Thor and Benji were left inside to eat and then play their own games. We settled in at the small wrought iron table out on the patio and Daniel slapped a sizzling steak onto my plate.
"I have a question for you, Daniel," I began, as we dug in.
He shrugged. "Ask away."
I paused for just a moment. "Do you know – do you know a woman named Linda Henson?"
"Well, I think I know who she is. What about her?" He concentrated on cutting up his nice thick rib eye. He took a close look at it and then doused it with more steak sauce.
"Do you know her connection with Ronald Larch?"
"Scuttlebutt is that they're in an affair, and have been for a long time."
"Yeah, I was pretty sure about that part." But suddenly I recalled Walter Schubert’s remark to Larch in the coffee house a few days before. "Daniel – is Linda Henson connected in any way to John, the homeless man?"
He glanced up at me. "Well – you might not believe this, but I've heard she was once married to him."
That got my attention. "Uh – that gorgeous blonde was married to Homeless John?"
"Was married. That's the word around the station. I guess it was right after she got out of high school. He was some years older than she was, but not many guys could resist Linda Henson."
I hardly knew what to say.
"But it’s all just rumor."
I could only shake my head. "Now, let me get this straight. Ronald Larch has a thing going with John’s ex-wife?" I just sat there, blinking. "That’s a pretty good stretch, going from the most popular girl in school to being the ex-wife of a guy who died homeless on the street."
Daniel nodded. "Yeah, it does seem pretty weird. All I know is that when Larch became Carpenter’s campaign manager, some things about Linda started surfacing around town. I don’t know how many connected Homeless John to Linda, though. Their divorce happened quite a few years back. I don't think they were married for long."
"What kinds of things surfaced?"
"Oh, mainly that Larch is still married and carrying on an affair with Linda. Rumors also say his wife doesn’t seem to care. I believe there's money on her side."
"Did you know, at the time of John’s death, that he and Linda had been married at one time?"
He shrugged. "To be honest, Laila, I did
n’t think about it. The other day some of the other EMTs were talking about Councilman Carpenter's vendetta against the homeless. John’s name came up in connection with that, and then somebody mentioned about him and Linda being married a long time ago. That's all I know. "He looked up at me. "What made you ask about her?"
"I saw her at John’s funeral. At the graveside, but at a distance. Then she tried to get to her car before anybody could get close to her.
"Then I saw her and Larch just this morning at Roasted Love. She got in a hurry again when she saw me looking at her and ran like a rabbit."
"So – she seems to know you?"
"Sure seems like, it, yeah. And – I have to wonder if she's connected to John’s murder somehow."
Daniel looked thoughtful. "If Linda was at his burial, she must still have some feelings for him. Otherwise, why would she have gone out of her way to be there? It doesn't make much sense for her to kill him and then go to his funeral. She'd just draw attention to herself."
The devil’s advocate was at it again. Worst of all, he had a valid point.
Chapter Fifteen
Even though I didn’t like keeping secrets from Daniel, I knew I couldn't tell him that I was still going down to the rough side of town. But when I arrived at Roasted Love early the next morning, it looked like the rough side of town was now coming to me.
A scruffy-looking man sat against the wall outside the coffee house, right in the spot where Homeless John used to sleep. As I got closer, I saw that he had sticks of red licorice in his hands. A package of black candy stuck out from his tattered shirt pocket.
This could only be Licorice Billy, who apparently had decided to make John’s former spot his own.