Buried Bones (17 page)

He got out of the car and walked around to open my door, as if I were waiting on him to perform the male duty. It was reluctance, not manners, that kept me in the leather seat.

"You have some official capacity, Sarah Booth. If you're caught, no one will punish you. I'm a foreigner. Worse, a Latino." He leaned so close his lips brushed my hair. "A former soldier for socialism. A Sandinista." There were just enough Ss in the sentence, whispered against my ear in that Spanish rhythm, that I couldn't control the chill bumps. My God, if he could achieve this effect with talk of politics, what could he do to me with compliments?

"Coleman will put me in jail as fast as he would you if I disturb a crime scene." True enough, and I didn't want to go inside and confront the scene of
Lawrence
's death.

"If you find the manuscript, you can solve the murder." He arched his eyebrows. "I'm certain those memoirs are the basis for his murder.
Lawrence
made it clear he intended to reveal secrets. He just didn't understand how dangerous that could be."

"If I find the manuscript, you'll try to take it."

He shook his head. "
Lawrence
wasn't a cruel man, and as an artist, I respect his right to tell his story. But I have to be certain of what he knew, what he said. I won't try to take it. I simply have to know."

He was the epitome of sincerity. I wanted to believe him, but I needed more. "What are you afraid he wrote?"

He looked down the drive, focusing on the beautiful oaks still frosted with a dazzle of snow. "My father assumed the name Arquillo. He was not Nicaraguan."

I remembered the spiteful comment at the dinner party. "He had a past to hide."

He nodded. "He started a new life in
Nicaragua
with my mother. He was very young during the war, a young man. Mistakes were made, but nothing so terrible. Still, my mother is alive. To have the secrets of the past printed ... If they are in the book, I must prepare her. That's all I ask."

"Why would
Lawrence
include such things in his book?" This spoke to the heart of the matter. I'd watched Lawrence and Willem together. There seemed to be a genuine fondness.
Lawrence
had been instrumental in getting Willem's work accepted in several big galleries. He had, in fact, championed the artist.

"I don't believe he did, but I can't risk it. I came here expressly to ask
Lawrence
about this. My mother is dying." His eyes narrowed. "Sometimes death comes as a friend. Other times it is a goad, a stick that beats a person hard. When it is this way, the reaction can be fear and a desire to lash out." He turned abruptly. "Such things I've witnessed with my own eyes. My mother is terrified. She is obsessed with this book. I must do this for her to die in peace."

Never in my wildest dreams had I thought to feel pity for Willem Arquillo. Yet I did.

"What if we find the manuscript and you discover that
Lawrence
has written something . . . about your father?"

"Then I will prepare her for it. We can prepare together." He walked up to the crime tape and touched it. "Do not think me uncaring when I say that she may die before the manuscript is published. There are times when the gods show a moment of kindness."

"You won't feel compelled to try and change what
Lawrence
has written?"

He turned back to face me, the whiteness of the snow all around him contrasting with the golden tan of his complexion. "If
Lawrence
has written about my family, he has put down only the truth. You must understand that it is death which has caused my mother to lose her nerve, to want to tidy up a past that is not agreeable to neatness. I learned, long ago, never to fear the past. Once you do, it becomes a hobgoblin that grows larger with each passing night."

His eyes were the most striking color of gray and his gaze held me, making sure I understood. I nodded slowly. "If the manuscript is in the cottage, you'll read it and then give it to me?" Of course, Harold would have to be contacted. As executor of the estate, he would determine the ultimate fate of the biography. But it wouldn't hurt one whit if we looked at it.

"I want to know what to prepare for."

"Okay." I ducked under the crime tape and signaled for him to follow. Willem had touched my soft side, but there was one irrefutable fact. If I found the manuscript, I had an excellent chance of catching
Lawrence
's killer.

The front door opened at my touch. I noticed then, for the first time, that the lock was broken. When I'd found
Lawrence
's body, the door had been unlocked, but intact. We stepped into the room and I stopped. There was movement in the kitchen, and I put out a hand to halt Willem. It was an unnecessary precaution. He, too, had seen something.

Stepping in front of me, he moved toward the kitchen. I reached out to halt him, but he was already five paces across the room, moving with a speed and stealth that made me think of James Bond. Willem had not lied when he'd said he had been a soldier. The training showed.

A scuttling sound came from the kitchen, and I almost cried out when the small creature rushed out toward us.

Willem scooped the cat into his arms in a fluid motion. "Ah, Apollo," he whispered to the cat, chuckling softly. "You stole at least a year of my life." He came toward me with the cat in his arms. "
Lawrence
's favorite terrorist cat."

"Apollo," I whispered, unwilling to speak aloud. I scratched the cat's ears and was rewarded with a purr. "Madame said that the cats weren't allowed in the cottage. She said the sheriff put them out." The others were nowhere in sight.

"I heard that Lillian Sparks came and took them. She couldn't find this one." Willem transferred him into my arms. "I know he misses
Lawrence
."

It was an unexpected sentiment. I held the cat as I turned slowly about, examining the room.

"What is it?" Willem was staring at me.

"It's just that this place is so empty. All of the paintings, the books. Everything that was once so vivid. It's all fading."

"
Lawrence
is gone." He stepped away from me. "Where do you think the manuscript might be?"

I gently put Apollo on the floor. "Let's try his study. If it's there, it shouldn't be hard to find."

"I disagree. If it were easy, Brianna would already have it."

"Why are you so positive it was her?"

"Of all of us, she has the most to lose. And like it or not, her celebrity and her father's wealth give her a certain privileged status. Do you really think a local sheriff could stop her?"

That was a point I didn't want to argue. Coleman Peters, the sheriff, didn't seem the type to be cowed by Brianna's fame. But I'd seen too many other men fold beneath her demands. Instead of replying, I led the way into the study. We had to pass the hallway where the chalk outline of
Lawrence
's body was still on the floor. Mercifully, someone had cleaned up the blood. Willem stopped to look at the outline. "He deserved death with dignity. Not an ending as he scrabbled for the telephone."

Once again, Willem's sensitivity surprised me, but the reality of what we were doing had begun to set in. I wanted only to conduct the search and get out. It was as if I was peeping into a private place.

I found two boxes of manuscripts, most of them sent to
Lawrence
by other writers for him to review or edit. In a smaller plastic container were poems and plays, riddles, and the beginnings of three novels. There was no sign of the manuscript. If it had ever been in the cottage, someone else had taken it.

I stopped my work long enough to find Willem, who was poking through the pigeonholes of an old desk.

"It would be hard to hide a manuscript in that small a place," I noted.

He shut a small drawer. "Yes, a paper manuscript. But what if
Lawrence
had put it on computer disk?"

"There's no computer. Just an old electric."

Willem restacked a bundle of magazines. "
Lawrence
hated the idea of computers. It took him decades to use an electric typewriter. Only after arthritis began to hurt his fingers. But he wasn't a fool. He didn't want to learn new technology, but since no one has found his manuscript, I suspect he may have paid someone to put it on a computer disk for him." He opened another small drawer and poked through it with his finger before shutting it. "Even so, I don't believe it's here."

We'd worked in our coats and gloves because the cottage heat had been turned off. He pulled off his gloves and beat them against his leg to knock off the dust.

"I'm sorry," I said, as disappointed as he was.

"We tried." He lifted my gloved hand to his face, leaning into the palm. "I owe you, Sarah Booth."

"Don't be silly. I wanted to find it as much as you."

"I always repay my debts. It's a matter of honor."

He was so serious. "I like a man who talks of honor." I tried to lighten his mood.

"I should get you home. It's getting late."

Indeed it was. The light in the cottage had gradually dimmed as the sun had begun to fall below the oaks. We put everything back as we'd found it and started out of the house.

"Meow." Apollo called to us from the kitchen.

"We can't leave him," I said. The cat would starve in the cottage, and the idea of him being there, alone, waiting for
Lawrence
to return, was too sad to bear. I felt tears sting.

"Will you take him?" Willem asked.

"I have a dog."

"Yes, I recall." He bent to pick up the cat. Apollo arched his back and spit, one front paw striking out with lightning speed. Willem drew back his hand with a cry of surprise.

"Willem!" I grabbed the injured hand. The cat's claws had raked the back. He was bleeding. "Let me put something on that."

He shook his hand, pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket and binding the wound. "It's nothing. Let's get the cat and get out of here."

But when we tried to find Apollo, he was gone. Vanished. And darkness was falling.

"I'll come back for him tomorrow," I said. "We should go."

Willem took my arm and together we left the cottage, taking care to close the door behind us.

On the drive back to Dahlia House we were mostly silent, but it was not uncomfortable. Willem was deep in thought, his attention focused on some inner landscape.

"I'll call you tomorrow," he said as he stopped the car in front of the house. "Forgive me for not walking you inside."

He waited until I was up the stairs and opening the front door before he drove away. Thank goodness he missed the sight of Sweetie Pie rushing out of the house with such vehemence that she almost flattened me with the door.

"Sweetie," I called after her, but she was gone, vanishing into the darkness. There were several excited yelps, and I knew she was out for the evening. Ah, foolish youth. I would have to wait up for her. Alone. I decided to employ the long hours by working on the case.

Madame was right about one thing. I didn't know
Lawrence
. The best way to narrow the field of suspects was to get to know him a little better.

My mother had been an avid reader, adding her own books to the established library of the Delaney clan. I trotted into the library, and because it was so cold, I gathered up an armload of
Lawrence
's books and took them back to the parlor, where I immediately lit a fire and put on some Mozart. The cover of
Weevil Dance
caught my eye and I opened it to the title page.

"To Rosalyn, who taught me the lessons of life." The dedication didn't surprise me, but the publication year did: 1942.
Lawrence
had been a very young man.

It was with a tingle of anticipation that I discovered that the setting of the book was
Moon
Lake
, the very real locale where Lawrence, Madame, and several others had spent a summer.

After that initial observation, I was swept up in the story. The record player stopped, the fire burned low until I buried my body beneath the comforter on the sofa, and yet I read on.
Lawrence
transported me back in time to a lodge on the edge of a resort lake where illegal gambling was the order of the night and where four youths lost their innocence in a series of events that seemed to foretell the future.

It was four in the morning when I finished and knew with dead certainty that Lawrence Ambrose had been murdered.