A Carnival of Killing by Glenn Ickler Read Free Book Online

sort of like a turkey watching the farmer sharpening his ax.
    Okay, I thought, that leaves me with four other red cloaks and Vulcanus Rex himself to question during the lunch break. I didn’t want to push any of them too hard, but at the very least I wanted to find out which ones had been questioned by the police. That would give me a starting point for my next chat with Detective Curtis Brown.
     
     

Chapter Six
    The Heat is On
     
    Mere words cannot convey the wonderful feeling of being inside the Crowne Plaza Hotel and immersing myself in an enduring envelope of heat. Wonderful, that is, after a brief period of needles lancing through my fingers and several minutes of knife points stabbing into my toes as my tortured digits returned from their state of cryogenic suspension.
    “Thank god we’re only doing this for one day,” Al said as he banged his toes against the carpeted floor in an effort to restore circulation. “I can’t imagine these guys freezing their asses off every day for … how long?”
    “The carnival runs twelve days,” I said. “I don’t know if they’re out in that damn truck every day, but I’m guessing at least ten.”
    “Give me a sweaty day at the Aquatennial any time,” Al said.
    This would be the Minneapolis Aquatennial, which occurs in August when the daytime temperatures range from eighty-five to ninety-five degrees.
    “That does seem like a more appropriate time to water ski,” I said.
    “It’s a more appropriate time to do anything outdoors. I swear my toes are frost-bitten from standing around on that cake of ice by the river.”
    “Think about that water skier’s bare feet.”
    “I’m remembering how she looked in that skin-tight rubber dry suit and thinking about more than her feet being bare.”
    “A shocking statement by a married man,” I said. Al’s wife is an extremely attractive blue-eyed blonde whose figure is still svelte after giving birth to a daughter and a son.
    “I’m speaking strictly as a photographer,” Al said. “I constantly try to get to the bottom of things.”
    Vulcanus Rex and his Krewe ate lunch at a long table in the room where we’d met them that morning. As we ate, I was able to get a better look at their faces because they’d removed their hats and goggles, but I didn’t recognize any of them as men who’d been featured in the news.
    I was seated between Grand Duke Fertilious, blond, blue-eyed, round-faced and younger than I expected, and Baron Hot Sparkus, who was older (early forties), thinner and less willing to chat up a reporter. Fertilious wanted to question me about journalistic procedures and ethics. Hot Sparkus, who I wanted to question about Lee-Ann Nordquist’s last visit to a bar, was engaged in a long conversation with Klinker, who was seated on his other side.
    Our desserts were before us when I finally managed to detach myself from Fertilious and get in a word with Hot Sparkus. He was a square-faced, broad-shouldered man in his mid-thirties with bushy black eyebrows and a heavy five o’clock shadow. According to the Vulcans’ Website, Hot Sparkus was “the spark plug of the Krewe,” whatever that meant.
    I had decided to take a less direct approach to questions about who was in the bar with the murdered Klondike Kate, so we talked about the Carnival in general, the role of Vulcans and, finally, about the role of Klondike Kate. Our conversation was pleasant and relaxed until I asked if he had been acquainted with the unfortunate Lee-Ann Nordquist.
    Even this roundabout tactic failed. The man’s back and shoulders went rigid. “What’s Lee-Ann Nordquist got to do with your story about riding with us?” he asked.
    “Nothing really, but I’m working on the murder story as well, so I’m looking for comments from people who knew her.”
    “You’re sure she was murdered?”
    “I don’t think she took off her coat and laid down in that frozen driveway and died all by herself. Do you?”
    “Well, it seems to