Chapter Thirty-Three

Kate briefly filled Bonnie in. “Artie will take his truck over his land the way he came, and we’ll go along the road and up the drive the way we normally would. That way if Charlene and Dud are on their way here or are leaving, we’ll see them.” Kate helped Bonnie get back to her car.

Though Kate had wanted to jump in the truck and go with Artie, she didn’t think it wise to leave Bonnie there in the field.

“You never did feel completely at ease with Charlene and Dud, did you?” Bonnie soldiered along, not letting her bum ankle slow them down.

“Their story never quite came together.” Kate thought back to that very first day when the Howells had slipped out of the Country Diner. “Dud had hesitated once when he said they came from South Carolina, and so did Charlene. Their Southern accents seemed all wrong too. And their clothes were all wrong right down to Dud wearing his nice shoes, too nice for bird-watching. We saw them at Artie’s and in town, but never ran into them bird-watching. Besides, if they came from someplace that close to Copper Mill, they’d have known that evenings in September could turn cool, and Dud would have brought some warm clothes.”

“That makes sense.”

“Though that might have been a ruse to get a pair of Artie’s overalls for Dud. The parrots like to grab the straps,” Kate explained.

“How would Dud know that?”

“They’d made appointments to come see Artie before we ever got involved. Those parrots are his pride and joy, and if the Howells showed an interest in them, they surely would have gotten the same tour I did.”

They moved through the trees and trudged on, Bonnie still poking the ground ahead of her with her cane as they approached the spot where she had sprained her ankle. “Do you have any reason to think they’ll be at Artie’s?”

“Well, Charlene said they planned to leave today. They’d also know that Artie would be out of the house at specific times of the day, and if they looked at his appointment book, they’d have seen that no one was coming by for a tour.” Kate held a branch back to make way for Bonnie.

They passed the broken sapling and headed for the car.

Kate got the keys ready in her hand. “I think that explains why the Howells went to so much trouble to keep us suspicious of Artie, why they turned Dot in, and why, according to what Lucas told Paul, Joanie’s Ark got a second complaint, this one from a woman, trying to make sure Lucas didn’t fly over Best Acres.”

“Well, if my concern over the missing bird flocks around Best Acres made things more difficult for them, I’m certainly glad of that,” Bonnie said.

“I think it did. So did Artie’s new policy about making appointments. I suspect we’ll find that because of us, they’ve had to make a lot of adjustments to their plan on the fly.”

“And that means they were more likely to make mistakes.” Bonnie tsk-tsked as she hobbled along.

“But it also allowed them to be more creative. We brought up the missing birds, and they probably talked to Artie about it. If he confided in them, they would have known about the library book. So one of them smudged up the pages with Artie’s birdseed.”

“Which they used to cast doubt on poor Artie.”

Kate’s mind was racing as they reached the road. “Then they turned Dot Bagley in for collecting cats, but not until they’d taken some of her dowels and line. They needed to keep the suspicion focused on Artie, and they probably didn’t like the idea of someone roaming around out here who might be able to place them at Artie’s house at certain times.”

“Dud and Charlene set the booby trap, didn’t they?” Bonnie extended her hand toward the car door and wobbled slightly.

“Yes.” Kate moved ahead of her and opened the door. “You saw the system Artie had to let his rehabilitated birds into the aviary. If he had set a booby trap, it would have been more complex than a fishing line. They just used pieces from one of Dot’s traps. But then the simplicity of it also leads me to believe that Charlene and Dud never expected anyone to actually get hurt on their trap. They must have wanted to make it look like something Artie would have made. Something we’d find as we poked around bird-watching.”

“But what would that accomplish other than making Artie look guilty?”

“They probably expected us to find it and call the sheriff. That would have kept Artie away from the house, giving them time to smuggle the blue-mutation Amazons out of there.”

Bonnie lowered herself into the passenger seat, looked up, and asked. “How can you be so sure they’re after the parrots?”

“Both Charlene and Dud have tiny scars on their hands, which means they’ve had some bird bites in the past and recently. Plus, Artie told us the day he introduced them that they’d met online with people discussing exotic birds, remember?”

“No,” Bonnie confessed. “Which is why you’re so much better at this than I am.”

“Then Dud always had the exotic sunflower seeds with him. I saw Artie use them to quiet Bebe down. Also, every time we were out here and ran into Charlene and Dud, they’d been inside Artie’s house, but the birds weren’t squawking.” Kate tucked Bonnie’s cane in alongside her friend and shut the door.

When she’d made her way to the driver’s seat, she continued. “But when I came to the door, the birds made a lot of noise. Same when Artie showed them to me. They didn’t stop until Bebe quieted down. The Howells must have been going inside and immediately making sure Bebe got fed the seeds to keep him from screeching.”

“Why didn’t they just take the birds then?”

“I’d guess because most of those times they had their names down in the appointment book. The one time they didn’t, I was there looking for Artie.”

“Should I call Livvy?” Bonnie began to root around in her purse for her cell phone.

“Not just yet. Let’s see if Dud and Charlene are at Artie’s or if they’ve already been there. If they have, and the parrots are gone, we’ll call the sheriff. Maybe he can catch them before they get too far out of town.” Kate maintained the speed limit, though she really wished she could go faster.

“But what if they’re dangerous?” Bonnie pulled the phone out and held her thumb over the button that would dial Livvy’s number.

Kate had considered that. “If they were willing to go that far, they’d have just shown up unexpectedly, hit Artie over the head, or worse, and taken the birds.” She leaned over the steering wheel. As soon as they cleared the curve, she would be able to see if the Howells’ van was at the house. “No, even as I’ve pieced things together this much, there’s still a lot that doesn’t fit about those two.”

“Like what?”

“Like they never touched all that money Artie has in his donation box. And they tipped LuAnne really well. They seemed like genuinely nice people. Charlene, particularly.”

They rounded the bend, and Artie’s house and barns came into view. There, sitting in front of the house, was the van. If the Howells had been paying attention, they would have known that Artie had left quite a while ago. They’d have acted quickly, taken what they wanted, and have been gone by now. Unless they’d run into trouble or were having second thoughts.

“Maybe they’re crooks, but just not very good at it,” Bonnie suggested.

Kate pulled the car into Artie’s drive, relieved that Charlene and Dud hadn’t gotten away with the parrots already.

Bonnie held her phone in both hands in her lap, ready to call and report to Livvy what was happening. “I just have a hard time picturing Charlene and Dud as exotic-bird smugglers.”

“As Christians, we don’t want to rush to judgment. There’s more to their story. I think we’re about to learn the rest of it any minute now.”