“I think the income from the fields is hers, yes. She owns the land. Nick owns the house and some fields to the north of his house,” Rowenna explained.
“Well,” Joe said quietly, as if he wasn’t really speaking to anyone but himself, “I would say that lets out the owner being the killer.” He glanced over at Jeremy and Rowenna, and then his gaze shifted to take in Brad, who was rejoining them, though he still looked shaky. “Go on in to the station. I’m going to need statements from each of you. Go now, and start writing the minute you get there. I want every detail just as you remember it.”
As if anyone could ever forget the way the corpse looked, staked above the corn and dressed up like a scarecrow, Jeremy thought.
As Rowenna started for the road, Jeremy gently caught her arm. “Are you all right?” he asked. He flushed slightly as she stared at him, a silent question in her eyes. Could any of them actually be all right after what they had just seen?
She nodded mechanically and glanced toward Brad. “A lot better than he is.”
Jeremy nodded. He toyed with the idea that maybe he should stay behind to help and let her drive his car back to town, but he’d seen the corpse, and he’d seen the field, so Joe was going to need his statement in the end anyway. Besides, Joe was obviously good at his job; if there was something to be found in the field, Joe would see that it was discovered. And he would no doubt resent it if Jeremy tried to hang around. He would get more information if he went about it carefully, he realized, than if he forced himself in where he was neither needed nor wanted. Besides, he hoped to attend the autopsy, which meant he needed to be on Joe’s good side.
“Get out of here,” Joe said now. He didn’t bark the words like a command, and he didn’t sound irritated, but his meaning was clear: they needed to do themselves the favor of being somewhere else.
Together, they walked through the crushed stalks, disturbed by the passage of so many people, to the road. Crime-scene tape was already stretched in a huge ring around the area that surrounded the corpse, and they had to duck under it when they reached the shoulder.
When she stepped onto the pavement, Rowenna suddenly let out a dry laugh.
Jeremy stared at her questioningly. Had she finally lost it? After what she’d just been through, it would certainly be understandable if she had.
“What?” he asked.
“I’m out of gas,” she said, still laughing, clearly on the edge of hysteria.
He’d forgotten that little detail, too, he realized. “Give me your car key,” Jeremy said. “I’ll ask Joe to have one of his men drop it at your place once it’s gassed up.”
She nodded. Brad, still looking pale and barely there, got into the backseat of Jeremy’s rental without a word. Rowenna took the passenger seat. Jeremy was back two minutes later and made sure she was belted in before he revved the engine and pulled a U-turn, facing the car back to town.
“Look,” she said, pointing down the road.
The AAA truck was there to help her at last. She shook her head. “I’m sure Joe or one of the cops will explain,” she said.
Jeremy just nodded and kept driving.
He thought that he could drive all day and all night, but it wouldn’t matter. There was no driving away from what they had just seen.
News of the ghastly discovery seemed to travel faster than the breeze. By that evening, it was all that anyone was talking about locally, and it even made the national news.
The act of giving statements at the police station—which should have been fairly simple, since Rowenna had almost literally stumbled upon the body, and the others had found it only in the course of looking for her—took the majority of the afternoon. While he was still at the station, both of Jeremy’s brothers called, offering advice and whatever assistance he needed, and both of them asking with concern if he was sure that the corpse wasn’t Mary Johnstone.
He was certain the dead woman wasn’t Mary, but at the moment the police had no idea who she was. He hoped, since there was now a national database that listed missing persons, that she would not remain a Jane Doe for long. Whoever she was, someone must have loved her and someone must be missing her, and they deserved to know what had happened to her, as awful as it was.
At five o’clock, they left the station. They hadn’t eaten. None of them had been hungry.
It was actually Brad who said that his stomach was growling. But despite his hunger, he wanted a drink first.
Jeremy understood. Rowenna didn’t say anything—she had been quiet and thoughtful all afternoon—but she seemed content to go along wherever he led.
They went to a restaurant near the water’s edge, where their view was one of pleasure craft gently rocking at the dock and a peak of the House of the Seven Gables rising just over the tree line.