Hunting Season by Nevada Barr Page B

curiosity had been piqued. She wanted a go at the feisty old lady.
    "Looks like we come back tomorrow," she said disappointedly.
    "Wait," the sheriff replied. "Raymond's thinking, is my bet. Figuring the ramifications. How's answering versus not answering going to look in the local newspaper."
    "Maybe he's hoping we'll bust the door down and find him protecting the privacy of his sainted mum."
    Clintus laughed. "He'd love that." Local politics, for all that it seemed small-time to outsiders, carried much of the same low-down, mud-slinging, high-stakes ramifications as a bid for the presidency.
    Anna promised herself never to run for office even if an adoring constituency begged her.
    The sound of footsteps approaching announced the end of undertaker Barnette's cogitations. The heavy oak swung inward a foot or so, and Raymond extruded onto the porch pulling the door shut behind him. A mask of empathy was fitted over his features, but Anna sensed satisfied complacency beneath.
    "How's your mama doing?" Clintus asked, southern manners at the fore.
    Barnette shook his head in slow theatrical sadness. "It's a bad shock. I've called Doc Fingerhut. He's phoned in a prescription. Poor Mama is used to hard times. She'll weather." He tried a brave and understanding smile, but it was ruined by the oversized incisors.
    "We need to ask her a few questions," Clintus pressed on. "See if she can shed any light on where your brother was last night, who he was with."
    Barnette hesitated. Then, perhaps remembering he might hold the job of sheriff in the not-so-distant future, relented. "Don't be too long about it." Turning, he dug a set of keys out of his trouser pocket. He'd locked the front door behind him when he'd come out. Not since she'd lived in New York City had Anna seen such a paranoid display of personal security.
    The inside of the house was so dark it took a moment for Anna's eyes to adjust. Blinds were drawn on the windows, then reinforced with heavy drapes, as if light was the enemy. Heavy furniture of antique design crouched in the gloom. Wallpaper was dark, a brown and pink background for pictures framed in dark wood, subjects indecipherable in the dim light.
    Every available surface was cluttered with magazines, newspapers and cast-off clothing. Beer cans, half-eaten bags of chips and paper plates bearing crumbs finished the classic bachelor decor.
    "Doyce lived downstairs," his brother explained as they threaded their way through the darkling mess. "Mama lives up."
    Though the day was perfect, the temperature hovering in the low seventies with a slight breeze, the house was closed up tight. By the dusty fall of the heavy drapes, Anna doubted the windows had been opened in years. In place of the rich living air of the outdoors they were left with the chill flat touch of air-conditioning. It gave the Barnette ancestral home the same feel as Barnette's Funeral Home.
    Remembering the dirty plates littering Doyce's lair, Anna looked on the bright side. Perhaps the air-conditioning kept the smells to a minimum.
    Though the house was only two stories, the ceilings were close to fourteen feet high and to reach the upper floor they climbed two foreshortened flights. A window with a magnolia in stained glass shed green and yellow light on the landing where the stairs turned back on themselves. Below the window hung a flyspecked oil painting of the Last Supper.
    Anna's knowledge of biblical history was sketchy at best but she seemed to remember the Last Supper was eaten somewhere in the vicinity of the Garden of Gesthemane.
    "Sins against a holy God"; one of the lines circled in red at the murder scene. Anna shook off the thought. Probably half the homes in Adams County had religious images scattered across their walls. Besides, regardless of how tough old Mama Barnette was, she just wasn't big enough to lug around a piece of dead meat the size and heft of her older boy.
    After the pizza crust and old gym socks ambience of the