On Harrow Hill

He could picture himself replying that although his feelings had influenced his decision to be present that morning, they wouldn’t drive his pursuit of the truth. If that pursuit was to begin in earnest, it would be for another reason altogether.

He could picture Madeleine’s likely response—a patient smile.

His phone rang.

He was too logical a man to believe that coincidences were driven by unseen forces, but it gave him a tiny frisson to see Madeleine’s name on the screen.

“Just wanted to let you know,” she said, “our dinner has been moved to tomorrow evening.”

He had no idea what she was talking about.

“With the Winklers,” she added. “You might want to put a reminder on your phone.” She paused. “How are things in Larchfield?”

“Hard to say. There’s an odd—” He stopped speaking at the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs.

A moment later, Morgan pushed aside the containment curtain and came into the room, his expression more strained than usual.

“Sorry, Maddie, got to go. Talk to you later.”

Morgan was shaking his head. “Damn! As if the situation wasn’t bad enough by itself, now I’ve got Aspern to deal with. That’s who was on the phone. Expressing his ‘concerns’ about the investigation, the media, the negative impact on the precious image of Larchfield.” His gaze rose to the ceiling, as if searching for an escape hatch.

“What’s his concern about the investigation?”

“That my department may not be up to handling it. Or, more to the point, handling it quickly enough to avoid the town’s reputation being shredded.”

“A reputation he’s heavily invested in?”

“Not just heavily. Totally. Apart from the long-term Harrow Hill lease he inherited from his father, he’s acquired most of the old farms in the immediate area—which he’s been subdividing into ten-acre parcels and advertising as ‘Serene Country Estates Nestled Around a Picture-Book Village.’ Larchfield’s most prominent resident getting his throat sliced open in the middle of the night is not the picture Aspern is trying to promote.”

Gurney glanced toward the gruesome stain on the floor. “Inconvenient facts are still facts. What does he expect you to do?”

“God only knows. Identify the killer this afternoon? Arrest him tonight? Use my magic powers to keep the story out of the news?”

“If Aspern is concerned about your department, why don’t you just turn the case over to the state police? That’s what their Bureau of Criminal Investigation is there for.”

Morgan began pacing around the room, uttering little sounds of misery and indecision. Finally, he stopped and shook his head. “I can’t do that. It would be giving up too soon.” There was something pleading in his tone. “If we could manage it ourselves, that would be ideal. If we can’t, we can’t. But to give up before we’ve hardly gotten started . . .” He shook his head in a way that resembled a shiver.

“Small-town departments ‘give up’ all the time,” said Gurney. “They deal with drug arrests, burglaries, assaults—you know the drill—and hand homicides over to BCI. Simple matter of resources.”

“We have resources. We have an arrangement with the college’s forensic sciences department that gives us access to their state-of-the-art lab. We can get results here faster than BCI can get them from their lab in Albany. Admittedly, our people don’t have much major crime experience—except for Kyra Barstow—but they’re not stupid. They just need some direction.”

Gurney saw in Morgan’s eyes an obstinacy that would make further suggestions to transfer the investigation useless.

“So, your lead guy will be Brad Slovak?”

“You think that’s a mistake?”

“Hard to say, not knowing what your options are.”

Morgan turned toward one of the windows, gazing out at nothing in particular, and sighed. “Brad’s okay. Obviously not in your league. But we’ve got good support from Kyra on the tech side. In any event, it’s the best we can do at the moment.”

Gurney felt uncomfortable with the man’s far-from-subtle plea for help. He walked over to one of the windows and changed the subject. “Have you checked out the other buildings on the property?”

“Of course. Automatic part of securing the site.”

“Find anything of interest?”

“The carriage house was an eye-opener—Angus’s Mercedes, his wife’s Porsche, a big Mercedes SUV, and three vintage Bugattis. I’m guessing a million bucks’ worth of transportation. There are two apartments on the second floor—for the housekeeper and the groundskeeper.”

“Either of them hear or see anything?”

“Zip. We got a lot of detail on what they did that evening—TV shows they watched, when they went to bed, et cetera. But nothing useful. Questions about recent visitors, disputes, problems didn’t produce anything specific. We didn’t hear anything we didn’t already know. Which is that Angus had more than his share of enemies, and his wife is an icy self-centered bitch. But those interviews were limited. We plan to continue them.”

“Slovak handled them?”

“Yes. He also took Mrs. Russell’s statement.”

“While you were making the trip to my house?”

“Right.”