Page 10 of The Dead Come to Stay
Chapter 5
A victim had been murdered a crow’s mile from Jo’s cottage. A year earlier, and a man had been murderedinJo’s cottage. Would nothing trigger even an ounce of self-preservation in this woman?
“How, Jo?Howcan you forget to lock up?” he demanded.
“I swear, I meant to! Especially with a guest staying,” she said, as though this weren’t even more baffling.
“All right. So he left sometime in the night.” His eyes fell upon the bedstand where two keys glinted in morning sun. “And you’re lucky he didn’t take those with him, or the murderer might have them right now.” He resisted sayingagain.
“I just don’t understand,” Jo said, looking around. “He seemed in such a hurry to get to bed, then doesn’t sleep here?”
MacAdams turned his attention to the overnight bag, pulling a latex glove from one pocket.
“Don’t touch anything,” he cautioned. “You said he was on business. Did he say what kind?”
“No. Do you always keep forensic gloves in your pocket?” Jo asked, peering into the bag from the other side of the bed.
He didn’t unless he started the day off with a corpse in a ditch.The nagging irritation was spreading like an itch. MacAdams pushed back the duffel flap with more violence than necessary and fished out a knit vest, an unworn long-sleeved tee, the blue button-down and one very soiled and still damp pair of trousers. They’d been shoved in on top of the cleaner clothes, which didn’t make much sense. He looked closer at the fabric—all of it spattered in mud.
“That’s what he had been wearing,” Jo said. “Plus a rather short raincoat. It only went to his hips.”
The man must’ve walked to the cottage last night, like Roberta had done. It might explain why Jo hadn’t noticed a vehicle. But who walks across the fields in a downpour?
“Where’s the raincoat?” MacAdams asked, peering into the empty bag and then casting his eyes around the room. Jo closed her eyes and flapped her hands at the wrist.
“Double breasted, dark buttons. A sort of Sherlock cape thing at the back—gun flap.” She opened them again. “Not here, is it?”
It was not. And the body wasn’t wearing it, either. MacAdams called Green. It was a clue, if an absent one. He rang off to find Jo in the closet-small toilet.
“I don’t believe it,” she said, voice muffled. “He stole my soap and washcloth—” she looked at the clawfoot tub “—andthe towel?”
MacAdams made a quick survey of the toilet and bath, even crouching to look under the bed. No towels. The duffel had an assortment of toiletries tossed in the bottom. A very strange business trip indeed.
“This doesn’t make anysense,” Jo complained. “He left in the middle of the night without his bag, but takes mytowels?” She had walked to the nearby chair and prepared to sit in it; MacAdams caught her by both elbows.
“Evidence,”he cautioned. Jo grasped back and hung suspended from his forearms with asorry!expression. He leaned backward, pulling her upright next to him, if a foot shorter.
“Detective?” A uniformed officer stood in the doorway. “Was unlocked, sir.”
MacAdams let go of Jo a little abruptly.
“Thank you, Officer,” he said, crossing the room. “Get the team in here and get the contents of that bag to Struthers.”
“Yes, sir.”
“No one in or out till we’re through, Jo. I mean that. No strangers, no guests, no random businessmen.”
“He wasn’t ‘some stranger,’” Jo interrupted. “He was aguestat myrental cottage.”
“Yes, and I need to see his booking.” Possibly, he’d switched rather suddenly into hard-boiled.Consequence of the job, he told himself, unconvincingly. And Jo was catching the edge of his ill humor. But she sent him the booking details as requested, and handed over her keys before they returned to what should have been a celebratory event.
***
Forensics (minus the head of the department, Struthers, who was busy with their victim) bagged Foley’s belongings and made the usual sweep. Nothing else of note. MacAdams met Green at the station with Jo’s keys in his pocket, and in a very unpleasant mood.
“What’s the news?” he demanded.
Green waved her phone at him.
