6:08 P.m.
“Hush your mouth!” scolded Annie, as she pulled me close into an embrace. “You did no such thing.”
“Yeah, Annie. I think I did.”
She looked around furtively, to ensure we were still alone and out of earshot of everyone including Capps, the crowd of onlookers, as well as my blood-related Celtic boozehound and his golden girl.
“Even if that’s the case, it was self-defence. And let’s wait and see what the coroner determines first,” she implored me.
Only then did I notice the black van arriving on site, and Constable Capps jogging over to the vehicle’s window to direct the driver where to park.
“What’s the point? The security guards are just going to tell them what Lewis said.”
“I don’t think they heard anything.”
“What do you mean?”
Annie took a deep breath and exhaled before continuing.
“Look at those chumps,” she said, nodding toward the two pot-bellied, out-of-shape men in ill-fitting and cheap-looking security guard uniforms by the door to the portable, still chatting with the female cop with a notepad, whom I assumed was Capps’s partner. “They’re just a couple of backcountry bubbas trying to pick up a few extra bucks. There ain’t no protocol that they’ve been following. I told them I wanted a word with Kelly before the cops came and they didn’t even hesitate letting me have a go at him.”
I took a good look at both men and based on first impressions, they definitely didn’t appear to be the cream of the crop. While Annie had a point, I found myself more curious about something else that had just come to light with her revelations.
“Why did you want to talk with Kelly?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, why speak to him? And what about?”
Annie scoffed and pulled back from me. “To see if he’d confess to Jasper’s murder, of course.”
“Did he?”
Annie shook her head. “He was pretty out of it. Just kind of ignored me and started cryin’ like a tore up yaller dog.”
“Yaller dog?”
“A coward, Jed. He knew what he had done, and it was eating him up inside. It was clear as day. I’m telling you, even if it was some kind of fluke accident caused by a swollen throat that caused him to die, I don’t think Kelly was gonna be long for this world.”
“Are you talking about suicide?”
Annie shrugged. “You only know the tip of the iceberg when it comes to his mental problems. And if you ask my daddy Gus or any of the other Seven Heads, they’ll all tell you the same. The guy was highly unstable.”
I lowered my head as I tried to absorb everything Annie was telling me while Capps escorted the coroner and his team past us and into the portable. The appearance of the official investigators also put a damper on Declan and Flo’s jubilance, as they were now leaning against one of the two scooters while quietly puffing on their cigarettes.
“No,” I said, with a sudden degree of resolve that surprised even me. “There has to be more to it than that.”
“I don’t think so, Sugar. C’mon, now. Let’s go for a walk or get a drink, just you and me. I promise you’ll feel better.”
“I’d like that, Annie, but something’s not right.”
“Like what? Seems to me you’re just searching for the elephant.”
Annie and I just stared at each other for a few moments. Eventually, I had no choice but to prod her. “Do I really need to ask?”
“Sorry,” she said, clueing in to my lack of familiarity with her country colloquialisms. “I just mean you should quit looking for something that ain’t there.”
“I’d say a hundred-thousand-dollar bribe gone bad qualifies as something.”
“What?” she said, shocked.
I recapped how, after a little creative entry, Declan and I had found a bag of cash in Jasper’s locker, before I discovered Kelly Lewis’s involvement and his role in facilitating a payoff with Harland McGraw. Then I filled her in on all the other events that had occurred up until my recent attack courtesy of “Hot Saw” while in axe-throwing alley.
Annie listened intently, and was still shaking her head when I had finished.
“Son of a bitch.”
“Yeah.”
“Now it totally makes sense.”
“What does?”
“The last thing Kelly said.”
“I thought you already told me that.”
Annie leaned in and gave me a gentle peck on the cheek. “Jed, despite all that muscle and what your shirt says, let’s face it—you’re just a big ol’ softie.”
I looked down at my prototype wrestling attire and reminded myself of Dylan Thomas’s nuanced words—Do Not Go Gentle—and realized that only now was I starting to see the subtle layers in their meaning. Maybe the significance of the statement was more than just an adopted credo to aspire to as a grappling gumshoe. Maybe after everything that happened over the last couple of years, I had been trying to tell myself something. And maybe the message was that I no longer had what it took to be a PI.
“What aren’t you telling me, Annie?”
She took a deep breath and exhaled. “He let slip one more thing while he was talking to Jasper’s spirit or whatever, apologizing over and over before he put his head down on the table and passed.”
“Which was?”
“I can’t live without you.”
I could almost hear the door slam shut on the case. That was it. Kelly Lewis had killed Jasper Adams. It all made sense. In his desperation he saw an opportunity for a windfall for himself and his lover. He just underestimated the integrity of the man he loved so much. Which led him to a crime of passion, in the heat of the moment, after an argument, by a man prone to mood swings and suffering from mental illness.
The Mounties could see it. So could Annie and everyone else. But why couldn’t I?
I almost smacked myself upside the head. It was all right there in front of me. Yet here I was making a fool of myself while trying to connect the dots between Harland McGraw’s Timbersports skills, axes, and jagger wires, when in reality, those were all around the loggersports pit like items in a lumberjack scavenger hunt. I had seen it myself. Of course Lewis could have simply grabbed a wire to choke out Jasper in a fit of rage before giving into his worst impulses and driving a hatchet into the back of his head. And so what if there was a washer necklace of Kooty’s on the bottom of the log boom pool? I had established that the Doukhobor guru’s unique trinket and style of self-help was wildly popular at the Cloverdale Rodeo. Was it really such a stretch that a chain simply broke off the neck of one of the many competitors who ran on the floating logs? And that the cheap jewelry probably snapped loose from all the herky-jerky action during such a vigorous event before sinking in the water?
Annie was right. I was searching for the elephant. I guess on some level I thought solving Jasper’s murder could have been some kind of second chance for me, an opportunity to make peace with my past and get myself back on track. But now I saw that was nothing but a pipe dream. And even though he was a murderer, that delusion may still have very well cost a troubled individual his life because if I hadn’t been so doggedly on the hunt for a killer then Kelly Lewis would not only be in custody but also most likely alive. Despite what I had previously accomplished as a private detective, and regardless of the encouragement and pep talks given to me by my cousin and father, I could see now that I had to face the cold hard truth—I just wasn’t that guy anymore. Not the one they wanted me to be.
I was about to take Annie up on her offer to go for a walk and grab that drink when I heard stirring spaghetti-western chimes again. I scooped my iPhone out of my hip pouch to see an image of Brutus the yoga goat underneath my bookmaker buddy’s name.
“Sykes,” I said, answering the call.
“Mr. Ounstead,” he replied, with an unusual amount of urgency in his voice. “I am most relieved you answered so quickly.”
“Is everything okay?”
“I am afraid not.”
“What’s wrong?”
“It is Bartholomew.”
“Buffalo?”
“Yes. It appears word of the death of his cousin reached him. He … did not take it well.”
“What happened?”
“The unfortunate news has put him in an incredibly volatile and enraged state.”
“Can’t you calm him down?”
“I cannot even get near him. The entire area is in disarray and people everywhere are panicking.”
“What area?”
“My Agri-Zone.”
I glanced at Annie, who seemed quite worried. “Is Buffalo okay?” she mouthed. I held up a finger as I continued talking with Sykes.
“Damn it,” I muttered. The mess that I had already made was having an even greater domino effect.
“Are you able to provide assistance?” pleaded Sykes.
“Yes, of course. I mean, he’s probably just blowing off a little steam, right? Buffalo might be a big boy, but he would never hurt any animals or people or anything.”
“He has utterly run amok, Mr. Ounstead. And given his intellectual challenges, there is no telling what he is capable of. I fear the worst.”
I turned to face the Agri-Zone. The huge, helium-filled parade balloons of cows, sheep, pigs, and roosters tethered to ropes were swaying in a gust of wind in the distance as they hovered above the indoor ice arena that had been temporarily converted for the country fair. I turned around to see Declan and Flo had joined Annie, and they all shared expressions of concern. I looked them each in the eyes before responding to Sykes.
“I’m on my way.”