The Heirloom Murders - Kathleen Ernst [38]
He ushered her back to Marie’s empty chair, and he dropped into the one the officers used. “You have no idea who hit you?”
“No, I told you! None at all. It was dark, and I got spooked. I was turning to get out of there when something slammed down. It brushed right by my ear—” Chloe gestured—“as I turned. Then it hit my shoulder so hard I fell.”
“Was it a fist?”
She sucked in her upper lip, thinking. “Something harder, I think.”
That was bad. A fist might suggest that Chloe had startled someone who didn’t belong there, but had no real intention to cause bodily harm. “Are you sure it was a guy?”
Chloe closed her eyes for a moment, then shook her head. “No, I can’t be sure. He hit me really hard. But I guess it could have been a woman.”
Roelke’s right knee jiggled up and down. “Can you think of any reason why someone would be in Dellyn’s barn? I’m trying to figure out what this person was after. And why he—or she—didn’t just wait and let you leave, instead of attacking you.”
“The barn is packed with all kinds of antiques.”
“How valuable?”
“I have no idea! I’d never been in there before tonight.”
Roelke stood, and extended a hand to Chloe. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go see if Dellyn is home.”
Chloe struggled against another spasm of unease as Roelke banged on Dellyn’s front door. Still no answer.
“Let’s go take a look at the barn,” he said.
Roelke had Chloe wait outside while he searched the building. It seemed to take a long time. She stood with arms crossed, clutching her elbows. At least the lights were back on.
Finally Roelke poked his head out the door. “All clear. Come show me where you were.”
Chloe stepped inside. The lights were doing their yellow best to dispel the shadows.
“Two switches,” Roelke told her. “One by the door, one in the feed room. Evidently whoever was here turned on the lights when he came in the main door, and then turned them off with the feed room switch when he heard you come inside.”
And then crept up on me, Chloe thought, and attacked. She felt a flicker of remembered fear, but just a flicker. She hoped that wasn’t only because Officer Roelke McKenna, über-cop, stood beside her. She wasn’t big on the whole distressed damsel thing.
“And where were you when he hit you?”
Chloe pointed. “Right here. He knocked me against that stanchion.” She pointed to a vertical wooden post.
Roelke crouched to examine it. “Here’s what ripped your shirt.” He pointed to a large knothole on one edge of the post. The bottom tip of the C-shaped curve that bordered the hole was sharp, and still held a couple of cotton fibers.
Chloe swallowed hard. “I’m glad my head didn’t hit that.”
Roelke played the beam around the cluttered aisle. He abruptly muttered something unintelligible and brought the light to rest on something on the floor nearby.
“Oh my God,” Chloe whispered. She crossed her arms over her chest again, grabbing her shoulders, warding away any remaining evil. A primitive and obviously homemade hand cultivator lay in the sphere of light, a heavy wooden handle with a wickedly pointed curve of iron attached at the head. Used while kneeling in a garden, it would simply be a handy tool to dig holes or hack at deep-rooted weeds. But used as a weapon … “He could have killed me with that thing!”
“Yeah,” Roelke said grimly. “Don’t touch it.” He crouched and carefully eased the cultivator into an evidence bag he pulled from a pouch on his belt.
“What’s that—wait, turn it over again.” Chloe crouched too, compelled to get a closer look. She pointed to the tip of the wooden handle, which was carved with a flower. “It looks like a rose. That bastard attacked me with a piece of folk art!”
“Hunh.”
Chloe stared at the cultivator, struggling with a sickening slough of emotions. Someone had once lovingly taken the time to personalize the tool—perhaps some farmer’s gift for his wife, the rose chiseled out on long winter evenings?
“I turned as he was swinging,” she said again. “I think the handle hit my shoulder. But if I hadn’t turned … ” She couldn