I understand all your friends call you that, and I hope we're going to be friends.'
'I'd say we're already friends, and famous, beautiful folksingers are allowed to call me anything they like.'
The woman released my hand, raised her fine eyebrows slightly. 'Dr. Robert Frederickson, Mongo the Magnificent-the show business name you carried when you were a headliner with the Statler Brothers Circus; Circus Hall of Fame, criminology professor, now apparently retired, private investigator
'You're very welcome.'
'I'm so glad you stopped around to say hello.'
'Mary, this isn't exactly a social visit.'
Her smile faded slightly, and curiosity filmed her pale blue eyes. 'How can we help you, Mongo?'
'I'd like to talk to you about a friend of mine who drowned near here after supposedly taking one of your members' canoes out for a joyride.'
Mary Tree's smile faded completely, and the curiosity in her incredibly expressive eyes was replaced by sadness. 'Michael was a friend of yours?'
'A good one. We went back a lot of years. Our paths first crossed on a case I was working on.'
'Please come in, Mongo,' she said quietly, moving aside, gently putting her right hand on my shoulder and ushering me into a marble foyer decorated with marble statues in various states of disrepair and cracked, antique paintings.
She led me out of the foyer, down a narrow corridor, then through a large archway into a huge chamber that looked as if it had once been a ballroom. The room, which smelled of fresh paint, was bare except for a couch and three folding chairs set against one wall. The couch was covered with a plastic tarpaulin, as was the floor beneath a wall that was partially covered with cream-colored paint that matched the samples on Mary Tree's brush and face. The entire east wall of the room consisted of a bank of windows that offered a breathtaking view over a neatly manicured lawn that sloped down to the river. She dropped her paintbrush into a coffee can filled with turpentine, then led me over to the couch. She stripped off the plastic cover and motioned for me to sit down.
'Everyone else in the house will very much want to meet you, Mongo,' she continued quietly, 'but I know you want to talk first. We'll have some privacy in here. Would you like some coffee?'
'I'd love some, but not if it's any trouble.'
'It's not any trouble, Mongo; it's already been brewed.' She smiled again, but her smile had become wistful. 'I'll be right back.'
She went out through the archway, and I gazed out the bank of windows. As the rising sun passed behind the luxuriant green crown of a large elm tree, I could see a floating dock at the shoreline and a small sailboat anchored about thirty yards out. There were a number of dinghies tied to the dock, and nearby was a boat rack containing two canoes and a kayak, each intricately decorated with what appeared to be American Indian symbols, each exuding the almost sensual, palpable beauty that only lovingly handcrafted objects possess. One space in the rack was empty, and I wondered if it had held the canoe Michael had supposedly been using when he drowned.
Mary returned five minutes later with a wooden tray on which were arrayed a thermos jug, two coffee mugs, packets of sugar and a carton of Half and Half, and a plateful of bran muffins. She set the tray down on the seat of one of the folding chairs, which she placed in front of the couch. She poured me a mug of coffee, then sat down next to me on the couch. I declined milk and sugar, but did take one of the bran muffins; it was succulent, still warm from the oven.
'Good,' I said as I finished off my muffin. 'Thank you.'
'You're welcome, Mongo,' she replied, her tone matching her sad smile.
'Mary, I understand Michael was living here at the time of his death.'
'Yes,' she answered simply.
'How long had he been living here before he died?'
'About a week; six days, to be exact.'
Exactly the length of time he would have been in Cairn from the starting date of his assignment. 'How did he come to be living here?'
'We invited him.'
'Did you know he was an FBI agent?'
'Uh-huh.'
I drained off the coffee, which had a pleasant cinnamon aftertaste, then set the mug down on the floor. 'Did you know he'd been sent here to Cairn specifically to spy on you people? Did you know he was supposed to tap your phones and monitor your mail?'
'Uh-huh,' she replied in the same matter-of-fact tone as she picked up the thermos, then leaned over to refill my mug, which she handed to me. 'He told us.'
I almost spilled my coffee. 'He
Mary held out the plate of bran muffins, and I absently shook my head. 'What can I tell you, Mongo?' she said, a slight note of playfulness breaking through the sadness in her voice. 'He decided he wanted to come over to work for the good guys for a change.' She set the plate back down on the chair seat, then pointed to the half- painted wall to our right. 'As a matter of fact, I'm now painting the section of wall he started. He liked to paint and fix things.'
'You're saying Michael drove up here, knocked on your door, announced to whoever answered that he was Michael Burana, FBI agent, and that he was in town to spy on you?'
She leaned back on the couch, crossed her legs, and folded her large hands over her knees. 'As a matter of fact,' she said easily, 'that's almost exactly what happened.' She cocked her head, studying me, and obviously saw the consternation in my face. 'Yeah, I know,' she continued. 'We were a little taken aback, too. Some of our people were more than a little taken aback; they were convinced it was a trick. But then, we figured that if it was a trick, it was a pretty good one. And who cared if he spied on us? It certainly wouldn't be anything new. We figured that the worst thing that could happen to us was that we'd get some work out of him while he was doing his spying. This place is really the ultimate white elephant, you know, a real bitch to maintain. But it wasn't a trick. Michael was sincere. He was going to wait until he got his next paycheck from the FBI, then submit his resignation and apply for his pension.'
'Still, it wasn't as if he were coming into a houseful of strangers. You knew Michael.'
Mary Tree shook her head. 'Not before he showed up here.'
'You told the police you were old friends.'
This time her sad smile was tinged with a trace of bitterness, and she looked toward the ceiling in mock exasperation. 'I was being facetious. I'm afraid the police aren't into my brand of humor.'
'I'm sorry to report that I'm as dense as the police, Mary,' I said carefully. 'I don't get it either.'
She looked at me, raised her palms, and shrugged broadly, as if the answer was obvious. 'The FBI and a barefoot, pacifist folksinger of antiwar songs, a civil rights activist and war resister, Mongo? Old friends? Get it now? The FBI had been tapping my phones, monitoring my movements, opening my mail, planting phony stories in the press about me, and harassing my friends since I was seventeen years old and first walked onto a stage to sing one of Harry Peal's protest songs. In case you haven't noticed, this government takes a dim view of people who don't share its paranoid views of the world in general and communists in particular. All governments dislike citizens who protest, and different governments react in different ways. Over the years, this government has occasionally used the Gestapo and the KGB as role models for dealing with dissidents.'
'Was Michael one of the agents who spied on you in the early days?'
'Yes-although I didn't know it at the time. He worked undercover then, and he told me that he traveled around the country, going to all my concerts and the protest rallies I was involved in.' She paused, laughed lightly. 'He told me he knew all my songs by heart.'
'It sounds like the two of you got to know and like each other pretty well in the few days he was here.'
'Yes. People can become good friends, or mortal enemies, in a lot less than six days.'
'Indeed they can. Did you tell all this to the police?'
