“I refuse to get my hopes up,” she stoically said. “Do you really think she’s still alive?”
“It’s just an instinct. But yes. For one thing, Boston terriers are not a hot item for dog thieves. They have bat ears, bulging eyes that look at the walls, and their little nub of a corkscrew tail doesn’t cover anything important, if you know what I mean. Not to mention their flat faces, their tendency to get bald in spots, and their intelligence, which far surpasses that of most of their owners–not including you, of course. I would assume the dogs of choice for thieves are Labs, miniature collies, cocker spaniels, and maybe dachshunds.”
“Then Popeye may have been stolen as part of some bigger scheme that we don’t know about yet,” Hammer deduced.
“Exactly.” Andy nodded as their conversation steamed up the glass.
“That was very risky and probably foolish and reckless for you to pretend to be a journalist and go to Tangier Island,” Hammer then said.
“Look,” he replied, “based on an e-mail tip to Trooper Truth, I knew even before I went there to paint the speed trap that the state police was being set up for a political fall to take attention away from the governor, who is increasingly viewed as a blundering potentate because of that asshole Major Trader. It’s just a crime that nasty slob of a press secretary manipulates him so blatantly, but the poor old man can’t see it because he can’t see anything, period. You wouldn’t believe some of the stories I’ve heard when I’ve been poking around this past year.”
“Such as?” Hammer was getting interested.
“It seems, for example, that every time Trader brings Crimm cookies or candy, the governor soon after gets a gastrointestinal attack that completely debilitates him. And let me add, the goodies are always chocolate or have chocolate in them.”
“No. You don’t think . . . ?”
“I most certainly do, and I intend to prove it just as soon as the labs complete testing on the chocolates the governor supposedly sent you and what’s left of a fudge cake Trader had sent over to Ruth’s Chris.”
“You sent those to the lab?” She was shocked.
“Of course I did. I’d heard the rumors and the governor never even calls you, so why would he send you chocolates through guess who! I think that bastard, no-good Trader is lacing the governor’s goodies with Ex-Lax and has been doing it for years. What better way to confuse and manipulate someone than to have that person doubled over with cramps and embarrassment whenever it’s time to make key decisions, which, in the case of the governor, is daily?”
“That’s criminal!” Hammer said in disgust as she vaguely recalled being interviewed for the superintendent’s position, and Trader’s offering her a silver bowl of chocolate-covered peanuts, which she refused because she didn’t eat sweets or anything else fattening.
“Oh, there’s more,” Andy ominously said. “I’ve been doing some pretty thorough checking on Trader. For starters, his mother’s maiden name was Bonny.”
“I don’t see the significance.”
“You’re about to.” Andy met her eyes as the sun began to go down and shoppers hurried to and from their cars, oblivious to the very important conversation that was taking place in their midst. “The Bonnys are originally from Tangier Island. Trader’s mother married a waterman named Trader and Major Trader was born on the island on August the eleventh in 1951. He was delivered by a midwife, who apparently had a very difficult time with the birth because he came out feet first, which sort of seems appropriate since he inverts the truth and upends everything moral and decent.”
“So you’re suggesting that initiating VASCAR on Tangier Island was a deliberate set-up on Trader’s part,” Hammer supposed.
“Oh, yes. And one thing is certain, Trader knows the Islanders, all right, and probably still knows people on
that island. Yet he’s made no effort whatsoever to intervene for at least one very good reason.”
“Which is?”
“The Bonny family is descended from pirates,” Andy replied. “And I’m afraid I have more bad news,” he added, and then he told her about the trash bag and envelope left at his house last night.