16 

It had been a long day, but I still had a stop to make before I headed to my family at John Skye’s farm. It was confession time. I got into the truck and drove to the state police barracks in Oak Bluffs.

Dom’s office was on Temahigan Road in a building that for years had been painted an unstylish blue but had then been refinished with cedar shingles, which were now properly weathered and much more Vineyardy.

When I pulled off the road and stopped in the narrow parking space in front of the building, I took note of two other cars already in the back parking lot. They had that rental look about them, an impression confirmed when I saw local stickers in their windows. First Kate, then Arbuckle, and now these two drivers were contributing to the island’s winter economy. Crime was paying for local car renters.

I went inside and found four men with Dom in his office. Their stylish winter coats were open, showing suits and ties beneath. On Martha’s Vineyard, only lawyers and Mormon missionaries wear suits and ties, but these guys weren’t islanders. Their voices stopped when I appeared and they looked at me with flat eyes.

“Well, well,” said Dom, looking over his desk. “We were just talking about you, J.W.”

One of the men hooked a thumb at me and asked, “Is this him? Is this Jackson?”

“This is him,” said Dom. “We were about to go looking for you, J.W., but you’ve saved us the effort.

These gentlemen want to hear your version of what happened to their colleague Samuel Arbuckle.”

“That’s right,” said another of the men. “We want your story.”

DIA people for sure. “I need to talk to you,” I said to Dom.

“These gentlemen represent the United States government,” said Dom, “and they need to talk to you. You can talk with me afterward.”

“I’d like to talk with you first,” I said. “It won’t take long.”

The tallest of the four men showed his ID card. “We’re from the Defense Intelligence Agency,” he said. “We’d appreciate hearing anything you can tell us about Agent Arbuckle.”

His eyes were on the level with mine. I looked into them. “I want to talk with Sergeant Agganis first,” I said, “then I’ll tell you everything I know.”

“I think we have priority here,” said the man. “A man’s been murdered.”

I looked past him. “Dom, I want a minute of your time.”

“I don’t think you understand,” said the tall man. “We have a special interest in this case and every minute is important.” His voice was touched with temper and he put a hand on my arm.

I looked at the hand, and as I did I heard Dom’s voice: “All right, J.W. Let’s all relax, gentlemen. J.W., let’s step down the hall.”

The hand hesitated then left my arm and I looked into its owner’s eyes. Dom rounded his desk and waved toward a door. He and I went through the door and into a small room off the hall.

“Those guys are already mad,” he said. “Don’t make things worse. Now what is it that’s so damned important that it can’t wait?”

“I’ve had a memory improvement. There are some things you should know.”

His eyes narrowed. “Like what? Your ass can be in a sling if you’ve been lying to me. Talk. You’ve got one minute!”

“It’ll take more time than that,” I said, and I told him the whole story. When I was done, I said, “I don’t know what’s going on, but I know it’s something you should know about. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but—”

“But you didn’t want our sights to land on your friend Begay,” snapped Agganis. “Very loyal of you, I’m sure, but not very bright!”

“I think the local police should be told,” I said. “There’s a killer wandering around loose and—”

“I think I know who to talk to!” said Dom. “Jesus, Olive may be right about you belonging in jail.”

“I said I was sorry. You want to hear it again?”

“No! What I want is more cooperation than I’ve gotten so far. You can start by telling those suits out there what you’ve just told me.”

“I don’t want to get Joe Begay in trouble.”

“Joe Begay is already in trouble. We’re trying to get him out of it. Come on.”

We walked back to his office and into the stares of four pairs of eyes. “J.W. has a story to tell you,” said Dom in a calm voice, sitting down behind his desk. “When he’s through you can ask him any questions you want.”

I started with Joe Begay coming into my shed while I was scalloping and went from then to now, leaving out nothing but some of my wilder conjectures.

When I was through, one of the men said, “So this woman, this Kate MacLeod, put the moves on you, eh?”

I shrugged. “She likes men. It was nothing personal.”

“And she’s also hot for this Joe Begay, this friend of yours who told you he was on this trade mission?”

“That’s my impression.”

“And you think maybe it’s one of her ex-beaus who’s knocking off her new loves?”

“It seems possible.”

“And this guy shot Arbuckle?”

I don’t know if you can hear a curled lip, but I thought I detected one around his voice. “I don’t know who shot Arbuckle or why,” I said. “All I know is what I’ve told you.”

“The woman told you she knew Arbuckle?”

“She said she’d met him briefly in a restaurant while she was dining with a friend who knew him.”

“We’ll check out Arbuckle, the woman, and Begay, and those names she gave you,” said the tall man. “Where can we find MacLeod and Begay?”

Dom and I exchanged glances. “You won’t find Joe unless he wants you to,” I said. “I’ll give you his cell phone number. You can talk with him and arrange a meeting.”

“You know where he is,” said the fourth man, who up to now had said nothing. “If we phone him, he’ll have time to split. Tell us where he is.”

I looked at him. “I know Joe and I trust him. I don’t know you four from a pile of shit. He won’t run away, but I don’t know where he is, so don’t ask. Call him. That’s what I do when I want to see him.” I gave him Begay’s cell phone number.

“We can triangulate his phone and find him,” said another of the men. “Sergeant Agganis, I suggest that you put your friend here in jail and keep him there until this is over. If he’s got a cell phone, take it away from him so he can’t tip off his friends.”

“I know it’s fashionable in Washington to throw people in jail without charges and keep them there,” said Dom, “but this isn’t Washington. Here on our backward little island we usually don’t toss people into the hoosegow until they commit a crime.”

“How about tossing him in for interference with a police investigation?” asked the fourth man, almost genially.

“So far,” said Dom, who had good reason to do exactly that, “J.W. has told you everything he knows. He isn’t interfering with your investigation, he’s advancing it. If I were you, I’d get to work on the evidence he’s offered. I plan to do that myself.”

Good old Dom.

“Since you trained professionals are on the job,” I said, “I’m going home to my wife and kids.”

“I’d like to see where Arbuckle died,” said the fourth man. “You mind taking me there before you call it a day?”

“No problem.”

“I’ll follow you,” he said.

I turned toward the door.

“If you think of anything else, let me know,” said Dom dryly.

“I believe you have it all,” I said.

Outside, the fourth man put out a hand. “Name’s Sid Roebuck,” he said. He had a firm grip. So did I.

“J. W. Jackson.”

“Sam Arbuckle was a friend of mine, so this is personal with me.”

“It’s personal with me, too, because Joe Begay is a friend of mine.”

He followed me in one of the two rental cars. The winter day was short, but there was still light when we drove down my long, sandy driveway and parked in front of the house.

Roebuck got out of his car and looked around. He nodded toward the dark house. “Nobody home.”

“I moved my family to another house when this business began to seem dangerous.”

“I doubt if you’re in any danger.”

“I hope you’re right.” I showed him where Arbuckle’s car had stopped and where he had died in my arms.

“Mind if I look in the house?”

“No.”

We went in together and he went into every room. He tried the back door and looked at the windows. “You always keep the place unlocked?”

“I don’t like locks.”

“You keep one on the gun cabinet.”

“I’ve got two little kids. They’re not old enough to handle weapons.”

“You mind giving me a look inside.”

“No.” I opened the cabinet and he examined its contents.

“The rifle and shotguns were my father’s,” I said. “The pistol is my wife’s. She’s a competitive shooter.”

“I see you have ammunition for a couple of handguns that aren’t here.”

“My wife has one of her pistols, and the police have my revolver.”

“Why?”

I told him about giving the .38 to Olive Otero. He grunted and shut the cabinet door.

Outside again, in the falling light, Roebuck looked at the surrounding woods and out over the brown gardens toward the cold waters of Sengekontacket Pond and Nantucket Sound, then stared up the driveway.

“You hear any shots before Sam drove down here?”

“No, but it was shotgun season, so I probably wouldn’t have noticed if there was one.”

“From what Sergeant Agganis said, it doesn’t seem that Sam could have traveled very far after he was shot.”

“He had to be tough to travel at all.”

“Why do you suppose he came here to die?”

I gave him my thoughts about that, such as they were.

He nodded. “Well, we’ll figure it out. You know this island and I don’t. Any ideas about where to get started?”

“Nothing you and Dom Agganis haven’t already thought of. I’d start asking everybody in this area if they saw or heard anything, and I’d go up every driveway and road on the off chance that I’d find the place where Arbuckle was shot. My guess is that it happened on a road that’s pretty isolated, and that Arbuckle was meeting someone he knew and trusted.”

“Yeah, that was my thought, too. Sam was never cynical enough for the work he did. Well, I’ll be on my way. You can get in touch with me through Agganis’s office if you need to. I know how to find you.”

He drove away. I went inside and locked the gun cabinet, then drove to John Skye’s farm. I was tired clear down to my bones.