Deadly Is the Night

by Dusty Richards

  Smiling, Chet said, “Edie, that is the longest story he ever told in his life.”

  She dabbed her eyes. “Tonight you’ll have to tell me how you got to ride with these two.”

  “Can we do your dishes?” Chet asked.

  “Heavens no. You men have work to do today. But I will treasure your life stories forever. Thanks for making my day.”

  “No, we have to thank you for your wonderful food. And now we will go to work.”

  “I prepared a picnic basket for you to take. It has boiled eggs, sliced bread, prickly pear jelly, pickles, and cookies. Not a manly lunch but enough until you get back.”

  Chet kissed her cheek going out. “We love you, Edie.”

  Miguel went for the horses and Chet and Jesus went on to meet Deputy Knowles.

  “Last night, a man named Sam Thomas offered to ride with one of you if that’s okay?”

  “Fine. Jesus will ride with him.”

  “Certainly. He’ll be here shortly.”

  “Good. Miguel went for the horses. He can ride with us. He is my new man and learning how we do things. Jesus is a tracker and finds things.”

  “However you want to do things. I just want to know who the killer is and stop him.”

  “I know how you feel. It is your job to protect the folks up here. It may take a long time for us to resolve this, but in the end I believe we will find him.”

  They met Sam Thomas, a redheaded man about thirty, who had the hands and shoulders of a big Swedish lumberjack. He had a great smile and was as anxious as his pal to find the killer.

  They split up. Jesus and Thomas rode off to the second site. Chet, Knowles, and Miguel went to the first scene, the Forester place.

  It was frosty but the sun would warm things as the day advanced.

  Knowles told them on the road, “One of the church members, Jim Jennings, came by my house last night to ask if he could get title to the Forester place, if he paid the taxes. You know the sheriff is the county tax collector. He wanted it if it was cheap enough. As an investment, he said. I wrote the office in Preskitt to see what could be done. My wife is going to mail it.”

  “It isn’t farmland, is it?” Chet asked.

  “No. But if the homestead part has been completed it would be a cheap starter place for a newlywed couple. The church sends lots of them down here from Salt Lake. Jim’s a man in his fifties and stout. He’s made some good investments and is a rather rich man by Snow Flake standards.”

  “He have more than one wife?”

  “You know I have to live here. That federal law has to be enforced by your marshals so I’ll let that dog lie.”

  “I understand. I am not looking for a criminal investigation, I am simply curious.”

  “Thanks. Let’s not talk about that. I want to solve these cases. They keep me awake at night. I have run out of leads. I am so glad you came. I’ve been looking for apes in the woods I guess. I did think about your notion last night and it made me sick, the fact that the killer could be among us here. But you are right; he has to be. No drifters would keep coming back just to kill.”

  “You ever think about using a water witcher on these sites?”

  Knowles chuckled. “What could he do?”

  “I was in Fort Worth once and heard about a man who lost a pocket watch on a picnic in some tall grass prairie. He hired a man who witched water wells. He witched for two days with a peach tree fork and found it.”

  “How would we know what to tell him to look for?”

  “It’s a real wild thought, but we have no clues to point a finger at anyone, and maybe there is nothing for him to find. But it could be worth a try.”

  “Let me think about it.”

  “We are desperate and we do need a lead on something.”

  They walked around the site of the murders. The shack of a house had more cobwebs, Chet figured, than six months earlier. Old bloodstains were black. Someone had stolen the bed Knowles told him about. Chet stood on the rise to the north, wondering if the killer had stood in this same spot and watched the family while making his heartless plans to rid the world of these unbelievers. With the leaves on the trees, the watcher would not have been seen. Or perhaps he rode up like he had presents or food for them. No matter what he did, he brought cold-blooded death to four humans.

  “I’ve seen enough,” Chet said with still no answers.

  Knowles, mounting his horse, agreed. Miguel kept quiet. They rode in silence for several miles.

  “Now I have seen the place. What would be the tax price he’d pay for it, this guy you wrote the letter for who wants to buy it?”

  “Less than a hundred dollars.”

  “The house is a shack that leaks whenever it rains. I saw no garden spots. I dropped a small rock in the well. There is water at thirty feet but not much of it. No fences. No timber. Why would anyone want this place?”

  “He said as a future investment.”

  “He hasn’t eaten any funny mushrooms or smoked some weed in a pipe?” Chet asked.

  “No. He is a strong church member. I doubt he’d ever do that. I think he may have been trying to buy it before the murders. That cowboy that reported the deaths said he’d seen him out there checking around.”

  “Before or after the murders?”

  “Both sides of that happening.”

  “Strange to me why anyone would want it at any price.”

  Back at the office, Jesus and Thomas had returned as well from the number two site.

  Jesus shook his head. “We found nothing out there.”

  “Tomorrow we look at number three and four.” He looked at Knowles, who nodded.

  Their horses put up, they walked the dirt street back to Edie’s house. Winter-like weather kept hanging on. He needed to write his wife. This was going to take much longer than he originally thought.

  “Well the investigators are home,” she said, meeting them at the back door.

  He laughed. “Sure not much more than lookers.”

  “You three will solve it. I have the faith. Any new clues that you could list for me?”

  Chet shook his head, drying his hands. “The food smells good.”

  “You three ate since breakfast?”

  “Miguel, Knowles, and I had the picnic basket you gave us. Jesus, you and Sam Thomas just had the jerky you carry, right?”

  “Tomorrow you’ll have another basket. Two since you go in different directions.”

  “Hurrah,” Jesus said.

  After the meal, Chet wrote Elizabeth a short letter. Told her that the crimes were unbelievably bad, the clues had evaporated, and they had no suspects. That he’d be home when he could and he loved her.

  The men were gone to bed. Edie said she’d mail it for him.

  “Not a word, but you can help me with some information. A man called Jim Jennings keeps coming up. Do you know him?”

  “He has three wives and I am glad I am not one of them. Is that enough said?”

  Chet nodded. “I had to ask.”

  “He’s very outspoken.”

  “Thanks. What does he do?”

  “His wives milk cows. Sell some. They make butter and cheese and have babies. In the summer they raise crop-size gardens. He sells the produce. They never say anything at socials and never have time for quilting—because that is a woman’s event and at them women talk to other women. He doesn’t want that. There is an old adage he must use. Women are to be seen and not heard.”

  “Thanks. I better get some sleep. I hope we are not wearing you out.”

  “No. I want you to find the guilty party. There is one more man that you should know about. Grant Colby. Both his wives divorced him for his severe abuse to them. That, in my church, is unheard of, but it was so bad the church elders excommunicated him.”

  “Where does he live?”

  “In Randolph Canyon. He is a snarling bulldog sort of guy. The church board and bishop never went over there where they weren’t armed with shotguns.”
/>   “I wonder if Knowles ever questioned him.”

  She shrugged. “I have no idea.”

  “Of course not. Don’t tell a soul. I’ll look into it. Have any of Jennings’s wives complained about him?”

  “If they have I have not heard about it.”

  “Good night, Edie, and thanks again.”

  In his own bed later, he wondered about both men. He had to know more about both. It may not be either of them, but they were the only ones he had for the moment. He rose up, fluffed the pillow. Be a damn sight better being at home right now . . .

  CHAPTER 18

  The next morning before Thomas arrived, while his men were getting the saddle horses, Chet asked Knowles about the Colby guy.

  “I talked to him with two witnesses. We all had shotguns across our laps and we never dismounted. He said he was on his own place at the times I listed concerning the murders. He yelled that I had no right to question him and to get off his ranch property. I really think he told the truth. Why would he kill people he didn’t even know? His neighbors can mark the times he rides in and out of there. They dislike him and watch any activity he does real close. They had not seen him ride in or out except once every month or six weeks when he makes trips to town for supplies. And those times were not the times of the murders.”

  “Well, there goes another theory.”

  Knowles agreed. The two of them rode to another scrubby place where a man, his teenage son, and his wife were all murdered the same way as the others. Beheaded and her violated. Nothing outstanding showed up. The others had no reports on number four where a widower and his grown daughter were murdered in the same style.

  Jesus said it was as shabby as the rest of the sites.

  “It is almost like he was cleaning up the countryside,” Miguel said. This time he had gone with Jesus and Thomas.

  “That’s right,” Thomas said. “I wonder who else he plans to cull out.”

  “No telling, guys. Grady Burton is a well witcher. I talked to him last night about coming out and doing a search at one of the sites. He says he once found a ring for a woman but promises that there may be no results. Where do we start?” Knowles asked.

  “Number one place. Let’s scour it tomorrow. What does he cost?” Chet asked.

  “He is superstitious about that. He won’t charge us a thing.”

  “That is pretty nice.”

  “He’s like most of the residents up here. They want this madman captured.”

  “What else can we do, Knowles?”

  “I have no idea. But I would think that after all that slaughter the killer must have had blood all over his clothing.”

  “Right,” Jesus said. “Like a butcher has.”

  “Yes,” Chet agreed. “And if he took them home, his wife, if he had one, would notice.”

  “But if he had control over her, she’d never say a word.”

  Chet agreed with him.

  More unending thoughts about the situation that led nowhere.

  Back at the house, Edie handed Chet a letter from Liz. It had been forwarded from Holbrook.

  Dear Chet,

  I know you are real busy working on solving crimes. I am fine, and Monica with Lisa send their best wishes. We are all busy helping the less well-off folks in the church by sharing some canned food. Raphael also took two sacks of frijoles to the Methodist church. They said they had enough canned goods and the frijoles would help. Lots of people are out of work. Many blame the economy being so bad. Hannagen wrote you that they are holding up the government support money for the wire due to the economy. He said he would be in touch with you when he saw an opening. The ranches are doing fine.

  Come home when you can. I miss you so much.

  Elizabeth.

  “Is everything okay?” Edie asked, putting a full plate before him.

  “Yes. No word on the telegraph starting yet.”

  “Good,” Jesus said, and began eating.

  “Oh, Miguel, Lisa sent word she is fine. Liz never mentioned Anita, but she’s in town.”

  “She doesn’t write, either. I can send her a letter and they will get it to her,” Jesus said.

  “Maybe write one for me please?” Miguel asked.

  “We can do that,” Chet said between bites of delicious food.

  “Someone can read it to her?”

  Miguel smiled. “No. Lisa can read. She is the one teaching me, but I am not that good at it. Besides she doesn’t know where I am.”

  All four laughed.

  * * *

  Late the next morning they met the gray-haired short man, Grady Burton.

  “We appreciate your agreeing to help us find a needle in a haystack,” Chet said, and introduced his men.

  “I don’t know if I can do you any good. But we can try. This killer must be stopped.”

  They went to the Forester property and started going over the ground. Nothing.

  Chet brought sandwiches and more cookies Edie had made for them. They ate them for lunch and then went back to searching.

  “Hey,” Jesus shouted. “We found something.”

  He stood with Burton in an open spot in what Chet considered part of the side yard.

  “What is it?”

  “Someone burned a coat here. We have a small piece of material that did not burn. And a gold ring.”

  Chet looked hard at it. “It is tarnished gold.”

  “Forester never had a gold ring in his life,” Knowles said. “Or he’d have pawned it.”

  “I don’t know what it will point to, but I think it’s the killer’s clothing that was burned here.”

  “I saw the spot when I first came here and thought that this was where they burned their trash.”

  Miguel had polished the ring some. “There is writing inside.”

  “What does it say?”

  Knowles held it toward the sun to better see it. “E-m-i-l-y.”

  “Emily.”

  “Who is that?”

  Knowles shook his head. “There are some women in our community named that.”

  Burton nodded. “Several women, old and young, that I know of. But how did it get here?”

  “Using the traces of burnt material I’d say the killer burned the bloody coat, forgetting he had that ring in his pocket.”

  “I was over it twice,” Burton said.

  “Up there, on that rim, it is grassy and weedy. I bet when the killer was here he stood there watching. Try it next, Grady,” Chet said.

  Knowles was still polishing the ring. “Somewhere, someone knows this ring and who it belongs to.”

  “Well, the killer won’t tell you. That’s for sure,” Chet said as he headed up after Jesus and Grady.

  Grady stopped and Chet did, too.

  “What is it?” Chet asked.

  Jesus was on his knees digging carefully with his jackknife. Then dangling on a chain, he held up a dirt-packed pocket watch.

  “Oh, my God,” Knowles said, joining Jesus who was polishing it on his pants. “How did it get there?”

  “The earth must have been cracked open here. It fell in the crevasse and the monsoon rains closed it up again,” Grady replied.

  Knowles shook his head. “I know the owner of that watch—James Jennings. How do we prove it?”

  “I am thinking he knew that watch was here somewhere, couldn’t find it, which is why he wanted to buy the place.”

  “How does the ring fit in?” Knowles asked.

  “I am not worrying about that for now. What we need is a confession out of him to cinch this case.”

  “You’re right. A good lawyer in court could twist this around saying he simply lost it here.”

  With all of them gathered on the steep hillside, Chet warned, “We must be quiet about our finds. He can’t know a thing ahead of time that we have these two items. This is good evidence, but we still need his confession to close the case.”

  “If I’d have lost this good of a watch, I’d been on my hands and knees look
ing all over for it,” Thomas said, and laughed. Then, sober faced, he said, “But for the life in me I can’t imagine anyone murdering those children. They did no harm.”

  “Will his wives testify about him coming home with his clothes being bloody at any of those times?” Jesus asked.

  “If he can’t reach them to shut them up,” Chet said, “I bet they would talk.”

  “They damn sure don’t talk in public now,” Thomas said.

  Burton nodded. “You’d think they don’t have tongues.”

  “If you arrest him, would the bishop go with you to talk to them about testifying against him?” Chet asked Knowles.

  “I think he would. He wants these crimes solved and the thing put to rest.”

  “Keep looking. Knowles has the evidence. We will ride in quietly to see the bishop. No shouting when you return later even if you find more evidence.”

  Chet shook their hands. He saw both his men had relaxed a lot. Even Thomas and Burton looked relieved. But they still had some narrow bridges to cross before they had Jennings locked up forever. A lot would depend on his silent wives’ help—Chet knew they would be hesitant to testify. Maybe the ward leader or bishop could convince them to overcome the fear that talking could get them hurt or even killed.

  The whole thing was fragile.

  They stopped at the bishop’s house. They found him working on his business books. He removed his reading glasses and stood to shake their hands.

  His wife closed the doors to the study. The winter sun beamed in the southern windows as he showed them chairs.

  “How is the investigation going, Knowles? Nice to have you here, too, sir. I understand you are here to help get to the bottom of our murders.”

  “We made a find today.”

  “Good. What is it?”

  “Grady Burton witched at the Forester place for any item he could find. I know we didn’t need water up there. He had some luck finding some jewelry wrapped in burned suit material. It is a tarnished ring with the name Emily engraved in it.”

  “Who lost it?”

  “Let me show you the second find.” He drew out the watch. “This was found at the same site above the house in a crack in the earth that we think the monsoon rains sealed. These rains I understand came some weeks after the first murder.”