by Bill Crider
The door started to open.
Chapter 21
Rhodes sprang up and put his shoulder into the door, straightening his legs and shoving upward, hard.
Will was caught off balance and fell backward, landing on his back. The door fell onto his feet, and he fired his pistol into the air. He tried to bring the weapon to bear on Rhodes, who had popped out of the cellar, but Rhodes had his own pistol out and shot before Will had a second chance to pull the trigger.
The bullet hit Will in the wrist of the hand that held the pistol. Will screamed and dropped the pistol. Rhodes had to admit even to himself that it was a shot worthy of Sage Barton, or it would have been if Rhodes had actually been trying to make it. Sage Barton was an incredibly accurate shot, but Rhodes had been shooting only to scare Will or at least get his attention. The fact that he’d hit him was nothing more than an accident. Of course, if he’d hit him in the head, that would’ve been an accident, too, but not a happy one.
Will twisted his body and reached for the pistol with his uninjured hand. Rhodes stepped over and kicked the pistol aside.
Will lay back. “You’ve killed me, Sheriff. I’ll bleed out right here.”
Rhodes looked down at Will’s wrist. Will was small, but he had wide wrists, and by another happy accident the bullet had taken only a little chunk out of the edge of his wrist. It hadn’t hit bone or an artery. Will wasn’t in any danger. He probably wasn’t even in much pain.
“You’ll be fine,” Rhodes told him. “The handcuffs might hurt a little bit.”
“Handcuffs? You’d handcuff a dying man?”
“You’re not in any danger of dying,” Rhodes said, “but the county doesn’t like for prisoners to complain about their care. I’ll call for the EMS crew to come get you, just to be sure you’re well taken care of. You better clamp a hand on that wrist to stop the bleeding. I was just joking about the handcuffs.”
Will didn’t laugh about the joke, which was no surprise, but he did clamp down on his wrist.
“While we’re waiting,” Rhodes said, “you can tell me what you stole and why you killed Riley and Melvin.”
“I’m not telling you squat,” Will said.
Rhodes went over to where Will’s pistol lay. He picked it up and stuck it in his belt. Two-Gun Dan Rhodes. Then he walked back to Will.
“I’m arresting you for assault on an officer. That’s going to be the least of your troubles, though. There’ll be more charges later after I make up a list, so I’d better tell you what your rights are.”
Rhodes recited the Miranda rights and asked Will if he understood them.
“I’ve seen this stuff on TV,” Will said. “I know what it is.”
“And they say TV isn’t educational.”
“I never said that,” Will said.
“That was a joke,” Rhodes told him. “Stand up.”
“I don’t know if I can. The damn door’s on my feet, and my ankles are broke, or maybe my feet. Something’s broke. I’m in a bad way.”
Rhodes doubted that. “Give it a try. You can do it. I’ll help you.”
Rhodes bent and lifted the door with his left hand while keeping his pistol aimed in Will’s general direction. He couldn’t lift the door very high like that, but it was enough for Will to wiggle his feet free.
“Now you can get up,” Rhodes said.
Will struggled to stand, still holding his wrist, which was hardly bleeding now, and complaining about how his feet were broken. He managed to get upright and stay that way, although he looked a little wobbly.
“I can’t walk,” he said. “It’s bone on bone down there.”
“I don’t think so,” Rhodes said. He didn’t believe Will was hurt nearly as badly as he pretended to be. “Let’s walk on back to the front of the house. You first, hands behind your head. I’m not calling the EMS until we get there, so don’t dawdle.”
“I’m gonna sue the county,” Will said, “and you, too. You can’t shoot a man and break his ankles. It’s police brutality.”
“What would you call shoving somebody down into a cellar to starve?”
“That was an accident. I slipped.”
“Tell that to your lawyer.”
“I don’t have a lawyer.”
“Then you’d better get one. The lawyer might even believe you. It’s going to be hard to convince anybody that sitting on the door and screwing that hasp back on was an accident, though.”
Will didn’t say anything. He just stood there looking like he’d rather be somewhere else, anywhere else. Rhodes didn’t blame him.
“Start walking,” Rhodes said.
Will started walking, or limping, toward the front of the house, still gripping his wrist, although the bleeding had just about stopped. Rhodes stayed a few feet behind him, keeping his pistol ready in case Will was faking.
Which he was. His pickup was parked not far from the Tahoe, and they had to walk past it to get there. As they passed the pickup, Will made his move. He jumped to the side, fell to the ground, and rolled under the pickup.
Rhodes could have shot him, but he didn’t want to hit a vital spot and wind up in the news for having shot a man who was rolling on the ground. So instead of shooting, Rhodes lowered the tailgate of the truck and climbed into the bed. He stood in the middle so that he could see the ground on either side with just a glance and waited for Will to roll out.
It was quiet under the truck, and when Will didn’t appear, Rhodes said, “You don’t have a weapon hidden under there, do you, Will?”
Will didn’t answer.
“You’re just adding to your misery, Will. Resisting arrest, unlawful flight, bad stuff. It’s not going to look good at your trial.”
Will kept quiet, and Rhodes wondered what it would take to get him out. Maybe there was something Will cared about enough to come out if Rhodes coaxed him. Or threatened him.
“I’m not going to shoot you, Will,” Rhodes said. “The old ‘prisoner killed while trying to escape’ would get me off if I did, but I don’t want the hassle it would cause me. What I’m going to do is shoot your truck. I’m going to shoot a hole in the back window to start with. The bullet will go through the windshield, too. Then I’m going to shoot your dashboard. After that I’ll put a few holes in the doors and sides.”
“You can’t do that,” Will said. “It’s destruction of private property.”
“I’m not too worried about that, for some reason,” Rhodes said. “I’ll give you ten seconds to slide out from under the pickup, and if you don’t, I’ll start shooting. I’ll start counting now so you’ll know how much time you have. A thousand and one, a thousand and two, a thousand and three—”
“Okay, okay, I’m coming out,” Will said, and he slipped out on the driver’s side. While he was lying on the ground, he adjusted his glasses, which had slipped sideways on his face.
“Just lie right there,” Rhodes said, “while I get down.”
Rhodes took a couple of steps to the rear, stood on the tailgate, and jumped down. He wasn’t as agile as he’d once been, but he could still jump down a few feet without collapsing and keep his pistol steady while he did it.
“You can stand up now,” Rhodes said.
Will stood up and said, “I think I hurt my wrist again.”
“For some reason I don’t believe that,” Rhodes said. “I’m not going to bother to call the EMS. I’ll give you some first aid before I take you into town and put you in jail. If you need any treatment after we get there, we’ll call somebody for you after you’re booked.”
“What about my ankles?” Will asked. “They’re broke.”
“I don’t think so,” Rhodes said. “You seem to get around pretty well when you want to. Don’t start about the wrist again, either, when I handcuff you.”
“You said you were joking about the handcuffs.”
“That was then,” Rhodes said. “This is now. I have a first aid kit in the Tahoe. I’ll get you handcuffed, and then I’ll take a look
at that wrist.”
Will didn’t bother to thank him.
* * *
After Will was booked into the jail and put into a cell, he refused to talk to Rhodes without a lawyer in the room. He made a call to Randy Lawless, the best in the county, but Lawless was in court and couldn’t be reached.
“I’m not talking to you,” Will told Rhodes. “I’ll wait until I can get my lawyer here.”
Rhodes couldn’t do anything about that, so he let Will relax in the cell, as much as relaxing was possible, at any rate. He tagged Will’s gun and put it in the evidence room. It had been nice to be Two-Gun Dan for a while, but it wasn’t a name Rhodes wanted to keep. The pistol worried Rhodes because it wasn’t a .32. It hadn’t been used to kill Riley or Melvin. That didn’t mean that Will didn’t own another pistol, but it didn’t help Rhodes’s case in the least.
After dealing with the pistol, Rhodes had to tell Hack and Lawton all about the capture, which he did without going into all the details. He didn’t want the story turning up on the Internet, although he wasn’t sure Hack and Lawton wouldn’t just fill in some details from their imaginations if Jennifer Loam asked about what had happened.
When he’d finished the story to their satisfaction, Rhodes asked what he’d missed out on while he’d been gone.
“Major crimes only?” Hack asked.
“Whatever,” Rhodes said. “And no stories. Just give me a listing.”
Hack looked hurt, but he complied. “We got a guy walking along a county road without a shirt. Had some warrant out on him, so Buddy brought him in. He’s locked up now. Got him a nice orange jumpsuit, so he don’t need a shirt. Was a fight out at the trailer park, but it broke up before we could get anybody out there. Got a call about somebody looking in windows, but nothing came of that, either.”
Lawton interrupted the recitation. “Tell him about Ms. Fortson.”
“I was gettin’ to that,” Hack said.
“I just wanted to be sure you didn’t forget,” Lawton said.
“You sayin’ there’s somethin’ wrong with my mem’ry?”
“I just said I didn’t want you to forget. Bein’ helpful, is all.”
Rhodes sighed. He’d asked that there be no stories, but he knew he was about to get one, whether he wanted it or not.
“What about Ms. Fortson?” he asked to stop the argument that was developing and delaying the inevitable.
“She gets the newspaper,” Hack said.
Rhodes got the newspaper, too, and while it was a mere shadow of its former self, while it had been sold to some publishing group from outside the county, while it had laid off everybody except one or two people, and while it was no longer published daily, it was still a newspaper. Rhodes had nothing against Jennifer Loam’s Web site, and it was certainly more up-to-date than the newspaper, but now and then he liked to unfold a real paper and look over the articles, no matter how out of date they might be. If he got a little ink on his fingers, well, it was worth it.
“What’s wrong with getting the newspaper?” Rhodes asked.
“She’s not payin’ for it,” Hack said.
Rhodes didn’t see anything wrong with that, either. He paid for his own newspaper, but it would be a much better deal to get it free, which was about what it was worth these days. He knew there was more to the story, though, and he knew Hack was waiting for him to ask the logical question, so he did.
“What’s so bad about getting a free newspaper?”
“That’s what I wanted to know,” Lawton said.
“Don’t butt in,” Hack said.
“Well, that’s what I wanted to know, ain’t it?”
“Never mind that,” Rhodes said. “Just tell me what the problem with getting a free paper is.”
“Gettin’ it ain’t the problem,” Hack said.
He waited. Lawton wisely said nothing. Rhodes finally cracked.
“Then what is the problem?”
“Free ain’t always free,” Hack said, and gave Rhodes an expectant look.
“I’m dense,” Rhodes said. “Explain what that means.”
“It means she thinks it’s a scam,” Hack said. “She’s a widow-lady, and she thinks the newspaper’s trying to take advantage of her.”
“Not the newspaper,” Lawton said. “A newspaper can’t take advantage of anybody. The people who run the newspaper can, though.”
“We know that,” Hack told him. “It’s just a way of puttin’ things.”
“Well, you made it sound like the newspaper was the thing doin’ it.”
Rhodes broke in before they got to the “did not,” “did so” stage. “How could anybody take advantage of her by giving her free papers?”
“Easy,” Hack said. “Sure, they’re free now, but what if the paper decides that she’s been spongin’ off them, gettin’ newspapers without payin’ for ’em? What if they come at her and try to collect? Maybe go back a year or so and say she ain’t been makin’ the payments? Maybe charge her some big bill she can’t pay? What happens then?”
“Has she called them to stop the deliveries?”
“Says she has, but they didn’t stop. She quit pickin’ ’em up for while, but they just kept on comin’ and lay there on the end of her driveway, pilin’ up and ruinin’ the whole look of her place, so she gathered ’em up and called again. That didn’t work, either.”
“It’s just some kind of mistake,” Rhodes said.
“Prob’ly is, but you can’t tell Ms. Fortson that, not and make her believe it. Well, maybe you can. I sure as heck can’t.”
“Okay. You don’t have to make her believe it. Just call the newspaper and tell them to stop delivering the paper. Tell them if they don’t, we’ll arrest them for harassment.”
“Can we do that?”
“That was a joke,” Rhodes said. “Just tell them to stop. I’m sure you can convince them it would be a good idea.”
Hack didn’t look so sure. “I wouldn’t bet on it.”
“I would, but I’m not a betting man. I’d do it myself, but I have more work to do on this Will Smalls problem.”
“What kinda work?”
“I have to find out for sure that he’s guilty.”
“He’s guilty, all right,” Lawton said. “Got the wound to prove it.”
“It’s not much of a wound,” Rhodes said.
“Shot the gun right outta his hand.”
“That’s not what happened,” Rhodes said.
“Close enough,” Lawton said. “Wrist, hand, it’s all the same thing. Mighty good shootin’, I’d call it. I’d like to see the Lone Ranger do any better.”
“Or Sage Barton,” Hack said.
“That’s enough,” Rhodes said. He didn’t want them to get started on Sage Barton. “I have work to do.”
“I thought we just decided Will was guilty,” Hack said.
“There’s a problem with that,” Rhodes told him.
“What problem?”
“Proof,” Rhodes said. “I don’t have any proof.”
Chapter 22
Rhodes had missed lunch yet again, and he was tempted to stop at the Dairy Queen for a Jalitos Ranch Burger. And maybe a Blizzard to top it off. However, it was Bean Day. Rhodes was as big a fan of pinto beans and cornbread as anybody, especially if the beans were spiced up with some black pepper, salt, bacon grease, and a little bit of jalapeño pepper. He also liked a bit of jalapeño pepper in cornbread.
The problem was that a lot of other people in Clearview were fans of Bean Day, and the place would be all too crowded. Rhodes figured it would be better just to get something at the drive-up window, but there was a line there, too. He could either wait or go through one more day without lunch. He supposed he could stand to miss another meal. In fact, he was getting used to it, so he drove on to the Smallses’ house.
He glanced at the backyard when he got out of the Tahoe and saw that there was a separate storehouse located there. He had a feeling that if he looked inside, he might fin
d some of the proof he was looking for. Maybe Ellen Smalls would let him take a peek.
He went to the front door, knocked, and waited. Ellen opened the door after he knocked a second time.
“Back again, Sheriff?”
“I have to talk to you and Joyce,” Rhodes said.
Ellen took a sharp breath. “Is it about Will? Is he all right?”
“It depends on what you mean by ‘all right.’ Can I come in?”
Ellen stepped back from the door and let Rhodes into the den. He noticed that the Smallses, like Riley and the Hunts, had a big-screen TV, but it wasn’t new. It was a good bit thicker than the current models.
“I’ll get Joyce,” Ellen said, and she disappeared through a door.
In few seconds she was back with her sister, and both women stood there looking at Rhodes.
“We might feel better if we sat down,” he said, and the women sat on a worn sofa, leaving Rhodes to sit in a pink upholstered pedestal rocker.
“We need to talk about Will and Melvin,” Rhodes said when he was seated.
The rocker was a precarious perch. It could be turned in either direction all too easily. Rhodes would have preferred something a little more stable. He felt that he might tip over to the side or go spinning around at any second.
“What about Will and Melvin?” Joyce asked. “Where’s Will?”
“That’s what I came to tell you,” Rhodes said. “Will’s in jail.”
General consternation ensued. Rhodes waited for it to die down.
“What for?” Ellen asked after she got control of herself. “What’s he done?”
“That’s what I was hoping you could tell me. It looks as if he and Melvin and their friend Riley Farmer were involved in the thefts down in Melvin’s area.”
More consternation, along with protests and denials. Once again Rhodes sat in the wobbly rocker and waited them out.
“I don’t see how you can say that about Melvin,” Joyce said. She was calm but indignant.
“Or about Will,” Ellen said. “Those two are as honest as the day is long.”