Dead Man's Song (Pine Deep 2)

Saul Weinstock appeared next, smiling a tight and humorless smile that made him look pained. Unlike Terry, Weinstock’s grip was desperately strong and he gave Crow a quick hard pump, then used the grip to lean in close as he said, very quietly, “Let’s find a place later to have a word. Okay?” He moved on before Crow could answer.

The rest of the crowd was like a blur of handshakes and careful smiles. When it was over Val looked exhausted, and Crow wrapped his arm around her as they walked slowly up to the house.

(2)

It was a typical post-funeral affair, with small conversational groups forming, breaking, reforming. Crow wandered through, shaking hands, exchanging bits and pieces of conversation with some of the distant Guthrie relatives and the general Who’s Who of Pine Deep. The Philly cops were clustered together in a corner looking out of place; Crow saw Saul Weinstock come up and lead Ferro away for a private chat. They stood with their heads bowed together for five minutes.

While he was watching the crowds a couple of folks asked him for drinks and Crow realized that he had been standing by the small wet bar. Usually he avoided getting within sniffing distance of it, but he mixed and poured and tried not to remember their old familiar tastes.

“Can I put my order in?” Crow looked up from the Manhattan he was mixing and saw Ferro looking wry and amused, LaMastra flanking him. “You have time for a quick word?” Ferro asked.

“Sure,” Crow said.

Ferro turned to LaMastra, put one hand on his shoulder, and nudged him toward the drinks table. “Presto change-o! You’re now a bartender. ” Then to Crow, “Let’s step over out of the line of fire. ”

Crow let himself be led far away from the bottles. “Thanks,” he said.

“Hope you don’t think I was overstepping—”

“Hell, no. My AA sponsor would throw a conniption if he heard I was mixing drinks. ”

Ferro gave him a dour nod. “I just had a brief chat with your friend, Saul Weinstock. He said that there have been some unusual things happening in town. Would…you know anything about that?”

“This is Pine—” Crow began but Ferro held up a hand to stop him.

“Please, Crow, if I hear that ‘this is Pine Deep, things are always unusual’ line one more time I think I’m going to go a bit postal. I know things are unusual around here. I know this is America’s ‘haunted holidayland,’ yada yada yada. What I’m asking you, given the normal flow of odd happenings in Pine Deep, have you noticed anything outside of what you people here would consider odd. ”

“Hmm,” Crow said, “that makes me wonder what Saul told you. ”

Ferro’s face had a thoughtful, almost calculating look. “Would you mind just making a comment first?”

Crow shrugged. “Well…I read the papers, I talk to people who come into the store. It’s been a rough season. We had the blight—still have the blight—and that means that there’s a lot of tension and stress. There have been some fights. Probably people blowing off steam. You work your ass off all your life to try and make it work and then a bad season comes along and wipes you out, that’s gonna hurt. People get frightened, they get angry, and they start swinging. Is that what you’re talking about?”

“Anything else unusual?”

Crow thought about it. “Well, we had a pretty bad fire last night. A whole family was killed. ”

“What do you think it was?”

“I’m not a cop anymore, Frank, and I’m not a fire inspector. ”

“A cop’s always a cop,” Ferro countered.

“Maybe, but I’m also out of the loop. Terry was my conduit into the department, and he’s been wired ever since the Ruger thing. ”

Ferro nodded. “What about other things in town? Unexplained deaths, anything like that?”

“Not that I’ve heard of. Saul would be the one to talk to about…” his voice trailed away and he studied Ferro’s eyes. “What exactly did Saul tell you?”

“Hasn’t he spoken to you about his suspicions?”

“What suspicions? What are you talking about?”

Ferro’s eyes were hard for a moment, but then his expression softened and he shook his head. “That’s just it, Crow—I don’t really know what I’m asking. I had a short talk with Saul and all he did was make extremely vague hints and when pressed wouldn’t actually get to any point. If it was anyone else I would have thought he’d been hitting the sauce too hard and was just talking shit, but Saul Weinstock impressed me as one of the more level-headed men in this town, so I’m having a harder time walking away than I otherwise would have. ”

“Any idea what he was hinting at?”

“No. You?”