He was apparently feeling a little frisky right now; spittle had formed at the corner of his lips.
“Why Woody, you’re frothing at the mouth. I hope it’s not anything contagious.”
Woody’s smirk collapsed into an uncertain scowl. “What is that nasty-ass remark supposed to mean?”
“I heard a bunch of rabid coons were trucked into the area, and you know how I worry about you. I’d hate to think one had snuck up and given you a love bite. Then I’d have to decide whether to get you some shots or just shoot you.”
“Very funny, Porter. I’m about to bust a gut,” Woody sourly retorted. “I ain’t heard about no coons; it’s got nothing to do with me.”
“Word has it you’re the one who bought and released them. That wasn’t very smart, Woody. Now I’m going to have to watch every move you make.” I figured the least I could do was to give him the beginnings of an ulcer.
“Let me guess who started that vicious rumor. It couldn’t have been that darling little daughter of mine, now, could it?” Hardy spat. “She’s just pissy ’cause she’s trying to get money outta me that I ain’t got, the ungrateful little bitch.”
I only hoped Tammy V didn’t nourish the same financial delusions. Though I couldn’t imagine what Woody might possibly offer that would be worth enduring another day in his paradise.
Woody rolled off the couch and waddled to the TV, where he switched off one set and turned on another. Bending over, he fiddled with its antennas, swiveling each the slightest bit. One quick glimpse was enough to confirm that a shirt wasn’t the only item of apparel Woody was lacking. He was obviously into embracing his inner caveman these days. I just wished he’d kept the family jewels under wraps.
Woody delicately twirled the rabbit ears back and forth until the semblance of a picture appeared. Mission accomplished, he turned back to face me. “Besides, how’m I supposed to take care of my family? Why don’t you tell me that, Miss Smarty Pants?”
The bristles on his chin angrily erupted in a quivering wave, like a throng of hostile porcupine quills.
“I ain’t had no decent money since those goddamn bunny huggers slowed the fur trade to a crawl. And now there’s gonna be another mouth to feed, on top of it. Meanwhile, Wynona’s jerking me around for a car and Tammy’s demanding a new refrigerator. Dammit to hell! I’m already working day and night doing what a man’s gotta do. All I ask is gimme a market!”
He looked like he was about to pound on his chest like an angry gorilla.
“I got me a freezer full of coon, beaver, and muskrat skins outside. I got bundles of mink and fox pelts waiting to be shipped to a buyer. I can show you thousands of furs wrapped in plastic, going to waste. Hell, the only thing we’re living offa are the coon dogs I’m able to sell, and now you’re even trying to screw me outta that!”
I was tempted to remind Hardy of the monthly disability check he collected from his bogus claim of having a bad back, but getting kicked out of his house would only curtail my snooping.
“Free enterprise doesn’t give you the right to create a rabies epidemic,” I warned. “Besides, you don’t want your kids to get infected, do you?”
Woody laid back down on the couch, picked up his remote, and flicked through the channels.
“I ain’t done nothing wrong,” he obstinately declared. “But since you know it all, why don’t you take a look at my dogs and tell me if you spot the slightest sign of rabies? By the time you’re through, I bet you’ll end up wanting to buy one of ’em for yourself. Tell you what! I’ll sell you my champion dog dirt cheap: you can have him for just twenty-thousand dollars.”
Gee, like father, like daughter.
Annoyed, I gave the TV antennas a whirl, bringing a curse to Woody’s lips, and then headed outside.
The sound of screams drifted from the back of the house, accompanied by the clatter of tin can weapons. I wondered if Woody’s kids regularly received tetanus shots—or if Tammy V secretly hoped they’d contract lockjaw just to give her a few weeks of peace.
As I approached, the coon dogs broke into joyful song, wagging their tails and pressing against the cage. I gave each mutt a scratch, noticing that none was foaming at the mouth. The dogs began barking once more as the two boys again came hurtling toward me. This time it was the unpleasant elder sibling—Prince Charming—who’d been nailed by his brother. A trickle of blood dripped from his nose.
“Shouldn’t you boys be in school?” I inquired.
“Nah. Pawpaw says he can teach us everything we need to know,” answered the scrappy younger one.
Oh brother. Were these kids ever in trouble.
“So, what else do you do for fun besides beat each other up?”
“We play with Pa’s traps. They’re real cool! You wanna see them?” Prince Charming gallantly offered.
Who was I to turn down such an invitation? I followed the two dynamos into a wooden shack, where they headed straight for three large freezer chests.
“Pawpaw’s got over a thousand traps in here!” little Spunky bragged, throwing open one of the lids.
I took a peek inside. He was right; it was filled with deadly steel contraptions.
Prince Charming roughly shoved his brother aside and removed a few of the traps from the defective freezer. “This is a double-spring coil. And this here is a one-and-a-half-long Victor.”
I began to understand Hardy’s homeschooling curriculum as son number one proceeded to educate me on the ways of trapping and killing God’s little creatures.
“They’ll catch an animal, but they won’t snuff it. For that, you gotta have something Pa calls Sudden Death. It’s a 130 Conibear and a real killer!” the boy explained, holding one up. “This thing’s so strong, you gotta set it with tongs. Then you put it in a box with some food and wait for the action.”
“Yeah! When the critter crawls inside, the trap goes Snap! Bam! Boom!” Spunky added, with a karate kick. “Sometimes they die with their eyes wide open, like they don’t know what hit ’em, and then they look like this.” The kid’s eyes glazed over and his tongue lolled out of his mouth.
So much for instilling a healthy respect for all living things.
“This other freezer is where Pa stores his animal skins. He says they’re worth a hundred million dollars,” Prince Charming boasted.
No wonder Wynona and Tammy V thought Woody was rich.
“And this last one is filled with deer meat,” the kid added, hoisting himself on to the third freezer’s lid.
“What’s in there?” I asked, pointing to a large refrigerator that stood by itself in the corner.
Prince Charming began to fidget. “Pa keeps his fishing bait in there.”
“That’s not true! Pawpaw has it filled with deer meat. We got so much there’s no more room for it in the freezer,” Spunky crowed.
Prince Charming shot his younger brother a dirty look. That could mean only one thing: Woody was having a very successful poaching season.
“My Pawpaw’s killed sooo many deer that Ma has to think of a hundred different ways to cook it,” Spunky bragged. “She makes deer hamburgers, deer meatloaf, and deer spaghetti. Then there’s deer chops, deer steak, and deer barbecue. Tonight we’re having deer Sloppy Joes for dinner.”
“Shut up!” Prince Charming ordered, giving his brother a sharp rap to the head.
The little boy burst into loud tears.
I didn’t want Woody to come out just when I was making some headway. “Behave yourselves, and you can each have one of these,” I bribed, holding out a couple of Snickers.
Both boys grabbed the candy as if they were snatching it out of a trap. As they stuffed the chocolate in their mouths, I opened the refrigerator and began to rummage around.
The boys hadn’t exaggerated, and I began to wonder if Woody was working as the neighborhood meat market. Then my gaze fell on a large white plastic container. It peeked out from behind a partial haunch of venison, stuck in the rear of the fridge.
Some
times you can’t be sure why something strikes you as funny. God knows, my own refrigerator is chock full of things I’d just as soon forget. All I knew was that the container probably didn’t hold deer meat, and was using up valuable space. That alone made me curious.
“Hey! Why are you taking all the meat out of the fridge? Pa isn’t going to like that!” Prince Charming protested.
His tone plainly revealed there was something I wasn’t supposed to find, and I continued to clear a path. Prince Charming bolted toward the house as Spunky jumped up and down like a hyperactive kangaroo by my side.
“Stop that! Pawpaw never lets us play in there!” the child vehemently objected. He picked up his tin can weapon and twirled it with a threatening air.
Great. I was being held captive by a maniacal munchkin.
“Put your weapon down and I’ll give you the very last candy bar.”
Spunky pulled on his lip while mulling the offer over. “What kind is it?”
“It’s a special Mars bar with extra creamy caramel inside,” I blatantly lied.
Spunky went for the bribe, and I turned back to the task at hand. I removed the last chunks of meat and pulled the bucket toward me.
It was the type of three-pound deli container in which my grandmother used to store chicken soup. I popped open the lid, half-expecting to find matzo balls and chicken grease. Instead, I discovered something of far greater value. Gleaming up at me was what could have passed for glistening black pearls, but I knew the contents were Delta Gold—more properly known as highly prized paddlefish eggs. And the last thing Woody would be using them for was bait.
An ancient species, the paddlefish dates back almost 400 million years, inhabiting the earth long before dinosaurs. Its appearance is highly unusual due to an elongated, paddle-shaped snout. Slate-gray in color, the fish once grew over six feet in length and weighed up to two hundred pounds. But that was when the species was plentiful along its migration route—the Mississippi River and its tributaries. Today they’ve been wiped out in four states, with only remnant populations in others, due to overexploitation from commercial fishing and habitat destruction. I felt like Mary Leakey, having stumbled upon a lead.
A toss of the genetic dice is responsible for why the paddlefish is now in more trouble than ever. Talk about having bad luck when it comes to getting stuck with the wrong relatives: paddlefish are the North American cousin to the Russian sturgeon. In other words, they’re free-floating caviar on the fin, and therefore very lucrative. While most Southern states won’t allow paddlefish to be caught, Tennessee does. Still, the trade is highly regulated and seasonal, requiring a commercial fishing license along with an official permit to sell their eggs. Neither of which Hardy had, I was sure. What I did know was that this was the best time of year for poaching them. February is when female paddlefish are ripe with large, luscious eggs.
I dipped my finger in and tasted the briny roe. One of this planet’s greatest survivors was near extinction, just to satisfy the feeding frenzy of connoisseurs who demand caviar spread upon their toast.
“See, Pa? I told you she was doing something bad!” Prince Charming yelled.
I was tempted to grab the kid and shake him until I got my Snickers bar back.
“I stayed to keep an eye on her, Pawpaw. Just in case she tried to get away,” Spunky chimed in.
So much for loyalty. My only consolation was that the Mars bar I’d given him was stale.
Hardy ignored his miniature informants and turned to me. “I can give you some of those eggs, if you gotta hankering for them,” he offered, in an innocent tone.
I finally had the opportunity to nail him!
“Why, Woody, what a wonderful surprise! I didn’t know you’d become a commercial fisherman. How about letting me see your license?” I suggested pleasantly.
Woody broke into a nervous shuffle. “Hell, Porter. You know I ain’t got one of those things. It was a friend of mine who brought those eggs here. Tammy’s developed a craving for salty stuff—you know, what with her condition and all.”
“Sure, I understand. Just give me the name of your friend so I can pass on your regards,” I countered.
Woody hitched his thumbs in his overalls and slyly grinned at me. “Okay, you got me. I’ve been a baaaad boy. But, hell, I gotta do something ’sides lay around all day eating crackers!”
I pointedly looked at the scars on his hands. They’d been created by the kickback from a double-barrel rifle. I suspected most of his time was spent poaching critters, stopping only when he ran out of shells.
“Besides, it was just one itty-bitty little paddlefish that got stuck in my net. It seemed okay to take the eggs, being that it was already dead. I figured my brother Virgil could use ’em for happy hour at his bar.”
The Sho Nuf was a local dive hidden away in the backwoods, where rednecks regularly gathered to drink moonshine. Not the kind of place that catered to your caviar clientele.
“Save the tap dancing, Woody. I’m not in the mood for your crap,” I warned. “If you’re not dealing in paddlefish eggs, how do you know how to process them?”
Woody’s mouth flew open in surprise.
Fresh roe will begin to spoil unless processed within a couple of hours. Though not a complicated procedure, it requires the use of a wire mesh screen. The eggs are gently pushed back and forth over this sieve to remove all fatty tissue and membranes, after which they’re lightly salted. Only someone involved in the caviar business would have any reason to know the steps.
“While we’re at it, I also have proof that you transported rabid coons over state lines,” I bluffed, beginning to feel lucky.
“Bullshit!” Woody shot back, finally finding his voice. “There’s no way in hell you got any proof of that!”
“Oh no? Just take a look at this.” I produced a piece of coon fur with a flourish. “I found it on the floor of your trailer.”
Woody began to laugh. “Well, ain’t that just dandy. Pick yourself up enough of that shit and maybe you can make yourself a coonskin jacket!”
“I plan to send it off to our forensics lab. Obviously you don’t realize it, but coons from Ohio have much thicker fur than their southern cousins.” I stared him down.
“Dammit!” Woody mumbled, falling for my ploy.
“I figure between this piece of fur and trafficking in the eggs of a protected species, you won’t have to worry about how to spend your time anymore. You’ll be busy picking up litter as part of a prison gang for years.”
“Is she really gonna send you to jail, Pawpaw?” Spunky began to bawl.
“Don’t be such a wuss!” Prince Charming reproached, giving his brother a knuckle punch on the arm. “It’ll be just like on TV, where Pa escapes and is on the run. We can even help him plan the breakout!”
“Get the hell out of here now!” Woody bellowed.
Both boys scurried through the shed door. Then Hardy turned toward me with a surly expression.
“Well, you must be feeling pretty high and mighty right about now, Porter.”
Actually, I was feeling pretty darned good.
Woody took a pack of Redman tobacco from his pocket and bit off a plug. A bulge the size of a large tumor formed in the side of his cheek.
“I mean, especially for a low-level government lackey like yourself, who makes nothing but chump change,” Hardy began to needle.
“What’s the matter, Woody? Have you got something against an honest day’s work?”
“Come on, Porter, we both know what your bosses think of you. From what I hear, they’d gladly send you to Siberia if they could find a cubbyhole there to put you in.”
“What’s your point, Woody?” I asked in annoyance, wondering where he was getting his information.
“My point is that you’ve been in trouble with the Service since the day you joined.” Hardy chuckled. “Don’t look so surprised. You’d be impressed with the sources I got. What I do know is that you ain’t never going to be their golden girl.
Do you really think they sent a woman down here, expecting her to handle the situation? They’re probably hoping someone like me will bash your brains in with a shovel, drag your body into the delta, and make all their troubles disappear.”
My heart began to beat faster as I caught sight of the metal shovel standing in the corner of the shed.
Hardy noted my glance and his smile grew even more cocky. “Don’t worry, Porter. I’m not gonna knock you off. But it should make you realize that Fish and Wildlife ain’t never gonna reward anything you do. Maybe it’s time to reevaluate things and start planning for your future.”
I was still trying to figure out where he was going with all this, when Hardy headed for the back of the shed. He pushed pieces of plywood out of the way until a foot locker sat uncovered on the floor. Woody threw the lid wide open and began to reach inside. My hand flew for the .38 I kept tucked in the waistband of my pants.
“Don’t even think about trying anything funny!” I warned.
Hardy slowly turned around holding a smell metal box. Then he began to walk toward me.
“Put it down, Woody,” I cautioned.
Hardy placed the receptacle on a wooden table between us.
“Now open it very slowly.” I had every intention of nailing his ass to the wall should there be a handgun inside.
Woody raised the cover, allowing me a glimpse of its contents. A stash of hundred-dollar bills filled the container.
I stared at Woody in amazement, wondering what bank he had robbed. It took a moment before the realization hit me: the caviar trade was one of the last big money markets left to be drained. I also knew there was no way in hell I could ever prove where he’d gotten the cash.
He pulled out a thick wad of moolah and pushed the pile toward me.
“Just think about it, Porter. What’s gonna happen if the Service finds a way to dump your ass in the next coupla years? It’ll take time to find a new job. And God knows, you don’t have a husband to fall back on. Hell! Even if you stay, I’m sure you could use a little extra cash to pay some bills. If nothing else, this would make it easier to deal with that pain-in-the-ass boss of yours. You can daydream about how to spend the extra ten grand while he’s chewing your ass up one side and down the other for not keeping up with your paperwork.”
Black Delta Night Page 2