An Unattended Death, Part 7

      I got on the phone and called the county sheriff's office. The night dispatcher told me that C.J. was off duty. I asked her to tell him to call me as soon as possible.
      I didn't expect to hear from him until the next day, but about ten minutes later, the phone rang.
      "What do you need?" he asked curtly.
      "Well, it's about Aaron--"
      "I told you to stay out of that!" he cut me off.
      "I'm out of it," I said. "I'm out of it, but I thought of something that might help you."
      "Help me with what?" he asked. "The investigation is closed. You need to forget this. He was a junkie, he killed himself, end of story."
      "Okay, but one question, was Aaron wearing glasses when he was found?"
      "What?"
      "Was Aaron wearing glasses when he was found?"
      "What are you talking about?"
      "Simon Williams told me that Aaron's eyes were really bad," I said. "I think Aaron was nearsighted. Was he wearing his glasses when he was found? They weren't on him at his funeral." I paused. "Or maybe he wore contacts?"
      "Hold on," C.J. said. "I have his file here. I'll have to look at the Medical Examiner's report, but I don't think he was wearing either. Why?"
      "Because I drove out to where he was found--"
      "You did what?! After I told you--"
      "Before you told me," I cut in. "Would you listen for a moment? If Aaron was as nearsighted as Simon said he was, there's no way he could have made it if he wasn't wearing his glasses or contacts. Someone had to drive him."
      "Lots of people wear glasses and drive without them," C.J. said.
      "Farsighted people drive without them," I said. "But I'm nearsighted, and without my glasses or my contacts, there's no way I could drive out to those woods without crashing my car. Everything is a blur two feet away from my face. I can't see past the hood of my car. If his eyesight was that bad, he couldn't drive anywhere without glasses or contacts, much less to where he was found."
      C.J. was quiet for a long time. I could hear papers being moved.
      "Well?"
      "He wasn't wearing either," C.J. said. "And they weren't found in the car or in the woods."
      "It would be real interesting, don't you think, if they were found at his house?" I asked. "Especially since you told me that Marlene saw him driving away."
      "I've got to go," he said. "Don't say anything to anyone, not at all." He hung up.
      The next three days, I didn't hear anything about Aaron Brody and had just about decided that my thought hadn't led anywhere when C.J. called me that evening.
      "You were right," he said. "We found his glasses at his house under a couch. He didn't wear contacts anymore. And he was blinder than a bat ever thought about being."
      "So Marlene lied," I said.
      "She's not talking," C.J. said. He said Marlene wouldn't budge from her story, but the sheriff's department had discovered she had another boyfriend, a Robert Guidane. They brought in the guy, and after a bit of pressure, he told them all about it.
      Guidane said that Aaron and Marlene had arranged a drug deal. They purchased $25,000 worth of drugs and decided to "test" their buy before they sold it. Aaron shot up, but he took the amount he used to take. Aaron hadn't realized that he had lost the tolerance to the drugs that his former usage built up. He went into seizures. Marlene panicked. She called Guidane. By the time, he got there, Aaron was already dead. They took his body out to the woods and dumped it and then went back to the apartment and cleared the drugs out.
      "So she let him die," I said, feeling sort of sick. "She could have called an ambulance."
      "They had drugs out everywhere," he said. "She didn't want to be caught. His glasses probably came off during one the seizures and ended up under the couch. She never noticed. I'm not sure what the D.A. is going to charge her with, but she's not going to get away with it."
      "So it's over," I said.
      "Seems like it," C.J. said. "Marshall Brody is claiming those two killed his son. He knew as soon as we arrested them. He's got friends at the courthouse." He hung up.
      The next evening Marshall Brody startled me by knocking on my door.
      "I just wanted to thank you," he said. "I heard you figured it out. I knew he didn't kill himself. They killed him."
      I nodded, but thought that Aaron chose to take those drugs. And maybe he would have died even if Marlene had called for help.
      "They'll pay," he said. "Especially that slut. She knew he was clean. She's going to pay for it."
      And as I looked at his face, I realized something terrible, so terrible that I stupidly blurted it out.
      "You gave him the money," I said.
      He looked at me, and as our eyes met, I knew he knew I knew.
      "What?" he asked.
      "The money," I said. "Where did Aaron got the $25,000 for the drug deal. No one's mentioned a job." All sorts of things began to click in my mind. "Everyone else took a hard financial hit in the oil bust, but not you. How is that possible?"
      He didn't answer me. His eyes shifted to look behind me, checking out my house. Suddenly I felt cold. I thought about that gun he carried in his pocket.
      "The police know you sell drugs," I said. "They know."
      All of the life seemed to go out of him. His shoulders slumped.
      "You don't understand," he said. "You gotta take care of your family. I couldn't let my family starve. Family's everything. But he wasn't supposed to take the drugs." He shook his head. Tears ran down his face. "They weren't meant for us." He turned away. I watched as he drove away.
      I shut the door, locked it, sat down until the shakes passed, and then called C.J. -- who chewed me out royally for talking to Brody before I talked to him.
      Three days later, they issued an arrest for Marshall Brody and a search warrant for his home.
      No one knows if Marshall was tipped off, but a few minutes before the sheriff arrived at the Brody home, Marshall told his wife that he was going to clean his guns. He went into his wood-paneled den, shut the door and then shot himself. Maybe it was an accident. He didn't leave a note.
      After some court wrangling, his life insurance policy made his wife and daughters very wealthy. In the end, he took care of his family.

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