He had breakfast at Ma and Pa Kettle’s—scrambled eggs, toast, sausages, and Diet Coke—and read last week’sRepublican-River. The newspaper didn’t have a word about the murder, not because it was a crappy paper—though it was—but because it was a weekly and came out on Thursday mornings and Hemming had disappeared Thursday night.
As he ate, Virgil wrote down a list of names. He needed to talk to Jeff Purdy, the Buchanan County sheriff who also provided law enforcement services to Trippton; Justin (Justine) Rhodes, Hemming’s husband; and, he thought, he might make a quick visit to an elderly lady named Janice Anderson. It wasn’t much of a list, but it was a start.
He was finishing his Coke when Margaret Griffin came through the door, looked around, spotted him sitting by himself. She asked a waitress to bring her coffee and an omelet, sat down across from him, and asked, “What can you do for me?”
“I’ve been out at CarryTown before, so I know where it is,” Virgil said. “This guy who warned you off... what trailer is he in?”
“Number 400. I don’t know what his name is. I was going to ask at the post office. You want me to come along?”
“Better if I go by myself. I’ve got to give priority to the murder case, but when I get a break, I’ll run out there,” Virgil said.
“Okay. I looked you up on the Internet last night and found those stories about the school board... That sounded like quite the unusual situation,” she said.
“Not something you run into all the time,” Virgil said.
“I never ran into anything like it when I was a cop,” she said.
“Where were you a cop?” Virgil asked.
“L.A. Six years on the street, and things got so rough I finally said screw it. Started off to law school, ran out of money—didn’t much like it anyway—but that helped me get my private investigator’s ticket, and I’ve done okay,” Griffin said. “I do a lot of background checks for executive employment. Mattel is one of my big clients, so when they asked me to do this, I could hardly say no.”
They chatted for another ten minutes, then Virgil said, “You take it easy while you’re poking around, Margaret. This woman, if she’s in town, is going to hear about you, if she hasn’t already, and the people out here have guns.”
“You think there might be a real threat?”
“Oh, no, not really. Minnesota’s generally a peaceful place,” Virgil said.
“Except for a whole bunch of serial killings that you’ve looked at over the years, and Vietnamese spies killing people, and a school board that murders its critics, and now this woman who was murdered and thrown in the river...”
“Well... yeah. We’re not perfect.”
—
When Virgil got up to go, Griffin asked, “You don’t carry a gun yourself?”
“I’ve got one, but it’s, you know, heavy,” Virgil said.
She squeezed the bridge of her nose for a moment, muttered, “Okay.”
What she was thinking, Virgil thought as he walked away, was “hick cop.”
—
Virgil pulled on his ski gloves and walked over to the law enforcement center. A balding deputy was sitting behind a panel of bulletproof glass reading a book calledTechniques in Home Winemaking, which he put down when Virgil walked in.
He pushed an intercom button and said, “Virgil. Here to solve the murder?”
“That’s one thing. Is Jeff in?”
“Yeah, he’s back there. Be happy to see you, I believe. I’ll buzz you in.”
The working area of the sheriff’s office was behind a sturdy black steel door. When the lock buzzed, Virgil pushed through and heard the deputy call, “Hey, Jeff—that fuckin’ Flowers is here.”
Virgil had been there before and he followed the hallwayaround a corner as the sheriff popped out of his office and stuck out a hand. “Man, am I glad to see you. We gotta figure this thing out right quick. The Chamber of Commerce is all over my butt. Come on back.”
Virgil followed him back to his office, took a chair, and asked, “Who inherits? The husband?”
“Not quite sure. I haven’t seen a will yet. Gina had a sister, but the sister lives in Iowa City with her husband—he’s a doctor—and they were both there in Iowa when Gina went for the swim.”
