by James Swain
His thoughts drifted to Ricky Smith. He was a local fixture; the woman in the cafeteria had known what kind of soda he drank. And Ricky knew everyone, as well; he’d pegged Roland Pew’s bicycle sitting outside the bank that afternoon.
This is a small town.
What was the woman in the pickup truck trying to tell him? That everyone in town was connected to Ricky in some mysterious way? It sounded far-fetched, yet she had acted genuinely scared.
He rested his head against the tree, its bark cold against his neck. Closing his eyes, he felt like he was falling through a bottomless hole, and put the palms of his hands against the tree for support. All his life, he’d been having epiphanies, strange little moments in time when his brain suddenly saw truth where only questions had been before. He was having an epiphany now, and Ricky’s incredible string of luck suddenly took on a whole new meaning. To an outsider, Ricky winning the lottery and a drawing for a trip to Hawaii and a horse race looked like a miracle. But to the locals, it didn’t look like a miracle at all. Instead of making a fuss over him, they were accepting it. Anywhere else, they would have been throwing palm fronds at his feet and treating him like a saint.
Not here. Not once had Tony seen anyone in town come up to Ricky, whack him on the back, and tell him how amazing his lucky streak was.
But why?
Only one good answer came to mind. The locals knew something about Ricky that he didn’t. They knew what was going on.
This is a small town.
Valentine opened his eyes and realized he had his answer. The key to the puzzle was right here in Slippery Rock, and he walked out of the forest determined to find it.
21
Gerry figured it was time to leave Gulfport. He’d done like his father had asked, and talked to Tex Snyder. The fact that it had turned into a dead end was too bad, but he couldn’t do anything about it.
He checked out of the Holiday Inn a few minutes after six. He hadn’t eaten much that day, and had been eyeing the flashing neon sign on the restaurant directly across the road from the casino. BEST STEAKS IN THE SOUTH. He was in the mood for a big bleeding piece of meat, even though his old man would probably holler when he saw the charge come through on the credit card. What the hell.
He ended up ordering a sixteen-ounce T-bone with hash browns and string beans smothered in butter on the side. The meat was tenderized in something that would probably give him stomach cancer in ten years, but he didn’t care. He’d crossed a major bridge in his life today. He’d walked away from temptation. It was worth celebrating.
The meal made him want to sleep, and he ordered a double espresso. By the time he got on the road it was seven-fifteen and his eyelids felt like they were nailed to his forehead. He’d made a hotel reservation in Hattiesburg, and planned to get up first thing in the morning and catch a commuter flight back to Atlanta, then home to Tampa.
He drove to the run-down beachfront marina and hung a left on Highway 49. In his mirror he watched the marina’s lights slowly fade. He’d heard that Donald Trump had expressed an interest in the marina, then backed out. Gerry guessed it was because the Donald didn’t like the way gambling was run in Mississippi. The state had a conscience when it came to gambling, and had put limits on how much locals could wager; five hundred dollars for two hours was the maximum. They’d initiated the rule as a result of a rise in personal bankruptcies, and it had worked great. Gerry had decided he liked that. It kept things sane.
The speed limit was sixty-five. He drove a mile below it through the outskirts of Gulfport. The other good thing was that the state was pouring the proceeds from the casinos into public works and schools. Like the Indian reservations, they were doing something constructive with the money. He liked that, too.
After an hour he passed the town at the bend with the Bible store and noticed a state trooper’s car hiding in the shadow of two small restaurants. A few miles later, the smell of freshly cut pine trees invaded the car. His headlights caught the pine-milling operation up ahead. Acres of forty-foot-long trees lay on the side of the highway, waiting to be turned into two-by-fours. He filled his lungs with the great-smelling air.
He saw headlights come up from behind him. A Jeep, going way over the speed limit. Gerry shifted into the right lane. The Jeep moved over as well and got on his bumper. It had its brights on, and Gerry put his mirror down to cut the glare. He didn’t like how close the Jeep was, and punched his accelerator.
The cars separated, then the Jeep caught up. Where in hell was the state trooper when you needed him? Gerry heard a loud bang. The flash of a rifle being discharged was quickly followed by his car lurching to one side, its left rear tire blown to bits. Gerry hit the brakes and saw the Jeep swerve to avoid slamming into him. He accelerated and heard another loud bang followed by someone in the Jeep cursing.
This time when he hit the brakes, he put his foot straight to the floor. The rental screeched a hundred yards down the highway before it came to a halt. The Jeep couldn’t brake that hard without flipping over. It flew past him on the highway, then slowed down and did a hasty U-turn.
Gerry looked up and down the highway. He was in the middle of Mississippi nowhere. On one side of the road was a barren field. On the other, the pine-milling operation. He drove the car over the median, crossed two opposing lanes of traffic, and looked for a place in the logs that he could drive the rental through. Behind him he heard three men’s coarse laughter. They sounded like good old boys.
He found an opening in the logs and drove through it. It was just wide enough for his car. Then he had an idea. Braking, he threw the rental into reverse, then opened his door and jumped out. He started to run as the rental went backward. He heard it hit the Jeep.
“Shit,” a good old boy screamed.
“He’s getting away,” another shouted.
“Out of the car,” the third yelled.
Gerry ran down an aisle of stacked trees. They were stacked with spaces between them, and he saw his assailants on the other side, running alongside him. Each had a pump shotgun, a big belly, and a ponytail. What had happened to the old days, when guys with long hair stood for peace, love, and understanding? He saw one of them stop, aim, and fire. The blast flew by Gerry’s head.
Up ahead he saw another opening in the logs. He was doomed: Those good old boys would run through and shoot him and that would be it. Gerry couldn’t believe it. He’d finally gotten his act together, and now he was going to die.
His eyes saw a green and white metal sign. It was positioned next to the logs, and its lettering glowed in the moonlight. DANGER!! DO NOT TOUCH!
“There’s an opening,” one of them yelled.
“He’s mine,” the second screamed.
“No, he’s mine!”
Gerry felt his feet sprout wings. He reached the glowing sign before any of his pursuers reached the opening. Groping around in the dark for the thing that the sign didn’t want him to touch, his fingers latched onto a metal handle. He grasped it with both hands and looked through the space in the logs at the three bear-size men. They had stopped and were smiling like it was a rabbit they’d cornered and not another human being.
He yanked hard on the handle. A mighty roar followed as the forty-foot-long trees became disengaged from the metal cables holding them together. One of his pursuers screamed.
Gerry stood motionless. The space between the trees did not immediately close, and he watched as two of the men were instantly crushed. The third got a running start and was halfway across the highway when the trees caught up with him. He was knocked down like a bowling pin and carried along, his body banged and smashed.
The trees spread out evenly across the highway. Gerry waited until they’d stopped rolling, then walked over to where the first two men lay. Both had died with looks of surprise on their faces. He wanted to feel happy that they were dead; only, he didn’t. All he’d wanted was to get away. He hadn’t wanted to crush the life out of their bodies. It had just worked out that way.
He crossed the road and stopped where the third man lay in the middle of the road. The man was hanging on by a thread, the whisper of life in his eyes. His shotgun was still in his hand. Gerry kicked it away.
“You…,” the dying man moaned.
“Who sent you?”
“…gonna…”
“Tell me.”
“…die…”
He shut his eyes, and Gerry saw his chest cave in and realized he was passing into the great beyond. The wind, which had been blowing forcefully from the gulf, suddenly died off, and for a long moment time seemed to stand still. Gerry stared into the dead man’s face. Then he walked to the side of the road and surrendered his dinner.
The rain came back with a vengeance during his walk home, and Valentine peeled off his soaking wet clothes as he passed through the front door of his rental house and headed straight for the shower.
When he emerged ten minutes later, his skin was tingling and he felt refreshed. In the refrigerator he found the half-eaten sandwich from yesterday, and sat down at the kitchen table with a can of Diet Coke to wash it down. Since his wife had died, he’d been eating sandwiches for dinner and keeping crazy hours and basically living like a kid in a college frat house. Mabel was constantly scolding him about it, and out of deference to her, he picked up his wet clothes lying in the foyer when he was finished, and threw them in the washing machine in the basement. Then he dug out his cell phone and called his neighbor.
“How’s it going?” he asked when she answered.
“Oh, Tony, I’ve done something really stupid,” she replied.
Valentine sincerely doubted it. Mabel was one of the sharpest people he’d ever known. She rarely blundered, and when she did make a mistake, she was a master at fixing it.
“Let me guess,” he said, walking up the creaky basement stairs. “You wiped out the database in my computer.”
“That will never happen again,” she said. “No, this was just stupid. But I’m still ashamed.”
Reaching the first floor, he walked through the foyer to the kitchen and halted. A white envelope lay on the threadbare rug in the foyer. He’d had a visitor while he was downstairs, and he opened the front door and stepped onto the porch. It was still raining buckets. In the distance he faintly saw a kid on a bicycle pedaling furiously up a hill and out of sight.
“It must have been a doozy,” he said, closing the door. He picked up the envelope off the floor and went into the kitchen.
“I was in your study going through today’s mail, and I got distracted and without thinking…oh, this sounds like such a senior moment.”
“Come on,” he said, dropping the envelope on the kitchen table. “What did you do? The suspense is killing me.”
“I ate your hundred-thousand-dollar candy bar.”
“My what?”
“The 3 Musketeers bar that Ron Shepherd in Canada sent,” his neighbor replied. “It came in yesterday’s mail. Shepherd said it was for your collection of crooked gambling equipment, so I figured it must be important, even though I didn’t know how it worked. Well, like a dope, I absentmindedly tore off the wrapper and took a huge bite out of it. When I realized what I’d done, I nearly got sick.”
Valentine put his hand over his mouth. He’d helped Ron with the case over a year ago. A casino in Canada suspected its gift-shop manager of stealing from customers. Ron had sent him a videotape of the manager at work, and Valentine had quickly made the scam. Later, he’d learned the manager was stealing a hundred thousand dollars a year. It had to be a record, and he’d asked Ron to send him the candy bar after the trial so he could add it to his collection. He could not believe it now resided in his neighbor’s stomach.
“Is that laughter I hear coming out of your mouth?” Mabel asked.
“Sorry.”
“I get the feeling I haven’t totally ruined your day.”
“The image of you biting the end off, then realizing what you’d done—”
“Stop it,” she scolded him.
“Sorry.”
“So now that you’ve had a good chuckle, please explain what makes this candy bar so special? It certainly didn’t taste like it was worth a hundred big ones.”
“How much did it taste like it was worth?”
“Stop it!”
“Sorry. The manager kept the candy bar on the counter, next to where customers put items to be rung up. If a customer put down four items or more, he added the candy bar to the total. If someone looked at the receipt and questioned him, he pointed at the candy bar and said, ‘Didn’t you want that?’ The person would say no, and he’d apologize and give them their money back. It looked like an honest mistake, so no one ever reported it.”
“How much did the candy bar actually cost?”
“A buck.”
“You’re saying he did this a hundred thousand times a year?”
“Yeah. He had hundreds of customers a day. He cooked the books to hide the theft.”
“So what you’re saying is, I could have replaced the candy bar with one I bought at the grocery, and you wouldn’t have known the difference.”
This time Valentine couldn’t help himself and burst out laughing.
“What’s so funny?” she said.
“That’s something I would do,” he told her.
“Oh my, would you look at the time?” his neighbor said. “I’m off to the movies. Mustn’t let my one free day go to waste. Ta-ta.”
Valentine started to reply, but the phone had gone dead in his hand.
He retrieved the envelope he’d found in the foyer and opened it. Mabel probably hadn’t liked being strung along like that. He promised himself to make it up to her when he got home. The envelope contained a white sheet of stationery, with the faint scent of women’s perfume. He’d never liked things that were left anonymously. If the author wouldn’t look him in the face, why should he believe what was written on a piece of paper? His let his eyes scan the page.
WE MET THIS MORNING. I WOULD LIKE TO TALK TO YOU. MEET ME IN THE HIGH SCHOOL LIBRARY TOMORROW. FRONT DOOR OF SCHOOL WILL BE OPEN. WALK TO BACK, TAKE A LEFT, GO TO END OF LONG HALL. 9:00.
He found himself shaking his head. A clandestine meeting in the school library on a Sunday morning? It didn’t get any more spellbinding than that. He guessed the woman in the pickup had finally gathered the courage to talk to him. He smothered a tired yawn. The day had finally caught up with him.
The lumpy bed in the master bedroom felt surprisingly comfortable. He lay down in his clothes and stared at the ceiling. Sometime tonight he was going to wake up in a cold sweat. It had happened every time he’d shot someone. He would then lie awake and replay what had happened, just to reassure himself that he’d made the right decision. Sometimes, he’d drift back asleep. But most of the time, he’d do ceiling patrol.
As his eyes closed, he thought about Gerry. They hadn’t talked all day. He wondered how Gerry’s meeting with Tex Snyder had gone. He guessed Gerry hadn’t learned much. Otherwise, he was sure his son would have called.
He was still thinking about it as he drifted off to sleep.
22
Gerry’s insistence on not giving a statement until he had a lawyer did not sit well with the two highway patrolmen who appeared on the scene ten minutes later. The three dead men were locals; Gerry was a New Yorker recently transplanted to Florida. One of the patrolman wagged a finger menacingly in Gerry’s face.
“You better start talking, boy,” he declared.
“Not until I have a lawyer,” Gerry said.
So they cuffed his wrists and threw him in the back of their cruiser and eventually drove him to the Harrison County jail. On the way they passed several sprawling industrial plants and a refinery. The patrolmen continued to give him a hard time, and Gerry lowered his head and stared at the floor. His father had once told him that cops usually followed their first impressions. He obviously hadn’t made a good one here.
The jail was three stories of gener
ic yellow brick topped by razor wire. Inside, the patrolmen turned Gerry over to a tobacco-chewing plainclothes detective in a three-walled cubicle. The detective asked questions—current address, date of birth, arrest record—while hawking gobs of spit into a trash can. Gerry felt his stomach turn over.
“So you’ve been arrested for selling drugs,” the detective said.
“Pot. When I was a kid. It was a little bag.”
“How little’s little?”
“A quarter ounce.”
“Where was this?”
“Atlantic City. It’s where I’m from.”
“How old were you?”
“Fifteen.”
“Fifteen-year-olds in Mississippi drive cars and get married,” the detective said.
Gerry got his drift. The detective told him to stand up. They walked down a corridor to where fingerprinting equipment was shoved into a corner. The detective unlocked Gerry’s handcuffs and did his prints, rolling each finger carefully on the inkpad and then on the form. Then he did them again in weird groupings; four fingers together, both thumbs, until Gerry’s fingers were so black he couldn’t see the nails. The detective gave him a paper towel and a plastic spray bottle and led him to the bathroom.
“Don’t be long,” he said.
“How long’s long?” Gerry asked him.
Gerry thought he saw the detective crack a smile. Next stop was the mug-shot room, which also served as the snack room. The detective bought a Butterfinger bar from the candy machine while Gerry got a front and side shot taken by a techie.
“I need you to e-mail those shots to me,” the detective said.
“I’m kind of backed up,” the techie said.
“This can’t wait. I need to send them to the NCIC.”
The techie shot Gerry a look. “Okay,” he said.
Gerry was back in the detective’s cubicle when he remembered what NCIC stood for. National Crime Information Center. The tobacco-spitting detective was going to send his prints and mug shot to a law enforcement database to see if Gerry was wanted for any other nefarious deeds. He glanced at the clock hanging from the wall: 3:00 A.M.