“Yeah. Buddy of mine said a bud of this guy he knows was going to be in town for the weekend without a car and needed somebody to drive him around.” He shrugged. “Paid me decent. Cash, too.”
“Where did you take him?”
“Did more waiting than taking. Don’t know why he didn’t rent a car. I told him so, but he said I was stupid to talk myself out of a job.” Mitchell shrugged. “Hey, I was trying to save him money, but whatever.”
“You drove him around town?”
“What?” He tipped his head the other way to look at my computer from another angle. “In Chilson, you mean? Hardly any.”
My breath stopped, but my heart beat on and on, whooshing air through my veins and arteries so loudly that I could hardly hear anything else. I sucked in air and my ears started working again. “Then where did you take him?” To the farmhouse? The answer to Stan’s murder couldn’t really be so simple, could it? If anyone could have missed a murder happening under his nose, it would be Mitchell.
“Casino.” He pointed at the computer. “You looking to buy some property? I could find you some cheap acreage, if you want. There’s a sweet quarter section I know about, lots of maples you could harvest, probably pay for itself and then some. And the guy who owns an eighty next to me wants to sell.”
I swallowed down a laugh. Me, buy eighty acres of land? Mitchell obviously didn’t know the size of my salary. “Which casino?”
“More like which one didn’t we go to.” Mitchell shook his head. “I don’t get gambling. I mean, sure, maybe you’ll win sometimes, but those places aren’t dumps. You got to figure they’re making money hand over hand.”
Little spin, Gunnar had said.
“You don’t gamble, Minnie, do you?” Mitchell asked.
Not unless you counted waking up every morning. “So you drove Gunnar around to casinos? You didn’t drive him around the rest of the county?”
“Here, you mean?” Mitchell pointed at the map on my computer screen.
I’d been using the county’s geographic information system. This view showed property lines and I’d zoomed into the eastern part of the county. One click on a parcel and up came details like legal description and taxable value. And property owner. I was poking around at the properties near where the bookmobile had been damaged, but I wasn’t reaching any conclusions. I needed more information and I had no clue how to get it.
Mitchell tapped the screen. “Can you move the picture over this way? A little more . . . yeah. This long skinny property here? I was out there cutting trees for some guy a few weeks ago. Ash. Dead from that emerald borer bug. Ever see one? They’re kind of cool looking, for bugs.”
“A few weeks ago?” I echoed. “Around when Stan Larabee was killed?”
“Uh, yeah. I guess. A little before, maybe.” He put his index finger on the screen, guaranteeing a streaky fingerprint I’d have to clean up later. “Is that where that farmhouse is? Can you turn on the picture?”
I clicked a few clicks, changing the base map from property lines to aerial photography. Though the resolution wasn’t anywhere near CSI standards, it was easy enough to make out the straight lines and regular planes of a roof. “There it is,” I said, trying not to see into my memory.
“That’s the place? Huh.” Mitchell rubbed his jaw, which, since it looked like he hadn’t bothered to shave in three days, made a sandpapery sort of noise.
“What?” I asked.
“Sometimes your brain just clicks things together, you know?”
I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what things were rattling around in Mitchell’s head, but I asked anyway.
“Well,” he said. “Two things. That Olson guy. I asked him why he came to Chilson instead of Petoskey or Traverse, and he said his dad used to bring him up here hunting. From what he said, this is the place.” He left another fingerprint on the screen, one that was centered on a property maybe half a mile south of the old Larabee farm. “He said there was this old junky cabin they stayed at. Wonder if it’s still there?”
The back of my neck tightened. “What was the other thing?” I whispered.
“What’s that? Oh, the other thing. When I was out there, cutting that wood, I saw some guy on a quad going up the hill behind that farmhouse where you found Larabee. Pretty sure, anyway.”
“Pretty sure that was the house or pretty sure you saw a guy on a quad?”
“Huh?” He stared at me. “Oh. Both, I guess.”
“You have to tell the police,” I said.