Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos

'Ouch. Meg, I hate to say it, but if I were Monty, Tad would look awfully suspicious to me.'

'You don't have to be so tactful,' I said. 'He looks awfully suspicious to me, and I'm supposed to be his friend, dammit. Or at least his boyfriend's friend. He supposedly has an alibi, but I don't know if it's any good. This is great; we have to figure out if the stuff on this CD means Tad is in danger, or if he's just being melodramatic, or maybe trying to cover up a murder.'

'For the sake of argument, what if Tad decided it was a mistake, giving you the CD-ROM, and went back to try to collect it, found Benson ransacking your booth, and attacked him?'

'Or what if he went back to my booth to collect the CD-ROM, and Benson followed him and attacked him?'

'Also possible. He could have killed Benson in self-defense, or at least what he thought was self- defense.'

'Then what about the alibi?' I said.

'True,' Michael said. 'If the alibi is genuine. Then again, if it isn't genuine, doesn't arranging it suggest premeditation?'

'I hate this,' I said. 'I really hate this. I know how hurt Faulk will be if he finds out we suspect Tad, and that's nothing compared to how hurt he'll be if Tad turns out to be the killer. Michael, don't tell anyone we looked at this. If Tad's alibi's a phony and he did kill Benson, and realizes that he handed me his motive on a platter – '

'Understood. The less we know the better,' he said, and began closing the windows Tad's program had opened. 'I tried to look at it, but there was a password; I couldn't do anything with it. I know you probably won't want to hear this, but I think we should give this to Monty.'

'I don't want to hear it, but I agree. But we do it in front of witnesses. And not till we've made a copy of the data. Remember, we're not sure Monty's even qualified to investigate this.'

'Okay,' he said. 'l’ll start on the backup.'

'Meg,' Eileen said, sticking her head behind the curtain. 'Someone else wants to ask about the flamingos.'

'I'm doomed,' I muttered as I went back out into the booth.

I'd sold another flamingo and was deep in negotiations with a customer who wanted some wrought-iron cranes when Mrs. Fenniman came storming back into the booth.

'I'm only paying for twelve flamingos,' she announced.

'Well, that's fine,' I said. 'I only made twelve.'

'Then you need to learn to count, girl,' she snapped back. 'There're thirteen of them.'

'There can't be,' I said.

'Come see for yourself.'

I followed her out into the lane, where a crowd of tourists were inspecting the flamingo flock at close range.

'Clear the area!' Mrs. Fenniman boomed out, and the tourists did; or at least enough that I could see the whole flamingo herd.

I took a quick count. She was right. There were thirteen.

'You see,' Mrs. Fenniman said, noticing my frown.

'Yes, I see,' I said. 'But I only made twelve flamingos, so one of these has to be a ringer. And it's not hard to see which,' I added, zeroing in on the runt of the litter.

Oh, it was made along the same general lines as my flamingos. Same method, approximately the same size. The workmanship was far inferior, though. Where my birds flowed in long, graceful curves, this one had an awkward, squarish shape. The color was ghastly, not a pure pink at all but one with mottled brown and gray overtones, and the finish was peeling off in great leprous patches. The edges were less-finely finished – knowing how many small neighborhood children went to visit Mrs. Fenniman, I'd worked hard to see not only that the bills were blunt but that none had any rough places, sharp edges, or dangerous points. But every corner of this bird was a laceration waiting to happen, and it had a beak so sharp no responsible person would put it anywhere near small children. In fact –

'Call Monty,' I told Michael. 'There's blood on this flamingo's beak.'

'Blood?' Mrs. Fenniman trumpeted. 'On one of my flamingos?'

'No,' I said. 'You're only paying for twelve, remember? The blood's on the one you're not buying.'

'I haven't picked mine yet,' she grumbled. 'What if I like that one?'

I glowered at her and she retreated, clutching one of the unstained flamingos.

Using some clean rags, to avoid getting fingerprints on the flamingo – or at least any more fingerprints on top of what Mrs. Fenniman and dozens of passing shoppers had already made – Michael and I hauled the bogus flamingo back into my booth. And one of mine, for comparison. Mrs. Fenniman would just have to get along with eleven for a while.

When Monty showed up, he looked harassed, and not all that pleased to see us.

'So what's this nonsense about a blood-stained flamingo?' he said.

'I think I've found the missing murder weapon you've been hunting for,' I said.

'What gives you the idea we're missing a murder weapon, Ms. Langslow?' he said, a little too loudly. 'We found the victim with your knife stuck square in his back.'

'Yes, but you've known for quite some time that my knife didn't kill him, haven't you? Probably since about five minutes after the coroner saw the wound. When we were talking about my dad this morning, you said something about how many people were running around with knives and swords and bayonets. Why would you care, if you had the murder weapon? And it's no secret to anyone that you've been scouring the camp and the fair all morning for weapons; hell, you even confiscated some of my dad's surgical instruments for a while.'

'So what makes you think you've found this so-called missing weapon when we couldn't?' Monty said.

Was it just his typical stubbornness, or was there some more sinister reason for him to act so obtuse?

'Oh, for heaven's sake, just take a look at the thing, Monty,' I said, jerking a thumb at the bird in question. 'It won't kill you to look.'

He lost the mocking air when he inspected its beak, keeping his Band-Aid – decked hands well away from it, I noticed.

'Damn, you made that thing sharp,' he said.

'I didn't make it,' I said. 'This is one of the ones I made.'

I indicated my flamingo.

'Looks pretty similar to me,' he said.

'Similar? Are you crazy!' I exclaimed, and I pointed out the finer features of my bird and the shortcomings of the imposter.

'Still looks pretty much the same to me,' he said.

'They're right,' I muttered. 'Justice really is blind.'

'But you're right about one thing. This fellow's beak couldn't stab butter,' he said, indicating my flamingo with a disparaging air. 'You'd have to use him as a blunt instrument. This other one, now – that's a lethal weapon. Where'd you find the damned things, anyway?'

'Here, in my booth,' I said. 'They've been here all along.'

A couple of spectators tittered.

'They couldn't have been,' he said.

'Don't you remember when I was looking for my cash box?'

I said. 'You opened the case they were in yourself, and said there was nothing but birds inside. Then you locked it up again, with the murder weapon inside.'

More titters.

'You've been searching all morning for something that's been right here under your nose the whole time. Gee, maybe if you'd let me back in my booth a little sooner you'd have found the murderer by now.'