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“Who was that?” Shandra asked, walking into the great room with a tray holding a cup of tea, a mug of coffee, and a plate of cookies.
Ryan didn’t know whether to sit or stand. He felt like he should be doing something to find more concrete evidence. “Rickman from the forensics lab. They now believe a cedar post was what was used to kill Kerby.”
She stopped and stared at him. “We did have a couple cedar posts laying on the ground beside the barn back by the corral. I haven’t noticed them since Saturday.”
“They were taken to the lab.” He sat down even though he wanted to pace the room and figure out the best way to go about questioning Nattie again. He still didn’t believe the thin, older woman capable of swinging a cedar post hard enough to cause the damage he’d witnessed on the victim.
“And they discovered one of them was the weapon?” Shandra sat on the couch beside him. “What are you thinking?” She placed a hand on his thigh.
“Cedar.” He stared into her eyes and saw when she connected the word with his thoughts.
“No! Not little Nattie. You think she swung that post hard enough to—to kill someone?” Her eyes widened in disbelief.
“She’s allergic to cedar and while she told the doctor the itching started Sunday night, I remember her rubbing her hands together when I questioned her Saturday night.” The more he thought about it. Her answers and her actions proved she told the truth and had a guilty conscience.
“Do you think when she heard about the letters from Donald to Ruthie she looked for them because she had a guilty conscience about taking Ruthie’s dad from her for good?” Shandra’s comment echoed his thoughts.
“It could be. But we need more proof than her hands blistering.” He sipped his coffee. “She’s not a threat to anyone, I’ll have a deputy bring her in for questioning tomorrow morning. I don’t see her going anywhere either. Her daughter and her whole life is here.”
~*~
Shandra had trouble falling asleep. It bothered her that Nattie had killed Ruthie’s father. Why would she take away the one thing Ruthie wanted most after spending so many years loving and helping Ruthie?
She finally dropped off into a fitful sleep. Ella sat on the corral, pointing at horses as if counting them. Shandra walked up beside her. “Why are you counting my horses?” Grandmother shook her head. That’s when Shandra realized she was counting the fence posts. “Why do you count fence posts?” Ella continued the mime of counting. Shandra glanced around and something she’d witnessed when she’d glanced at the body came to her.
~*~
Ryan discovered Shandra up, humming, and making waffles when he entered the kitchen. “What are you so cheerful about this morning?”
“I figured out who killed Donald Kerby. Or rather Ella showed me. I think you should go ahead and call Nattie in and ask her why she moved the post. I’m guessing she’ll tell you because she thought Chea killed Donald.” Shandra set a plate of waffles on the counter and handed him a mug of coffee.
“And who do you believe killed Kerby?”
“Mr. Timms. Do you have the photos you took of the crime scene?” She sat down and placed a waffle on her plate.
“In my bag.” Ryan wondered what Shandra had seen in her dream that made her so positive she knew who had committed the killing. He walked into the great room, pulled the file out of his computer bag, and opened it on the counter.
He set out the photos he’d taken of the crime scene, wondering at Shandra’s chewing her food as she surveyed the dead man in the photos.
“What do you see?” She pointed to the photo of Kerby propped up against the fence.
“A dead man against a post.”
She shook her head. “Look at his arms, his boots, even his position.”
He noted what she pointed out. “A man smashed in the head wouldn’t have landed so perfectly.”
“Only someone who likes things in precise ways, would have set him that way.” Shandra added more syrup to her waffle and pointed at the photo with the hand holding her fork. “I would bet you a month of Sunday breakfasts that when you get Nattie to crack, she’ll tell you the post was resting across Donald’s lap. Mr. Timms wouldn’t have been able to toss it away. He would have had to make the whole scene neat and tidy.”
Ryan liked her thinking. He picked up his phone and dialed the Sheriff’s Office. “Dispatch, please send cars to pick up Nattie Small, and Mr. and Mrs. Timms for questioning. Have them brought to the Huckleberry Police Station, please.”
He dug into his breakfast, ready to start the questioning, knowing what his results should be.
~*~
Shandra fidgeted in the studio. She had tried for the last hour to stay focused on her next vase, but she kept thinking about Ryan questioning Nattie and the Timms. “What if I’m wrong?” She couldn’t shake the feeling that they’d missed something. Unable to concentrate, she cleaned up and climbed in her Jeep. She’d go check in on Ruthie and possibly be there when Ryan called her with the news.
~*~
Ryan decided to question Nattie first. He stepped in the room with some photos he’d had Blane photo shop. The best way to trip up the old woman would be to show her a photo of the deceased with the post across his lap as Shandra had suggested.
He entered the room. Mrs. Small fit her name. If not for her gray hair and wrinkled face, one would think a twelve-year-old sat across the table from him.
“Why did the deputy drag me in now?” she asked.
He noticed she had gauze wrapped around the palms of her hands. “How are your hands? I understand you’re allergic to cedar.”
“Yes, everyone but that nitwit I bought wood from knows. What does that have to do with why you brought me in?” She watched him intently.
“The post used to kill Donald Kerby was a cedar post. Slivers were found in his wound.” He slid the photo of the post forensics sent him across the table toward her.
“I told you and Doc Porter, I moved wood into the house and there must have been a piece or two that was cedar.”
“You were rubbing your hands together Saturday night when I questioned you and your daughter.”
She stared at him, her lips a tight line, her chin pointed up in defiance.
“When you couldn’t stop the itching, which you were doing on the other occasions I questioned you, you went to the clinic and Dr. Porter removed small, dry slivers from your hands. The same type as were found in the victim’s head.”
She flinched ever so slightly.
“Small dry slivers don’t come from freshly cut firewood.” He stared at her a moment and asked, “Why did you remove the post?” He slid the photo shopped picture across the table. The one with the post across the victim’s lap.
She stared at the photo.
“Was it because you thought Chea killed him?”
Her gaze snapped to his. “I done it. I killed the heartbreaker.”
Ryan shook his head. “I don’t believe you picked up a post the size of the murder weapon and swung it hard enough to strike a fatal blow.”
“You don’t know what I’m capable of when I’m mad.” She glared at him.
“Okay, let’s say you did it. Why?”
“Because he made my daughter fall in love with him, made her pregnant, and then disappeared from her life and Ruthie’s. Then sending those letters over the years to Ruthie and ignoring Chea. He didn’t deserve to come back here and give them both false hopes.”
Her words, and the anger she emitted while speaking, made him wonder if she hadn’t hit the man. But if she had, she would have left him lying how he landed.
“I believe your anger and the fact you would have tried to hurt him...if he’d still been alive when you came across his body.” Ryan leaned forward. “I know you didn’t do this. But why did you think Chea had, who by the way, I don’t believe killed him either.”
Relief relaxed Nattie’s face, fading some of the wrinkles on her face. “Chea didn’t do it?”
He shook his head. “Why did you think she did?”
“After we were told to leave, I’d stayed and talked with Mrs. Treat, telling her I was sorry that Ruthie had run like she did. When I came out them big doors, I saw Chea coming from behind the barn. Wondering what she was doing back there, I waited until she was in her car and leaving before I sneaked down the side and I saw Donald laying there. That post across his lap. All I could think of was to hide the post. I picked it up and put it in a pile by the side of the barn. Then I got in my car and left as quick as I could.”
Ryan nodded. “That’s what I thought. Thank you for being truthful. I’ll talk to Chea to see what she has to say.” He rose, walked around the table, and helped Nattie to her feet.
Out in the hallway he waved Deputy Speaks over. “Would you take Mrs. Small home?”
“Can I stay and wait for Chea? She might need me.”
Ryan nodded and Speaks escorted Nattie to the waiting area.
He turned to the door where the Timmses were waiting. “Blane, bring Mrs. Timms into the interview room, please.”
Ryan took his spot at the table and waited for Blane to escort Chea into the seat across from him. “Thank you, Officer Blane.”
The woman’s eyes were red-rimmed as if she’d been crying.
“Mrs. Timms, I have an eye witness who saw you behind the barn with Donald Kerby moments before he was found dead.”
She bit her lip and cast her gaze downward.
“Why didn’t he leave with you?”
Her gaze met his. “He said he didn’t understand how I could say I loved him and then not give his letters to his daughter. He accused me of making Ruthie hate him. We argued. He told me to leave and he’d come see me when he could look at me and not hate me.” She cried into her hands.
“Did you know your mother thought you’d killed him?”
Chea stared at him. “Mother thought...”
“You’d killed Kerby. She picked up the post laying across his lap and put it in a pile of posts hoping no one would find it, I guess. Or hoping if your prints were on it, she’d covered them up. Whatever her reason, she ended up admitting she touched the cedar post that killed Kerby.”
Understanding dawned in her eyes. “Her allergic reaction is from picking up the murder weapon? Oh no! Where is she?”
“She’s out in the waiting area, waiting for you.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Is this a trick? You tell me my mother picked up the murder weapon but you aren’t pressing charges?”
He shook his head. “She didn’t do it.” Ryan pulled out the photo of the body and slid it across the table. “How often do you think a man hit alongside the head with a post would land in such a well-placed manner?”
She stared at the photo for several blinks before her gaze rose to his. “Clarence killed Donald? But how? I made sure he didn’t know about our meeting or that I was bringing him to the wedding.”
“I’m sure your husband, being the in control, neat personality that he is, came across something that made him wonder.”
“He was at a meeting. He couldn’t make it to the wedding.”
Ryan shook his head. “He did meet with the principal. But their meeting was over in plenty of time for him to drive to Shandra’s and kill your ex-lover.”
Chea’s hands began to shake. “He killed the only man I’ve ever loved? All those years of putting up with his neatness, preciseness, and egotistical attitude and he killed my one chance to get out of that marriage?”
“Calm down and think. We’ve discovered there were several people who knew about you and Kerby before he disappeared. One of them being your husband’s principal. Do you think he could have said something to Clarence?”
Her eyes narrowed. “I thought we were discrete back then.”
“Not enough. I’ve talked to several people who knew about you and Kerby.”
“Then I guess he could have found out from anyone. But how did he know Donald would be at the wedding?”
“Did you leave the message you received from Donald laying around?”
“That has to be it. Maybe Clarence saw it in the garbage. I know I threw it away as soon as I read it. For fear he would see it.”
Ryan studied the woman. All of a sudden, she was agreeing too quickly, not sounding like a grieving woman.