A grave denied by Dana Stabenow

was rueful. “Neither of us is much good with a hammer. She told us to talk to Mr. Dreyer. He did a good job of it, too.”
     
    “Had to pay him in cash, though, he wouldn’t take a check,” Oscar said. “There isn’t a cash machine in Niniltna, did you know that?”
     
    “No, I didn’t,” Kate said.
     
    “I had to write a check and have that pilot guy fly it into Ahtna and cash it for me at the bank and bring the cash back.”
     
    “Imagine,” Kate said gravely. Oscar was oblivious but Keith gave her a sharp look, which she met with an innocent stare. “About Len Dreyer,” she said. “Did he mention any family or friends, or where he came from? Any arguments he might have gotten into with another Park rat?”
     
    The men looked at each other, and gave a simultaneous shrug. “I don’t remember anything like that,” Keith said. “He showed up, and when he did, he worked. I was so grateful, I wasn’t about to ask any questions. We needed that greenhouse up and running.”
     
    “Before winter?”
     
    “Sure. We installed a couple of propane stoves at either end, and grew stuff straight through the year.”
     
    “You must have laid in one hell of a lot of propane,” Kate said.
     
    “Yeah, our biggest expense,” Oscar said gloomily. Gloom seemed to be key to his personality. “We’ll be lucky if we break even this year, even if we don’t draw salaries.”
     
    Kate almost asked them what they were growing, but thought better of it just in time. “So you don’t remember any personal information about Len Dreyer.”
     
    “I didn’t even know his first name was Len,” Oscar said.
     
    “He’s good with corrugated plastic, though,” Keith said. “That roof is watertight.”
     
    “He was good,” Kate said. “He’s dead.”
     
    “What?”
     
    “He was shot. With a shotgun.” She looked at Oscar, still holding what upon closer inspection proved to be a very old side-by-side with some very fancy silver work.
     
    Oscar gulped and paled beneath his dark skin. “Well, I didn’t shoot him.”
     
    “Didn’t say you did,” Kate said.
     
    “Who are you, again?” Keith said.
     
    “I’m Kate Shugak. I’m —assisting Jim Chopin, the state trooper posted to Niniltna, in his inquiries into Dreyer’s murder.”
     
    Keith put a comforting hand on Oscar’s shoulder. “It’s all right, Oscar. I don’t think Ms. Shugak—”
     
    “Call me Kate.”
     
    Keith smiled. “I don’t think Kate is going to clap us into irons just yet.”
     
    “Do you remember any shots fired near here last fall?” They shook their heads. She nodded at the shotgun. “Have you fired that lately?”
     
    Oscar proffered it mutely. Kate broke it open. It was unloaded, and dusty with disuse.
     
    “It was my father’s,” Oscar said. “I don’t know what the right shells for it are. I don’t even know if it still shoots.”
     
    Kate handed it back, thanked them for their time, and left.
     
    “Burned down?” Bobby said. “Recently?”
     
    Kate shook her head, earning a thwack from Dinah. She sat on a stool, enveloped in a sheet, while Dinah trimmed her hair. Katya slid from her knee and headed for the open door at flank speed. Her mother downed scissors long enough for an intercept and deposited Katya in a floodplain of toys in the living room. “It’s cold and wet, and I found some ice when I kicked around a little. I’d say somebody torched it last fall.”
     
    “You sure somebody torched it?”
     
    “Absent conclusive forensic evidence, no, I suppose not. However, considering that it was Len’s cabin, and that Len’s body has just been found under Grant Glacier, and that Len underwent a radical lungectomy with a shotgun sometime in the past year, yeah, I’m pretty sure.”
     
    Unperturbed, Bobby said, “Where did he live, anyway? When I got him to do the roof, I got him through Bernie.”
     
    “He hung out at the Roadhouse?”
     
    “Who doesn’t? Where was his