Blood Walk Part 29

Nat grinned beneath his mustache, a red bush matching his sideburns, though his hair was dark. "How's the groupie? I saw you flirting with her."

Garreth grimaced. "I don't know what's worse, a juvie daring us to pick him up, or one inviting me to. Oh, speaking of juvies, our antenna-twister struck again. Three cars on Poplar. One of the neighbors saw some kids in the area, one matching Jimmy Pflughoff's description."

Nat scowled. "The little s.h.i.+t. If only we could catch him at it."

"He's. .h.i.t Poplar three times out of five. How about planting a car there, something flashy and inviting, with fairy dust on the antenna?"

Nat arched a brow. "Fine. Now if we can find a night dry enough not to wash off the marker, what car do we use . . . a certain flashy red ZX?"

"You go to h.e.l.l."

"Not devoted enough to sacrifice you own car, huh?" Nat grinned. "Speaking of flashy cars, there's someone new in town you ought to meet."

"What's he driving?"

"A Continental, but that isn't why you ought to meet him. The car just reminded me of him. He was at the Driscoll Hotel when I went by, asking Esther at the desk if a Madelaine Bieber lives around here."

Garreth fought an irrational desire to run.Don't be ridiculous. What do you have to be afraid of? Nothing . . . except questions that might revive others he preferred everyone to forget. He knew Lane was dead but to everyone else she had mysteriously disappeared. She had been disguised as a man that night. After the fire, of course, what remained of her body had been unrecognizable and Garreth never volunteered her ident.i.ty. Why should Anna Bieber have to learn her daughter was a killer?

Garreth forced a casual tone. "Did he say why he's looking for Mada? Who is he?"

"He's English. His name's Julian Fowler and he's a writer. I told him no one's seen Miss Bieber for over a year but he still wanted to talk to her family. I sent him over to your great-grandmother."

Despite the knots in his gut, Garreth felt a rush of relief. Now he could stop pretending calm. "What! You sent a stranger we don't know anything about to visit an old woman who lives alone? You should have had him talk to me!" He slammed the patrol car into gear and gunned backward in a tight Y-turn.

"What could you tell him?" Nat yelled after him. "You only met her the once. I'm not stupid, though. I looked over his identification before I gave him the directions. He's-"

"I'm still checking on Anna," Garreth interrupted.

4

The Englishman must have rented the car in Hays. Pulling up at the curb in front of Anna Bieber's house, Garreth's headlights shone on an Ellis County tag on the sleek gray Lincoln in front of him.

Garreth keyed his mike. "407 Baumen. I'll be out of the car on high band at 513 Pine." Sue Ann would recognize the address.

He moved up the walk and climbed the steps to the porch in long, urgent strides.

Anna Bieber answered his knock, her face lighting with surprise and pleasure. "Garreth! How nice. I wasn't expecting to see you until Sunday."

The radio on his hip muttered. Garreth smiled through the screen at the old woman . . . thin with age but still straight-backed and sharp-eyed. "I thought I'd just drop by for a minute. This Englishman is visiting for a long time this evening, isn't he?"

Her smile went knowing. "Ah. That's why you're here." She shook her head. "Thank you for your concern, but Mr. Fowler is a charming gentleman." Like so many people in the county descended from the Volga Germans who settle the area, her accent gave "is" and others 's a hissing p.r.o.nunciation. "Don't be such a suspicious policeman all the time."

"Con men are also charming." A distant part of him noted wryly that his anxiety for her had become genuine . . . as though he were actually her great-grandson and not just playing a role. "Grandma Anna, what does he want with Mada?"

"He's a writer researching for a book about World War II."

Lightning flashed, brightening the yard, followed several seconds later by a long drumroll of thunder. The wind picked up.

Garreth's radio spat a report of a tree knocked down across a road by lightning in Ellis County.

"Why don't I come in and meet Mr. Fowler?" Garreth said.

"Why don't you," Anna replied dryly. She unhooked the screen and pushed it open.

Garreth followed her through the hall into the living room. He left his jacket on for the appearance of huskiness its bulk gave him, and did not regret the choice when the visitor on the couch set his teacup on the coffee table and stood. Julian Fowler stretched up a good six-foot-plus, an athletic-looking man in his late forties with light brown hair, pale blue eyes, and the kind of peculiarly English face that had probably been pink-cheeked in his youth but had now aged enough to gain character and masculine edges. He looked vaguely familiar, though Garreth could not imagine where he had seen Fowler before. The Englishman's gaze raked him, too.

"Mr. Fowler," Anna said, "I'd like to have you meet my great-grandson, Garreth Mikaelian . . . Mada's grandson."

The visual autopsy ended abruptly. Fowler grinned in delight. "Really?" He pumped Garreth's hand. "Splendid. I don't suppose you'd know where your grandmother's got to?"

"I'm afraid not." Garreth rescued his hand and gave the Englishman a tight smile. "Excuse me, Mr. Fowler, but I don't quite understand what you want with Mada when you're doing a book about World War II. Shouldn't you be looking at military records?"

Fowler chuckled. "The book isn't about World War II, it just takes place during it. It's fiction. All my books are."

All his books? Garreth started. Fowler. Of course! Now he remembered where he had seen the face . . . on the back of a book his first wife Judith was reading. "You write under the name Graham Fowler."

The Englishman s.h.i.+fted his shoulders, as if embarra.s.sed. "Actually it's as much my name as Julian is. Julian Graham Fowler. I use it because my publisher is of the opinion that Graham sounds more appropriate than Julian for a writers of thrillers. It's just for books and promotional tours, however. Otherwise I'm Julian."

Garreth raised his brows. "I'd think using Graham would open more doors."

"That's quite true. Unfortunately, it also attracts attention when I need solitude." Fowler grimaced. "Tell me, what do you think happened to Mada? Mrs. Bieber says the chief of police believes she was abducted by accomplices of a man killed in town that night."

"As a hostage in case they were pursued. That's what he thinks, yes.""And you?"

Garreth shrugged. "I can't see abduction. We never found a body."

"Could she have simply run away?" Fowler frowned thoughtfully. "It's rather a habit of hers, isn't it . . . first haring off to Europe with that college professor, then abandoning him in Vienna, not to mention dodging Hitler's army and all."

Cold knotted Garreth's gut. "How do you know so much about her?"

Fowler blinked. "She told me. I met her once, you know, in the south of France after the war. That is, my parents did. I was just six at the time." He smiled. "I went mad over her. She was the most smas.h.i.+ngly magnificent creature I'd ever seen. When she visited with my parents, I was underfoot the whole time, hanging on her every word. She had marvelous stories about traveling around Europe with a Polish woman just before the war."

Garreth caught his breath. That would be Irina Rodek, the vampire Lane told him had brought her into the life.

"But the story I remember best was the one about escaping from Warsaw just ahead of Hitler's forces. She made it so real, like being there. When my publisher suggested that I try a World War II story, naturally I thought about her." Garreth had the feeling that Fowler had forgotten everyone else in the room. He stared dreamily past them. "We have a young girl coming from a sheltered, insular background, suddenly exposed to the sophistication and desperate glitter of pre-war Europe and then caught up in the violence of the war itself. Everything would be through her eyes, a romantic vision at first, then increasingly sophisticated, but still politically naive. Gradually, though, she understands what's happening and is terrified by it until finally, stripped of all innocence, honed into a practical, shrewd woman by the needs of survival, she triumphs." He focused on Garreth. "So I dredged up every detail I could remember her mentioning about her background and came looking for her, to talk to her and learn more about-" A clap of thunder shook the house, interrupting him. Fowler jumped. "My G.o.d. We're under seige."

Garreth had to smile. "Of a sort."

Lightning crashed outside, making the lights flicker. Rain drummed against the house. Garreth kicked himself for not bringing the slicker in with him.

The radio on his hip sputtered: "Bauman 407. 10-93, Gibson's."

An alarm at the discount house. The lightning had probably set it off, but it had to be checked out.

He backed toward the door. "Sorry we can't help you. I wish you luck luck on the book." Just not enough to learn what had really happened to Lane in Europe.

5

Wind drove the rain before it in blinding sheets. Swearing, Garreth dived down the steps and across the lawn toward his car.

But even that short a distance left him soaked. In the car he pushed dripping hair back out of his eyes with a grimace and peeled off his jacket, tossing it into the back seat. With his broadened temperature tolerance, the chill of the rain did not bother him, but water running down his neck did, and he hated the feel of the sodden trousers plastered to his legs.

None of which improved at the Gibson store. His slicker and hat did nothing to protect his cuffs and Wellingtons from further soaking while he walked around the building checking doors amid the crash of thunder and the shrill clamor of the store alarm. For a wistful minute he considered how much drier and more comfortable it would be searching the building from the inside, but with regret discarded the idea as too risky and waited outside until Mel Wiesner, the manager, arrived to shut off the alarm. If Weisner had found him inside, it would be impossible to explain how he had managed that with all the doors locked.

The s.h.i.+ft wore on . . . two bank alarms, both, like the Gibson's alarm. apparently set off by lightning; power lines pulled down by a fallen branch, where Garreth sat until a KPL truck and crew arrived to take care of them: fights in two bars; opening a car for a woman who had locked her keys inside the Shortstop, Bauman's single convenience store. None of the activity could quite make him forget about the writer or the bloodmobile, however. Through everything, both problems gnawed in the back of his mind.

Lightning and thunder eased. The rain settled into a steady drizzle.

Toward midnight the cruisers along Kansas Avenue had thinned to a last stubborn few. But the closing bars had begun emptying their customers onto the street and the combination of alcohol and wet pavement produced two minor fender benders and several near accidents. One of the latter erupted into a fight as the drivers, both big, burly men, piled out of their cars, enraged by the damage almost inflicted.

Garreth broke up the fight by stepping between them and while they stared down at him, astonished at being pushed apart by someone so much smaller, caught the eyes of each man in turn. "Don't you think that's enough? There's nothing to be upset about."

Rage faded from the men's faces. "I guess you're right:" They eyed Garreth with puzzled frowns, clearly aware that something had happened to them, but not sure what or how.

Garreth gave them no time to figure it out. "Then why don't you both go home?"

With pats on their shoulders, he steered the two sodden men toward their cars and stood in the street watching until they drove away.Someone chuckled behind him. "The Frisco Kid strikes again. I'd sure like to know how you make them roll over and wag their tails for you."

Garreth glanced around. It was after midnight already? Ed Duncan grinned at him from the other patrol car. The grin made the Morning watch officer look strikingly like Robert Redford, a resemblance Garreth knew Duncan cultivated. Garreth sent him back a wry smile. "It's a gift that comes with me blood."

"Okay, if you don't want to share with-hey, podner, we've got a live one!"

Garreth followed Duncan's gaze to a car weaving its way down the lane line on the far side of the tracks.

The light bar on Duncan's car flashed to life. "I'll pull him over. You test him and breathalize him."

Garreth frowned. "Me? It's your stop. You do it."

Duncan grinned. "But you're already drowned and I just got a trim and blow-dry this afternoon."

Usually Duncan did not bother him, but tonight the remark sc.r.a.ped the wrong way across Garreth's nerves. He said shortly, "Tough nuts. You want the f.u.c.king DUI, you haul your pretty blow-dry out of the car into the rain and write him up yourself."

He turned away.

"You got an att.i.tude problem, you know that, Mikaelian?" Duncan snapped after him. "You think you're so G.o.dd.a.m.n much better than the rest of us, a real hotshot, because you were a detective and worked in a big city department! But I never froze and let a partner get shot."

The jab hit dead center. Garreth stopped short, pain twisting his gut.

"And I wonder about you . . . skinny like that and coming from San Francisco. Maybe we ought to warn Maggie to watch you for night sweats."

With that parting shot, Duncan gunned the car away across the tracks, lights flas.h.i.+ng.

6

The rain either sobered everyone up on the walk to their cars or inspired cautious driving. After the private clubs closed at two their parking lots cleared without incident. Garreth checked the Co-op, Gfeller Lumber, and other businesses along 282 on the east side of town, then made a sweep through the city park up by the river and around the sale barn and rodeo grounds, disturbing half a dozen parked couples.

The rain continued unabated but radio traffic faded to near zero. For five and ten minutes at a stretch, only the soft hiss of static came over the air. Garreth yawned. Now came the hard part of the s.h.i.+ft . . . staying awake.

He turned around to head back south on 282.

Then in the distance, brakes and tires screeched.

Garreth held his breath, straining to hear through the drum of rain on the car. The sound stretched out for what seemed infinity before ending abruptly in a scream of crumpling metal and an animal shriek of agony.

Swearing, he flipped the light bar switch and stamped on the accelerator. The sound came from the north. Over the bridge was out of city jurisdiction but something cried out in pain-edged grunts and who else was there to check it out?

"407 Baumen. Investigating possible 10-47 on 282 north of the river. Advise S.O."

Half a mile past the bridge his stomach jolted floorward. Dark, square shapes loomed through the rain on the road, shapes the human eye would never see until on top of them. Angus cattle. Those Lou Pfeifer had reported earlier? One sprawled on its side groaning, rumen and intestines spilling onto the asphalt.

Garreth swung onto the shoulder, radioing for a wrecker and ambulance. The car that hit the Angus lay upside down in the ditch, a little Honda, or what remained of it after ploughing into a ton of beef at fifty-five or more miles an hour. And north beyond it, a human form hung across a barb wire fence . . . feminine in outline . . . motionless.

The stench of rumen contents and blood washed around him with the sound of the cow's agonized grunts as Garreth scrambled down into the muddy ditch to peer into the car. He ignored the thirst they triggered in him. The ditch carried two or three inches of water and another girl remained in the Honda. She did not move either. He smelled no more than the normal blood smell about her, though. By lying flat and reaching in through the slot left of the front window he could reach her wrist. A faint pulse fluttered under his fingers.

She was alive at least.

He splashed up out of the ditch to the girl on the fence, and cursed softly. This one must have gone out through the winds.h.i.+eld.

Her face had turned to b.l.o.o.d.y hamburger. With only pulp remaining of her nose, she gasped for breath openmouthed . . . in liquid, bubbling sounds and a blast of blood smell on each expiration. Cold bit into Garreth's spine. The girl's throat was filling with blood draining down from her nose.

"I need that ambulancenow! "he shouted into his portable radio.

"It's on its way," Doris Dreiling, the Morning dispatcher, came back.But how long before it arrived? Baumen had no regular ambulance service, just one owned by the hospital with a couple of personnel a.s.signed to it on each s.h.i.+ft, and when a call came those individuals could be in the middle of other duties just as pressing.

Garreth gnawed his lower lip. Maybe if he laid the girl on her side the blood would drain out of her mouth and let her breathe.

All the warnings against moving accident victims echoed loudly in his head as he gingerly lifted the girl loose from the barbs impaling her and eased her to the ground. On her side she did seem to breathe more easily. He covered her with his slicker against the rain.

A shrill cry mixed with the groans of the injured cow. "Help! Someone help!"