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Collingswood let out a yell and opened his eyes.
“What in the name—?” As he lurched to his feet, he caught sight of the headless form now half out of the coat pocket and writhing violently. With a whimper of terror he thrust out a hand to ward it off.
“It’s dead!” I shouted. My volume moderated. “Muscle contractions or something make them keep moving. It’s dead. It’s harmless. The head is gone.”
I thought I saw a splatter of something across the room, but I wasn’t sure. I put down my gun. Collingswood was white as buttermilk.
“It was in— it was in my—”
Eyes bulging, he pointed a trembling finger, but drew it back abruptly to claw at his chest.
“Mr. Collingswood!”
He sagged against my desk. Dear God, was he having a heart attack? I gave my chair a shove on its casters and lowered him into it.
“Mr. Collingswood, who’s your doctor?”
He shook his head.
“Pills.” His scrabbling hand succeeded in freeing them from an inside pocket. Thumbing open the lid, he managed to shove one under his tongue without spilling them all.
Nitro. Digitalis. Something like that. He did have a heart problem. This might not be an out-and-out attack though. His breathing steadied. The pinched look was leaving his face. He nodded as if to indicate he was okay.
“I’m not sure what I should do,” I said uncertainly. “I doubt it’s the right thing, but there’s a bottle of gin in my desk.”
A faint sideways move of his head signaled No.
“Water.” The brief word didn’t sound strained.
This year, in a burst of largess, the building management had put a water cooler in the hall. I filled one of the glasses I kept for the gin. They’d had water in them before without showing ill effects.
“Maggie?” A worried face peered out of the domestic staffing agency one office next to mine. “Is everything okay? We heard a bang.”
“Oh, I bumped my coatrack and it fell over into the wall. Sorry to scare you.”
I hurried back with the water. Collingswood took two gulps and paused, sipped the next two, repeated the sipping until the water was gone. His eyes closed briefly as he let out a breath.
“I’m sorry I scared you. I probably wouldn’t have done what I did if I’d known you had heart trouble.”
“No. I think you probably saved my life. What kind...?” His eyes slid toward his coat. He couldn’t bring himself to look directly.
“I’m no snake expert. I just knew it didn’t belong in somebody’s coat pocket. And with you carrying those pills you have, I’m pretty sure you shouldn’t be sitting here gabbing about it. You need to get home and lie down. I’ll call you a cab.”
“I can’t. I need to get to the office. I ducked in to drop off some papers on my way here. My partner was coming down with one of his headaches. They flatten him. I sent him home. I need to be there.”
“Mr. Collingswood...”
I leaned my hip on my desk, keeping a healthy distance between me and the all-too-active remains of the snake.
“I’m in better shape than I appear at the moment.” He gave a determined smile. “I would appreciate a cab, though. I’ll have someone get my car later. We can talk about — this — when you come to C&S.”
***
“What do you know about snakes?” I asked when Rachel Minsky’s secretary put me through to her. Rachel owned a commercial building firm and could walk a construction site with the best of them, albeit in high heels and, preferably, furs.
“The two-legged kind or the Pentateuch kind?”
“The kind you find in the woods.”
I’d just put Collingswood into a cab. He’d regained some color and still insisted on seeing me later.
“You’re not thinking of going somewhere to put up a tent and drink from a canteen and swat flies, are you?” Rachel asked.
“No.”
My chair was back in its proper spot behind my desk and I was keeping an eye on what was left of the snake. It didn’t seem quite as dead as I’d assured Collingswood, but its movements weren’t getting it anywhere either.
“Well, then. Chances are you’ll never see one. I seldom do tramping around when they’re clearing things for a new project.”
“I’m looking at one right now. In my office. I’m optimistic it’s dead. At any rate, it’s missing a head. It’s not a garter snake, which is the extent of my knowledge. I was hoping you might recognize a few other kinds from the tramping you mentioned.”
She was silent a second before uttering words quite colorfully profane.
“In your office? You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“I may be slightly more conversant, but the smartest thing would be for me to bring over one of the men who know what they are when we do come across one. Shall I?”
“Please.”
“I may have to check at more than one site. Give me forty-five minutes.”
***
Waiting for Rachel gave me time enough to call the client who was expecting me with my final report. She agreed that I could mail it and I’d stop by later if she had any questions. She already knew the gist of it. I’d found her missing husband playing house with someone else two counties away. I hoped my hunt for Gil Tremain had a happier ending.
At the moment, the man who had hired me to find him concerned me more. Loren Collingswood had a bad heart. He’d been getting unsettling phone calls. A snake had turned up in his pocket — enough to scare the bejeezus out of anyone. It had all the hallmarks of someone trying to kill him.
What did it have to do with a missing engineer? Before I got far in thinking about it, my door flew open and Rachel strode in. More accurately, she strode two steps and stopped. Her eyes swept my floor, then rose to give the rest of the room a similar treatment.
“That?” she asked aiming a fingernail gleaming with polish the color of burgundy at the coat hanging over the arm of the chair.
“Yes.”
Rachel was my height with a cloud of raven hair and a chest that made men turn to admire it. As usual she was dressed like a million dollars, her cranberry wool suit topped by a black fur shrug.
“This is Mr. Taylor.” She indicated a raw-boned man in workman’s garb and hobnail boots behind her. “He knows an amazing lot about snakes.”
He ducked his sandy head in awkward greeting.
“Saw a-plenty growin’ up down in the hills.”
The two of them came all the way in. Rachel stood within chatting distance of me and cupped her elbows with her hands. I sat on the edge of my desk. We watched Taylor circle the chair that held the folded coat. Squatting on his haunches, he surveyed the length of slowly moving reptile. After several moments he picked up the coat and carried it to the far side of the room. He dumped its contents, nudging them with the toe of his boot.
“This here’s a plain old Kirtland,” he said. “Harmless ‘cept for scarin’ you.”
“It’s winter. Don’t snakes hibernate or something?”
He twisted a finger in his ear and squinted.
“Well, they do tuck up in someplace out of the weather and sleep some. But come a nice sunny day, anyplace there’s a nice rock or two to hold heat, you might see a snake.”
But not in a coat pocket, I thought grimly.