by Bill Crider
“They’re going out the back door,” Benton yelled.
Rhodes turned to him. “What?”
“The back door. I heard the back door.”
Rhodes heard something, too. He jumped off the porch and ran along the front of the trailer. Benton was a little ahead of him.
“Go back to the car,” Rhodes said, but Benton either didn’t hear or didn’t care to obey. They turned the corner at the end of the trailer, ran a few more steps, turned the back corner, and stopped. There was nobody there.
That was when Rhodes heard the front door. Tricked by two men who probably hadn’t even graduated from high school, Rhodes thought as he turned to run back the other way.
He heard the rumble of the Mack’s engine, and by the time he got to the front yard, the big tractor rig was turning toward the dirt road that led up the hill to the double-wide.
Rhodes sprinted for the county car. Benton panted along behind him. Rhodes didn’t intend to wait for him. When he reached the car, he opened the door and jumped in, turning the key in the ignition before the door closed. He pulled on his seat belt and put the car in gear just as Benton opened his own door. Rhodes started to pull away, but Benton dragged himself inside and allowed the car’s momentum to slam the door shut.
The Mack was running wide open down the hill. It turned the corner at the gate leaning dangerously to the side and took off on the county road, throwing up clods of dirt as it went.
Benton bounced around in the front seat of the Dodge as he struggled with his seat belt. When he finally got it fastened, he was still jostled quite a bit. His hat had slipped down on his forehead, hiding his eyes.
Rhodes was also jostled by the rough road. He struggled to keep the car under control.
“Where are they going?” Benton asked.
Rhodes didn’t answer, mainly because he didn’t know. He got the radio mic and called Hack. When the dispatcher came on, Rhodes told him the situation.
“What’s that county road number?” Hack asked.
Rhodes told him.
“Duke’s out that way, not far from Obert,” Hack said. “I’ll see if I can get you some backup.”
Rhodes hooked the mic and concentrated on his driving. He didn’t think Duke, the county’s newest deputy, would be of much help. The county roads wound around all over the place, one joining another at odd junctions. The Eccles cousins would know them all, Rhodes was sure, and Duke wouldn’t know them nearly as well. Rhodes had lived in the county all his life, but even he didn’t know all of them.
“You ought to be able to catch a big truck like that,” Benton said.
Rhodes hit a bump, and the county car went briefly airborne.
“Or not,” Benton said.
“I appreciate your confidence in my driving,” Rhodes said as he fought the wheel.
The Mack barreled across a bridge that spanned Pittman Creek and thundered up a hill.
The county car was gaining on them, but the driver turned the truck sharply where there was no real road, just a barbed-wire gate leading into a pasture. The truck tore the wire from its moorings and headed off across the open country, bouncing wildly.
Rhodes didn’t even try to follow. He stopped the car and watched.
“Those two are crazy,” Benton said.
“Not as crazy as I’d be if I tried to follow them,” Rhodes said. “I’ve already got a new dent in this car. I can’t chance tearing up the suspension.”
“Do you have any idea where they’re going?”
“Nope,” Rhodes said. “Once they get over the hill they can go a lot of different directions.”
“So you’re going to let them get away?”
“I hate to disillusion you,” Rhodes said, “but that’s about the size of it.”
Benton took off his hat and tried to push it into something resembling its proper shape.
“I can live with that,” he said.
* * *
Rhodes dropped Benton off at his house and went back to the jail. Nothing unusual was going on around the county, aside from the fleeing cousins.
“Just couple of loose cows,” Hack said when Rhodes asked. “Boyd’s after ’em. Broken water main shootin’ a geyser in the air over at the Kelly place on Pine Street. I called the water department ’bout that. Couple of neighbors arguin’ about some trash in the yard. One claims the other put it there. Ruth’s on that one.”
“Any response to that bulletin you put out last night?” Rhodes asked.
“About the man leavin’ the scene of a murder? Not a thing. No reports of any hitchhikers. Nobody called to say they saw him. He’s the invisible man.”
Not so invisible, Rhodes thought. It would be easy enough to walk back to town from the Leverett place and not be seen after dark.
“I expect ever’body out that way’s got their doors locked up tight,” Hack said. “No use, though. That fella’s long gone, like you said.”
“Maybe. The Eccles boys know something about it, though.”
“You gonna tell me?”
Rhodes could have drawn it out, but he didn’t bother. He told Hack what had happened.
“That’s just like those two,” Hack said, “but it might not be what you think it is.”
“Why do you say that?”
“They might not want to talk because of somethin’ else that happened. You know. The Chandlers.”
“You think the Chandlers might have mixed it up with the hunters?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Hack said. “You could ask ’em.”
“I already have. They denied it.”
“Too bad you can’t ask Lance and Hugh. They might have a different story, if they’d tell it.”
“They’ll tell it,” Rhodes said. “Eventually. Did you get anything more on those bank robberies Baty supposedly planned?”
“Ruth did. She said to tell you there’s not any good descriptions of the man who pulled those jobs. Just a big man with a stockin’ pulled down over his face. Had on a hoodie when he went in the bank, so nobody could get a good look at him, anyway.”
The man in the car with Baty had been big, though that didn’t prove anything. It suggested a few ideas, though.
“You heard anything else about our friend Hoss Rapinski?” Rhodes asked.
“Why would I?”
“He said he was sticking around. Said he wanted to catch himself a killer.”
“He’s a show-off, all right,” Hack said. “He’d love to prove he was smarter than you.”
Rhodes gave him a look.
“Not that he’d have a chance of doin’ it,” Hack said.
“He might if I don’t find out some things pretty quickly.”
“How you gonna do it?”
“I’m going to hunt some hogs,” Rhodes said.
Chapter 9
“You must be crazy,” Ivy said.
“Probably,” Rhodes said, and Yancey yipped in agreement.
“You’ll get killed,” Ivy said, and Yancey yipped again, as if he was excited at the prospect.
“I don’t think so,” Rhodes said.
They were in the kitchen, eating dinner, which tonight consisted of some kind of casserole made with cabbage, macaroni, and lots of black pepper. It was good, but Rhodes was glad he’d eaten the hamburger for lunch.
“I know you don’t think so,” Ivy said, “but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen. All those men with guns, and the hogs are dangerous, too.”
“We probably won’t even see any hogs.”
“That’s another thing,” Ivy said. “Who is this we? Do you even know any of them?”
After talking to Hack, Rhodes had set out to find the names of some of the men who’d been in the group with the Eccles cousins the previous night. It had taken him the rest of the afternoon, but he’d found out that one of the men was Arvid Fowler, an electrician and air-conditioner repairman. According to Fowler, he occasionally joined the Eccles cousins on a hunt. He’d been with them at the Lev
erett place, all right, but he claimed that he hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary. He told Rhodes he didn’t have any idea why the Eccleses would have run away when Rhodes tried to talk to them.
“I know Arvid Fowler,” Rhodes told Ivy. “So do you. He fixed the air conditioner for us a couple of years ago.”
“Overcharged us, too,” Ivy said. “You can’t trust a man like that.”
“It was on a Sunday,” Rhodes pointed out. “He told us he’d have to charge more to come out on a Sunday.”
“Well, he shouldn’t have. It was an emergency.”
“Not for him.”
“You’re trying to get me off the subject, aren’t you,” Ivy said.
Rhodes got up and refilled his water glass. “That cabbage sure is hot,” he said when he sat back down.
“It’s not the cabbage. It’s the pepper. Now stop avoiding the subject.”
“What subject?”
“You know what subject.”
The dangers of Rhodes’s job, though he didn’t consider them great, had been a topic of discussion before.
“Don’t worry about me,” Rhodes said. “I’ll be fine. I always am.”
“That depends on the definition of ‘fine,’” Ivy said.
Rhodes grinned. “I didn’t say ‘clean.’”
“I know it’s your job,” Ivy said, ignoring him, “but sometimes I think you take more risks than you really have to.”
“Not this time. I promise.”
“Not that I could stop you even if you didn’t.”
“True,” Rhodes said, “but you wouldn’t try to stop me, would you?”
“Not a chance,” Ivy said.
Later that night, Rhodes wished she’d tried.
* * *
Arvid Fowler was a wiry man about five and a half feet tall. He had a face like a wise monkey and wore rimless glasses. He had a big pistol strapped around his skinny waist. Rhodes judged it to be a .357 Magnum.
“Reason we go to the Leverett place,” Folwer said in answer to a question from Rhodes, “is that nobody knows for sure who owns it. We don’t do any trespassin’, and we just go where we’re invited, or where the land’s open like out there.”
“Some people don’t like it that you come here,” Rhodes said.
They were standing by Fowler’s old red pickup, which was parked on the side of the road not far from where the Ford Focus had stopped the previous day.
“If they don’t, ain’t nothin’ they can do about it,” Fowler said.
“You were parked on a different road last night,” Rhodes said.
“Other side of the woods, yeah,” Fowler said. “Thought we’d come in from this side tonight.”
It was just about dark. Fowler had told Rhodes that the other hunters would be arriving soon.
“Any reason why you decided to make the change to this side of the woods?” Rhodes asked.
Fowler shrugged. “Just seemed like the thing to do.”
Rhodes didn’t think that was the truth, but he didn’t push it. He figured he’d find out more when some of the other hunters arrived.
“Here comes somebody now,” Fowler said. “I don’t think I know that truck, though.”
It wasn’t a truck, Rhodes saw as it came to a stop behind the county car. It was a Hummer. Hoss Rapinski got out, put on his hat, and joined them.
“Fancy meeting you here, Sheriff,” the bounty hunter said. “Who’s your friend?”
“This is Arvid Fowler,” Rhodes said. “Arvid, meet Hoss Rapinski. He’s a bounty hunter.”
“Fugitive recovery agent,” Rapinski said.
He and Arvid shook hands.
“I seen you on TV,” Arvid said. “You’re the one brought in Slick Tomlin.”
“That’s right,” Hoss said. He looked at Rhodes. “The law couldn’t find him, but I did.”
“What do you think you’ll find out here?” Rhodes asked.
“Don’t know,” Rapinski said. “I asked around town and found out this was where the murder happened.” He took off his hat and fingered the brim. “I like to look at the scene of the crime and talk to the witnesses.”
“Now just a minute,” Fowler said. “Ain’t nobody a witness to anything. We’re just here to hunt hogs.”
“I meant witnesses to the hog hunting,” Rapinski said. “That’s all.”
Before Fowler could question him, a pickup pulled to a stop behind the Hummer. Rhodes heard dogs barking.
“That’s Winston,” Fowler said. “He brings the dogs.”
Len Winston got out of his truck, and Fowler went to help him with the dogs.
“You ever hunted hogs?” Rapinski asked Rhodes.
“Nope. Might be interesting, though.”
“Come on, Sheriff, you don’t care about any hogs. I know you’re looking for witnesses, same as I am.”
“Witnesses to hog hunting?”
Rapinski put his hat back on and didn’t answer. Another pickup arrived. A man named Ed Garver got out and helped Fowler and Winston with the dogs. Rhodes walked over to see what they were doing. Rapinski followed him.
“Body armor,” Fowler said when Rhodes asked. “Kevlar, just like the bulletproof vests you lawmen wear.”
“You think somebody’s going to shoot at the dogs?” Rapinski asked.
“Hogs’ tusks are worse than bein’ shot,” Winston said. “Who’re you?”
Rhodes introduced Rapinski to Winston and Garver.
“Don’t know as we need any more people,” Garver said.
Garver worked as a plumber for a man named Trey Allison, and he was nearly as big as Rapinski. Like Fowler, he had a pistol, which Rhodes was sure was a .38. He wasn’t as impressed by the bounty hunter as Fowler had been.
“We won’t get in the way,” Rhodes said. “Mainly we’d like to hear about last night.”
“I already told ’em we didn’t see anything or hear anything,” Fowler said.
“What about Lance and Hugh?” Rhodes asked. “You think they’ll be here?”
“Doubt it,” Fowler said. “If they were comin’, they’d be here already.”
He explained to Winston and Garver what had happened between Rhodes and the Eccles cousins.
“Those two are about half crazy,” Winston said. “I don’t know why they’d run off like that. Do you, Ed?”
“Nope,” Garver said. “They got nothin’ to hide, far as I know.”
It was dark now. The dogs whined and strained at their leashes, eager to be off on the chase. Winston had trouble holding them back. The dogs were tan with dark muzzles.
“What kind of dogs are those?” Rapinski asked.
“Black Mouth Curs,” Winston said. “Won’t no other kind of dog will do for huntin’. Coons, hogs, you name it.”
“They run quiet,” Fowler said. “Don’t start to bay till they got ’em a hog.”
“Strong, too,” Garver said. “Not afraid of anything. They’ll stand at a hog’s head till you get there with the gun, no matter how big and mean that sucker is.”
“You must have had one bayed up last night,” Rhodes said. “I heard the dogs.”
“Sure,” Fowler said. “That’s the way it was.”
“What happened to the hog?”
“He got away. We left. That was it.”
Rhodes wasn’t convinced, but Garver changed the subject.
“Harvest moon tonight,” he said, looking across the field. “Ought to be able to see pretty well without lights.”
“Yep,” Fowler said. “Let’s go.”
“Before we do,” Rhodes said, “just tell me some more about what happened last night. You know there’s more to it than hog hunting. I heard all the shooting.”
“Don’t know nothin’ about that,” Fowler said. “You can stay here if you want to, but we’re goin’. Right, boys?”
“Right,” Winston and Garver said together. “Can we leave, Sheriff?”
“Don’t let me stop you,” Rhodes said.
“Hold the dogs,” Winston said to Garver, handing him the leashes. “I got to get my gun.”
He went to the cab of his pickup and brought out a .30-30 rifle.
“I’m ready now,” he said, and Fowler jogged down into the bar ditch and out into the field on the other side. Winston and Garver followed. The dogs were so eager it was as if they were dragging the big plumber behind them.
“Well,” Rapinski said to Rhodes, “did you learn anything?”
“Not a thing,” Rhodes said.
“You going with them?”
“I guess so,” Rhodes said.
“Let’s go, then,” Rapinski said.
He and Rhodes moved down into the ditch. They were almost to the woods when Rapinski spoke again.
“That Garver’s a big guy. You know him?”
“I’ve heard he does good work,” Rhodes said.
“Been around here long?”
“Couple of years. Came up here from Galveston before Hurricane Ike blew in and decided he liked this part of Texas. No hurricanes.”
“Seems like he’d have had a lot of work if he’d gone back home after the storm. Took ’em a while to rebuild. He could’ve made a lot of money.”
“I’m sure he does all right here,” Rhodes said. “Everybody needs a plumber now and then.”
“I guess so,” Rapinski said.
They walked in silence for a while, careful to avoid twisting an ankle on the dirt clods. The shadows cast by the bright orange moon made walking across the field even more treacherous than usual. Rhodes still felt an occasional twinge from last night’s adventure, and it was hard for Rapinski to walk in his expensive boots. They looked good, but they weren’t made for hog hunts.
“How’d you happen to wind up here tonight?” Rhodes asked, hoping for a more definitive answer than the one he’d gotten before. “It took me a long time to find out the hunters would be here again.”
“Confidential sources,” Rapinski said.
“You seem to have a lot of those.”
“Just part of the job,” Rapinski said.
He might have said more, but they had reached the woods. The three hunters weren’t far ahead of them. Rhodes heard Fowler say, “Let ’em loose.”