Homicide My Own - Anne Argula [48]
“Did you find the notebook?” Houser asked.
“Shaddup,” said I.
“C’mon, what happened?”
We ignored the perv.
We pulled up to the tribal police double-wide and went inside, this time dragging Houser along with us. Like when, after the K-Mart thing you still have to stop at the bank but this time you bring Fido in with you because you’re afraid of the way you thought you lost him, and at least here they’ll give him a biscuit.
Robert was on duty, the first Robert. Though he looked a lot like the second Robert, I could tell the difference.
“Good evening, Robert,” I said, best of friends. I was a little drunk. “The chief here?”
“Nope.” He looked over Houser, trying to figure that one out.
“Hey, Robert,” said Odd. “Where’s your evidence locker?”
“Our what?”
“Your evidence locker,” he said. “Where you keep evidence of crimes?”
“Why’d you want to see that?”
“Just a thought,” said Odd.
“Hold on a second,” the kid said, and he went into the back room.
“It’s after eleven,” I said. “What made us think the chief would be here?”
“He’ll be here,” said Odd.
“You think the notebook might be in the evidence locker?”
“Most likely not.”
I was holding Houser by the back of his belt. He had nothing to say.
Robert came back out carrying a cardboard box with a lid on it, the kind of box made for storing files. He put it on the counter and took off the lid. It was their evidence locker.
We both stuck on heads over the counter and looked inside. Tagged hunting knives and a cheap .22 revolver, a broken longnecked Bud bottle with dried blood on the business end of it, a pint of Kessler’s, half full, a baggie of grass, a set of skeleton keys, some phoney drivers licenses, and one disconcerting glass eye which seemed to look at us accusingly.
“What are you looking for?” we heard behind us. The chief, of course.
We turned but we didn’t say anything, enjoying a little stare-down instead.
“Your prisoner looks healthy,” he said finally.
“I wouldn’t go that far,” said I. “But we’ll let a psychiatrist decide.”
“Why are you still on the island, and what are you doing here?” he asked. A threat had entered his voice. Da frick.
“They wanted to look at our goodie box,” said Robert. “Not much to see.”
“We were looking for a blue notebook,” I said, “a blue notebook belonging to a school girl, which seems to be missing, and we were wondering if maybe you had it.”
“Why would we have it?”
“Whether you had it,” I said, and there was a pretty good threat in my voice too, because I don’t take threats well, unless, of course, they come from the lieutenant, and then I take them very well. “But I guess if you had it you wouldn’t hide it in the goodie box.”
“I wouldn’t hide it anywhere, because I don’t have it.”
“The kids used to tease you,” said Odd, falling back into that dreamy way he had when he was flashing back. “They’d call you Bony Pony, because you were so skinny, all skin and bones.”
The chief looked for a moment as though someone had taken a ballpeen hammer to his heart. Robert suppressed a snigger, still not beyond the stage where he couldn’t appreciate a good burn at someone else’s expense.
“Come back to my office,” said the chief to us. “Robert, put their prisoner in the lockup.”
Knowing Houser was going back to where he gnawed open a vein, and seeing his reaction to same, made me want to get comfortable with the chief and spend some quality time. Who knew if Houser would draw any time in Spokane? He might as well draw a little here.
The chief shut the door behind us in his little office. We all sat down, the chief behind his desk. “I think it’s time you tell me what’s going on here,” he said.
“I think you know what’s going on here,” said Odd. “That’s why you’ve been following us, just like you dogged me when