That ate up more time than I allotted, so when I finally got to Hornsby’s Jackie was already there. She was standing next to her Toyota pickup, talking on a cell phone. She wore a loose, deconstructed silk jacket, white cotton sweater, a knit wool skirt that stopped well above her knees and heels that extended her legs by a few hundred miles. Her thick blond hair, brushed into large waves, was pulled back from her face with a flowered headband. She wore lipstick that matched her sunglasses, the kind you only find in places like Venice, California. She looked like a million bucks.
She clicked the cell phone closed as I approached, and said, “Don’t start.”
“What.”
“Whatever you were going to say.”
“About what?”
She put a hand on her hip and did a little bump.
“You know, the girly clothes.”
“I know better. I got sensitivity training.”
She snorted.
“There’s money well spent.”
“Is he here?”
“Haven’t checked. I honestly just got here. Can you give me something to work with?”
“Hornsby has something I need to see. I can’t ask for it, because he won’t talk to me. Which makes me want to see it even more.”
“What?”
“Hornsby’s the trustee of a trust that owns Bay Side Holdings. That makes the beneficiary the developer. Your ex-client. I need to talk to him. Or them.”
“I’m not big on trusts, or estates, but I don’t see a connection between rental property and a dead woman.”
“That’s exactly the point.”
“What is?”
“She’s dead.”
I walked away from her to avoid more questions. I hoped she’d follow.
Hornsby’s car was still in the driveway. Jackie joined me as I walked up the path and rang the bell.
“Did he answer the door last time?” I asked her.
“He yelled at me to go away. From the inside.”
I rang it again and called his name. Nothing.
“Let’s check the back.”
“Huh?”
“Last I saw him he was working in his backyard,” I told her as I led her through the arborvitae.
I yelled his name again as I walked around clusters of crowded shrubbery, through pachysandra and over balls of flowering mums. Jackie followed as best she could in her spiked heels.
“If I’d known we were on safari—”
We stood on the small patch of grass at the center of the garden and looked around. She gripped my right bicep with both hands to keep from sinking into the moist soil.
“Must have flown the coop,” she said.
“Or he’s hiding inside.”
I noticed there was a little footpath partially obscured by the draping branches of a big Norway maple, now mostly denuded of it’s bright yellow-orange leaves. I remembered Hornsby heading that way with his wheelbarrow after he told me to get lost.
“Let’s look back there before I start yelling,” I said.
“If the cops show, you get your own counsel.”
The lot was much deeper than it looked, obscured by the dense foliage. The path threaded around bunches of overgrown forsythia, holly and bamboo. Mingled with the pungent odor of rotting leaves was the shoreline smell of Sag Harbor Bay, only a hundred feet away. Low tide.
The path opened into a clearing. Milton Hornsby was lying in the center on another patch of grass. He was on his back with his legs stuck straight out. He was wearing the same clothes I’d seen him in before, but his face was less recognizable under all the blood. A Smith & Wesson .38 revolver, not unlike Sullivan’s, was in his right hand. The top of his head was mostly gone. It looked like he must have done it lying down, through the mouth. Neater that way. Attached to his chest with a big safety pin was a blood splattered five-by-seven-inch index card.
“Don’t touch him,” said Jackie, through a clenched fist held to her mouth. “What’s the note say?”
“Go to hell.”
“Pardon me?”
“The note. That’s what it says. ‘Go to hell.’”
“Famous last words.”
“Or shipping instructions.”
“I called to say we were on our way. You and me together. I got his answering machine. Oh, man.”
The blood was bright red. Fresh.
“You have your cell phone?” I asked her, but she was already dialing. “Wait,” I said.
She looked at me wide-eyed.
“I can’t wait,” she yelled. “I have to call right now.”
“I want to look in the house.”
“No.”
“It’s probably in there.”
“No can do. That’s an illegal act. Disbarment just for starters.”
She started dialing.
“You’re his lawyer.”
“He fired me. Wouldn’t do it anyway. I like you, Sam, but not that much.”
“Goddammit.”
“I can do it later if you give me a chance. Legally. I’ll get permission to examine. To make sure everything’s secure. Right now, we got much bigger fish to fry. Jesus, I can’t believe this.”
I looked down at Hornsby. And his note.
“Same to you, you miserable, old …”
“Hey, hey, hey,” said Jackie, interrupting me and taking my arm again, “don’t knock the dead. Crazy bad luck. Come on, walk me back to the house. I’m gonna get sick.”
As we walked I listened to her call the police.
“Sag Harbor have their own cops?” I asked.
“Of course.”
“What about the Town?”
“Depends on the case.”
When we reached the area behind the house, I checked the back door. Jackie shoved herself between me and the door handle.
“I swear to God, Sam,” she yelled, pushing on my chest.
“Take it easy. I’m not going in.”
She was breathing hard, looking frantic and furious. Seemed like the ideal time to ask for another favor.
“Could you call the Town cops? Have them relay a message to Officer Joe Sullivan. Tell him what happened —that I’m here with you.”
“What the hell for?”
“He’ll want to know.”
“Friend of yours?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
“God knows you could use a few.”
Ten minutes later the street was full of cops stringing yellow tape and paramedics and investigators snapping
