“That just never happened,” Cathy said. “First off, he was too nice to get complaints, but second, he was maintenance for all the city buildings. Mr. Fix-it and Mr. Cleanup. All internal, really. He didn’t have much contact with the general public, other than to sometimes chat with people as he shoveled snow off the walks.”

“Hard to shovel wrong enough that someone would want to commit murder over it,” Isaac said.

I hesitated. As Kristen had suggested, I’d contacted Bax Tousely. He was out of town on vacation, so we didn’t talk face-to-face, but his text messages all indicated that Brown had been a great guy, everyone liked him, et cetera, et cetera.

I continued to hesitate, because I was talking to two city employees, and even if my first impression of them was compassion and kindness, who knew what lurked in their hearts? But opportunity was presenting itself, so I went ahead. “What about the people who work here? Did anyone have a grudge against him for any reason?”

Isaac frowned. “Can’t think of anyone.”

“Ariella Tice,” Cathy said. “Remember?”

Isaac’s frown turned into a full-on grimace. “Thanks. I’d tried to forget.”

Cathy looked at me. “She was hired a couple of years ago, right out of college, but she was fired in, oh, let me think. Late April. She was assistant to the finance director, but it wasn’t working out, so the city manager let her go.” She glanced at a closed door. “You could talk to him, but he’s busy prepping for the first budget workshop.”

She stopped, but there was clearly a story coming, so I waited.

“Brown retired in early May,” Cathy said. “And the day, the very day, he was leaving, Ariella stomped in here, barged straight back to his office, and yelled at him that no one her age would ever get the kind of pension he was getting, that it wasn’t fair, that all the city cared about was taking care of the older employees, and that people in her generation were on their own and it was all because of people like him.”

Isaac shifted. “There is some truth in that.”

“Sure,” Cathy said, “but why take it out on poor Brown? He couldn’t help when he was born.”

Though we chatted a few minutes longer, they couldn’t come up with anyone else at the City who had ever spoken a harsh word to Brown. They thanked me again, and I did my best to accept their thanks.

All the way up to the library, I wondered if what I’d just learned about Ariella Tice could have been twisted into a reason to kill someone. I didn’t see it, but as Detective Hal Inwood had told me many times, almost anything could become a motive for murder.

Chapter 6