by Bill Noel
That said enough. “I understand Preacher.”
“I need to prepare for this morning’s service. See you in church.”
I nodded, more uncommitted than affirmative.
38
The rain intensified and I rooted through the hall closet to find my seldom-used umbrella before I headed out to First Light Church’s harsh weather meeting spot in a former storefront on Center Street. Preacher Burl had come to Folly from Indianapolis and founded the church under the sun and over the sand on the beach close to the Folly Pier. Because of its unique location and endearing personality of its minister, First Light had grown and met needs of residents the city’s traditional houses of worship failed to attract. Charles was a regular, and I, for lack of a better term, had become an irregular in attendance.
I shook water off the umbrella and set it inside the door. The rain, combined with meeting in the least popular of the church’s sanctuaries, had taken its toll on attendance. There were fewer than a couple of dozen people gathered around the lemonade cooler in the front corner of the storefront. Charles was talking to the preacher but before I could speak to them, Burl moved to the school lectern that served as his common-man’s pulpit.
“Please take your seats and silence thy portable communication devices,” Burl said, using the words that had started every service. I joined Charles on the second row and looked around. I was surprised to see Joel Hurt moving to the front pew. He had a look at me, I’m important smirk on his face and took his time being seated to make sure everyone saw him.
I must confess—something that’s wise to do in church, but not the best route in the courtroom—that I didn’t pay much attention to Preacher Burl’s Bible readings and homily. My thoughts kept going back to Lauren, Katelin, Joel, and how devastated Brad and Hazel Burton must have been and Brad’s outburst that Chester Carr had told me about. Something else kept nagging at me, something I couldn’t put my finger on, but something that seemed important at the time. What was it?”
As Burl’s flock, as he called us, stood to sing one of my favorite hymns, “How Great Thou Art,” to conclude the service, I still couldn’t get my mind off Joel and my hostile feelings toward him.
“Chris, earth to Chris,” Charles said and tapped my arm.
“Sorry,” I said. “What?”
Several of the worshippers had left and Charles and I were standing beside the pew. “Burl wants to talk to me, but I told him you and I were heading to the hospital to sneak in and see Al.”
It was the first I’d heard about “our” plan. “We are?”
He answered my question when he said, “Ready to go?”
The ride to the hospital on the edge of downtown Charleston was miserable. The rain was so intense that layers of water covered more of the roadway than remained clear. Charles stared out the side window and didn’t say anything about last night’s party. He never mentioned Heather and had the defeated look of someone wallowing in misery. My focus was on keeping the car from sliding off the road.
I wasn’t any more optimistic as we entered the automatic front doors of the hospital. I couldn’t imagine that they would let us see Al, making the trip a total waste. My fears were partially realized. Outside the intensive care unit, a harried nurse stopped us and said there was no way Al Washington could have visitors. I asked her if Dr. Tanesa Washington was on duty. She said she didn’t know but was kind enough to check and told us Al’s daughter was in the hospital and for us to go to the ER and ask if Dr. Washington was available.
We had waited fifteen minutes before Tanesa was able to meet us in the corridor outside the emergency room. Her shoulders were slumped, her eyes bloodshot, and it looked like she’d aged a decade since I’d seen her last.
She managed a smile and said she was glad to see us. I asked if she was okay and she said, “Not really. We lost someone on the table.” She bit her lower lip and shook her head. “Not a damned thing I could do to save him.”
I told her I was sorry and she said it was part of the job. I didn’t know how she did it and told her so.
“Thanks. I suppose you came to see Dad.”
“You bet,” Charles said. “How can we sneak in?”
“It’s better if you didn’t. He’s in bad shape, still not making sense. Sorry.”
I told her we were sorry as well and were praying for him.
“I’ll tell you something you can do,” she said.
Charles asked what.
“Bob Howard was over a couple of hours ago. I told him the same thing I told you about seeing Dad. He was on his way to open the bar. He’s been a godsend and allowing him to keep his pride and joy open. The bar’s been Dad’s life, and Bob’s truly been Dad’s savior.” She hesitated and scraped her shoe on the tile. “But, umm, how can I say it, I worry about the, umm, cultural differences between Dad’s customers and, umm, Mr. Howard.”
“Got it,” I said and smiled.
Tanesa returned the smile. “I know Lawrence, Dad’s cook, will be there and helps more than Dad would admit, but, well, you know.”
I did and told her getting a cheeseburger was next on our agenda.
She thanked us and said she needed to get back to work. She shuffled back into the ER and we left to make the short three block drive to Al’s Bar and Gourmet Grill.
The sounds of Marvin Gaye singing “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” reached us before I reached for the door to the tired bar. We stepped in the dark room and waited for our eyes to adjust before trying to find Bob. From what I could see, the crowd appeared as sparse as it had been at the First Light service. There were groups at three tables and two men leaned against the bar. Lawrence was facing the grill and the most unlikely bar owner in the United States and probably on the continent leaned against the wall beside the grill.
Bob had on frayed navy-blue shorts, a sweat-stained Hawaiian flowery shirt, and a frown the size of a football. Sweat rolled down his cheeks.
I smiled as I approached him. “See you have everything under control.”
Bob wiped the sweat from his cheeks. “You’re a damned smart ass.”
“Is that anyway to address your fine customers?” I said.
“Hell no, and if a fine customer ever comes in, I’ll treat him different.”
Charles couldn’t stand being left out, even if it was a conversation of insults. “How are things going, Bob?”
Bob pointed his chubby forefinger at the jukebox where Stevie Wonder was singing “Superstition.” He pointed to his ear. “Is blood pouring out?”
Charles studied Bob’s ear like it was an archeological find. “Don’t see any.”
“Damned sure feels like it. That frickin’ crap these deaf-eared customers call music is making my head explode.”
“What happened to all your country classics Al had added to the jukebox?”
Over the wishes of most of the bar’s regulars, Al had added several of Bob’s favorite country songs to his Motown-oriented jukebox. Bob and Al’s friendship defied all logic, but it was real, “damned real” according to Bob.
“When you came in, did you see a damned picket line in front? Did you see angry, hungry hordes flinging signs around and chanting ‘Down with Country Music!?’”
We said no.
“Know why you didn’t?” Bob asked.
I played along. “Why?”
“Because that damned Al’s afro, black, negro, African American, or whatever they want to be called today, customers said unless I kept the jukebox playing good music and not country crap, they were going to picket. Chris, I’ve been in here less than a week and have already had to squelch a damned race riot. Hell, I had one former Black Panther member scoot in on a walker and threaten to punch me in my happy, smiling, ivory-colored face.”
And I’d wondered why Tanesa was worried!
Lawrence delivered burgers to the nearby table and came over and asked if we wanted anything to eat.
I started to answer when Bob said, “Lawrence, ge
t your bony butt back to the grill. You’re messin’ in my job.”
I was surprised when Lawrence smiled. “Yes, Master Bob, whatever you say.” He walked away.
“He’s a good guy,” Bob said. “I’m thrilled he’s here.”
“And it shows,” I said, oozing sarcasm.
“Yep,” Bob said. “I’m a natural at this customer and employee relations schmoozing.” He looked around the room like he didn’t know what to do with us. Finally, he said, sit anywhere and don’t mess up anything. Cleaning’s not my strength.”
Not like customer and employee schmoozing, I thought as we moved to the booth with Bob’s plaque on it.
“Think he’ll make it?” Charles asked.
“Al or Bob?”
Charles looked toward the grill. “Bob. Al’s in good hands.”
“If someone doesn’t kill him first, he has a chance,” I said.
“Those two opposites would do anything for each other,” Charles said and shook his head, more in admiration than anything negative.
I tapped my fingers on the table. I realized what had been nagging at my unconscious: Joel’s alibi, more accurately, his alibis.
“Charles,” I said, “What were you doing three days ago in the middle of the afternoon?”
“Don’t know, why?”
“That’s the point.”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“If someone asked me what I had been doing let’s say last Thursday at two o’clock, I would have been hard pressed to remember. You just said you couldn’t remember three days ago. I suspect that’d be true if you asked most people about a day and time farther back than yesterday. Times get muddled, the order in which we do things can get turned around, and whether we admit it, much of what we do is so inconsequential that we don’t remember it.”
Charles looked down at the table and blinked twice. “Yeah, a couple of days before Heather wanted to talk to me—you know, before she decided to leave, I thought about talking to her about marriage. I forgot all about it and look what happened. She’s gone.”
That wasn’t what I had meant, but my friend was having a tough time focusing. What had happened with Heather was weighing on him. I tried again, “My point is we forget our actions quicker than we think that we do.”
He said, “True, so what?”
“Joel told Cindy that he had been meeting with his campaign manager at the time Lauren died.”
“Yes.”
“And Wayne confirmed Joel’s alibi. That means—”
“So?” Charles interrupted.
“Let me finish. When Katelin allegedly killed herself, Joel told the chief he was with one of his landscape crews, or possibly pricing a landscape job at one of Wayne’s remodel sites, or he could have been driving between some of those locations.”
“Come on Chris, I’ve got a headache. One more time, so what?”
Lawrence brought our cheeseburgers before I got to the so what. The soothing aroma from the still-sizzling burgers made me realize how hungry I was and I took a bite before continuing. Charles ignored his food and stared at me. Waiting was not one of his strengths.
“So, Joel has one airtight alibi, and one that wouldn’t hold up in court. If the police had suspected that Katelin’s death wasn’t a suicide, Joel would be the prime suspect. He may be a liar, but he’s not stupid. He would have known he would be a suspect and would have concocted a better alibi.”
“I don’t follow,” Charles said and waved his hand in my face. “Got a question, do you think Heather heard how good everyone was talking about her at the party?”
Charles was able to change direction on a pinhead, but whenever we had been talking in the past about something as serious as murder, he was the first not to let the conversation drift.
“I’m sure she knows how much everyone there loves her,” I said, hoping that satisfied his concern.
“I think so too. Sorry, what were you saying about Joel’s alibis?”
I repeated what I’d said and Charles looked toward the door, before he said, “Are you still thinking Joel killed both?”
“He’s obsessed about getting elected mayor. He’s started an aggressive political campaign much earlier than anyone ever has. He’s proven himself to be a liar and backstabber. And one of the foundations of his campaign is to stamp out illegal drugs on Folly.”
Charles made eye contact. “And his girlfriend’s thought to be a druggie, not quite the poster child for his campaign.” Charles nodded. “So, Joel killed Lauren and Katelin, we already suspected that.”
“But,” I hesitated, “I don’t think he did. He could have killed Lauren, or maybe he didn’t.”
Charles continued to ignore his lunch, but took a long draw on his Budweiser, and said, “So let me see if I have this right. You think Joel killed Lauren because he had an airtight alibi during her time of death. And that he didn’t kill Katelin because he didn’t have a good alibi? What am I missing?”
“Yes and no. What if we’re looking at it backwards?”
Charles shook his head. “I feel like I’m talking to Dude. I know my mind’s been operating at half-speed, but what in the hell are you talking about?”
The country sound of Roger Miller’s “When Two Worlds Collide” flowed from the jukebox, and a chorus of groans came from two tables when Miller started singing. I glanced over at Bob who was standing by the door. He had a huge grin on his face.
I turned back to Charles. “In the last week Burl, Cal, and someone else have made comments about how good friends do anything for each other. Look at Al and Bob, or Cal and Burl; and, you don’t look that far, how about you and me. I’d do anything for you, and suspect you’d do the same.”
Charles nodded but didn’t say anything.
“I think it was Wayne.”
“Whoa, Wayne. Why?”
“He and Joel have been friends long before they moved to Folly. Wayne is Joel’s campaign manager and is as intent on getting Joel elected as Joel appears to be. Wayne alibied for Joel, but it also provided him an alibi at the same time. And, as far as I know, we don’t know what Wayne’s alibi is for the time when Katelin died, was killed.”
Charles closed his eyes and tilted his head left and then right. “I still don’t get why it was Wayne instead of Joel.”
“Joel would have created a better alibi if he killed Katelin. From what everyone said, he was closer to Lauren than he let on after her death. I simply don’t think he would have killed her.”
“But you think Wayne could have because he wasn’t close to her.”
“Yes. I think my feelings about Joel have been biased because he’s challenging my friend Brian.”
Charles looked at his cheeseburger and at me. “I’m not convinced.”
“I’m not sure I am either, but it makes more sense to me than the other way around.”
“If Wayne did it, wouldn’t Joel have known since he was Wayne’s alibi?”
“Known maybe, suspected possibly. I don’t know.”
“So, what are we going to do about it?”
“I’m going to find Cindy after we leave here and tell her what Chester said about seeing Joel driving by his house when he was supposed to be with Wayne.”
“And tell her your suspicions about Wayne?”
“Maybe.”
I had been so intent on convincing Charles about the possibility of Wayne being a killer while trying to keep his focus off Heather long enough so we could discuss the killings, that I didn’t notice Bob until he scooted into the booth and shoved me against the wall so he would have enough room to fit his ample rear on the seat.
Bob looked at Charles’s plate and said, “What’s wrong with your food? Hell, I didn’t spit on it.”
I knew Charles was in no mood for kidding, but Bob didn’t.
Charles gave him a nasty look. “It’s fine. I’m not hungry.”
“Well excuse my helpful ass,” Bob said and wrinkled up his nose. He turned to me.
His shoulder rammed into my arm as he turned. He said, “Forgot to tell you something. I got a call last night from Jeff Holthouse.”
“Jeff Holthouse?” I said.
“You getting senile? You met him and his wife at the fundraiser at my mansion.”
“The realtors,” I said.
Bob nodded. “Anyway, Jeff called to say he had met with Joel Hurt again about the landscape job he told you about at the party. Joel started talking about how corrupt your buddy Brian Newman was. Joel had told him the same thing earlier, and Jeff wanted to change the subject and said something about hearing about the woman who killed herself in the garage and wondered if Joel knew her. Know what Joel told Jeff?”
I wondered how I would have known. “What?”
“Joel told Jeff he barely knew her, but his best friend had dated her but dumped her because she was crazy.”
“Did Joel say who his best friend was?”
“Damn, Chris, do I have to do everything for you? I figured that might be a clue but I don’t know a clue about what. And don’t say you’re not getting involved in whatever’s going on over there. You always say that, but you get sucked in anyway.”
I started to thank Bob for whatever, when one of the customers at a table by the window yelled, “What’s it take to get another beer around here?”
“Hold your damned horses!” Bob said and mumbled something I couldn’t understand.
“Customer schmoozing, Bob,” I said. “Customer schmoozing.”
He cocked his head in my direction. “Smart ass.” He pushed himself up from the table and ambled to the thirsty customer to do some customer schmoozing.
“Interesting,” I said to Charles.
Charles watched Bob go and said, “Don’t suppose Joel’s best friend is Wayne.”
“I’d put money on it.”
39
There was no break in the rain as I headed back to Folly. There was also no break in Charles’s despondency. I tried to talk about Joel and Wayne and anything either of us may have heard that would help point a finger at one or the other, but I would have had better luck talking to Bob’s customer who wanted another beer. I understood Charles’s pain, but didn’t know what I could say to help. I decided silence was the best approach and listened to the wipers slapping against the windshield as they rhythmically moved back and forth, barely keeping up with the downpour.