A Festival of Murder (11 page)

“Yet
you opened up a gift shop so you could take advantage of their fascination,”
Canberry pointed out.

Embarrassment
heated Nicholas’s skin. “The shop wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“How
so?”

“I
planned—hoped—to make a living writing about tea. Writing brew reviews and
articles about the lifestyle surrounding tea. That kind of thing.”

“There’s
a tea
lifestyle
?” Canberry’s lips twitched. His expression sobered, his
eyes unreadable behind the reflective lenses. “You’re telling me you’re a tea
blogger?”

Nicholas
shook his head stiffly. “I had the content, but Internet access up here is
sporadic at best. When I could get online down in Estes, well, I couldn’t quite
figure out how to maximize revenues from ads.” It was a sore spot for Nicholas.
It made him feel old and out of touch. “After six months I began to think of an
alternative income and well, it came to me while I was staring out my front
window. A man was in the process of stealing my lawn gnome. It wasn’t the first
time someone had stolen something from my yard either. So I thought, if they
want a souvenir, I should make them buy it.”

“Instead
of using ads on your blog you could sell ad space on your lawn.”

Nicholas
pretended he hadn’t heard that. “But just because I’m selling that alien
nonsense doesn’t mean I encourage people to believe in it. I’m fulfilling a
demand, not creating it.”

“So
you’re saying if you had your way no one would believe your abduction story?”

“That’s
a fair conclusion to draw.”

Canberry
arched an eyebrow. “I’m surprised to hear you say that. Especially after
hearing from other sources that you and Rocky Johnson got into it twice because
he
didn’t
believe you. I admit I’m confused.”

Nicholas
didn’t think Detective Canberry would be confused even if he were colorblind
and forced to play a game of Twister, but he played along.

“If
you heard all the dirty details about our argument, which I’m sure you have,
then you know Rocky was trying to push my buttons by saying I’d lied about the
abduction so I could take advantage of the people here. That’s what I had an
issue with.”

“If
he’d printed the story he’d intended, all of Hightop would have suffered from
it.”

Nicholas
pinched his lips before saying, “Probably.”

“But
you would have been harmed the most. Your reputation was at stake.”

“Now
you’re beginning to sound like Rocky Johnson.”

“But
it’s true, isn’t it? Your reputation means a great deal to you.” Canberry’s
gaze flicked to the teeth-shaped scabs on Nicholas’s hand. “Enough to defend
it.”

“I
don’t think anyone would enjoy having their name dragged through the mud.” The
sting of it hadn’t left Nicholas’s consciousness all these years later.

Still,
he could tell Canberry didn’t know about Ben and the scam in Tampa yet. That
would likely change by the day’s end, but it put Nicholas a step ahead for the
moment.

He
stared down at his ravaged shepherd’s pie with surprise. When had he mauled it?
He pushed it away. “Look, I realize you’re digging for suspects and I’m
probably one of them, but are you absolutely sure it wasn’t an accident?
Murders just don’t happen up here.”

“The
autopsy is still pending. The body has to be handled by the county and there’s
a backlog. But there’s an injury to the head, which leads me to believe Rocky
Johnson was struck before he was pushed into the lake. Possibly dead before he
hit the water. We’ll find out when the coroner checks the lungs.”

Nicholas
was glad he hadn’t eaten the shepherd’s pie. His stomach was beginning to churn
as realization set in. “What are you placing as time of death?”

“Between
4:00 and 8:00 p.m.” Canberry calmly took a sip of his coffee. “I understand the
party didn’t start until seven.”

“So
you’re collecting alibis for everyone from four to eight?”

“Has
yours changed?”

Caught
aback, Nicholas stuttered, “N-no. Why would it have?”

Nicholas
didn’t trust the other man’s smile. “It’s just that it’s weak. No one to
corroborate it. I was half expecting you to say that you remembered you’d been
with Miss James. She doesn’t have anyone to corroborate her alibi either.”

“A
secret rendezvous would have been convenient.” He wished he’d spoken to Phoebe
and arranged it, in fact.

“But
that would be lying,” Canberry said, “and you’ve established that you’re not a
liar.”

Nicholas’s
fingers went white around his fork.

“What
about evidence?” he forced himself to ask. “Hopefully, you’ve found something.
A lead of some sort.”

Canberry
pushed back his chair and rose to his feet. He pulled out his wallet and
selected a five-dollar bill, which he left on the table between them. “Oh, I
have all sorts of leads. Right now I’m focusing on motive. Once you find one
powerful enough, you’ve found your killer.”

“People
can dislike one another without needing to murder them.”

“That
holds true only until someone winds up dead.” Canberry’s eyes never moved from
Nicholas. “Usually the most obvious suspect is the culprit.”

“In
these circumstances, I’d expect a long list.”

Canberry’s
smile could have sliced paper. “You’d be surprised.”

Nicholas
gulped.

“By
the way,” the detective said as he turned to go. Nicholas braced himself, teeth
gritted, while Canberry checked an old-fashioned pocket watch on a chain. “You’ve
stoked my curiosity. What were you doing last night around 3:00 a.m.? I
happened to notice you as I was heading for Ascension.”

Nicholas
shook his head. “Last night? You must have mistaken someone else for me. I was
home asleep.” He paused before asking hesitantly, “What was I doing? This
person that you thought was me.”

“You
stood outside your shop with a shovel for a few seconds before you walked
around the building and out of view.” Canberry tapped his tie tack and added, “Maybe
an alien meet-up?”

Nicholas’s
smile was sickly. This was a nightmare unfolding in the daylight.

“If
you saw me then it must have been me. But I don’t remember, Detective. Ever
since the abduction I’ve . . . suffered from occasional
bouts of memory loss. Very occasional, though.”

“So
I’ve heard. In theory, you could do anything and not remember it afterward.”
Canberry adjusted the Burberry scarf around his neck and tucked the pocket
watch into an inner pocket of his coat. “Right?”

Nicholas
stared back. “I didn’t kill Rocky Johnson.”

“As
far as you remember.” Canberry gave him a curt nod. “Have a nice day, Mr.
Trilby.”

Every
eye in the place followed the detective to the door. Nicholas didn’t watch. He
was too caught up in his private panic.

Had
he gone to the
shop last night and forgotten it? He’d stayed up later than usual to entertain
himself at the expense of Charles’s party guests, but he’d gone straight home
after that. However, according to Detective Canberry, he’d sleepwalked. Why?
More importantly, what if this wasn’t the first time he’d done it?

Phoebe
slipped into the seat vacated by Detective Canberry. She was paler than usual.

“Does
he think we did it?”

Nicholas
took a moment to answer, his brain still wrapped around the mystery of his
memory lapse. “We?”

He
found it endearing, and encouraging, that she blushed. “I just meant Canberry
probably thinks we teamed up to kill Rocky.”

Nicholas
sat back in his seat, suddenly curious. “Why would he come to that conclusion?”

Annoyance
pinched her features. “Come on, Nicholas. I know you’re in the same boat I’m
in.”

“Hopefully
not the same one that Rocky Johnson fell out of.”

“You
don’t have a good alibi. Just like me. That makes us prime suspects.”

“How
do you know I don’t have a good alibi?”

“He
told me so. I think he was trying to trick me into squealing on you.” She stood
up jerkily. Her lack of grace and composure ever since Johnson’s body had been
found struck Nicholas as troubling.

“I
guess it doesn’t matter, does it?” She threw her question on the table like a
gauntlet. “The best alibi in the world won’t matter if Detective Canberry is
set on arresting one of us.”

He
frowned. “Phoebe, the man’s not pursuing a vendetta.”

“He
uses a pocket watch and he wears non-prescription glasses, Nicholas. I wouldn’t
be surprised if he’s been scouring the murder scene with a magnifying glass and
calling out clues to an assistant who’s forced to answer to the name of Watson.
This is his dream come true, and he won’t sleep until he convicts someone. He
fails, otherwise.”

He
would have found her comments amusing if he didn’t share her impressions of the
detective. He reached over and took her hand. It was cold and clammy. “I’ll
find the person responsible for this and make sure he’s taken away.”

It
was one of those moments when she was supposed to smile trustingly at him, and
realize that even though he ran a gift store selling alien Pez dispensers he
was a bold, courageous man who would make a good husband.

She
pulled her hand free and snorted in a very unladylike way. “You’re as helpless
as the rest of us, Nicholas. Half the people up here think you did it.”

She
stuffed Detective Canberry’s five-dollar bill in a pocket of her apron. “At
least he’s not a bad tipper.”

With his wallet
ten dollars lighter, Nicholas made his way out of the Gingerbear and toward the
walkway that would take him down to Main Street. Just as he reached the top
step, he was assailed from below by a chorus of voices.

“There he is!”

“Mr. Trilby! Mr.
Trilby!”

“We’ve been
looking for you!”

Naturally, he spun
on his heel and hurried with as much dignity as he could back across the yard
of the Gingerbear and into the forest; that is to say, with none at all. The
disappointed and bewildered calls to him soon faded from his hearing.

The forest
surrounding Hightop was utterly silent. The snowfall muffled everything but the
crunch of his boots as he slowly picked his way between the trees. After a few
minutes, he stopped and turned a full circle. He couldn’t see any buildings
from where he stood. They were obscured not just by the snow but by the knit of
trees forming a heavy thicket of wood. He wished he could pick up his cabin and
deposit it right here, and disappear from view and memory.

“Hello,” he said
to a pair of dark eyes peeking from behind the base of an aspen. The rabbit
spun and quickly hopped away, swallowed in seconds by its surroundings. He
envied it.

The drama inspired
by Rocky Johnson’s murder and the extra attention it was funneling toward
Nicholas was getting on his nerves. Like the rabbit’s, his urge to run was
strong. To climb in his car and drive off, leaving Alien Artifacts behind. The
shop was sliding deeper and deeper into the red. Phoebe was content to ignore
his flirting for the rest of eternity. What was the point of fighting off the
inevitable and risking what he was sure was coming next? He faced bankruptcy
and jail time, and not necessarily in that order.

He knew why.
Running would be uncomfortably close to mimicking what Ben had done. Even
though Nicholas could now sympathize somewhat with the pressure his friend must
have felt, that didn’t mean he forgave Ben for his crime.

He watched through
narrowed eyes as a large, dark form wove between the trees. At first he thought
it was an elk since it wasn’t large enough to be a moose, but then realization
bloomed when he saw the streak of red. What Winchester was doing out here
Nicholas had no idea, and he was torn between hoping the alpaca might
permanently join a herd of elk and feeling compelled to make a cursory effort
to corral the animal so he wouldn’t become a meal for coyotes.

He whistled.
Winchester didn’t flick an ear. Nicholas knew the animal wasn’t deaf; he was
simply being typical Winchester. Nicholas glanced at the sky. Where was a UFO
when you needed one?

With nothing
better to do since he was in no hurry to return to the shop and sell more alien
junk, he shoved his hands into his pockets and slogged through the snow,
trailing after the alpaca.

He had no idea
what motivated Winchester. Alpacas were as familiar to him as water buffalo. It
was only thanks to Kevin that he fed the animal the correct food. He’d never
owned a pet, and it could be argued that he didn’t own Winchester either. The
thing had simply wandered into his yard one day and no amount of found-pet ads
had been able to foist the creature onto someone else.

The beast demanded
that Nicholas go through the motions of pet ownership, paying attention to
whether the animal lived or died, grudgingly trying to make it
happy
of
all things. Curiously, Winchester occasionally returned the favor. A couple of
times, when Nicholas hadn’t wanted to get out of bed, when he’d been shaken by
something unnamable but definitely alien lurking in the back of his head,
Winchester, as if sensing something amiss, had butted his head against the
kitchen door and forced Nicholas to get on with daily—earthly—routine.