Free Borderlines by Archer Mayor

and weighted down. I began to peel off the cumbersome and very dirty bunker coat as I answered his last question. My own body odor, finally released, damn ear made my eyes water. “Probably the wood stove. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll hit the hay.” I hung the coat on the truck’s tail gate and walked away. “‘Night.” “I have more questions.” The tone was supposed to freeze me in my tracks. “Don’t doubt it for a second. I’ll be around.” I didn’t need to turn round to see him glaring. The heat from his eyes on the back of my head was enough. The truth was, I had some questions of my own. As a rule, accidental fires have a way of explaining themselves, especially where dead bodies are involved. People either die in their beds, oblivious to what killed them, or they’re found along the way toward some hoped-for exit. When they appear behind a locked door, with the key on the outside, I have to wonder just how “accidental” the fire might have been.
    I didn’t make a clean getaway. As I walked down South Street toward I-14, a red Mercedes pulled in, heading my way. The license plate was marked “QUNCY.” I moved out of its way and bent down to the driver’s window as it stopped alongside me. “I thought you drove a blue car.” Dr. Beverly Hillstrom, Chief Medical Examiner for the State of Vermont, smiled up at me. “I did. I traded it in. Big mistake. You should stick to the larger Mercedeses; these little ones just aren’t the same.
    I laughed at that. “I’m lucky to be stuck to a rebuilt Toyota.
    How are you?” She patted the back of my hand, which was resting on her door.
    “In tip-top shape. What on earth are you doing here? You look terrible, by the way.” She wrinkled her nose. “And you smell awful.”
    “Thank you. I’m staying with my uncle. I used to come up here regularly when I was a boy.” “And play fireman?” “How’d you guess?” “You should see your face in the mirror. You look like a chimney sweep. And your ear looks medium rare.” She gave me an appraising look. “It’s hard to imagine Joe Gunther on vacation.” “I’m supposed to be working with the local SA on a small job around here. If you came from Burlington, you made awfully good time.” “The local M.E.’s out of town and I was in Barton anyway. My husband and I are looking for property in the Kingdom. Pure serendipity. Who’s the SA-Potter?” “Very good.
    She laughed. “Not really. I was told he’d meet me here.” There was a small pause. “So, what have we got here?” “I don’t know. I figure if I stay around long enough, maybe you’ll tell me.” I let her park and opened her door for her. As she swung her legs I saw she was wearing a dress and high heels elegant garb for an gant woman. “Lord.
    You’ll have a tough time getting around in these.” She stood up and walked to the back of the car. “I used to. I’ve haven’t since.” She opened the trunk and pulled out a pair of dirty L.L. Bean boots with bright blue socks stuffed in them. “So, you suspect ‘foul play,’ as they say?” I watched as she slipped off her shoes. Beverly Hillstrom was in mid-fifties, maybe a bit older-tall, blond, and slim-but she looked thirteen years younger. I’d first met her on the case in Brattleboro that stimulated the local politicos to make a scapegoat of my boss and me on the hot seat for six months. She’d been the one person who’d supported my reopening what had seemed a closed case and had even plied forensic evidence she’d been keeping in the deep freeze for no reason.
    And that, as Humphrey Bogart would say, was beginning of a beautiful friendship.
    “I don’t know what I suspect-nothing specifically. It’s got several visible readings as I see it, bit of a surprise package.” “And I’m to unwrap it.” “If you would.” I glanced up at the sound of another car pulling behind us. A man in his late thirties, wearing a bad complexion, thin ir, a pot