Owls Well That Ends Well Part 15

I deduced from Dad's silence and the solemn look on his face that there wasn't much we could do to save Sophie from becoming some larger owl's dinner if she were unlucky enough to encounter one.

Inside the barn, I was relieved to see that Spike was fine. Dad, Eric, and Sammy hurried over to the far corner, where the owls had their nest high up in the rafters, while I followed more slowly, studying my surroundings. The barn was going to be my forge-my works.p.a.ce. I felt possessive about it. I felt a stab of guilt when I realized that I harbored some resentment toward Gordon. Okay, I could blame him for trespa.s.sing, but it wasn't his fault he'd gotten murdered in the barn. And was it selfish to hope that his murder wouldn't affect my ability to work here?

But looking around, I felt rea.s.sured. I probably couldn't get past what had happened here until the chief had arrested someone for Gordon's murder-arrested the real killer, that is, not poor hapless Giles. But the barn already felt like home again. More so than the house, I realized, with a pang of guilt. In fact, while my decluttering labors had dimmed my appreciation for the house, they hadn't touched my love of the barn.

Perhaps because the barn didn't need much more work. No one expects a blacksmith's forge to look like a House Beautiful photo shoot. All I had to do was move my tools and equipment into the least ramshackle end of the barn and I was set. The odd falling board or shingle wouldn't hurt my iron and tools. They'd survive if the whole barn fell down on them, which two expensive structural engineers had separately warranted wouldn't happen.

I'd planned to set up my forge Monday, as soon as I packed off the unsold yard sale debris to charity or the dump. Maybe I should still do that, even though we might not be finished with the yard sale. I'd be a lot easier to live with after a few hours of pounding on things with my hammer.

I stood with my eyes half closed, appreciating the barn, while the owl fanciers, having rea.s.sured themselves that Sophie hadn't fallen victim to a hulking feathered bully, began searching the barn floor beneath the nest. For pellets, I a.s.sumed.

I suspected Dad was prolonging our stay in the barn so I could examine the place for clues, but I wasn't sure there were any to find. I saw all the stuff Gordon had acc.u.mulated, neatly arranged along one wall, much of it still dusted with fingerprint powder. We'd have to clean the powder off before we put the stuff back on sale. If they even let us sell it.

And if the police dusted the entire two-acre collection for prints, maybe I should just call Goodwill now.

"Sammy, they're not dusting everything for fingerprints, are they?"

"No, mostly just the stuff in here," he said.

"That's good," I said. "So why aren't Horace and the rest still working on the stuff outside?"

"They will be tomorrow," Sammy said. "Right now, they're searching the suspect's house."

"For what?" I asked. "They have the murder weapon."

"Yes, but they haven't found the victim's keys and wallet."

Aha! So they were the mysterious missing items I'd overheard Horace mention.

"And they won't find them at Giles's house, I can tell you that," I said.

Sammy shrugged.

"They have to search, anyway," he said. "You've got to be thorough in a murder investigation."

I decided to suppress my honest opinion of the investigation so far. Instead, I drifted to the corner where they were searching and looked up toward the owls' nest.

Sophie sat on a rafter, gazing down at us. Her face, with its heart-shaped ruff of white feathers and long, flat beak, looked deceptively mild. I was relieved to see that she wasn't bobbing her head. I'd seen her do it once, when I was up in the hay loft clearing things out some weeks before, and thought it rather cute how closely she resembled one of those bobble head dolls. Only later did Dad break the news to me that I'd probably gotten closer to her nest than she liked, and that the head bobbing was a sign that she was getting ready to attack.

She wasn't bobbing tonight. She only stared down at me and blinked, in slow motion, as if asking me what I was doing here. Good question.

"Dad, can you keep an eye on things here while Michael and I go into town to see Giles?" I said, still watching Sophie.

"Don't tell me the jail has visiting hours this late," Dad said.

"Not until morning," Sammy said.

"Actually, we hope the lawyer will get him bailed out soon, and we can take him home," I said.

"Can't the lawyer do that?" Dad asked.

"The lawyer could," I said. "But Michael thinks Giles would appreciate seeing a few familiar faces, and I want to hear Giles's side of the story."

"Ah," Dad said, nodding. "Get him off his guard and interrogate him. Good plan."

"Not exactly," I said. "We're on his side, remember?"

"That's right," Dad said. "But I have to admit, in a way, it's a pity. Giles would make such a perfect defendant."

"That's not fair," I said. "Just because he's a bit stiff and pompous-"

"I didn't mean that at all," Dad said. "Do you really think he's pompous? I thought he was a friend of yours."

"Sorry," I said. "I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions about what you meant. It's just that I've noticed that people who don't know him get that impression."

Including me, when I first met him.

"I just meant that he would be a very distinguished defendant," Dad said. "Cultured, well-spoken, and ... well, handsome doesn't apply, I suppose, but he's ..."

"Appealing, in an untidy, bookish, professorial fashion," I suggested.

"Yes, that's the ticket," Dad said. "And very suitable, too. I mean, it's a much cla.s.sier murder than most, isn't it? Killing someone over a book, instead of drugs or money or infidelity or any of those typical motives. And a vintage mystery book, to boot-I really like that part."

"I'm sure it will be a comfort to Gordon at that great yard sale in the sky, knowing he made an atypically cla.s.sy exit. And to Giles when he's put on Death Row."

"Laugh if you like," Dad said, in a tone of mild reproach. "I'm just saying that when you finally identify the real culprit, I hope it's someone ... um ..."

"Equally cla.s.sy, but not so nice?" I suggested. "I'll remember that tomorrow when I start auditioning candidates for the role of the real killer. Meanwhile, I want to interrogate-I mean talk to Giles. Just to see if he knows anything we can use to shake Chief Burke's belief in his guilt. You know, if I were an evil person, I'd point out to the chief that there was probably an eyewitness to the murder."

"An eyewitness!" Dad exclaimed.

"Meg," Sammy said, very solemnly. "You should have mentioned this to the chief earlier."

"It wouldn't do any good," I said. "You'll never get him to talk."

"Who?" Dad asked, while Sammy shook his head with a worried air.

"Him." I pointed to Spike.

"Hmm," Dad said, looking at Spike. "You're right. He could very well have been in the barn when it happened."

"And look how cheerful he is," I said. "He's not usually this happy unless he's bitten someone quite recently. He probably enjoyed the vicarious bloodshed."

"You could be right," Sammy said. "Do you suppose we should test him for blood spatter?"

"What good would that do?" I asked. "For one thing, he probably does have blood spatter on him; he must have bitten three people today alone. But even if you found Gordon's blood on him, all that would prove was that he might have been in the barn at the time of Gordon's murder, which isn't exactly relevant. That bookend weighs more than Spike, and I'm pretty sure the murderer had opposable thumbs."

"I should tell the chief, though," Sammy said. "Don't give him a bath until I find out if we need to test him."

"A bath? Do I look like a m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.t?" I said. "But if you like, you can take him into protective custody."

"No, thanks," Sammy said.

"Released on his own recognizance," Dad said.

I was about to leave them to their fun when I saw Sophie close her eyes and shudder slightly.

"Dad," I said. "I think something's wrong with Sophie."

Chapter 21.

Dad, Eric, and Sammy hurried back to the corner and stood at my side. I pointed. Sophie's face took on a pained expression. Her eyes closed, her features scrunched up, and she shifted uneasily from foot to foot.

"Grandpa?" Eric said, looking slightly uneasy himself.

"Should we leave her alone?" I asked, jerking my thumb at Eric, trying to communicate to Dad that if Sophie were about to keel over at our feet, maybe we should lure Eric out before her demise.

"No, let's stay a little longer," Dad said.

"She hasn't been poisoned, has she?" I asked. "That is what SPOOR is worried about, right? Farmers using poison on their rodents and killing the owls?"

"No, I don't think she's been poisoned," Dad said. "Watch."

We watched for a few more minutes. I was already working on how to explain Sophie's death to Eric if Dad stuck me with the job, and wondering whether we had a box the right size to serve as a coffin for the owl funeral that I could see in our future.

Suddenly Sophie stretched out her neck, opened her beak, and spat out a pellet.

"There," Dad said, beaming proudly, as if Sophie had done something particularly clever. "You see, she's fine."

"Co-o-ol!" Eric said, running to retrieve the pellet. For the SPOOR collection, no doubt.

"Ick," I said.

"Can she do it again?" Eric asked.

As if this were her cue, Sophie launched herself into the air and swooped gracefully out the open door.

"Isn't that fascinating?" Dad said.

"At least she makes a lot less fuss than a cat with a hairball," I said. "Take Spike inside, will you? I'll see you when I get home from jail."

"Is there anything else I can do to help?" Dad asked, as he headed over to Spike's pen.

"No," I said. "Then again-if you wouldn't mind. It's not something you can do tonight, but if you wouldn't mind tomorrow ..."

"Just say the word," Dad exclaimed.

Dad was disappointed at his secret a.s.signment-obtaining lavender and rose bath products from Cousin Rosemary-but the warning that she must on no account know that he was buying them for me satisfied his taste for cloak-and-dagger operations.

Michael and I had plenty of time to cool our heels and eat our share of the picnic supper when we got down to the police station, but shortly after ten, Chief Burke let Giles go. Probably a good thing we'd come to collect him. The defense attorney was having a splendid time, arguing with the chief and threatening to file various motions. He wasn't eager to leave. We hustled the tired and disheveled Giles out of the station.

"Enthusiastic sort of chap," Giles said, when we were safely in the car.

"Well, this is what they live for, defense attorneys," I said. "A nice, challenging case."

"And he's very good," Michael put in. "Whenever any of the law school professors need a defense attorney, he's the one they call."

"That's encouraging, I suppose," Giles said. "Just as a point of information, do the Caerphilly law faculty get arrested often?"

"Not really," Michael said. "But I'm told that when and if they were, he's the very man they'd call.

Giles nodded.

"Think positively," I said. "As a mystery buff, don't you find it exciting to experience the criminal justice system firsthand, instead of just reading about it?"

"No, I think reading about it is infinitely preferable," Giles said, looking at me with alarm. "For that matter, I suspect it will be a good long while before I really enjoy reading mysteries again. Especially police procedurals."

"You'll feel better in the morning," Michael said.

"Better, perhaps; but not differently," Giles murmured.

Giles lived in a quiet neighborhood, only minutes from the police station-and, for that matter, only minutes from campus. You had to move out of town, as we had, to find anyplace that wasn't only minutes from anyplace else in Caerphilly.

Our original plan was to ferry Giles back to his car, but he looked so beat that Michael suggested that we just take him home and worry about the car tomorrow. Giles didn't protest.

Though when we arrived at his small, mock-Tudor house, he insisted on inviting us in for sherry and, despite the late hour, I didn't protest. I wanted to hear Giles's side of the story. And I didn't mind finally getting to see Giles's study, where Michael had spent so many happy hours. I understood Michael's point that Brits were more reserved than Americans, and didn't invite people to their homes as readily, but I thought it was about time.

Giles went to fetch the sherry and Michael collapsed into a shabby but comfortable-looking green plush armchair while I prowled around exploring. Giles had four of the chairs cl.u.s.tered together in the center of his study-the walls being completely occupied by more square feet of bookshelves than most town libraries could boast. Giles's book collection still overflowed the shelves. Stacks of books marched along the base of the bookcases, and more mountains of books occupied every open s.p.a.ce. Small mounds surrounded each armchair, and here and there large Indian bra.s.s trays balanced on book stacks of suitable height to form side tables, while battered corduroy cushions thrown atop low heaps of books took the place of footstools.

Comfortable clutter, I found myself thinking. Earlier in the day, I'd have called that an oxymoron, but Giles's study reminded me that not all clutter was irretrievably bad, and suggested that maybe some collections of things, however large and apparently disorganized, didn't qualify as clutter. Should I feel guilty for having a double standard about clutter?

Since nearly every square inch of wall s.p.a.ce was occupied by books, Giles had improvised a way to display the decorations most people hung from picture hooks. He'd used those hooks designed to hold Christmas stockings on a mantel without driving a nail into the wood to suspend various objects from the front of the bookshelves. Two silver stars supported a small oil painting, a team of bra.s.s reindeer towed a pair of antique dueling pistols affixed to a polished wooden board, and a series of framed certificates of appreciation from various arcane societies floated beneath a series of bra.s.s letters spelling out the cryptic message ACNE ELOPE. I puzzled over the sequence for several minutes before realizing that he'd combined the letters in two sets of holiday hooks, one reading PEACE and the other NOEL.

Now, I settled into another faded green chair and waited for the sneezes. Giles's study reminded me of his office, which I had seen before. I always sneezed half a dozen times shortly after entering his office until my nose adjusted to the prevailing atmosphere of book dust and left me alone. I expected his study would have the same effect.

"I want our library to look like this," I said, when I'd gotten past the sneezes.

Our future library, that is. Right now most of our books were packed in boxes and stored in Michael's office at the college, in the Cave, or at my parents' house. But we'd already designated one huge room on the ground floor as the library, with an adjacent room for Michael's office. It had the potential to look just as cool as this, I thought, looking around. In fact, even cooler.

To my surprise, Michael only looked around wistfully and nodded. Odd. Normally I was the one who would have trouble visualizing what the library could look like once we replaced the missing floor, mended the waterdamaged ceiling, and put new gla.s.s in all the boarded-up windows. Was he just tired, or was something else wrong?