AUGUST 1952
As Harry’s Buick chugged up the switchback mountain road, he wondered when he was going to get his free time back. A few phone calls from his office were okay, but he didn’t feel right working the state police case on his own taxpayers’ dime, so he had been squeezing in the investigation before work, in the evening, and on his day off. Or, as today, on his lunch hour.
He downshifted and pressed on the accelerator. He had spoken to his counterparts at the Lake George Police Department and the Warren County Sheriff’s office. They both kept pretty close track of their summer residents, the ones in expensive water-view houses and the ones in honky-tonk motor courts alike. Neither was aware of any domestic disturbances around the time of the girl’s death, or of any oddities like a young woman alone at a family camp.
Which left his neck of the woods. Which, at the moment, was practically vertical. Millers Kill hadn’t seen a boom in the tourist trade like Lake George, and they had never appealed to the rich society types who flocked to Saratoga Springs for the racing season and then flew away again. What summer camps they had were old, built by the generation who went up to the mountains on now-defunct railroads to hunt bear and deer and moose and to take the air. Nowadays the air was in Arizona, apparently, but there were still descendants of those Victorian camp builders who came faithfully or grudgingly every summer. Those that still had money tore out the heavy wooden beams and curlicue carvings in favor of glass walls; those whose fortunes had dwindled had to make do with dark interiors and grandma’s bric-a-brac.
He had visited the van der Hoevens and the Griswolds; two families who had held on to the inherited cash and had long, low, modern summer camps to show for it. Both places had been stuffed with enough wives, children, and grandparents to make Harry confident that no man could possibly have been sneaking around long enough to find a girl, let alone deck her out and dump her body.
Next on his list was the Barkleys’ camp, an old-fashioned log building distinguished by a long porch lined with rocking chairs. When Mrs. Barkley had been alive, the window boxes had been full of geraniums and ivy; as Harry drove closer, the bare wooden troughs made the front of the house look like a blank face.
There were several cars parked along the grassy verge of the curved drive, all of them late-model Lincolns and Buicks and such, the dust from the mountain road scarcely showing on their glossy wax finishes. He was surprised to see anything other than Mr. Barkley’s well-preserved Ford; the days of young guests and house parties had gone along with their only son, dead on an Italian hillside trying to take a redoubt from the Germans.
The door opened as Harry exited his car. It took him a moment to recognize Samuel Barkley; it had been three years since he had seen the man last, in a condolence call upon Mrs. Barkley’s passing. Her widower had had the physique you’d expect of a man who’d spent a half century having three-martini lunches and taking meetings behind a desk.
The man on the porch, on the other hand, looked like he could have just been released from the army. His waist was small, his chest was large, and he glowed with vitality, despite his white hair. It wasn’t until he reached the bottom of the steps that Harry could see the lines and wrinkles proclaiming Barkley’s age.
“Chief McNeil!” The banker shook his hand. “It’s been too long.”
“That it has.” Harry gestured to his own expanding stomach. “I’m getting old, and you look like you’ve found the fountain of youth.”
Barkley grinned. “After Edie passed, I started spending less time at the office and more time at the swimming pool. Started riding again when I was up here. Dropped sixty pounds, and my doctor says I’ve got the heart of a twenty-year-old. And I’m not giving it back to him!”
Harry dutifully laughed at the old chestnut.
“So what are you doing up here? Come to see if I was still alive?”
Harry shook his head. “Wish it was just that. There was a girl left dead in a road in Cossayuharie a few days ago. She’s not local, so I’m looking to see if any of our summer folks might recognize her.”
“Left dead? Was it a hit-and-run accident?” He turned toward the assemblage of automobiles. “I can’t imagine any of my guests having anything to do with such a thing, but please. Go ahead and take a look.”
“No, the medical examiner didn’t think it was a car accident.” Harry tried not to sound like a kid explaining how his ball went through a window. “To tell the truth, he isn’t sure what killed her.”
“He isn’t sure?” Barkley didn’t quite look at him as if he was a crackpot, but it was close. “So … she wasn’t killed, she’s just … dead?”
“It could be natural. Or accidental. Or malicious. But either way, she’s a Jane Doe I’d like to identify. Would you mind if I had your guests take a look at her photo?”
Barkley gestured toward the steps. “Most of them came up from the city in the past two days, so I don’t know if they’ll be any help, but you’re more than welcome to come in and ask your questions.”
Inside, the camp had the distinct feel of a womanless house—none of those pieces of lace and little doodads a wife or daughter-in-law might have put around. Instead, it had reverted to its origins as a hunting camp, with antlers, hide rugs, and a bar that would make any fancy hotel proud. “We were just having some drinks before dinner. Can I get you something?”
Harry held up a hand. “Thanks, but no.” The banker steered him past a leather davenport toward double doors opened wide. The view from the parlor, endless green and blue mountains fading to the distance, was enough to distract Harry from the men gathered in what looked like an old-fashioned smoking room.
“Gentlemen, this is Chief Harry McNeil, our local constable. Chief McNeil, these fellows all work very hard for me, and are here for a little R and R in the fresh Adirondack air.”
Most of the men didn’t look as if they’d traveled past Twentieth and Broadway. Four were wearing lightweight pants and coats that would snag and tear within ten minutes of walking through the woods. Another had on what Harry assumed was a golf shirt and sweater. The bridge game dealt out on a card table didn’t speak much of the great outdoors.
“Sorry to disturb you with some unpleasant business, but I need you all to take a look at some pictures for me. We have an unknown dead girl we’re trying to identify, and we’re asking our local summer visitors for help.” He didn’t want the men passing the photos around hand to hand; he’d never get an unfiltered reaction from them. “If you could come into the front room one at a time, we can keep this separate from what looks like an enjoyable afternoon.”
It felt like something out of a silly detective novel, each one of the men walking through the double doors and pondering the face and full-body photos of the dead girl. Unlike the suspects in a mystery story, however, none of Barkley’s guests were considerate enough to gasp or turn pale when seeing the pictures. To a man, they all shook their heads and murmured some variation of “What a shame.” The last of them, one of the blue-blazered fellows, added, “None of us have laid eyes on any girls since we left the city. It’s a stag weekend.” He made a face. “Unfortunately.”
Barkley came up beside him to examine the picture. “Pretty girl,” he said. “I hope you find out who she was and what happened to her.”
“I don’t suppose any of your young men in there have had a chance to get away on their own, have they?”
“Well, yes, on the horses. Lloyd and Charlie are out on a ride right now.”
“The rest of us aren’t allowed to ride.” The blue-blazered fellow sounded as if his parents hadn’t smacked him enough as a kid.
“That’s because the rest of you aren’t competent to ride in the mountains without laming my stock.” Barkley turned to Harry. “I’ve had to have the vet up here five times so far this summer.” Harry gave him a look of genuine sympathy. Barkley was summer folk, but he respected the mountains like the locals did.
“Maybe I can come back when your other two guests are in. Just to cross them off my list.” Harry looked around the room. Everything neat and clean and polished. There was probably a maid or cook. “You have quite a place here.” He drifted over to the long lawyers bookcase beneath the stairway. A lot of histories. A shelf of thick textbooks, probably the dead son’s. And a whole lot of titles in, if his schoolboy studies hadn’t deserted him, Latin. You could tell a lot about a man from the books on his shelves, and Barkley’s said he was a man far happier in the past than in this present.
“Thank you.” Both of them heard the noise from outside; a heavy clop-clop and the whicker of a horse that knew its stable was near. Barkley smiled. “Looks like you won’t have to make a second trip. Come on outside.”
Two men were dismounting in the dooryard, both of them dressed sensibly in denim jeans and sturdy shirts. The horses—ponies, really—were a pair of dark bays, with muscular legs and sweet eyes. Barkley introduced the aforementioned Lloyd and Charlie, and Harry did his routine and showed them the pictures. Neither of them could help. At this rate, he might as well ask the horses.
After they led their mounts around the side of the cabin, Harry indulged his curiosity. “What’s really going on up here? Those boys playing cards inside don’t seem like the types to indulge in wood sports.”
The banker man smiled. “You have a keen eye, Chief McNeil. I’m planning to retire. I thought I’d be passing the business on to my son but…” He shrugged. “So instead, I’m turning the whole kit and caboodle over to one of these sharp young minds. You’ve seen them all. Can you guess which one it is?”
“One of the riders.”
Barkley laughed. “Got it in one.”
“Like you say, I’ve got a keen eye.” Harry opened his car door. “Let me know if anything comes up, please. If anyone happens to remember anything.”
“I will. Say, you didn’t tell me—where did your men find the girl?”
Harry forced himself not to scratch the back of his neck. “Cossayuharie.”
Barkley’s eyebrows went up. “I thought that was patrolled by the state police?”
“I’m … helping out. The state police don’t always have the time to…”
“Actually do what they’re paid for?”
“Not how I’d phrase it.” Not that he disagreed.
The banker nodded. “Just keep in mind what Horace said, Chief. Non omnia possumus omnes. We can’t all of us do it all.”