Page 23 of Hang on St. Christopher

We looked in the fireplace but couldn’t tell from the ash whether he burned his personal correspondence.

“This is bloody peculiar,” I said. “Let’s start over.”

Again, we searched the house for anything that might reveal where Mr. Townes had come from, or even a clue to his provenance.

Nothing.

“Aye,” Crabbie agreed. “Strange.”

A second canvassing of the neighbors also revealed nothing.Quiet man who kept to himself,and in Ulster no higher compliment could ever be paid to anyone. You could be killing prostitutes by the score in some basement dungeon, but if you were a quiet man who kept to himself, the neighbors wouldn’t badmouth you to the cops or the TV crews.

No basement dungeon, by the way. (We checked.)

Back inside to look at the pictures again. Half-finished portraits of local children and families. Still lifes of flowers and leaves. Some of the landscapes revealed a bit of information: he had extensively painted the County Antrim coast and the Fermanagh lakes, and he had made several attempts at Ben Bulben in County Sligo. There even looked to be one of Monet-style haystacks. So he got around a bit.

“Do you want a cup of tea, Sean?” Crabbie asked.

“Third cup of the night, but why not?”

Crabbie stuck the kettle on, and I retired to the living room, which had a well-stuffed bookcase. On top of it were a few big art books—Kandinsky, Roy Lichtenstein, Rothko, and Jackson Pollock. Not exactly the schools that Mr. Townes followed in his own works.

Above the bookcase were twopossiblyoriginal Picasso etchings—which, if genuine, would almost certainly be the most valuable pieces of art in the house. They were tiny and they were signed, but I couldn’t tell if they were prints from a shop, or the genuine article. I held them up to the light and looked at the back, but I couldn’t figure them out. They were small and they looked old, but they could easily be prints or copies. Hmmm.

I examined the bookcase. Bookcases were better than nothing at pointing you toward someone’s personality. Thrillers, art books, a few history books, and quite the collection of Penguin Classics. I thumbed through a few of them looking for receipts or bookmarks, but nothing fell out.

The last of the long summer twilight had gone now, and I flipped the lights on. At this time of year, full darkness didn’t come until eleven, so it must be pretty late night now. I tapped my watch, but I had forgotten to wind it. The grandfather clock claimed it was 6:17, which I doubted. The living room had no TV or radio or stereo for me to flick on and find out what hour it was in the rest of the world.

“What time is it?” I shouted to Crabbie.

“Can’t talk; I’m on the phone to the station!” he yelled back.

I went to the living room windows and looked out at the street. Eerily quiet now. I’d sent all the coppers back to the station, except for a constable I would keep outside to secure the crime scene, and one forensic officer finishing up her work.

Crabbie came into the living room holding two teacups and looking glum.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“No sign of the stolen car yet. And no appearance of Quentin Townes on the electoral register, the central criminal registry, or the Interpol registry. He never applied for a passport under that name north or south of the border, and he never got a driver’s license under that name either. Here’s your tea. I told them to try every database we had, ’cause I knew you’d want that.”

“Aye, I do. And?”

“It’ll take them a bit. They’ll call us.”

I took the mug and looked at him askance. “No biscuits, mate?”

“Didn’t seem right to nick his biscuits,” Crabbie replied.

“You’re drinking his tea.”

“Tea’s one thing; food’s another,” he said definitively. Crabbie had very firm moral boundaries, and if you didn’t want to upset him it was best not to question him about the geographies of those boundaries.

He was looking off kilter, was the Crabman.

“Here’s one for you,” I said. “Why did the dairy farmer get his wife another acre of pasture for her wedding anniversary?”

“I don’t know.”

“Because love is a cattlefield.”

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