by Bill Crider
I didn't have any more questions for Perry Stone, and I got up to leave.
"Wait a minute," he said as I stood. "There was somebody else, but he wasn't anybody who could help. Just the opposite, I guess. He came in right after Brenda."
I sat back down. "Who was that?" I said.
"He just wanted to ask a few questions about the pistol. I told him I'd never seen it, and that's the God's truth."
"I believe you," I said. "Did you mention what Brenda had told you?"
"I guess maybe I did. I told him she'd had a scare and that she needed me at the house. I asked him if he thought they'd let me out. He said they wouldn't."
"And who was it that said they wouldn't?" I said.
"It was Deppidy Jackson," he said.
~ * ~
I went back to Fred's and gave him a report, which was unfortunately pretty skimpy.
"Too bad somebody got to that barrel," Fred said. "Not that it would've proved anything."
"It would have given us a place to start," I said. "We don't even have that, now."
"You could always go to that gas company and start talkin' to 'em about their waste disposal methods," he said.
"Sure I could. Or I could go out to Hollywood and get a job as a movie star."
"I was just kiddin'."
"Good," I said. "I don't want to take on a gas company. I don't need the grief that a big corporation can cause me. Right now, I can always go back to painting houses."
"You don't see many alligators when you have a job like that."
"Yes, and that's just one of the advantages. I also very seldom get shot at or shit on by birds."
"We've done discussed that a time or two. Didn't no birds shit on you."
"They came close."
"Close don't count."
"All right. But it was bad enough. Besides, I did get shot at, and someone did try to kill me with that truck."
"You say you saw Deppidy Jackson drivin' it?"
"It or one just like it. It might not have been the same one. This one had a county emblem on the driver's door. I don't know about the other one. I never got a side view of it."
Fred smiled. "Too busy runnin'," he said.
"Damn right."
He lit up a Camel. "But you still think it's the same one?"
"Has to be," I said. "I don't care if those things all look alike. When one of them tries to kill you, you remember it."
"What do you think's goin' on around here?" Fred said, blowing a smoke ring. We were standing outside by the Jeep, so the smoke ring didn't stand a chance. The wind shredded it immediately.
"Somebody's using your land for a chemical dump," I said. "Somebody killed Zach Holt and his wife. Not to mention your alligator. And somebody was making noises and calling you before all that happened. That's what's going on."
"And somebody tried to run you down in a pickup that looks like the one owned by the County."
"Is the one owned by the County," I said. The more I thought about it, the more certain I was.
"Okay. If you say so. And somebody moved that barrel that we saw. I know all that stuff, too. But I'm not the hotshot detective, so what I want you to do is tell me what all that means, and who did it."
"That's the part I haven't quite worked out yet," I said.
"Which part?"
"All those parts." I hated to admit it, but it was true. "Maybe I'm not such a hotshot detective after all."
"Don't take it too hard," Fred said, tossing the butt of the Camel to the ground and crushing it under his boot sole. "I got a lot of faith in you. It's just that this is all right puzzlin' to me."
It was puzzling to me, too. "We don't even know if all this stuff is connected," I said. "It might be a lot of separate incidents."
"What you reckon the odds would be on something like that?" Fred said.
"Pretty high, I guess."
"I'd say so."
"All right then," I said. "If it's all connected, let's try to put it together. Let's suppose Holt ran across somebody dumping the chemicals, threatened them, and got shot for his trouble."
Fred shook another Camel out of his pack. "Sounds good. So why didn't they shot him when he found them? And why did they kill his wife? And what does all this have to do with my dead gator?"
"Holt killed the gator. He was planning to sell the skin, but he got killed before he could do it."
"Okay. So who moved the barrel?"
"Deputy Jackson. He ran across the dump, maybe because of something he found out during the Holt investigation, and took the barrel in as evidence."
"And why did he try to kill you? If it was him that tried to kill you, I mean?"
"I haven't got that part worked out yet."
"And what about that gun you told me about them havin', the one Perry Stone's supposed to've shot Zach with?"
"That's another little problem," I said. "It could be that Jackson is helping the gas company out. That's why he moved the barrel, tried to kill me, and framed Stone."
"It all fits, I got to admit," Fred said.
I had to admit that it fit, too. Perry had told both his father and Jackson about Brenda's seeing the lights and hearing the noise. Jackson could have gone to investigate and found the barrel, removing it to get rid of the evidence rather than to preserve it. I didn't much like Jackson, or trust him, and I could easily believe he was tied into everything.
But it still bothered me. "If it all fits," I said, "why don't I believe it?"
"Dunno. You got it all worked out."
"All except the calls and the noises."
"Yeah, well, any crank could've done those things."
"True. But why?"
"Why do cranks do anything? Just wanted to. Maybe because I wouldn't sell my land to the state for a park. Not that I've been asked. Anyway, they ought to know me better than that. Stuff like that just makes me mad. Gets my back up like an old mule's. I wouldn't sell now, even if I'd wanted to in the first place."
"I don't blame you," I said. It was nice to be a man of principle, and Fred was certainly that.
"You gonna tell the Sheriff about all this?" he said.
"I guess I have to," I said.
~ * ~
The only thing that bothered me about talking to Sheriff Tolliver was the fear that he might tell everything I said to his Chief Deputy. It wasn't going to be easy to tiptoe around what I suspected and still tell most of what I knew.
I decided that the best thing to do was simply to skip over the part about my near demise under the tires of the giant truck. I could say we got suspicious about the dump for some other reason, such as the fact that I'd seen Gene Ransome head in that direction. And that had been the first reason, after all. The episode with the truck had been more frightening, but it was Ransome that had made me curious in the first place.
And that was another part of the puzzle: Ransome. I still didn't know where he fit into things. Maybe the Sheriff could help with that.
The part about the gun being planted in Stone's pickup was a little more delicate, but maybe I could suggest it without being too offensive. If I planted the suspicion in just the right way, Tolliver would be very careful about what he said to Jackson, if he said anything at all.
There were still some things that bothered me, but I would just have to tell my story and see what happened.
Tolliver was in his office, tilted back in his desk chair with his sharp-pointed boots resting on the desk top. His long legs were encased in a pair of doubleknit Wrangler jeans, and he had on a blue-and-white-checked Western-style shirt with a yoke in back. He wasn't wearing his hat, and the white streak in his hair showed to good advantage. I figured he could keep on getting elected forever, if he wanted to.
"What can I do for you, Smith?" he said, not bothering to get up or take his feet down.
He probably wouldn't have been so casual if I'd been a registered voter in the county, but since I wasn't, I didn't say anything to him about his behavior. Instead, I told
him more or less what I'd planned to tell him all along.
When I finished, he did take his feet down. He put them under the desk, put his elbows on top of it, and leaned forward. "You want to make that last part a little bit more clear?" he said.
"Which part?"
"That last part. The part about the pistol that we got on Perry Stone."
"Well, Perry tells me he never had a pistol in his pickup. His wife told me that as far as she knew, he didn't own one. Maybe somebody planted it in his truck."
"That's what I thought you said. You got any idea who might've done a thing like that?"
"It could've been anybody with access to the truck," I said, hedging a bit.
He thought about it. "The truck was parked here at the jail, just waiting for us to search it. I guess a lot of people could've walked by and seen it. We didn't try to hide it."
I didn't know how far to push it, but I was afraid that if I said any more he might think I was trying to cast a bad light on his whole department, maybe even on him.
So I just said, "That makes it tough."
"Tough. Yeah. Maybe. But maybe Stone and his wife are lying and the pistol was there all the time."
I didn't believe that, and I said so.
"All right, that's your opinion. The truck was locked, though, and if you're trying to make any other kind of accusation, maybe you'd better just come right out and say it."
I wasn't ready for that kind of argument yet. "I didn't mean to imply anything," I said, feeling cowardly.
"All right, then. I'll look into things. You can be sure of that."
"What about this Gene Ransome?" I said. "He's been hanging around the county a lot, riding along on the back roads, heading down toward that dump. Do you know anything about him?"
"Not a damn thing. But I'll check him out, too. You can tell Fred Benton that I'll take care of things. Now that you've given me this information, I'll put my best man on it. If it helps us to solve the murder, so much the better." He stood up and extended his hand.
I shook with him, feeling as if he had raised me a notch in his opinion. I might not be a voter, but I was someone to reckon with.
I left the jail, wondering why I wasn't happier.
~ * ~
It didn't take me long to figure it out.
I wasn't happy because as far as Tolliver was concerned, Jackson was in the clear. Above suspicion. No Deputy of Tolliver's could be guilty of something so crass as planting a gun behind the seat of Perry Stone's pickup. No way.
Which meant that Tolliver was going to keep right on holding Stone in jail and doing as little as possible to look for other suspects. He'd said he'd put his best man on it, but no doubt he'd simply forget it. I just hoped that he would at least see what he could find out about Gene Ransome. If Ransome was connected with Wessey Gas, then he'd have some explaining to do even if he wasn't connected with the murders.
By the time I got back to Fred's, it was time for supper. Mary had fixed chicken-fried steak with cream gravy, heavy on the black pepper. There were mashed potatoes, just in case we didn't get enough carbohydrates from the gravy and the batter on the steak, and hot rolls to take care of any possible shortage if we skipped the potatoes.
I put butter on the rolls and gravy on the potatoes as well as on the steak. It wasn't often that I got to eat a home-cooked meal like that, and I wanted to take full advantage of the opportunity, even at the risk of clogging my arteries permanently within the next fifteen minutes.
Fred and I dutifully helped Mary clean off the table, but afterwards we went out into the yard so fred could smoke and not be tempted to dispose of his ashes in the sink.
"So you think Tolliver won't do much," he said after he'd lit up.
"I'm afraid he won't," I said. "He's got Stone, he's got a pistol, and he's even got a motive. If Stone can't come up with some hard proof of where he was, he might even get convicted."
"Hate to see that happen," Fred said.
He blew a smoke ring even bigger than the one that afternoon, and this one held together. The wind had died almost to nothing, and the air was warm and still. It was nearing nine o'clock, and the sun was about to sink behind the trees.
"I don't know what we can do about it," I said.
"I feel bad about that," Fred said. "I don't think the boy did it, even if that woman he's married to doesn't deserve to have him back."
I thought about Brenda. She just wanted more than a good old boy like Perry could, or would, offer her. What she saw in Zach, I'd never know, however. According to Fred, he was an outlaw who just managed to get by on the fringes of society. Having seen where he lived, I couldn't imagine that his prospects were about to improve anytime soon.
But that brought up the thought of Holt's connection with the dump. Brenda had told us he knew about it, and that it meant money in some way. How much had he known, and what did he have to do with it? I wondered if he'd known enough to get himself and his wife killed.
"If he did, Ransome's the key to the whole thing," I said aloud.
"How's that?" Fred said.
"Ransome was going to that dump to meet someone. He knows what's there, and he knows who put it there."
"You right sure about that?"
"No, but it seems likely. That's not the kind of place you'd go to on the spur of the moment. You own the land, and you don't ever visit it, but Ransome did. We've got to find him and find out what he knows."
"Well, all right. You're the detective. How do we go about doin' that?"
"I don't know. The Sheriff could help us, but I don't think we can count on him. And we can't just drive around the County looking for him."
"He's got to be stayin' somewhere. Couldn't you check the motels? We don't have but two or three of 'em, so he might be pretty easy to find."
"That's as good an idea as any. I'll start tonight."
"I'll go with you," Fred said. "Always wanted to see how a real private-eye did things like that." He turned toward the house. "Let me just go in and tell Mary."
He didn't get inside, however, because that was when the noises began.
15
The sun had gone down behind the trees by then, but the sky was still lit but fading into gray. It would be much darker in another fifteen minutes, but the light didn't do anything to alter the strangeness of the sounds we heard.
"That's not gators bellerin'," Fred said. "I don't know what the hell it is."
It didn't sound like anything I'd ever heard before, either. It was a sound a man could make, maybe, or an animal that was in pain. That was all I could tell. There was nothing mechanical about it.
"Is that anything like the noises you heard before?" I said.
"Little bit, I guess," Fred said. He was straining his eyes toward the bottom land, trying to see what was making the sound. "Think we oughta go see about it?"
I thought that we should, but I didn't really want to. "Where's it coming from?"
Fred pointed. "Back down in there somewhere."
"Where the carcass is?"
"Somewhere in there. Sound does funny things back in the trees and marshes. You can't be sure."
"All right," I said. "We'll go see. But I really think we should take a gun."
"How about a rifle?"
"Right. That's what I meant. A rifle."
"I'll get one." He started for the house again, then turned back. "Mary's not gonna like this one little bit. She wouldn't let me go down there the other times."
"Tell her I'll take care of you," I said.
"That oughta do it," he said. He laughed and went in.
A few minutes later he was back, carrying a rifle and a padded leather case.
"Winchester Model 94," he said. "It's a thirty-thirty, holds six cartridges, and it's ready to go. It's got a lever action, so all you got to do--"
"I've fired a lever action before," I said.
"You don't have to act like you got your feelin's hurt. I just wanted to be sure. Safety's right here." H
e put the rifle in the case, zipped it, and put the case in the back of the Jeep. "I got some more cartridges in my pocket, in case we need 'em. I hope we don't."
"Probably won't," I said. "But I've been shot at and chased by a man-eating truck lately. This time I want to be able to fight back. And if a blonde woman tries to hold me at gunpoint with a .22--excuse me, I mean at riflepoint--then I want something to shoot her with."
We climbed into the Jeep and Fred started it up. "You wouldn't really shoot a woman, would you?" he asked.
"The way I feel right now? Sure I would."
Fred shook his head. He was a real old-time Texan, full of respect and reverence for women, even if they were holding a rifle on him. At least in theory he was. I decided not to remind him of some of the things he'd said about Brenda last night.
The noises had stopped by the time Fred went into the house, and I hadn't heard them again. Bouncing around in the Jeep, I would have had a hard time hearing anything.
When we got down to the gator carcass, Fred stopped. It was fully dark, and over the ticking sound of the cooling engine I could hear insects humming and splashes in the water. A mosquito buzzed around my head.
"Did you ever see that old movie called Alligator People?" I said.
"I don't think I ever heard of that one," Fred said, leaning on the steering wheel. He doused the lights, and we were sitting in deep blackness. "Who was in it?"
"Lon Chaney, Junior, I think. He played a man with a hook instead of a hand on one arm."
"You watch that kind of thing much?"
"Not too often. It was on late at night once when I didn't feel like changing the channel."
"Who were these alligator people?"
"I don't know," I said. "Victims of some crazy doctor's crazy experiments, I think."
"How come you to think about somethin' like that right now?" he said.
"I don't know. Just the general atmosphere around here, I guess. You hear any more of those noises?"