by Ace Atkins
“I need you to get them off my back,” Walls said. “You need to let them know I’m not a part of this. Talk to Sheriff Wise or Larry Cobb. Or whoever. But they’re making me a damn nervous wreck. Shit, I can’t work. My business is suffering. People are whispering that I had something to do with Kenny getting shot. God damn, I wasn’t even in the state. How the hell could I rob a man from two hundred miles away?”
“They saying you’re an accomplice? The ole finger man?”
“Something like that.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Come on, Mr. Stagg,” Mickey Walls said. “You know me. You knew my daddy. You politicked for him when he ran for tax collector. My momma used to wait tables out here. She plays bridge with your wife. You ain’t never used anyone else for your carpeting and flooring needs but Walls.”
“You met my needs, son,” Stagg said. “Sure do appreciate you.”
“They’re out there now,” Walls said. “In my fucking house, taking shit out in boxes. There are state police over at my office, taking over my computer and looking at my hard drive and emails. I don’t want anyone to see those. I have some special memories with Tonya on there. Bedroom photos of me and her, if you know what I’m saying.”
“I think you got more to worry about than some policeman looking at your ex-wife’s cooch,” Stagg said, leaning back into his executive chair and laying his tasseled loafers on the edge of the desk. “Just what did you go and hide?”
“Nothing,” Walls said. “God damn, it’s hot in here. Damn. Listen, I don’t have that money. But you got to hold up your end of the deal in this.”
Stagg tilted his head. He reached into a coffee cup for a fresh peppermint candy. “We ain’t got no deal, son.”
“Didn’t you send that crazy bearded bastard out to see me?” Walls said. “The one with all those wild tattoos down his arm?”
Stagg sucked on the peppermint, getting rid of the sour taste in his mouth. He lifted his chin, listening and waiting for the Walls boy to explain how the hell he thought they had a connection.
“That man threatened to cut off my fingers,” Walls said. “When I wouldn’t admit I’d stole from Cobb, he told me he’d put my goddamn pecker under a table saw and mail home my parts to Tonya. He wasn’t joking about it. The man has crazy eyes.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“So you admit you sent him?”
Stagg didn’t answer. He wondered when Ringold would be back from town, maybe needing him to escort old Mickey Walls out of the Rebel. Walls leaned in, looking over his shoulder at the empty doorway and then back at Stagg. “You got what you wanted,” Walls said. “Just give me some space to breathe.”
Stagg felt a little poke at his heart, face filling with blood. “Slow down, slow down. Speak English. Just what did you hand over to Mr. Ringold?”
“Don’t you know?”
• • •
Chase thought they were home free until they hit signs for Satsuma, Alabama, and noticed that highway patrolman shagging their ass. “You see him?” Chase said.
Peewee turned down the Toby Keith CD they’d been playing since Montgomery, “Drunk Americans” blaring full tilt, and glanced back in the van’s side-view mirror. “Yes, sir,” Peewee said. “I spotted that bastard about five miles back. I can’t tell if he’s following us or we just headed in the same direction.”
“He don’t seem to be in no hurry.”
“We can just keep on riding down into Mobile or we can take the next exit and see if he follows.”
“You ever been to Satsuma?” Chase said. “Don’t look like much.”
“I’ve been to Creola,” Peewee said. “I fished the Mobile River one time and some of those bayous around here. Didn’t catch nothing but the daughter of the fella who sold us gas. Boy, let me tell you something, that barefoot country gal sure knew how to work my pump.”
“Uncle Peewee?”
“Yes, sir,” he said, keeping that needle set down at sixty, easy and steady in the slow lane.
“You ever been somewhere you didn’t get laid?”
“Haw, haw,” Peewee said. “I’m gonna duck on down into ole Satsuma and see if that motherfucker tails us. I can’t stand for him to be riding up on my asshole for the next fifty miles. At Mobile’s where we take the interstate over to New Orleans and head on back to Bourbon Street. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Temptations, here we come.”
Peewee turned on his blinker and slowed down to fifty, sliding on off 65 and onto the road running into the downtown. Satsuma looked like any other town off the highway. There was an Arby’s, a Subway, McDonald’s, Waffle House, and a big sign for some place nearby called CATFISH JUNCTION. They hadn’t eaten since back at the Denny’s truck stop, but Chase didn’t mention it, as that patrol car had gotten off the interstate with them, riding slow and easy past the Pintoli’s Italian restaurant, China Chef, and Los Tres Amigos. Not making a move, but not slowing down, neither.
“What’s he doing?” Chase said.
“Bird-dogging us.”
“What’re we gonna do?”
“Shake his ass,” Peewee said. “Soon as I find the right road.”
“You shake him and they’ll know where we at.”
“Hell, I know,” he said. “I know. But we got to do something before we hit a goddamn roadblock. I’ll pick us up another vehicle.”
“How’s that?”
“Son,” Peewee said. “Before I was a safe man, I used to lift cars. I stole cars and semis all over Alabama and north Mississippi. We had a chop shop up in Corinth where you got cash on the barrelhead. Fine times.”
“He’s on us.”
“I got fucking eyes,” Peewee said. “Watching him in the mirror. But I ain’t gonna jackrabbit off this road until he gives us cause.”
Chase felt like he might get sick, reaching up under his hoodie and finding the gun he’d used to shoot the deputy. He’d told Peewee he’d tossed it in a pond back in Gordo, but he couldn’t let it go. He felt the slick trigger, rough handle, knowing it was stacked and reloaded, ready to rip. Chase swallowed a bit, watching that patrol car nosing up toward their bumper, Peewee stopping at a light.
“Shit, he’s got us,” Chase said.
“Sure looks that way,” Peewee said. “Cornholed in Satsuma.”
“We gonna run?”
“Ain’t nothin’ left to do.”
Peewee looked to be sweating a little, glancing to the highway before him and the patrol car behind him. He gripped the party van’s wheel, and Chase believed the old man was about to put the pedal to the metal and speed on away from this son of a bitch and back into the nooks and crannies of Satsuma, Alabama, where they could steal some boring-ass Chevy. Damn, he hated to see the van go.
The light turned green and Peewee rolled out steady and low, following that highway for a half mile, before that dang patrolman turned his ass into a fucking Taco Bell and headed to the drive-thru for a fucking Doritos Cheesy Gordita.
“Praise Jesus,” Chase said.
“We got to dump the van.”
“Come on, now,” Chase said. “Let’s not rush it.”
“Boy, we got half the state of Alabama out looking for the faces of Bear Bryant, Nick Saban, and AJ McCarron painted along the side of an Econoline. You want to take a bet on how long it takes to find us?”
30.
Two days after interviewing the fat man Peewee Sparks over in Gordo, Alabama, Lillie brought Mickey Walls back into the sheriff’s office for a sit-down. No one had seen Sparks, his nephew Chase, or Kyle Hazlewood since warrants had been issued. They had a little leverage on Walls, some new evidence, but Hazlewood had been her ace in the hole. Kyle was halfway human. Mickey Walls didn’t seem to give a good goddamn for anyone but Mickey Walls.
Today he’d brought his lawyer with him, a slick, bald-headed man from Memphis who rapp
ed in his firm’s commercials for local TV. They hadn’t been in the room but five minutes and the lawyer had referred to Mickey as “Mr. Walls” no less than twenty times. Lillie recalled the rap going something like Your business partner left and took all your money. / Your wife just split and got another honey. / You need a lawyer. / Yeah! Yes, you do. / You need a lawyer.
“Always wanted to ask,” Lillie said. “Do you write your own material? Or you hire someone for those commercials?”
“You can make fun all you want,” the bald lawyer said. “But you remember it. Can’t forget me.”
“I have a mind for faces,” Lillie said. “I just hate cluttering it up, is all.”
Sheriff Wise walked through the open door and shut it behind him. In the corner, Lillie had set a little video camera on a tripod to take in everyone at the table, a condenser mic set in the center. Mickey Walls looked like shit. He was wearing pajama bottoms with a MISSISSIPPI STATE sweatshirt and work boots.
“Some new information has come to light,” Rusty said, hands folded in front of him, earnest grin on his face. “We wanted to give Mickey—I mean, Mr. Walls—a second chance at helping us with the investigation. I’ve got an important member of our community wanting answers, a shot-up deputy who may always walk with a gimpy leg, and now we have three men connected to this crime running loose as fugitives. We just are looking for a little direction, Mickey.”
“How many times does Mr. Walls have to tell you he’s not involved?” the bald lawyer said.
“So you don’t know Peewee Sparks or Chase Clanton?” Rusty said.
Mickey looked to the lawyer and the lawyer nodded.
“No, sir.”
“You at least know Kyle Hazlewood, right?” Lillie said.
“You know I do.”
“You heard from him?” Rusty said.
“Not in a long while,” Mickey said. “I told you I’d help out if I did. I don’t know what he’s mixed up in, but I want to help him and y’all out.”
“Appreciate that, Mickey,” Lillie said. “You’re real stand-up.”
“Like I said, Mr. Walls doesn’t need to be here,” the lawyer said. “The only reason he agreed is that he wants to help law enforcement get some kind of justice. But I need to warn you, his business has suffered as well as his reputation. If you want to arrest him, I recommend you do it now. Because this cloud of suspicion over his head is taking money away from my client and food from his kids.”
“He doesn’t have kids,” Lillie said. “Do you, Mick?”
Mickey shook his head. Man, he looked like hell. He hadn’t shaved for a few days and had obviously slept in his clothes. He stunk, too. Lillie could smell him from across the table, wanting to issue him a bar of soap and toothbrush and let him head on over to the jail. If they couldn’t arrest him, maybe they could just hose him off in the parking lot.
“We know you and Kyle were talking on New Year’s Eve,” Lillie said. “Kyle’s phone records show y’all calling back and forth twelve times. You talked six times after midnight on the first.”
Mickey wouldn’t look up from the table, he just nodded along to show he was listening.
“I think you’ve already established Mr. Walls and Hazlewood are friends,” the lawyer said. “Don’t you call your friends on New Year’s Eve?”
“Not a dozen times,” Lillie said. “That would annoy the shit out of me.”
“I thought you folks were headed somewhere new,” the lawyer said. “My client is very tired.”
“We want to ask him about Peewee Sparks and Chase Clanton,” Rusty said.
“He told you he never met those gentlemen,” the lawyer said. “Never heard their names.”
“I met Peewee Sparks,” Lillie said. “I assure you, he’s no gentleman.”
“Regardless, I don’t understand why you wanted my client to return to the sheriff’s office,” the lawyer said. “As I’ve said, this presents an air of guilt in a small community. Money is lost. Trust is eroded.”
“Do you know them?” Lillie said.
Mickey looked to the lawyer. The lawyer again gave his blessing.
“No, never met them.”
“Have they ever been in your house?” Lillie said.
“He said he didn’t know them,” the lawyer said.
Rusty Wise stood up, really getting into the role of sheriff now, even Lillie finding his act credible in some small way. He walked away from the table and stretched off camera but spoke loud enough for all of them to hear. “Funny, we got a bunch of beer cans and likker bottles out of your house with those boys’ prints all over them,” Rusty said. “Looks like y’all had a hell of a party, watching football and maybe some adult films.”
“Bullshit.”
“We got ’em,” Lillie said. “So why don’t you quit jerking us around, Mickey. You lied about knowing Sparks and Clanton, and you lied about talking to Kyle. You ran the whole damn operation from down in Gulf Shores, and when it went to hell, you boogied on back up the highway to get things straight. You want me to keep going?”
“What else do you have?” the lawyer said. “Because I’m not hearing a word that links my client to a shooting of your deputy or the burglary of Mr. Cobb. If we’re done here, I need to get on back to Memphis.”
“Shooting another commercial?” Lillie said. “Can’t wait.”
“Mickey?” Rusty said, leaning onto the conference table, mouth close to the mic. “We’re going to go ahead and place you under arrest for working as an accomplice to the robbery of Mr. Cobb. But I’ll tell you, I’m working like hell to show you were running those sonsabitches when they shot Kenny. I’ll nail your ass for that.”
Lillie smiled. She looked up at Rusty Wise with a grin to show her appreciation of his cussing and sticking it to Walls like he needed.
“Y’all are making a hell of a big mistake,” the lawyer said. “Do you know how much revenue this man has lost already?”
“Mickey?” Lillie said. “You want to say something?”
Mickey looked down at the table, head slung down, rounded back and flat face. He shook his head and closed his eyes. “I’m just tired,” he said. “I’m so goddamn tired.”
“I know you want to help,” Lillie said.
“Mr. Walls—” the attorney said.
“I didn’t want to,” Mickey said.
“Mr. Walls—” the attorney said.
“They came over,” Mickey said, not moving a bit, speaking in almost a whisper. “Kyle wanted to get back at Cobb after what he’d done. He brought along those two boys from Alabama. They had a plan, they wanted me to be a part of it.”
“And what did you say?” Lillie said.
“I told Kyle I didn’t want no part of it,” Mickey said. “I tried to get him to change his mind. I wanted to help him. I told him those two boys were bad news and they’d sell him out for a nickel.”
“Do you think he’s dead?” Rusty said.
Mickey stayed silent for a half minute. A tear ran down his left cheek as he then said, “Can someone get me a glass of water? Damn it, Kyle was a good man. One of my best friends.”
• • •
Johnny Stagg pulled into the Piggly Wiggly on his way home, his wife telling him he needed to pick up a bottle of Diet Pepsi, a loaf of Wonder Bread, and some Triscuits. He parked in the cripple space, since he had one of those tags hanging from his ElDo’s rearview. Ain’t no one in Jericho gonna ask Johnny Stagg if he had the right or was he a cripple, they’d just assume it was something official. Stagg had crawled out, heading to the Pig’s front door, when he saw that official black car slide down the row of cars and park right behind his Cadillac. The Trooper got out of his vehicle, nodding to Stagg, leaving his fucking door open and engine running like Johnny was supposed to hop up into the car like a dog or some truck stop whore.
“Come on,
Stagg,” the Trooper said as he’d gotten within earshot.
“No, sir,” Stagg said. “I don’t think so. Last time I seen you, you put a nine-millimeter in my mouth like it was a man’s peter. I think I’ll go about my grocery shopping without any interference.”
“Didn’t you make a call to the good senator?”
“That’s between me and him,” Stagg said. “Now, how about you get the hell out of my way.”
“Fine by me, Johnny Stagg,” the Trooper said. “But don’t you want to know what I’ve found out?”
Stagg stepped close, leaned in to the man’s old, gray buzz-cut head, and whispered, “I told Vardaman that you were a stone-cold nut. They need to lock your ass up in Whitfield. You weren’t acting on no one’s authority but your own. I’ll cut your ass down at the knees.”
“C’mon, Johnny,” the Trooper said. “Let’s take a ride.”
Stagg brushed past the Trooper, walking toward the image of that big smiling pig wearing a butcher’s hat, just as pleased as punch that the grocery was cutting off his hog parts, wrapping them up, and parceling them out to folks. The Trooper grabbed his arm and said, “Can’t you see I’m trying to help you?”
“How’s that?” Stagg said. “Or you want to try and violate me again in public?”
“I want to violate something, I’d do better than a broken-down crook like you, Stagg.”
“Get the fuck out of my way.”
“You need to listen up.”
“I may not win, sir,” Stagg said, stepping toward him, “but I’ll go down with fists flying and teeth gnashing.”
“Your boy Ringold ain’t what you thought.”
Stagg stopped cold. Parked by the front door, Miss Dorothy Castleberry, garden club president ten years running, tooted her horn and waved her fat arm out the window. Stagg parted lips, showed his teeth, and grinned, waving back, the Trooper’s hand feeling like a vise on his arm. “Who is he?” Stagg said through clenched teeth.
“Your boy is a goddamn federal agent,” the Trooper said. “Unless you get your head out of your ass, everything you got in this county is about to burn to the ground.”