Stitch In Snow by Anne McCaffrey

Author:Anne McCaffrey [Anne McCaffrey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Transworld
Published: 1985-01-05T05:00:00+00:00

8

WHEN I WALKED up the ramp in Denver, I had graduated from Visiting Celebrity to Murder Witness. This makes for flash photos and newspaper reporters and an entirely different sort of reception I’d rather not endure again.

Fortunately Peter Taggert was there. After my first confusion of shouting ‘no comment’ my arm was grabbed by a stocky man in an elegant pinstripe suit with one of those expensive patterned tie and shirt combinations. He elbowed two reporters out of the way and placed his broad back between me and the other important members of the press.

‘I’m Pete Taggert, Mrs. Lovell, if you’ll just come with me.’ He ran interference. ‘No comment, boys. You can see Mrs. Lovell later. Right now, I got her. This way, Mrs. Lovell.’ He seemed to pow/barn/crash on my name. But he could pow/barn/crash through the reporters.

‘Give me your baggage checks, Mrs. Lovell,’ he said to me in an undertone as we raced down the slick corridor.

He gave them in turn to someone running beside us and then veered suddenly to our right, through a door marked ‘private’, down some steps leading to a corridor, through a door to the back VIP parking. He guided me to a big, dark green Buick convertible. We were away, zooming out of the airport, neat as you please.

There were still snowdrifts lining the roads.

‘First, Mrs. Lovell, thanks for calling today. You’re saving Jerry’s life. Second, let me apologize for dragging your son into this but that was the only clue we had to your whereabouts without a police search. I don’t think guest lecturers would appreciate that kind of attention. Jerry’d seen your son’s address on a letter. He wanted me to get that straight with you first. Third, having got you here I’d better tell you that this is going to be a nasty case.’

He kept his eyes on the road as he talked so that I had only his rather rough profile to look at and no indication of his attitude or feelings. He drove fast but well and spoke in a low, well placed voice which was conversational rather than obviously controlled.

‘There’ve been some snide cracks about your existence, Mrs. Lovell . . .’

‘Why did you emphasize my name so heavily at the airport?’

‘Jerry said you were quick . . .’ He grinned.

‘I also know him as Dan rather than Jerry . . .’

‘So he said. About your name, his is Lowell.’

‘Close but no cigar . . .’

‘Not when you see the handwriting on your room bill. It looks like Lovell. Clerk error, okay, but the prosecution is making out that you knew each other before; that your presence in the hotel was pre-arranged . . .’

‘And the murder?’

‘The alibi was pre-arranged . . . so the murder could be committed with impunity.’

I felt cold and a bit sick.

‘I suppose we arranged the snowstorm, too?’

‘They’d like it if you had.’ Peter Taggert’s mouth curved down in a sour smile.

‘I’d never met Dan . . . Jerry . .

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