Barclay, Linwood Novel 08 - Never saw it coming by Linwood Barclay Page B

Eleanor Garfield, wife of one of their employees.
    “We wanted to talk to any of the people Mr. Garfield works with, and see if they can help us in any way,” Rona said.
    A short round woman in an orange apron said, “Oh yeah?”
    “We’re thinking, maybe Mrs. Garfield knows or is friends with some of her husband’s co-workers.”
    “I don’t think she really knows anyone who works here,” the woman said. “I don’t think I’ve ever met her, don’t think I’ve even seen her in the store, although we all feel just terrible about what’s happened, you know. We feel real bad for Wendell. What a horrible thing, you know?”
    Rona looked at the woman’s name tag. “You think you probably know Mr. Garfield as well as anyone around here, Sylvia?”
    The woman shrugged. “I know him okay.” She leaned across the counter so she wouldn’t have to raise her voice. “But I guess, if you want the one who knows him best, you should probably talk to Laci.”
    “Laci?”
    “Laci Harmon,” Sylvia said, nodding knowingly.
    “Are Ms. Harmon and Mr. Garfield friends, Sylvia?”
    “Well, I don’t want to be sayin’ nothin’ that’s going to cause anyone any trouble,” Sylvia said.
    “What do you mean by that?”
    “Nothin’, nothin’ at all. I’m just sayin’ that if you want to talk to someone who knows Wendell, you know, pretty intimately, she’d be the one to talk to.” She put exactly the right emphasis on the word, hitting it not too hard, but just hard enough.
    “I see,” Detective Wedmore said. “Do you know if she’s here now?”
    “She is. You could probably find her over in ’lectrical or maybe lighting fixtures.”
    “Which way’s that?”
    Rona wandered in the direction Sylvia had pointed. She only found customers in the aisle displaying electrical parts, but there was a woman stocking shelves under an array of lit light fixtures. Wedmore could feel the collective heat of them overhead.
    “Excuse me,” she said. “Are you Laci Harmon?”
    The woman turned with a start. Wedmore put her in her mid-forties, about a hundred and sixty pounds. Nicely round in the right places, and a little too round in the wrong ones. She had brown hair that hung straight down, wore no makeup, and looked at Wedmore through a pair of oversized black-rimmed glasses.
    “Yes?”
    Wedmore showed her ID. “I’m trying to find out what happened to Eleanor Garfield.”
    “Oh!” the woman said. “Ellie! It’s a horrible thing.”
    “We’re certainly hoping it’s nothing too horrible,” Wedmore said. “We’re talking to everyone we can who might be able to help us, and I understand you and Mr. Garfield are co-workers.”
    Laci Harmon’s neck flushed. “Well sure, we all work with Wendell. He has lots of co-workers. I’m certainly not the only one.”
    “I understand you might know him a little better than some of the others here.”
    “Who told you that?” Laci asked.
    “Is that not true?”
    Laci shrugged. “I mean, we talked, sure. You see someone at work every day, you say hello, you kid around, that kind of thing. No big deal.”
    “I didn’t say that it was,” Wedmore said. “You seem a bit nervous, Ms. Harmon. Is everything okay?”
    “I’m fine. Totally fine. I just, you know, don’t get interrogated by the police every day.”
    “Does this feel like an interrogation to you? I’m just asking a couple of questions.”
    Laci Harmon laughed nervously. “I guess, you know, we’re all a bit on edge, that’s all. Worried about Wendell. You know, because of Ellie.”
    “Of course, I can understand that. Do you know Mrs. Garfield?”
    Laci shook her head. “No, I don’t. I may have met her once, at a staff thing a couple of years ago, but I wouldn’t know her if I tripped over her.” She put hand to her mouth. “That didn’t sound right. Like I would trip over her. Like she’d be lying on the ground or anything.” A nervous laugh. “God, I’m sounding like some kind of