Nowhere Man: A Riley King Mystery

by Richard Neer

  “You keep insulting my epistolary vocabulary and you’ll be posthumous. I just don’t get what’s in it for you. Jason never brought up money. Didn’t even offer to share expenses.”

  “Pro bono. I’m sure you know what that means.”

  “Got something to do with doggie treats? Yeah, 5-0, I know what it means.” He downshifted and accelerated around a dawdling Caddy that was clogging the fast lane. “You don’t even wanna meet this widow first, see if she deserves it? For all we know, she might be some sorta junkie who mucked up her own life.”

  “Think of it this way --- Christmas is a few weeks away. This’ll be our good deed. Our tidings of comfort and joy.”

  “Fa-la-la. You know I’m with you, but I ain’t all that keen on finding out about some has-been rock star. I should say, a never was. Now finding out what really happened to Sam Cooke…”

  We were about to climb the causeway leading to Hilton Head. The December sun was low in the sky and the colors on the water were spectacular. Seems like I always mention it when driving over this span near sunset, but it never fails to move me.

  I said, “First thing I want to do is talk to Alex, see if she can point me toward the cops who investigated this originally. I doubt there’ll still be files on it, but maybe the lead guy is still alive.”

  “The list of favors you owe my girl just keeps growing. Lucky I’m around to pay her back.”

  “Tell you what. I’ll ask her over dinner tonight. Pomodori. My treat. Don’t know why but I’m in the mood for Italian.”

  “She’d be into that. I was afraid you’d say we had to drive all the way up to Beaufort to check out that frog and peach joint. Weird name, but it’d give you a chance to check out that Kat lady again.”

  “Get off it, Moses. She’s happily married to a nice guy. I’ll admit, if she was available, she’d be in my wheelhouse, that’s for sure. I was impressed.”

  “I could see that. And Mr. Black have to be blind not to notice. I could tell she liked you, too. Don’t know why, but there was sparks flying after lunch.”

  “Why do you keep pushing this?”

  “I think you know why. You need to move on from Jaime and Charlene oughta be off limits. You ain’t met anyone lately that be lighting your fire.”

  “Nice Jim Morrison reference.”

  “Huh?”

  “Light my fire. The Doors’ first big hit.”

  “He do that? I thought Jose Feliciano wrote that one. Point is, you closed the book with Jaime, like you need to do with Charlene. Don’t get me wrong. I like Jaime but you two ain’t never gonna resolve your living situation. She’s a big time Hollywood agent and you a washed up old detective on the East Coast. Never the twain shall meet.”

  “I get it. And the stunt she pulled with Cami Purdy still pisses me off. But Jaime’s been part of my life on and off for five years and I’m not looking to jump into the next big romance right away. Rebounds are okay in basketball but with women, the ones you get on the rebound wind up paying the price for the sins of their predecessor.”

  “Gotta respect that, 5-0. Most men be wanting to punish the whole gender after what Jaime did to you.”

  Ginn was right. I need a diversion. I just don’t want some poor lady to catch me on the rebound and pay the price for Jaime’s transgressions. Although Katrina McCann didn’t strike me as someone who would play the victim for long and let me get away with bullshit revenge. Alas, she was taken.

  6

  Tomey had time on her hands. The crime rate on the island in the off season is low. It’s low in the on-season as well, but then there are tourists to hassle. As much as the city fathers are grateful for the revenue they bring, they do create an uptick in prostitution and drug offenses.

  We had just been seated at Pomodori. Ginn ordered a bottle of Chianti and I skipped the line about Fava beans. Its expiration date passed twenty years ago.

  Tomey said, “Dinner on Riley King. I know what that means. Let’s cut to the chase so we can eat in peace. What do you need from me?”

  “Someday, that balance sheet you’re keeping in your head is going to explode. Why does everything have to be so transactional with you?”

  “Oooh, touchy tonight, aren’t we? Does it have anything to do with the new chick you have a crush on?”

  “Thanks, Moses. I owe you one. FYI Alex, there is no new chick I have a crush on. It’s your boyfriend’s imagination. He thinks it’s funny playing matchmaker. He’s a regular Dolly Levi.”

  “There’s nothing about Moses that reminds me of Carol Channing. So I guess I won’t tell you what I found out about her.”

  Ginn watched our back and forth with amusement. I said, “Is it relevant to the case? I assume Momo here told you all about what we did today.”

  A while back, Alex had let slip that her pet name for Ginn was ‘Momo’. I had never used it in front of either of them, preferring to hold it for the proper moment. This seemed like a good time to get him back for his relentless jibes about me and Katrina McCann.

  I saw Ginn’s face shift from amusement to embarrassment. It could just be my imagination, since he has the sternest poker face on the planet. But he does have a ‘tell’ when something bothers him, the slightest twitch of his left eye.

  Alex noticed it, too. “Moses, I have no idea where he came up with that. I never told him.”

  I said, “Can we cut the high school shit please? Just tell me what you found out. Okay?”

  Ginn finally spoke. “You’d best do that, Alex. No telling what other little secrets my man’ll spring on us next. Got me thinking he’s got our room bugged.”

  “The only bugs in your room are the Palmetto bugs you attract by bringing food up there. Enough. So what do you know, Alex?” I said.

  The waiter arrived with our wine. Ginn gave it the old sniff and swirl and pronounced it righteous. It was.

  Alex took a sip, seconded the approval of the grape and said, “Well, first off, if you did have a yen for this McCann woman, she and Black aren’t married. She still has her own place up near Charleston and the house you saw today is in his name only.”

  “You sure about that? He called her his wife a few times and she didn’t correct him.”

  Ginn said, “You didn’t see no wedding ring on either of them, did ya?”

  “She was working in the kitchen. As for him, wood workers often don’t wear rings when they’re dealing with power tools.”

  Alex said, “Be that as it may, they aren’t married, at least not legally. She has a pretty long arrest sheet, too.”

  “What did she do?”

  “She’s an activist. Liberal causes. Civil disobedience. Last one was about taking down those Confederate statues. Pinko like you would probably approve.”

  “Yeah, I do. And how do you feel about those statues, Mister Ginn?”

  “She just pulling your chain, 5-0.”

  “Lot of that going around tonight. Did you find out anything about the shootout in Hardeeville?”

  The waiter was hovering and Ginn shooed him away. Alex said, “Only that it’s cover-your-ass time. No one wants to talk about it. Even the yentas around the station.”

  “Yentas? Where did you pick that up?”

  “I read.

  Ginn refilled Alex’s glass. That’s her ‘tell’. When she’s nervous, she drinks hastily, whether it’s water or wine. The first time and only time I’ve seen her drunk was when I introduced her to Glenfiddich. It was after a stressful day and she gulped it down like it was Dr. Pepper.

  I said, “What I would like from you Alex, is if you can find out who had lead on Townes’ vanishing act case forty years ago.”

  “I’m way ahead of you. Here’s everything you need.”

  She reached into the pocket of her blazer and pulled out a pink Post-it note. On it was the name, address and phone number of a retired County sheriff.

  “I already told him to expect your call tomorrow. If you can manage by yourself for a day, Moses and I have pl
ans to see a matinee Christmas concert in Savannah.”

  7

  I didn’t need Ginn to join me on the trip to Beaufort to see former County Sheriff Jim Bolton. I’d actually played golf with him a couple of years ago. Stone and I were on the last four holes at HarbourTown when a distinguished looking gent pulled up in a cart and asked if he could join us. We offered to let him play through but he said he welcomed the company.

  It was only after we had drinks with him in the clubhouse that he told us what he’d done for a living. A longtime cop, now retired, he had been elected Beaufort County Sheriff for several terms. He was now living on a pension near the County Seat and using his old contacts to score complimentary tee times to supplement his own country club membership.

  When I called that morning, he said that he doubted he could shine much light on the Townes case. I said perhaps I could jog his memory with my questions and I didn’t mind driving up to Beaufort. He said it would a waste of my time but he’d be willing to talk if I insisted.

  “We’ve met before,” he said, when I arrived at his canal front home, late-morning. It was larger and more formal in style than Black’s, and had probably set him back twice the price. The water view was impressive, at least what I could see over his sizable boat.

  “I didn’t think you’d remember.”

  “I birdied seventeen that day. First and only time. After that seven iron to the green, you must’ve thought I was some golfer. Then I reverted to form and shanked one into the marsh on the next hole.”

  He was seventy six and still in fine shape. Full head of white hair. Dressed in a shiny black nylon running suit, the kind that went out of style in the nineties, but showed off his slim physique. He had a white towel wrapped around his neck.

  “Just back from a run, sir? I said.

  “Jim is fine, son. Yeah, I still manage to do three miles four days a week. My times are a lot slower than they used to be, but I’m still able to do it, Lord willing.”

  Bolton had a very mild southern accent, even though he had lived and worked in Beaufort County his entire life. He once ran for Congress in this district, but had lost the Republican primary to a fellow named Mark Sanford, the deposed governor, famous for an Appalachian Trail hike that detoured through South America to be with his mistress.

  I said, “Thanks for agreeing to meet with me. I won’t take up much of your time.”

  “When Alex Tomey called, I was happy to accommodate her. She’s a winner, that one. How do you know her?”

  I told him how Alex had been a great help on a number of my cases, leaving out the fact that she was living in my house with a much older black man. Most people accepted Ginn and Tomey as a couple, but Bolton’s generation has some holdouts.

  “Give her my regards. She’ll be chief of police on that island someday, mark my words. Let’s sit on my screen porch. I have space heaters going so it should be comfortable. How do you like your coffee?”

  “Half and half if you have it. Medium, no sugar, thanks.”

  He produced a freshly brewed mug from a high tech single serve machine. “So, what do you want to know?” he said, once we settled in. The sun was bright but the temperature had yet to leave the forties. The propane heaters were welcome.

  I told him how Jason Black had met Townes’ widow and wanted to help out. I mentioned the new group that had recorded songs that sounded like ones he’d written years ago.

  “Well, we didn’t know we had a big celebrity in our midst, just a drunken local troubadour. When I caught the case, I was chief of detectives on the county force. Seemed like a routine accident. Van ran off the road. We don’t get a lot of ice here, but that was a cold night and it’s possible he just skidded off the shoulder.”

  “Those old VW’s didn’t handle very well under the best of conditions.”

  Steam rose from his mug. “That’s what we thought. You wanna check out the place, it’s easy to find. That particular stretch has some bad karma.”

  I said, “What do you mean?”

  “The van wreck was within a few yards of that billboard on Lowcountry Drive. Or Coosaw Scenic, if you like. The one Caleb Whiteleather’s folks put up to commemorate their son. Poor kid was killed by a drunken driver there. Tragic.”

  “I’ve been by there many times. The sign says the guy who did it is in jail. Back to Townes, did you see any skid marks?”

  “I don’t recall.”

  “Didn’t you guys patrol that highway?”

  “We did but, well it’s embarrassing. The officer assigned to that stretch wasn’t at his post that night. Wouldn’t have mattered though. Not to speak ill of the dead, but Mr. Townes was a frequent marijuana user. It’s possible he just drove off the road.”

  “Obviously, you searched the area.”

  “Our guys with the canine unit. Covered a grid of a couple square miles or so. Back then there was no seatbelts or airbags, ‘specially in a piece of shit like that van, pardon my French.”

  “So what do you think happened?”

  “My guess, and it’s only a guess, is that he got conked on the head from the impact and then wandered off and died somewhere in the woods. That area is swampy and there are gators around. If he fell asleep outside in the cold, could’ve made one of them a nice meal.”

  “But this happened in the winter. Aren’t the gators sleeping underwater? I almost never see them out on the banks when it’s cold.”

  “As I recall, it did get close to seventy a day or two later. Still got real cold at night. But there’re turkey buzzards and vultures around, too.”

  “His wife said he had a notebook with him with some of his new material. Nothing like that in the van?”

  “No, sir. Now understand, some kids found the van a couple days after his wife said he left. They called it in and then we investigated.”

  “Why didn’t they take the guitar?”

  “They were honest kids, came from good families. After you called, I checked with Records at County. Got the names of the boys who found it. Trouble is, the two kids are dead now.”

  “That’s odd, isn’t it? If they were kids then, the oldest they’d be would be mid-fifties.”

  “One was an alkie, drank himself to death. The other was a landscaper. Cancer. Working with them chemicals without no protection. Didn’t know they were dangerous then.”

  My coffee had cooled enough to sip. It was good.

  “So there was nothing else unusual?”

  “Like I said, the man was no big deal back then. But you know the way these cults form around dead musicians. Jimmy Rodgers was only thirty two when he passed. Country guys today make like he was Sinatra. I never did cotton much to that yodeling.”

  “Do you remember how much damage was done to the van? Any indication how fast it was going?”

  “It couldn’t have been going that fast. Coulda been he fell asleep at the wheel and it ran off the edge. Lodged up against a tree.”

  “Do you know why the officer whose responsibility it was didn’t do his job that night? I’ve been stopped on it a couple of times. You just get off the interstate and you’re used to cruising at 75 and the limit on the stretch is 55.”

  I could see that he wanted to say something but thought better of it. He just shook his head. “Just between you and me, the cop who had that assignment was derelict in his duty. Had a woman he was seeing, married to our chief at the time. He was with her, not that it would’ve changed anything. I do have another explanation for what mighta happened, if you’d care to hear it?”

  “Sure, that why I came.”

  “I saw the letter the guy wrote to his wife. He was depressed, sounded suicidal. I think he might’ve killed himself.”

  “Deliberately wrecking the van? His body would’ve been inside.”

  “Could’ve been upset that he wrecked the van and that was the last straw. His life was falling apart. Couldn’t get a break in his career. Marriage mighta been on the rocks. It’s also conceivable he got out and hi
tched a ride to parts unknown. Planned it all along, a clean getaway. Decided to start a new life with a new identity.”

  “Anything’s possible.”

  “So let me get this right. You’re been hired to look into this by the widow. After forty years?”

  “Actually, I’m doing this as a favor. She’s almost broke, working as a cashier at Home Depot even though she’s over seventy. Some of Townes old songs are getting airplay these days from a hot new band, songs he never released. There might be royalties coming her way, which would be a big help.”

  “I understand. I have to say this though --- you’re wasting your time looking into the disappearance. We did a damn thorough job years ago and we couldn’t get to the bottom of it. I was you, I’d be chasing down that band and see where they got the tunes. Could be he just got tired of his old lady and started up fresh with some new broad. He was that type, you ask me. Changed his name, sold the songs and never looked back.”

  8

  It was lunchtime and I debated skipping the meal to find the man who might have some clues about what happened with Townes that cold December night, forty years ago. My rumbling stomach won out.

  I’m not sure why, but I wound up at the Frog and Peach. Maybe it was the pleasant memory of Finnan Haddie, although I knew it wasn’t on the menu. It could be that I thought that Katrina McCann might enlighten me about the Brand X massacre. Or it could be that Tomey and Ginn had put a bug in my head about the unmarried Kat.

  In any case, there she was, at a stand near the entrance, presumably to answer the phone and assign the waitresses. Not much of either going on.

  When she saw me, she smiled, her left eyebrow arched in a question mark. “Riley King. What brings you here? Looking for Jason? He’s home working in his shop.”

  “No. I was in town interviewing the cop who had lead on the Townes case. It’s lunchtime and I wanted to see if the Italian food was as good as what we had yesterday.”