House of Blues Read Free Page B

were
overturned, though not Sally's high chair, which was empty.
    Arthur lay on the floor, faceup, eyes open, white
shirt soaked red. There was blood on his pants too, at the groin.
    The house was so still Sugar's breath sounded like
screaming.
 
 
    2
    "Mrs. Hebert? I'm Skip Langdon."
    The woman on the porch looked blank. She was as
ordinary a woman as Skip had ever seen, though she was trying—she
had on a lot of makeup and her dishwater hair had been highlighted
and permed. She was a little overweight, not much, really, just
slightly round, and wore expensive pink slacks with a sleeveless
white knit top to which small pearls had been sewn at the neckline.
    "Yes?" she said, as if unable to comprehend
why strangers were invading her house.
    "Detective Skip Langdon. I'm from Homicide."
    " Oh, I see."
    Skip had arrived with her platoon, all in the same
car, because there weren't nearly enough unmarked cars to go around.
They must have looked terrifying, a six-foot-tall woman and three men
in suits, advancing like a phalanx. Skip was talking because she had
caught the case, meaning it was simply her turn—she'd been next on
the list when the call came. She gestured for the others to go
in—she'd interview the witness, they could divide up the other
chores.
    Rather than sad, the woman seemed bewildered and
scared out of her mind, though she'd had a little time to calm down.
The district officer had arrived first and had called Homicide. All
Skip knew was that Sugar Hebert had arrived home to find her husband
shot dead in the dining room.
    Hebert said, "They're gone. All of them. I only
left for twenty minutes."
    "Shall we talk in the car?" Hebert looked
as if she could stand to sit down.
    "Yes. Please. They said I couldn't stay in the
house."
    " I'm sorry."
    "Well, not that I'd want to." They were
side by side now, and something passed over Hebert's face that could
have been a memory—of her dead husband, perhaps.
    Another car arrived—Paul Gottschalk from the crime
lab and Sylvia Cappello, Skip's sergeant. "Can you tell me what
happened?"
    "We were having dinner—my husband and my
daughter, along with her husband and their little girl. Somebody
spilled something on Sally and I went to get her clean overalls. When
I came back, it was like it is now. Blood everywhere, and Arthur—"
    " The other three were gone?"
    "Gone! Disappeared into thin air."
    Slowly, Skip drew the story out of Sugar Hebert—how
the family had dinner every Monday, how they had recently celebrated
Arthur's birthday and he had announced his retirement, but tonight
had reneged; how they had fought, the other three, though this one
didn't participate. How she had been gone only twenty minutes—thirty
at the most—and had come home to find her world in shards.
    "Did you touch anything?"
    "No. Not even Arthur. I couldn't stand to look
at him; it was too . . . that wasn't my husband down there. I just
sort of crab-walked to the nearest phone and called the police."
    "And where was that phone?"
    " In the hall."
    In the house. So she had touched something. "Did
you call anyone else?"
    " My son Grady. But he wasn't home."
    "Would you like to call him again?"
    " I left a message." She looked around, as
if she expected Grady to be in the car.
    The obvious explanation, it seemed to Skip, was that
the argument had escalated, someone had pulled a gun—probably
Dennis—and shot Arthur. Then Reed and Dennis had fled with their
daughter.
    "Excuse me a minute," she said, and radioed
for a district car to check Reed and Dennis's house.
    She turned back to Hebert. "Do you know anywhere
else they might go?"
    "Not really." She looked uncomfortable.
    "Are you sure?"
    " Well, Dennis's parents live here. But they'd
never go there. Why would they?"
    "What's their address?" When she had it,
she radioed for a check there as well.
    " Do you know," she said when she was done,
"if Dennis carried a gun?"
    "I know he didn't. He and Reed were dead against
guns."
    "So Reed didn't