“We haven’t got any enemies.”
“How about in business? Got anyone mad at you there?
Fire anyone? Out-shrewd someone?”
He shook his head. His wife said, “Not good old Rog.
Everybody likes good old Rog. Everyone thinks he’s so terrific. Everyone feels sorry for him married to a bitch. But I know him. The bastard.”
“How about you?” I said to her. “Anyone you can think of that has reason to hate you? Or hates you without reason?” She looked at me blankly. The booze was weaving its magic spell. “Any old boyfriends, disappointed lovers?”
“No”—she shook her head angrily—“of course not.”
“Can either of you think of anyone at all who hates you enough to give you this kind of trouble?” Blank stares.
“There must be someone. Maybe hate is too strong a word.
Who dislikes you the most of anyone you know?”
In a voice thick and furry with booze she said, “Kevin.”
Bartlett said, “Marge, for God’s sake.”
“It’s true,” she said. “The little sonova bitch hates us.”
“Marge, goddamn you. You leave my kid alone. He didn’t kidnap himself.”
“The little sonova bitch.” She was mumbling now.
“She’s drunk as a goddamned skunk, Spenser I’m putting her to bed. Drunk as a skunk.” He took her arm, and she sagged protestingly away from him. “Sonova bitch.” She began to giggle. “He’s the little sonova bitch, and you’re the big sonova bitch.” She sat down on the floor still giggling. I got up.
“You need any help?” I said.
He shook his head. “I’ve done this before.”
“Okay, then I’ll go to bed. Thanks for supper” As I went. out of the kitchen I saw Dolly Bartlett scuttle up the stairs ahead of me and into her room. Pleasant dreams, kid.
Chapter 13
The next morning, Saturday, Kevin’s guinea pig turned up. I was sitting at the kitchen table reading the Globe when I heard Marge Bartlett scream in the front hall. A short startled scream and then a long steady one. When I got there the front door was ajar, and she was holding an open package about the size of a shoe box. I took it from her.
Inside was a dead guinea pig on its back, its short legs sticking stiffly up. I looked out the door. A young Smithfield cop I didn’t know came busting around the corner of the house with a shotgun at high port.
“It’s okay,” I said. Marge Bartlett continued to scream steadily. Now that I was holding the package her hands were free, and she put both of them over her face. The cop came in holding the shotgun down along the side of his leg, the muzzle pointing at the floor. He looked in the box and made a face. “Jesus Christ,” he said.
“It came in the mail,” I said. “I suppose it’s the same one the kid took with him when he disappeared.”
Marge Bartlett stopped screaming. She nodded without taking her hands from her face. The cop said, “I’ll call Trask,” and headed back for the cruiser in the driveway. I took the box and wrapping paper and dead guinea pig into the kitchen and sat down at the table and looked at them.
There was nothing to suggest what killed the guinea pig.
The box said Thom McAn on the cover, and the brown paper in which it had been wrapped looked like all the other brown paper wrapping in the world. The box had been mailed in Boston, addressed to Mrs. Margery Bartlett.
There was no return address. They’re too smart for me, I thought.
“What does it mean, Spenser?” Marge Bartlett asked.
“I don’t know. Just more of the same. I’d guess the guinea pig died, and someone thought it would be a good idea to send it to you. It doesn’t look as if it’s been killed.
That might suggest that Kevin is well.”
“Why?”
“Well, a kidnapper or a murderer is not likely to bother keeping a guinea pig, right?”
She nodded. I heard a car spin gravel into the driveway and slam to a stop. I bet myself it was Trask. I won. He came in without knocking.
“Oh, George,” Marge Bartlett said, “I can’t stand much more.”
He crossed to where she was standing and put an arm around her shoulder. “Marge, we’re doing what we can.
We’re working on it around the clock.” He looked at me.
“Where’s the evidence?”
