A photograph and a sister’s loyalty weren’t enough to bring a dead man back to life on a murder board.
I let Chowder out before the sun was up, did my hair before the kettle had finished, and stood at my closet trying to dress for a day that would take me from the sheriff’s office to a doctor’s waiting room to a quiet drive through a quiet neighborhood.
I chose a cream linen shirtwaist dress, fitted through the bodice and full through the skirt, with a thin black belt at the waist.I added black leather kitten heels and pearl studs at my ears, and I pinned my hair back at the temples because the humidity had no respect for vintage waves.
Chowder waited at the top of the stairs in a tiny navy bow tie with thin white pinstripes.He’d selected it himself by sitting next to it in the basket where I kept his collection.Whether that constituted preference or simple proximity I had stopped trying to determine.
“We’re investigating today,” I told him as we descended.“Try to look like a detective, not a suspect.”
He snorted.
By seven thirty I was parking the Karmann Ghia outside the sheriff’s office and following behind Chowder as he led the way.The building was the first thing past the bridge—a low-country white clapboard with moss-green shutters, raised up on brick with a deep front porch and a dark green metal roof.Palm trees lined the walkway and the parks department had planted hydrangeas in the front beds.The only thing that gave it away as municipal was the sign and the smattering of patrol cars in the side lot.
Deputy Harris was at the front desk.Dash had taken the rookie under his wing, mostly because after Milton’s tenure as sheriff he wasn’t sure who he could trust from the old guard.There were deputies that had gone to prison with Milton, and Dash had been in the process of hiring new deputies since he’d been installed as sheriff.
“Morning, Mrs.McCoy,” Harris said, standing behind his desk.“The sheriff just got off a call.You can go on back.”
“How’s your mama?”I asked out of politeness.
“She’s doing okay.My sister is about to have her first baby so she’s in Charleston for a couple of weeks.”
“How exciting,” I said.“Is Adelaide out today?”Adelaide was the new admin for the department.She was a fifty-something woman with bottle-blond hair, an impressive typing speed, and a no-nonsense attitude, which was apparently what you had to have when dealing with cops and the public.
“At a doctor’s appointment,” he said.“She’s due back soon.Thank the Lord.This phone rings nonstop.”
Even as he said the words the phone started ringing.I gave him a wave and headed back to Dash’s office.It was in the middle of a long hallway and attached to a large room that tended to be where deputies congregated before and after shifts.
The door that led off the hallway was open, and I knocked on the frame before entering.I noticed he had the door closed to the attached room and the blinds behind his desk were open and showed a view of the river.It was a peaceful office.
He was at his desk in shirtsleeves and his mouth quirked in a smile.
“Mrs.McCoy,” he said.“Beautiful as always.”
“Now Sheriff,” I said coyly.“I bet you say that to all the taxpaying ladies.”
“Just the ones who drive me crazy with that red lipstick.”He looked down and said, “Good morning, Chowder.That’s a smart-looking bow tie.”
He woofed in response and jumped up into one of the leather chairs across from Dash’s desk.
“You’re earlier than I expected,” he said.
“I’ve been up since four thirty.The shop reopens tomorrow and my hands don’t know what to do with themselves.”I sat in the chair next to Chowder.“I came for the file.”
He pushed a folder across to me and I opened it.
A small stack of Polaroids was clipped to the inside of the cover.Five of them, the colors gone orange after twenty-five years in a manila file, but still graphic in death.
I made myself look.
The first was a wide shot of the study from a doorway.It showed a heavy mahogany desk, leather chair, a wall of bookshelves.Henry was slumped sideways out of the chair, his upper body angled toward the floor, his head fallen.I could see a small entry wound at the side of his temple.
The second Polaroid showed a close-up of the wound to his right temple.A spatter of blood crossed the desk blotter and whatever papers had been in front of him.
The third was the gun on the floor at his right side.A small semiautomatic similar to the one I kept in my nightstand drawer.A .22 by the looks of it.
The fourth was the bourbon glass on the desk.It looked untouched.
The fifth was a wider shot from the opposite angle, and in it you could see the front of the desk, Henry’s chest, and his left hand resting in his lap.The gold of his wedding band caught the flash.
