Blood Relative (The Jacob Lomax Mysteries Book 4) Page 3

  I let him draw me a beer. Then I showed him the picture of the Butlers.

  “Do you recognize the man?”

  He frowned at the picture. “I’m not sure. Who is he?”

  “Samuel Butler. He said he was in here two weeks ago last Saturday drinking shots and beers with a guy named Winks.”

  His eyes brightened. He may have even smiled behind his hairy muzzle. “Sure, I remember him now. Coors and Wild Turkey. Winks probably had the same. It’s what he does when someone else is buying.”

  “What time did Butler come in?”

  He frowned briefly. “Are you a cop or something?”

  “Private detective.”

  “Wait a sec.”

  The waitress had returned with some bills. The bartender rang up the sale and gave her change, which she dropped in her bank, a cocktail glass. He came back to me and raised his eyebrows.

  “You asked?”

  “The time Butler came in.”

  “I can’t say for sure. Except it must’ve been before noon, because I remember it was slow, and we always get people in here for lunch, even on Saturdays.”

  “How did Butler act?”

  “Act? I don’t know. He sat about where you’re sitting and had a drink or two alone before Winks drifted over and joined him. He’s good at that. Winks, I mean.”

  “Did you hear them talking?”

  “Not really.”

  “How long was Butler here?”

  He shook his head, slicing the air with the sharpened points of his mustache.

  “No idea. We got busy, and I think he and Winks moved into the back room. I didn’t see him leave the bar.”

  I nodded, getting out my pad and pen. “I appreciate your help,” I said, then asked for his name, address, and phone number.

  “Why?” He was thinking, hassle.

  “Butler’s attorney wants to see you. It’s no big deal.” I didn’t tell him he’d probably use up half a day driving to Denver and back and answering questions in front of a stenographer.

  He said, “Shit,” but he told me his name, Randy Stilwell, and where he lived.

  “What’s Mr. Winks’s first name?”

  “Beats me,” he said. “Everyone calls him Winks.”

  “Where can I find him?”

  Stilwell shrugged. “He comes in here a couple times a week.”

  “Where does he live?”

  “I don’t know. Up in the hills somewhere.”

  “Elliot could probably tell you.” The waitress had spoken from the end of the bar. Stilwell and I turned to look at her. “If he’s not too drunk already,” she said. “He’s in the back room shooting pool.”

  This private-eye business was easier than I remembered. I nodded my thanks and picked up my glass of beer.

  The “back room” could seat a hundred or two.

  Against the distant wall, to my right, was a battered wooden bandstand. There were microphones on chrome stands, huge mute speakers, and an elaborate, silent set of drums. A cowboy boot was sketched in glitter on the face of the bass drum. The scuffed and barren hardwood dance floor was rimmed by wooden tables and metal folding chairs. More tables were crowded into the rear half—the near half—of the room. There was enough space behind the last seats for a pair of coin-operated pool tables.

  Dead animals overlooked it all.

  Mounted high on the walls were the heads of deer, antelope, elk, and mountain cats. A few stuffed pheasants had been thrown in for color. On Friday nights amplified noise would rattle their glass eyes.

  I wondered if the two guys shooting pool were responsible for any of the mounted heads.

  They were in their early thirties, one big, one small, dressed alike—blue jeans, plaid flannel shirts, and rough-cut boots. The big guy had a full red beard. He sat with one haunch on a table beside a group of beer bottles. He selected one and took a long pull. When he spoke, his voice boomed.

  “Elliot, you are one lucky son of a bitch.”

  “Hey, that’s the way I planned it.”

  I walked in. They looked me over—sports coat, slacks, no tie—figured that I was neither friend nor foe, and returned their attention to the table.

  Elliot picked up a small blue cube and chalked his cue, grinning like a smart ass. He had an angular face, a pointed Adam’s apple, and a lot of brown curly hair piled on top of his head. A bunch of keys jangled at his side. When he spoke, he slurred a few words.

  “What I did was,” he explained to his big red bearded pal, “I used left English on that shot, just like I saw a guy do on TV. It’s all angles, anyway, like geometry.”

  “Jesus Christ.” Big Red turned toward me and shook his head sadly. “You see what I have to put up with?”

  I gave him a shrug, then said to Elliot, “Are you Elliot?”

  He moved around the table and began lining up the game-winning shot—eight ball in the corner. “Who wants to know?”

  “My name is Lomax. I don’t mean to interrupt your game, but I—”

  “But you are interrupting it,” Elliot said, grinning up at his pal. “Right?”

  Big Red shrugged at me.

  “Plus you’re in my way,” Elliot said.

  I gave him a grin that made him look twice. Then I said, “Sorry,” and moved away from the end of the table.

  Elliot hunched over, set his narrow jaw in concentration, and fired. He sank the eight, but he’d shot much too hard. The cue ball banked off the end cushion, rolled all the way back toward him, and dropped in the corner pocket. Big Red boomed a laugh.

  “God damn it.”

  “Tough break,” I said. Then, “I was told you could tell me where to find a man named Winks.”

  “So what.” Elliot began fishing quarters out of his jeans.

  “So where can I find him?”

  “What do you want with Winks?” Big Red asked me.

  “He’s going to testify at a murder trial.”

  Elliot gave me an incredulous look.

  “Winks?”

  I nodded. “My client’s lawyer wants very much to talk to him.”

  Elliot said, “Winks on the witness stand? Can we watch?” Then he laughed at his own joke. Big Red chuckled.

  “Is there something wrong with Mr. Winks?”

  Elliot put quarters in the change taker, shoved it in, and pulled it out. Pool balls rumbled and clicked under the end of the table.

  “First of all, there’s no ‘mister’ to him.” Elliot squatted down and slapped a plastic triangle onto the stained green felt. “His real name is Russ Armbruster. They call him Winks because he’s got this thing with his eye.”

  “Where can I find him?”

  “And second of all, he’s about as loony as they come.”

  “Nice way to talk about your neighbor,” Big Red put in.

  “Neighbor, shit.” Elliot began plunking balls into the triangular rack. He paused, looked up at me, and explained, “Winks owns the acreage to the south of mine. If I’d’ve known about him, I never would’ve moved there. He likes to shoot at aliens.”

  “Illegal aliens?”

  “Aliens from outer space,” Big Red said, and chuckled into his beard.

  I looked at Elliot for confirmation. He nodded.

  “Winks is fairly certain that they have landed and live among us. He claims they look just like people except for a glow around them that only he can see.”

  Terrific. Samuel Butler’s fate depended on a guy who was trying to kill E.T.

  “Can you tell me how to get to his place?”

  “I can show you.” He checked his watch. “As soon as I whip this big bastard in one more game.”

  Big Red said, “In your dreams.”

  The “one game” turned into three. I had time to order a sandwich from the bar. Meanwhile, Elliot and friend slammed down beers as if aliens really had arrived. I learned that they were both welders at Rocky Flats, midnight to eight, disassembling contaminated glove boxes. I guess I’d drink like that, t
oo, if my job description included the word “plutonium.”

  We left the bar at one, which was about ten o’clock their time. The bright sunlight made us all blink. Big Red climbed into his pickup and drove away. Elliot’s was the other one, the one with the giant muddy tires.

  “How, ah, tough is it to get where we’re going?”

  He grinned at the old Olds. “It’ll be a challenge,” he said.

  CHAPTER 5

  I FOLLOWED ELLIOT’S TRUCK NORTH out of Golden. He drove fairly straight for a guy who’d been drinking beer for the past five hours.

  The residential street quickly transformed into a two-lane highway. There were low brown hills to the left and open brown plains to the right. We turned left at a sign marked Golden Gate Canyon Road.

  Soon we were snaking through piny hillsides, splotched white with old snow. Elliot’s truck slowed, then angled off the asphalt onto an ill-maintained road. The Olds thudded and creaked arthritically over rocky bumps and muddy potholes. The truck’s brake lights went on. I stopped. Elliot’s arm pointed out his window. I saw a narrow, rocky space between the evergreens. I assumed it was a road.

  Elliot waved once, then spun his macho tires, tossed gravel onto my hood, and disappeared around a curve.

  I eased the Olds to the left and set her crawling through the trees. I held the wheel with both hands to fight the violent contours of the trail. It twisted steadily upward. A few miles later, the road flattened, and the trees opened.

  The residence sat at the rear of a straw-colored meadow. Either Winks had a big family, or carpentry was his hobby. Unpainted, weathered wings sprouted one from the other at each end of the house. An addition to the farthest right-hand wing was under construction. Skeletal two-by-fours shone in the sun like the bones of a prehistoric beast.

  Three other beasts, live ones, charged across the meadow toward me.

  They were shaggy mongrels—small but territorial. They surrounded the Olds. I rolled up the window to shut out their piercing, vicious little barks.

  I drove slowly forward. The trail skirted the meadow and approached the house from the side, taking me past a pile of rusted, twisted metal, perhaps the wreckage of a UFO. I stopped the car near the house and shut off the engine.

  The only sound was the muted yapping of the munchkin-sized monsters.

  A man came around the rear of the house. He was in his sixties, with a few days’ growth of white stubbly beard. He wore baggy blue jeans, scruffy boots, a blue cotton shirt, and a red down vest. A green cap that said John Deere was pulled down hard on his head.

  I inferred from his shotgun that he was cautious about strangers.

  He carried the weapon at port arms and walked up to my side of the car. I rolled down the window and tried to say, “Howdy,” but his yapping dogs drowned me out. He kicked at one of them, and they all shut up. I noticed he was winking at me, his right eye twitching uncontrollably.

  “Are you from the assessor’s office?” he demanded in a crusty voice.

  “No, sir.” Always call a man with a shotgun “sir.”

  “Then what the hell do you want here?” Wink, wink. “This is private property.”

  “Sir, my name is Jacob Lomax. I’m looking for Russ Armbruster. Elliot said I could find him here. Are you Mr. Armbruster?” Of course he was. Winks.

  “How do you know Elliot?”

  “I just had a beer with him at a bar in Golden.”

  Winks snorted and winked. “A beer. Elliot seldom stops at one.”

  I smiled pleasantly. He was still holding the shotgun, although more loosely now.

  “I’m a private detective working for Samuel Butler’s attorney.”

  He frowned. “Butler. The name sounds familiar.”

  I showed him the photograph. “He said he drank with you in Golden two weeks ago last Saturday.”

  “Sure,” he said, smiling, winking at the photo. “I remember him. Hell of a nice guy.” His smile faded. “You said ‘attorney.’ Is he in trouble?”

  “Mr. Butler’s been charged with murdering his wife.”

  He stared at the photo of Samuel and Clare. “Her? I’ll be goddamned.” He shook his head and winked. “You know, that’s about all that poor son of a bitch wanted to talk about.”

  “What, killing his wife?”

  “Hell no. How much he loved her.”

  “Can we go in the house and talk?”

  The kitchen was dirty but tidy. There was a greasy gas range, a smudged white refrigerator, and worn wooden cabinets. Cans of flour, sugar, and coffee were carefully lined up on the linoleum countertop. Recently washed dishes sat in the drainer, drying, and a moldy dishrag hung neatly over the faucet. The floor was gritty underfoot.

  We sat on wooden chairs at the chipped, white-painted table. The dogs settled at our feet.

  Winks poured us coffee in mugs. He added Jack Daniel’s to his, then raised his eyebrows to ask me if I wanted some. His right eye continued to twitch. It was starting to get on my nerves. But at least he’d put away his gun.

  “Sure,” I told him.

  He poured in a shot and asked, “Did he shoot her?”

  “No, she was bludgeoned with a wrench.”

  Winks tucked in his chin and leaned away from me, as if I’d just told him that Clare Butler had been trampled to death by mice.

  “Bludgeoned?”

  “That’s what the police say.”

  Winks shook his head, winking. “That surprises me more than him killing her.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I figured he was sorta like me.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “Meaning if he was gonna kill his wife, he’d use something designed and built for the purpose. Not a wrench.”

  I sipped my bourbon-laced coffee and thought this over. It was a weak point—the choice of murder weapon. I doubted Oliver Westfall could use it. But then, you never know about lawyers.

  “You said you and Butler talked about his wife.”

  “Mostly he talked.”

  “What did he say?”

  Winks drank from his mug, then poured in another slug of bourbon.

  “He loved her, he needed her, he wanted her,” Winks said in a singsong voice. “All that kinda crap.” He drank his coffee-flavored bourbon and winked. “Listen, I had a couple of wives myself, and I know how they can twist your mind around so you start thinking that your life wouldn’t be worth a damn without them. Hell, they invented marriage, men didn’t.” He drank from his mug and poured in more bourbon. “You ever been married?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you know what I’m talking about. Me, now, I’m finished with women. Besides, how can you trust any of them since the landings.”

  “The what?”

  He squinted at me, winking. “Never mind,” he said.

  Oh, the landings. I asked him, “Did Butler talk as if his wife were still alive?”

  Winks winked. “That’s a damn fool question. Course he did. He talked about how they’d fought and he’d hit her and he was afraid she would leave him. I almost told him ‘good riddance,’ but I could see he was hurting. So I gave him the secret of getting a woman to forgive you.”

  He paused and forced me to ask, “And what might that be?”

  “Flowers.” He winked. “Works every time.”

  “I see.” So the flowers had been Winks’s idea. “Then what?”

  Winks shrugged, winking. “After that he seemed happier, I guess. We had a few more rounds, and then he was anxious to get home to…the wife.” Winks made it sound unmanly.

  “What time did he leave?”

  “Well, I stayed on till three, like I usually do. And he’d left a bit before that. Say, two-thirty.”

  This confirmed what Butler had told me. And what Westfall had implied, that Butler wasn’t behaving like a man who’d just killed his wife. Westfall would no doubt tell the jury that if Butler were trying to establish a phony alibi, he certainly would’ve done something more r
eliable than drive to Golden and drink with a total stranger, a semireclusive flake.

  Although the flake part could be a problem. Winks might not volunteer a deposition for Westfall. And when he did appear on the witness stand, either by his own volition or under order of subpoena, the D.A. might get him talking about aliens.

  Of course, this was assuming Winks would come to court peaceably and not shoot the process server. Who, come to think of it, would probably be me.

  I thanked Winks for his hospitality and drove back toward Denver.

  CHAPTER 6

  IT WAS ONLY THREE O’CLOCK, and already I’d put about a hundred miles on the Olds driving from downtown to the county jail to southeast Denver to Golden and beyond, finding Butler’s bartender and Winks. A full day’s work by anyone’s measure. Now I could find a bar and take the rest of the day off.

  Except it was too early to start drinking.

  Hell, I could just go home.

  And do what, housework? Maybe I needed a hobby. Or a pet, something to fill my spare time. Or maybe I’d been living alone too long.

  Quit whining, Lomax, and get busy.

  As I came out of the hills on Sixth Avenue, the eastern sky spread before me, hazy blue turning to smog brown near the horizon. There was an inversion layer today, warmer air above, cooler air below, trapping the pollution at ground level. The tallest downtown buildings stood like waders, hip-deep in muddy waters.

  I cursed the pollution and steered my fossil-fueled machine south on I-25.

  This was the route Samuel Butler had taken the day Clare was murdered. He’d bought flowers on his way home, a peace offering.

  Or was it just part of his phony alibi?

  After all, the evidence weighed heavily against Butler. Even I’d believed he was guilty after talking to his attorney. Why was I so sure now that he was innocent? Maybe I was kidding myself. Maybe I simply wanted him to be innocent so that I’d feel I was working on the side of justice.

  I took the turnoff at southbound Colorado Boulevard.

  It was about a quarter mile to Evans Avenue. In between was a La Quinta Motor Inn, a Perkins, and a Denny’s. There were no flower vendors in sight. It was three o’clock now, perhaps too early for them. Or maybe they only worked the area on weekends.