all turned to stare at Ama’s husband like they feared he carried an Uzi under his shirt.
Ama may’ve grasped what this was about. Truchi didn’t appear to. If anything, his general stoicism seemed less weary than usual, more bemused. She looked disgusted on his behalf.
“I don’t believe it,” Connie pronounced as if no one else’s opinion mattered.
“Tell me what happened,” Ginny demanded.
Sam dragged his attention back to her. “You first. It’s good for you to talk. It’ll help you stay alert.”
Ginny looked at me. Maybe she wanted me to ignore Sam and answer her. Hell, maybe she wanted me to tell her what to do. At the moment, I didn’t know, and I didn’t care. I needed to sit down. My efforts to take charge of this situation had ended in panic, and I didn’t feel able to continue functioning.
I had to do better.
The two armchairs and the love seat were already occupied, so I retreated to the wall beside the wet bar and lowered myself to the floor. The rug was almost as thick as a cushion, but comfort wasn’t exactly uppermost in my mind. Fighting the confusion of fever and the slow erosion of the artificial energy Sam had given me, I tried to make my brain work.
I needed to figure out what was wrong with that hole in the wall. It meant something—something I hadn’t seen yet. Unfortunately reason and deduction weren’t my best skills. As a rule, I lived on intuition. And at the moment I felt so hampered, so incomplete, that I couldn’t think about anything except the night I got shot.