“Yeah, he’s got a big-ass generator going in the shop. Now why do you suppose that is? He’s got enough four-forty to run all his tools coming in on the line. Had the fans running in the paint shop. So I went in closer, along this windbreak of pines that goes from the woods, stops about fifty yards from the shop.” Teedo leaned forward on his elbows, taking his voice even lower. “You know how Gator is supposed to be out there all alone?”
“Yeah?”
“Not that day. Jimmy Klumpe was there, bigger’n shit, sitting in his garbage truck, had Gator’s trash container up on the lift. Top open. Just sitting there, engine running…
“Then this person comes out of the shop. Got this paint suit and breather mask on. When they took off the hood, saw it was a woman. Thought it was his sister, Cassie, at first. She had this black hair, same build.”
“Really?” Griffin said, “I heard Cassie never goes out there, hasn’t been back since their folks-”
Teedo shrugged. “Wasn’t Cassie, though. ’Cause little while later Gator and her brought these black heavy- duty garbage bags out from the shop and loaded them in the Dumpster. Jimmy hoists her up and drives off. But he goes north, not back toward the town dump. Goes into the woods. And Gator, he starts up his Bobcat and moves all these boxes and big plastic drums from the shop into the garage part of his barn. Then him and the woman went into the farmhouse…
“Wind was right, could hear them in there. Windows musta been open. Was the bathroom, ’cause the shower was running.” Teedo flashed a grin. “Heard the kinda noise you ain’t suppose to make with your sister.”
“So you think he’s cooking dope out there?”
“Cooking dope?” Teedo laughed. “Man, when’s the last time you were on the streets?” He raised his beer. Before he got it to his lips, Griffin clamped his hand over the bottle top and looked Teedo directly in the eyes.
“Why you telling me this?”
Teedo shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe because you’re the only person around who’s crazy enough not to be afraid of the guy.” Then he set the bottle down and reached for his wallet. “Hey, and I got this.” Teedo took his wallet from his hip pocket and withdrew a salmon-colored slip of paper. An old Powerball lottery ticket. He handed it to Griffin. “That woman? She drives a silver Pontiac GT. Never seen that car in town. Had it hidden in the barn. Look on the back.”
Griffin turned it over; three letters and three numerals printed in ballpoint. Set it on the table.
“License plate on the Pontiac,” Teedo said.
Griffin narrowed his eyes, waiting.
Teedo shrugged. “You know people, those guys who come up from the cities to hunt sometimes, Broker’s pals. They’re cops, right.”
“So? Keith Nygard’s a cop.”
Teedo shook his head and said cryptically, “Him and Gator’s high school buddies. When the meth house blew up and all Gator’s cousins burned, Keith, he looked the other way.”
Teedo finished his beer, set the bottle aside, leaned forward, and lowered his voice. “So. Jimmy was there, using his truck for something Gator’s up to. Just saying-if Broker was my friend, and he’s messing with Jimmy, the person who comes back at him might not be Jimmy. Might be someone who needs Jimmy. In which case it might not be about kids fighting on the playground.”
Griffin exhaled, picked up the slip of paper, and turned it slowly, weighing it. He looked up at Teedo. “You willing to go back out to Gator’s farm?”
“Nope. Ain’t my fight. No disrespect, but fuck a bunch of white guys. It would be interesting, though, to find out if the lady driving that Pontiac has a record, huh?” Teedo gave Griffin the barest smile as he stood up and put on his coat.
Griffin said, “Anything else you can tell me?”
Teedo shrugged. “Every Saturday morning, nine A.M., Gator comes in town and eats bacon and eggs at Lyme’s Cafe.”
After Teedo left, Griffin sat for several minutes studying the number on the slip of paper. Okay. This was something Keith should know about. He went out, got in his Jeep, drove into town, and pulled into a diagonal parking slot in front of the old two-story redbrick county courthouse. The snow on the barrel of the Civil War four- pounder cannon on the lawn had melted during the warm day. Since sunset, the temperature drop had formed a long fringe of icicles.
Griffin stared at the icicles, organizing his thoughts. The sheriff ’s office occupied one side of the lower floor. He could see Howie Anderson, Keith’s chief-and only-deputy during the winter, standing in the well-lighted window, leaning over, talking to Ginny Borck sitting at the dispatcher’s desk.
He knew they had a new computer and radio setup purchased with Homeland Security money; primarily to monitor Border Patrol and Highway Patrol advisories. Be easy to run a license plate check.
Then he considered Teedo’s cryptic snapshot of Keith being Gator Bodine’s high school pal, how they’d teamed up, since the Marci Sweitz episode, to rid the county of meth. Remembered Susan’s remark about the cursory medical examiner’s report after the trash house fire. Accidental death. No arson investigation. The cursory autopsies.
Griffin looked up and down the empty street; not much going on except the slush starting to set up and freeze. Everything seemingly hunky-dory-except that, just below the surface, the pollution cooking under Jimmy Klumpe’s property on Little Glacier might leak over into the big lake.
And kill the summer trade that supported the town.
Could that kind of hovering phantom cause a solid family man like Keith Nygard-wife, three kids, second-term sheriff, deacon in his dad’s Lutheran church-go into the drug business as a hedge against the future?
Nah-he could see Keith getting blindsided, but the guy was just too rock-ribbed Lutheran to go over the line. It was time to slow down and think this through. All he had was Teedo’s hearsay story and a number scrawled on a lottery ticket. Walk in there with a bunch of bar talk, and he’d sound like an excited citizen who’d been watching too many detective shows.
He needed a little more specific information before he approached Keith. One thing he could do was reach out to J. T. Merryweather, see if he’d run a check on the license number. His mind made up, Griffin backed out of the parking space in front of the courthouse and drove slowly out of town, slowing as he went past the lighted windows of Lyme’s Cafe.
A few minutes later Griffin stood in his kitchen, phone in hand, tracing a number in his phone book with his finger. Teedo’s slip of paper lay on the open page. Without hesitation he tapped in J. T. Merryweather’s number, down on his ostrich farm in Lake Elmo.
Denise Merryweather answered the phone, her voice tightening when she placed Griffin in the part of her husband’s life that involved Phil Broker. “Is it important?” Her tone was cool. “We’re eating supper.”
“It’s important.”
A moment later, J. T., St. Paul PD captain of homicide when he retired, came on the connection. “Griffin. What’s up? This about Broker and Nina? How’s she doing?”
“Actually, Nina’s coming out of it. Broker? He’s stressed to the max, but he won’t admit it.”
“Figures,” J. T. said.
Griffin picked up the piece of paper with the number on it and said, “J. T., I need a favor…”
Chapter Thirty-one
Sheryl spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon smoking, watching daytime TV. And watching the phone. She imagined Gator pacing in his shop, watching
“Country Buffet, in Woodbury, that mall off Valley Creek Road and 494, you know it?” said a calm voice without introduction. She knew the restaurant…
…and the voice.
“It’s a dump,” she said.
