Shoot First, page 5
All true. And completely false.
“With no cameraperson what good—?”
“This was a preliminary meeting,” Mike interrupted. “Unfortunately, we ran into a scheduling conflict. Going to need to meet with her again. We’ll try tomorrow.”
I wanted to grin at his maneuvering to buy us freedom tomorrow, but that would have given it away.
Haeburn huffed. “I better not find out you two have been using company time for personal errands.”
That was pretty nervy, considering Mike and I, along with camerawoman Diana Stendahl and aided by a handful of other staffers, had produced the two biggest stories KWMT-TV had seen in decades, and the best it had ever seen. That’s not bragging. Topping KWMT’s previous best is a low bar.
Not to mention I’d gone to check on a police radio call, which real reporters frequently did.
Something Haeburn and Fine knew nothing about.
DAY TWO
TUESDAY
Chapter Five
By the next morning, we knew the dead man’s car had been found on the next street over. And the car was a truck. If I were a true Wyomingite, I’d think of it as the dead man’s vehicle, since that could include pickup truck, SUV, cattle hauler, eighteen-wheeler, or even the occasional car.
This particular pickup had been rented the previous morning at the Cottonwood County airport.
When I say airport, don’t think of O’Hare or JFK or LAX. Don’t think, either, of Cody or Sheridan.
Think of a bare-bones block building plunked down near a strip of asphalt in the middle of scrub and emptiness. It was probably a good use of the arid, relatively flat, high-desert conditions of the eastern part of the sprawling county. More important to locals, occasional planes didn’t bother nearby cattle.
The combined ticket and car rental counter was manned — or in this case womanned — by one part-time employee, who drove over from her house if anyone called.
All that information was in the Sherman Independence that had arrived on my doorstep this morning.
Good for Needham.
Independence editor and publisher Needham Bender must have torn up the front page of the Tuesday edition of the twice-weekly paper for his report on the shooting at Mildred’s house.
He’d beaten the pants off last night’s KWMT-TV coverage.
He could have written one word in crayon, and he would have done better than KWMT, since Fine had kept all mention of what he termed a “sordid domestic situation” off KWMT.
“It was a home invasion,” Mike had argued futilely when it became clear yesterday afternoon that no coverage was planned. “The only domestic part was it took place in a house.”
“We don’t know the relationship between the shooter and the victim,” Fine responded primly. “It could have been a lover’s quarrel.”
He spun around at the titters that drew.
Not from me. I’d been too busy grinding my teeth. Mildred was the victim. But if I’d protested, I wouldn’t have put it past Fine to go after her on-air, outlandish lover’s quarrel and all. No coverage was better than bad coverage.
Still … Damn. Reading the Independence made me want to weep.
Facts. Clear prose. Freedom from twists and spins. A fine example of reporting the news on deadline. It made me homesick for what I’d once known. What I’d once done.
I had the Independence open on the battered kitchen table while I drank my coffee and ate yogurt.
The table rocked. Not rocked in the musical or complimentary way, but in the fundamentally unstable sense. Which was why I’d learned to stop filling anything holding liquid to the top. Especially morning coffee. The tabletop didn’t need caffeine. I did.
The table, like most of the furnishings, had come with the Hovel.
Before arriving here, I’d figured my stay in Wyoming would be even more temporary than the stops my ex and I had made in a rapid ascent of the career ladder. So I’d left most of my belongings in storage. Once here, I was glad I had. No way did I want to expose my furnishings to the Hovel’s unloving ways.
Though one look at the bed had immediately sent me out to buy a new one.
The phone rang.
I glanced at the clock automatically. Far too reasonable a time for Mom to call. She preferred crack of dawn in Illinois, which means pre-crack-of-dawn in Wyoming.
It was Jennifer Lawton, the news aide/utility infielder from KWMT-TV. Apparently she’d taken a course in speed-talking since yesterday.
“Truck rented at the airport in the name of Ted Edwards,” she started without a hello. Before I’d recognized that as the name the man had given Mildred, Jennifer had another dozen words out. “Paid cash. Had an out-of-state driver’s license, Alabama, someplace like that. He arrived at the airport in a pickup, and left it there. That’s a rental, too. From the Billings airport. No rental in Billings in the name Ted Edwards. They’re tracking that rental right now. More later.”
“Wait. See if you can get a copy of his driver’s license. Here or Billings, either one.”
“Will do.” Then Mata Hari Lawton hung up, leaving me to replay her words until they started to make sense to my morning brain.
The phone rang again.
“Mildred’s been released while they investigate.” Mike’s words were at regular speed, thank heavens.
“How do you—?” That was half a stupid question. Aunt Gee. “She’s not at her house.” The house was still surrounded by police tape and observed by the tall, skinny Sherman Police Department officer.
“Still a crime scene,” Mike said. “She’s at Sally Tipton’s house.”
“You say that like I should know Sally Tipton.”
“Thought you might have heard about her from Mildred. Mildred, Avis Finneker, and Sally Tipton have been friends forever.”
“Mildred mentioned a friend, but not her name.”
“I suppose she’s the junior member of the group. The one who fades in comparison to the strong personalities of the other two. Anyway, that’s where Mildred is. Want me to pick you up?”
The implication was clear. Pick me up to go to this woman’s house to talk to Mildred about the shooting.
I assumed a stilted on-air delivery. “Yes. I need background for Helping Out. She’s an excellent source for issues arising from buying and selling collectibles, as well as attending garage sales. Thank you, Michael.”
“Always glad to help KWMT-TV’s consumer affairs ace. Don’t forget, sports memorabilia is a huge market. I’ll let the office know we’re out on assignment. Be there in half an hour.”
* * * *
“What has the sheriff’s department told you?”
It took nearly an hour to get around to asking Mildred that. Not because Mike was late picking me up. And not because it took long to get to Mildred’s friend’s house. It was because Mildred’s friend’s determination that we be comfortably seated, watered, and fed produced a dithering flurry of offers, instructions, and questions.
No, thanks, no tea.
No, really, no tea. Not even chamomile, even though, yes, it was soothing.
Yes, this chair is fine. An extra cushion was entirely unnecessary. No, truly, the sun isn’t in my eyes. Well, okay, if it was easier for Mildred to have people on her right because her neck got stiff, of course we’ll move. No, the sun wasn’t in Mike’s eyes now.
No, thanks, no coffee. Or iced tea. Or — Okay, yes, a glass of lemonade would be nice. Yes, it was unseasonably warm today. Absolutely, that was good for the ranchers bringing in hay, and, no, when she said her flowers could use rain, it was quite clear she hadn’t been wishing ill for the ranchers. No, no one could possibly think that.
She was short and round. Her hair was mostly white and reminded me of cotton candy.
Where Mildred had an air of sturdy independence, Sally Tipton’s wide, staring eyes gave the impression she didn’t quite grasp what passed before them. She had a peculiar way of talking. She started each sentence quickly, but each word within the sentence was drawn out and loud. The combination became robotic, and difficult to interrupt. She appeared to take audience silence as proof of enchantment, so she kept talking.
By that point Mike was alone offering responses. I was worn out.
No need for cookies. Well then, yes, as long as she wouldn’t hear of having a guest in her house without a plate of cookies out. Yes, ma’am, cookies did make all the difference in making a discussion pleasant.
“Sally!” Mildred finally rapped out. “Sit down and be quiet.”
Her friend did as she was ordered with the air of a puppy who’d heard an all-too-familiar slap of a rolled-up newspaper against a hand. I didn’t care for it as a way to deal with people or dogs but had to admit it worked this time.
That’s when Mike finally got in that first question, about what the sheriff’s department had told Mildred.
“Them,” she snorted. “They’re not telling me a thing except don’t do this and can’t do that.”
We then heard a detailed account of how the sheriff’s department hadn’t known what they were doing, what with sending in multiple people to make her tell them what had happened over and over instead of talking to each other and saving her the trouble. In complaining about having to repeat her account at the sheriff’s department, she repeated it to us. Several times.
Unfortunately, she gave us no new information.
“Can you believe that Shelton? Won’t let me in my own house. A gift in appreciation for all my grandfather did. And that Shelton says I can’t go in.”
“It is a crime scene,” Mike ventured.
“Crime? What crime? Self-defense! I was protecting myself and my home. Last time I checked, I didn’t have to let some hoodlum waltz in and murder me to death without lifting a finger. Why—”
“You should write a letter to the editor, get it run in the Independence,” Sally said.
That shunted Mildred’s head of steam in a new direction. “Why would I waste my time doing that? Think it’s going to get that Shelton and his people out of my house, probably pocketing things left and right, and even if they’re not, they’re touching my belongings.”
“No,” Sally said.
I realized she was answering the question Mildred had never finished asking: If Sally thought writing a letter to the editor would get her back into her house sooner.
It took Mildred a couple more beats to get it. “Then why would I bother writing a letter to that damned Bender at the Independence?”
Uh-oh. Had a Bender relative crossed Mildred at the county fair, too?
Sally’s posture was still retiring, but she said, “You were talking so nice, the words flowing out like you’d practiced, about protecting yourself and all, I thought it sounded like one of those letters in the newspaper. With the words already in your head, you wouldn’t have to stop to think them up, so you might as well send it to the Independence. That’s all.”
Mildred turned her head, possibly to give Sally a more direct look. I couldn’t know, since the move put the back of her head toward me. Sally’s expression never wavered from vague pleasantness.
“Did the sheriff’s department indicate the name the man gave you might not be real?” I asked.
“Not real? What do you mean? He told me that was his name, and,” she concluded with an air of finality, “they said that’s the name the car was rented under, so it must be his name.”
Mike gave me a look, inviting me to bring forward the information Jennifer had dug up and I’d shared with him on the drive over. But I had no desire to dispute with Mildred. At least not until we knew more. She’d been unsettled enough.
“Did the sheriff’s department give you any idea of what he might have been after?”
“It could have been anything. I have the finest collection in Cottonwood County.”
“Russell Teague,” Sally murmured to her hands, folded on the table.
Mildred shifted. “Nobody knows what he has because he won’t let anybody see. Like a miser. Gets things, keeps them for himself.”
“If he’s found the treasure—”
“Oh, please. Those Teagues have yammered on about a treasure forever and never found it. This one’s only got money because of relatives back East.”
“The museum,” Sally added.
“Pfft.” Mildred’s expelled breath dismissed it.
“Emmaline—”
“Emmaline? Emmaline Parens has nothing compared to me. Nothing. She thinks she’s so high and mighty, saying she’s focused on provable items of Cottonwood County history. Then what does she do but donate most of it to a museum.”
I’d yet to visit the Sherman Western Frontier Life Museum, so had no opinion on it. But Mildred and I parted ways over this donor. Encounters with Mrs. Parens had given me great respect for the former teacher and principal.
“What does she have now? Nothing. It’s all there in the museum and she has to start over. If she can.” Her expression shifted. “That Emmaline Parens acts like she’s better than the rest of us, but she carried on with a foreigner. A foreigner. And not even married. Elmer Parens must have gotten a nasty surprise on their wedding night.”
Mildred was as riled on this topic as she’d been about the rhubarb pie. Many people have hot buttons. Knowing it was a common foible, however, didn’t make it any more pleasant to watch.
In turning away, I met Sally’s eyes for an instant. Something flitted across them, gone immediately.
Mike, heroically, took on the task of turning the subject. “The thing is, there could be a lot more to this than you not being able to get back in your house right away, Mildred.”
Sally gasped. “You mean she might be charged with murder?”
I half wished Mildred were as easily startled. “We want to make sure that doesn’t happen,” I said. “That’s why we’re asking these questions.”
Mildred said, “No reason to bother yourselves. My lawyer said this is an open-and-shut case. It’ll be cleared up in no time.”
If her lawyer said that, she needed a new one. “Who’s your lawyer?”
“James Longbaugh.”
My first thought was that Tom had come through, as promised, in the one area he’d volunteered to help with. My second thought was Mildred’s account didn’t match the competent lawyer I knew Longbaugh to be. I feared it was her optimism speaking.
“This is serious. You understand that, don’t you?”
“It’ll be fine. There’s no—”
Sally grasped Mildred’s arm with both hands. “Oh, Mildred, if you should go to prison, think how you would dislike it there.”
Mike made a choking sound.
I pressed the advantage. “There’s another factor, Mildred. More important than any legal issues. You could be in danger.”
“Mildred in danger?” Sally repeated. She sounded thunderstruck.
“Very much in danger,” I said staunchly, before Mildred could grab on to her friend’s surprise as would-be proof that my contention was absurd. “Mildred, have you had any disagreements with anybody? Is anyone angry at you?”
She was shaking her gray head before I finished. “No.”
Sally made a small sound.
“What is it, Sally?” Mike asked.
Mildred glared at him. I empathized. Once Sally got started, would we be able to stop her?
“Disagreements. You and Avis, that last day about—”
“My cousin and I had spats all the time. It’s a shame she died after one, but she knew how I felt about her.”
“Oh, yes. You told her that day. Yes. And her niece on the phone about the will—”
“Elizabeth meant disagreements with somebody here, Sally. Not someone dead. And not somebody across the country. For heaven’s sake. Use your head.”
I spoke quickly because Sally looked as if she might want to argue in favor of including the dead and distant. “It’s most likely to come back to your collection. I’m concerned the man who broke in was operating as someone’s agent. In other words, someone else was behind it. That someone could try again.”
“Oh. No. That’s—” Sally wailed.
“Let’s have tea now,” Mildred interrupted. “Sally, make some tea.”
Sally rose. “Okay. I’m going to make us tea, and then we will put our heads together and think this through. Because this is a horrible situation. Absolutely horrible. It is unthinkable—”
“Tea,” Mildred said.
“—anyone could think Mildred Katarese was actually a murderer when she knew she had to protect—”
“Tea.”
“—herself from that man. Yes, yes, I know, you don’t want me defending you. I will get the tea, but that doesn’t change—”
“Tea!”
“—these young people have been sent by heaven. There, I said it. They mustn’t give up, no matter how much you say you don’t need them.” She shuffled toward the stove.
She was sweet.
I far preferred Mildred’s acerbity.
As if she’d heard my thought and agreed with it, Mildred murmured, “A dear soul.” Then added with tart impatience, “It’s like she lives in some rose-colored cocoon.”
Interesting mix of images. But someone who lived in a rose-colored cocoon would be more likely to underreact than overreact, wouldn’t she?
Mildred added, “She has no right to drag you both into doing something that’s not the least bit needed.”
“Never mind,” I said. “It’s decided. We’ll do a little digging to be sure this wraps up as quickly and smoothly as possible. Better to have too much ammunition than too little.”
“My lawyer will take care of it. You have jobs and busy lives.”
“It’s no problem,” Mike said.
“I’m not in danger—”
“You can’t know, Mildred,” I interrupted. “Until we know who this man was, and if someone sent him, no one can know. We’re going to keep looking into this.”
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