The Skeleton's Knee by Archer Mayor Read Free Book Online Page A

want him burning the place down with the old oil lamps that were there.”
    “Did you give him the refrigerator?” I asked, trying to widen the view he’d allowed me of their relationship.
    Coyner nodded. “I was getting rid of it.”
    I couldn’t shake the impression that Coyner was not the renting type, unless there’d been some irresistible angle. “How often did you see him?”
    “Barely saw him at all.”
    “Monthly?”
    “Not even. He never moved from the place.”
    “Didn’t he ask you what you needed from his garden?”
    “He knew, after a while; I’m a man of regular habits. If something special came up, we left notes. Said he wanted to be left alone—no ifs, ands, or buts. So that’s what I did. I wasn’t interested anyhow. If he wanted to be a hermit, it was fine with me.”
    “But you called the ambulance,” I insisted.
    “He was supposed to drop some stuff off. I got to wondering. He had regular habits, too.”
    “Lucky for him.”
    “Guess not.”
    I smiled inwardly. Sentimental he was not, but I suspected that after twenty years, at least an element of predictability had been disrupted by Fuller’s death, which had resulted in the closest thing Fred Coyner would ever come to mourning.
    “Mr. Coyner, I noticed Fuller had a lot of supplies and equipment to keep his garden going. How did he pay for it?”
    “Guess he was a rich guy.”
    I feigned surprise. “Really? He didn’t look it.”
    “Well, he was.” Coyner’s face suddenly became stern. I could sense a concern that he’d said too much.
    I kept pressing. “Did he pay for fixing the house up, too? A lot of that work doesn’t date back twenty years.”
    “Yeah.”
    “He did pay for it?”
    Coyner’s lips were compressed to two thin white lines. He nodded wordlessly.
    I shook my head and whistled softly. “I guess he was loaded. You said he never left the place. How did he buy the building materials, the gardening equipment, all the rest of it?”
    Coyner was becoming restless; his hands found one another and began unconsciously fidgeting. “I got it. He’d leave a note.”
    I moved to throw him further off balance. “And a hundred-dollar bill or two.”
    His back stiffened and he chewed his lower lip for a moment. “I got work to do.” He began to walk off.
    My voice lost its leisurely tone. “We’ll have to finish this sometime. Me or maybe the State’s Attorney or the state police.”
    He stopped and glared back at me. “They’ll be trespassing.”
    I shook my head. “No they won’t. But they’ll drag you into this further than you want to go. It’s your choice.”
    He suddenly grimaced and clenched his fists. “So what if he paid in hundred-dollar bills? Wasn’t my business.”
    “Didn’t say it was. What else did you buy for him?”
    Coyner shrugged, his fists loosening somewhat. “Supplies—whole wheat, tofu, nuts and berries, and anything else he needed. I’d get most of it in Bratt.”
    “How did you two first meet?”
    His expression remained guarded, but he became a bit freer with what he knew. “He found me. Somebody must’ve told him about the house. Said he wanted to be left alone, that the world was a shitty place. He also said he’d make it worth my while, and he did, and that’s all there was to it. I let him alone and he did likewise.”
    “There’s a lot more food growing around that house than two men can eat. Did he let you sell the surplus?” The fists closing again was confirmation enough. I moved on quickly. “He ever have visitors?”
    “Early on, when he was adding onto the building.”
    “You never saw who?”
    “They came and left at night. I don’t know who, or how many, but I do know it stopped.”
    “When?”
    “Same time—’bout twenty years back.”
    “And nobody since?”
    “Nope.”
    “What about the newer construction? Did he bring people in to help him? Or did you do it?”
    “He did it himself—alone.”
    “And you never saw him leave the