by Bill Crider
“Let’s hope we don’t have any more customers for you for a while,” Rhodes said.
“You need to do something about that windshield on your own car.”
“You got that right,” Rhodes said.
He thought about what he needed to do next. So many things came to mind that he was almost overwhelmed, but he thought he’d start by having a talk with Ike Terrell. After he did something about the windshield.
“When you drop that car off,” Rhodes said to Autry, “come by the jail and pick this one up.”
“Another customer already,” Autry said. “Business is sure good.”
“Take it to the Burgess Body Shop. They’ll know what to do.”
“Be pretty hard not to,” Autry said.
* * *
Rhodes drove to the jail and parked out front. He’d use the spare cruiser for a day or so while the windshield was being replaced. He didn’t think he’d even mention the windshield to Hack. No use to give him an opening for criticism.
When Rhodes opened the door and entered the jail, he saw Hack at his desk. Lawton, the jailer, stood outside the door to the cellblock. As soon as they saw Rhodes, both men started to whistle the same tune. It was familiar, but Rhodes didn’t quite recognize it. He stood and listened for a few seconds, and then it came to him. It was “El Degüello,” which Rhodes had heard many times while watching a movie called Rio Bravo.
He walked to his desk, put Wellington’s laptop on it, and sat down.
The whistling continued.
He started working on the form to log the laptop into evidence.
The whistling continued.
Rhodes knew that if he gave in to Hack and Lawton, it would be a while before he found out the reason for the whistling. Was it worth the aggravation? He decided that it was either give in and be aggravated or continue to listen and be even more aggravated, so he turned in his chair.
“All right,” he said, “what’s up with ‘El Degüello’?”
The whistling stopped.
“You ever see Rio Bravo?” Hack asked.
“Not more than a dozen times.”
“Then you oughta know,” Lawton said. “It means—”
Hack glared him into a quick silence. Hack was always the leader in these things, and he didn’t like for Lawton to give the game away so soon.
“I know what it means,” Rhodes said. “No quarter.”
“Yeah, that’s it, all right. In the movie. But do you know what it means to us?”
“Who’s us?”
“Us right here in this jailhouse.”
Rhodes thought it over. He said, “It means that I’m John Wayne, Lawton’s Dean Martin, and you’re Walter Brennan.”
Lawton started to laugh, looked at Hack’s red face, and nearly choked trying to stifle his laughter.
“The question is,” Rhodes said, ignoring both of them, “who’s Ricky Nelson and who’s Angie Dickinson?”
“That ain’t what it means,” Hack said, his face still dangerously red. Rhodes hoped he wasn’t going to have some kind of episode.
“I had a feeling it didn’t really mean that,” Rhodes said. “So what does it mean?”
Lawton wisely kept quiet. Hack said, “You remember how in that movie John Wayne arrested this kid whose daddy was comin’ to get him out of jail?”
“I remember,” Rhodes said.
“Well, you got Able Terrell’s kid here. What if his daddy comes after him?”
“They say he’s got rocket launchers down there in the compound,” Lawton said. “He could blow the walls of this jail right down.”
“I don’t think he has rocket launchers,” Rhodes said, though he wasn’t really sure. There was no telling what somebody might need in case of the zombie apocalypse. “We don’t have to worry about that.”
“Maybe he has ’em and maybe he don’t, but he’s got all kinds of guns,” Hack said. “He could come in here and wipe us out.”
“Runs a meth lab back in those trees,” Lawton said. “That’s what they say.”
Rhodes had often wondered about how the Terrells survived. Fishing and gardening wouldn’t be enough to get by on, not unless they were very good at it. He was almost certain, however, that they weren’t selling meth. If they were, there’d be a steady stream of customers into the compound. Nobody knew of anybody who visited the compound, and nobody had ever reported heavy traffic in the area.
“Oughta go in there and arrest the whole bunch of ’em,” Hack said.
“I’ll tell you what, Stumpy, you get some dynamite lined up, and we’ll be all set. He won’t stand a chance.”
“You can make fun if you want to, but it could happen like I say. What this county needs is a SWAT team. That’d do the job.”
Rhodes wondered if Hack had been talking to Mikey Burns, one of the county commissioners. Burns would love the idea of a county SWAT team.
“We don’t have one, though,” Rhodes said. “What about that suspicious stranger Buddy was checking on?”
Once Hack was given the opportunity to hassle Rhodes, his mood improved immediately, as Rhodes had known it would.
“Mighty suspicious, all right,” Hack said. “Just down the road from Miz Killen’s house. She lives not too far from the old college out there.”
“Lots of trees on that road,” Lawton said. “Stranger could hide in ’em and not be seen for a while.”
“That’s right,” Hack said. “A woman livin’ alone can’t be too careful. Gotta keep an eye out for suspicious strangers.”
“’Specially one that just stands around all day lookin’ right at her house,” Lawton said.
“Buddy was ready, though,” Hack said. “He had that cannon of his loaded up and primed. Got a hair trigger on that pistol, he tells me.”
“Be against the law to kill the stranger,” Lawton said. “Seein’ as how he was federal.”
“Wait a second,” Rhodes said. “Are you telling me there was a federal agent in Obert? Spying on somebody’s house?”
Hack looked at Lawton, who shrugged and grinned.
“Well, now,” Hack said, “that’s not exactly what we said.”
“What we said was—” Lawton began, but Hack cut him off.
“What we said was, the suspicious stranger was federal and it would be a crime to shoot him.”
“A federal crime,” Lawton said. “Serious business.”
As usual when Hack and Lawton were doing their routine on him, Rhodes felt slightly disoriented, as if he’d wandered into an old comedy routine by Abbott and Costello, whom Hack and Lawton happened to resemble in their physical appearance as well as their conversations. Hack was a slightly shorter version of Abbott, mustache and all, and Lawton a somewhat less rounded Costello.
“Who’s on first?” Rhodes asked.
Hack looked at Lawton. “Do you know what he’s talkin’ about?”
“Not me,” Lawton said. “I thought we were talkin’ about the suspicious stranger.”
“Just tell me,” Rhodes said. “Is Buddy in federal custody for shooting a federal agent? Is Mrs. Killen a spy?”
Hack tried to look surprised that Rhodes could be so dense. “We never said any of that.”
“Then what did you say?”
“Well—” Lawton started, but Hack cut him off again.
“What we said was that Mr. Gore—you know Mr. Gore? Lives right down the road from Miz Killen?”
Rhodes knew Gore. He’d owned a lumberyard at one time and had retired to Obert several years ago, but Rhodes knew Gore because of something else.
“He called us about some vandalism a while back.”
“That’s the man,” Lawton said. “The very one.”
“Somebody ran over his mailbox,” Rhodes said.
“Crime against property,” Hack said, “and a federal offense, too, since a mailbox is used to hold mail.”
“We caught the perp,” Lawton said. Rhodes wondered if he’d been hanging around with Buddy. “Wasn�
�t really vandalism, though.”
It hadn’t been vandalism, and they hadn’t caught anybody. The school bus driver on that route had called in and confessed. He’d hit a pothole in the gravel road, swerved, and taken out the mailbox. Nobody had been hurt or even shaken up, and the driver hadn’t called when it happened because he had to finish his run on time and didn’t want to get the students home late. He’d paid Gore for the mailbox the next day.
“I think I know where this story’s going now,” Rhodes said. “Mr. Gore got a new mailbox.”
“Nice sturdy one,” Hack said. “Standin’ tall. Lookin’ right at Miz Killen’s house.”
“No wonder she was nervous,” Lawton said. “What with that stranger not movin’ all mornin’ long.”
“Buddy didn’t shoot it, did he?” Rhodes asked.
“Nope,” Hack said. “He went by Miz Killen’s house and had a little talk with her. Told her it might be a good idea if she paid a visit to Dr. Fiddler.”
Fiddler was the optometrist who had an office attached to the local Walmart.
“What did she say to that?” Rhodes asked.
“She told Buddy she could see as good as anybody and that he was a smart-alecky young whippersnapper.”
“She called him a whippersnapper?”
Rhodes hadn’t heard the term in years. The last time had been when Gabby Hayes had used it in some movie Rhodes had seen about ten minutes of on TV.
Hack nodded. “That’s what Buddy said she called him, and you know Buddy don’t lie.”
“So Dr. Fiddler shouldn’t be expecting her to show up at his office.”
“I don’t think so,” Hack said. He grinned. “I don’t think Miz Killen’s gonna be callin’ about any mailboxes for a while, though.”
Just another day in Blacklin County, Rhodes thought. Maybe he could get a straight answer to another question now that Hack and Lawton had had their fun, so he gave it a try.
“Who called in the dead man at the college?”
Hack looked frustrated. “Ever’body in town. Well, that’s what it seemed like. Phone just started to ring till ever’ line was full. One of ’em was your pal Seepy Benton, but there was plenty of others.”
Rhodes hadn’t been hopeful that knowing who’d called in the death would be of any help, so he wasn’t too disappointed in what Hack told him. He turned back to his work just as the phone rang.
Hack answered, listened. “You sure about that? You could drive into town, tell him right here.”
The speaker on the other end got loud and angry then. Rhodes could hear the tone but not the words.
“You could even tell him on the phone,” Hack said.
The voice on the phone was loud and angry again in response.
“No need to get snippy,” Hack said. “I’ll tell the sheriff and see if he can make it.”
The same angry tone came from the phone.
“You have a nice day, now,” Hack said and hung up.
In all his years in office, Rhodes had never heard Hack say that before.
“That was your friend Able Terrell,” Hack said. “Well, it wasn’t him, exactly. It was some guy said he was callin’ for Able. Able wants you to come out to the compound for a little visit. Wants to talk about his son.”
That wasn’t protocol. “We don’t go to him,” Rhodes said. “He comes to us.”
Hack looked frustrated. “I told the fella that. Did you hear me tell him that?”
“I heard you. It’s too bad Able won’t come. He should visit his son.”
“What he should do and what he’s gonna do is two different things. The fella said he didn’t leave his place for anybody but that you’d want to come down there and see him.”
“What’s this fella’s name?” Rhodes asked.
“Duffy, I think he said. Sounded like that, anyway.”
Rhodes didn’t know anybody named Duffy who was associated with Terrell, but that didn’t mean much. Nobody knew who was at the compound.
“Did he say why I’d want to make that visit?”
“He said he has something to tell you about the dead man,” Hack said.
That did put a different spin on things.
“He could’ve told me on the phone.”
“I know you were listenin’,” Hack said. “I know you heard me tell the fella that. Able won’t talk on the phone. Says he doesn’t trust phones.”
“Did he mention where they heard about Wellington?”
“Same place me and Lawton did,” Hack said. “You sure didn’t tell us. It’s on Jennifer Loam’s Web site.”
“She already has a story about that?”
Rhodes supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised. News had always traveled fast in Clearview, and with the addition of the Internet to the town’s life, it traveled even faster.
“Has one about that and the car chase, too,” Hack said. “Sounds like somethin’ Sage Barton would’ve been in.”
Rhodes didn’t want to talk about Sage Barton. “Did Duffy mention what kind of information Able had?”
Hack shook his head. “Just said he had it. You gonna go?”
“I guess so.” Rhodes stood up. “I might as well hear what he has to say. First I need to put this laptop in the evidence room and then talk to our prisoner.”
“He ain’t doin’ much talkin’,” Hack said. “Buddy couldn’t get a word out of ’im.”
“Maybe I can be more persuasive,” Rhodes said.
He put the laptop away. When he came back, he told Hack to have Ruth check it over, and then he headed for the door to the cellblock. As he went through the door, Lawton and Hack started to whistle “El Degüello.”
Chapter 9
The cellblock, like beauty shops, had its own unique smell, and it was just as hard to describe. It was composed of powerful cleansers mixed in with what seemed to be the smell of a few generations of prisoners who’d been housed there over the years, along with some industrial-strength air freshener that Lawton used too much of to suit Rhodes. Maybe it covered some other, even less pleasant smells, though.
Ike Terrell lay on his bunk, staring at the bottom of the unoccupied bunk above him. He wore the county’s orange jumpsuit, which it occurred to Rhodes might have passed as fashionable street wear in the seventies. A long time gone, and probably for the best.
Ike didn’t deign to acknowledge Rhodes’s appearance at the cell door, so Rhodes tapped on the bars.
“Yeah?” Ike said.
“We need to talk,” Rhodes said.
“I don’t have to talk to you.”
The kid had plenty of attitude. Rhodes had to give him credit for that.
“Not if you don’t want to. If you’d like to have a lawyer, we can get one here. I wouldn’t be surprised if the judge had already assigned one to you.”
Ike swung his legs off the bunk and sat up, leaning forward so as not to bump his head. He pushed his hair out of his eyes and said, “Lawyer or no lawyer, I don’t want to talk. What is there to talk about?”
“There’s that stolen hair in your car, for starters,” Rhodes said. “After we get that subject out of the way, we could talk about Earl Wellington. Your English teacher. You remember him, don’t you?”
“I remember him.”
“You know he’s dead, right?”
Ike looked surprised. “I knew something bad was going on. I didn’t know Dr. Wellington was dead.”
“You must have known. Otherwise you wouldn’t have left the college so fast.”
“I don’t know what you mean. I left because it didn’t look like classes would be meeting, so I figured I could just go home.”
“With a car full of stolen hair.”
“I don’t know how that hair got in my trunk. Somebody must’ve put it there.”
He sounded so convincing that Rhodes almost believed him. Not quite, however.
“I didn’t mention it was in the trunk,” he said.
“It wasn’t in the car with me, so it must
have been in the trunk.”
Good recovery, Rhodes thought. “Where were you going to sell the hair?” he asked.
“What hair?”
All Rhodes really wanted out of life was a straight answer to a simple question. He was pretty sure he was never going to get it. Certainly not from Ike Terrell.
“I’m going to pay a visit to your father,” Rhodes said. “He has some information to give me. You have any idea what it is?”
“My father doesn’t give information to anybody,” Ike said. He clearly didn’t want to talk about Able. He leaned back, swung his legs up, and lay down in the bunk, resting his head on the jailhouse pillow, which was about as thick as a dime. “He doesn’t have visitors, either. I’d stay away if I were you.”
Rhodes tried to get him to say more, but Ike closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep. Rhodes left him there and went back to the outer office.
Hack was busy on the computer, and Rhodes stopped to tell him to have Buddy interview the residents at the Forest Apartments. Hack nodded, and Lawton said he had to clean the cells, so Rhodes was spared any more whistling.
* * *
Cal Autry had picked up the cruiser with the broken windshield, but that was all right. The spare car was ready to go, and Rhodes headed southeast again. It was a much less stressful trip this time, and if he hadn’t been involved in the car chase earlier, he’d never have known that it had happened. He passed the same houses and yards, but now he could look at them without worrying about having a dog run in front of the car. A woman in front of one house was watering flowers with a hose. She waved as Rhodes passed by. No one had waved that morning. They’d all been too shocked at what they were seeing.
While he drove, Rhodes thought things over. He couldn’t quite figure out what was going on with Ike Terrell. There was something between him and his father, that much was certain. Beyond that, Rhodes didn’t have any idea. Maybe Able Terrell would enlighten him.
Then there was the dead man, Earl Wellington. Judging by what he’d seen, Rhodes thought the man’s death was likely an accident, though caused by some kind of struggle. An argument of some kind? That’s what it appeared to be, but if that was right, the argument had gotten far too physical.
Rhodes didn’t know what to think of a man who liked cats and Sage Barton books being killed in a struggle. It didn’t seem in character, somehow.