Drowning Barbie

by Frederick Ramsay

  Over the relatively short time that he’d been sheriff, the number of deputies on the force had grown disproportionately to the town’s population. It seemed that as Picketsville’s population shrank, the need for more police grew. Ike was not prepared to make a generalization about that beyond noting that the same phenomenon could be seen in many of the country’s larger cities, particularly those near the southern border. At least twice a week Ike tried to hit the seam as the two shifts changed. It presented a time to chat, to be brought up to date on everything from his deputies’ personal lives, kids’ schooling, and the things they’d noted while out on the road that might be useful in the future. But all in all, quiet was the norm at seven in the morning.

  It came as something of a shock, in the midst of this relative calm, when Flora Blevins exploded through the door yelling at the top of her lungs that she needed to have words with the sheriff. As it happened, Ike had chosen that morning to put in his appearance but was running late. The apparent lack of urgency shown by the deputies who were otherwise occupied and therefore reluctant to drop everything and deal exclusively with her problem caused her to raise her voice a full octave and the volume several decibels beyond comfortable.

  Darcie Billingsley, substituting as night dispatcher for Rita who in turn was filling in for Essie and who would not report for another hour, left her desk and met Flora and tried to calm her down.

  “Whoa up there, Miss Flora. I’m sure we can get this all sorted out. One of these nice men can handle whatever problem you have. Is something going on at the diner?’

  “I need to see Ike Schwartz and I need him right this very damn minute.”

  As Picketsville rarely heard Flora Blevins swear, everyone within earshot froze in place and stared at her.

  “Where’s he at, Darcie Billingsley? I need to talk to him now.”

  “Well, sure you do. I am sure he’ll be along any minute now. Why don’t you have a seat in his office and I’ll fix you a nice cup of tea. How’s that sound?”

  “Don’t you mollycoddle me, girl. Don’t want any tea. Can’t stand the stuff. Tea is for old women with blue hair and for Nancy boys. You got any coffee? Good, fetch me a cup, black with one sugar, and then you call your boss. Tell him what I said, that I need to talk to him.”

  Darcie had Ike’s cell phone number punched in when he walked in the door, his phone twerping.

  “Where you been?” Flora shouted from across the room. “I been here like an hour waiting for you.”

  “You’ve only been here five minutes, Miss Flora.”

  “Darcie, you mind your own business Listen here, Ike—”

  Darcie stiffened and glared at Flora. “What I do here is my business, Miss Flora, and you need to know you are not the only person with a problem. You can be a rude as sin if you want to, but these folk are here to serve this town in ways I hope you never know about, and some of them are dead because of it.”

  “Now, look here, Darcie, I know you’re still grieving for your husband and—”

  “It ain’t about me, don’t you understand?”

  “It’s okay, Darcie,” Ike said and put his arm around her shoulder. “Miz Blevins is just wrought up and she’s sorry, aren’t you Flora? Now, you go brief Rita and then get on home to your kids.”

  Darcie wiped her eyes and retreated from the room.

  “Okay, Flora, what’s on your mind that can’t wait and makes abusing Darcie so ever-loving important? I take it you did not come in here this morning to turn yourself in for obstruction of justice, so what’s up?”

  “She’s gone.”

  “Who’s gone?’

  “Who do you think? The girl is. Arlene went up to her room where we was keeping her safe and it were empty. That piece of garbage, George LeBrun, must have found out where we had her hid and broke in to snatch her.”

  “Slow down, Flora. Where had she been hiding and why do you think LeBrun found her and took her?”

  Flora launched out of her chair which rolled backward and hit a filing cabinet. The collision made a noise like distant thunder. No way Ike would defuse Flora anytime soon.

  “Who else would have done it? We fixed up a room for Darla in the attic. Don’t look at me that way. It was a nice sunny room, good as any in the house, only harder to find. She was okay up there, maybe even happy. She knew things had to settle down on account of her Ma being killed and LeBrun on the loose. Then this morning, boom, she’s gone. Either LeBrun got her or she’s off and running.”

  “Assuming you are wrong about LeBrun, and I am afraid I already know the answer, but do you have any idea where she might have run to?”

  “Maybe back to Leota.”

  “Who’s Leota?”

  “Leota Blevins, my other cousin. She lives in Virginia Beach and the girl, Darla, had been living with her for the last couple of years.”

  “Why am I finding out about this now? You do realize that if you had been forthcoming…Oh, the hell with it.” Ike turned and called out to his chief deputy. “Frank, I need a new BOLO on the girl, last seen fleeing Picketsville this morning. Also a second one on a Leota Blevins. She’s from Virginia Beach—”

  “I heard, Ike. I’m on it.”

  “She can’t have gotten far. Flora, think, where might she have gone?”

  “Except back to Leota, I don’t have a notion. It’s gotta be LeBrun.”

  “If it was LeBrun, I promise you we’d know, and kidnapping would not be his approach in this case.”

  “Not? You mean…? Oh. What happens now?”

  “Now? Now I put extra men on the road and we wait for a call, a sighting, for the girl to return to the attic. There isn’t anything else we can do.”

  “It ain’t enough.”

  “It will have to be. Go back to the Cross Roads and go on about your business. You don’t have any reason to suspect LeBrun, but if you start bawling this around town, he will surely hear about it and then he really will be in the game.”

  “I messed this up a little, didn’t I, Ike?”

  “Big-time, Flora, big-time. Now get the hell out of here and let us do our job.”

  ***

  Ten minutes after Ike had dispatched his deputies, the morning shift and half of the previous one was out on the streets, and George LeBrun received a call informing him of this new turn. The caller asked what George wanted him to do.

  “Stay close as you can to the search. I need time to think about this. Good work, by the way.”

  “Always a pleasure. Seems like old times like when old Loyal was running the show.”

  “Yeah, maybe, if you say so. Loyal Parker was a stupid son-of-a-bitch and now he’s dead. If you’re smart you’ll remember that. Okay, keep your phone on. I may need to talk some more.”

  George snapped his phone off and sat down for a think. How far could he trust this guy? A lot of time had passed since they worked together. Was this news official or a scrap picked up in the bar last night? People talked all the time. Still, he ought to know. LeBrun realized he should have asked him more questions.

  “I’ll need to call back, but first I need time to think the thing through,” he muttered. He stamped his foot three times which was his signal for Betsy or one of the other girls to crack a pair of Heinekens and bring them upstairs. George, like too many self-indulgent men, believed he did his best thinking with a beer in his hand.

  It wasn’t true, but he believed it.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Leota Blevins spent most of the previous night sitting in the cab of her truck, eyes fixed on the front of Axel’s Road House. Trade seemed brisk. Customers—that would be bikers and the bottom echelon of Picketsville society—came and went, but once George LeBrun disappeared inside, he never reappeared. What with the trip from Virginia Beach and the trauma of seeing Mark’s burned-out trailer she fought to stay awake and her s
pirits began to sag. At midnight she could no longer keep her eyes open. She started the truck’s engine and drove to a nearby motel whose clientele, judging from the noise that penetrated the cardboard thin walls, were Axel’s customers as well. She paid cash and then regretted it. She had not planned an extended stay in Picketsville, just long enough to find Mark and some answers. Consequently she arrived with only her customary sixty dollars in her purse.

  “Why sixty?” her friend Florence once asked.

  “Because one hundred presents too big a temptation to go off and buy something I don’t need. Fifty is sensible and sixty is fifty with a margin for error.”

  Her friend had raised an eyebrow but hadn’t said anything, though by the look of her, she’d come close.

  The next morning Leota rose early, purchased two donuts and a second coffee at the local Dunkin’ and had resumed her watch by six. The likelihood that LeBrun would be moving so early seemed slim at best, but she didn’t want to risk missing him if and when he did. By eight o’clock she began to experience the consequences of her lack of planning when she’d made a decision to stake out a felon. The compounding problem, of course, arose from the coffee, one at the shop and a second, a takeout—extra large.

  A sheriff’s deputy pulled up beside her and asked for some ID. He studied it, glanced at her through the window over the top of his mirrored sunglasses and pocketed her license and registration. She was about to protest when he requested that she follow him back to the sheriff’s office. She had no idea why the sheriff wanted to talk to her but guessed it might have something to do with Darla. Surely he hadn’t connected her to either Mark or Ethyl, had he? Not enough time had elapsed to have done that. She’d soon find out, but at that particular moment she had a more pressing problem. For two reasons she agreed to follow the deputy back to town with less reluctance than she might have had otherwise. First, if she made a fuss, the deputy might look in the truck bed and find the twelve-gauge shotgun under the tarp. More immediately, a chat with law enforcement seemed less threatening than venturing into a biker bar to use the ladies’ room.

  Paper covers rock, rock breaks scissors, scissors cut paper, and a full bladder, sure as all get out, conquers fear of arrest.

  ***

  Ike slid into the church parking lot and walked the five yards to the office doors. The aroma of honeysuckle still scented the air, but once again, he didn’t notice. The Reverend Fisher knew something Ike needed and he would get it from him one way or another. He climbed the stairs and breezed by the secretary who made a feeble effort to stop him.

  “Now about the girl…”

  “Ike, I told you I won’t break the seal of the confessional.”

  “I understand that, but even you have your exceptions. I heard child abuse was one of them.”

  “That is correct. But you’ve already heard everything I can tell you about that.”

  “Not everything, I’m guessing. The important thing you should know right now is she has run away again.”

  “Sorry? Again?”

  “She fled from her home a few years back and the common-wealth put her in a foster home. Around the time you saw her, she’d moved in with Flora Blevins who owns the Cross Roads Diner. After I discovered that and interviewed Flora, the girl took off. Flora said she was as afraid of me as she was of whoever else is after her.”

  “Ah, Ike there is something you need to know about that.”

  “And that would be?”

  “Give me a minute. I need to sort out what I can tell you and what I cannot.”

  Ike tried not to tap his foot. He did not know how much time he was willing to spare on the clergyman, if any, but sitting in the church office waiting for him to rearrange his scruples did not meet his standard of time usefully spent.

  “Here is what I can tell you. When all of the really bad abuse, the sexual abuse, happened, your police were involved.”

  “What!”

  “Her words were…I’m paraphrasing…‘She’— that would be her mother—‘never went to jail because the cops were in on it.’ I suppose that when she heard you were asking about her she freaked.”

  “My department?”

  “Before your time, yes. The sheriff then had a funny name, she said.”

  “Did she offer any other names?”

  “Ah, Ike…”

  “Okay, okay. I’ll say some names and you nod yes or no. A deputy named George LeBrun…Loyal Parker…Billy Sutherlin…Jack Feldman…You’re not nodding, Rev. Okay, never mind, you may not want to say anything but your eyes speak volumes. So now I know why the Smut woman never served any real time. She was being covered by my predecessor and his gang of goons in return for making her daughter available.” Ike stood and paced. “Rev, if this wasn’t a church, I would swear enough to peel the paint off the walls. It is unthinkable, but this is not the first time I’ve heard reports about my predecessor and his people and their habit of abusing women. Thanks. I don’t know if it will help get her back into custody and safe, but at least now I know why she ran.”

  “I’m sorry I can’t be of more help. My heart went out to that girl.”

  “Maybe you can. If she came to you once, perhaps she will again. If she does, tell her two things. First, I am not Loyal Parker. He’s dead. Second, LeBrun is free at the moment and may be looking for her and she should come in before he finds her. Can you do that?”

  “Of course. And if she won’t?”

  “Offer her sanctuary here. And then call me.”

  “The minute she hears me call you she’ll bolt.”

  “You’re right. Call Flora Blevins at the diner instead. She won’t react to that. Flora can negotiate for me.”

  Ike’s phone twerped.

  “Yes. What do you have for me? Okay, I’m on my way.”

  “Anything I need to know, Ike?”

  “Maybe, Rev. Leota Blevins, the woman the girl lived with before she turned up here, has been picked up out on the highway. I’m hoping she can tell me something and we can bring the girl in.”

  Chapter Thirty-two

  All things considered, Leota, thought, it could have been worse. She’d told the deputies what they wanted to hear and apologized to the sheriff for Flora not being more forthcoming. Had she known the circumstances surrounding the girl’s disappearance, of course, she would have come right in, and so on. As much as they might have liked to, they had no real reason to hold her and she had been released. They also gave her strict orders to stick around town until further notice in case the girl contacted her. She said she would. Her plan, which had been forming in her head for a day, now included sticking around anyway. She intended to do so whether the sheriff’s department wanted her to or not. She had some serious business to deal with before she’d head back to Virginia Beach. That is, if she ever did.

  The cops were serious about finding the girl. “Serious as a heart attack,” one of them had said. The threat LeBrun posed seemed to have put the whole sheriff’s department on edge, so much so she doubted they could act rationally if and when the girl, LeBrun, or both were to appear. She headed toward the highway to resume her surveillance at the Road House. She hoped her target hadn’t stirred. If his car and/or the guy who’d been driving him were still in the area, she’d assume LeBrun remained in place and she’d take up her post again. First she would check out the barn where Darla had hidden her backpack. She might be holed up there. If not, it would draw her in eventually. That backpack contained everything the child valued and, more importantly, everything she needed to travel. Leota could not understand why Darla insisted on lugging those old clothes around. Her childhood, perhaps, the part she still clung to, the part that didn’t give her nightmares. In any event, she wouldn’t go without it and wouldn’t do to have the bag and its contents found by the police if it still happened to be in the barn.

  ***

 
Being on the run was not a new experience for Darla. She’d done it before, several times, in fact. This time would be no different. She regretted leaving her godmother’s house, but she’d heard that sheriff talking in the diner and the other guy who somebody said was FBI. Well, she’d had all the Picketsville Sheriff’s Department she ever wanted already and wasn’t about to hook up with it again. Not in this lifetime anyway. She’d slipped out of the house after Arlene left to go to the diner and Flora had settled in front of the TV to watch some dopey reality show. She’d wandered along Main Street until she was sure no one had followed her. Once certain she was—for all practical purposes—alone, Darla had moved into the service alley behind the street’s storefronts. She’d spent the night curled up behind a dumpster near where she’d had her hair cut earlier in the week. The dumpster reeked of discarded salon trash, an aroma she thought a whole lot nicer than the stench of garbage in the dumpster behind the restaurant, which had been her first stop.

  The sound of doors slamming and trash cans being emptied had woken her early and she’d scuttled away in the pre-dawn darkness. She intended to make her way to the highway, hitch a ride, or walk if necessary, to the nearest truck stop, tell her “sad story” a few times to some of the over-the-road jocks, and she’d be in a semi on her way west in no time. The routine had worked before. She was sure it would again. But first, she needed to retrieve her backpack with her getaway stuff from the barn where she’d convinced Leota she needed to drop it. It took her an hour to find the barn.

  The ramshackle building still retained that old barn smell even though she guessed it had been, like, forever since there were any animals or farm stuff in it, except for, maybe, mice. Evidence of some resident rodents had to be brushed aside as she crawled back under the rafters to where she’d hidden her backpack.