cover most of my ideas about that pruner before the first siren erupted. Over the next half hour or so at least
a dozen vehicles accumulated out front, discharging maybe twice that many people, ready to start bustling. Most were carrying
something: different sizes of black cases, a 35 mm camera, a Palmcorder, assorted tools and measuring devices. Not a one of
them turned out to be Calvin, the deputy I knew. My luck, he was on vacation that week.
More people on the scene did not signal a quickening of pace. The sheriff made everybody else wait beyond the ropes while
two guys, one with the camera, the other manning the Palmcorder, filmed Ryan and his surroundings from all angles. Then it
was the doctor’s turn. Once he was finished, several other men, who I concluded must be evidence collectors from the way they
kept putting things in plastic bags, were allowed in. When they were finally through collecting, the whole thing loosened
up and it became open season on Ryan’s remains; at least that was the visual effect.
The action was by no means confined to that area—people started tromping all over the place. The deputy named Joe wanted access
to the Bronco and thrust a consent form at me. His attitude would have won him a flat refusal, except it would be damn inconvenient
to have the Bronco off-limits for any length of time. So I signed my okay and unlocked it for him, then immediately started
regretting. I am careful with my things; I did not appreciate watching its contents yanked out and strewn around.
Roxy, indoors, was understandably outraged at her exclusion from the action. Normally she’ll give up barking at what she hears
if she doesn’t get to see it. That morning she sounded as if she could go on nonstop forever and fully intended to.
Just shy of eruption I butted into a conversation the sheriff was having with one of the oversized-black-briefcase toters
to announce that I was going inside.
“Good idea—it’s a zoo out here. Look, I’ll need to go over a few more things with you when I get a chance to take a break.
It shouldn’t be more than ten, fifteen minutes. Is that entrance your Bronco’s parked near the one I should use?”
“I’ll leave the screen door unhooked.”
It was more like half an hour before he came in. At least that’s what my watch said. My natural sense of time, usually pretty
good, had gone dysfunctional. And every pertinent train of thought I tried to board immediately derailed. I’d been sitting
at the dining-area computer, the one I let the boys use, botching up game after game of Tetris and feeling less and less on
top of anything at all.
“Nice back here,” he commented, going straight to the wraparound solar windows to check out the view down to the creek. “I
heard you’d done wonders with the place once you get past the front.” And then with a quicker gear shift than I’d have anticipated
from this man, “Do you have any idea why Ryan Jessup came to see you last night?”
I shut down the computer before turning to answer him. “Do we know he came to see me? He never got as far as ringing the doorbell.”
He pulled one of the dining-table chairs back out of the sun and sat too, which inspired Roxy to come over and plop her head
in his lap. The neck massaging resumed. “One of my men found his car ten yards or so in along that tractor path to the Berkmeiers’
pasture.”
“Beats me why he’d leave it there. It’s not like I’m short on parking space. Or maybe he didn’t know that. It would have constituted
a first for him to set foot on this property at all. As you will find out when you ask around, Ryan and I did not get along,
professionally. We had no relationship whatsoever beyond the office.”
“Gotta wonder what was on his mind. Were you and your nephews home all evening?”
“From somewhere between eight-thirty and a quarter to nine on. We went for pizza after the Junior All Stars