The Kingdom Where Nobody Dies (4 page)

Chapter Five

The knock at the door took McIntire unawares. He'd heard no car, so whoever it was had come on foot, bicycle, or horseback. Leonie was the only person he knew who traveled on either two wheels or four legs, so that left two legs, which meant Mia Thorsen. He'd not seen much of Mia that summer, and a visit at this hour meant that she must have run into some sort of crisis.

The floors were filthy, but at least he'd done his weekly dish washing. He buttoned his shirt as he peered between the curtains.

It wasn't Mia. A stocky woman in a kerchief and a dark blue dress, long sleeves and long stockings despite the heat, had retreated to the bottom of the steps and stood staring at the door. Ready to take off if the wrong person answered it? Somebody with car trouble, most likely. A lone female finding any port in a storm.

She showed no sign of bolting when McIntire stepped out, nor any damsel in distress hesitation.

“Mr. McIntire, how do you do? I'm Jane Hofer. I hope I'm not disturbing you. May I have a few minutes of your time?” The head scarf didn't quite manage to hide movie-star blond hair that made a flagrant contrast with her otherwise matronly appearance.

The victim's sister, then. She must have broken the land speed record making the trip to St. Adele. According to her sister-in-law, she lived in Iowa or somewhere pretty far off. Maybe it was Wisconsin. McIntire swung the door wider, murmured an inane apology for the state of the house, and led his visitor to the living room, which had cooled to a bearable level during the night. Leonie's pretentiously-called library, being on the north side of the house and shaded by spruce trees, was cooler still, but he'd been sleeping there, and it wasn't in a fit state for receiving female visitors. Or any visitors for that matter.

His offer of coffee or tea was met with a grateful smile and “No, thank you.” She smoothed the back of her skirt and sank into the spot he'd indicated on the sofa. “I don't take stimulants.”

She didn't look like the stimulant type for sure. She'd even managed to make that hair, which must be exactly the shade Leonie spent so many hours trying to glean from a bottle, look, not dowdy, but…business-like. McIntire said, “Please accept my condolences for the loss of your brother.”

“Thank you. The circumstances of his death make it especially difficult to accept.” Her speech was heavily tinged with German.

“Yes, it must be awful.”

“Particularly for his wife.”

“Of course.”

“And for the children.”

They were beginning to sound like a pair of wind-up dolls. McIntire asked, “Is there something I can help you with?”

“You're an officer of the law. It is possible that my brother was murdered. I should think that helping in this instance goes with the job.” The soft rebuke was accompanied by a beatific smile that would have done Father Doucet proud.

“I'm only a town constable, Miss Hofer. But I'll certainly do what I can to bring your brother's killer to justice.” Talk about wind-up dolls.

“May I have a glass of water, Mr. McIntire?”

“Of course. Forgive me for not offering it.”

When he came back, she'd moved from the sofa to a stiff backed chair. She touched the glass to her lips, then placed it on the coffee table. Maybe the ice he'd put in was too decadent.

Maybe physical discomfort was the price of mental loosening-up. Miss Hofer sat in the chair like she was strapped to it, but spoke in a gossipy tone, “Constable McIntire, my sister-in-law is not a well woman.”

“I could see that.” The words slipped out before McIntire could stop them, but they brought a twitch to the corners of Jane Hofer's lips.

“Her weight is only one aspect of her health problems.”

She didn't expand, and McIntire didn't like to ask, just said, “She'll have a difficult time without her husband.”

The woman nodded. “Perhaps.”

Perhaps? Was there some doubt? “She must not be able get around much, and the children can't be expected to run a farm.”

“Jacob and Samuel are almost grown men. They've been working harder than most grown men for years. Ever since my brother returned home.”

The tone was sharp. McIntire waited.

She sighed and a smidgeon more of the starch went out of her shoulders. “My brother was an idealist, but when it came to his own family….” She shook her head. “He was a firm man. Every member of a family should contribute what they can, and it's up to the parents to see that they do, but Reuben went much too far. During the war and for a few years afterwards, he was only home for a few short visits. His family lived with Mary Frances' father in Iowa. After he died they survived on letting his land out to be farmed on shares and what they got from the county. When Reuben came back, he was a stranger to the children, and he felt like he had to make up for lost time. He worked his father-in-law's farm for a year, until they lost it when the estate was settled. Then he rented a smaller farm and saved every penny, and somehow he was able to buy the place here. He worked night and day to do it, and saw to it that everybody else did, too. He made the children slaves, beasts of burden. Up before dawn so they could get a couple of hours work in before school. Even his youngest. I doubt any of them have had more than five or six hours of sleep a night in the past three years. Sometimes a whole lot less.”

It was making McIntire's childhood sound positively rosy.

Miss Hofer smoothed her skirt again and went on, “Mary Frances, as you say, has not been able to do much. She has no choice but to rely on Claire's help, and it's good for a girl to learn to keep house, but it was only her influence that kept those boys from being worked right into the grave.” She picked up the glass. “Reuben made their lives a misery, but he made them self-sufficient.” The ice clinked. “They'll manage.”

What was she saying? That Reuben Hofer's family was better off without him? It sounded like she might not be far wrong. She also might be the person, outside Reuben Hofer's immediate household, who knew the most about him. McIntire asked, “Do you have any idea who might have killed your brother?”

“No, certainly not. I expect it was an accident. Mary Frances says there's a great deal of shooting going on around here.”

“Not so much this time of year.”

“But it
could
have been an accident.”

“Anything's possible, I guess.” Why did people always say such a stupid thing? There were any number of things that were absolutely, irrefutably, beyond a shred of doubt, impossible. But Hofer's death being accidental wasn't one of them. It could have been accidental, but it sure as hell wasn't likely.

“It would be much less…harrowing for his widow and children if this were an accident.”

“A murder investigation won't be pleasant for them,” McIntire agreed.

“Mr. McIntire, may I speak frankly?”

McIntire doubted Jane Hofer could speak any other way. “Most certainly.”

She folded her hands in her lap and fixed her eyes on his. “Mary Frances will, in all likelihood, not live to see her children grown.”

“But surely—”

“She knows that. She may have another year or two. No more. Possibly much less. Her greatest fear has been what would happen to her children without her protection.”

“From your brother?”

She nodded.

“That's not a concern now.” There'd be no lack of other fears to step up to take its place.

“No,” Jane Hofer agreed. “Now all she has to worry about is leaving behind four orphans condemned to living with the knowledge that their father was murdered. Live with everyone else knowing it, too. Memories are long, and people, children in particular, are not always kind.”

It would be ugly, there was no doubt about that.

“I think it was an accident. Someone getting in some target practice, or shooting to frighten raccoons from the corn, perhaps.” Her gaze remained unflinchingly direct, as she went on. “When Reuben said he'd decided to go to college, we were all astounded. He'd never shown any sign of having such ideas. He didn't ask permission, he just left.We thought that he'd come back when he'd seen enough of the world, but by the time he'd finished sowing his wild oats, he'd met Mary Frances and she was…. They were married.” She took another sip from the glass and stood up. “Mary Frances is a good person. She's borne a great deal. I don't know how she manages to get through every day, sick as she is, knowing she's going to be leaving her children forever. Nothing can bring my brother back. I don't want to see his widow's suffering in her final months of life made any worse than it has to be.”

Was she actually telling him to forget it? Write it off as an accident? God's will, perhaps? What did she think a township constable could do about it? He didn't even try to keep the incredulity out of his voice. “The county sheriff and the state police will be in charge of this investigation, and they are
not
going to see it as an accident.”

“Yes,” she said. “I'll be speaking to the sheriff soon. He's asked me to identify Reuben's body.” The prospect didn't ruffle her outward placidity.

McIntire's offer of a ride home was turned down. “God saw fit to bestow two good legs upon me, I'll rely on them.” She thanked him for the refreshment and walked briskly down the drive.

McIntire had heard God invoked more in the past 24 hours than any time since the short trip he'd made to Monte Carlo in 1936.

Chapter Six

It could have been an accident. If it had happened in October, McIntire would hardly have thought twice about it. But, despite Mary Frances Hofer's claims, and the fact that the odd woodchuck or two might be dispatched, bullets didn't generally fly in July the way they did during hunting season. But the wound, according to Guibard, might have been the result of a bullet fired from some distance. He wasn't sure. An accident would seem far fetched on the face of it, but why? It would hardly be the first time. If a stray bullet hit a tree, there wouldn't be a crowd of gawkers standing around marveling at the improbability of it all. Of course if the tree had been hit dead-on in the place that was sure to kill it instantly, while it was chugging through a hayfield, it might be a different story.

It did seem unlikely that, in the short time he'd been in St. Adele township, Reuben Hofer could have managed to provoke enough animosity to get himself killed. His German roots might possibly have resulted in a problem or two during the war, but nothing extreme, and that was past. Outside of those whiskers, he'd done nothing to create much of a stir.

“A firm man,” his sister had called him. McIntire knew what it was like to have only your mother to provide a shield from your father. Still, Colin McIntire had been considered an All Around Great Guy by everyone
but
his son, and, so far as McIntire could see, that included his wife. It might be worth finding out if the same was true of Mrs. Reuben. Her reaction to the news of his death might be an indication that it was not.

Great guy or no, it was a relatively safe bet that somebody had wanted him dead and had seen to it. McIntire was in no position to write it off as an accident even if he wanted to. Did the woman truly think he would, or that he had that kind of influence?

She was right about one thing, murder was never pleasant for those left behind, and was going to be particularly tough for a family whose remaining parent was essentially immobile. He could at least go over and see if there was anything he might do to help out. A ride to town, phone calls. It sounded like the kids could handle the chores okay.

He dawdled long enough over his late breakfast, or early lunch, to give Koski a chance to pick up the sister and cart her off to town. But not long enough to wash the frying pan. There seemed to be no point in bothering. You washed the dishes and hardly turned your back before they were piling up again.

He took Leonie's car. Mrs. Hofer might need a lift somewhere, and the Nash was bigger than his Studebaker. Probably not big enough, but bigger.

The girl sat on the front steps, peeling potatoes. In the brief glimpse before she snatched up the pot in one arm and the dog under the other and scampered inside, McIntire could see that she was older than the seven or eight he'd first guessed. Despite her small size, her disappearing act had more intent than startled doe reflex, and there was a hint of curiosity in her aspect that you didn't see in a kid.

Not, for instance, in the tow-headed boy who knelt in the dirt at the side of the house, pushing a wooden-block bulldozer through sand moistened by water trickling out of a pipe that protruded from the foundation. A drain for the kitchen sink. It couldn't have been the most hygienic place to play.

Around his scabby knees was spread a lilliputian landscape, a masterpiece of creativity and ingenuity. Trickling streams skirted miniature hillsides covered with spruce twig forests. Stick and string fences enclosed pebble livestock. A pea pod canoe floated on a hubcap lake.

The small overlord of this universe looked briefly in McIntire's direction, then turned his back and went back to grading a road to the front door of a rusty syrup can cabin.

McIntire knocked at the door his sister had escaped through.

Her mother was in the same spot. The peas had been replaced with a heap of string beans next to an open magazine. The room's stale odors were overlain with the ghost of fried fish. Mrs. Hofer inclined her head toward a chair and reached to switch off the radio, mercifully quashing Art Linkletter's chat with a troop of saccharine four-year-olds.

McIntire accepted the offer of coffee. At temperatures already in the high eighties, he couldn't manage to convince himself that it was not only to see her stand up. The ploy didn't work. Mary Frances Hofer, without turning her head, called out, “Claire, come heat up the coffee!”

No child appeared. McIntire heard a sound from the back of the house—the creak of a screen door inching open and just as stealthily closing.

“Claire!” She called again. Her shoulders jiggled. There must have been a shrug in there somewhere. “I guess she's gone outdoors.” The nervous chuckle came once more, a peculiarity that could rapidly turn irritating.

“Never mind,” McIntire reassured her. “It's getting too hot for coffee. I only came to see if there's anything I can do for you.”

“That's very kind. My sister-in-law is here. She's taking care of things.”

“Yes. She came by this morning. I was amazed to see her here so soon.”

The woman nodded, forcing several more chins to the fore. Her hands fluttered about as she talked, from her mouth to her chest, to the table, giving an impression of ditheriness at odds with both her size and the situation. “Jane's a wonder. She didn't even stop to pack a bag. Spent all night getting here, turned up about nine, raring to go. I guess she slept on the train. Not something I could ever do, all that rattling and bumping around. She's gone with the sheriff now.” There was a slight hesitation, maybe simply to draw breath, before she added, “To identify my husband's body.”

“Mrs.—”

“She'll take him back to be buried in South Dakota, with his family at the colony. My two boys will go with her. I'm afraid I'm not well enough to travel. I'll stay behind with my younger children.”

“Colony?”

“Prairie Oak. It's a farming community.”

It must be some religious organization. Quakers? Amish? It explained the sister's unconventional manner and dress as well as the family's consternation at Reuben's going off to seek his fortune in the big world and winding up married to a Catholic.

“They wouldn't let him come home when he was alive, but they will now.”

“Mrs. Hofer,” McIntire was not sure how to approach it. “Mrs. Hofer,” he began again, “I know this is distressful for you, but…do you mind answering some questions?”

“I guess I'd have to hear the questions before I can tell you that.” This utterance ended, not in a giggle, but a whistling gasp.

“Is something wrong?” What a stupid question. McIntire rephrased it, “Are you feeling ill?”

“I'm quite all right. Only a little out of breath. What is it you want to know?”

There was no point in beating about the bush. Mrs. Hofer was well aware that her husband had been murdered. “Did you hear a gunshot yesterday morning?”

“The sheriff asked me that already. No. I didn't hear it, or if I did, I didn't pay any attention. I'd have had the radio on, and the fan, too.”

“What about your children?”

“What about them?”

“Did they hear anything?”

“I wouldn't know.”

“Did Mr. Koski talk to them?”

“He talked to Jake and Sam for a few minutes. He didn't question them about…He just asked if they'd be able to handle the farm chores, that kind of thing.” She added, “I think Mr. Koski has two very big fans. The sheriff seems to be their new hero.”

This time the concluding chuckle was accompanied by a smile that said Pete probably had acquired at least three new fans.

Kids have good hearing, and they were most likely out of doors when the murder took place.

“At least one of your children could have heard the shot,” McIntire said. “They might be able to say what time it was or what direction it came from, maybe even how close it sounded. We have nothing else to go on.”

“You want to ask, go ahead.”

It was a challenge McIntire wasn't sure he was up to. “Where can I find them?”

“My older boys are still hilling the potatoes. I don't know where Claire could have got off to. She was here getting dinner ready a few minutes ago. She must have gone to the garden for something. Joey's out there somewhere. They can't be far away.”

The young lady might not be far off now, but McIntire would bet that she'd maintain a safe distance if she saw him coming, and he wasn't likely to be able to sneak up on her. The little boy, he wasn't about to tackle.

“Perhaps it might be best if you asked your youngest son.”

She nodded. “I guess I could, but I don't want to worry him. He's hardly more than a baby, and he gets upset easy. He might be more likely to tell Father Doucet. He's coming over this afternoon.”

McIntire set off past the barn. The occasional shout and slamming car door came from the direction of the hayfield where Reuben Hofer died. Koski's crew would be searching the area within rifle-range.

The two older boys were—suspiciously un-boylike, to McIntire's way of thinking—in the potato field, shirts off, bristly sun-bleached hair contrasting with lean muscular backs burned to a roast beef mahogany. Sons Colin McIntire would have sold his soul to have. Sons McIntire might have been proud to have himself. Curious that the idea of rearing offspring that resembled himself was as distasteful to McIntire as it had been to his father. He reflected on this epiphany as he stood in the shade of a scrawny beech and beckoned them over.

He was rarely at ease with adolescent boys. Never having been one himself, he had no idea what went on in their self-destructive little minds.

The young men put their heinie-trimmed heads together for a short conference, then trudged between the rows to present themselves. They didn't look either curious or apprehensive. They didn't even look glad for the excuse to rest in their labors, just stood, glistening with sweat, waiting. McIntire once again felt out of his depth.

His introduction—“I'm the constable here.”—brought blank stares followed by, “The sheriff told us not to talk to anybody but him.”

“I didn't come to question you. I just wanted to see if you could use some help.”

They looked at each other, then turned their twin befuddled gazes back to him. “You wanna hill spuds?” McIntire hoped they didn't have a third hoe waiting in the wings. Thankfully the thinner of the pair, who also might have been the stupider of the pair, said, “We're almost done.”

Stupid and an optimist. They were barely a third of the way into it.

“Which one of you is the older?”

The stockier boy gave a grunt, and McIntire turned to the other. “You can go back to work.”

That got a reaction, one of disappointment. The kid trekked back into the field, dragging his hoe through the sandy soil.

His brother dug a finger into his left ear and squinted into the sun. “Sheriff Koski said we weren't supposed to talk to—”

McIntire wasn't interested in arguing over the heroic Koski's instructions. “I'm sorry about your father,” he said. “It's going to put some heavy of responsibilities onto you.”

“I guess.”

What was he doing here, badgering these two children whose life was making a rapid transition from misery they would have been able to escape in a couple of years, to a hell that would be with them for a long, long time? “I just need to ask one thing, then you can get to back to work.”

“The sheriff said—”

“I know what he said, but if you don't talk about things soon, you'll forget. You were in this field when your father died. Did you hear anything?”

“Like what?”

The kid wasn't making this easy. “Like a shot. Or anything that might sound like a gunshot.” If it had been at close range, they couldn't have helped but hear it. The hayfield was less than a half mile away.

“No. I didn't hear nothing.”

McIntire let him go and tackled the younger brother. He hadn't asked the older boy's name. He tried to be more courteous to this one. After determining that he was speaking to Sam, and that the other one was Jacob, McIntire said, “I was saying to your brother that you boys will have a lot of responsibility now.”

“We can handle things. We're used to it. We work hard.” His gaze darted everywhere except in McIntire's direction, belying his confident words.

“There'll only be the two of you to do everything. Your father worked hard, too.”

“We got along fine without him before. For a long time. We just had Grandpa, and he was too old to do much of anything.” He looked toward the house and barn. “We might have to cut back some.”

“Be sure you ask for help if you need it.”

Sam hefted his hoe and stepped away.

“I also need to ask you, before you forget, if you heard anything yesterday—anything that might have been a gunshot.”

For the first time the boy focused his eyes directly on something, regarding the naked toe that thrust itself through the hole in his tennis shoe, almost as black as the shoe itself. “I might have heard something. It wasn't very loud.”

“What did it sound like?”

“Far away. I just thought it was a car back-firing.” He repeated, “It wasn't very loud.”

A car. Not his father's tractor back-firing. “Could you tell the direction?”

“I wasn't paying that much attention. It was just a noise.” He coughed and waved without looking up. “I think that way maybe.” McIntire turned in the direction he'd indicated. Toward the main road. South. The shot that killed Reuben Hofer would almost certainly have come from the north.

“But maybe not.” The choke in the young man's voice, almost a sob, brought McIntire around.

“I hated the son-of-a-bitch.” It was low but emphatic.

McIntire struggled. He, of all people, should know what to say. “Sometimes that can make it even harder.”