Colors of Blood by Gerrie Ferris Finger

Author:Gerrie Ferris Finger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: horse racing, saratoga, race track, belmont
Publisher: Bold Venture Press

26

The sheriff explained about Frank’s firing. “Frank told his drinking buddies he was going back to Loblolly Farm. Lombard refutes that. Never would hire him back. Disruptive. Then after that, he disappeared. Nobody’s quite sure when. Back then we didn’t find a soul who saw or spoke to him in the last few days before he was missed by friends. The rumor was he was messing with the lads, sexual-like. No one would talk. It went cold fast. Now, well, we got the body, if it is his body.”

“I can believe Wells fired Frank for spouting off at him, especially if he was propositioning the staff.”

“These horse managers think they got to be tough. The ones coming here from down under put up with it. They hardly speak English anyway. The Frank rider, I saw him once at Loblolly. He was arrogant on a horse. Sassed Otis that day.”

There was another thing he hadn’t confided earlier. I asked. “Did your body in the woods in any way resemble Frank Dupain?”

“Just being a small person is all. His own mother wouldn’t have known him.”

We were parked on the shoulder of the road just off the entrance to Hollow Meadow Farm waiting when a gray cloud perched directly above us spilled its bags. In ten minutes Callie Agner’s vehicle should be exiting the gates. “Black truck, big tires,” Travis said of her vehicle. I was on the lookout for it.

Travis cell-phoned his deputy to catch up on what was going on at the cop shop, and I reviewed what I’d learned so far in South Carolina. All my professional life, on all my cases, complex or easy, I’d asked questions, sought answers, mulled facts, studied evidence. Much more slippery and treacherous than hard data, though, was that I sought out feelings—expressed or repressed. I believed that in feelings there lay the complexities of truth and comprehension. What had I learned today that would lead me to such understanding? What had I witnessed of the people I talked to? I’d learned that the small body in the forest was likely that of Francois Dupain. For some reason the sheriff doled out his information in sequels. The sheriff had obviously questioned Harry Wells about the missing Hollow Meadow rider named Frank as a possibility for his body in the woods. Why didn’t he tell me that in the beginning? Or about messing with the lads. He reminded me of a card player who liked to sling out trump cards as he went along, showing off his prowess.

Harry Wells hadn’t wanted to be again questioned about Dupain, but he let me know that the rider had been kicked out of his barn. Maybe literally.

And the pompous Whitehead? Who knew what feelings lay buried in his bureaucratic heart. How much did the sheriff and Doctor Whitehead know but weren’t saying about Soire’s getting on at Loblolly Farm? What had Whitehead wanted to discuss with Travis after our conversation ended abruptly.

Earlier the sheriff let out an informational hold-back when he mentioned Evangeline’s calling him from the airport.

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