Adieu at the Zoo_A Jefferson Zoo Mystery Read online

  “Dressed?”

  “Yeah. For when they remove the plastic bags.”

  “I’ll send someone down in the morning to search for the shoes,” I said. “The bare feet are a puzzle. I mean, maybe you were right the first time, and the guy wasn’t murdered here. If he was murdered elsewhere, his shoes could contain a clue.”

  “Which is probably why the killer decided to remove them. I wonder—”

  Jodie interrupted again. “I wonder who the heck he is. I hope it’s not somebody I know.”

  “Unlikely.”

  “No. Likely. Remember, I grew up around here. I know everybody. I’ve been trying to think if I’ve heard about a missing person lately, but so far I haven’t come up with a name.”

  I glanced over to see her lost in concentration. A long string of curly auburn hair hung down the side of her face. Even with Dan present, she hadn’t bothered to tuck it back into her ponytail, which I interpreted as a sure sign of high anxiety levels.

  No doubt her angst stemmed as much from worrying about the identity of the victim as from the experience of having found the body. I hoped our dead person wouldn’t turn out to be a friend of hers, or worse yet, a relative. Her extended family had lived in these parts for ages, arriving with the first wave of English settlers moving down from Virginia. She was right about knowing everybody.

  “We should find out soon,” I said, trying to sound comforting as the deputies launched a successful final effort. The bulging corpse lay on the stretcher, held in place by thick Velcro straps. I heard one of the deputies comment “thar she blows” before Sheriff Joyner, who tipped the scales at three hundred and fifty pounds and counting, shot him a dirty look.

  Police, like medical personnel, develop a certain callousness about death, a coping strategy that helps them get through their days. I could sympathize, which is one reason I concentrate on plants instead of animals, and even then, I can get weepy-eyed over the demise of my favorite African violet.

  Moving the loaded stretcher off the rim of the concrete basin proved even more difficult than retrieving the body from under the bridge and lifting it into place. Dan Saunders offered to help, but the sheriff waved him off. “They’ll take care of it, don’t worry.”

  Maybe Sheriff Joyner never heard the phrase many hands make light work, I thought. Based on his reputation, I’d wager he nurtured a sadistic streak when it came to his underlings and enjoyed watching them suffer. The sheriff moved closer to the railing for a better look and when he did, Dan glanced back at us and shrugged.

  On the far end of the boardwalk, Bob Anderson paced back and forth making one call after another on his cell phone, probably to zoo board members. I wondered if he’d had any success reaching Sally Ann, who last we knew was in London for a visit with her South African relatives. We all suspected she had a lover at the British Zoo, and you can imagine the jokes flowing from that topic.

  Bob had spoken barely two words to Jodie and me when he arrived, other than a quick hello, which was more than Nate had to say. There goes my day off, I thought, knowing Jodie and I would face a million questions in the morning. Maybe we could leave soon. I was not looking forward to a close-up view of this corpse.

  Nate stood beside Dan on the boardwalk, both men looking grim. I knew if Nate could blame this dead body on me, he’d do it in a heartbeat. I prayed on a regular basis that he’d lose his job before he figured out a way to relieve me of mine.

  Recent gossip linked him to a local woman, whom the rumor mill said would love to steal my job if she could pull it off. I half believed it might be the motivation behind her affair with Nate, although women seemed to go for him, which I failed to understand.

  If I were a snake in the grass like his current paramour, I’d tell his wife about his latest mistress, but Mitzi is a nice lady—too good for him, and I knew she’d find out sooner or later without my help.

  I preferred sooner to later, but in either case, I wouldn’t be the one to deliver the bad news.

  Chapter 7

  Ignoring the rumblings in my empty stomach, I turned my attention to the surreal tableau engulfing my precious Wetlands exhibit. Automobile motors from four vehicles hummed behind the headlights aimed at the steaming marsh. Two deputies slogged through the muddy waters carrying the stretcher bearing the unknown corpse, whom Jodie had taken to calling Mr. X. Surveying the scene, I could easily imagine a zombie rising from the waters and claiming the corpse in the service of the undead.

  More than ever, I wanted to leave the site of the current crime. Not only was I about to die of hunger, but exhaustion might kill me first. I’d had a tiring day potting up flowering plants from a variety of areas around the zoo and transporting them to the Aviary in order to ‘pretty things up,’ as Mary Ellis, the Zoo Alliance’s Assistant Director put it.

  I liked Mary Ellis. She had a tough job and I felt sorry for her so I was glad to do whatever I could to lighten her load. However, at the moment, my stomach was begging for a large order of Moo Goo Gai Pan with a side of vegetarian pot stickers, a sure signal my anxiety levels were at least as high as Jodie’s.

  The deputies transferred the corpse to a stretcher provided by the local EMTs.

  “Time to put a name to Mr. X,” Jodie said, jumping out of our zoo cart.

  I tried to stop her, but she was determined. “I’m not sure you want to be the one to the I.D. the body.”

  She greeted my suggestion with a look of condescension. “You don’t have to come with me. I can do this alone. I have a stronger stomach than you.”

  She was right about that. Almost everyone has a stronger stomach than I do.

  “Okay, go ahead. I’ll wait here,” I replied valiantly. Even though my stomach was empty, I knew one look at the bloated former person now being freed from his or her trash bag confinement, and I’d upchuck whatever residual digestive juices remained. It’s a good thing I never followed my father’s advice to become a nurse.

  Jodie joined Nate, Bob, Dan, and the sheriff, the five of them lined up along one side of the stretcher, the side opposite me, while the two EMTs cut away the rope and black plastic. As the pieces of rope fell to the ground, I realized where I’d seen the woven pattern before. Weaving is one of my hobbies, so it’s the kind of thing I notice.

  The rope was called Bee Line, and it’s a type used by the Design staff. I’d asked about it once, which is how I knew the name. Design, by the way, is where all of our creative people hang out. My best friend Ginger Edwards is the curator. She runs the place, which is a lot like herding cats, but somehow she manages.

  In any case, I needed to tell Dan about the rope as soon as I caught him alone and away from the sheriff. I couldn’t believe any zoo employee committed this murder, because the screening process for zoo jobs is stricter than Homeland Security’s.

  However, the new barns were going up next door to Design’s staging areas, and the contractor’s employees came and went from that area on a regular basis. Snatching a piece of rope from Design’s litter would be easy since there was a lot of it lying around. Artists aren’t the neatest people in the world, I’ve noticed. All that right-brained creativity leads to a deficit of left-brain organizational skills, but it’s an acceptable trade-off from my point of view.

  Besides, I’m not the neatest person in the world, either. That point aside, the first thing I’d do if I were the sheriff, would be to interview Mooney Construction’s job foreman, Ray Glover, and find out from him which of Mooney’s employees had less than stellar reputations.

  As the garbage bags came off the body, I saw Jodie’s hand fly up to her mouth. My heart took a nosedive as I realized she recognized the corpse, just as she’d predicted. Not the result I’d been hoping for.

  I left the cart and walked over in time to hear her tell Bob, “That’s Jack Dubois.”

  “You know him?” Nate said, as though Jack Dubois might have fallen from outer space.

  “Who’s Jack Dubois?” Bob asked, calm as usual, in strik
ing contrast to Nate’s volatile nature.

  Jodie clutched her sides and shook her head from side to side before glancing up at Dan. “It’s a good thing Andy didn’t come down here with you.”

  “He’s a friend of Andy’s?” Dan asked.

  Jodie nodded, tears streaming down her face. “They’re related.” Her hand covered her mouth and I could barely hear her responses.

  The sheriff brushed past Dan. “How well do you know Jack Dubois, Missy?”

  Jodie glanced up at Dan and then at the sheriff. “He’s Andy LaRue’s cousin. We all went to school together.”

  “I should have recognized him myself,” the sheriff said, glancing over at the body with a look of disdain. “I’m not surprised to find that no good bum ended up dead.”

  We all end up dead sooner or later, I thought, but I knew what the sheriff meant. Apparently, Jack was a local lowlife and we were looking at first-degree murder here—no two ways about it. Probably the result of a drug deal gone sour.

  “I feel so awful,” Jodie said, turning to me and burying her face in my shoulder.

  I put my arms around her and hugged her close as she sobbed quietly. I’d never heard of Jack Dubois, but then I hadn’t grown up anywhere near Chestnut City and my social life, limited as it was, tended to center around zoo employees and their spouses or significant others.

  Apart from work, church seemed to be the major outlet for meeting people in this churchy part of the country, but I wasn’t a big churchgoer. Not that I’m irreligious, I just can’t seem to find the right combination of theological orthodoxy and the social liberalism to which I ascribe. It’s an easier mix to find up north or out west, I believe, though I’ve never lived west of Pittsburgh.

  As I hugged Jodie, she looked up at me with an expression I’d never seen on her normally imperturbable face.

  Fat tears wobbled down her cheeks. “I dated him in high school.”

  Her voice barely rose above a whisper and I had to strain to hear her.

  “He wasn’t as bad as everybody said.”

  I kept hugging her thinking about her words. Not as bad as everybody said? Exactly how bad do you have to be to end up a murder victim?

  Chapter 8

  After the sheriff and his deputies left with the body of Jack Dubois, Jodie and I rode back to the administration offices on the electric cart, turning down offers of rides from both Bob and Dan. For some reason, driving the electric cart back in the dark gave me a false sense of being in control.

  For the first half of the trip, neither Jodie nor I spoke, both lost in our thoughts or worn out from the day’s events, I wasn’t sure which. Finally, I broke the silence. “How about going out to eat with me tonight? My treat.”

  “Not tonight, Sam, but thanks.”

  I’d never known Jodie to turn down a free meal, a clue to the depth of her grief over the death of Jack Dubois, although grief wasn’t quite the right word for the way she seemed to feel. More like melancholy.

  I tried consoling her. “I’m really sorry he turned out to be a friend, and I wish you hadn’t been the one to find him.”

  “It’s okay.” She dabbed at her eyes. “He wasn’t exactly a friend any more. We’ve lost touch over the years, but it’s better I found him than Andy. The two were pretty close even though they fought a lot. Their families moved down here from Quebec. Their mothers are sisters. Jack’s first name is Jacques and Andy’s is André, which meant they took a lot of teasing in school, the kids calling them frogs and worse. It wasn’t right, and it’s the reason they’re both so quick with their fists.”

  “Kids can be cruel,” I said, remembering a bully or two from my childhood.

  “Andy tried to keep Jack on the straight and narrow,” Jodie continued, “but you know Andy, he didn’t go about it in the right way. Always sounding self-righteous like he was looking down his nose at Jack, which led to arguments and sometimes fist fights.”

  She hesitated. I think she realized the implication of her words, which set me wondering about the fact that Andy wasn’t answering Security’s phone.

  “Not that Andy would ever hurt Jack, not seriously,” Jodie went on. “They’re both impossible in their own ways. Or rather, Jack was, but they loved each other. Andy will be devastated when he hears about Jack.”

  I looked over to see a few more tears glistening on her cheeks. She wiped them away with the back of her hand. “It’s so hard to think of Jack in the past tense,” she whispered. “In high school, I liked him better than Andy and they both knew it.”

  “They competed over you?”

  “Funny, isn’t it? Especially since for most of my life I never thought of them as boyfriends because we grew up together. They lived on my street. I dated each of them in high school but it was like going out with my brother. How fun is that?”

  I had difficulty finding the right words to offer comfort or sympathy or whatever Jodie required in this situation, so I went with the tried and true. “Sure you don’t want to grab a bite to eat with me later? My treat.”

  “Thanks, Sam, I appreciate the offer, but I just can’t eat right now. The thought of food makes me want to barf. I can’t erase the image of Jack’s bloated feet from my mind.” She glanced over at me and even in the dark I knew the look on her face. “And, of course, your crack about the turtle’s dinner isn’t helping matters.”

  “I apologize profusely,” I said. “Who would have guessed you’d know the victim?”

  “Me,” she mumbled, as we pulled into the employee parking lot behind the administration offices. Lights shone inside and outside the building, which meant Bob was back in his office probably still on the phone with Sally Ann. Considerate of him to light the way for us, I thought. Nothing Nate would have done.

  The zoo can be an eerie place after dark, especially for a wimp like me. It doesn’t take much to creep me out and even if it did, hearing a lion or an alligator bellow when you’re alone at night in the middle of the woods? It’s enough to frighten Braveheart. I can only imagine what a dinosaur must have sounded like, but since no one was around to hear, I guess we’ll never know. In any case, it’s not something that keeps me up at night.

  I held the outside door for Jodie and followed her up the stairs and down the hall to our suite of offices.

  “I’ll mash the lights,” she said, employing a southernism that still sounded foreign to my ears.

  “Hey, lookee here.”

  I saw her pointing to the Jefferson County Zoo envelope taped to my office door. Beside the envelope was a large handwritten note from my secretary, Maddy Walsh, who it seems, had no respect for my privacy:

  Sam,

  Important message inside from Nelson Farthington III.

  Something about having dinner with him.

  A large arrow at the top of the note pointed to the envelope, which was addressed to me in perhaps the neatest handwriting I’d ever seen. A yellow smiley face with one winking eye appeared at the bottom of Maddy’s note. Sometimes I feel like Rodney Dangerfield when it comes to getting respect from my staff.

  Chapter 9

  As we stared at the note taped to my door, I could see Jodie struggling to contain herself.

  “Sam, you’ve been holding out on me. I didn’t know you were seeing Nelson Farthington the Third, son of Nelson Farthington the Second, son of Nelson Farthington the First and who knows how many other Farts back in jolly old England?” She paused for breath. “Did you know they trace their bloodline to Queen Victoria?”

  “No, why would I? And how do you know?”

  “The Farthingtons are prime targets for gossip around here. You can’t have been born and raised in this town without knowing everything there is to know about the Farthingtons, although I’ve always sorta felt Nelson three might be gay, so I’m surprised to see you and he are an item. However, it explains why you’re always giving poor Dan Saunders the cold shoulder.”

  I was too exasperated to know where to begin. “If Nelson Farthington were
gay,” I said, about to challenge her logic, “wouldn’t everyone around here know that for a fact? And what does it matter, anyway?”

  “You have a point, Sam. It’s just that everything he wears I’d like to steal and cart off to my bedroom closet.”

  “Not every well-dressed guy is gay,” I reminded her, “and besides, I’m not seeing Nelson Farthington as you put it, nor are we an item, nor does he have anything to do with my non-existent relationship with Dan Saunders.”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  “Besides,” I said, unwilling to yield to her cynicism, “if Nelson Farthington wants to have dinner with me and we don’t yet know if that’s the case since we’re unaware of the actual contents of this envelope…”

  I tapped the envelope as I removed it from my door, “…it probably has something to do with the grant proposal we submitted to the Farthington Foundation. I hope it means they’re giving us a pile of money.”

  I gave Jodie another exasperated look. “I’m beginning to regret telling you about meeting him at the fundraiser today.”

  “I know, I know,” she said, shifting from foot to foot, “but don’t just stand there like a flippin’ flagpole, open the envelope and satisfy our curiosity.”

  “Your curiosity, you mean.” I turned the envelope around in my hand. “It is addressed to me,” I said, “personally.”

  “Saaam!”

  “Hang on.”

  I opened the door to my office, walked over to the desk and removed a penknife from the top drawer. Letter opener in hand, I carefully, more carefully than I knew Jodie wanted, slit the envelope and retrieved the contents. The note was written on zoo stationery, which my considerate secretary no doubt provided.

  With a flourish, I held the epistle in front of my nose and read aloud, including the punctuation for emphasis: “Dear Ms. Clark, comma, I’m writing to apologize for spilling punch on you today, period. May I redeem myself with a dinner invitation if you’re not busy tomorrow night, question mark. You might enjoy seeing my father’s exotic plant collection, period. Sincerely, comma, Nelson Farthington.” I paused. “Period.”