Pity and a Shame

Chapter 8

The noise was deafening. Dozens of little witches, ghosts, pirates, and princesses and just about every TV cartoon character flooded into the Nature's Gateway hall, dashing about madly to see the apple dunking pails, the taffy on a string challenge and the impressive light show on the small stage at the back.

All the adults were obliged to dress up as well; this was a town celebration. Only Brian was excused from having a costume in case something came up and he had to respond. He argued that he couldn't very well investigate an accident or a break-in dressed in a clown suit or something equally inappropriate.

Janet whispered that she thought a clown suit would be very appropriate and danced away giggling from his threat to pinch. She had donned a homemade cat woman suit of leopard leotard, gold mask and large whiskers and was having a great time teasing Brian.

Gilly (with a soft gee), wife of Gilly (with a hard gee), swirled through the crowd in a blood-red cape, long black tresses and deadly looking fangs. Her husband Ricky was a poor representation of Dracula. The Judge and his wife were dressed as Jack and Jill, making the two grandsons carry the prop bucket.

Polly Whitehorse wore her traditional Indian costume, buckskin and a huge feathered headdress, and held court over the proceedings from a large chair on the stage. Brian watched the party comfortably from a safe space along the side of the room, avoiding the stampeding children but still able to greet the adults as they flowed past.

A tall, fur be-decked Viking, brandishing a cardboard axe leaned on a section of wall next to Brian and raised his paper mug in greeting.

"I understand you were talking to my wife." The Viking slurped his drink past the huge fake moustache.

"And your wife would be...?" Brian peered at the face.

"Carol Tzajke. I'm Erik Tzajke."

"Oh, my pleasure. Yeah I uh, heard a rumour she and her daughter might have seen a car in the Gough driveway before he was- before we found him dead. But that's all it was, a rumour."

"Where'd you hear the rumour?"

Brian assessed the sharp eyes beneath the dyed cotton brows and decided that this was a direction he didn't want to go. "Marge down at the courthouse passed it on to me. She's always picking up bits of gossip and hearsay. It was nothing." Brian saw another question coming and quickly jumped in. "Actually, why I was following it up is because I'm continuing a cursory examination into Gough's death... you know, following up for my report to the Ingersol police."

"Hmmm. So, have you learned anything new?"

"Nope."

"Erik! I knew that would be you." Irving Keldman, the town grocer, swathed in a voluminous white sheet and carrying a plastic pumpkin head under one arm drifted in between them. "Love that suit. I told Lily, I said, you watch for a Viking tonight, that'll be Erik Tzajke."

"How's it going, Irving." Erik relaxed and seemed to lose interest in quizzing Brian.

"It's a struggle, Erik. I should tell the sheriff here how much a struggle."

"What's wrong now, Irv?" Brian could guess what was coming. Irving constantly complained about the school kids stealing beans for peashooters or pinching handfuls of his seedless grapes. They were the bane of his existence.

"Now it's not, sheriff. Now it's always." The tanned, shiny head nodded solemnly. "Expenses I'm incurring from the constant pilfering of my inventory. These kids... they are a curse on my business." He stopped his complaining when a petite little woman in a sequined cape and tiara took his arm, patting it and shushing him as she led him away.

"Looks like Lily is pretty used to Irv's rants."

"Yeah. Most husbands and wives know one another pretty well, I guess." Erik moved away leaving his comment hanging like a dark mysterious cloud.

The evening went as planned with all the little children happily loaded down with treat filled bags and finally the older kids and some parents carting them off home, leaving the balance of the adults to finish up and assist with the cleaning. Brian found himself back on a ladder taking down the lanterns he'd hung only that afternoon. Janet stood at the bottom, packing them away as he handed them down.

"I saw Erik had you cornered earlier," she said.

"I think he knows she's up to something. Some of his questions carried a definitely suspicious tone."

"What did you tell him?"

He bent down and handed her the last lantern, whispering, "That it was you she was seeing."

Janet shook the ladder, causing him to jump to safety.

"Now, now," Polly steamed alongside, "that's exactly the sort of thing that causes accidents."

"It was no accident," Janet smiled menacingly.

"It's okay Polly, we were just horsing around." She gave them both a stern look and set off across the hall to reprimand someone else. "You'll get us in trouble, Catwoman." He teased, pulling her tail.

"If you want any more of that," she said, pulling it back, "you'll watch your remarks."

"Brian, I need to speak to you, alone." Doc Butler interrupted, showed an apologetic smile to Janet, and took Brian's arm.

"What's up?"

"Not here. Outside."

A brisk wind had risen, and the two men stepped around the corner of the building for a little shelter. Dry leaves swirled in a flickering dance through the floodlights mounted on the eaves. Brian pulled up his collar and jammed his hands in his pockets.

"What's goin' on, Doc?"

"I've bin studyin' that police report you copied to me real hard and I think we reached the wrong conclusion."

"What conclusion?"

"That Paynter was killed in his house."

"Look, this is not a good time, Doc, come by the office in the morning and I'll give you my undivided attention, okay?"

"It's important, Brian."

"I'm sure it is. Tomorrow, Doc." Brian went back inside, more interested in Catwoman than Paynter Gough.