Bill Hopkins - Judge Rosswell Carew 01 - Courting Murder Read Online Free PDF

was what she thought about springtime. Hitting her again seemed a possibility.
    Babe said, “I think often.”
    “You should be more romantic. Thinking too much means not enough action. Thinking is simply thinking. Action is romantic.”
    “Thinking is my job,” said Babe. “When will we do it?”
    “The execution?” The killer felt Babe move her head, and silence fell for a few moments. “We’ll have to seize the first chance we get. It could be days, weeks. I don’t know.” The killer shook a finger at her, much like a parent scolding a kid who’d raided the cookie jar. “We have to be prepared when opportunity rings the doorbell. We have to be ready at all times.”
    “How will we do it?” Babe said.
    “Who? What? Where? When? How? What are you? A journalist?”
    “If I’m in on this, I need to know how. The plan. How can we have a plan if we don’t have details? You keep springing new details on me and then you won’t tell me other details. I’ve got to know.”
    “A gun would be nice.”
    “And bring the neighbors running? That’s stupid.”
    “I told you,” the killer said, “this place is isolated. Even if one of these ridge runners hears a gunshot, he’ll think it’s one of his kinfolks shooting deer before the poachers kill them off.” Not only did the killer have to grab Babe’s attention, it was work keeping it from wandering.
    Babe said, “There’s more than one way to shoot an old dog.”
    The killer laughed. Babe said something funny? What a miracle!
    “He’s a son of a bitch,” the killer said. “A dog shooting is exactly what we’re going to have. A gun right between the mutt’s ears would turn the deadly trick.” The killer’s target practice had been regular and effective. The shots wouldn’t miss.
    Babe said, “I’d like a gun.”
    “You would. A gun is just like you.” Babe was a woman who loved guns.
    “Or a knife. That would be quiet. Quiet and effective.”
    “Do you have a gun?”
    “No,” Babe said.
    “Also just like you not to have a gun,” the killer said, once again pointing out the obvious. She claimed to love guns yet didn’t have one. “Then how about a knife? You’re right that a knife would be quiet. You have a knife? And I don’t mean a butcher knife. A butcher knife is meant for dead meat. We need a knife meant for live meat.”
    “A knife.” Babe snapped her fingers so hard it sounded like the pop of a firecracker. “Yes, a knife would be quiet and quick.”
    “Got one?”
    “Everybody’s got a knife, and I don’t mean a butcher knife. You can never tell when a knife might come in handier than a thumb on a monkey. There’s a knife in the office.”
    The killer had a better idea. “No, I’ve got it. A hangman’s noose. A nice noose for an execution in this nice place.”
    “A noose it is.” Babe kicked at a sweet smelling golden currant shrub. “It might take longer. Choking takes longer. But it would be quiet and it would work. I’d enjoy watching that dish of crap choke to death.” She crushed several of the shrub’s yellow flowers in her hands. “But what do we do with the body? Bury it here?”
    “That’s the last thing we want to do.”
    Babe said, “Then what?”
    The killer listened to a bullfrog belching love songs for a few seconds before answering.
    “If we dump the body in the middle of everything, where we talked about before, they’ll never suspect us. They’ll never suspect us.”
    “Why? That makes no sense. I’m not sure I understand this part. How would it help us to dump a body on the courthouse square?”
    “We’re smart, outlandishly smart,” the killer said. “They’ll think whoever did it was stupid to dump the scum there. Distraction is our insurance. We’ll be magicians, pointing one way with the right hand while the left hand does the deed. It’s so simple, it’s subtle.”
    To emphasize the feeling of ingenuity for figuring out this part of the plan, the killer kissed her. Deep.