The Nighttime is the Right Time

by Bill Crider

  "Don't see any reason why not," Newberry said. "Who did you want to see?"

  "I'll start with Bo," Rhodes said.

  ~ * ~

  Bo Peevehouse, who had a cellular phone, also had the biggest TV set in Blacklin County, or so Rhodes had heard. He'd never seen it, himself. Bo had done very well in insurance, which Rhodes knew about in the same way he knew about the TV set, through Ivy, Rhodes' wife, who worked at a rival insurance agency.

  Peevehouse had red hair that he wore in a spiky crew cut that Rhodes thought looked pretty strange with his Western garb. Bo's boots were dusty but otherwise clean. His hands were smooth and white. Not the hands of a cowboy.

  "Did you see the body?" Rhodes asked him.

  They were sitting at a small wooden table in the camphouse, which had only one big room with a concrete floor. The rafters were covered with antlers, some of them small, some of them having five or six points, and the walls held pictures of wolves, deer, mountain lions, and Rocky Mountain sheep. There was a cot in one corner, a fireplace with more antlers nailed to the rough wooden mantel, and some metal folding chairs.

  "Nope," Peevehouse said. "I didn't see it, and I sure didn't want to. Ben Locklin threw up, they told me, and I would've done the same thing. I don't need to see any bodies. All I did was call your office on my phone."

  He patted his shirt pocket, where Rhodes could see the slim outline of the telephone.

  "Flip model," Peevehouse said. "You wanta have a look?"

  Rhodes didn't. "You brought some wood for the fire?"

  "Sure did. Somebody's gotta do it, and I figured it might as well be me. I don't mind working for my dinner."

  "Who else brought wood up?"

  Peevehouse didn't know. "I was busy shootin' di-- I mean I was doin' somethin' else."

  "Who do you know that might want to kill Gabe Tolliver?"

  Peevehouse didn't want to talk about it. He looked at the antlers, at the pictures, and at the concrete floor. Finally he said, "Sheriff, you know what it's been like in this county for the last ten years? People haven't had much money, and when the bank was sold to that holdin' company, a lot of the old guys who'd been there for years lost their jobs. Gabe held onto his, but he had to be tough to do it. He couldn't do business the way he had before. You might say he was foreclosin' on the widows and orphans, and the only people who could get a loan were the folks who didn't need one. There were plenty of people who didn't like Gabe."

  Rhodes knew Tolliver's reputation. But the word was that Gabe liked being tough. Foster had already hinted at it, and Rhodes had been hearing it for a long time before that. That wasn't really what he was interested in.

  "Anybody here today get turned down for money he needed to keep his doors open?" he asked. "Anybody here today lose a house or a car because of Gabe?"

  Peevehouse shook his head. "Not that I know of."

  "I didn't think so. Now what about other things? The kind of things that people get really upset about."

  "I don't like to gossip, Sheriff," Peevehouse said. "When you sell insurance, you meet a lot of people and you hear a lot of stories. I don't pay 'em much attention."

  He was looking at the fireplace while he talked. Rhodes figured he was lying.

  "I think you should tell me if you've heard anything," Rhodes said. "I'll just find out from someone else."

  "I guess you're right," Peevehouse said. He looked away from the fireplace and sighed. And then he told Rhodes what he'd heard.

  ~ * ~

  Ben Locklin was five inches over six feet, but his hands were as small and soft as those of a teenage girl.

  "It was a hell of a shock," he said. "Seeing Gabe lying there, like that, his stomach ripped open. I don't mind telling you I lost my lunch. It was a hell of a mess. Looked like he got gored by a bull to me, but I hadn't seen any bull down there in the woods, or any cows either. That's why I told Bo he'd better call you."

  "You thought somebody had a reason to kill him?" Rhodes asked.

  "Gabe was a good man," Locklin said, folding his arms across his wide chest. "I know what people think about him, but they think worse of me. I'm his boss, after all. I could tell him to do different if I wanted to."

  Rhodes didn't really believe that. Locklin had been with the bank for twenty years, but everyone knew that didn't make a bit of difference to the new owners, who were probably planning to get rid of him as soon as they got more of their own men in place.

  "I wasn't wondering about his business practices," Rhodes said. "I wanted to hear about his troubles with women."

  Locklin looked at him.

  "You know what I mean," Rhodes said. "He had a wandering eye, from what I hear."

  "I don't know about that," Locklin said. "What my employees do on their own time is their own business."

  "In a town the size of Clearview it isn't. I've already heard about it from Bo."

  Ben waved a dismissive hand. "Gutter talk."

  "Maybe. You've heard about it too, though, haven't you?"

  "I've heard. That doesn't mean I believe it."

  "That kind of talk gets under people's skin," Rhodes said. "Whether it's true or not." He told Locklin what he'd heard.

  Locklin thought for a second or two and then admitted that he'd heard more or less the same things. Rhodes asked if he'd mentioned the talk to Gabe.

  "Yeah, I said something. He told me to mind my own damn business, not that I blame him. Whatever he was doing, it didn't affect his work at the bank."

  "And those men I mentioned, they had loans they'd missed a payment or two on?"

  Locklin shrugged. "Yeah, I guess that's right."

  That was all Rhodes wanted to know.

  ~ * ~

  George Newberry was just as reluctant to talk as Peevehouse and Locklin had been, but when Rhodes told him that he'd already heard the gossip, Newberry gave in. He confirmed everything that Peevehouse and Locklin had said.

  "But it's just gossip," he said. "Stuff you hear if you hang around a convenience store all day like I do. I don't know that a word of it's true. You know what it's like when stories get started."

  Rhodes knew. But there was generally a factual basis for things, even if the facts weren't as juicy as the story that finally made the rounds of the entire community.

  "Both those men went down for firewood, according to Foster," Rhodes said.

  "Maybe so," Newberry agreed, "but that doesn't make them killers."

  That was true enough, but it put them in the vicinity of the murder. Right now that was about all Rhodes had to go on, that and the gossip.

  "Send them in," he told Newberry. "I'll talk to them together."

  "You think that's a good idea?"

  "Maybe not," Rhodes said. "But it's the only one I have."

  ~ * ~

  Neither Hal Janes nor Brian Colby looked like a killer. They were young and skinny, and in their tight jeans and Western hats, they looked as if they were just about to go to a rodeo and ride a bronc or maybe enter the calf roping event. Colby had a red and white bandanna tied around his neck.

  They came into the camphouse and stood awkwardly until Rhodes told them to sit at the table. He stood by the fireplace and watched them.

  Janes was little a taller than Colby, but Colby was a lot wider through the shoulders. Either one of them looked big enough to have killed Gabe without too much trouble. Colby's boots were dirty, but Janes' were spotless.

  Both men were nervous. Colby fidgeted in the folding chair, and Janes rubbed his hands together as if he were washing them.

  Rhodes gave them a few seconds to wonder about what he was going to ask them. Then he said, "I know that you both went down to bring in some wood for the fire, and I know that one of you killed Gabe Tolliver. What I don't know is which one of you did it."

  "Jesus Christ," Colby said, standing up and knocking over his chair. It clanged on the hard floor. "You must be crazy, Sheriff."

  "Lots of people think so," Rhodes said. "What about you
, Hal?"

  Janes was still sitting at the table, still dry-washing his hands.

  "I wouldn't know about that," he said. "I think you're makin' a big mistake, though, accusin' two innocent men without any evidence."

  "How would you know I don't have any evidence?" Rhodes asked.

  Colby picked up his chair and sat back down. He looked at Janes and seemed as interested in the answer to the question as Rhodes did.

  Janes gripped the edge of the table with his fingers, looking down at his nails. "The way I heard it, Gabe's just lyin' down there dead. Nobody saw him get killed, so there's no witnesses." He looked up at Rhodes. "Ben Locklin found the body, and he said it looked like a cow did it, or a bull. Said Gabe looked like he'd been gored."

  "So there must not be any evidence of any murder," Colby said, more relaxed now and tipping back his chair. "Ben would've seen it if there was."

  "Ben's not a trained lawman," Rhodes said. "He works in a bank."

  "So did Gabe," Janes pointed out. "The same bank. Maybe they had a fight and Ben killed Gabe."

  "Ben found the body, all right," Rhodes said. "He didn't kill anybody, though."

  "Did you ask him?"

  "I didn't have to," Rhodes said. "Now let me tell you what I think happened."

  "It won't do you any good," Colby told him. "I didn't kill anybody, and I don't have to listen to you."

  "Me neither," Janes said. "I don't see why you're pickin' on us."

  "Because of your wives," Rhodes said.

  "You son of a bitch," Janes said.

  Colby didn't say anything. He just sat there and looked as if he'd like to be somewhere else.

  "Tolliver was after both of them," Rhodes went on, ignoring Janes. He'd been called worse. "You were both behind on loans, and he was using that to get at your wives. That's the way he was. He'd promise a little leeway if the woman would meet him somewhere for a drink."

  "I think you'd better shut up, Sheriff," Colby said.

  Rhodes ignored him the way he'd ignored Janes and leaned an elbow on the mantel in a space that was free of antlers.

  "I think it happened this way," he said. "One of you saw Tolliver going for wood and followed him down there. Maybe you already had in mind what you were going to do, but I don't know about that. Maybe you just wanted to talk to him, tell him to stay away from your wife."

  "So what?" Colby said. "What'd be wrong with that? If he was messin' where he shouldn't have been, he needed tellin'."

  Rhodes agreed. "There's nothing wrong with telling. But that's not what happened. Whoever followed Gabe got so mad that he killed him. Maybe there was an argument first, and maybe Gabe said a few things he shouldn't have said. I don't know about that, either. I do know that somebody took a tree limb and clubbed Gabe in the back of the head."

  "That wouldn't look like a bull gored him," Colby pointed out.

  "No, so someone tried to cover up. Not that it did any good. That smack on the back of the head couldn't be hidden."

  "Maybe he hit his head when he fell," Janes said. "After he got gored."

  "That's a good argument, but it's not what happened. If he hadn't been hit first, he would have screamed. Somebody hit Tolliver and then gored him with a tree limb. Maybe with the same one he hit him with."

  "Where's the limb, then?" Colby asked.

  "Burned up," Rhodes said. "The killer broke it up and took it to Jerry for firewood."

  Colby didn't believe it. "Wouldn't Jerry have noticed the blood on the pieces of the limb when he put it in the fire?"

  "Whoever killed Gabe jammed the limb in the dirt to clean the blood off," Rhodes said. "If there was any blood still on it, the dirt covered it up. Foster wouldn't have been looking for it."

  "Sounds like you don't have any evidence, then, Sheriff," Janes said.

  "Maybe not. But I know who killed Gabe Tolliver."

  "Who?" Janes asked.

  "You did," Rhodes said, stepping toward the table.

  Janes shoved back his chair, kicked over the table, and threw Brian Colby at Rhodes.

  Colby and Rhodes went down in a heap on the floor. Rhodes banged his elbow, and Janes ran out the door.

  ~ * ~

  No one in the yard tried to stop Janes. They didn't even know for sure what was going on until Rhodes came running out after him.

  By that time Janes had vaulted the fence and headed across the pasture. Rhodes knew that if Janes made it to the river bottoms, about a mile away, they might never catch him. The bottom land was thick with trees and if a man was careful and knew the woods, he could stay in the trees most of the way across the state.

  Rhodes knew better than to try vaulting the fence. He valued the more delicate parts of his anatomy too much for that. He went through the gate, but that put him even farther behind Janes.

  He probably wouldn't have caught him if it hadn't been for the armadillo. The armored mammal, frightened by Janes' approach, sprang up out of nowhere and shot across Janes' path.

  It was too late for Janes to try to avoid the armadillo. He kicked it, tripped, and went sprawling in the bitterweed. The armadillo rolled a few feet and then it was on its way again. Janes got to his knees, but Rhodes reached him before he could get up, put an armlock on him and then slapped on the cuffs. After that it was easy to march him back to the camphouse.

  They got there at the same time the ambulance arrived, followed closely by the J.P., another county car carrying Deputy Ruth Grady, and Red Rogers, a reporter for the local radio station who was looking for a good story. Rhodes figured he would get one.

  ~ * ~

  It was nearly dark before things were straightened out, but no one left. They were all too curious to know the story, and besides, there was all that barbecue to eat, not to mention peach ice cream.

  They were so eager to hear the story that they even invited Rhodes to stay.

  Red Rogers tried to get Rhodes on tape, but Rhodes didn't want to talk for the radio. He wanted to eat ribs and ice cream.

  "You owe it to the community," Rogers said. "You have to tell us how you knew that Hal Janes was the killer."

  Rhodes could smell the barbecue, and he looked longingly at the ice cream freezers under their quilt covers.

  "We'll save you some cream," Newberry assured him. "You go on and talk."

  "Great," Rogers said. "So how did you know it was Janes?"

  "His boots were too clean," Rhodes said. "He was the only one here with clean boots. Which meant that he'd cleaned them off. I think he stepped in a cow patty on the trail and left a boot print in it. But he noticed the print and kicked the patty to pieces, so naturally he had to clean his boots. Deputy Grady is looking around for his bandanna right now. I think she'll find it."

  Rogers was incredulous. "And that's it? You knew he did it because his boots were clean?"

  "That and his hands," Rhodes said. "You look at all these men here, they're dressed up in cowboy clothes, but they're not cowboys. They're bankers and salesmen and store owners. There's not a calloused hand in the bunch. Janes didn't want me to see his hands because he'd scratched them up on the limb he used to kill Tolliver with. You can't fool with that rough bark like that, not without marking your hands."

  "But what about hard evidence?" Rogers asked.

  "We'll find that bandanna," Rhodes said. "And we'll find traces of bark in the scratches on Janes' hands. We'll find cow manure on his boots, too, in the cracks and crevices. He couldn't get it all off."

  "But will that prove he killed Gabe Tolliver?"

  "He had a motive, the means, and the opportunity," Rhodes said. "We'll see what a jury thinks."

  There was more that Rogers wanted to say, but Rhodes didn't listen. Everyone was eating from paper plates heaped with ribs and brisket, beans and potato salad, and the covers were off the ice cream freezers. Rhodes wanted to get his share.

  It turned out to be even better than he'd thought. The ribs were smokey and spicy, and the ice cream was so smooth and sweet and cold th
at he could have eaten a whole gallon.

  It was too bad, he thought, that Hal Janes and Gabe Tolliver weren't there to enjoy it.

  Cap'n Bob and Gus

  Another series character I enjoy is Bill Ferrel, a Hollywood private-eye who’s never appeared in a novel. He’s been in a number of short stories, however, including this one, which was listed in the “honorable mention” section of a big volume of “the year’s best fantasy stories.” I never thought of it as a fantasy, however.

  I think it was S. J. Perelman who said that Hollywood was a dismal industrial town controlled by wealthy hoodlums, or something like that. Maybe he was right. But it seems to me there are just as many rich lunatics as there are rich hoodlums. In fact, the guy who was bellowing at me on the phone was probably both.

  I was trying to calm him down. "Mr. Gober, I can't understand a word you're saying. Maybe if you'd stop yelling."

  "Goddammit, Ferrel, I'm not yelling! You want yelling? I'll give you yelling!"

  He turned things up a notch or two. He sounded like a buffalo with a bullhorn. I decided there was no need trying to make sense out of things until he ran down.

  It took about five minutes by my watch. When I was sure he was finished, I said, "Go over the part about the parrot again."

  "Goddammit, Ferrel, have you been listening to a word I've said?"

  "Yelled. A word you yelled."

  That set him off again. He pays me pretty well, so I guess he's got a right to yell if he wants to. He's the head of Gober Studios, and in 1948 his pictures grossed nearly as much as those of any studio in Hollywood. As best I could tell Gober was hoping to do even better in '49, but apparently something had happened to the parrot.

  I didn't know what a parrot had to do with Gober's box office, and I didn't want to fool with one, but I'm on retainer to the studio. Usually that involves keeping some star's name out of the paper for having gotten boozed up and assaulted a cop or maybe having knocked up someone's underage daughter. I could handle that kind of stuff, but a parrot? I wasn't sure about a parrot.

  And then I thought I heard something about a cat.

  "Hold on there a minute, Mr. Gober," I said, trying to interrupt his semi-coherent soliloquy. "Did you say something about a cat?"