Adieu at the Zoo_A Jefferson Zoo Mystery Read online

  Adieu at the Zoo

  A Jefferson Zoo Mystery

  Harol Marshall

  Adieu at the Zoo

  Copyright© 2012 Harol Marshall

  Fire Star Press Edition 2018

  Cover Design Livia Reasoner

  Fire Star Press

  www.firestarpress.com

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews

  DEDICATION

  To my friends Gin Wall and Ellen Greer

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Many thanks to those who’ve been especially helpful to me in writing this novel, although any errors, misrepresentations, or inaccuracies belong to me. Special thanks go to my good friends at the North Carolina Zoological Park, Gin Wall and Ellen Greer, and to my family, including my husband Jerry, and my cousin June.

  Special thanks to Cheryl and Livia at Fire Star Press for taking on my books and believing in me, and additional thanks to my friends at the Triad Writers’ Roundtable: Trudy Atkins, Karen Fritz, Larry Jakubsen, Imogene Joyner, Lynette Hall, Dixie Land, Dave Shaffer, and John Staples, and the Writer’s Group of the Triad (WGOT) Mystery Writers I, including Agnes Alexander, Betty DiMeo, Helen Goodman, and Nancy Gotter Gates. Thank you all for your encouragement and support.

  Chapter 1

  Ever wake up exhausted before you even roll out of bed? For me, this was one of those days. My work schedule began at the ungodly hour of five in the morning as my staff and I rushed to finish last minute preparations for the grand opening of the zoo’s newest exhibit—the Elwood Duke Forest Aviary. The hectic pace left me tired and cranky by the time the shindig began.

  My name is Samantha Clark, but I go by Sam, and I’m Jefferson County Zoo’s first Curator of Horticulture. My zoo is located in North Carolina’s central piedmont plateau twenty miles south of the Virginia border. I’ve worked here for nine of the zoo’s twenty-year existence, which is nearly as long as I’ve been widowed. Jefferson Zoo was a lifesaver for me, and on days like today, I need to keep reminding myself of that fact.

  Exhibit dedications are big fundraisers in the zoo world and this was no exception. Our fundraising organization, the Zoo Alliance viewed the Aviary dedication as the premier fundraiser of the year, which accounted for much of the day’s stress. Today’s bash found me hobnobbing with the city’s moneyed elite most of whom gushed over the beauty and allure of the exotic birds while totally ignoring the lush tropical oasis my horticulture staff and I had worked so hard to create. The plant collection was, in my humble opinion, the highlight of the exhibit, but I vowed not to be offended by visitors who looked past the gorgeous plantings to ogle a tiny bird who only wanted to be left alone.

  My staff handled their end of the day‘s operation on time and with fewer than normal mishaps. However, the keepers had run behind schedule for the past month, so some of the later-introduced residents were freaking out a bit more than usual. As were Alliance staff members who worried about unwanted encounters between the exhibit’s nervous tenants and the guests who helped pay the bills.

  In the minutes prior to opening, I overheard one Alliance staff member complain to a keeper, “We can’t have nervous birds pooping on our patron’s heads.”

  The keeper shrugged off the complaint with, “We can’t diaper them.”

  I decided to stay out of the ruckus and headed for the refreshment table, eying the little crab and avocado pastries since I’d skipped lunch and was two degrees short of starving. In the middle of piling my recyclable plate with a variety of tasty morsels, I felt a hand on my elbow and turned to see one of our biggest donors sipping raspberry punch and dodging a pair of misbehaving Toucans.

  “Nice to meet you…Samantha Clark,” he said, glancing at my nametag. “I’m Nelson Farthington.”

  World-traveler and self-styled naturalist, Nelson Farthington III held out a delicate hand. My forthright handshake enclosed a limp dishrag grip. I quickly eased up, wondering if I’d left all of his finger bones intact. At five-nine, I’m considered a big woman, and while no one would call me dainty, I am slim by American standards and I stay in shape when it comes to muscle tone and fat ratios. The fact that I lift weights on occasion might suggest I don’t know my own strength, but in the case of Nelson Farthington Number Three, I felt he could benefit from an annual membership at our local Y.

  “Nice to meet you too, Mr. Farthington,” I replied, “and please, call me Sam.”

  I’d met the man three or four times in the past, always at fund-raising events, but apparently lasting impressions aren’t my forte. I may have to resort to make-up—eyelashes that glue on one at a time, or hot pink lipstick to match the color of my sunburned face and neck.

  The aristocratic, handsome, single, and very rich Nelson Farthington lived next door to the Jefferson Zoo on a two-hundred-acre estate that bordered the northwest corner of zoo property. Every year for the past five years, Nelson III had attended at least one of our fundraisers, sometimes two if he happened to be in the country and not particularly busy at whatever keeps him occupied when he drops by the family manor.

  The latest rumors had him traveling back and forth to the Congo on a mission to save Bonobo chimps, which are on the verge of extinction. Bonobos, sometimes known as the erotic ape for their hyper-sexuality, provide fodder for many an in-joke at the zoo. I hoped the topic wouldn’t crop up because I had no interest in learning about Nelson’s affinity for the little guys.

  “And you’re a curator, Miss Clark?”

  I nodded and glanced down at the expensive Italian loafers peeking out from under his beige linen slacks.

  “May I ask what you curate?”

  Nelson Farthington’s face glistened with anticipation. I knew the look.

  “Plants,” I said.

  “Plants,” Nelson parroted, as the female Toucan swooped in front of his face, startling him and sending the contents of his punch cup spraying across the front of my neatly pressed camel-colored Jefferson County Zoo shirt.

  I jumped back, but not soon enough. “Oh sh…oot,” I said, catching myself from using language unfit for public interactions.

  “Oh, I’m so sorry,” Nelson Farthington blurted, reaching his hand in my direction.

  I blocked his move with my arm and brushed bubbles of pink liquid from my somewhat substantial chest, but the fruit punch had already soaked in. I looked like an ad for Girls Untamed.

  “No problem,” I told him. “These shirts aren’t my favorite, and besides I’ve always gone in for the tie-dyed look.”

  I followed up with a smile, hoping I hadn’t sound too lame, because the Farthingtons were big contributors to the zoo and I could use a bit of their money to brighten the bare spots in the rhino exhibit, bare spots being a euphemism for the rhino’s current muddy wallow.

  Before my scintillating exchange with Nelson Farthington could escalate further, a call came in over the Security channel on Zoo Com, our two-way radio system, signaling a problem.

  “Sam, here.”

  “Sam, I need you at Wetlands right away. It’s, uh, an emergency.”

  Sounds of distress rang out from Jodie, one of my horticulture techs.

  “Have you called Security?”

  “I did, but nobody answered.”

  “Keep trying. They can reach you before I can.”

  “But can you hurry? I’m down here alone and I’m
nervous.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  “I’d rather wait ’til you get here to tell you about it.”

  I preferred knowing the details immediately, but I let it go. Jodie’s drama queen reputation might mean she got her waders stuck in the mud and couldn’t wriggle out by herself.

  “Okay,” I said, “and keep trying Security, I’m on my way. I’ll call back to check on you.”

  I shrugged my apologies to Nelson Farthington. “Nice to meet you, gotta run,” I added, swallowing the rest of my drink.

  “I enjoyed meeting you, too,” I heard him call to my retreating back as I wended my way through the posh Aviary crowd.

  Hurrying toward the staff exit in the rear of the Aviary, I crossed my fingers I’d find my electric cart where I left it, parked alongside the service road next to the back door. If one of my staff came along and borrowed it while I was frittering away my time entertaining Zoo Alliance patrons, I’d have their head on a stake.

  I pushed open the loading platform door with my shoulder. The outside air was warmer and more humid than the climate-controlled tropical environment inside the Aviary. Early May and already the thermometer read ninety-two degrees with eighty-five percent humidity. Gotta love global warming, I thought, as I took the steps down two at a time.

  Chapter 2

  I spotted my jungle-patterned cart parked on the side of the road. Not where I left it, but at least my staffer returned it quickly, a lucky break that would save me a long walk and save the borrower his or her job.

  To be fair, I can’t really blame someone for snatching a cart now and then. Our zoo is one of the largest of its kind in the country, even though only one-quarter of our seven hundred acres houses zoo animals, a situation that’s scheduled to change over the next twenty years.

  According to our board’s grand plan, exhibits will cover over half of our current land area, an expansion that depends on how much money Zoo Alliance can raise for us, and they’re feeling the pressure.

  I slid onto the battered seat of the zoo cart, flipped the key to the on position and headed in the direction of the Wetlands exhibit, resuming my conversation with Jodie along the way.

  “I’m totally creeped out down here alone, Sam.”

  “You probably couldn’t be in a safer place. I’m halfway there, but I can’t talk and drive. Call me back if you have to, otherwise keep trying security. I don’t know why they’re not answering.”

  “My guess is Andy’s on duty tonight and he forgot his radio when nature called. He’s probably sitting in the men’s room reading the latest issue of some hunting magazine.

  “More likely, a girlie magazine.”

  I tried not to picture it.

  Holding the accelerator pedal to the floor for maximum speed, I zipped along the single-lane road at a blazing eighteen miles per hour. A large male bison, its wooly triangular head bent to the ground, nibbled grass a few feet from the habitat’s perimeter, surprising me as I rounded a corner alongside the Great Savannah exhibit.

  The Great Savannah, like each of our current ecological zones, is a three-tiered exhibit, meaning it contains savannah animals from three continents—North America, Africa, and Asia currently. At the next fork, I hung a left onto the Wetlands service road where a chorus of gray tree frogs announced my presence, assaulting the air with their raucous rain calls, more reminiscent of South American jungles than the woodlands of North Carolina’s central piedmont.

  Entering the Wetlands exhibit, I caught sight of Jodie standing on the wooden overflow bridge wearing her waders and a long-sleeved safari shirt, her auburn curls escaping from under a cock-eyed sun hat. Mosquito netting shielded her face from an army of buzzing insects as she leaned precariously over the railing, scraping the handle of her rake back and forth.

  The image only confirmed my view of her definition of the word ‘emergency.’ I watched with curiosity as she worked furiously to retrieve something caught in the tangled muck of the basin. At least she wasn’t stuck in mud in the middle of the marsh since I hadn’t wanted to go in after her, and my waders were back at the office.

  What was the big emergency, I wondered, that compelled her to pull me away from the Aviary fundraiser?

  I parked my cart at the edge of the marsh and tromped up the boardwalk. “Hey, Jo, what’s up?”

  She leaned over the wooden railing and pointed to the concrete catch basin that traps refuse and keeps detritus from contaminating the lake when the waters overflow.

  “Have a look,” she said.

  I bent over the railing and blinked wildly. A large sheet of black plastic tied with strands of rope stuck halfway into the catch basin. A few inches of water lay in the bottom of the trough. Protruding from the far edge of the plastic I could see a pair of mottled, purplish-gray human feet. An Eastern Box Turtle nibbled away on the big toe of the left foot. Jodie pried the turtle off with the handle of her rake and moved it away, but the stubborn creature crawled right back and snagged another toe.

  “What the—” I nearly bit off my tongue for the second time that evening.

  “Yeah,” Jodie said, with a grim shake of her head, “see why I told you we had an emergency here?”

  I tried to gather my thoughts. Imagining rather than sensing an offensive stench in the air, I pushed myself away from the railing and exhaled long and deep. “Have you been able to reach Security yet?”

  “I gave up trying. I didn’t want to be alone here when they arrived. You know the trouble I’ve had lately with Andy LaRue and he’s on duty tonight. I’ve been ducking behind the Cannas every time a vehicle drives by, worried it might be Andy, or worse yet, the murderer.”

  A chill ran up my spine despite the heat and humidity. I wasn’t sure if it originated from fear or my nagging backache. “Murderer?”

  Jodie pointed her rake at what we could see of the corpse. “The person who killed him and dumped him in our marsh. Couldn’t he have done his dirty work someplace else?”

  I was at a loss for words, debating what to do next.

  “Sam,” she wailed, “I nearly died of a heart attack down here alone worrying about a serial killer.”

  I ignored her serial killer comment. “I’ll call Dan Saunders’s cell phone and ask him to meet us here alone,” I said, referring to our Head of Security. I much preferred dealing with him over Jodie’s friend Andy. “I’m not ready to broadcast this news over the open channel yet, or we’ll have the whole sheriff’s department at our disposal before anyone can figure out how to handle the publicity end of things.”

  Jodie grimaced and glanced over the railing again giving me a stricken look. “We’re looking at a murder here sure as a cat’s got whiskers, and I just hope whoever did this isn’t hanging around on zoo property stalking another victim.”

  “Let’s not jump to conclusions. We have no way of knowing whether this was murder,” though I was clueless as to how it could be anything else.

  “So, you’re guessing he committed suicide? Tied himself up in a garbage bag and jumped into three feet of water?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted, “but as you so succinctly point out, we can safely eliminate drowning because his feet are sticking out. If he’d wanted to stand up, my guess is, he would have had that option.”

  “I think somebody bumped him off in a different location and carried his body over to the Wetlands hoping it would sink to the bottom and decay before anyone found it. They probably thought the water was a lot deeper than it is.”

  “You may be right. Otherwise, it’s a pretty bizarre burial.”

  “Stranger things have happened around here,” she said, leading to her countering her own hypothesis. “With the economy as tough as it is, maybe some family couldn’t afford a cemetery plot and decided to leave the guy’s remains in a place he loved. He could have been one of our regulars.”

  “Not likely.”

  “I mean, it’s possible,” she added lamely.

  “Anything’s possible
, but it’s not easy to dump a body here unseen, murder or not. Besides, if a family can’t afford a burial, they’d dig a hole and plant the body in the back of their garden rather than dragging it down here.”

  Jodie rolled her eyes. “Does everything for you come back to gardening?”

  “Pretty much,” I said, as the two of us found relief in dark humor, a coping mechanism we shared.

  Chapter 3

  I removed my cell phone from my belt holster and dialed Dan Saunders.

  He answered with, “Hey, Sam, what’s up?”

  “Are you in the Park?”

  “Yeah. Just pulled into Security. Is there a problem?”

  “Can you drive over to Wetlands. I have something to show you. It’s personal,” I added, hanging up before he had a chance to question me. “That should mean come alone,” I told Jodie, “without Andy LaRue in tow.”

  I had no interest in dealing with Andy, although not for the same reason as Jodie. Andy had a major crush on her, which provided the zoo staff with more entertainment than either Jodie or Andy deserved. As a result, mentioning his name to Jodie even in jest, brought a vitriolic response. I understood. Andy’s egotism irritated the heck out of a lot of people including me, but I had more important things on my mind than Jodie’s embarrassment or Andy’s peculiar expressions of insecurity.

  “A dead body isn’t the kind of publicity the zoo needs right now,” I said, putting business worries into words. “Not with attendance down, counterfeit bills up, and break-ins at a record high. What’s next for this place?”

  Jodie answered my rhetorical question with a gloomy prophecy that concerned me with every thunderstorm these days. “Given the weather reports lately? I’d wager on a tornado.”

  I knew the latest climate-change models predicted increased bouts of cataclysmic and unpredictable weather, and we’d been seeing more than our share lately.