Proof Positive: A Joe Gunther Novel (Joe Gunther Series) by Archer Mayor Read Free Book Online Page B

rarely guilty of such a companionable gesture.
    What he said was even more unusual. “Interesting. Made me think about an old case in New York when I heard about it, dating back to the late ’40s. Two recluse brothers named Collyer. Lived in a four-story brownstone. People smelled something bad, cops broke in, and found one of them dead in his own booby trap and the other dead of starvation. Supposedly the second one had been paralyzed for years and dependent on the first for food. Pathetic whacko’s, of course, but famous for all that. For years after, the New York Fire Department used to call a hoarder’s house a ‘Collyer.’ They’re basically death traps. I’m not surprised your nutcase got himself killed.”
    Joe looked up in amazement. He was struggling to recall when he’d last heard Willy go on about any historical tidbit. Lester Spinney, another member of their four-person squad, indulged without the slightest provocation, but Willy?
    “That was called in by a thief, right?” Willy asked.
    “Yeah,” Joe replied. “Jason Newville. You know him?”
    “I know who he knows. I’ve seen him, is all. Too low on the totem pole. He steal anything before he found the body?”
    Increasingly intrigued by Willy’s interest, Joe told him, “No, but he made two prior visits before he fell over the body. I guess he was scoping the place out and building up courage.”
    Willy laughed. “That fits. You met him?”
    “Newville?” Joe asked. “No. Why?”
    “Total wimp, from what I know. Still, I can see the appeal of a hoarder house. The Collyer place had something like fourteen pianos, a car in the basement, maybe twenty-five thousand books—about a hundred and forty tons of crap, total.”
    “Why would any of that appeal to Newville?” Joe wanted to know.
    “Because of the value of it all. The Collyers’ estate was priced at over a million bucks, in 1947 dollars,” Willy stated. “That’s what sticks to these loonies: Every hoader’s somehow sitting on a pile of gold coins. Burglars circle these dumps like flies on shit. You been to a hoarder house, haven’t you?”
    “Sure,” Joe conceded, recalling several without hesitation.
    “You ever see anything other than a thousand stuffed teddy bears, or a million moldy newspapers, or the world’s biggest stack of garbage bags full of clothes? Or all three?”
    “No.”
    Willy returned to his desk across the small room, still speaking. “Well, there you have it. That’s the truth of it. But I guarantee you that every chicken-headed, douche bag thief I know will swear on a stack of Bibles that all hoarders are just millionaires dressed by Goodwill. Dumber than hell.”
    He sat down and without another word began poking through some paperwork, his interest in Joe’s research extinguished as quickly as it had caught fire.
    Joe resumed watching the screen as Rachel followed the late Ben Kendall around his cluttered realm. Embarrassed to be counted among Willy’s misinformed losers, he couldn’t deny sharing the notion that there was something rational lurking beneath Ben’s mania. After all, wasn’t it smart to hide something in the midst of plenty?
    Of course, in Joe’s case, it wasn’t necessarily jewels or money that he was envisioning. It was answers.
    *   *   *
    Rachel hesitated getting out of the car at the end of Ben’s rutted driveway.
    “You sure you’re okay with this?” Joe asked her.
    She nodded once sharply. “Positive.” She pulled open the door handle. “It’s just a little weird, coming back.”
    They entered the clearing side by side, Joe watchful, as cops tend to be; Rachel more introverted, her eyes straight ahead.
    “I looked at the video you sent me,” he told her as they approached the main house. “You could tell how Ben warmed to you, in short order.”
    “I think he was lonely,” she responded. “He got along with everybody, but it was mostly on the surface. I noticed that when we went out collecting, he