“Took me back some to see her on Josey Pye’s lap.Desi, I mean. Not Miss Laurel. Seemed wrong somehow. They don’t really look much alike. You think so, Hank?”
“Not much. Not like you and me. Their hair ain’t even the same color.”
“Still, there’s something.” Dillon regarded Call. “I reckon you’re going to talk to Desi. Maybe you’ll see the same thing we do.”
“Maybe,” said Call. He wondered if Josiah Pye had seen the same resemblance that the boys had. That alone made Desiree worth seeking out. He remembered Laurel saying that she felt uncomfortable around Pye. Was this why? It wasn’t out of the question that Pye had shown an interest in Laurel and she put him off. He could have found that Desiree was an adequate substitute. He hardly would have been rejected there. “If Pye’s responsible for the theft, have you come up with how it was done?”
“If?” asked Hank. “No question about it.”
Dillon’s brow furrowed. “Has something changed your opinion? You seemed pretty set on his guilt yesterday.”
“Trying to keep an open mind.”
Hank shook his head. “I guess you gotta do that, but Dillon and me already made up our minds. It wasn’t us. Rooster doesn’t move quick enough to have done the deed. Miss Laurel’s got more to lose than gain, and Mrs. Lancaster couldn’t have climbed up on the box. So I suppose you can keep that mind of yours open, but ain’t nothing gonna come of it.”
“Maybe not. Still, I’d like to know how it was done. Any ideas? You must have talked about it.”
“Sure,” said Dillon, “we talked. Didn’t much come of it. Our best guess is magic. Nothing else explains it.”
“Magic,” Call said dryly.
Hank shrugged. “You asked. That’s what we come up with.”
“Well, that’s enlightening, but I don’t think I’ll be sharing that with Mr. Stonechurch.”
“Probably better if you didn’t,” said Dillon. “We knowhow it sounds. You don’t want him thinking you’re a knucklehead. Hank and me don’t care so much.”
Call chuckled. “All right. I appreciate your help. One last thing, which bunk was Pye’s? It wasn’t obvious to me.”
“That’s cause Rooster stripped it,” said Hank. “Josey didn’t have much and he took it all with him, but since you want to know, it was the last one on the left, farthest from the door.”
Call nodded and thanked them again. “I’ll still have a look around if you don’t mind.”
The brothers shook their towheads in unison. Dillon said, “Suit yourself.”
9
Call stood on the right side of the bunk that Josiah Pye used to occupy. He had no idea what he’d hoped to find, but he thought he should look. It would have been too much to expect that Pye had left a note behind claiming responsibility. Something like a joke’s-on-you confession. Apparently Pye did not possess Call’s own dark sense of humor.
There was a small chest at the foot of the bed that Pye would have used to store his belongings. Every bunk had a similar chest. Call opened Pye’s. As expected, it was empty. Still, it was hard not to be disappointed. Call closed the lid with the toe of his boot and considered his next steps. He knelt beside the bunk, looked under it, picked up the mattress, and swept his arm beneath it. Nothing. It was as if Josiah Pye had never existed.
As he stepped back into the aisle between the two rows of bunks, Call’s gaze moved from one identical chest to the next, and it occurred to him that just because a particular bed wasn’t in use did not mean its chest was necessarily empty.
He was prepared to examine the one nearest to him when the bunkhouse door swung open. He straightened as Laurel appeared on the threshold and wondered why he felt like a child caught with one hand in the cookie jar.
Her head tilted to the side. She wasn’t frowning,although she seemed to be leaning toward that expression. “What are you doing?”
“Satisfying my curiosity.”
She stepped into the bunkhouse. “That’s not a helpful answer.”
“I thought I’d have a look in these empty chests to see if Mr. Pye might have left anything behind.”
“That chest you were about to open wasn’t his.”
“I know, or at least it isn’t where you’d expect his to be. Doesn’t mean that he didn’t use it. It was just a thought.” He paused, studied her. “Why areyouhere? Do you need me for something?”
“I just sent Hank to help Rooster muck out stalls. I thought you’d be doing that.”
