Alafair Tucker 01 - The Old Buzzard Had It Coming

member of said Creek Nation, had a face both the color and texture of a walnut, covered over the top by a stiff gray buzz of hair that stuck up like a scrub brush. The lively gray eyes that examined Alafair with such human delight betrayed the fact that at least one of Mr. Turner’s grandparents had been white.
    “I was just stir crazy, Mr. Turner,” she told him. “I came into town to see if we have any mail and to visit a while with my sister-in-law Josie Cecil. Do you mind if I leave Missy here for a spell? Too cold to leave her standing outside for long.”
    “Not a bit,” Mr. Turner assured her. “Not like I’m doing much business today, and none at all if it wasn’t for you Tuckers. Shaw’s pair is right over there.”
    “Shaw? Did he say where he was going? Might ride home with him.”
    “Said he was going to drop into the sheriff’s office and jaw with Scott a while.”
    She handed Mr. Turner the reins. “Well, if he comes back before I’m done visiting with Josie, would you tell him I’m here in town?” she asked.
    “I’ll do it,” Mr. Turner called after her, as she ducked back out into the cold.
    The town Post Office was directly across the street from the livery, at the corner of Second and Main. The tiny establishment consisted of one long wall of cubbyholes and a little counter, presided over by Mrs. N.C. Fluke, the postmistress. There was no one in the town of Boynton who knew as much about what was happening in the vicinity and what people were thinking about it. Every person who lived within a ten-mile radius of town had to pick up his or her mail from Mrs. Fluke, and if there was anything Nadine Fluke loved, it was gossip. At this hour, she was throwing mail, and Alafair could just see pieces of her through the jigsaw of postboxes.
    “Morning, Nadine,” Alafair called, and the entire Mrs. Fluke appeared from around the corner with a stack of letters in her hand. Nadine Fluke was a pretty, fair-haired widow of about Alafair’s own age. She had been postmistress for three or four years, now, since the death of her husband. She lived in a little apartment behind the post office with her only child, a ten-year-old son.
    “Alafair!” Nadine exclaimed. “I never expected to see anybody but townfolk today. If you’re here to get your mail, you’re too late. Shaw already picked it up. He had something from the Grange, and there was a letter for you from Enid. Your sister, I reckon.”
    “Oh! Well, I’ll look forward to that. I haven’t heard from Ruth Ann in a while. Since I can’t get the mail, I’ll just have to pass the time of day for a while. What are you hearing about this murder out to the Days’ place?”
    Nadine sat down on her stool behind the counter. “Nobody can talk of nothing else,” she assured Alafair. “And just between you and me and this stool I’m sitting on, it’s pretty shocking what people are saying. I mean, I know Harley Day wasn’t no prize or nothing, but most everybody I’ve talked with seems to think it was about time somebody done him in. Can you imagine? And to just say it straight out like that! You know he must have had some good quality somewhere in him.”
    Alafair shook her head, but didn’t comment. Nadine’s charitable attitude toward Harley was rather nice for a change, and Alafair felt somewhat guilty that she didn’t share it. “Anybody have any ideas on who might have done it?” she asked.
    “That boy of his, John Lee, seems to be the leading candidate, since he disappeared and all. But if he did do it, nobody wants to blame him much.”
    “I sure don’t want to blame him, either,” Alafair told her. “He’s such a nice boy. Have there been any other names bandied about?”
    “Why, to hear tell of it, just about everybody in the county could have done it. Ara Kellerman thinks it’s likely that it was the wife, since she had the most grievance. But since Harley sold that home brew, he was always consorting with murderous types. For my money, I’m picking one of them. You know, Bud Ellis that works over at the Mill and Elevator company was telling me just yesterday that his boss Mr. Lang was supposed to go out there to the Day place on the very evening that Harley disappeared. He said Mr. Lang was mighty unhappy when he came into work Thursday morning because he had made that long trip out there in the ice and snow and all for nothing.”
    “For nothing,” Alafair repeated. “So he never saw Harley at all on