Touchy and Feely (Sissy Sawyer Mysteries) Read Online Free PDF Page A

Rycerska.’
    ‘Oh. Sure. I’m Trooper Baxter Patrick. And that’s Trooper Willy Jones.’ Both troopers looked about seventeen years old, with creamy boys’ complexions and rosy cheeks. Baxter Patrick had gingery hair and Willy Jones had a little black mustache that must have taken him about six months of hard straining.
    ‘Do we know exactly when this happened, Trooper?’
    ‘Three-oh-seven. Willy and me was out looking for a stolen quad bike. We was less than five minutes away, at Allen’s Corners.’
    ‘Talked to any of these people yet?’ Steve asked him. ‘Which of them were eyewitnesses and which weren’t?’
    ‘Only the cashier saw it actually happen. The victim’s spouse was in the vehicle at the time, but she happened to be looking the other way.’
    ‘And these others?’
    ‘Stopped to help, when they saw that there was something wrong.’
    ‘Nobody touched anything?’
    ‘The victim’s wife gave him CPR, that’s all.’
    ‘Some people watch too much TV,’ said Doreen. Doreen was small and pasty-faced and sharp-featured, with unusually pale eyes. ‘CPR’s not much help for missing brains.’
    Steve looked around the gas station, and across the highway, to the abandoned diner, and the woods. ‘Anybody see anything? Anybody hear a shot?’
    Trooper Patrick shook his head. ‘According to the cashier, the guy just dropped.’ He opened his notebook and said, ‘Howard Stanton, aged forty-seven years old, realtor, 1441 Pine Vista, Sherman.’
    They heard a siren approaching. An ambulance pulled into the filling station, followed by a Jeep from the coroner’s department. Steve walked over to the Ford Explorer where Sylvia Stanton was sitting in the passenger seat, with a plaid blanket wrapped around her. She was being comforted by a plain-looking woman with greasy blonde hair. Sylvia’s eyes were wild and she was shaking as uncontrollably as if she had Parkinson’s disease.
    ‘Mrs Stanton? My name’s Detective Steven Wintergreen, Connecticut State Police. This is Detective Doreen Rycerska. We’re deeply sorry for your loss, Mrs Stanton.’
    ‘I could take her home,’ said the plain-looking woman.
    ‘That won’t be necessary, thank you. She’s in shock. We’ll take her to the hospital and have her checked out.’
    ‘She needs warm milk with a shot of brandy in it,’ the woman persisted. ‘My mother gave my father warm milk with a shot of brandy in it, when he sawed all his fingers off.’
    ‘I’ll remember that,’ said Doreen. ‘You know, if ever I—’ and she loosely flapped her wrist.
    ‘You’ve been very helpful,’ Steve told the woman, and smiled. The woman nodded, and then scowled at Doreen. Doreen took no notice. Doreen was used to being scowled at. Her husband Newton had walked out on her the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and taken the children, and the dog, and the First Connecticut savings book. She badly missed the savings book.
    Steve took hold of Sylvia’s hands. ‘Mrs Stanton, we’re going to get you to the hospital, but first I have to ask you a couple of questions.’
    Sylvia stared at him, still shaking. ‘I didn’t see anything. I was trying to tune the radio. I didn’t even see him fall down.’
    ‘You didn’t notice anybody lurking around the filling station?’
    ‘Nobody. No.’
    ‘You didn’t see any passing vehicles on the highway, moving very slowly, maybe?’
    Sylvia shook her head.
    ‘How about stationary vehicles?’
    ‘There was nobody else here. We were the only customers.’
    ‘Did you hear anything? Like a car backfire?’
    ‘I didn’t see anything and I didn’t hear anything. I only looked around because Howard seemed to be taking such a long time to pay for the gas. That’s when I saw him, lying on the ground. I thought . . . he’s fallen over, why doesn’t he get up?’
    ‘And you didn’t see anybody else in the vicinity? Or any vehicles?’
    ‘Not that I can recall, no.’
    Doreen said, ‘Mrs Stanton, do you know