Snake raised his hand, closed it into a fist, and studied the crusted scrapes along his knuckles.
“Oh that. Yes, I had a flat on my car yesterday and had a bitch...a bit of trouble getting the nuts off the bolts. You know how difficult tight nuts can be.” He grinned at Wroten.
“Mr. Snake, was there anyone else in the parking lot during your discussion with Mr. Spike?” Victoria asked.
“No, ma’am. Just me and my friends. But I assure you that Spike was perfectly fine when we left him. I think he was considering ways he might find the money he owes me.”
“I seriously doubt that, Mr. Snake.”
“And why would you doubt that, ma’am. All you have to do to find out the truth is ask Spike. I’m sure he will tell you that everything I’ve said is exactly the way it happened.”
“Well,” Victoria said, drawing the word out. Apparently Wroten had decided to let her step in at this point. I still worried about her, though. She was playing a dangerous game with a man who I was certain was as vicious and deadly as his chosen namesake. “Because, you see, Mr. Spike can’t talk to us.”
There was a momentary tightening of skin around Snake’s eyes, as if the sudden thought had crossed his mind that he and the others might have gone too far the night before. Johansson might be in the hospital or something.
“Too hung over, is he?” Snake asked.
“Too dead,” Wroten said, his voice snapping out the words.
“Dead?”
“As a doornail,” Wroten said.
“Alas,” Snake said, looking abruptly down-hearted but otherwise himself again, calm and cool and in control. “Then I shall never be able to collect my money.”
Wroten slammed his hand down on the table. The resounding crack echoed through the room, startling all of us. Even so, Snake was the first to recover.
He stared directly into Wroten’s eyes, unblinking and unfazed.
“Alcohol poisoning, no doubt. Someone should have warned him.”
CHAPTER TEN
“Alcohol poisoning, my ass,” Wroten roared. “You know good and well what killed Eric Johansson.”
Snake’s face remained blank, his eyes expressionless and cold.
“No, sir. That I do not.”
Wroten straightened up and glared down at Snake. The man’s hand was back on the table top, serpent’s head glowering at Victoria who was still staring at Snake as if she were hypnotized by him.
Maybe he really is a snake, I though abruptly.
“Yes,” Wroten said more calmly. “Yes, you do.”
“Then what killed him?”
Wroten leaned over until his face was level with Snake’s “You did. You and your little group of merry men. You took him outside when he was too drunk to defend himself, and you beat and pummeled and kicked him until he was nearly unconscious and then you left him there, helpless on the gravel, and went off to God-knows-where to celebrate you’re having taught the city punk a lesson.”
It came out rushed, almost in a single breath.
I was stunned, and I already knew what had happened to poor Eric. I could not imagine how Snake would be able to shake the accusation off as if nothing had happened.
But he did.
“No, sir. I did not.”
“Of course,” Wroten continued, as if Snake had never spoken, “I could get into a heap of trouble if I said things like that just because I think you’re an inhuman lowlife who gets his kicks by destroying the lives of innocents.”
“Yes, sir, you surely could.”
“That’s why I gave you the chance to speak first, to see if you would come clean and tell the truth. Since you didn’t, let me tell you a few things that might change your story a bit.”
He reached into a pocket on his jacket and pulled out the small plastic bag with the white powder.
“Look familiar?”
He tossed it onto the center of the table.
Snake leaned over and pretended to study it closely. I noticed, however, that his hand never moved, never even came near touching it. Finger prints? I wondered.
“No. I’ve never seen that before in my life. What is it? Sugar?”
“Right. Like you have no idea what that is or how it came into Eric Johansson’s possession.”
“No idea. And no idea.”
I was amazed at the insolence in Snake’s voice. If I had been Wroten, I would probably have had the guy on the floor and been halfway through the process of beating the truth out of him....
But wait, that was what Snake had done to Eric, wasn’t it.
I tried to calm myself and listen with as much control as Wroten was showing. Victoria still stared raptly at Snake.
I swear her head was moving slightly in time to his movements.
I shivered again.
At least I could be a bit more understanding toward Deputy Allen the next time I saw him.
“So you wouldn’t recognize cocaine when you saw it?”
“That’s cocaine?” Again Snake leaned forward for a closer look. “It doesn’t seem all that dangerous does it? Maybe Spike just didn’t know how to handle it?”
That seemed like a tacit admission to me, but I’m not the law. Thank heavens.
“Or maybe Spike just didn’t know how to handle his pusher? Maybe he didn’t quite believe you when you threatened to beat him to death unless he came up with the money.”
“Now that would truly be stupid, wouldn’t it, Deputy Wroten? If I were selling drugs—which I’m not, of course—and if Spike bought some from me—which he did not—and then if he didn’t pay me like he agreed, why would I kill him?—which I did not. That would be the fastest way I can think of to be sure I’d never see a penny of what he—hypothetically, of course—owed me.”
“But it would be the fastest way you could think of to make sure that any other deadbeat druggies paid up fast.”
“‘Deadbeat druggies’? Really? Should you be talking about law-abiding citizens like that, Deputy Wroten?”
He leaned all the way back in his chair, clasping his hands behind his head to show his utter disregard for everything Wroten was saying to him.
I wanted to kick the legs out from under the chair and watch him slam down on his head.
All right, I wasn’t as calm as I should have been.
But then, I had seen what Snake and his gang had done to Eric.
I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get to sleep easily for a long while.
Snake put one booted foot up onto the table and crossed the other over it. It was as if he were baiting Wroten.
If so, Wroten snapped up the bait.
“What do you think I would find if I took those fancy boots of yours to the crime lab down-mountain and had the techs spend a couple of days with them?”
“Well,” Snake said coolly, “I expect they would find dirt and maybe a touch of cow shit on them, since I mostly walk around in your town.”
“And here?” Wroten pointed to the polished edges where the steel toes were snugged against the leather.
“Not much more. Maybe some polish. Even a little bit of high-test metal cleaner. They looked a bit dullish yesterday, so I spent a long time polishing them to bring out that just-like-new sparkle.”
“No traces of human blood? Of Eric’s blood?”
Snake jerked upright in his chair, his feet falling to the ground with a thump.
“And if they did? What of it.” Now there was a solid emotion in his voice cutting through the coldness. “Spike was throwing up like a baby by the time we got him outside in the fresh air, really puking up his guts, you know. Who knows, maybe I stepped in some of the vomit, maybe there was blood in it. People do that, you know, get so shit-faced that when they throw up they break little blood vessels in their throat and then there’s blood in the vomit.
“Who’s to say that’s not what happened with Spike?”
“Who’s to say I shouldn’t arrest you on suspicion of murder?”
“Murder?” Snak
e sounded honestly offended. “You have one witness back there who will swear that Spike made it back into the bar long after me and my friends took off. You have another one who will swear that he drove Spike home, drunk out of his gourd and maybe a bit banged up from falling on his face in the parking lot. But you don’t have a single witness to say that I ever laid so much as a hand on him.”
“You seem to know a lot about what happened after you left. I think maybe you’ve been so worried about going overboard that you and your cronies rushed back here first thing in the morning to make sure that when you beat Eric Johansson nearly senseless you didn’t also....”
“Kill him? You can’t make a case for murder. That’s pretty clear to me. I think it would be just as clear to a lawyer.”
Snake grinned.
“And you can’t make a case for me dealing drugs, either. No witnesses, remember. The only one you know of who could testify that it was me—hypothetically, again—is dead. And I sure as hell didn’t kill him.” Another sudden spurt of anger surged through Snake’s voice. “You can’t even charge me with beating the kid.
He leaned forward and glared directly at Wroten as he almost spat out the words: “No witnesses.”
He settled back into the chair.
“You can’t arrest me for anything, Dep-u-ty Wroten. Not a thing.”
“Deputy,” I said suddenly, unable to hold it back, “can’t you just arrest him for being an unspeakable little bas....”
“Lynn, dear,” Victoria said, the first words she had spoken for some minutes now. It wasn’t like her to be silent for so long. “You shouldn’t say things like that. Deputy Wroten knows the law better than you or I.” She was still staring into Snake’s eyes when she spoke. It made her look as if she were an automaton, capable of saying only what he wanted her to say.
“There are such things as rules of evidence, acceptable police procedures, and, as Mr. Snake rightly points out, witnesses. Deputy Wroten is bound by the law to behave in a certain way.
“Isn’t he, Mr. Snake?”
Snake glanced at her as if surprised to find that she was on his side.
“Right as rain, ma’am. Right as rain.”
“And as much as we might find it distasteful,” here Victoria pushed her chair back and stood, her eyes never breaking contact with Snake’s, “we must abide by the law. Even if we know that Mr. Snake here beat a young man nearly to death over a matter of a few dollars and a few grains of cocaine.”
Snake didn’t look quite as comfortable as he had a moment before.
Victoria continued walking around the table, until she was standing right next to Snake, even a bit too close, invading his personal space for reasons I could not begin to figure out. She leaned over—although she was enough shorter than he that she didn’t have to lean far, even when he was sitting—and continued speaking directly into his face.
“Even when we know that you are dealing drugs from this hell-hole, Eddie. Even when we know that your dear mother and father would be so embarrassed if they knew what was going on right now that they would hide their faces in shame, Eddie.”
There was a bright red glow in Snake’s cheeks now, a flush that was accompanied by a sharp increase in his rate of breath. I could hear the air pushing in and out of his lungs.
Victoria leaned even closer. Her nose almost touched his—almost, but not quite. Her voice remained as quiet and calm and controlled as ever.
“Even though poor Eric Johansson, beaten and bruised and bloody in his bed, cold and stiff and dead is still worth more than twice what you are, Little Eddie, living and breathing and warm and....”
“Get out of my face, you old witch!” Snake—only now he was more Edward Garton than he was Snake—yelled at her. “Shut up! You...!” Instead of finishing his sentence, he raised his right arm—serpent twisting and coiling and twining as if it were alive—and thrust it, palm forward, directly into Victoria’s chest.
With a sharp little cry, she went over backward, landing on her back on the filthy floor.
For an instant, everyone froze, including Victoria. Her eyes were wide, startled looking, and her lips formed a tight, “Oh.”
Then the stasis broke.
Carver leaped off the stool and came across the room at a run.
“Miz Sears! Miz Sears!” he cried as he knelt beside her and put his arm around her shoulders and tried to support her while she seemed to gasp for breath.
The cluster of men at the doorway surged a few steps forward at their fearless leader’s heroic action—strong-arming a helpless old woman—but snapped to a halt when Deputy Wroten looked their way and pulled his service weapon from his holster. He didn’t point it at them, but the message was clear. Back off. Now!
Garton had pulled himself as far back in his chair as possible and was pointing at Victoria with his left hand—untattooed but still the hand of a strong, muscular, and vigorous young man—and was bleating, “You saw that, Wroten, you saw that, she provoked me, she shoved her face right into mine and she....”
“Oh shut up, you pathetic loser,” I said. “No one wants to listen to your excuses for being a bullying liar.”
I hurried around and, kneeling at Victoria’s other side, helped Carver as she tried to stand up. It took several attempts but at last she was standing on her own. She took a tentative step, winced, and put her hand on her hip as if to say, “Well, that truly and honestly hurts. But it could be worse. He could have broken it.”
As soon as she was upright and stable, she took a step toward Garton. He rose to his full height and glared down at her, but it didn’t make a bit of difference. There was no question now as to who was in charge.
“Edward, that was a foolish thing to do. But you were always doing foolish things, even as a boy. Now you are doing foolish things as a man.
“Selling drugs to children.
“Threatening people who don’t do as you wish.
“Beating up smaller men, bringing in your gang to join with you.”
“Assaulting little old ladies who never raised a hand against you.”
“Hey, wait a minute,” Garton yelped. “Assault! I never...I didn’t....”
“Officer Wroten,” Victoria said, just as primly as she had spoken to Rafferty the first time she entered the bar, with just as much sweet-little-old-lady-who-wouldn’t-hurt-a-fly intonation in her voice as she had demonstrated when Edward Garton first spoke to us, “do I need to swear out a formal assault charge now, or can it wait until we get back to Fox Creek?”
“Well, ma’am,” Wroten responded, a touch of John Wayne in his voice and his cuffs hanging from one hand, “Since you have a room full of witnesses that this man shoved you to the floor when you had made no physical threat against him, and especially since one of those witnesses is a sworn officer of the law, I guess we can cuff him here and take care of the paperwork later.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“That’s all well and good,” Victoria said from her padded seat in one of the booths at the back of Land’s End. It was more comfortable for her, since her hip really had taken quite smack against the hardwood floor.
“He will be where you want him when you get the coroner’s report back on poor Eric....”
“Safely in jail,” I added.
“Yes, Lynn dear, where he should be. But Richard dear, don’t you see that it would be no good trying to accuse him of murdering Eric Johansson.”
“Not murder, no. We couldn’t prove intent. But manslaughter....”
“Not even that. I’m afraid, Richard, that all that poor benighted young man is guilty of is aggravated assault and battery. All! Listen to me. He and his cronies—who should also be charged....”
“They will be. They’re in the other room with strict orders to behave themselves. Carver’s keeping an eye on them. I’ve let them know in the strongest possible terms that if they cause any trouble, the charges will go up accordingly. They’re already falling all over each other pointing fingers of guilt
.”
He cast a glance at Garton, who was sitting by himself at one of the tables along the wall. He was the only one in the place besides the three of us, and Rafferty over behind the bar. The two old fellows who had been here during Wroten’s interrogation of Garton had disappeared right after the action had settled down.
Garton was securely cuffed to a metal pipe extending from floor to ceiling. He didn’t look particularly comfortable with one arm hanging at about shoulder height, but I don’t think it was painful.
Too bad.
Victoria followed Wroten’s gaze.
“It’s so sad. He and his cronies beat a defenseless and exceedingly vulnerable young man, they kicked him with steel-capped boots, they caused him gross bodily harm, and they left him alone and injured on the parking lot.”
“Right. So?”
“Well, I’m afraid, Richard dear, that they didn’t actually kill Eric.”
Wroten sighed and slumped back in his chair.
“I like it better, I think, when you refer to me more formally as Deputy Wroten or even as just plain Wroten. That means you’re with me. But the moment you start in with ‘Richard dear’, that mean’s I’ve blown it somehow. And you’re going to tell me how.
“Not exactly blown it, Richa..., Deputy Wroten.” She smiled. Her smile could be disarming even when you knew that she was about to let go with both barrels. “Just...uh... misinterpreted several crucial facts.
“You see, I think I know why Eric Johansson died, what actually killed him, and where I can find the instrument of his death. But you are going to have to trust me for a bit longer.”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Not really, because you have to see the entire string of events completely or it won’t make sense.”
“When will the van be here to pick up Garton and his merry men?” I wanted to know in part because I wanted to get on with whatever Victoria had in mind and in part because if it was going to take more than half an hour or so, I was going to borrow Wroten’s gun, march over to the bar, and insist that Rafferty do something about finding me some food. I was starving.
Wroten checked his wristwatch.
Serpent's Tooth Page 8