Nick of Time

by John Gilstrap

  Ben shifted his glare to Carter. “Say what’s on your mind.”

  “You didn’t see the shooting, is that correct?” Carter asked.

  “Never said I did. But I sure as hell saw the kids who did it.” He gingerly touched his bruised eye. “Got the trophy to show for it.”

  “But you never saw them shoot,” Carter pressed.

  Ben’s eyes narrowed. If he were a younger man, it was a look that would have spelled impending violence. “You are a lawyer, ain’t ya? Always huntin’ for the technicality. Well, let me put it this way for you: if I wake up tomorrow morning and the ground is dry, I’ll assume that it stopped raining even if I never saw it stop.”

  “It’s an important distinction, Ben,” Darla added. “Mr. Janssen has a theory that someone else did the shooting, then fled before you stepped out from the back. From what you told me earlier, I don’t see a way to tell him that he’s necessarily wrong.”

  “But the sheriff said that that boy was a murderer,” Ben said. His faith in his own assumptions appeared to be weakening.

  “He is,” Darla said. “But from another state. Michigan. That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s our man for this.”

  “My daughter’s never hurt a soul in her life,” Carter added. “I think that what you saw—I mean what you really saw—were actually two witnesses to the crime whom you caught in the act of trying to help.”

  Ben started to close the door again. “I’m calling the sheriff,” he said. “I want to talk to Frank Hines himself on this.”

  “He thinks you’re senile.” Carter stopped the closing door with a few inches left in its arc. “You know for a fact that you loaded the security recorders, yet he says that you’re just too old to remember.”

  Ben allowed the door to open again, his expression more wary than ever. “What’s y’all’s game, anyway?”

  “I have no game, sir. What I have is a crisis. I’m trying to save my daughter from a murder charge, and you’re the only person in the world who can help me.”

  “What makes you think I want to?”

  “Because the law requires it,” Darla said. “We don’t get many murders around here, Ben. You don’t want to be on the wrong side of this one. At the end of the day, we all want the same thing—justice.” Carter cast her a grateful glance, but she didn’t acknowledge it.

  Ben scoffed and tossed a thumb at Carter. “He don’t give a whit about justice. All he wants is to protect his baby girl. I heard what he had to say in the shop this afternoon.”

  “Of course I want to protect her,” Carter said, “but only because I know she’s innocent. That means there’s a real killer out on the streets somewhere who needs to be arrested.”

  Ben looked to Darla for confirmation.

  “It’s complicated, okay, Ben? It’s just really very complicated. Now, are you going to let us in or not?”

  * * *

  “I’m not supposed to be talking to you,” Ben said as he led them inside. “Either one of you.”

  Darla recoiled. “Says who?” Once inside, she removed her Smokey the Bear hat and dangled it by her side. Water dripped onto the floor.

  Ben’s tone made it seem obvious. “Sheriff Hines. He doesn’t want you or anyone else messing up my memory. I already told him everything I know, and he said that he doesn’t want me to get confused.”

  Darla scowled. “He mentioned me by name?”

  “Not you. Him.” Another thumb at Carter. “Once he heard you were a lawyer and the murderer’s father, he predicted you’d come.”

  Carter braced at the continued use of the m word. “She’s not a murderer,” he said again, trying to push from his mind the number of times he’d heard the parents of ruthless killers utter the same words.

  Ben led the way into the living room, where everything was slipcovered and doilied. The gloom of the day, filtered through heavy blinds, bathed everything in the sepia tones of an old photograph. He gestured to the woman on the couch, whom Carter recognized as the initial gatekeeper. “I believe you’ve already met my wife, Carol,” he said.

  Carter smiled. “Hello again.”

  Carol’s frown didn’t loosen a bit. “You’re crazy inviting him in here like this,” she growled. It was as if Darla wasn’t even there. “Sheriff told you not to, but you do it anyway, you’re likely to end up in jail yourself.” For a lady who looked like everybody’s grandmother, with her hair tied into a tight bun and an apron tucked up under her ample breasts, Carol Maestri had a tough edge.

  Ben gestured to the chairs. “I ain’t never been much for following orders,” he said. “Have a seat. You’ve got the floor.”

  Carter stalled by clearing his throat. The moment of truth had arrived. In order to get Ben Maestri’s cooperation, Carter was going to have to confess to a blizzard of felonies. For starters, there was misprision of a felony—the fallout from his conversation with Nicki—followed by accessory after the fact to murder. God only knew what an aggressive North Carolina prosecutor could dream up to go along with them. Even if he stayed out of jail, he’d probably never be permitted to practice law again.

  Actually, that particular prospect didn’t seem so bad.

  Carol Maestri used the brief silence as her own invitation to speak. “Chas Delphin was a good boy,” she said. “Fifteen years old, lives just down the road a bit. I used to babysit for him years ago, and every holiday, he used to come by just to say hello.”

  Ben looked uncomfortable. “Carol, sweetheart, I don’t think you need to—”

  “I do so need to,” she snapped. “I want this fellow to know what a terrible thing has happened. I want him to know why his pain don’t mean nothing to me. Chas was a good boy, Mr. Janssen. He wanted to be a writer. Science fiction. He knew more about nothin’ than any ten boys his age, and now he won’t never become anything because somebody wanted the money in his till.” As she spoke, Carol’s lip started to quiver, but her eyes stayed dry. “It hurts to live in a world where that sort of thing can happen.”

  Carter hadn’t prepared himself for this. Through all the machinations of trying to get Nicki back home, he’d never allowed himself to think about the boy who was killed—about the parents who would suffer the unspeakable agony his death. Hearing her talk about Chas’s dreams to be a writer, he thought about the millions of words that would never be written, the stories that would never be told, all because some asshole with a gun took his life with a simple flick of a finger on a trigger. Carol was right. It did hurt to live in such a world.

  “Mrs. Maestri,” he said softly. “You might not believe it, but you and I are on the exact same side of this issue.”

  Carol scoffed and looked away. “Innocent people don’t run away, Mr. Janssen.”

  Carter told Nicki’s story one more time. When he was finished, no one said anything as they grappled with the dilemma faced by a desperate young lady.

  “So, you’ve spoken to your daughter,” Ben said.

  Carter couldn’t deny it. “The details she gave me were vivid. The kids bet everything that the video would prove their story. Without it, they’re stuck.”

  Something transpired between Carol and Ben that Carter caught only because he was wired into such things. It was a shared glance, and a shift of position. They seemed to be waiting for the other to speak first. “What is it?” Carter asked.

  Ben seemed to be sifting through the images in his mind. “When I heard the shot, I knew right away that it was a robbery. And I think I knew that Chas had to be dead.” His voice caught in his throat, and Carol reached over and tapped his hand. “I didn’t do anything. I cracked the door just a little and peeked out. Isn’t that terrible? A boy not even old enough to shave is shot in my store, and I don’t have the guts to step out without peeking.”

  Darla took a breath to console the old man, but Carter stopped her with a brief twitch of his hand. Ben had tapped into his emotional memory, and Carter didn’t want anything to break his train of thought.

  As i
f reading each other’s thoughts, Ben and Carol clasped hands. “I just stood there, watching, wondering what the hell I was supposed to do. I mean, my God, they’d just killed my clerk. I’d have been a fool to rush out into something like that.”

  Carter said nothing, silently urging the old man to continue.

  “At first, all I saw was the boy. Your boy. Your daughter’s boy. He was by the front door, looking out, anxious to get going, I think, because he was looking for something outside. Then I saw him look toward the counter, and that’s when I first saw the girl, your daughter.” Ben raised the fist of his free hand to his forehead.

  “No, that’s not right, either,” he corrected himself. “I guess I couldn’t really see her. Not all of her anyway, because that view is blocked from the door.”

  “Could you hear what they were saying?”

  “No, sir, I couldn’t. My hearing ain’t all that it used to be. I mean, I probably could have if I’d really concentrated on it, but I was just too blamed scared to pay attention. Then I remembered the security monitor. I remembered that if I wanted to see what was going on out there, all I had to do was look into the TV screen.”

  “Why didn’t you do that before?”

  “Never thought of it. I just heard the sound of that shot, and I went right to the door. When I did get to looking at that screen, that’s when I saw them both with Chas. Your boy was nervous as a cat. He couldn’t get out of there fast enough.”

  “What was Nicki doing?”

  Ben seemed to age five years as his mind replayed whatever he was looking at. His eyes grew red as he shot a look to his wife.

  “What is it, Benny?” Carol asked. She leaned in close, as if worried that he might be sick.

  “I thought she was trying to rob him,” Ben said. “I swear to God, that’s what I thought.” He shifted his eyes toward Carter. “But she was trying to help him, wasn’t she?”

  Carter just held his gaze, letting him close the loop for himself.

  “I’m so sorry,” Ben said. “I just assumed.”

  “I understand,” Carter assured him.

  “How many lives can one afternoon ruin?” Carol asked no one in particular.

  Where Carter came from, lives were ruined every hour. “How different was the story that you just told me from what you initially told the police?”

  “They didn’t even ask the same questions.” He looked to Darla. “You know that.”

  Darla clasped her hands. “We all made assumptions.”

  Carter didn’t want to travel that road again. It was all asked and answered. “Think hard on this, Ben: Do you have any idea who might be inclined to rob your store? Or, perhaps more to the point, to kill Chas Delphin?”

  “Absolutely not,” Ben said.

  “We have our toughs and our hoodlums just like any other community,” Carol added, “but we don’t have murderers in Essex.”

  Evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, Carter didn’t say. He decided to change tacks. “Tell me about the tapes in the security recorder.”

  “They’re not there.”

  “But you thought they were.”

  The old man frowned. “I’d have sworn on a stack of Bibles that I’d loaded it just this morning.”

  “But you’re sure it’s empty now?”

  “It’s the first place the sheriff went when he arrived on the scene,” Darla reported.

  “I can’t understand,” Ben said. “Changing the tapes is the first thing I do every morning. I don’t know how I possibly could have forgotten it.”

  Something stirred in the back of Carter’s brain. It was rare in his experience for nondelusional, healthy people to claim that they had done something so recently only to find that they in fact had not. It was much more common in the reverse—that people would go to do something twice, forgetting about the first iteration.

  “Is it possible that the shooter was aware of the cameras and took the tapes on the way out?”

  “I don’t see how. There’s no way someone could have passed without me seeing.”

  “How about a back door?” Carter pressed. “A separate entrance where they could have slipped in after the fact, while you were tending to Chas?”

  “There’s a back door, but that’s locked, all the time. I got a iron bar that needs a key to pull it away. The fire marshal don’t like it, but I don’t care. I’m tired of having stuff stolen from back there.”

  Carter tried to make the pieces fit. “Have you looked at the tape deck yourself, Ben? I mean, since the shooting?”

  “I haven’t been back in the office at all,” Ben said. “They wouldn’t let me. I don’t think anyone’s been back there except the sheriff. They’ve got it all roped off.”

  It made sense, Carter thought. As long as the Quik Mart was an active crime scene, it would have been inappropriate to let anyone enter.

  The shadowy outline of an idea began to form. Carter hesitated, then went for it: “Is there a chance that the sheriff made off with the tape?”

  Darla nearly launched out of her chair. “Whoa, whoa. Where did that come from?”

  Carter raised his hand to calm her down. “Take it easy, Deputy. It’s just a question.”

  “Well, I don’t like what you’re suggesting.”

  “I’m not suggesting anything,” Carter said. “I’m just following a lead. If Ben is certain that he put the tape in the machine, and the sheriff is the only other person to walk into the back office, what’s left?”

  “Why on earth would he want to do that?” Ben asked.

  “One question at a time,” Carter said. “I’m trying to balance both sides of the equation.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense,” Carol huffed. “Why would the sheriff want to destroy evidence?”

  Carter shrugged. “To keep anyone else from seeing it.”

  Darla stood, ready to walk out. “Oh, for God’s sake.”

  “But why?” Ben asked again.

  “You tell me.” Darla was clearly upset by the mere hint that the sheriff might have been involved, but Ben seemed only intrigued.

  Ben’s scowl deepened. “I suppose just about anything is possible, but I don’t see how he could have smuggled them out, either. I was standing out front, and I already told you that the door in the back is barred. And before you ask, I don’t think he could have snuck it past everybody in the front, either. You already seen how he fills out his uniform shirt. It ain’t like he could stuff it under there.”

  Darla had had enough. “I can’t sit here and listen to this.”

  “Then leave,” Ben said. Coming from him, the words startled everyone.

  Carter spoke up to keep Darla from having to respond. “Look, Deputy, I know it’s startling, and maybe we’re way out of line, but at this stage, the only dangerous question is the one we don’t ask. There’s a long list of those in this case. Have you been listening to Ben?”

  “Why would Sheriff Hines do such a thing?” Darla asked. “Surely, you’re not suggesting that he’s the killer.”

  Carter waved that off as preposterous. “Of course not. Maybe he’s covering for someone else.”

  “Who?”

  “You tell me.”

  “How about his boy?” Carol asked.

  Ben and Darla answered together: “Impossible.”

  Ben expounded, “That boy’s never done a wrong thing in his life. He’s the local baseball star. He’s got a bright future ahead of him. His father’s the sheriff, for God’s sake. That’s just not possible.”

  Carter turned to Darla, expecting more confirmation. Instead, he found her staring at infinity. “Deputy?” He broke the trance, got her attention. “You disagree?”

  “Huh?” she grunted. “Oh, about Jeremy Hines? Absolutely not. He’s not capable of something like this.”

  Ben jumped as if someone had poked him. “Wait a second!” he proclaimed. “There is someone you need to talk to. Oh, goddamn, why didn’t I think of this before? There’s a kid, a troubl
emaker, been in and out of my store a lot the past couple of months. Tall kid. Dark hair.”

  Darla’s head whipped around. She knew exactly. “Peter Banks?” she asked.

  “That’s him,” Ben said. “He and Chas had a big fight a couple of weeks ago.”

  “They did?”

  “Okay, not a fight, I guess, but words. Angry words. Chas caught him tryin’ to steal and made him give it back.”

  “Did you call the police?” Darla asked.

  Ben waved away the idea. “Nah, the kid put it all back, so I figured no harm, no foul. I was right proud of Chas for that, though. He told the kid that he was banned for life from the store.”

  Carter thought it seemed thin. It was a place to start, but—

  “It don’t fit with your theory of the sheriff coverin’ for somebody,” Ben said. From his tone, it was hard to tell if he was relieved or sorry.

  “Don’t be so sure,” Darla said.

  Carter shot her a curious look and she responded with a little shake of her head that said, “Not now.”

  She asked, “Do you remember if Peter came to your store alone, or was he with someone else?”

  Ben had to think on that one. When he remembered, his eyes grew large.

  “It was Jeremy Hines, wasn’t it?”

  Ben looked like a man who’d had an epiphany. “Yes, it was. And he was as angry at Peter as Chas was. I remember that. He told him to give it all back and went on and on about getting him in trouble with his dad.”

  Carter arched his eyebrows. “Time to pick up Peter Banks?”

  “Gotta find him first,” Darla said. “I know exactly where to go to start looking.”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  “C’mon, Nicki, wake up. We’re here.”

  The words startled her. She didn’t realize she’d fallen asleep. When she sat up and looked around, it occurred to her that maybe she’d pulled a Rip van Winkle. The whole world had changed. The beach road had given way to just a beach with a house in the middle of it. Dunes surrounded them on three sides, with the front door facing the fourth.

  “Where are we?” she asked. Her mouth was so dry that her tongue felt swollen.