by Jada M Davis
Faint and far away, so far, a voice prayed.
“...and see us through the days and nights to come, and help us live as Thou wouldst have us do, O Lord, in Thy Name and in Thy service. Amen.”
The organ music, again, and the voices. And then the organ played on alone, the voices still, and the peal of the organ swelled and soared and died.
Voices, not singing now, not musical, but happy and gay, and feet tramping the floor, doors opened and slammed. And the rain was cold on his face now, and he shivered, wiped a damp sleeve across his face and hurried back to the car.
He sat slumped down in the seat and watched people file out of the church, walk to cars, drive away.
And, finally, the last car light dimmed out far up the street, and the church lights snuffed out.
All but one, the light in the study.
Preacher Green was seated at the desk. Before him, on the desk, was the package of money. He sat staring at it, his hands spread to each side of it, not touching it. When he heard the door open behind him he whisked the package into a desk drawer.
Ree hit him as he turned.
It was a glancing blow.
The preacher threw himself backward, far backward so that his chair overturned, and the barrel of the gun glanced off his forehead.
There was blood on the preacher’s face, but he was getting up.
He made no sound.
The blood welled from a cut on the preacher’s forehead, into his eyes, and he wiped it away with his sleeve. Slowly, with deliberate slowness, he picked up the chair and sat down.
Ree stood, the gun heavy, out of place heavy, in his hand.
It was too late now.
The preacher had seen him.
That first blow should have been enough, and wasn’t.
He’d bungled.
“Sit down, son,” the preacher said.
“No.”
“You’ve come for the money?”
“Yes.”
“It isn’t yours,” the preacher said.
Ree slid open the desk drawer with his left hand, grasped the package and stuffed it into his coat pocket.
The preacher wiped blood from his face with his sleeve, stared at the sleeve, and then took a handkerchief from his coat pocket and held it to the cut.
“The money wasn’t yours, either,” Ree said. “But you had it.”
“I was going to call the police.”
Ree laughed.
“You’ve had plenty of time to do that, preacher. Plenty of time!”
Preacher Green nodded, shrugged his shoulders. “I won’t try to fool you,” he said. “I’ve had plenty of time, as you said. I brought the chair from Laura’s apartment. When I brought it into the study I carried it upside down and noticed the taped place on the lining.”
“You meant to keep the money,” Ree said. “You meant to keep it.”
“No.”
Ree laughed again.
“I was tempted,” Preacher Green said. “I opened the package and counted the money. There’s enough there to do a great deal of good—for the church and for a great many people. I thought of that and I was tempted. But I won’t try to fool you, son. I thought of myself, too. I thought of myself and my wife and my daughter. I remembered all the years I’ve lived on half enough money, in run-down parsonages. And I’ve remembered the dresses my wife has worn—given her by some church member who wouldn’t wear them again because she’d grown too fat or because they were too threadbare....
“But I was going to call the police, son. I wanted that money. I was tempted. I needed it. But I wasn’t going to keep it.”
“You’ve had plenty of time,” Ree said.
The preacher smiled, “That’s my sin, son. You’re right. I had plenty of time. But I wasn’t going to keep it.”
“Well, you should have called the police a long time ago, preacher. It’s too late now.”
“It’s never too late to right a wrong, son.”
“Don’t hand me that crap!”
“Leave the money,” Preacher Green said. “Leave the money and go away.”
Ree smiled, lips curling.
“Leave it for you?”
“Then let me call the police before you leave. You can listen. I’ll tell them I found the money, and that’s all I’ll tell them.”
“No soap.”
“You can go away. I don’t know you. You can listen to me talk to the police, and then you can go away.”
“Preacher, you’re wasting your time.”
“I’ve wasted a lot of time in my life, son. But I’ve planted a lot of seed, too. Some of that seed has borne fruit. I don’t know what you’ve done. I don’t know. But you’re a troubled man, a mixed-up man, and I’d like to help you. Believe me it’s not too late!”
“Cut out that crap!” Ree said. “Don’t give me that not too late business!”
“Then what are you going to do?”
What?
Ree stared at the preacher, the gun heavy in his hand.
What?
“You should have stayed out of this, preacher. You should have called the police when you found that money.”
“Let me call now, son. Don’t do... what you’re thinking.”
Ree felt the sweat pop, felt it trickle, on his face and under his arms.
“Don’t do it,” the preacher said.
The gun was heavy, so heavy in his hand, and the preacher’s face floated, inflated and floated, and he tightened his grip on the gun.
Preacher Green lunged, straight across the desk, on his belly with arms extended and hands clawing and grasping for the gun.
Ree hit him.
A crunching sound, a sickly and moistly thumping sound, and the preacher sighed, slumped, slid downward face first to the floor, his back arched as he fell, to lie doubled up on the floor.
Hit him again?
No need.
Maybe he should hit him again. Just to make sure.
No need.
The preacher was, or had been, a big man, a handsome man, florid and broad featured, full of good humor, bubbling over with personality.
It was plain to see. Plain there on the face, the wide unwrinkled face with its thick nose and puffy cheeks, the widespread mouth, open and gaping now. He looked dead enough.
Now what? Leave the preacher there? No. He’d be found too quickly.
But where? Leave him where?
And then he knew. He knew just the place. The well. He lay the gun on the desk and stooped, grasped the preacher around the waist and lifted. And then he remembered the lights, dropped the preacher and went over to switch off the lights.
The preacher was a big man, a heavy man.
Ree half dragged him, half carried him, arms around his chest, hands clasped, walking backwards and half dragging and half carrying.
Rain and darkness felt like friendly arms, reaching out and enfolding him, holding him safe from fear and punishment.
It was dark, pitch dark, womb dark.
Once he stumbled and fell.
He reached the car, lowered the body to the ground, gently to the ground, and opened the door.
It was hard work, stuffing the preacher through the rear door, and he was breathing hard when he closed the door.
Breathing hard, and trembling.
And now for the gun.
But there were footsteps.
Clickity-clack, clickity-clack, clickity clickity clickity-clack. A woman’s footsteps on the walk leading from the street to the study.
The preacher’s wife?
Or some silly Sunday School teacher with an adolescent crush, returning after church to ask the preacher a question, as a school girl lingers after class to consult the teacher.
He heard a door open, and then the lights in the study flicked on.
It was Laura.
The gun was in there, and in there was blood, all over blood, and it was Laura silhouetted in the doorway.
Ree drove away, fast, and kne
w he wasn’t driving fast enough.
The speedometer climbed to eighty, and he knew that wasn’t fast enough.
Once he slowed down, determined to dump the preacher’s body beside the road.
But no, he decided.
No use to give them a corpse so soon.
Let them look for it.
He caught a glimpse of the side road leading to the well, a fleeting glimpse as he passed it. He braked the car to a stop, backed up, and nosed down the road.
There was the well.
He stopped, flicked off the lights, and got out.
The preacher was too heavy to lift over the fence.
Ree climbed the fence, caught the preacher’s arm and dragged him under.
He dragged the body.
But the wind will blow and the rain will fall and the sand will blow before the wind, and there’ll be no track.
It couldn’t be far to the well, not far, but it was miles and still there was no well. His feet slipped on the gravel of the embankment and the body twisted in his arms. The body sagged to the ground limply.
He pulled the wire down and slid the body over it.
Head and shoulders first.
The wire caught the preacher’s clothing, but he pushed harder. Something tore. He swore.
The body was balanced on the wire. One more shove—he found himself holding his breath.
One shove, one hard shove, and the weight was gone, the preacher gone, and he held his breath, clenching fists, cringing.
A splash. That was all, just a splash, and he wondered if the body would float.
No flowers on that grave. Baldy had flowers, but no flowers for the preacher.
Chapter Tweny-six
Laura recognized the gun.
There was blood all over, and blood on the gun.
She’d seen that gun before.
She drove the forty miles to Breton in forty minutes. She circled the courthouse square, driving slowly, and parked near the driveway leading from the street to the courthouse basement.
Why tell?
Keep quiet and kill him.
Ree would leave town, she knew. He would go far away, and she hadn’t much time.
The man wasn’t human. He hadn’t looked human the night he beat Wesley, and he must have looked the same when he killed her father tonight.
She left the car and walked across the wet grass, under the trees, in the quiet still of the night, conscious that her feet were cold and damp, but not caring.
...and I, Laura Green, do solemnly swear and depose and further saith that on a certain night the said Willa Ree did willfully and with malice aforethought and with some degree of pleasure beat unmercifully one Wesley and I further believe did later kill said Wesley further and moreover that on this night tonight with further malice aforethought and for all I know no little pleasure club my father a preacher of the Lord’s gospel on the head until he was dead and further I do solemnly swear that on many previous occasions the said Willa Ree did with malice aforethought willfully and with no small degree of pleasure and satisfaction sleep with me and make love to me as well as he was able and I do further say and depose that a murderer makes love as well as or maybe a little better than do other men and further the witness sayeth not....
Her heels clicked on the worn stone steps. She paused at the door and brushed hair back from her face.
Why go in? Why not find him and kill him? They’ll try to smear you, Laura, because they’re all in it, all of them.
She pushed the door open with her shoulder, click-clacked down the dark hall, and entered the sheriff’s office.
He was using the telephone, but hung up.
“What can I do for you, Miss Green?” the sheriff asked.
She tossed the gun on his desk.
“That belongs to Willa Ree.”
The sheriff stared at her.
“Tonight Ree killed my father!”
“Tell me about it,” the sheriff said.
“I went to my father’s study. In Rockford. He’s a minister. There was blood. Blood everywhere. And the gun was on the desk.”
“And your father?”
“He wasn’t there.”
“Maybe he isn’t dead.”
“He’s dead.”
“But his... he wasn’t there?”
“No, but there was blood all over.”
“You know that gun belongs to Ree?”
“I’ve seen it before.”
“Why would Ree hurt your father?”
The sheriff motioned her to a chair.
“It began on the night of the Johnson Tool Company robbery,” she began. “Ree came to my apartment and I knew—instinctively—that something was wrong. But it was the next night that it happened....”
The sheriff asked no questions. As she talked, he smoked.
Laura told all she knew about Willa Ree.
The sheriff was polite, even considerate. When she finished talking, he walked with her to the car. She drove to the apartment, drank a glass of whisky straight, and then fell on the couch, face down, and cried.
Maybe I’m not going to make it, Ree told himself. Maybe it’s not in the cards for me to make it. Maybe all the things you do, good and bad, add up and add up and then something or somebody or something subtracts the smallest from the biggest and throws the book at you if the biggest is the bad things you do.
There’s been too much trouble, too damned much trouble. You can’t run like hell out of hell, and this whole thing has been hell. A nightmare.
Should never kill, never kill, never kill. Steal and rob and cheat, but never kill.
Two things. Don’t cross a state line and don’t kill.
Forty grand in the coat pocket, and that should be enough. So take off now and don’t stop and look back and don’t come back, ever, never, and cross not one state line but any and all to far away and hell and gone.
Twenty grand in the lining of the coat in the closet. Forty and twenty makes sixty, the sum total of forty and twenty thousand dollars adds up to one ranch in South America or Mexico. Easy living. Women, plenty of women, and no hard work and no worry and no scheming and no looking back at all the things it took to get sixty thousand dollars.
A rabbit runs and the dogs chase.
Run and there’ll always be somebody to chase, even if they don’t know why you’re running or why they’re chasing.
So don’t run.
Walk, don’t run, to the nearest exit.
Take it easy, slow and easy, and hand in a resignation and take off.
Only the old lady, Baldy’s sister, knows the truth about Baldy. And she’s just guessing. Who would listen to her?
But Laura knows about the preacher. So there’s no time to waste.
Don’t walk, run. To the nearest exit.
Too bad to miss all that gravy. It was just beginning to get good. Gravy, hell.
Ree, you’ve had the meat. Leave the gravy for the hungry amateurs.
It stopped raining.
Everything was going to be all right.
He’d go away. Far away.
He wondered why Laura had gone to see her father. Could she have known he was going—followed him? She guessed that the money—or something—was in the chair, and... well, what the hell.
Messner called the deputy, Blondie.
“That old woman—the one we thought was screwy—where does she live?”
“Out on the railroad,” Blondie said. “Oak Street, I think. Anyway, that well she was talking about is on the railroad track.”
“I want you to get some men and go out there,” Messner said. “Get down in that well and see if you can find Wesley’s body.”
The deputy cursed. “You don’t believe that old hen’s story? For cryin’ out loud! I went out there and examined that well! There’s net wire around it and there’s not a tear in it anywhere! There was a loose place at the top, but I’ll bet it hasn’t been touched in years!”
“Get yourself out there
,” Messner said. “Go down and have a look.”
“Sheriff, that woman’s nuts! Everybody knows it! And she admitted she was just guessing!”
“The car was out there, and there was blood on the seat. I’ll meet you out there.”
“O.K.!”
Messner hung up, walked to the window and stared into darkness.
He’d known all about Laura Green. He’d made it his business to know, because she’d been Ree’s girl and he felt it was important to know everything possible about Willa Ree.
But he hadn’t believed Ree had killed Wesley. The woman, that wrinkled old woman, had marched in and told him Ree had dumped Wesley down that well. She’d heard shots the night before Wesley’s car was found, and when she’d heard about the car, with blood on the seat, she’d known Ree had killed Wesley.
Well, she could be right. After tonight, if Ree’d really killed the preacher—it wouldn’t do any harm to have a look in that well.
He could still hear her voice, her cracked old voice.
“That Willa Ree did it,” she had said. “Wesley’s in that well.”
But he hadn’t believed her.
He’d sent Blondie out there, and Blondie had said there couldn’t have been more than a couple of feet of water in the well, and that he could have seen a body if there’d been one.
Now he wasn’t so sure. Blondie was cocksure, but not too bright, and more than a little lazy.
Now, after what Laura Green had said, he’d have to take a look in that well. If Ree killed the preacher, he could have killed Wesley.
He left the courthouse and drove out of town.
Blondie had picked up the janitors, two Mexicans, and old Pete, the handy man at the courthouse. He’d cut the fence and had driven the county pickup close to the well, using its lights to work by.
It was still raining.
Old Pete was grumbling, standing around and grumbling, while the two Mexicans tore the net wire from the framework of the well covering. Blondie was fastening a block and tackle to a beam lying across the top of the well.
“Somebody’s tampered with this wire since I was here last,” Blondie said.
“You got a flashlight?” Messner asked.
“Yeah.”
“You going down?”
“Yeah.”
“Hurry it up.”
“O.K., but you stand by and see they don’t lower me too fast.”