little early for anything that drastic.”
“Well, Mr. Collins has your name on the list, so I’ll open up. Hang on a sec.”
“Actually I’m here to speak with the barn manager, Orlando Polk. I gather his brush with amnesia has been remedied, and he’s back on the job.”
“I’m not sure about ‘on the job,’ but Kelly brought him home from the hospital yesterday. He seemed fine; remembered my name anyway.” Pete chuckled, then added, “ ’Course I made a real jerk out of myself.”
“How’s that?” Rosco asked.
The guard shook his head. “Well, I assumed he’d heard the news about the missus being murdered and all, so I was just makin’ small talk, you know? Said something like, ‘That’s a real shame about Mrs. Collins being killed.’ ” He sighed. “Anyway, the news seemed to hit Orlando pretty hard . . . which is natural . . . I mean hearin’ about it for the first time and all. Stuck my foot in my mouth, that’s for dang sure. Yeah, my wife tells me to keep my big yap shut, and I never listen to her. It’ll dawn on me someday, I guess.”
Rosco thought, Thank goodness there are people who do talk too much; my job would be a heck of a lot tougher if there weren’t. What he said, however, was a sympathetic, “I could have fallen into the same trap myself, Pete. I would have assumed his wife would have already broken the bad news.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Pete opened the gate, and Rosco drove up the long lane of trees, eventually emerging at the center of the farm. He drove directly to stable B, where the barn manager and his wife had their apartment. Rosco wanted to avoid the main house in hopes that he could speak to Orlando without being chaperoned by any Collins family members. Parking the Jeep behind the stable, he entered the barn through the large doors on the west end.
The structure’s ground floor was divided in two sections. The western end had six roomy box stalls on either side of a broad central aisle; then came a side entrance with double doors leading to an exercise corral, and beyond that, the building was sealed off into what was obviously the manager’s living quarters. The entire upper level in the stable area was covered with a hay loft, and Rosco noted it was already well stocked for the winter ahead. He strolled along the aisle toward the apartment, passing the stalls, each of which was occupied by a sleek and handsome steed, who regarded the stranger with curious and haughty eyes. Small frames screwed to the walls separating the boxes displayed the boarded horses’ names as well as those of their owners on removable four-by-six-inch file cards. Rosco silently read as he passed, deciding the animals’ names could just as easily pass for the gold-leaf monikers members of the Patriot Yacht Club spread across the aft end of their expensive vessels: Pricey Lady, Windmill, Hokey-Pokey, Flashdance, To a T, Daddy’s Girl, Good Guess, Beautiful Dreamer, Endymion, Zephyr, Flight of Fancy, Oh, My Word! He chuckled to himself and tapped three times on Orlando Polk’s door.
The man who answered was shorter than Rosco had expected, about five-seven or -eight, with long, jet black hair pulled into a ponytail. His skin was darkened and lined from the sun, and his black eyes shone with a sparkle and intensity that gave him a curiously boyish appearance. He extended his hand to Rosco and smiled; his teeth were a gleaming white in contrast to his swarthy complexion.
“I take it you’re Rosco Polycrates?” he said, then looked at his watch. “Right on time. Mr. Collins seems very impressed with you, which is good enough for me. Come on in; take a load off.”
The apartment consisted of a main room that served as kitchen, dining area, and living area. Open stairs led to a second-floor loft. The partial cathedral ceiling was crafted of exposed, rough-hewn wood, and the decorations reflected the manager’s Native American heritage, giving the place the feel of a hunting lodge hidden far off in the woods. Rosco observed that there seemed to be little evidence of a woman’s touch; as the thought passed through his mind, Kelly emerged at the edge of the loft. At that height she seemed taller than she actually was, but her short blond hair gave her a pixielike, Peter Pan appearance, and Rosco half expected her to fly down to the lower level.
“My wife,