by Ann B. Ross
That answered one question: no, he didn’t remove all his bolts, nails and screws when he went to bed.
He walked to the gate and clasped a bar with each hand. There was no welcoming smile this time. “What do you want?”
“I want Adam Waites. He called me from here, saying he needed help to get home. Where is he?”
“He left. Hours ago.”
“Well, could you just let me in to look around a little? He sounded ill or hurt. Dying, in fact. You may think he left, but he could be lying somewhere in desperate need of help.”
He studied me through the bars, and I thought for a minute that he wouldn’t answer. Then he said, “Mrs. Whitman’s orders say that once this gate is locked for the night, we’re not to open it—not for you, not for anybody.”
“Well, wake her up and get some new orders! Tell her Adam’s in trouble. I’m sure she’ll reconsider if she knows that.”
“He’s not here—how many times do I have to tell you?” And that rude and unfriendly man turned his back on me and headed for his Jeep.
“Young man, look here!” I scrounged around in my pocketbook and pulled out my cell phone. “In less than fifteen minutes, there’s going to be a swarm of deputies, a search-and-rescue squad, a K-9 team, an EMS vehicle and a firetruck sitting out here with red and blue lights waking up not only Mrs. Whitman but all her neighbors. Now you can either let me in or you’ll certainly be letting them in.”
He stopped, turned around and put his hands on his hips, glaring at me.
“Oh, quit posturing,” I said. “Those pajamas are about to fall down as it is. Now open this gate and get out of my way.”
And he did. He went to one of the pillars, opened a niche and, using a key, unlocked the gate. The two sides began to slide apart as he got in the Jeep, calling, “Follow me.”
As if, I thought, but didn’t say, getting in my car and putting it in gear. He’d been giving me the runaround, so I was through being courteous. Besides, taking orders didn’t sit well with me.
As soon as the gates parted and while he was turning around, I drove on through, heading for the house.
Chapter 46
I whirled the car around the courtyard, making a circle to look for Adam’s truck in the beam of the headlights. The courtyard was dark and empty, so I pulled to the side, got out and put on the raincoat and hat against the misting rain.
I looked around, seeing little but shadows thrown by the distant pole lights. The house loomed over me in the dark and so did the four-door garage—no lights were on inside or out. Where was everybody?
Two sets of headlights swept across the front of the garage, one after the other, as the gatekeeper sped into the courtyard with, I hoped, Sheriff Ardis McAfee right behind him in a seriously large pickup with a growling engine. The Jeep stopped with a squeal of brakes on the wet pavers, rain flickering in its headlights. The metal-pierced driver hopped out, hopping mad. “You were supposed to follow me.”
“I don’t have time to dillydally around, young man. What’s your name anyway?”
“Uh, Carl.”
“Well, Carl, I’d like you to meet Sheriff Ardis McAfee.” I flung out my arm toward Ardis as he descended from his truck, settled a hat on his head and ambled over to us, Etta Mae, holding a pocketbook over her hair, hurrying after him.
“Evenin’, folks, or maybe mornin’,” the sheriff said, the light rain beginning to speckle his hat. “What kinda problem we got here?”
Before I could get out a word, Carl said, “No problem. None at all. This woman insisted on coming on private property to search for somebody who’s long gone.”
“That’s not so!” I broke in. “Adam called from here, so he’s here somewhere. It’s a matter of finding him because he sounded desperate. And,” I went on, rounding on Carl, “you ought to be eager to help, in case he’s lying injured somewhere on this private property. Lawsuits abound, you know.
“And where is Agnes?” I demanded, having worked up a full head of steam. “Why isn’t she out here looking for him? She was the one who called him—nothing would do but he had to get out here to fix her generator, and I guess now that it’s fixed, she can just go to bed and forget about him.”
“Okay, okay,” Ardis said, patting the air, “let’s see where we are before we call in the lawyers. Now, young man, where is Ms. Whitman? If she’ll give her permission to do a little ground search, we can get on with it and leave the fussin’ for later.”
Carl glanced up at the dark house. “She doesn’t like to be disturbed.”
“Well, now that’s too bad,” Ardis said, “because I ’spect we’re gonna have to disturb her. Why don’t you go wake her up, tell her why we’re here, and ask her for permission to look over the grounds. Then she can go back to bed. Oh, and turn on all the outside lights while you’re at it.”
Carl stared at the sheriff for a second, then he nodded and walked off toward the house. Before he got fully into the shadows around the house, I saw him put a cell phone to his ear. She wasn’t asleep! He was reporting to her, while she stayed out of sight. Didn’t want to be disturbed, my foot!
The sheriff and Etta Mae drew close, as the sheriff’s sharp eyes peered at me from under his hat. “I’m a little ways off my stompin’ grounds here. How ’bout bringin’ me up to date.”
“Well, see,” I said, straining to make my case, “Adam called me a little while ago, and I didn’t know who it was at first, he sounded so distressed.” And I went on to recount the phone call, ending with his last words. “He said he was at Agnes’s, which I assume meant at her house or on her grounds somewhere. Then the very last thing he said was a string of mumbles that ended with the word dying. Which scared me to death.”
Ardis responded with a low grunt, the meaning of which I couldn’t interpret. “And you think Nellie might know where he is?”
“It was all I could think of. I mean, coupled with the fact that he left with her to come here and that he told me this was where he was. So I thought of you, her being your niece and all. I didn’t want to come barging in here on my own.” Which, of course, was exactly what I’d done, but not without knowing that backup was on the way.
“Uh-huh,” the sheriff said.
Etta Mae leaned in, lowering her voice. “Looks like,” she said, “if he’s still here, they would’ve helped him if he’s sick or something. At least help him find his truck.”
“It’s all very strange,” I said. “And all I know for sure is that for the last week or so he was more and more reluctant to come out here and work for that woman. But she kept on and on at him, thinking up things for him to do.” I stopped and thought about that. “Of course, I tried to help by thinking up things for him to do at my house. You know, so he’d be too busy to leave.”
“Well,” the sheriff said, casting an eye around, “I see what you mean, but that boy ought to get some backbone and stand up for himself. But I give you this: the Whitman woman has a way about her. I met her when I came to see Nellie the other day, and I saw the way she rules the roost around here. Look what all she talked Nellie into. Her mama’s gonna bawl her eyes out when she sees her. If Nellie ever gets home. From what she says, they got some weird worship services goin’ on out here.”
I gave him a sideways look, thinking that it took one to know one. Of all the weird worship services I’d ever seen, it had been the snake-handling one he’d sent us to.
“That’s what I understand,” I agreed. “And I think they’re pressuring Adam to join in, but you know, Sheriff,” I went on, “there’re all kinds of strange and unusual worship services going on if you just look around.”
Ardis let that little jab go right over his head and looked instead past my shoulder toward the house. “Wonder where that boy got to. He must be having trouble waking Miss Agnes up. I kinda get the feelin’ they don’t much like night visitors. Might have to do a little threatenin’.”
“With what?” Etta Mae asked, shivering a little. Etta Mae never lik
ed confrontations on the edge of the law. “You don’t have any authority here, do you?”
“Nope, but I got professional courtesy,” the sheriff said with the assurance of a man with a badge. “I b’lieve I could get us some help if we need it. And if Carl don’t get movin’, I may have to call on it.”
Just then lights came on all around us—floodlights on the corners of the house, garden lights, lights over the garage doors, and lights along the drive. Water started spurting out of the fountain and all four garage doors went up.
“Look!” I said, pointing past Etta Mae’s head. “There’s Adam’s truck.” The truck with its camper shell sat lonely and abandoned in the last bay of the garage.
“You ladies stay here,” Ardis said as he went over to the pickup. Etta Mae and I followed, but not closely, and watched as he opened the cab door, looked around and shook his head. Then he walked to the back, opened the shell and searched the truck bed. “Not here,” he said, jumping down.
By that time Carl, having finished reporting in, walked over to us. “I told you,” he said, all in a huff. “Waites is not here. He left hours ago.”
“Not without his truck, he didn’t,” I said, stepping up in his face. “That truck holds everything he owns and he wouldn’t leave without it.”
“Well, I’m telling you he did,” the nail-studded man said right back at me. “It wouldn’t start, so he walked away. He left the windows down, so I rolled it into the garage when the rain started.”
“And you didn’t offer him a ride? What kind of people are you?”
“The kind,” a strident voice out of the dark said, “who don’t like strangers invading private property.”
We all turned to see Agnes Whitman, fast-walking and furious, appearing in a pool of light. She was wearing a long, filmy peignoir that revealed she was also wearing ink up one arm and down the other.
“Where’s Adam?” I demanded. “His truck’s here, so he must be, too. Where is he?”
Agnes propped her hands on her hips and said, “I don’t know and at this time of night I don’t care. You are on dangerous ground to come in here and start throwing accusations around.”
I opened my mouth, but Ardis put a hand on my shoulder. He had a smile on his face, but it wasn’t particularly pleasant. “We have reason to believe that Waites has been injured,” he said. “He made an emergency call asking for help, and said he was here, at your place. Now, we can handle it ourselves by looking for him or we can turn it over to the local sheriff, whichever way you want.”
Well, that was reasonable, I thought, and would probably be more effective than pulling the Tattooed Woman’s stringy hair out. So I subsided and let Ardis handle her.
“Go to it then,” she said, flinging out her arm. “Look for him all you want.” Then with a sly smile, she said, “To save you a little time, though, I’d suggest you look in Cheyenne’s bed first.”
Oh, Lord, I thought, the boy has been compromised. But would he be dying, too? It didn’t make sense. I’d heard of old men kicking the bucket on their wedding nights, but Adam was awfully young to be having a heart attack, regardless of whose bed he was in.
“Good idea,” Ardis said, without turning a hair. “We figured to start with her anyway. Where is she?”
Chapter 47
“Show him, Carl,” Agnes snapped, as if she’d had her fill of us. She turned—that see-through robe billowing out around her—and headed back to the house. “They can look around, then get them out of here.”
“Well, I never,” I mumbled, stunned by her rudeness. If people had shown up at my house on a mission of mercy, I would have at least invited them in for coffee. But to add insult to injury, she turned off all the outside lights, even the security lights on the far reaches of the property. Only the headlights of my car were still on, which made me worry about running down the battery.
Even Carl seemed startled to have been left in the dark. But he’d been given his orders, so he hooked a thumb at Ardis and said, “Easier to take the Jeep. Cheyenne’s in the women’s quarters over beyond the church.”
The church? That was a surprise. I hadn’t known that New Agers believed in churches, church services being relatively recent compared to the centuries of pagan worship. I would’ve thought they’d have oak trees or corn circles or temples or maybe piles of stones to dance around.
I started to follow Ardis to the Jeep, but he said, “Etta Mae, you and Miss Julia better stay here. If the boy’s with Nellie, I’ll bring him back. If he’s not, I’ll deal with her. Y’all get in the car and wait for me.”
I started to protest, but he raised a finger and shook his head. “No tellin’ what we’ll find. Stay here.”
Ardis, I decided, had a highly developed sense of what was appropriate for delicate women to know. I understood what he expected to find, but Adam had not sounded like an exhausted lover on the telephone. And I didn’t believe for a minute that he’d given in to the wiles of a girl with hyperactive hormones.
Etta Mae and I stood there in the mist, watching as Carl drove the Jeep off the courtyard onto a track that went behind the garage and led to the expanse of the estate beyond the house. Ardis was off on either a rescue mission or a fool’s errand, and I was fairly sure I knew which it was.
“Let’s sit in the car, Miss Julia,” Etta Mae said. “We’re getting soaked.”
So we got in, but I didn’t like it. How could I sit in a dry car, doing nothing, while Adam might be dragging himself through a muddy ditch, trying to find a helping hand? We were wasting time waiting for Ardis to discover that Nellie was sleeping alone.
“Etta Mae?”
“Ma’am?”
“Can you drive Ardis’s pickup?”
She gave me a sharp glance. “I don’t know, but I wouldn’t touch that truck. It’s his personal vehicle and he loves it to death.”
“What’s so special about it? As far as I can tell, if you’ve seen one pickup, you’ve seen them all.”
“Not hardly,” she said. “It’s a heavy-duty Ram truck, Miss Julia, fully loaded with HEMI power, a four-door mega cab, off-road action, quad headlights, a Ram toolbox, a trailer hitch, center console, Sirius radio and a navigation aid. You’d need a training course to be able to drive it.”
I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel. “Off-road action sounds interesting, but I guess what I’m asking is, can you drive a truck in general?”
She squinted at me. “I’ve driven one or two. Why?”
“Look there.” I pointed toward the open garage, lit up by my headlights. “See that thing in the second bay? Looks like a buggy of some kind? I bet it’d be easy to drive.”
Etta Mae sat up and strained to see through the rain-streaked windshield. “That’s a golf cart. You’re not thinking… ?”
“I certainly am. Adam’s not with Nellie, and I doubt he even has been. He’s out in the weather somewhere, unable to get inside. The grounds are what need to be searched, not somebody’s bedroom. And that little go-cart thing is just what we need to look for him. Come on.” I opened the car door and stepped out.
Etta Mae just sat there, a deep frown on her face. “I don’t know, Miss Julia. Ardis told us to wait.”
“Leave him a note. Come on, if you can drive a pickup, you can drive a golf cart. It even has a canvas top to keep us dry. We’ll just drive around the front yard and along the back where the pool is and in and out of the trees along the edges—you won’t believe how big this place is.”
I walked into the garage with Etta Mae reluctantly following. We stood for a minute gazing at the open-sided two-seated cart with its little fat tires and no windshield.
“Try it, Etta Mae. See if it’ll start.”
She crawled in, but she did it gingerly, then she studied the unadorned dashboard. “There’s a key in the ignition.”
“Well, see. It was meant to be.” I got in on the passenger side and held on to a roll bar. There were no doors or seatbelts. “Crank it and let’s see if it�
��ll run.”
“You think we’ll get in trouble?”
“Agnes said we could look around, so that’s what we’re doing. Crank it up.”
“Well, okay.” Etta Mae turned the key and the little motor started up and began purring away. “Oh, that’s neat. But where’s the gearshift? I can’t find it.”
I helped her feel around the dashboard and the steering column, then felt around the floor and the seat. “Wonder what this is,” I said, moving a lever, thinking to adjust the seat.
The little cart spurted backward out of the garage, with Etta Mae yelling, “Whoa!” She hit the brakes just before we hit my car.
“Oh, my goodness,” she said, resting her head on the steering wheel. “It got away from me.” She sat up and blew out her breath. “We better figure this out a little better.”
After a few minutes of trying this and that, consisting mostly of searching around for driving instructions, she said, “It’s got two gears—forward and reverse—and I was looking for first.” She giggled nervously. “And guess what? No lights.”
“No lights?” I said, feeling defeated before we’d even started. “How’re we going to search woods and fields without lights?”
“Yeah, and how’re we going to stay out of holes and ditches with no lights? It won’t work, Miss Julia. We’ll just have to wait for Ardis.”
I could’ve cried until something else came to mind. “Etta Mae, you know that big, heavy flashlight that Coleman has? You know, like all the deputies carry? Wouldn’t you think Ardis has one, too?”
“You mean a heavy-duty Maglite? I expect he does.”
“Run get it. If that Ram truck of his has everything you say, it’ll have a flashlight, too.”
She sat for a few minutes, considering the matter—probably wondering how free she should be with her date’s property. Of course she was prepared to drive off in who knows whose go-cart, so I didn’t think borrowing a flashlight should hold her back.