Oblanski called Arn on the way over to Frank Dull Knife’s shop. “We picked up Jefferson Dawes a few minutes ago. Want to sit in on the interrogation?”
“Picked him up for what?”
“Johnny’s murder.” Oblanski outlined in a few words why: Jefferson knew Cheyenne Regional well, including the maintenance door devoid of surveillance cameras. And he would have known what angles the cameras were capable of recording. “He had access to caps and masks. And he’s got a closet full of lab coats.”
Arn rubbed his forehead, trying to get a handle on what Oblanski just told him. “Tell me you have more than that.”
“We do,” Oblanski said. “You were right—the crime scene techs found a footprint right outside Gaylord’s house last night that was identical to the one in Johnny’s room. It was the same tread pattern as we found on Delbert Urban’s back.” He paused. “And the same shoe print as the one I overlooked outside the house the night Gaylord hung to death.” He went on to explain that Captain Moore had reviewed the hospital tapes, and one camera picked up Jefferson walking past Johnny’s room ten minutes before he was murdered.”
Arn had thought about Jefferson as he lay in his hospital bed last night: his wife running off with that science teacher sounded sketchy, as did his statement that Gaylord invited him to his house to warn him away from Adelle. What if Jefferson hadn’t taken Gaylord’s advice? What if he’d wanted Adelle enough to kill for her? Worse, Arn realized, what if he was looking for multiple killers for the officers? Then there was the Old Spice he was certain he’d smelled the night he and Ana Maria were attacked.
“We served a search warrant on Jefferson’s car and found a pair of Nikes with what looks like the same tread pattern,” Oblanski concluded. “We’re having it compared with the others.”
“Why did you search his car?”
“We received an anonymous tip that the shoes were in his Caddy,” Oblanski said.
Perhaps, Arn thought, the anonymous tip came from the only other person who knew that Jefferson was the killer. Someone who would be pissed at their husband’s activities now with younger women. “Better get someone over to interview Adelle,” he said. Pain shot down his neck as he turned in the seat to check for traffic. “She told me that the night Gaylord died, she was to meet Jefferson for some heavy-duty lovemaking, but he was a no show. When you interview him, ask him to verify where he was that night.”
“And if he can?”
“Then she was lying to me,” Arn said. “And she might have helped Jefferson hang Gaylord.”
The line went quiet for a moment while Oblanski jotted things down. “Can you think of anything else?”
“Lean on him about his first wife,” Arn said. “I checked with customs and they have no record of her ever leaving the country. If Jefferson killed Johnny—and Gaylord, ten years ago—he’d be a good contender for the Five Point slayings.”
“What’s that got to do with Jefferson’s first wife?”
“If she found out about him, she might have been afraid she’d be next and fled Cheyenne.”
“Okay. But you’re sure you don’t want to sit in on his interrogation?”
“I got other things to do.”
“Like what?”
“Remember, I was hired to solve Butch’s murder.”
Frank sat looking over reading glasses perched on his nose, bulbous with burst blood vessels from too many sessions with Jim Beam. When Arn walked through the shop door, Frank squinted at his computer screen. He wrote down parts numbers that Arn easily read upside down. Frank looked up and tossed his glasses on the desk. “Look what the cat drug in.”
Arn nodded to the screen. “Hate to interrupt when you’re dick-deep in some porno site.”
Frank’s face turned red. “I need a starter for an MG Midget. Wish people would just go to Import Motors.” He leaned back in his chair, the chain of his biker wallet slapping the arm of the chair in time with his nervous foot. “What the hell you want now?”
“The truth.”
“What planet are you living on?” Frank taunted. “Didn’t you ever hear you’ll never get the truth from a career criminal? Which I was”—he grinned—“before I got religion. These days, I’m a legit businessman. Now what do you want?”
“Hannah suspected that you killed Butch, didn’t she?”
“Where the hell did that come from?”
“She threatened to go to the police that night she chased you out of her house.”
“She never chased me.”
“Emma Barnes said otherwise.”
“That old prune who lived next door—”
“Can remember the color of your shirt and the shine of your boots that night.” Arn hung his Stetson on the elk antler coat rack. “Did Hannah threaten to go to the law because you killed Butch? Or because she could put you away on that burglary charge?”
Frank’s lip quivered and Arn pressed his point. “The Highway Patrol ruled the cause of Hannah’s fatal accident was brake failure. You work on her brakes?”
“You son-of-a-bitch!” Frank came off his chair, but Arn shoved him back down. Pain shot up his shoulders from the strain, but he wasn’t going to let Frank know it. “Hannah could put you away. That’s why you rigged the accident.”
“I wasn’t going back to the joint,” Frank said, more in a whisper, as he slumped in his chair.
“Not with Butch dead, you weren’t.”
Frank reached into his shirt pocket and grabbed a pack of Marlboros. His hand shook as he brought the cigarette to the shaky match. “You know Butch dismissed the burglary charge.”
“He could have refiled it any time, and you’d be back looking at a habitual criminal conviction.”
Frank lit his smoke and looked around for an ashtray. He dropped his match in the same Skippy jar he’d drank whisky out of the last time Arn was here. “I didn’t see Butch the night he was murdered.”
“So you claimed. Some horse shit about having to get up early for a carburetor job. Except you weren’t at your shop the next morning.”
“I told you before I hooked up with another babe that night after Hannah started rubbing all over Ned Oblanski. I thought, what the hell, if she can come onto another guy, I can go home with another woman. We left the bar ’cause the little lady wanted some quality time at her house. Outside Wellington, Colorado. Exactly fifty miles from my shop.”
“Why should I believe you now that you’ve had ten years to come up with some cockamamie alibi like that? Maybe because you want me and Oblanski’s department off your case for Butch’s murder.”
“Enough!” Frank flicked his cigarette onto the floor and crushed it with his boot. “Sure I committed that burglary, just like Butch said. But he planted evidence, he wanted me so badly. If he’d done a little more digging, he’d have had me dead to rights.” Frank shook out another cigarette and crumpled the empty package. “Hannah wouldn’t have dared testify against me. She was with me the night I burgled that home.”
“Hannah?” For the second time, Frank’s statements had caught Arn flat-footed.
“You didn’t know, big city detective,” Frank grinned. “Hannah went through that window like she was born to break and enter. And we cleaned the house out. And a few homes the next week.” Frank leaned in, smiling, remembering. “And you know why she loved it? She was an adrenaline junky. She fed off the excitement of getting caught. And she repaid me in bed every night.”
“And Butch found out?”
Frank blew smoke rings toward his dirty ceiling. “When Butch brought me in for the burglary, he showed me a Rolex he claimed was stolen and said he found it in my car. I called bullshit on that. I never stole anything fancy I couldn’t fence right off. So I dropped the bombshell about Hannah helping me.”
“Because you knew he had you dead to rights?”
“Because he planted the Rolex, and I knew I couldn’t get out of it. I told him Hannah and I were a team. If I went down, I’d drag her right down with me. He had no choice but to drop charges.”
Arn regained his thoughts and grabbed his pocket notebook and pen. “If you weren’t even in town when Butch was murdered, what’s the name of the woman you went home from the bar with?”
“I can’t do that. She’s still married. I don’t want to cause her any grief.”
“And just what did you and Hannah argue about that night Emma Barnes saw her chase you out of the house?”
Frank shrugged. “After Butch was dead, there just was never a spark there. No intrigue any more. I needed some new babe. Know what I mean?”
Arn didn’t. After eighteen faithful years with the same women, the spark had never left until the day she died. And it was still there for Arn.
“Hannah was on me constantly to stop by after Butch was murdered. I put it off as long as I could. The trips to Wellington took up a lot of my time. I told her I just felt odd screwing her in the same house her old man died in. I told her we needed to split. When I left the house, she chased me out onto the yard. Threatened to go to the law about our burglaries. But I knew it was a bluff. She’d never risk being charged along with me.”
“Why are you telling me this now?”
“A former cop, and you’ve never heard of the statute of limitations? I can’t be charged for those burglaries. It’s too long ago.”
Frank leaned forward and blew smoke in Arn’s direction. “And I didn’t have to kill Hannah or Butch. He sure as hell wasn’t going to put his old lady away.” He laughed. “What would people think?” He motioned to the door. “Now I got MG parts to order, so get the hell out.”
Arn reached out with his pen and tapped a large welt on the back of Frank’s hand. The man jerked his hand back and covered it with the other. “Where’d you get your knuckles scraped up?” Arn asked.
Frank held up his hand. “This? Work related.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t from hitting some old Indian alongside the head over on 5th Street last night?”
“Could be.” Frank grinned. “Or it could’ve happened when I went to Wellington yesterday while a certain lady’s husband was away. And the wrench slipped off while I was working on her Buick.”