Читать книгу The Tanglewood Murders - David Weedmark - Страница 12
ОглавлениеScotty Doherty wore two silver hoops on his left ear, eight on his right, and long pork chop side burns. On his left shoulder he had a tattoo of a hawk, but only the talons were visible beneath the sleeve of his beige t-shirt. On his right arm he had a tattooed ring of barbed wire.
Scotty kicked down on the brake of his faded blue Camry and cranked his steering wheel around as the tires dug into the loose gravel, stopping six feet in front of Ben Taylor. He turned to face Taylor and folded both arms on the ledge of his open window.
“Hey!” he called to Taylor. “Where you been all day?”
Taylor stopped, thumbs in his front pockets, and raised his eyebrows quizzically.
“Ohhh, I’m just yankin’ ya,” said Scotty. “Where you off to, all on your lonesome?”
“Off to get some dinner,” Taylor said with unconcealed irritation.
He was annoyed that the day had ended so early. It was only seven o’clock. Eleven hours without a cigarette had slit open and exposed every nerve.
“Straight up. Wanna ride?”
Taylor walked behind the Camry and, once Scotty remembered to unlock it, opened the passenger door. Metal ground against metal near the hinges as he forced the door closed.
“Where were you today?” Taylor asked.
“Hiding from that pig,” Scotty laughed. He pursed his lips and added needlessly, “Caines really busts my ass.”
Taylor buckled up and rolled down the window. Scotty spun his steering wheel round and kicked down on the gas pedal, wheels pulling up gravel. Once he passed the Voracci house and approached the end of the laneway, Scotty turned up the radio. Tom Petty was “Running Down a Dream” at top volume.
The old Camry had seen better days. Specks of rust elbowed their way through the dust on the blue paint. Exhaust escaped through the holes in the muffler. Inside, the car smelled of tobacco, grease and sweat. Crumpled Burger King bags and empty cans of Coke littered the passenger’s side of the floor. A faded paper pine tree swung impotently from the rearview mirror. Yet the black vinyl seats, dashboard and steering wheel had been treated with Armor All religiously once a month for the last two years. This was Scotty’s home and his only refuge through the busy season. It was the place he lived, ate and slept when he worked sixteen to eighteen hours a day from June to October.
“That fat slob Caines really screwed up my day,” Scotty said as he approached the highway. He turned the wheel and directed the car towards town. “I’ll tell ya, I thought I’d never get out of there.”
“Could be worse.” Taylor slid back in his seat and looked across through the driver’s side window at the steady line of trees bordering the road.
“Oh, yeah!” Scotty turned his head to Taylor with a sudden grim realization. “Did you hear they found Anna? Just fucking awful.”
“I know.”
“I found out just after lunch. Maria was crying at the picnic table and told me. Just awful. When did you find out?”
“When Juan and I found her this morning.”
“This morning?” Scotty did a double-take, trying to keep his eyes on the road. “That was you? I thought it was Juan and Michael Voracci. That’s fucking awful. I’m so glad I wasn’t there.” He whistled, loud and piercing. “I don’t even want to imagine!”
Scotty pushed in his cigarette lighter and pulled a cigarette from the pack between them. Taylor was craving a cigarette, but the smoke was still nauseating. His increasing irritability from the nicotine withdrawal combined with the smell of the smoke made his stomach turn. He clenched his fist and stared at the road ahead.
A dead raccoon lay torn on the gravel shoulder.
“And you’re sure you want to eat?” asked Scotty. “I don’t think I could eat for a week after seeing something like that. You really saw her, right? Was it the first time? I mean, have you ever seen a dead body before?”
Taylor nodded.
“Not me,” Scotty continued. “Just my grandfather and my mom’s aunt. Those were both in a funeral home, and that was bad enough.
I’ll tell ya, I don’t want to go near that end of the orchard ever again.
I don’t like cops, but that’s not why.” He wiped his forehead with his bare forearm. “That’s where she died, ya know? I couldn’t ever go around there again. Not even if you paid me.”
“Why not?” Taylor asked, already suspecting the reason.
“It’s just, I don’t know…all tainted now.”
“Do you believe in ghosts?”
“Nope.” Scotty, annoyed by the force of the wind in the car now, cranked the window closed, his arm vigorously pumping the handle to move the stiff gears. “Never seen one. Never want to.”
Beck’s Tavern was on the edge of Andover, about three miles southeast from Tanglewood Vineyards. Any traces of the farms that had dominated the area here when Taylor was a child had all but vanished in a ten-year frenzy of suburban building. Occasionally the skeletons of a couple of abandoned barns, or the remnants of split rail fences could still be seen from the highway in the midst of vinylclad split-level homes, and the maze of winding drives, streets and crescents, all enclosed by row upon row of cedar privacy fences.
The tavern was generally empty this early in the evening. The pre-dinner crowd had gone home, and the drinking crowd was still finishing dinner. With orange formica tables and vinyl chairs, it felt more like a diner than a tavern to Taylor. The seating area was the shape and size of a boxcar, but without as much character. The walls had been recently dry-walled, painted white, with beer posters tacked neatly between each of the four windows facing the parking lot. Two grey-haired farmers, dressed in green overalls, sat at the bar eating fish and chips. Scotty came here regularly, several times a week, when he had money in his pocket, enamoured as he was by Cindy, the blonde waitress.
The pair had their choice of seats and took the table closest to the door. They ordered two burgers and two beers. Cindy smiled at Ben but refused to look Scotty in the eyes. She either frowned or looked to the floor each time he grinned at her, showing his teeth.
Scotty never realized that she refused to look at him. He averted his own eyes each time she appeared to look in his direction, but he watched her carefully when she walked away. When he noticed Taylor watching him, Scotty huffed and began to slide the salt shaker from left to right and right to left across the table in a self-conscious game of catch.
“Any idea,” Taylor began, “what Caines is up to in that locked greenhouse?”
“Who knows?” replied Scotty. “Who cares?”
“Ever see anyone else in there?”
“Nah.” Scotty shrugged. “Caines is the only one with keys. I think he worked out a deal to have a place to do his own gardening or something. Oh. Carl might have a key.”
Taylor nodded. Carl Avery was the horticulturist and a friend of the Voracci family. He worked only a few hours each week to measure and test the use of pesticides and fertilizers. The hydroponic tomatoes were fully dependant on the chemical fertilizers pumped into them. While Abe Wagner handled most of the care for the vineyard, Carl Avery was the only one who knew how to care for the tomatoes.
“Last year,” Scotty said after some thought, “you know, when they closed it off, I asked Carl what they were doing in there. He said it was just a new kind of grape. Hydroponic grapes, he said.”
Taylor squinted at Scotty. “Hydroponic grapes. For wine? Was that a joke?”
Scotty shrugged and stared back without blinking.
“Soil is important for wine,” said Taylor. “Hydroponics won’t work.”
“But you’ll get more grapes,” Scotty said, staring at Taylor as if he were an imbecile. “They’ll be bigger too. More grapes means more wine. Isn’t that a good thing?”
“No, it isn’t good,” said Taylor. “You want to make the fruit work to get the best taste. You don’t want the vines to be full of fruit. Less fruit means better taste. Why do you think we spend so much time pulling at them? That’s why some of the best wines in the world grow on the soil no one else wants.”
Scotty continued to stare.
“Didn’t that strike you as being a bit odd?” Taylor asked. “I think Carl was pulling your leg, kid.”
“I never thought much about it,” Scotty said, looking bored now. “I don’t go in Michael’s house. I don’t go in his truck, less he asks. I don’t go in Caines’ greenhouse, less he asks. I just work there, y’know?”
Taylor could see this was getting too heavy for Scotty. He nodded until he was certain Scotty’s thoughts had begun to wander.
“I think...” Scotty began to grin, “it’s pot.” He popped with a short, unexpected laugh. “That’s it. They’ll put hash in the wine.
Like…like…Voracci Weed Wine.”
“Tanglewood High Vine.”
“Wonder Wine!” Scotty snorted, putting his hand over his mouth a second too late.
Scotty was still laughing as Cindy set the two plates of burgers and fries down on the table. Scotty abruptly stopped laughing as soon as he saw her. Taylor thanked her and returned her smile.
“Did the cops talk to you?” Scotty asked once she had left.
“Not really. Not yet. They will. They’ll want to talk to you too, I’m sure.”
“Why me?”
“They’ll want to talk to everyone,” Taylor said as he pulled the onions from his burger.
“Dammit.” Scotty shook his head back and forth as he talked.
“I really don’t want to talk to them. I don’t want to. I hate cops. I won’t do it.”
Scotty pushed his plate away, looked at it thoughtfully, pulled it back and began to pick at his fries.
“Why are you upset?” said Taylor. “Something you don’t want to tell them?”
“No.”
“Something you don’t want them to find out?”
“Hell, no!”
Taylor stared at him thoughtfully as he bit into a fry. “You’ve got me curious about something,” he said. “You know, as we’re laughing and joking about all of these things, there’s something that I’d like to know.”
“What’s that?”
“Is there anything else bothering you about this besides ghosts and talking to the police?” Taylor asked.
“Isn’t that enough?”
“For starters,” Taylor said pointedly, “what about the fact that a girl you worked with is dead?”
Scotty shook his head, holding a french fry in front of his mouth, and whispered, “I know.”
“And that someone killed her.”
“I know,” Scotty whispered even more faintly. He did not put the fry in his mouth, but did not put it down. He held it there, poised in front of his lips, forgotten, as he stared at Taylor’s eyes.
“And that it might be someone you work with?”
“What are you saying?” Scotty whispered almost inaudibly. The french fry tumbled from his fingers. “You think I had something to do with this?”
“Did you?”
“Of course not.”
“I know you didn’t do it. I’m sure they know it too. But something’s wrong. What is it?”
“I mean...” Scotty shook his head. “I know I joked about her when she was alive. Who didn’t? I mean, except you. But everybody else, y’know? It’s just cuz she was so stuck up sometimes. Even when we thought she ran away. But that’s just talk.”
“Yes.” Taylor stared at him pointedly. “Just talk. But you said something about her yesterday, Scotty. Remember what you said?”
Scotty’s eyes bulged. “What? I didn’t say anything about her.”
Taylor nodded. “You didn’t really want to get her drunk. And lure her father out of the house for a night. Or get her into the cooler for a few hours. And you didn’t say anything about the old mattress in the pump-house?”
“That was just talk. That doesn’t mean I’d really do it.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
“And if I thought for a second she was dead, do you really think
I’d talk about her like that? Sheesh!” Scotty shivered. “That just makes my skin crawl. I wouldn’t say anything like that...” leaning forward and whispering now, “especially about the pump-house…” sitting back again, “if I had any idea she was dead. You know I couldn’t do anything like that.”
“Maybe not,” Taylor conceded.
“That just proves you don’t know anything about me, man,”
Scotty continued, speaking as fast as the words formed in his thoughts. “If you did, you’d know I wouldn’t be able to hurt a fly.
Do you think I’d waste my time working here and sleeping in my fucking car if I could cut it as a criminal? And if I did hurt someone, do you really think I’d stick around for even ten minutes before I blew this fucking lousy dump forever? And if I did hurt anyone, I’d take out Caines first. You know that.”
Taylor smiled.
“So!” Scotty sighed with touch of triumph. “So that proves I didn’t do it.”
Taylor leaned forward. “Sure. Or it proves you wanted to throw everyone off the scent.”
“No! That’s stupid.”
“Then why are you afraid of the police?”
“I just don’t like cops, okay?” Scotty shook the ketchup bottle to no avail.
“But it won’t be the local cops now,” Taylor said. “It’ll be the OPP.”
“Why?”
“She was murdered,” Taylor said without expression.
“But the town police handle this side of the townline…”
“So what? This is a serious crime.”
“Get real. To us it’s serious. To everyone else she was a Mennonite.”
“She was murdered. What does being Mennonite have to do with it?” Taylor demanded. He drank some of his beer, knowing he had to be patient if he was to find out why Scotty was so afraid. “I’m sure you don’t want anyone to get away with this. It could be someone you work with, for all we know. Someone you drink beer with.”
Scotty picked at his fries, deliberating. “Look,” he said, “I don’t want you thinking anything that ain’t true.”
Taylor sipped his beer, listening. He had no idea why Scotty cared about Taylor’s opinion of him, but he was not going to question that now.
“I owe some money,” Scotty continued, whispering, leaning close to the table. “That’s all it is. It’s my old lady. She put the cops on me a while back. She doesn’t know where I am. I’m supposed to pay her five hundred a month for my kid. But she never let me see him, and I didn’t have the money. So she put the cops on me. She’s living with her parents in Brampton now. I can’t afford to pay her that kinda cash. Not in the winter. You know what we make here. Besides, her parents have money. But she hates my guts, and I gotta hang low till she backs off. That’s all.”
Taylor understood that as confidential as Scotty’s story sounded, it was certainly a cover for something else. He could not imagine Scotty ever having a job that required him to pay more than a hundred dollars a month in child support. Again, that didn’t matter right now. At this point, Taylor only wanted to know if Scotty was hiding anything about Anna’s disappearance and murder.
“It’s hard enough,” Taylor offered as he sipped his beer, “to take care of one person on these wages. I can’t imagine taking care of a whole family.”
Scotty chewed a fingernail.
“How old’s your kid?” Taylor asked “Three or four now.”
“Boy or girl?”
“Girl.”
“Does she have a name?”
“Of course.” He sipped some beer. “Kendra.”
“Kendra.”
“Kendra Sue.”
“Pretty name.” Taylor grinned. “Do you have any pictures?”
“Not any more. I used to. But it was ruined when I fell into the septic pond last summer. It was in my wallet and it ruined my wallet.” He gulped his beer. “You sound like a cop now too. What does this have to do with Anna?”
“Nothing. Just wondering if you had a picture of your little girl.”
“Nope.” Scotty finished the last of his fries. “Do you think it was someone we know?”
“The killer? Could be.”
“That sounds so weird,” said Scotty.
“What.”
“The killer. Like it’s a movie or something.”
“This isn’t a movie.”
“I know. It just sounds weird to say it out loud. It doesn’t seem real.” Scotty hooked his fingers as quotation marks, “‘The Tanglewood Killer’.” He pretended to shiver. “I was thinking.” He sat forward then looked around to ensure there was still no one within earshot. “I think it was that Mexican.”
“Which Mexican?”
“What’s his name. You know, that mean little guy with the switchblade. The one who hit Michael Voracci the other day…you know…Miguel!”
“Miguel has a switchblade? Are you sure it was Miguel?”
“Sure. I saw it once.”
“You’re talking Michael Voracci?” Taylor watched as Scotty nodded. “When did all this happen?”
“A couple days ago, remember? Oh, maybe you were in the cooler then. Voracci told him to move his boxes out of the aisle, and Miguel punched him in the head. I know. I was right there.”
“You saw him hit Voracci?” Taylor asked.
“Sure. I was just coming in. I guess he was breaking down some old boxes. They were all over the floor, and Voracci slipped on one, and he got sore. I guess he yelled at him and Miguel took a swing at him. Cut his face a bit, cuz he had the box cutter still in his hand.”
“He cut him?”
“Just a bit. Right here.” Scotty touched his temple near the hairline. “Saw him today though. You can barely see it. He doesn’t have a black eye or anything. I think he got off pretty lucky. Miguel is a crazy fuck. Everybody knows that.”
“He seems quiet to me,” said Taylor.
“Sure. Ever see him smile?”
“Not really.”
“There you go. I think he did a lot of drugs. His eyes were always red and glassy, y’know?”
“Yes. I noticed that.”
“I think he’s an illegal too. Voracci said he was going to call the cops, but I don’t think he ever did. He can’t tell the cops he used an illegal, y’know.”
“I guess not.” Taylor had finished with his burger. The bun was hard, and the meat was burnt on one end. He pushed his plate to the side.
“The cops should find him, though—especially with this thing with Anna. I don’t think Miguel is his real name though. The migrant workers, the Mexicans, all called him something else, I think.”
“Maybe you should tell the cops.”
“Why me?”
“Like you said, Voracci may not want them to know about
Miguel. And if you think he had something to do with Anna, you have to tell the police.”
“Maybe. I don’t want to get Voracci in trouble though,” Scotty said quietly as the waitress came to pick up their plates. He smiled at her again, but she did not seem to notice.
Scotty watched her black skirt sway as she walked away.
“She’s cute,” Taylor said.
“She’s hot. I’d love to take her out some night.”
“Why don’t you ask her?”
Scotty guffawed. “Are you kidding me? She wouldn’t have anything to do with us. We’re farmhands.”
“Come on, she’s a waitress. She’s cute. Kind of grumpy, but that might just be at work. Give it a shot.”
“No way,” said Scotty.
When the waitress returned, writing out their bill, Taylor pretended to notice her name tag for the first time. “Nice meal, Cindy.”
“I’m glad you like it,” she said with a flirtatious smile.
“You’re not Beck’s daughter, are you?”
“Nope.”
“That’s good.” He sat back, crossed his arms and grinned at her.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you something since the first time we met a couple weeks ago.”
Cindy seemed to be bracing herself, suddenly nervous. “What’s that?”
“Who the hell is this Beck guy, anyway?”
“Becky,” she grinned. “The owner’s daughter.”
“Is that her nickname, or did someone lose the ‘Y’ on the sign?” asked Scotty.
“That’s her name,” she replied. Then she shrugged and picked up their plates.
Taylor nodded. “Anyway, that’s real sweet. How old is she?”
“Now? Probably in her sixties. This place has been here a long time…sir.”
Taylor grinned. “Are you open for the long weekend?
“Canada Day? Yes.”
“But they’re giving you the day off, right?”
She held their plates on a tray on the counter behind her and began to add up their bills. “Nah, I’ll be working all day.”
“Do they pay you overtime for that?”
“Yeah, they are...in a way. I get all of Saturday and Sunday off.”
“Going out with your boyfriend?”
She smiled again, anticipating the direction of the conversation.
“Nah. I broke up with him after Christmas.”
“Then maybe you could go out with me…or my friend here,”
Taylor continued.
Scotty glowed.
“That depends,” she said, ignoring Scotty. “What did you have in mind?”
“How about a movie?”
“What kinda movie?”
“A bad movie.”
She laughed. “I’m not seeing no bad movies!”
“Bad movies are best.”
“Oh yeah? How come?”
“If it’s a bad movie, you won’t mind me distracting you through the best parts.” He beamed at her.
“I don’t think so.” She tore his bill from her pad and put it on the table in front of him.
Taylor picked up the bill and reached for some money. “You’re absolutely right,” he said. “I’ll pick you up at seven. Here or at your house?”
She leaned towards him, whispering softly. “Here. Wait out front.”
“That’s the spirit.” He winked and slid out of the booth, Scotty following his lead.
Outside, Scotty walked slowly, chewing his nail, thinking. “That was smooth,” he said. “But how the hell did you do that?”
“You just have to be confident,” Taylor said and waited for Scotty to get in the car and unlock the passenger door.
“I have bad luck with women,” Scotty said as Taylor slid into his seat.“Besides, I don’t get to meet too many good-looking women once the summer starts up. There’s the waitress there, but she likes you.
There’s Voracci’s wife, and he’s got her. And there’s the Mennonite girls at the winery, but I’d have to go to church…”
“Ever meet his wife?” Taylor asked.
“Whose wife?”
“Voracci’s wife. What’s she like?”
“Ginny?” he said. “She’s pretty. Not a model. Younger than you, older than me, I’d say. Nice tits. Nice legs.”
Taylor forced a smile at Scotty’s attempt to describe her.
“Brown hair. Big brown eyes,” Scotty continued. “Canadian, not Italian. She wears dresses and jeans, I guess. She never comes out.
When she comes out, she never goes far, ’less Voracci’s with her.”
“But have you seen her lately?” Taylor asked.
Scotty shook his head. “Nope. She won’t talk to the workers either. She comes out for the company picnic every July. Other than that she stays in the house. I think she travels a lot too. She’s nice to look at, but I heard she’s really stuck up. A real bitch.”
“No kidding,” said Taylor. “That shouldn’t surprise me.”
“Me neither. The pretty ones usually are.”
“That’s one hell of an attitude,” said Taylor. “I can’t imagine why you’re on your own.”
Scotty shrugged and made the car thunder down the darkened highway.
“You should go into town more often,” Taylor shouted over the wind. “Or go to the beach. There are lots of girls there.”
“Yeah, right. Those girls aren’t interested in anyone like us.
They’re looking for college guys.”
“I’m serious. Just shave, get a haircut, and you won’t have a problem at all.”
“That your secret, Taylor?”
Taylor shrugged. “I guess.”
“Then why don’t you shave?” Scotty laughed. It had been a joke.
As a reflex, Taylor touched his chin. He was surprised when his fingers felt three or four day’s growth on his face. “Guess that’s not my secret.”
“So how did you know?”
“What?”
“That she wanted to go out with you when she said she didn’t.”
Taylor laughed and flashed Scotty the bill. On the top, she had written: “You’re bad!” and included her phone number.
Scotty dropped his head and shoulders in surrender. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
Taylor laughed, and crumpling the piece of paper, let it stream out the window and into the night.
“You bastard,” laughed Scotty. “I’d have called!”
“She didn’t give it to you.”
“So you should call!” Scotty shouted.
“Why?” asked Taylor. “I know where she works. She’s at Beck’s more than she’s home anyway.”
“Still...” Scotty began until “Highway to Hell” came on the radio, and he lost his train of thought.
“We go back to work in eight hours,” said Taylor. “Just get me home.”
