including Tommy Jensen’s Headless Horseman Hideaway Restaurant and Bar. His effigy of the headless horseman, a good seven or so feet high, lurked on the roadside to attract clientele.
And it had been used to display the head.
The parking lot was filled with cars, mainly cop cars. It was barely 7:00 a.m. At least seven uniformed officers were there, ready to handle crowd control and keep the few cars on the street moving along. A crime scene unit van had just arrived and jerked to a halt, followed seconds later by the ambulance from the morgue.
They’d begun the search for the missing man that morning, just half an hour earlier.
“You’ve done it. You and Rollo have done your jobs,” Lieutenant Purbeck said with a sigh. “Not what we expected to find, or hoped to find, but...” He paused. “But that’s part of Richard Highsmith, anyway.”
The blood was congealing. It had dripped over the crisp collar and seeped onto the shoulders of the white cotton shirt and blue jacket on the should-have-been-headless mannequin. The eyes were open in death, and crows and blackbirds lurked, waiting to attack. Even as Maureen stared up at the atrocity before her, a crow zeroed in, aiming for the soft tissue.
“We’ve got to get that down!” One of the cops, a young man, new to the force—Bobby Magill, Maureen thought—groaned, sounding ill.
“Anyone who’s going to puke, get the hell away from the crime scene! Let’s get it covered!” Lieutenant Purbeck shouted.
At Maureen’s side, Rollo gave one of his deep, bone-jarring barks. Maureen quickly soothed the large wolfhound. “Good job, Rollo,” she murmured. Men scrambled, as Lieutenant Purbeck said, “I want a step...a block...something. We need an investigator up there. And crowd control! Someone arrange detours until we’ve got all this out of here. And I sure as hell don’t want anyone around gaping and snapping shots for Twitter and Facebook!”
Gina Mason, head of the forensics unit, stepped forward and yelled at them. “Get the birds away! And then get some kind of screening set up. We have to preserve the scene! Can we get rigging and tarps around the—the— Around it! Everyone will be breathing down my neck for trace evidence and I’ll have to say we were defeated by a crow!”
Dr. Aaron Mortenson from the coroner’s office had arrived, as well. He got out of his car and walked over to Gina.
“Let the photographer up there first, and then I’ll take a quick look. I won’t disturb anything until you’ve had a chance to get what you need,” he told her.
Mortenson was middle-aged, trim in appearance and always reserved. He saw Mo and Rollo. To her surprise, he nodded to her with something that was almost a smile. A silent acknowledgment that said, Work well done. He sighed loudly. “Since it’s so early, thankfully no four-year-old saw this and realized the head was real. God knows— Halloween. It might well have taken hours even in broad daylight before anyone saw that it wasn’t just part of some grisly display.”
She nodded solemnly back at him.
Lieutenant Purbeck came to stand near Mo, allowing the technicians and the medical examiner the space they needed.
He set a hand on her shoulder.
“I’m okay,” she assured him.
Then she turned away, grasping Rollo’s collar and taking him with her. He’d done his job well. Too well. This was one search she wished she could’ve sat out. Sooner or later, someone would have really looked at the headless horseman that stood outside the entrance to Tommy’s place. The police hadn’t really needed her services. She actually wished that they hadn’t called her; this one was a little too close to home.
“Why my horseman?” Mo heard. She turned.
Tommy Jensen, an old friend—and owner of the Headless Horseman Hideaway Restaurant and Bar—had been allowed through. The restaurant didn’t open until eleven; his staff didn’t even arrive until nine or nine-thirty. But, she realized, looking at his grim face as he stared at the scene, it was his horseman and his parking lot. She figured he’d been called in.
He looked at her bleakly and tried to smile. “Of all the horsemen in all the world...”
Mo touched his arm. He was her senior by a few years; she’d known him since she was ten or so. She recalled that the older girls had often teased him because he’d been a big, awkward kid. He still liked to moan about his dating life. But now that they were all older and presumably more mature, the group she’d hung out with growing up now frequented his restaurant. It was her favorite hangout when friends met up at night for dinner, coffee or drinks. He always took care of them.
He’d been born and bred in the area and was a true lover of the Hudson Valley. He’d owned the restaurant for about two years and it was charming, offering pool tables, dart boards and an “enchanted forest” for young children when their families came for lunch.
Purbeck turned to him. “What time did you leave last night, Tommy?”
Tommy was startled—as if he’d just realized he might be a suspect. “About 2:30 a.m. And I didn’t leave alone. I left with Abby Cole. We cleaned up, locked the place and were together the whole time. I drove her home.”
“And you didn’t see anything? Anything at all unusual?” Purbeck demanded.
Tommy shook his head. “Sir, I’m telling you, we were worn-out. Halloween’s coming, you know? We’re busy. We had to announce last call and practically shove people out of their chairs. When we finally took off, my car was the only one in the lot and...”
“And?”
“I didn’t even glance at the horseman, to be honest. But, like I said, we’d been busy. We had a lot of visitors and people were talking at their cars before leaving. They’d been to the attractions, the haunted houses, the storytelling, all that. So...I’m not a cop, but I don’t see how this could have been done until the wee hours of the morning.”
Purbeck released a sigh. “Call your people. We’re going to have this area closed off for the next five hours or so.”
“The poor guy! I feel really bad about this.” Tommy frowned. “But why did it have to be in front of my place? Oh, Lord, will anyone ever come here again?” he asked, his tone dismayed.
“They’ll flock in—to see where the head of Richard Highsmith was found,” Purbeck said dryly. “You can open, but not until dinner.” He paused, glancing at the scene. “I’m giving my crime scene techs a good five hours. Until then, the crime scene tape stays up. Oh, and, make sure I can get hold of you.”
Tommy looked at Mo. “Don’t leave town, huh?” he said. Then he looked back at Purbeck. “I don’t leave town often, sir, so no worries there. Can I go home?”
“For now. Tell Abby we’ll be talking to her and the staff,” Purbeck added.
Tommy waved as he turned to leave. Then he stopped. “Mo, can you come by later? He could be right about business being okay—or people could be so creeped out, they won’t come anymore.”
“I’ll come by, Tommy,” Mo promised. “I’m sure you’ll be okay.”
She wished she believed
