Free The Skeleton's Knee by Archer Mayor

chart’s the only real thing you’ve got, and it was the only thing that got stolen. It must have something going for it. You want me to call Billie and set something up?”
    I stood up, still not convinced. “Yeah, okay—try to tell her diplomatically that I don’t want to spend a lot of time on this, though. I agree I ought to check it out, but I still don’t have much faith in it. It smacks of voodoo and crystal balls.” I checked my watch. “I better run, or Harriet’ll have my head. There is one other thing: Outside of the local food co-ops in town, are there any other health-food wholesalers Fuller might have used for his supplies?”
    She thought for a moment. “How varied was the garden?”
    “Enough that I sure didn’t recognize much. Some of it was decorative, but it was mostly produce. And the house was filled with the kind of seeds, grains, nuts, and rabbit pellets you people call food.”
    She grinned and poked me with her foot. “Did he sell any of it?”
    “Coyner did the selling, in exchange for rent; I’m going to have someone look into that end of it.”
    “But Coyner wouldn’t tell you where the supplies were bought?”
    “Not yet, and he may not; he’s not feeling very friendly right now.”
    “Let me call around. I won’t mention names,” she added, anticipating what I was about to say. I kissed her quickly before heading out the door. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”
    “My pleasure. There is a price, though: dinner at my place tonight?”
    I made a face. “Can I bring my own food?”
    “No.” She laughed and threw a pencil at the door.
    I was just about to climb the long set of stone steps leading from Main Street to the Municipal Building when I heard Allen Rogers call me from across the street. “Hey,” he said, waving an oversized envelope out the driver’s window of his car. “How’s this for service?”
    “Great, Al. I appreciate it.” I crossed over to him as he backed into a parking space.
    “No sweat—I was heading home. By the way, were you alone when you were photographing that chart?”
    I looked at him carefully. “Yes. Why?”
    He got out of the car and joined me on the sidewalk, an excited smile on his face. “Well, I did the print like you asked, as a close-up of the chart, but the negative included both the chart and the window below it, so I did a full-frame proof first.” He handed me the envelope. “Open it.”
    I did so, spreading the contents out on Allen’s car hood. There were three photographs: one of the chart, in high contrast to make it easily legible; one of both the window and the chart above it, in which the exposure had been cut back to favor the latter; and one of just the window, exposed to favor the stronger outside light. In this last picture, badly out of focus and distorted by the window’s cheap glass, was the unmistakable figure of a human being, lurking at the edge of the blurry trees.
    “Interesting?” Allen asked, his face beaming.
    “Very,” I muttered.
    “You know who it is? I can’t even tell if it’s a man or a woman.”
    “I think it’s a thief,” I answered. “And maybe worse.”

6
    SAMMIE MARTENS AND DENNIS DEFLORIO , the two squad members I’d asked Harriet to locate earlier, were waiting for me in my office. I invited Willy Kunkle to join us and sat on the edge of my desk to address them.
    I began with Sammie and Dennis. “Have you two been brought up to date?”
    “Ron did the honors,” Sammie answered, “And we’ve read the reports.”
    “Good. Sammie, I’d like you to check out the hospital. Interview everyone who had anything to do with Abraham Fuller, from the nurses and orderlies to the finance people who got the cash from him. Then I’d like you to check out Fred Coyner’s records at the tax assessor’s office, the county clerk’s, and anywhere else he may have left a paper trail.”
    Samantha Martens, intense, dogged, enthusiastic, occasionally bullheaded, was never going to give