The Dirty South - Charlie Parker Series 18 (2020)

by Connolly, John

  Harmony glanced sharply at him. He stared back, and saw her face soften, then crumple.

  ‘Don’t make me do this,’ she said, as she began to cry.

  ‘It’s for his own good, Harmony. You know it.’

  ‘You just want to put someone away for the Kernigan girl’s death, because then everyone will be happy, and the money will start flowing into this town.’

  ‘No,’ said Griffin, ‘I want to see the right person apprehended, because if we make a mistake, more girls are going to die. You know me, Harmony: I’m not about to allow that, not if it’s within my power. You don’t want it either, and neither does Tilon. If he cared about Donna Lee, he’s hurting right now. He’s also scared, and probably not thinking straight, but he may know something that could help us. He’ll be able to fill in a few of those missing hours, and bring us closer to finding the one that killed her.’

  Harmony searched in her apron again, and this time came out with a tissue. She wiped her eyes and nose, and returned the tissue to its hiding place.

  ‘I’m telling you the truth,’ she said. ‘I don’t know where Tilon is. He left yesterday.’

  ‘And he didn’t say where he was going?’

  ‘No. I expected him back last night, but he didn’t show. And then—’

  Griffin didn’t press her, but allowed her to take her time.

  ‘Then a man came by late, and told me to pack some items for Tilon: clothes, toiletries. Enough for a couple of days, he said.’

  ‘Did you know him?’

  She shook her head. ‘But he’d called earlier. He and Tilon talked for a while, then he left, and a few hours later, Tilon left, too. I wasn’t happy when the man returned and started telling me what to do in my own home. I didn’t like him. I didn’t like his manner. I considered him to be morally suspect.’

  ‘What did he look like?’

  ‘Small. Bald. Green eyes, but with no light to them, like a dead cat’s.’

  ‘How did he get to your place?’

  ‘He drove.’

  ‘Did you notice his car?’

  ‘It was a crappy Chevy, but it sounded good, like a race car.’

  ‘What color?’

  ‘Green, same as his eyes.’

  ‘Did you get the license number?’

  Harmony searched her apron for the third and final time, produced her cigarette pack again, and opened it. Written on the inside, in pencil, was a license number.

  ‘I think,’ she said, ‘that Tilon has been keeping bad company.’

  62

  Leonard Cresil sat in the currently patron-free environment of the Gilded Cage and thought that there were few places more depressing than an empty strip club. On the other hand, Burdon County, like the rest of the state, was unlikely to run out of titty bars that were depressing even when occupied. On his run north, Cresil had passed a club advertising BYOB, Mondays to Thursdays. Cresil didn’t know too much about the economics of running a titty bar, but he couldn’t see the percentage in letting men arrive carrying their own cooler boxes. Next thing, they’d be consuming their own fried chicken, and getting their old ladies to dance on the stage for free, just so they could view them from a fresh angle.

  Cresil had been provided with a cup of coffee by one of Randall Butcher’s dancers. She was petite and good-looking, but Cresil seemed barely to register her presence beyond thanking her for the coffee and declining some gravy and biscuits offered in case he hadn’t yet eaten. He wasn’t a morning guy when it came to his appetites, and this was as true of the carnal as the culinary, but he acknowledged a slight stirring in his groin as he watched the girl walk away. Cresil’s urges tended toward the aggressive at the best of times. He lived his life on the basis that any benefit to him had to come at a cost to someone else, and the greater the cost to the other party, the greater the benefit to Leonard Cresil. Ultimately, Cresil wasn’t happy unless someone else wasn’t happy, and preferably because he’d caused them to become that way. If the Kovas business worked out as Randall Butcher hoped it would – which would be due in no small part to Cresil’s own efforts – then Cresil planned to come back to the Gilded Cage some night when he was more in the mood, and claim an honorarium from Butcher in the form of one of his girls, although not that little angel; perhaps, instead, one that was burned out and wouldn’t be missed too much while her bruises were fading.

  Now here was Randall Butcher himself, and beside him that redheaded piece of shit Ferdy Bowers, who had just arrived looking flustered. Cresil had wondered how long it would take for the Cades’ two whipping boys to find common cause. He’d known Butcher on and off down the years, and they’d helped each other when it suited them. Bowers he was aware of largely by reputation: the runt of the Burdon County business litter, feeding off whatever remained in the tit once the Cades were done suckling.

  The three men shook hands, and Butcher made the formal introductions.

  ‘It’s my feeling, Leonard, that you only appear when you have trouble in mind,’ said Butcher, once they were all seated.

  ‘You know why I’m here,’ said Cresil.

  ‘The bodies in Burdon County.’

  ‘That’s right. Mr Shire is concerned about the activities of the Cargill police.’

  ‘I’ll bet he is. I hear he’s taken money from near half the state, and promised as much in return to the other half. Some of that cash in his pocket is mine and Ferdy’s.’

  ‘Then it’s in all our interests,’ said Cresil, ‘that a solution be found to these terrible crimes. Are you feeling all right, Mr Bowers?’

  Ferdy Bowers had shuddered involuntarily. It was a response to the tone of Cresil’s voice, and the way his tongue had rolled the word terrible around his mouth, as though savoring the taste of it. Leonard Cresil, Bowers thought, was just the kind of man that could spit-roast a dead girl with sticks. It sickened Bowers that he was forced to keep such company, even temporarily. Randall Butcher was bad, but Cresil was a whole other can of worse.

  ‘I’m fine,’ said Bowers. ‘It’s cold in here, that’s all.’

  ‘Not to me. It might be that you’re susceptible to chills, on account of a constitutional weakness.’

  ‘That must be it.’

  ‘Get to the point, Leonard,’ said Butcher. ‘I got a business to run.’

  ‘I’m tired of working for others,’ said Cresil, ‘and cleaning the shit from their shoes. I have my eye on a bar in Boca Raton, and figure I may just retire there. If this deal goes through, my bonus, along with a cut from Mr Shire’s end, will set me up for life.

  ‘But Mr Shire is conflicted: there are risks involved in doing nothing about these killings, and other risks inherent in permitting the police to delve into them. Having slept on the problem, Mr Shire has come down on the side of no investigation. After all, a couple of months went by between the deaths of the Hartley and Kernigan girls. On that basis, the papers will be signed, and the first foundations laid, before we see another body – if we ever do. By then it’ll be too late to redline the project, and Griffin and Cade can call in the state police to solve the crime, letting the professionals take care of it. A bunch of amateurs beating around the bushes can only attract the wrong kind of attention.’

  ‘And has Shire seen fit to explain this reasoning to Evan Griffin?’ said Butcher. ‘Because my information is that the chief is of a contrary view – a contrary disposition, even.’

  ‘Plus, they’re not all amateurs,’ said Bowers.

  ‘What?’ said Butcher.

  ‘They’re not all amateurs,’ Bowers repeated. ‘Griffin has brought in a former detective from New York to help with the investigation, a man named Parker.’

  Cresil eyed Bowers with something approaching interest.

  ‘So I’ve been led to believe,’ said Cresil.

  ‘I didn’t know about this,’ said Butcher.

  ‘You’ve probably been too distracted by pussy and narcotics,’ said Cresil. He returned his attention to Bowers. ‘Have you met Pa
rker?’

  ‘He came to my office this morning. He was asking questions about the Cades, and the dead girls.’

  ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘That he should never have come to Burdon County.’

  ‘I could have told him that,’ said Cresil, ‘with or without dead coloreds.’

  ‘And how does Shire feel about Parker’s involvement?’ said Butcher to Cresil.

  ‘Mr Shire hasn’t yet been brought up to speed on it,’ said Cresil, ‘but I imagine he’ll be discommoded when he finds out.’

  ‘You could just inform him once the problem has already been taken care of,’ said Butcher.

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘No Parker, no investigation – or only the imitation of one.’

  Bowers stood. He might have agreed with the substance of the words, but not their implication.

  ‘I don’t want to hear that kind of talk,’ he said.

  ‘Sit down, Ferdy,’ said Butcher. ‘You were in this from the moment you walked through that door.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Cresil, ‘sit down, Mr Bowers. I wouldn’t want cause to doubt your discretion.’

  Bowers sat.

  ‘We’re not talking about killing,’ said Butcher, ‘just derailing.’

  ‘If you say so,’ said Cresil.

  ‘You are incorrigible, Leonard,’ said Butcher. ‘You’ll make Ferdy here anxious.’

  ‘So you’ll take care of it?’ Cresil asked Butcher.

  ‘I won’t even have to use my own people. All it’ll cost is a couple of cases of beer. I expect if Shire chose to seek a public vote on his policy toward the investigation, it would receive unanimous support in most quarters. Pruitt won’t have trouble finding idle hands for the devil’s work.’

  ‘So that’s one problem solved,’ said Cresil.

  ‘There are others?’ said Butcher.

  ‘One, but it may be both a problem and a solution. I was speaking with Reverend Pettle last night—’

  ‘That preacher and his church are giving me ulcers,’ said Butcher. ‘I can remember when he was holding roadside services, and sucking in exhaust fumes along with the fire of the Holy Spirit, and now he wants to go head-to-head with the Pentecostals.’

  Cresil didn’t like being interrupted. Even after Butcher had finished talking, Cresil allowed silence to accrete, just so Butcher would restrain himself in future.

  ‘Well,’ Cresil continued, when he judged the moment was right, ‘the reverend was very close to Sallie Kernigan. He ministered to her needs, you might say, and not just the religious kind.’

  Butcher seemed about to comment, but thought better of it.

  ‘The affair initially lasted a couple of months,’ said Cresil, ‘but came to an end just about the time that the reverend’s wife found out about it. Unfortunately, Pettle’s flesh is weak, and his spirit isn’t much stronger. In recent weeks, he and Sallie reignited the embers of their relationship. That’s information you can use right there, Randall. It might prompt the reverend to moderate his position on that church business.’

  ‘It just might,’ said Butcher.

  ‘If it does, I’ll expect a dividend. I’ll leave the amount to your discretion. I know you wouldn’t cozen a friend.’

  Randall Butcher would have cheated his own mother, given the chance, but not Leonard Cresil. Friendship didn’t enter into it, only prudence.

  ‘In addition, Pettle told me that Donna Lee Kernigan had been seeing a white man. I think you, Randall, may have an inkling of his identity.’

  ‘Tilon Ward,’ said Butcher.

  ‘How long have you known?’

  ‘We thought it might have been the mother, not the girl, until Tilon yesterday admitted otherwise.’

  ‘Even though Ward’s daddy had some previous in that regard?’

  ‘Tilon’s daddy liked children,’ said Butcher. ‘Donna Lee was legal.’

  ‘Not by much.’

  ‘Enough in the eyes of the law.’

  ‘Where’s Tilon now?’

  ‘Pruitt moved him out of town.’

  ‘Away from the police?’

  ‘And to cook,’ said Butcher.

  ‘You’re taking a chance, cooking meth with all this police attention in the county.’

  ‘You pass Bradley’s House of Centerfolds on the way over here?’

  ‘That the BYOB titty place?’ said Cresil.

  ‘Yep. That’s what we’re competing with here. I need cash reserves, especially if I’m to start building once Kovas climbs off the fence.’

  ‘And once Pettle starts to see sense about that disused church,’ said Bowers, who was one of Butcher’s co-investors in the proposed Cargill titty bar venture.

  ‘If he starts to see sense. That fucking preacher …’

  Cresil sat back in his chair and folded his hands across his stomach.

  ‘If I were the killing kind,’ he said, ‘and someone made himself available as a culprit for my crimes, I might take the opportunity to rest easy and wait for the heat to die down before I started again, assuming I even elected to recommence my activities. It might be that I’d already gotten such urges out of my system. A passing vice, if you will.’

  Bowers looked like he wanted to put his hands over his ears and begin keening to cover the sound of their voices. Instead, he contented himself with looking miserable.

  ‘Are you talking about feeding Tilon to the police?’ said Butcher. ‘What if he has an alibi?’

  ‘Does he?’

  ‘He told me he was home the night Donna Lee probably died.’

  ‘He would tell you that, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘His momma will attest likewise.’

  ‘Then it’ll be for the police to establish the truth of it. In the meantime, Tilon will be behind bars, some of the impetus will seep from the investigation, and we can go ahead with confirming deals and making ourselves wealthy.’

  Butcher tugged at his lip. Cresil’s plan didn’t quite resemble his own, which was to keep Tilon cooking for as long as was feasible before having Pruitt Dix take him for a walk in the woods. Butcher didn’t want Tilon to end up spilling his guts to detectives about the meth operation in order to prove he could be believed on other subjects too, such as the death of Donna Lee Kernigan.

  ‘Or suppose we feed them Tilon, but make sure he’s dead when they find him?’ said Butcher.

  ‘You know,’ said Cresil, ‘that would work too.’

  63

  Griffin and Knight stood in the parking lot of the Dunk-N-Go, watching Harmony Ward return to work.

  ‘Souped-up green Chevy,’ said Griffin. ‘Small, bald driver.’

  ‘With dead eyes.’

  ‘Sounds a lot like Pruitt Dix.’

  ‘An awful lot,’ said Knight.

  ‘Is he still licking Randall Butcher’s boots?’

  ‘Last I heard.’

  ‘You think Randall will talk to us?’

  ‘Not without a lawyer, and even if he does, whatever he has to say won’t be worth hearing.’

  Griffin took off his hat and scratched his head. His eczema had begun acting up again. Soon he’d have blood and skin under his fingernails.

  ‘Just when I think this county can’t get any more screwed up,’ he said, ‘it finds a way to disappoint me.’

  A similar conversation was taking place among Dr Ruth Temple, Spiro Nixon, and Lewis Pickett, the executive director of the state crime laboratory. Pickett wasn’t a scientist, but had progressed through the ranks of the state police and the US Marshals Service before accepting the post of director. The crime lab had previously operated under the auspices of the state police, but it was felt that having an arm of the law processing evidence in a crime might leave a bad taste when it came time to prosecute, so it was now an independent entity. Nevertheless, it helped that Pickett came from a law enforcement background, because it meant he could understand the needs of both the police and the scientists, and manage them accordingly. Alternatively, in times of crisi
s, it enabled two entirely different groups of people to complain about him simultaneously, thus giving them a target for their ire while the lab went about its business.

  Now Pickett listened while Temple and Nixon told him about the fingerprint and the hit from the system.

  ‘Hollis Ward?’ said Pickett. ‘Well, I’ll be damned.’

  ‘Do you know him?’ said Temple.

  ‘I’ve had the pleasure down the years, but it wasn’t much of one. If you’d asked me about him five minutes ago, I’d have told you he was dead. No chance of an error?’

  ‘None,’ said Nixon. ‘It was a very good print.’

  Pickett caught the implication.

  ‘You’re saying it’s too good?’

  ‘No, just that if Hollis Ward was seeking to damn himself, he couldn’t have gone about it any better.’

  ‘And there are no other prints on the body?’

  ‘None from Hollis Ward,’ said Temple. ‘We found some bruising to the upper left arm, and got some partials from that. It looks like someone else might have grabbed the girl hard in the twenty-four hours before she died, because the partials don’t match Ward’s prints.’

  ‘Well done on getting even partials.’

  ‘We had residue, which helped,’ said Nixon.

  ‘What kind of residue?’

  ‘I’m guessing grease or motor oil, but I won’t be able to say for sure until it’s been analyzed. I tried running the prints, but they’re not in the system.’

  Pickett looked again at the hit on Hollis Ward.

  ‘Hollis, Hollis,’ said Pickett, ‘where have you been all these years?’ He waved the paperwork at Temple. ‘You been in touch with Evan Griffin about this?’

  ‘No, I thought I’d run it by you first.’

  ‘Any reason other than to hamper my digestion?’

  ‘We have a request from the Burdon County Sheriff’s Office to copy it immediately on the autopsy results, since the chief deputy is, as you’re aware, also the chief investigator for the county, and his office is cooperating with the Cargill PD on the investigation.