“Did anyone see Primrose after she left the morgue?”
“Nope.”
“Did you discover anything in her room?”
“The lady was fond of Post-its. Phone numbers. Times. Names. Lots of notes, mostly work-related.”
“Primrose was always losing her glasses, wore them on a cord around her neck. She worried about being forgetful.” I felt a cold spot in my chest. “Any clue about her destination Sunday afternoon?”
“Not a word.”
A deputy entered and placed a paper on the sheriff 's desk. She glanced at it briefly, back to me.
“I see your wheels are running again.”
My Mazda was the talk of Swain County.
“I'm heading down to Charlotte, but I want to show you a couple of things before I go.”
I handed her the purloined photo of the Tramper funeral.
“Recognize anyone?”
“I'll be goddamned. Parker Davenport, our venerable lieutenant governor. The little twerp looks like he's fifteen.” She returned the print. “What's the significance?”
“I'm not sure.”
Next, I handed her Laslo's report, waited while she read.
“So the DA was right.”
“Or I was right.”
“Oh?”
“How about this scenario? Jeremiah Mitchell died after leaving the Mighty High Tap last February. His body was stored in a freezer or refrigerator, removed, then placed outside later.”
“Why?” She tried to keep the skepticism out of her voice.
I withdrew the notes I'd taken at the library, took a deep breath, and began.
“Henry Arlen Preston died here in 1943. Three days later a farmer named Tucker Adams disappeared. He was seventy-two. Adams's body was never found.”
“What does that have to d—”
I held up a hand.
“In 1949 a biology professor named Sheldon Brodie drowned in the Tuckasegee River. A day later Edna Farrell disappeared. She was around eighty. Her body was never found.”
Crowe picked up a pen, placed the tip on the blotter, and slid it end over end through her fingers.
“In 1959 Allen Birkby was killed in an automobile accident on Highway 19. Two days after the wreck Charlie Wayne Tramper disappeared. Tramper was seventy-four. His body was recovered, but it was badly mangled, the head missing. The ID was strictly circumstantial.”
I looked up at her.
“That's it?”
“What day did Jeremiah Mitchell disappear?”
Crowe dropped the pen, opened a drawer, and withdrew a file.
“February fifteenth.”
“Martin Patrick Veckhoff died in Charlotte on February twelfth.”
“Lots of people die in February. It's a lousy month.”
“The name ‘Veckhoff’ is on the list of H&F officers.”
“The investment group that owns that weird property near Running Goat Branch?”
I nodded.
“So is ‘Birkby.’”
She leaned back and rubbed the corner of one eye. I pulled out Laslo's find and set it in front of her.
“Laslo Sparkes found this in the dirt we collected near the wall at the Running Goat house.”
She studied but did not reach for the vial.
“It's a tooth fragment. I'm taking it to Charlotte for DNA testing to establish whether it goes with the foot.”
Her phone rang. She ignored it.
“You need to get a reference sample for Mitchell.”
She hesitated a moment. Then, “I can look into it.”
