Free A Most Curious Murder by Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli Page A

an answer.
    “I’m looking for books.”
    “Books? You kiddin’ me? The old guy who lived there was murdered yesterday. What in hell you doin’ looking for books at a time like this? Don’t seem right, you ask me. Instead of doingthat, we should all be out chasing that little lady over there.” He pointed around Adam’s house. “There’s your killer. I’d say let’s get this over with and take that lady off to prison.”
    She could tell he wasn’t a man she’d be able to talk to sensibly but didn’t want to say out loud how ignorant he was.
    “I’m here because my mother asked me to search. Dora Weston? Your neighbor?”
    “You’re Jenny, I bet. I remember you. You were a hellion. Warren Schuler—remember me? Heard about what happened to that library of your mother’s. Is this about that?”
    Relieved he was distracted, Jenny nodded, agreeing that “this” was about “that.”
    She nodded again, wondering how much time the man had to kill.
    “You know who the old guy was?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Adam Cane.” He sniffed and rolled his eyes as if she was too dense to bother with. “One of the Cane family—that mansion over on Oak Street. Can you imagine him living the way he did? Coulda used help with that yard. Got that old car. What I heard was his sister cheated him outta the family money. You know about that?”
    She nodded. “But I don’t believe everything I hear.”
    “You ask me, we should chase all the rich people right outta this country. Get rid of ’em. Nothing but a bunch of bloodsuckers. Along with politicians. Get one big boat—”
    “If you chase all the rich away, who would pay your salary?” She couldn’t help herself.
    “I don’t work. Got a disability.”
    She wished he’d go back inside his house. Maybe if she didn’t answer too many of his questions . . .
    “Don’t you have to look for books on the inside of a house?” The man burped in one hand. He looked embarrassed and grinned, saying he was sorry.
    “We thought maybe the people who tore the Little Library apart might have run through here. You know, throwing books away.”
    The man nodded. “Yeah. I can see that, I guess. Well, I’ll let you get back to it. Got to get ready for court. I got jury duty in Traverse City today. Hope you find your books. I’d help your mother out, but I don’t think she’d much like the kind of books I read.”
    The man snickered and went back inside his house.
    ***
    Jenny walked faster through the rest of the yard—outer edges to center. One foot after the other. Nowhere was the weedy ground upturned. No mounds of dirt. She got down on her knees to check for soft spots, places where puddles stood, not draining after the rain.
    The yard hadn’t been touched this spring. Weeds and grasses grew thick, strangling what might once have been flowerbeds. She neared the center of her search grid and found nothing—a relief. She could tell Zoe not to worry. Fida was not buried in Adam’s backyard.
    As she turned to leave, her toe caught on something beneath a section of bent grass. When she knelt to look, clumps of weeds appeared to have been dug up, then pushed back in place. She ran her fingers along the edges of the clumps—around a line of raised and dying vegetation.
    She closed her eyes and dropped her head. This wasn’t what she’d hoped to find and not something she wanted to dig up. She didn’t want to unearth a mangled white dog with a red collar.She closed her eyes and thought of leaving it all untouched. It would be easy to say she’d found nothing.
    But she couldn’t.
    It didn’t take much to pull at the edges of the separated clumps. Sticking her fingers into the spaces and pulling hard brought up the first one, and then another—two squares with disturbed dirt beneath. The ground was wet and soft. With only her fingers to dig with, she scrabbled at the ground until she felt something and sat back to gulp her breakfast back down her throat.
    She