by Moreau, Iza
“What’s it about, Sue-Ann?” he asked.
“I’ll tell you when I see you,” I told him.
He sputtered a little, but finally agreed.
After I hung up I sent Cal a lengthy email bringing him up to speed on what we had found out—Gina and I agreed that it was better coming from me than from her. I had gotten back a brief message: “Good work. Keep peeling that onion. C.D.”
I spent the next morning trying to relax. First, I spent a quality half hour with Alikki in her pasture, brushing out her mane and gingerly picking out blackberry brambles from her tail. In the few days I had owned her, she had become an important and unique character in my life. I loved currying her, stroking her coat, or just watching her in the pasture swishing her tail lazily at gnats and walking as gracefully as she could from one lush patch of grass to another. Sometimes if I was too attentive to her, she would swish me with her tail, roll her eyes, or snort at me. I loved it all, but had learned to back off when she wanted me to.
That morning, after Alikki had dismissed me, I decided to practice my kyudo. I mentioned earlier that archery always relaxes me, and Japanese archery requires a zenlike, meditative state that is almost like being in a trance. I was anxious to escape from my surroundings for a while, but to shoot archery properly—especially kyudo—you can’t have anything else on your mind. Despite the fact that I donned my white and blue practice uniform and thick, three-fingered glove, despite the fact that I did my best to empty my mind of all outside influences, the practice session was a mess. My shots missed the target with such consistency that I may as well have been blindfolded. The world was way too much with me.
First on my mind was the goat story—not only did I think over all the things I had found out so far, but I agonized over tasks I had yet to do. Like talking to Donny at lunch and maybe calling Ray Colley and Paul Hughes. And it was more important than ever that I make another trip into the woods.
Jack was second on the list of things I had to deal with. I was worried about him going to the Middle East and getting killed while at the same time I realized that if he survived, the experience might give him enough confidence and self-sufficiency to be the person he was always meant to be. The idea for his book was tantalizing, his asking me to write the copy was tempting.
Bubbling under was concern about my thyroid. I had almost decided on having the radioactive iodine treatment, but it would have to wait. Sex I could put off; in fact, being radioactive might give me an excuse for taking a rain check if I felt myself weakening in that direction around Jack or Donny or whoever. But endangering Alikki and her foal was out of the question.
And, of course, entwined through each of my thoughts was Gina. The last week had been more than hectic; I had felt as if there were far too few hours in the day to get anything done, yet through it all, what I wanted to do most was sit and talk to Gina. My growing friendship with her was a total surprise. She was able to calm down my frantic nature just by her presence; she didn’t care if I couldn’t be as strong as I would like to be all the time. The fact that she was seeing Cal sent my thoughts in directions more scattered than my arrows, and I knew that somewhere on the horizon, Cal was going to play a bigger part in how our friendship progressed.
Another good thing about Japanese archery is that the arrows are nearly twice as long as regular arrows. They’re almost impossible to lose in the grass.
When I put everything away and went back inside, I found that Jack had gone out somewhere. My mother’s bed was made but slightly rumpled, with one of my father’s Zane Grey books on the pillow, a bookmark carefully sticking out the top.
The phone rang and I ran into my bedroom to answer it. “Hello?”
“Is this Sue-Ann?” The deep masculine drawl was familiar, but I couldn’t put a name to it right away.
“That’s right.”
“This is Paul Hughes.”
“Oh. Hey, Paul, how’s it going?”
“Sorry to bother you on a Sunday morning, Sue-Ann, but I need to talk to you.”
“That’s okay, Paul. What’s on your mind?” I was pretty sure I already knew what was on his mind, and looked around automatically for a pack of cigarettes. Where was Gina or Goth Girl when I needed them? I steeled myself by sitting on the bed, my back against the headboard.
“I had a long talk with Cal Dent this morning,” Paul began. “On the golf course. He told me you were still looking into that goat story.”
“He gave me the go-ahead. But it’s not just a goat story any more, Paul. Did Cal tell you about the dog and the chickens?”
“He told me a lot of things, and I’ll have to tell you that it upset me some. No, it upset me a lot, because I quit after nine holes and came home. Sue-Ann, I’d like to ask you not to go any further with this. I’m asking you as a friend. Well, I guess if I’m going to be truthful, we really don’t know each other well enough to be friends, but I can ask you as a colleague.”
“I respect that, Paul. But I’m going to need to ask why you want me to stop.”
“You know why, Sue-Ann. You’ve got it into your head that my son is somehow mixed up in some damned craziness.”
“Tell me about your son, Paul,” I said.
“About Pauley? What do you want me to say? He’s a good kid, he just . . .”
“Just what?” I asked.
“Look, Sue-Ann. I’m not gonna sugar coat anything. I was in the Marines most of the time Pauley was growing up, and we moved around a lot. We lived in Kuwait for a while after Desert Storm, but when I retired we moved here to Pine Oak where my wife was born. I bought a nice place to live. Pauley got into a good school. But then after 9/11 they asked me to come back to Washington and help with some counterintelligence work. While I was gone, my wife found out she had cancer. It was the quickest thing I ever heard of—two weeks and she was gone. But I was out of the country and couldn’t get back . . .”
“I’m sorry, Paul.”
“Pauley was . . . he didn’t handle it well. He blames me for not being there when Susan died. He doesn’t understand the pressure I was under—you just can’t leave a job like that with so much at stake for the country. It’s all about responsibility and getting on with your life, and I don’t know why the hell Pauley doesn’t understand that. We don’t talk any more, Sue-Ann. We just don’t talk.”
“It’s okay, Paul. I’ve been meaning to call you about all this anyway. Did Cal mention any of Pauley’s friends?”
“I don’t think so. Who do you mean?”
“Adam Zimmer and Becky Colley.”
“I know he sees them some, yeah.”
“Well, the three of them have gotten into some strange rituals.”
“Rituals? What the hell kind of rituals?”
“I think they see themselves as outcasts—in fact, I think they’re proud of it. One of them found a book on the occult and it gave them an idea of being empowered—something they haven’t found in their real lives. So they’ve been performing secret rites or sacrifices.”
“I don’t believe it,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Ask your son,” I said simply.
“Even if you’re right, Sue-Ann, they haven’t committed any crimes.”
“Stealing livestock, killing animals for the sake of killing? Yeah, those are crimes. Breaking into my house and trashing it is a crime.”
“Hold on now, you can’t blame Pauley for—”
“I guess Cal forgot to tell you that part, too. But, yeah, those three kids were the ones that broke in.”
“Damn it, Sue-Ann, you’re making up things just to see your name on a byline.”
“First of all, Paul,” I said with asperity, “I don’t need any more bylines. I had enough of those when I was in Baghdad and people from all over the world were trashing my reports in their fucking right-wing blogs. Second of all, I can prove that those kids broke into my house. Last but not least, none of this matters because I would never write up anything that would put you or your s
on—or Becky or Ray or Adam or Linda C—in a bad light if I could help it.”
“You mean—?”
“I’m not a scandalmonger, Paul. I don’t like people breaking into my house or killing animals just for drill, but if people want to go out in the woods and waste their time calling up voodoo demons, it’s not any of my business.”
“Sue-Ann, I—”
I interrupted him again. “There’s a caveat.”
“What’s that?”
“A caveat is kind of an exception—”
“I know what a caveat is. Just tell me what you’re going to tell me.”
“Paul, what will happen when somebody catches them breaking into a house or stealing something? When that happens and they call the sheriff, there’s no way in the world to keep it secret.”
“Okay, I understand that. That’s fair.”
For some reason, I didn’t tell him about my fear that the kids were in actual, physical danger. I guess I thought that a word to the wise was enough. I contented myself with saying, “So you’ll talk to Pauley?”
I heard a deep breath on the other end of the line—not the inhalation of a cigarette, but a deep sigh coming from Paul’s very depths. “I can’t do that, Sue-Ann. At least not right now.”
“Why not, Paul?”
“When I got back home yesterday afternoon, Paul, Jr. had moved out. I don’t know where he is.”
~ ~ ~
Donny drove into the Burger King parking lot ten minutes late—he was driving his Harrison towing wrecker, so he was probably on call—but I didn’t mind. It gave me time to get my story together and to eat a sandwich. I hoped that Donny could help me remove another layer of Cal’s onion.
Donny was showered and clean shaven. His short, light hair was wind tossed and the work uniform he wore was clean and pressed. Although it was after noon, he looked tired and gave me barely a nod as he entered and made a beeline for the counter. After he had gotten his order of a large coffee and a fish sandwich, he made his way to my table. “Okay, what’s so important, Sue-Ann, that you had to get me way out here on the one day of the week I might have stayed home?” he asked.
I came right out with it. “I think that Adam was the one who broke into my house.”
Donny knitted his eyebrows. “You mean Linda C’s Adam? No way, man. Why would Adam—”
“Remember you told me that you showed him some of my Courier stories?”
“Yeah?”
“Could one of the stories have been about that marijuana bust?”
“The one where the truck jackknifed off the road. Yeah, that was one. I helped get that truck back into Forester. I mean, after they got a crane out there to right it. I told Adam I could have picked up a few of those bricks and brought them home with me, but that marijuana was for shit.”
“Maybe Adam asked whether I might have picked one up and maybe taken it home as a souvenir.”
“Naw, he . . .” His sentence trailed off and he was obviously remembering something.
“Donny, you’re a nice guy, but you trust everyone too much. Most people aren’t as honest or as innocent as you are—even kids. You must have told him and I’m not angry, I just wish you’d think. What if he had called the sheriff?”
“Well, I may have said something . . . I’m sorry, Sue-Ann. I guess I was just trying to be pals with the kid and didn’t think about how it might get you in trouble. But Adam wouldn’t say anything.”
“Adam did say something, Donny. Last Friday night he overheard someone calling me on a cell phone asking me to go out and cover a story. He remembered my name and remembered about the pot, so he and maybe two of his friends hid outside my house and waited for me to go out. Then they broke in looking for that marijuana. They just about tore up the house, but it wasn’t there. The only thing they took was that bottle of tequila you gave me.”
“Sue-Ann. None of this makes any sense. Do you have any proof that it was Adam?”
I sighed and sat back in the plastic booth. “I do, yes, but having proof isn’t the point. The point is that I’m afraid that something bad is going to happen to Adam or his friends if they don’t stop what they’re doing.”
“You mean if they don’t stop breaking into people’s houses?”
“No. It goes way beyond that. What I’m going to tell you now may seem crazy but it’s true. What you do about it—tell Linda C or Adam’s father or even the sheriff—is up to you.”
“All right, Sue-Ann. Go head.”
“Adam has gotten mixed up with a boy named Pauley Hughes and a girl named Becky Colley. There may be more of them, I don’t know. They get together and dress all in black and have secret meetings. One of them—I think probably Pauley because he’s a couple of years older—has gotten into the occult and thinks he can call up spirits or demons. . . .”
“Sue-Ann, do you know what you’re saying?”
“It doesn’t matter whether you believe me or not. It just matters that you hear me out. I’ve been investigating a story about a goat that someone killed and stuffed in a dumpster.”
“You mentioned a goat last time I saw you. But what’s a dead goat—”
“Donny, killing a goat and putting it in a dumpster doesn’t make any sense. It’s something that no one in the world would have done. It’s something that just begged to be looked into. So I did some investigating and found the place in the woods where the goat was killed. There were voodoo symbols on the ground, blood all over, and an empty tequila bottle in the bushes. The same brand of tequila that was stolen from my house.”
“Do you know how many bottles of that brand of tequila—”
“Donny, damn it, I don’t care! Believe me, it was the same one. I brought it out of the woods and I can get Dilly to lift fingerprints off it if I have to. But if you listen to me and don’t interrupt, I won’t have to. What brand of cigarettes does Adam smoke?”
“How do you know he . . . Marlboro Light, same as me.”
“I found Marlboro Light cigarette butts in the same place I found the tequila bottle, as well as butts from two other brands—Newport and Doral.” I brought my legal pad up from the seat and extracted a photo from between its pages. “Look at the kids in this photo.”
“That’s not—whoa, is that Adam?”
“And the girl is Becky Colley. Know what brand of cigarettes she smokes? Doral. Know whose goat it was that was killed? Her dad’s.”
“Her dad is Ray Colley?”
“Right. But it gets worse. A couple of days ago, someone broke in to a woman’s chicken house out on Peg-leg Road and stole some chickens. While they were at it they killed the woman’s dog by stringing it up and cutting its guts out. Just for thrills. Then they took the chickens out to that same place in the woods, cut their heads off, and burnt them in some kind of sacrifice.”
“You saw this?”
“I saw the remains. And I’m not the only one. Are you starting to believe me?”
“I . . . I don’t know. Why are you telling me this? Why not talk to Linda C?”
“I don’t know her that well and she probably doesn’t like me anyway. I’m giving you the heads up so that you can talk to her, so that you can take care of it.”
“Why don’t you talk to Ray Colley or that other boy’s dad?”
“I spoke to Pauley’s dad this morning,” I said grimly.
“It just sounds so crazy,” he said.
“Donny,” I told him. “It is crazy. And I have a really bad feeling about it.”
“Okay, Sue-Ann,” Donny said. “I’ve heard you out and some of it might even make some sense, but there’s one thing that just doesn’t fit.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“You said that nobody would have been crazy enough to kill a goat and put it in a dumpster.”
“Yeah? What’s your point?”
“I don’t have six college degrees, Sue-Ann, but think about it. Someone did kill the goat and put it in the dumpster.”
It was a poi
nt that someone with six college degrees might have missed, and I was pleased, somehow, that Donny had grabbed on to it. Luckily, I had an answer. “No, Donny. That didn’t happen, and that’s the scary part. The kids killed the goat. Someone else put it in the dumpster. Whoever it was scared them away the first time—next time they might not be so kind.”
“Who?”
“Somebody who doesn’t want them out there.”
Donny crumpled up his sandwich wrapper and stuffed it in his empty coffee cup. “You said that dog was killed on Peg-leg Road, right?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Adam’s dad lives near Peg-leg road—right out by our farm.” He stood up and took a step, then backtracked. “I’m not promising anything, but if I get the chance, I’ll ask Jerry if he knows anything about what Adam and Pauley have been doing.”
“Thanks, Donny.”
I stayed for a few minutes after Donny left. I even bought a piece of chocolate pie and felt good about my appetite coming back.
~ ~ ~
I arrived back home to find Jack standing in my mother’s bedroom, ironing clothes. He was dressed in a white undershirt, checked boxer shorts, and white socks. He had turned on the radio and was singing along to “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.”
“When did you get into country music?” I asked.
“Didn’t. I just turned on the radio and there it was.”
“Why are you still here?” I asked. He had taken everything from his car and piled it on Cindy’s bed. His suitcase was empty on the floor.
“Don’t have anywhere else to go,” he said. “I sublet my apartment for the rest of the summer.”
“You—” I felt like stamping my foot, except that’s another thing that people don’t really do. Instead, I put my hands on my hips and glared at him. “You move out of your apartment and drive down here after not having seen me for a year and expect me to let you move in?” I shouted. “I can’t believe this.”
“It’s only for a few days,” he said reasonably. “My flight leaves from Tallahassee Wednesday.”