Code 61 - Donald Harstad [86]
I gave Chester a disgusted look. “Wanna try that again?”
“Is this guy a priest?” asked Tillman, holding up a crucifix that looked to be about a foot long.
“Nope,” I said. “He's a vampire hunter.”
“No shit?” said Tillman. “Way cool.”
On the way back down to the cars, with Tillman toting the pack, I asked Chester why he had tried to defy my order to stay away from the scene.
“In the first place, I was lost,” he said, without much conviction. “In the second place, I hardly think it's fair that you have patrols out just to keep me from my job.”
Aside from the fact that only a dedicated egocentric would think our patrols were meant for him, it was the first time I had heard him refer to a job.
“Just what would your job be?” I asked between mossy limestone stepping blocks.
“To bring the vampire to justice,” he replied.
“That's our job,” said Hester. “Just ours.”
“God's justice,” he said. “Not the laws. The justice of the righteous.”
“Oh,” I said, “that's just fuckin' swell.” I stumbled, and made my usual graceful recovery. “In the first place, he's probably not anywhere around here.”
“Who? The one you were all chasing?”
“Whoever it is you're looking for, Chester,” I said.
When we got to the cars, I told Tillman and Knockle to get a wrecker for Chester's car, and then escort it and him to the jail. I reiterated the traffic charge.
“Aren't you going to charge me with interference?” asked Chester.
“No. But don't push it. I'm willing to cut you some slack, because you weren't actually in contact with anybody but us. But, like I said, don't push it.”
“Of course.” He was smiling.
“Knockle,” I said, “do not give this gentleman a ride back to this area. Keep his car in Maitland as evidence, and take him directly back to his motel over in Wisconsin, as soon as he posts bail.” I paused. “And tell Harry that he's over there, and what happened.”
“You bet, Carl. Hey, too bad about those pants. You looked pretty good before you went up the hill.”
NINETEEN
Monday, October 9, 2000
13:21
When we finally got headed up to the Mansion again, Hester and I tried to come up with a game plan. To begin with, we wanted to know what Edie's five housemates knew about who had been upstairs when we went to the third floor. We were virtually certain that it was this Peel, but we needed to be sure. It was apparent that he'd been up there a while, possibly since Edie's murder. Had they known? I was willing to bet that at least some of them had. So was Hester.
We were pretty sure that the unknown called Peel had killed Edie, probably killed Baumhagen, and had been the window peeker at Alicia Meyer's. It looked like we were going to have to find out about Peel from the group at the house, though, since Jessica Hunley had split too soon to be interviewed. It was a case where, the more we knew about Peel, the more we'd probably know about the why and where of the killings.
We also wanted to determine two things about the movement of Edie's body. First, we needed to make sense out of the bloodstains. Both the stains on the carpet and those on the servants' stair had been explained by the action of setting down Edie's body in the body bag. Whoever was moving it needed either a rest, or a way to open the doors. Either way, the problem was determining why the stains were at the bottom of the servants' stair, which only went to the third floor; and on the second floor in front of Edie's door. If she'd been killed on the third, and we certainly had no real evidence that she had, it might explain the movement. Except to get her down to the second, the logical way was to go via the main stair, which we had gone up. To go down from three all the way to one via the back stairs, then right back up to two via the main staircase…. Illogical. Not to say not possible, but not logical.
As Hester said, “Especially since it doesn't look like she was killed up on the third, anyway.”
“Since