"We used to camp over on the Gunnison River, and fish some, all four of us. After Ralph killed him, we took his car with the boat tied on top. Blackie had this old Ford, too, and he was teaching me to drive it. Ralph drove and I followed in the Ford. We went late at night and then we took the boat out and turned it over. We made it look like he was drunk-which he often was. We left an empty bottle by his car and tent and drove back in the Ford. The next day we were supposed to leave to go back home, so we just did. We took the bus to Kansas. Aunt Helen came back to Ouray that weekend and of course Uncle Blackie was missing. It was a week or so before his car was found. They figured he'd left to go fishing by himself just after we returned to Kansas."
"Why didn't you bring the body over to the river?" Dean asked.
Westlake cringed. "Mostly scared, I guess. It was safer to leave him in the mine. No one worked the Lucky Pup in those days. No one went up there."
"You were pretty clever for a couple of kids," Dean said.
Westlake smiled. "Clever but scared. Aunt Helen invited us back the next summer, but we were still too frightened to come. They all thought it was because we missed Uncle Blackie so much. We just didn't want to go near the place. Every time the phone rang for a year, we were sure someone had found the body. But time passed, and the call never came. Aunt Helen died a few years later. We never saw her again."
"Why now? Why go back into the mine after all these years and take the chance of swapping the bones and getting caught?" Cynthia asked.
"You and your brother had already left to go back to Kansas when your uncle was supposed to have gone fishing," Dean added. "Even if the bones were discovered and it was known the drowning was a ruse, no one would have suspected you boys."
"They would have blamed Aunt Helen. She and Uncle Blackie were always fighting."
"But she's long dead, too."
"That doesn't make it right to have someone accused unfairly. To smear her character. No, I'd have come forward before I'd let that happen. I never meant for anyone to get hurt."
"Did you buy the liquor for Billy?" Dean asked.
Westlake shook his head. "No. I loved that boy. Billy found it in his Jeep. A bottle of vodka. He thought it was a present from me, being his oldest friend. I told him that was nonsense and he had no business drinking at his age. Then some of his friends at the funeral said they thought it was that sheriff guy Fitzgerald who planted it so he could arrest Billy and look good for the election. Pumpkin told me they thought he chased Billy down the mountain to his death!"