by Jackie Lynn
“Are you able to keep it elevated like I told you?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Chariot replied. “They gave me an extra pillow to put under it.”
“Good,” Rose said, thinking that must mean that she was staying in her cell and probably in her bed. She hoped that meant she was safe from any harm, that no one could take her away.
There was a pause in the conversation.
“Do you think you can bring me the photo album?” Chariot asked.
“Will they let you have it in there?”
“I asked and the woman deputy said that she didn’t care if I had it. She’d just need to look in it to make sure there wasn’t any contraband or anything in it that I can’t have.”
“Well, that makes sense,” Rose responded. “I’ll bring it over there later today,” she added, thinking that would probably make Chariot very happy. “What about the bag you packed?” she asked, remembering the small bag that Willie had left in the office. She glanced around and noticed for the first time that it wasn’t on the counter where she had left it.
“Oh, no, I don’t need that. It was just some clothes,” Chariot replied.
Rose looked behind the counter and around the office. She was sure that she had left it on the counter when she went to bed. She wondered where it could have disappeared to. She decided not to worry about it, however, since Chariot said that it contained only clothes.
Suddenly Rose remembered the man from the night before, the man Willie found in Chariot’s tent. She wondered if the young woman might recognize his name or know who he was.
“Chariot, do you know a guy named James Booker?” she asked.
She figured that Chariot was thinking about the question. She waited for an answer.
“No,” Chariot finally replied. “James Booker,” she repeated. “Why would I know him?” she asked.
“He was in your tent last night,” Rose replied, hoping not to frighten her. “He had set up his place next to yours sometime while we were at the hospital.”
Chariot didn’t respond. She was waiting for more from Rose.
“He said your alarm clock went off in the middle of the night and he had walked over to ask you to turn it off. When he found out that nobody was in the tent, he went in to turn it off himself.”
“Well, that’s weird,” Chariot responded.
“What’s weird?” Rose asked.
“I don’t have an alarm clock,” she said.
“A battery-operated one, it’s black with glow in the dark dials,” Rose noted.
“No,” Chariot repeated. “I don’t have one.”
“Hmm. Well, I did think he was a bit suspicious,” Rose said, wondering who this late-night camper really was.
“It’s an old trick,” Chariot responded.
“What?” Rose asked.
“You give yourself an alibi for being somewhere you shouldn’t be. That way, if somebody catches you, you say you were in there to answer a phone or that you heard a baby crying, wanted to turn off a radio or an alarm clock, anything like that,” she said.
“I see,” Rose said, thinking that Rhonda was right about the things addicts learn to support their habit.
“So, what about this guy?” Chariot asked.
“He had South Dakota plates,” Rose replied. “I thought you might know him. But you don’t recognize the name?”
“Booker,” Chariot said again. “No, I don’t know that name.” She paused. “What did he look like?” she asked.
“Tall, maybe twenty or twenty-five, long hair, wore cowboy boots.”
“Was he wearing a leather coat?” she asked.
“Black one,” Rose replied. “With a different kind of emblem on the back.” She tried to remember what she had seen.
“A lightning bolt,” Chariot stated. “A white one.”
“Yes!” Rose replied. “Exactly. How did you know?”
“James Booker,” she said. “It’s Snake,” she added. “He must be one of the guys who pulled the robbery with Jason. Those guys that he was with are in this gang. Well, it’s not really a gang, just a few guys from a couple of years ago who wanted to act like they were tough. Put those lightning bolts on their coats. Jason wore one for a while.”
Rose recalled the story that Lucas had heard that two of the men who pulled off the robbery were dead and one was missing. The missing man must be Snake. He had followed Chariot to West Memphis and was looking for whatever Jason had taken. He must have been threatened that if he didn’t get it and return it, he would be the next one to die.
“Is he still there?” Chariot asked. It was obvious that she was hopeful that he would clear up the mess she was in.
“No,” Rose replied somberly. “He drove off after Willie tried to shoot him,” she added.
“Willie tried to shoot somebody?” she asked. “I wouldn’t have thought he had it in him,” she said.
“Apparently, you brought something out of Old Willie that none of us expected,” Rose noted.
“Wow,” Chariot said, considering the actions of the old man who had picked her up from the ditch and driven her back to Shady Grove. “That’s sort of surprising,” she added.
“Yeah, I’d say,” Rose responded.
“Well, can we find Snake?” Chariot asked, sounding suddenly optimistic.
“We can try,” Rose replied. She was thinking the same thing. If they could find the man from South Dakota and get him to talk to the authorities, they might be able to clear Chariot and get the man who had murdered Jason.
“Have you seen the sheriff this morning?” Rose asked. She knew that he was the one they most needed to contact because he could help them locate James Booker. He could help them get everything settled.
“Nah,” she replied. “Just the woman deputy,” she added. “She’s real nice.”
Rose thought about that. She didn’t know that Montgomery had hired any women to work for the department. She thought about Deputy Martin, a guy she hadn’t seen before, who came with Montgomery to pick up Chariot, and knew that there were a couple of new deputies that had recently been added to the staff. She wondered about the woman Chariot had met.
“Well, I expect him to come around and let us know what he found out about your charges,” Rose said. “He promised to do some research last night and he should know who is coming to get you from Pierre. He’s the one we want to tell about James being in town. He could help us find him.”
There was silence from the other end of the line.
“Chariot?”
Still nothing.
“Chariot, are you there?” Rose asked.
“Yeah,” she finally answered. “There’s a couple of cars that just pulled up in the parking lot,” she noted.
“You can see that?” Rose asked. She still wasn’t sure that she knew where in the jail the phone booths were located.
“Yeah, I can see outside.” She hesitated. “I think they’re South Dakota cops,” she added.
“Are you sure?” Rose asked. She glanced at the clock and figured that they must have driven all night to get to Arkansas. She was sure that the sheriff hadn’t called them until almost midnight. She wondered how they could have gotten all the way from South Dakota in just seven hours.
There was another pause.
“Chariot?” she asked.
“Yeah, just a minute. I’m going to take a look.”
The line sounded as if it went dead. Rose waited. She looked out the office window and saw Ms. Lou Ellen coming in her direction. She had her laptop computer in her hands. She stopped in the driveway and Rose looked in the direction her friend was facing and saw Thomas walking toward her. He was holding a stack of papers. She assumed that they had both completed their research and were bringing in their work to share with Rose.
“Chariot?” she called out.
There was nothing.
“I can’t see,” finally came the response. “They parked on the other side of the building.
“Oh,” R
ose responded.
“So, you’re going to try and find Snake today?” Chariot asked. “And then maybe I’ll get out of all of this.”
Rose smiled. She didn’t want to get the young girl’s hopes up, but it did seem likely that if one of the three robbers was still alive and could make a statement about what was going on, Chariot could be freed. She could hardly believe it would be this simple.
“I’m going to see what I can do.” She wasn’t sure how she could find the guy who had left in such a huff the night before, but she figured that since he hadn’t found what he was looking for that he would still be around the town somewhere. With all of her connections, and if the sheriff got involved, she certainly should still be able to find the guy.
“And you’ll bring the album?” Chariot asked.
“Sure,” Rose replied. “Oh, by the way, I have the photo card, too,” she noted, recalling how it had fallen out of the album when she was leaving the tent.
Rose glanced down and realized that since she was wearing the same pants from the night before, that the card was still in her pocket. She reached in and felt it exactly where she had placed it.
“What card?” Chariot asked.
“The little digital camera card,” Rose replied. “It was stuck in your photo album,” she added.
There was a pause.
“I don’t have a digital camera,” Chariot said, sounding a bit confused. “Are you sure it was in my album?” she asked.
Rose was surprised. She felt in her pocket to make sure that the card was there.
“I’m sure it came out of the photo album when I was leaving the tent. It dropped out. I picked it up and stuck it in my pocket. I still have it.” She pulled the card out of her pocket and set it on the desk.
There was silence from the other end of the phone line. “Chariot?” she called.
Just as before, there was no reply. Rose thought that maybe the young woman had placed the receiver down again to see who was in the parking lot or who was coming into the station. She waited.
“Chariot?” she called out the name again.
She waited and then she heard the line go dead. There was a click and then a series of beeps began.
“Chariot?” Rose called out again, hearing nothing but the beeps. It seemed that someone had hung up the phone that Chariot had been talking on. Rose just didn’t know who that someone was.
EIGHTEEN
Dear, to whom are you speaking?” Ms. Lou Ellen and Thomas had walked into the office.
Rose was standing at the desk, appearing as if she were on the phone. The receiver, however, was pulled away from her chin, as if she were waiting for someone and not involved in a conversation. She shook her head and rolled her eyes, as if that would explain to her friends that she was engaged in a frustrating phone call.
The two shut the door behind them. Ms. Lou Ellen was waiting for a response.
“I’m on hold,” Rose finally replied.
“Ah,” Ms. Lou Ellen responded with a smile. “How lovely,” she added. She walked over to the table and began setting up her laptop computer. She plugged it in, turned it on, and pulled out a chair.
Thomas stood at the counter. He glanced over the papers he had in his hand and organized them while he waited for Rose to finish her conversation.
“No, I was just talking to her.” She readjusted the receiver so that the other party could hear her clearly. She shook her head again at Thomas. “Yes, I’ll keep holding,” she added. She blew out a breath.
“I was in the middle of a conversation and we got cut off,” she explained to Thomas and Ms. Lou Ellen. “I called back because I just want to make sure everything’s okay.”
The two nodded and continued to do what they were doing. Ms. Lou Ellen sat down in front of her computer. Thomas was reading over the papers he had brought in with him.
“She’s in the infirmary?” Rose asked. “Are you sure?” She waited. “Is everything okay?” Another pause. “Did something happen? I was just on the phone with her not more than five minutes ago. We got cut—” She was interrupted.
Thomas looked up and listened. He could see that Rose was getting flustered. She glanced at him and he winked. It seemed to calm her a bit.
“You’ve seen her in there?” she asked. There was some response from the other end.
“Okay, if you’re sure she’s all right,” she said into the phone. There was a reply and then Rose hung up. She shook her head.
“What’s up?” Thomas asked.
“Chariot,” she replied.
Thomas waited.
“I’ve just got a bad feeling,” she said. She rubbed her neck.
“What did you find out in your research?” she asked her friends.
“Dear, did you get any sleep last night?” Ms. Lou Ellen had turned to face her friend. She could see the dark circles under Rose’s eyes and knew that she was wearing the same outfit she had on the day before.
“Not much,” Rose replied. “Why? Do I look that bad?” She walked over to the table and glanced in the mirror that she could see in the small bathroom since the door was open. She still held the small card in her hand that she had picked up from the desk and she dropped it on the table as she tried to smooth down the sides of her hair.
Ms. Lou Ellen just lifted her eyebrows and went back to work booting up her computer. She noticed the small card Rose had dropped on the table and, without thinking, inserted it in her computer.
“Really?” Rose asked. She knew her friend didn’t want to answer the question. “I do look bad, don’t I?” She turned to Thomas.
“You look fine,” he replied. “Just tired,” he added.
“What time did you get to bed?” he asked.
She shook her head and walked back to the desk. “I don’t know. After two, I guess.”
“That late?” Thomas asked. He had not seen Rose since she had left with Chariot to go to the hospital.
“It was a crazy night,” Rose replied, slumping down in the seat at the desk.
“Your horoscope mentions that a stranger comes down the path in your direction,” Ms. Lou Ellen noted. Apparently, she was not retrieving the information she had found about South Dakota, she was reading the daily horoscopes.
“Well, that must be last night’s reading because having a stranger come down my path has already happened,” Rose responded.
Thomas and Ms. Lou Ellen turned to Rose to hear more.
“You didn’t hear the gunshot?” she asked, assuming that everyone at Shady Grove had heard Willie firing off his weapon.
They both shook their heads.
“Lester Earl did make a bit of a racket about one thirty or so. Was that it?” Ms. Lou Ellen asked.
Rose nodded.
“I thought the old dog was recalling his days as my bedmate and woke up with his manly passion, if you know what I mean.” She winked.
Rose rolled her eyes. She knew that her friend teased about her three-legged companion, claiming that the dog was the reincarnation of one of her ex-husbands.
“A man from South Dakota, we think a friend of Chariot’s boyfriend, was in her tent last night looking for something,” Rose explained. “Willie surprised him with his shotgun.”
“Well, I would imagine that was quite a surprise,” Ms. Lou Ellen surmised. “Was anyone hurt?”
Rose shook her head. “No,” she replied. “But the guy got away and Chariot and I think that if we can find him, he can clear up a lot of this stuff about her, probably get her out of jail and out of trouble.”
“So you were talking to Chariot?” Thomas asked, recalling the phone conversation Rose was having when they came into the office.
“Yes,” Rose replied. “She called me when I got in this morning and we were talking about the man in the tent and when I described him, she thought she recognized him from Pierre.”
“Why did you say that you had a bad feeling?” Ms. Lou Ellen asked.
Rose looked confused. She thought for a
second and then remembered her last phone call, the one to the jail. “Oh, right, because we got cut off.”
“You and the man in the tent?” Ms. Lou Ellen asked, trying to follow her friend.
“What?” Rose shook her head. “No,” she replied. “Me and Chariot.”
“Oh.” Ms. Lou Ellen nodded. “That’s who you were on the phone with this morning when you were disconnected.”
“Right,” Rose responded. “Then when you walked in, I had just called back and they said she was in the infirmary,” she added. “But I think that’s odd because how did she get to the medical clinic so quickly?”
Thomas shrugged. “I guess when her call was cut off she wasn’t allowed to make another one and they just took her to check out her ankle.”
Rose rubbed her eyes, trying to clear her head.
“What happened to the stranger who came down the path, the one Willie tried to shoot?” Ms. Lou Ellen wanted to know.
“He got away,” Rose replied. “He acted like he was really angry about what had happened and he loaded up his stuff and took off.” She recalled how he stomped away from the tent and left in such a hurry. She wished that she had tried to stop him.
“And Chariot thinks she knows who it was?” Thomas asked, trying to piece together what happened during the night.
Rose nodded. “What we think is that Jason—”
“Chariot’s young lover,” Ms. Lou Ellen interrupted.
“Chariot’s young lover,” Rose repeated. “Jason was involved in a robbery of a bad guy and that Jason took something from the guy they robbed. He was killed because this guy wants his stolen property back. Lucas heard the talk around town and they say that there were three men involved in the robbery. Jason and one other are dead and a third one is missing.” She went over all of the details that she knew.
“Discovered in West Memphis, Arkansas, going through Jason’s girlfriend’s tent,” Thomas concluded.