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Mystery
Deadly Forks
by Paul R.
Lloyd
Forks,
Washington, is not what you would call the glamour capital of the
universe, but when the fog lifts on this side of the Olympic
Peninsula, the scenery is among the best anywhere. Unfortunately for
Lieutenant Lawson, more fog lifted from the ground than his head.
“Think it’s
safe to campout with the vampire problem?” Lawson patted his police
issue 38.
What could I
say? “Probably. You’ve got a weapon, right?”
“Lignum Vitae
bullets.” Lawson pulled one out of the side pocket of his suit coat
jacket and held up the greenish dark bullet head with a pronounced
grain pattern.
“You’re
kidding, right?” I took the bullet into my hands. It felt like wood.
“Hard as iron
but still qualifies as wood. Perfect for taking out a vampire. Don’t
know why nobody thought of it before.” Lawson pulled the bullet out
of my hand.
“Maybe there
would actually have to be vampires before somebody worried about
making real wooden bullets. What about werewolves?” I couldn’t keep
from smiling, but it didn’t matter.
Lawson’s eyes
went wide. “There a full moon tonight?”
“Don’t know.”
“Reminds me,”
Lawson said, patting the 22 pistol in the other side pocket of his
suit jacket. “When do the deer turn into elk?”
“What?”
“Doesn’t
matter. Silver bullets in the 22.”
“So I guess
we’ll be safe?” I tried coughing to cover my laughter, but it didn’t
mask the horrific scream from somewhere in the fir forest. “This
way.” I headed into the woods at the edge of town. Doesn't take long
to run out of Forks.
The forests on
the peninsula are thick with trees that shoot up a hundred feet or
more, leaving a dark space beneath for deer to play or vampires to
flock if you’re into bloody teenage romance. The girl was easy to
find after the second scream despite the shadows.
“What
happened?” I asked her.
“She’s dead.
They killed my friend.” The girl’s hands were over her mouth so it
was difficult to understand her.
“Who?” Lawson
asked.
“Vampires.”
I took a
gander at the dead girl’s neck. She was flat on the ground on her
back with the top of her head touching the screamer’s shoes. The
screamer stepped back as I knelt to examine the body. “Two puncture
wounds to the neck, Lawson.”
“Any other
teeth marks?” Lawson looked down at me with those
deer-in-the-headlights eyes of his.
“There are no
teeth marks, Lawson. This is your run of the mill murder. The
puncture wounds form perfect circles like an old fashioned ice pick
would make.”
“Or a sixteen
penny common nail?” Lawson asked.
“Yeah. A
sixteen d common. Well, more like a twelve, but either way she’s
dead. The weapon punctured her juggler in two places. She must have
bled profusely.”
Lawson pointed
at the body like he knew something. “Vampires sucked it all up. See,
no blood on her blouse.”
“Killed
elsewhere,” I said. “Some creep cleaned her up and dumped her here.”
Lawson looked
at the girl. “What do you know about this, sweetheart?”
“She’s my
friend Suzy Quanto. We were camping with Douglas First and Richard
Spooner.”
“Camping
nearby?” I asked.
“Just over
that rise. I woke up early, went for a walk. You know, to count the
trees.”
“How many?”
Lawson asked.
“Never mind
him,” I said. “He’s city.” Turning to Lawson, I said, “She had to
take a leak and didn’t want a crowd so she took a little walk. She
found her girlfriend dead and screamed.” I eyeballed the
teenybopper. “That about right?”
“Yes.”
“Where are the
boys?” Lawson asked.
“Back at camp.
Like I said, it’s just over that way.”
“They didn’t
come running when you screamed twice?” I asked.
“Teenage boys,
you know.” The girl placed her hands on her hips like I was supposed
to understand about young men not waking up when one of their
girlfriends screams her head off.
“Let’s go
visit the campsite and see if the boys are ready to wake up,” I
said.
Two hours
later, the sheriff had the murder scene under control and the guilty
person in custody. They also had a red pickup impounded. My eyes
popped when I saw the six strips of bacon that arrived with the two
eggs over medium I ordered in the local restaurant. Yeah, it was the
restaurant from the movie, except the movie wasn’t actually filmed
in Forks, but hey, it was close enough to fill an August morning
with teenage girl type tourists and their tow-along parents.
“You know
what’s on my mind,” Lawson said as he snagged a bite of hot cakes.
“You want to
know how I did it, right?”
“Like always.”
I swallowed
some coffee and jumped in. “You’ll recall that Douglas First claimed
he didn’t do it. He said he was with the sophomore at the time of
the murder and that I should check with the sophomore to confirm his
alibi.”
The waitress
poured us both another cup of java.
Lawson leapt
for the sugar bowl. “What did the sophomore say?”
“Sophomore
confirmed the story. They were together. Then the sophomore said
something interesting.”
“What was
that?” Lawson stirred his mug.
“The sophomore
said that the junior and Tanya Rock were spending a lot of time
together, if you get my drift.”
“Yeah, I get
it. Anything else?” Lawson chewed a bite of hotcake.
“I talked to
Richard Spooner and he said he hasn’t been spending all that much
time with the junior. He prefers to hang out with the senior.”
“That’s all
you needed to know?” Lawson reached for his mug.
“Only one of
the three suspects could have done it, right?” I jammed a bite of
bacon into my yap.
“Yep. Had to
be Douglas First, Tanya Rock or Richard Spooner.”
“The sophomore
and Douglas First have provided an alibi for each other, right?”
“Yep.
“So that only
leaves one suspect, right?”
“Of course.
The murderer has to be…”
Whodunit?
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