Alafair Tucker 01 - The Old Buzzard Had It Coming

about to laugh, or choke, or leap up from his chair and hustle her out of the room. She plunged ahead, just in case. “He told me that you were friends with Maggie Ellen Day, a while back.”
    Dan lowered his cornbread to the table and studied it absently for a moment before he answered. “A mite more than friends, Miz Tucker,” he confessed. “At least as far as I was concerned. I was mighty partial to Maggie Ellen.”
    Shaw shot Alafair a stern look. Apparently, he was having second thoughts about this scheme. “Dan,” he said, “you don’t have to talk about this if you don’t like to.”
    Dan leaned forward on his elbows and quirked up an ironic little smile. “I don’t mind,” he said. He looked up at Alafair. “My pa told me that you’re worried about your girl Phoebe, Miz Tucker, because she and John Lee are sweet on one another. I reckon that’s why you want to ask me about this.”
    Alafair blinked at him, surprised. Either this young man was as astute as his father, or Alafair was going to have to admit to being a ham-handed interrogator.
    “Well, yes,” Alafair admitted, abashed. “I’m sorry to be bothering you with this, son. But I am worried about my daughter, and when I heard that my husband had hired you to come out, I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to ask you what you think.” She didn’t compound the matter by confessing that bringing him out to the farm for questioning had been her idea. “Do you have any thoughts about who might have shot Mr. Day?”
    Dan shook his head. “I’d like to help you, Miz Tucker,” he said. “I like John Lee, and I’d like it if he could be happy with a fine girl. But I don’t have no idea who shot Mr. Day. He was such an awful old snake that anybody could have done it. He was a cheater and a thief. He tried to cheat my pa, and my pa was just about the only merchant in town who would do business with him when he did it. I’d have been happy to do the honors if I’d have thought of it before Maggie Ellen run off.”
    “I heard he came between you,” Alafair said.
    Dan looked up at her, then over at Shaw, as though he was trying to determine how much they knew before he answered. “He tried,” he said at last. “But we just got sneakier about meeting. It was a lot harder to see one another, though. Sometimes I didn’t see her for weeks as a time. I told her, though….” He paused and gazed into middle space for a few seconds, then resumed briskly. “I told her, though, that I’d be proud to marry her any time she wanted. We could get us a little house in Boynton. But she wanted to get completely away, out of the county, and take as many of her brothers and sisters as she could. I suppose she thought she couldn’t wait any more, but I was surprised when she ran off like that. I expect that once she hears her old man is dead, she’ll show up again.”
    “Do you think she keeps in touch with John Lee?” Alafair wondered.
    Dan shrugged. His face was very red, now. “I don’t know what John Lee knows. I wouldn’t be surprised if she keeps in touch with Naomi, somehow, though. She was pretty protective of Naomi.”
    Shaw stood up. “All right, Alafair,” he interjected firmly. “I think you’ve tormented this fellow enough for one day. We’ve got to get back to work, now, before the day gets completely gone.” He seized Alafair by the arm and hustled her out the tool shed door into the cold.
    “He seems like a good honest boy,” Alafair observed, totally unaffected by the look of exasperation on Shaw’s face. “But he never once mentioned that Harley beat him up, did you notice that?”
    “I doubt if it was his proudest moment,” Shaw said. “Now, if you’re done with your questions, go on back up to the house and let us get on with it.”
    “Now, Shaw,” Alafair chided. “If you’re so set against my talking with Dan, why did you go ahead and invite him out here? I told you what I intended.”
    Shaw let go of her arm. “Well, maybe I did,” he admitted reluctantly. “But I think that’s enough. He’s bound to get the idea you suspect him of something, otherwise. Did you even learn anything you didn’t already know?”
    “I learned that him and Maggie Ellen kept on seeing one another for a while after Harley drove him off.”
    Shaw made shooing motions. “Go home and think about that, then. I’ve got to get back inside before Dan thinks I’ve abandoned him.”
    Alafair trotted back toward the