Chopping Spree

“How much had Victor overexcavated?”

“’Bout six or eight inches. Over that huge expanse of land, you’re talking a lot of dirt. He sold it all through those little We Got Dirt ads, and he made about a million and a half. He had his crew helping him out, too, for cash.”

“So… how do we reconstruct the whole thing?” I puzzled.

Tom tilted his head and considered. “It’s complicated. Victor Wilson was not only very greedy, he was a very mean, very smart guy.”

But he acted nice, my mind automatically supplied. The creep.

Tom went on: “Say Lucas No-toe Holden, the former construction manager, discovered the drainage problem and accused his excavator of overexcavating and selling off the dirt. Maybe Lucas wanted to alert Barry but Victor intercepted him. By the way, you want to hear about everybody’s favorite cadaver?”

“Is this going to destroy my appetite?”

“Hope not. We got back the drug screen. Holden had been injected with cocaine, and that, we think, caused the heart attack. Again, it was probably Victor, but I doubt we’ll ever be able to prove that. Our theory is that after Victor Wilson intercepted Lucas Holden and used the hypodermic on him, Victor quickly drove—through the night—to a motel where he could wear Lucas’s sweatshirt and ball cap to check in as Lucas. Then Victor set up a scene so that it looked as if Lucas died of natural causes, and left the body.”

“And the coroner out there didn’t test for drugs because…”

Tom stood to make me another espresso. Except for bruise marks around my neck, I was in pretty good shape. I liked being pampered, though. In fact, I loved it.

“Because Lucas Holden was a diabetic with heart disease, Goldy,” Tom explained, as velvety dark coffee spiraled into a new English china espresso cup. Tom had bought it for me and hidden it until an appropriate occasion presented itself. He figured catching Victor Wilson qualified. “There was no obvious drug use,” he went on. “So they didn’t run a screen. That kind of case, the medical examiner probably wouldn’t get involved. Remember, a coroner can be a nurse whose husband is a rancher, say. Her only job is to determine the cause and manner of death. And with no foul play, no obvious drug use, the corpse in pretty good shape, then the coroner thinks, Bingo! Donation.”

“But how did Ellie become involved?” I wondered aloud, as I gratefully accepted the crema-loaded espresso.

“First you gotta look at what happened with Barry and Victor. Again, our theory is that Victor typed up a note, supposedly from Lucas Holden, saying ‘I quit! I’m going to Arizona. Send my check there.’ ‘Where in Arizona?’ Barry probably asked Victor, and Victor said ‘Prescott’ because it came into his head. While Barry was out at the site, though, he saw that something was wrong with the footings. They were even with the surface level of the dirt, instead of below it. Barry had an architecture degree, so—”

“So he acted on his own,” I interrupted, “and got the plans from the county. And took pictures. And confronted Victor?”

Tom sighed. “We think so. But that’s not all Barry confronted him about.”

I sipped the coffee and ran my fingers along my throbbing neck. “When was all this?”

“We’re guessing a month ago. That’s when Barry first confronted Victor with the overexcavation, and the returned check from Arizona. Where was Lucas? Barry wanted to know. Why hadn’t Lucas ended up where you said he was going? And, what the hell are we going to do about this drainage problem you’ve created?”

“Good Lord.”

“We figure Victor pushed Barry into the ditch when they had this confrontation. Unknown to Victor at that time, two illegal Mexican immigrants who worked for him, Jorge and Raoul Sanchez, were watching. Jorge and Raoul speak great English. And they worked their butts off for Victor, who sometimes paid them and sometimes didn’t. One day, the two brothers came early for their money, and overheard the whole thing. Barry probably asked Victor one question too many. Hey, by the way, how come these concrete footings are even with the topsoil, instead of being eight inches lower than the soil?”

I sighed and shook my head. “So Jorge and Raoul saw Victor push Barry Dean into the ditch? And knew why, after that, Barry complained about headaches?”

“Yup. Jorge and Raoul, chewed out, unpaid, and maybe just a little scared of how violent Victor could become, walked off the job. Victor, instead of being afraid of Jorge and Raoul ratting him out, called them up and said, ‘One of you needs to come over here and drive this truck into Barry Dean or I’m going to turn all of you into the INS. Then you two and your mother and all your little illegal family will be bused straight back to Mexico.’”

“That bastard.”

“Victor made Jorge and Raoul swear the person who had pushed Barry into the ditch was a woman. Using the same blackmail technique, he forced Raoul to phone in an anonymous tip that Julian had driven the truck that almost killed Barry and you. But they both felt guilty, which is why they called you anonymously to tip you off about the headaches. And left you that note in Spanish, too.”

“And I brought the bastard cookies! But I still don’t understand about the cuff links, and Ellie, and all that.”

“After the ditch incident, Victor must have been real worried about what Barry would do. In particular, he might have worried about how much Barry had told his very public girlfriend, Ellie. So before Barry could do anything, Victor probably decided to kill Barry and frame Ellie. He followed Ellie around, saw Teddy Fury nab her purse. Teddy kept the purse and the cash, but tossed the rest of the purse’s contents—including Ellie’s car keys and the cuff links receipt—into the Dumpster. Victor fished that stuff out and laid his plans. First he’d crash Ellie’s car into Barry’s, to establish the jealousy. Then he planted the cuff links in the dump truck, so it would look as if Ellie tried to kill Barry because he was having something on the side with Pam. But the truck scheme to kill Barry failed.”

“And I lost a box of shrimp rolls,” I commented.

“At that point, Victor was probably desperate,” Tom went on. “He stole your Henckels knife, stalked Barry, and stabbed him in an area invisible to security cameras, behind the P and G shoe cabinet. When the clerks approached to do the cleanup, he shoved Barry into the cabinet. But as he was leaving the store, he saw you coming in with Arch’s guitar. You were asking one clerk after another where the shoe department was. He waited, watched you discover Barry, and whacked you with the guitar.”

“Then when Julian was arrested, that worked for him, too,” I concluded glumly. “He just blackmailed—who was it? Raoul the construction worker?—to say Julian was driving the truck! That son of a bitch! He didn’t succeed in getting Jorge and Raoul into trouble, did he?”

“Don’t worry,” Tom reassured me. “Jorge’s lawyer got the INS deal he wanted, and both Jorge and Raoul are cooperating fully in the investigation.”

“Raoul and Jorge,” I murmured. “Two siblings who really care about each other.”

“Oh! And speaking of siblings! Kim Fury finally called. Apologized profusely for not getting back earlier, but she had gone out looking for her brother, whom she still seems to be constantly ticked off at. But at least she found him. Teddy wasn’t holed up studying quantum mechanics, either, sorry to say, or doing volunteer work in the ghetto. But they’re probably going to close the strip bar where he’d been living in the basement.”

“Ah.” I frowned at the dregs in my demitasse. “What was Teddy doing there?”

“Busboy. Got free rent and meals, made good tips, and he got to see the shows for free.” He perused his cake recipe and began assembling ingredients.

“All right,” I said finally. “Before we get into the whole Pam and Page thing, tell me why Barry didn’t just fire Victor when he discovered what he was doing.”

Tom turned to me. “Goldy, you yourself gave us the answer to that. First of all, as mall manager, Barry didn’t have the power to fire Victor. Pennybaker International would have had to do that. And why didn’t Barry contact Pennybaker?”

“Because he was afraid of negative publicity,” I answered grimly. “Because he was afraid all his borderline- legal antics with giving the vendors’ goods away would be discovered. Because if Pennybaker swooped in with their analysts and managers, Barry would be blamed, somehow, for the delay in the mall construction. Maybe they’d discover he was blackmailing Shane Stockham over the rent issue. And… maybe they’d even get wind of his affair