“Tact, certainly.” The woman’s eyes gleamed. “Well, I best be on my way. Have to stop by the mercantile yet, you know. If anyone there saw something suspicious last night, I’ll come straight back here and let you know.”
“Um… Thank you?” He could just imagine Mrs. Ranulfson interrogating poor Mr. Foley’s customers. “And so that you’re aware, I sent a note about your missing jewelry to the sheriff up in Central.” It had been the only other thing he could think to do. “They’re on the lookout for anything that matches your necklace and earbobs.”
He’d done that last night before he’d learned about the burglary at the warehouse, but now they had two robberies nearly a month apart. What were the chances they were unrelated?
Though jewelry from an unoccupied house would be much easier to steal than entire crates from a warehouse.
“Well…” She eyed the papers cluttering the top of his desk. “It does seem as though you’ve got work to do, so I’ll leave you to it.” She gave a curt nod, which once again sent the feathers atop her hat swaying, then swept out the door.
Isaac sank back into his chair and rested his head in his hands. He should probably have lunch, then see if his brotherhad returned. He glanced out the window. What were the chances a snowstorm would blow in while he was eating, and he wouldn’t be able to get out to Elijah’s for a day? Or maybe two days? A month, even?
He reached beside his desk for the sack containing his bread and ham, but the door opened. Thomas Dowrick stepped inside and hung his coat on a peg.
Isaac eyed the back of his trousers, unable to stop the grin that spread across his face. At least the red flannel of Thomas’s union suit wasn’t hanging out. “Been to visit your wife, I see.”
The back of Thomas’s neck turned red, and he stalked toward the chair across from the desk. “As a matter of fact, I have.”
“Good. Can’t have Eagle Harbor’s newest deputy showing his union suit to the world.” Isaac rummaged in his bottom desk drawer for one of the little tin stars he’d inherited when he’d taken over as sheriff, then slid it across the desk to Thomas.
“I think the story will do enough damage on its own,” Thomas spoke through a tight voice.
“Already around town, is it?” Looked like Betty Ranulfson wouldn’t be the only one telling stories at the mercantile today.
Thomas glowered and grabbed the star. “I remember being asked to stop by so you could deputize me, not so you could laugh at me.”
Isaac muffled another round of laughter and stood to grab the Bible from the shelf behind his desk. “Stand up and place your hand on the Bible.”
Thomas did as instructed.
“Thomas Dowrick, do you promise to uphold the law?”
“I do.”
“Then I hereby deputize you as an officer of the Eagle Harbor Sheriff’s Office.” He nodded toward the pin in Thomas’s hand. “Go ahead and put that on.”
Thomas sat back down and worked the pin through the fabric of his shirt. “Been thinking about what happened last night. Those men didn’t want to kill you. Otherwise they’d have used your gun on you.”
Isaac scratched the back of his neck. Looked like his new deputy had a good head on his shoulders, and here he’d just been happy to find a man as big as Thomas who’d work for nothing. “No, they’d have used one of their own. Several of them were armed.”
“Why, then? Surely they didn’t think beating up the sheriff was a good idea.”
Isaac put the Bible back on the shelf, then sat. “Trying to teach me a lesson, as near as I can gather.”
“And this lesson is…?”
“Probably to leave them alone and let them do whatever they want. Like Jenkins.”
Thomas frowned. “Who’s Jenkins?”
“Don’t you remember the former sheriff? Big.” Isaac extended his arms out in front of him to resemble the size of Jenkins’s stomach. “Always drunk. Always willing to look the other way during a crime if there was some sort of benefit to him.”
It was how he’d gotten roped into running for sheriff when he didn’t have a lick of lawman experience. Though anyone had to be better than Jenkins.
Thomas squinted. “I suppose. Never had much cause to run into him before.”
Isaac fiddled with a pencil on his desk again. “Well, either those loggers think they can intimidate me, or they’re trying to distract me from something else.”
“Like what?”
