Death of a Jester by Deb Richardson-Moore

Author:Deb Richardson-Moore
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781782642657
Publisher: Lion Hudson
Published: 2018-05-08T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Malachi finished his eggs and bacon at St James AME, and carried his coffee out the door. He usually helped with clean-up, but not today. He was in a hurry to get a newspaper.

He walked down South Main, quiet before folks headed to church. He passed in front of the Rambler building, quiet, too, now that the morning edition had been delivered. He ducked into a side alley, where a recycle barrel beside the loading dock held discarded papers – ones not good enough to throw on driveways. He helped himself.

He took the paper to a bench on South Main and read every word about Miz Branigan and Cleo finding Andre Arneson on their farm, the boy’s return to his family, Shack’s murder. Of course, he knew a good bit of the story already. TV had it last night, and details had whipped through Tent City like a tornado.

Still, the paper had some stuff he didn’t know. How the boy said a clown had biked him to the first place, which turned out to be the barn of someone named Satterfield. How he claimed he’d seen two clowns. Nothing about the boy seeing the murder, though.

Malachi read on to see if the reporters had the part about Andre seeing a clown in the homeless camp days before his kidnapping – the part he’d overheard at Miz Isabella’s office door. Yep, there it was. He sat back. Miz Branigan and her friends had done a good job.

Malachi let out a long sigh. Truth was, he was relieved. Immensely relieved. He laughed out loud when he flipped inside to see a picture of Cleo, sitting like a queen on Miz Branigan’s side steps. He was acquainted with the big shepherd and appreciated how protective she was of Miz Branigan.

Now that he knew he’d had nothing to do with the kidnapping – that his blackout on the hill above Tent City 2 was unconsciousness and nothing else – he was eager to talk to Miz Branigan and Detective Scovoy.

Because, despite his drunkenness, maybe he’d seen something the night of the kidnapping.

Okay, but where to start? Twice Malachi thought he’d seen swirls of white in the woods outside Tent City 2: once, before he ever heard about any clowns, and once when Miz Arneson came in, dragging Andre with her. He’d dismissed it at the time. But could it have been those giant white clown pants the reporters wrote about?

Also, Andre said a clown had approached him with candy when he was alone in the camp bathroom with his sister Stacy outside. Was that when the kidnapping was supposed to take place? Did the kidnapper see Stacy and fear she’d raise a ruckus?

A thought occurred to him, and his eyes shot open. Was Andre even the specific target? There’d been clown sightings at Oliver Creek Apartments, the elementary school and Glenden Arms. Was the kidnapper simply seeking a kid, any kid?

Surely he could’ve got more in ransom by snatching another kid. But ransom didn’t seem to be the point.

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