Murder at the Courthouse

by A. H. Gabhart

  “Desperation can make a person do things you can’t imagine.” The judge tightened his hold on the boy. “Besides, it doesn’t matter what you would really do. Not as long as the folks believe you might have done it.”

  “So then the good deputy here finds out and I shoot him. Is that it?” Anthony said.

  “That’s good, kid. You’re catching on,” the judge said.

  “But what about me? Who shoots me?” Anthony sounded merely curious.

  “Why, you kill yourself, kid. Nobody will be too surprised. I think they’ll be so relieved that it’s all over, they’ll hardly ask any questions.”

  “It won’t work, Judge. You might as well turn yourself in.” Michael did his best to sound confident as he held out his hand toward the judge. “Just give me the gun, slow and easy.”

  The judge actually smiled. “I’m sorry, Michael, but you’ve got to realize I’m going to be the next state representative. I’ve got things to do. Important things. You’re a good boy and all, but the state needs me more than it does you. I can make things happen.”

  “You’re nuts.” Anthony tried to twist away from him, but the judge pushed the gun against his head.

  “Could be, but I don’t think so. Enough talk.” The judge pushed the boy toward the car. “Time to get on with it, like the boy said. June will wonder where I am.”

  “Listen.” Michael spoke up suddenly. “I hear a car coming. What are you going to do, Judge? Kill everybody in Hidden Springs?”

  The judge hesitated, his eyes darting toward the road. Michael looked at Anthony’s face. The kid was smart enough not to move his head, but he did blink. That was signal enough for Michael. With a yell that would have done the Confederate Rebels proud, Michael lunged at the judge, knocking his arm up. At the same time Anthony dropped to the ground. The gun went off, the bullet whizzing harmlessly over their heads.

  Michael grabbed the judge’s arm before he could bring the gun back down. The judge was stronger than Michael had expected. For a moment, neither gave ground. With their faces inches apart, Michael said, “Give it up, Judge. It’s over.”

  The judge backed up a couple of steps, then suddenly banged his head into Michael’s.

  For a second, Michael was dazed and his hold slackened. The judge whirled and began pushing against Michael.

  “Watch out, Deputy,” Anthony yelled. “He’s trying to push you over.”

  Michael’s feet slipped on the rock as he glanced over his shoulder. They were close, too close. Michael hooked a foot behind the judge’s legs and they both went down hard with Michael on top. He banged the judge’s hand that gripped the gun against the rocks. Bones crunched as at last the judge dropped the gun. Michael grabbed it and scrambled to his feet.

  The judge sat up slowly, holding his hand. “We can talk about this, Mike. Work something out.”

  “I don’t think so, Judge. You’re under arrest for murder. You have the right to remain silent,” Michael started.

  “Stop it. Don’t read me my rights. I know my rights.” The judge glared up at Michael. “And weren’t none of them murders.”

  “You stabbed Joe with his own scissors.” Michael backed up out of reach.

  “An accident. I didn’t mean for it to happen. I just wanted to talk to him, but he wouldn’t listen.” The judge groaned as he pushed against the rock with his good hand to stand up. He got a few inches off the rock and then sank back down hard. He reached toward Michael. “Help me up.”

  “I don’t think so, Judge.”

  “What’s an old man like me going to do? You’ve already broken my good hand. I can’t even stand up, and there’s that Hank Leland.” The judge looked past Michael toward the road. “You might know he’d be the one to spoil things.”

  Michael looked over his shoulder. Sure enough, Hank was bouncing along the rutted road in his old van. Michael looked back at the judge. Strangely enough, in spite of everything he knew the man had done, he felt sorry for him, or maybe he was sad for himself. “There’s nothing I can do, Judge. It’s over.”

  “I guess you’re right. It is over.” Tears filled the judge’s eyes. He looked up at Michael. “I’d take it kindly if you’d just shoot me, Michael.”

  “You know I can’t do that.”

  “Well, give the gun to the boy there.” The judge’s eyes flickered over to Anthony. “He wants to kill me. It’d give him a lot of pleasure.”

  “I don’t think so.” Michael didn’t look at Anthony. “He’s not a murderer.”

  “You mean like his father.” The judge let out a sound close to a laugh. “You never know what you can do till you have to. That’s all I ever did. What I had to.”

  Behind Michael, Hank’s van stopped and a door slammed. The judge pushed against the rock with his uninjured hand and this time managed to get to his feet.

  “Okay, Judge. Let’s go.” Michael motioned with the gun toward Anthony’s car.

  The judge didn’t act as if he heard him. Instead, he was staring at Hank. “That idiot has his camera out. I can’t do this.”

  Without warning, he turned away from Michael and hurled himself toward the edge of the cliff. Michael grabbed for him and managed to catch his jacket, but the judge was already too close to the edge. He embraced the pull of gravity. Michael teetered on the edge and might not have recovered his balance in time if Anthony hadn’t grabbed him and yanked him back.

  Behind them Hank snapped pictures.

  28

  Anthony clutched Michael’s belt as the judge fell, arms and legs flailing against the air as though he’d changed his mind and wanted to climb back to safety. Then he slammed onto the surface of the lake below. The water swallowed him like a hungry mouth.

  Michael closed his eyes after the judge disappeared under the water. He was suddenly very aware of the sun on his face and the slight breeze touching his skin.

  “You think it killed him?” Anthony asked.

  “Yes.” Michael opened his eyes and stared down at the lake. Was it wrong to be glad for the feel of pulling in breath when he’d just seen death? Death that could be laid at his door because of his cockeyed plan.

  Anthony turned loose of Michael’s belt and stepped closer to the edge to peer over at the widening ripples in the water below. “And that, ladies and gentlemen, was my father.”

  “Not in any way that counted.” Michael wanted to jerk the kid back from the edge.

  Hank came up behind them. “I don’t believe it. Was that the judge? It looked like he jumped.” Then as if Anthony’s words had just reached his ears, he went on. “Did you say he was your father? Wow, what a story!” He pulled out his notebook and pencil. “The big boys will be after this one. They’ll have to give me a byline.”

  Michael turned and punched Hank in the jaw. Hank fell with a heavy thud, his pencil and notebook skittering away from him on the rocks as he instinctively protected his camera.

  Hank scrambled up to a sitting position and felt his chin gingerly while he worked his jaw back and forth. “Hey, why’d you do that?”

  Michael didn’t bother answering him. Instead he turned to Anthony. “You okay?”

  “Better than you maybe.” Anthony eyed Michael as though he’d sprouted horns or three eyes. Maybe both.

  Michael pulled his phone out of his pocket and held it out to Anthony. “Here. Drive out till you can get a signal. Call Betty Jean and tell her the judge went over the edge. She’ll know who to call. Her number is in the contacts.”

  Anthony took the phone. “What are you going to do?”

  Michael stepped away from him toward the edge of the cliff. “I’m going down to pull him out.”

  “I thought you said he was dead.”

  “He is.”

  “Then it’s too late to save him,” Anthony said.

  “It’s been too late for that for a long time.” Michael walked along the cliff edge until he found the spot where a steep path wound down to the water’s edge.

  Anthony traile
d after him while Hank grabbed his notebook and pencil and scrambled to his feet, still rubbing his chin. He came after them but stayed well back from Michael.

  “Maybe I’d better stay and help you. You might drown down there by yourself.” Anthony looked past Michael toward the lake.

  “You saying you care whether I drown or not?” Michael didn’t look around at him.

  “No, but you drowning wasn’t part of the plan.”

  “Lots of things weren’t part of the plan.”

  Hank came up behind Anthony. “Go ahead, kid, and do what he says. I’ll help him.”

  “Help him what? Drown and then take pictures?” Anthony looked from Hank to Michael and back to Hank. “Or he might drown you.”

  “Naw, he wouldn’t do that, and he’s right. He has to pull the judge out. He owes it to Miss June.”

  Michael looked around at Hank for the first time since he’d hit him. “She called you?”

  “Yeah.” Hank took his camera from around his neck and placed it carefully on the ground. He eyed Michael a minute and then pushed it farther away from the edge. “She tried to disguise her voice, but she’s called me a million times to put the screws on me for free space for this or that community service ad. There wasn’t any way I could not recognize her voice.” Hank stopped and looked past Michael down toward the lake. “But no way was I expecting this.”

  “I’ll go then, I guess,” Anthony said.

  “That’s what I told you to do, but don’t drive crazy. There’s no emergency now,” Michael told the boy before he started toward the path.

  Hank waited a minute and then followed him. Loose dirt spilled down the path as their feet slid on the incline. They were halfway to the bottom when they heard Anthony’s car starting up.

  “I’m sorry I slugged you.” Michael stopped to regain his balance after he slipped on a loose rock. Below them, the ripples in the water lapped against the shoreline.

  “Good newspapermen are supposed to get slugged now and again. Proves they’re doing their job.” Hank lost his footing and slid toward Michael. Michael put a hand out to stop him. “Of course, it would have been better if the boy had had the camera. That would have been some shot. Mild-mannered deputy sheriff swinging at dedicated get-the-news-this-time-every-time newspaper editor whose mouth was surely hanging open.”

  “It’ll kill Miss June if you print any of those pictures.” Michael leveled his eyes on Hank. “Especially since she’s the reason you’re out here.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. I’m thinking she might have felt worse if I hadn’t got here in time.” Hank held on to Michael’s arm to keep from sliding against him. “Wonder why she called me instead of the sheriff.”

  “I guess the old girl’s got more going for her than we thought. She knew you’d follow up on the tip, but she couldn’t be that sure about the sheriff.”

  “You think she knew all the time?”

  “I think maybe she might have suspected it after Rayburn. She said she remembered the name.” Michael turned and slipped the last few feet to the lake’s edge.

  “That’s more than any of the rest of us did. Or is it?” Hank followed him down.

  “Anthony knew.” Michael unstrapped his gun and laid it on the ground. “I didn’t figure it out until today.”

  “You going to give me the scoop?”

  Michael looked at him. “You going to lose those pictures?”

  “Come on, Michael. That’s asking too much.”

  Michael stripped off his uniform without saying anything.

  “I’ll find out what happened anyway,” Hank said.

  “Not from me.” Michael dived into the cold water and swam out toward where the judge’s body had risen to the surface. Behind him, he could hear Hank yelling something, but Michael didn’t bother trying to hear him. He didn’t want to listen. He didn’t want to think. He couldn’t think about it yet. He just had to keep doing what had to be done, one thing at a time.

  He dragged the judge’s body out and laid him on the rocky bank. It hurt him to see the man’s slack face with lake water and blood dribbling out the corner of his mouth. He’d never seen the judge’s face when it wasn’t full of purpose, whether he was arguing somebody around to his point of view, pushing a pet project, or winning a vote. He was, by turns, earnest, intense, hearty. Whatever the occasion called for. Now it seemed some occasions had called for murder.

  “I still just can’t believe it.” Hank stared at the judge’s body as Michael pulled his uniform back on. “Maybe Rayburn. That’s hard enough to believe, but are you saying the judge killed Joe?”

  Michael buckled his gun holster back around his waist. “I don’t think you heard me say anything.”

  “I can’t promise to delete those pictures, Michael.”

  “He jumped because he couldn’t bear to see the picture you’d take.” Michael sat down on a rock and tugged on his socks and shoes. He kept his eyes away from the judge’s body.

  “He jumped because he couldn’t figure any other way out.” Hank fingered the notebook in his pocket but didn’t pull it out. “What was he going to do? Kill you and the kid too?”

  Michael glanced up at Hank, who was studying him with narrowed eyes. He could almost see the gears turning in the editor’s head as he tried to figure it all out. Michael carefully tied his shoelaces, then stood up. “You got anything in your van we can cover him up with till Justin gets here?”

  “I should’ve gone with the boy and let you take your chances drowning, Keane.” Hank headed back toward the steep path. He looked back to say, “I’ve got an old raincoat in there, but I’m not climbing back down with it.”

  “You can pitch it down.”

  After he covered up the judge’s upper body with Hank’s raincoat, he sat down to wait for more help to arrive. He could have climbed back to the top, but even as sad as it was there beside the judge, it was better than up on top with Hank and his questions. He might give Hank some answers in time, but not now. Not with the wounds so raw. Hank could wait.

  He looked out over the lake and tried not to think about anything except how blue the water was and how the breeze swept ripples in front of it across the surface. He wished for his rowboat so that he could just get in and row out on the lake away from everything.

  Above him, he heard tires on the gravel, car doors slamming, and voices. He couldn’t make out their words. He didn’t want to. The sound of the voices told enough, sort of like an opera he’d seen once where, in spite of not understanding a word anybody onstage was saying, he still knew the story was a tragedy.

  The rest of the day was one thing after another that he didn’t like. Helping Justin and the sheriff carry the judge’s body back up the cliff. Worrying about having to give the sheriff CPR when his face turned blotchy purple before they got to the top. Then answering his terse questions once the sheriff could breathe again.

  He didn’t like not seeing Anthony there anywhere. He didn’t like the white, tight-lipped look on Justin’s face or the way Hank kept scribbling in his little notebook.

  He didn’t like the way the sun was warm and bright as if nothing in the world was wrong.

  He especially didn’t like it when the sheriff said, “Somebody will have to tell Miss June.” And everybody looked at him.

  After that was decided, they all left him alone, as if he had been set apart for some sort of a sacrifice and they were all afraid to get too close for fear they might become part of it too. Even Hank gave him a wide berth.

  They were wrapping things up and the sheriff was ordering Michael to drive the judge’s Cadillac out to save the taxpayers the cost of a wrecker when Buck did finally show up. He came barreling down the gravel lane so fast that Lester’s car behind him was almost lost in the dust he raised. Both of them had their lights flashing.

  “The keys might not be in the judge’s car.” Michael kept his eyes on the two cars speeding in and didn’t look at the sheriff. He sincerely hoped the keys weren’t in the
judge’s car.

  “Look at those idiots!” The sheriff made a sound of disgust when Buck slammed his car to a stop right in the middle of the road. Lester jammed on his brakes and skidded sideways off the road. “That’s all we need. Two totaled police cars.”

  The sheriff glared at the two men piling out of the cars before he turned back to Michael and went on talking as though there had been no interruption. “The judge always leaves his keys in his car. You know that. He says you don’t have to worry about car thieves in Hidden Springs.”

  “Just murderers.”

  Buck rushed up to them without even looking back at Lester. His face was white and his lips were in a grim line. “Man, am I glad to see you, Mike. Sally Jo said you called for backup. I was heading out when she canceled the call. Then Lester radioed me that somebody got killed down here, but he didn’t know who or how.” He glanced over at the sheriff. “What’s going down?”

  Instead of filling him in, Sheriff Potter started yelling at him. “What’s the idea of coming in here like gangbusters and slamming on your brakes like that? You trying to see if Lester’s air bag works?”

  “If he had any sense, he’d have known I was going to stop.” Buck matched the sheriff’s anger word for word.

  “That’s the point.” The sheriff stepped closer to Buck and went up on his toes to get right in his face. “The boy hasn’t got any sense. You should know that.”

  Buck stepped away from the sheriff and held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “You’re right, Sheriff. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

  “I reckon that’s understandable. Considering.” Sheriff Potter blew out a breath. “I better go make sure he’s not hurt.” The sheriff started over toward Lester’s car sitting sideways in the ditch beside the road. He looked over his shoulder at Michael and Buck. “You boys don’t go anywhere till I see if we can get him back up on the road. You might have to push.”

  “We could call a wrecker,” Michael said.

  “We aren’t calling no wrecker. Waste of taxpayers’ money.” The sheriff stalked on toward Lester standing in the road, wringing his hands.