Page 37 of Always Murder

“Yeah.”

He sounded surprisingly grim when he said, “Wait for it.”

We pulled to a stop in front of one of the oldest structures.It was painted blue, with board-and-batten siding and a single-pitch roof that made me think of an overgrown shed.Two large windows were set into the front of the house, and they were made up of lots of small panes of glass that looked thin and wavy.The door was the same—splintered wood, peeling white paint, and lots of panes of glass.Trying to keep the place warm this time of year was probably a nightmare.

Bobby killed the engine and looked over at me.

I made the Scout sign.“I will be super-duper careful.”

“It’s three fingers,” he said.

“It is?Wait!Were you a Boy Scout?”

“There’s zero chance I can talk you out of this?”

I thought about how to answer that.Finally, I said, “It’s Millie.”

“That’s what I thought,” he said and got out of the car.

As we approached the house, a skinny girl who looked about twelve years old came outside.She was bundled up in a man’s canvas work coat that fell almost to her knees, faded blue jeans, and the kind of ugly black boots meant for stomping.Her hair was hidden by a watch cap.She dragged an old cooler out from the side of the house and sat.And then she produced a pipe and a tobacco pouch.

“Sissy,” Bobby said.

The girl kept her gaze on the pipe as she packed it.Her voice was high when she said, “Deputy Mai.”

And then she went on packing the pipe.

I waited a few seconds, but Bobby didn’t say anything, so I asked, “Is Anthony around?”

“What do you want him for?”

“We’re looking for Paul Naught,” Bobby said.

The girl—Sissy—made a sound of acknowledgment.She worked a box of matches out of her pocket, struck one on the narrow concrete apron, and went to work lighting the pipe.If you’ve never seen a twelve-year-old do it, it’s really something.

“Could you get him?”I asked.“You wouldn’t have asked why we wanted to talk to him if he wasn’t here; you would have told us he wasn’t home.”

Bobby opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, the girl shouted around the stem of the pipe, “Anthony!”

The wind picked up, and overhead, power lines swayed.I hadn’t noticed them until now—black cables running from building to building.Something told me that Pacific Power hadn’t been the one to hook them up.Part of it had to do with how low to the ground the power lines ran.Also, the fact that one of them was propped up with a forked branch.

Steps shuffled toward us from inside the building, and a moment later, a man appeared.He wore a coat over a hoodie, with joggers and unlaced boots.He had his hood pulled up, and to judge by his mussed hair and puffy eyes, Anthony had just been rudely awakened.He was taller than me, and he had the rawboned look that made me think of country boys.I put him at somewhere in his early twenties.He was definitely the man I’d seen talking to Ryan.

Anthony looked to Sissy first, then me, then Bobby.He mumbled, “Deputy Mai.”

With a nod, Bobby said, “Hi, Anthony.”

“They want to ask you something,” Sissy said.She struck another match and turned her attention back to her pipe.

“We’re looking for Paul Naught,” I said.

Anthony stared at me.Through me, actually.Like I wasn’t even there.

“I understand you’re looking for him too,” I said.“I wanted to know why.”

Anthony still had that half-asleep look in his eyes.After a couple of seconds, he turned to Sissy and said, “Am I looking for Paul Naught?”

Sissy shook her head.

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