The Sky Took Him - An Alafair Tucker Mystery

by Donis Casey

  “Do you expect Sheriff Hume still has that empty nitroglycerin can from out to Pee Wee’s well?”

  Burns didn’t answer right away. Instead he was wondering why he was even talking to this perfectly ordinary-looking woman with the disconcerting gaze, who was a stranger to him, to boot. None of this had anything to do with her, except in the most perfunctory way. She was just one of the extended family which hung around like a tableau in the background of any tragedy. But she kept turning up, asking odd questions and making observations in as straightforward a manner as any man he had dealt with. Burns was finding it hard to dismiss her in the polite and cursory fashion he normally used to deal with family. He wondered if her unassuming presence and sharp eye actually might be of some use in this situation. He gave an unconscious shrug and decided to go with it.

  “I don’t know, ma’am. I expect he does. Why?”

  “Mr. Burns,” she said, “have you ever read Pudd’nhead Wilson?”

  ***

  Hanlon waited until the very last minute to buy his train ticket. After watching his boss being hauled away in the ambulance, he had gone back to his little attic room over the garage behind the Collins house just long enough to shuck out of his chauffeur’s uniform and change into the most common, nondescript clothes he had. He took what cash he had from the drawer in the dresser and stuffed it in his pocket, and pulled a worse-for-wear cowboy hat down low on his forehead. He wasn’t supposed to have a pistol, since he was on parole, but he did, of course, wrapped in a ratty blanket and stashed on the top shelf of his closet. It was small, but it fit in his jacket pocket just right, along with the razor. He would have liked to take a change of clothes, but he didn’t want to be carrying anything or have anything on him that might be memorable in the slightest. He considered stealing something of value from the house that he could hock later. Nothing portable that he could get to quickly came to mind. He managed to get down the back stairs and into the alley behind the property without being seen, and walked through side streets until he reached the train station.

  He meandered around the street for a long time, sticking close to back entrances and alleys, hovering close to the station and watching closely for any sign that the law was about. If he had had a choice, Hanlon would have preferred to leave town on a horse, or by hitching a ride on a delivery truck or wagon. The fact that it was Saturday made it easier. There was a lot of activity on the streets at this hour on Saturday, since the stores were open late and a lot of folks came out to shop and stroll, or just to watch people. He preferred a crowd. It was easier to be unseen in a crowd.

  It was right about dusk, just before the lamps are lit, when it’s hard to be absolutely sure of what one is seeing, when a train pulled into the station from the east. Hanlon waited until arriving passengers had disembarked and he began to see those who were departing begin to board before he made his way into the station. He stood near the entrance for a few seconds and checked out the other people in the room: a woman with two middle-sized kids, a couple, a cowboy asleep on a bench with his hat pulled down over his face. Satisfied, Hanlon walked up to the counter and eyed the schedule posted next to the window to see where this train was bound. Not that it made any difference, as long as it was out of here.

  “One for Woodward,” he said to the clerk.

  “Better step on it, mister,” the man said. “Train’s leaving in a couple of minutes.”

  Perfect. Hanlon paid for his ticket and walked immediately out onto the platform, where he could survey the situation one last time before he got on. The conductor beckoned to him from one of the passenger cars. He boarded and made his way down the aisle of the as-still-unlit car, finally taking a seat near the exit in the back. The train had not begun to move, but Hanlon could hear the chug of the engine firing up.

  He leaned back and closed his eyes, already planning his route out of Woodward and to the west. California, maybe. There were a lot of Irish in California. A good place to get lost.

  He felt someone sit down in the seat beside him and opened his eyes. It was the cowboy he had seen sleeping in the station. The cowboy smiled before reaching into his coat pocket, drawing out a sheriff’s deputy badge, and holding it under Hanlon’s nose.

  “Why, Mr. Hanlon,” the cowboy said, “are you leaving town without letting anyone know? I believe that’s a violation of your parole.”

  Sunday, September 19, 1915

  Martha could hear Grace’s piping laughter coming from the backyard as she approached her aunt’s house on the sidewalk. It was a pretty morning, but Martha wasn’t in a very pretty mood. She had just spent two hours with Olivia and Ruth Ann at Mr. Henninger’s brand spanking new funeral home, viewing Kenneth’s artfully displayed body and discussing funeral details.

  It had all seemed incredibly macabre to her. The entire time she was there, she kept thinking that Kenneth looked rather like he had painted his face like a blowsy saloon girl and then stretched out and gone to sleep on one of the display counters at Klein’s. But Olivia seemed happy with the arrangement, so she bit her lip and kept her opinion to herself.

  Finally, she had had enough, so she had left Olivia and Ruth Ann to commune with the dearly departed for a while.

  She headed back to the house alone, and as she walked up the driveway and into the backyard, she found Lu hanging bedsheets on the line with Ron on a quilt at her feet. Grace had created a cradle out of a small wooden crate and some rags, and was in the process of hauling Ike over to it in order to serve as baby. She was carrying him with both arms clutched around his generous middle, right under his front legs, the bottom half of him swinging precariously in front of her. He was so big that she could barely manage his weight, and his back paws were only a fraction of an inch off the ground, his toes splayed in alarm. He looked over at Martha, the picture of long-suffering resignation, in the forlorn hope that she might rescue him from this indignity.

  Grace called out a greeting to Martha, but was too intent on her task to come over, so Martha left poor Ike to his fate and walked to the clothesline. Lu moved a hanging sheet aside and gave her an appraising look as she approached.

  “Everything okay at funeral place?”

  Martha shrugged. “Olivia seems happy.”

  Lu’s expression didn’t change, but Martha thought she detected an ironic glint in the black eyes.

  “Have you seen my mother lately, Lu?”

  Lu indicated the house with a lift of her chin and stabbed a clothespin over the end of a pillowcase. “Since church, she been up with Mr. Yeager, reading. Mr. Yeager says he likes your ma’s book.”

  Martha nodded. “Thank you. Would you like for me to take the kids off your hands?”

  Now all she could see of the housekeeper was two slipper-clad feet peeking out from under an enormous white sheet. “No, Miss. Maybe later, when Miz Yeager and Olivia come home and I fix luncheon. You go rest now.”

  Martha opened her mouth to make a polite protest, but in the end she just said, “Thank you,” and didn’t argue. She entered the house through the back door and walked through the parlor, pausing to hang her hat on the rack in the foyer before she mounted the stairs. The house was quiet. When she reached the second floor, she threw a glance at her uncle’s bedroom, and was surprised to see the door was standing open. She could make out Lester’s outline under the quilts, and an empty chair standing beside the bed. Even from the stairwell, she could hear her uncle’s ragged breathing.

  Curious, she walked down the hall to her mother’s bedroom and looked in. Alafair was lying on top of the bedspread, staring at the ceiling, her hands folded over Mark Twain’s book on her chest.

  “Ma?” Martha said, and Alafair’s head turned on the pillow to look at her.

  “Hello, honey. How does Kenneth look?”

  Martha walked into the room and sat down in one of the side chairs under the window. “Pretty good, considering that he was dead for a week before he got found.”

  “It helps if somebody puts
you in a cold storage unit.” Alafair’s tone was dry.

  “You know, it did occur to me that Kenneth got himself so doped up that he just walked into that locker and stretched himself out for a little nap.”

  Alafair sat up and propped herself against the headboard. “Me, too. Except that you’ve got to have a key to get in them lockers, and he didn’t have a key on him.” Alafair crossed her ankles and moved her book from her lap to the bed. “Speaking of keys, when is Olivia going out to the bank in Garber to see if that little key she found fits anything?”

  “Oh, it’ll fit. Sheriff Hume telephoned the banks out there yesterday and found out that Kenneth did rent a box at the First Bank of Garber back about a year ago. The sheriff said he’d come pick us up and take us on out there on the train early this afternoon. The bank manager will meet us there and let us in. The sheriff was going to see a judge this morning and get a warrant. Unless Kenneth had told the bank that Olivia could get into the box, which he didn’t, they aren’t going to let her open it without a court order.”

  “So you’re going, too?”

  “She asked me, so I said I would.”

  “How about Streeter McCoy?”

  “How about him? There’s no reason in the world for him to come.” Martha suddenly realized that she sounded unduly acerbic, so she changed the subject. “Isn’t it just the awfullest thing about poor Zip Kolocek? I sure liked that boy.”

  Alafair’s face crumpled and she looked away. She took a deep breath before she replied. “That poor child. That poor innocent boy. What critter would do something so mean that would blow a couple of fellows to pieces like that?”

  “I reckon Pee Wee Nickolls is convinced he knows what critter.”

  Alafair looked back at Martha. “I hate it that Pee Wee took the law into his own hands like that. Now he’s not only lost everything, he’s under arrest.”

  “I expect that any jury of folks from around here will be on Pee Wee’s side.”

  “How is he doing this morning, have you heard?”

  “I understand he had an operation early this morning to pick chunks of wood out of his body and set some bones.”

  “What about Collins?”

  “I haven’t heard about him. I don’t think he’s expected to die, though.”

  Alafair gave a thoughtful nod. “Pee Wee’s lucky the blast didn’t take out his other eye. I hope he decides to go into another line of work, after this.”

  ***

  While Martha was discussing events with her mother, Sheriff Hume and Chief Burns were sitting in the chief’s office, drinking coffee and bringing each other up to speed on their respective murder investigations. Neither was in a hurry to question Hanlon, who was currently on the second floor of the courthouse, handcuffed to a chair, in the dim, airless, converted janitor’s closet that currently served as an interrogation room for the Enid police department. John Burns had been the Chief of Police for the City of Enid for only a few months, but he and Elsworth Hume had worked together quite a bit already, mostly raiding illegal drinking establishments and seizing contraband booze. Hume was competent and serious about his work, and Burns liked that. He also liked the fact that, even though Hume appeared to be grim and humorless, he had a ready, dry wit which was so subtle as to be almost undetectable.

  The death of Kenneth Crawford from an overdose of opium in Enid had occurred in Burns’ jurisdiction. The deaths of Deo Juarez and Zip Kolocek from an overdose of nitroglycerin outside of Garber had happened in an unincorporated area, and thus were the purview of Hume, the Garfield County Sheriff. Given the fact that everyone involved with these three murders was unshakably convinced that Buck Collins was responsible for both incidents, the Sheriff’s Office and the Enid Police Department were working together on their cases.

  Until Hanlon had made a break for it the night before, there had only been the sketchiest of circumstantial evidence connecting Collins to any of the deaths. There was an undercurrent of carefully repressed excitement in the room as the two lawmen prepared to question Hanlon. No one dared say it out loud, but the possibility existed that Buck Collins had finally made a mistake that could be used to bring him down.

  Hume glanced at his pocket watch and set his mug down on the corner of Burns’ desk. “Well, I reckon we’d better get on with this, before Collins’ lawyer shows up and goes to interfering with our interrogation techniques.”

  Burns laughed. “I expect that Collins ain’t thinking quite as sharp as usual right about now, thanks to old Pee Wee Nickolls.” He stood up and pulled on his suit jacket, and the two men walked down the hall to the stairwell leading to the second floor.

  “You think this little ruse of ours is going to work?” Burns was taking the stairs two at a time in an effort to keep up with the longer-legged Hume.

  Hume shrugged. “It’s worth a try. If Hanlon goes for it and spills the beans, we won’t have to make good.”

  “Well, I hope we don’t. That lawyer of Collins’ is slicker than spit on a glass doorknob.” He signaled to the guard standing outside the interrogation room to unlock the door.

  Hanlon looked up when the door opened, but said nothing. Burns turned the only other chair in the small room around backward and straddled it. Hume leaned back against the wall in the corner and crossed his arms over his chest.

  “I hear you tried to leave town under cover of night, Mr. Hanlon, with a firearm and a razor in your pocket, to boot,” Burns said. “Now why would you go and do something stupid like that? That’s a violation of your parole, after all. Are you so eager to go back to the clink?”

  “I’ve got nothing to say.”

  “Collins might have something to say about your attempting to leave his employ without his permission, when he finds out about it.”

  “It was Collins sent me on an errand. You can ask him about it.”

  “Collins is not in any condition to answer questions right now, Hanlon, as well you know. I figure the sheriff and I will just have to ask you. Where were you on Friday night? Anywhere near Yeager Transfer and Storage? How about the home of Kenneth Crawford? Or maybe you took a little trip out toward Garber that night, and while you were ransacking the Crawford well buildings, you decided to replace the machine oil with nitroglycerin. Considering what happened, I believe we could convince a judge that that little stunt constitutes murder.”

  “I was with Mr. Collins all evening on Friday, and I retired late to my room, which is above the garage at the back of the house. I spoke to Cletus, Collins’ butler, when I came in. His room is next to mine. He can tell you right when I came in. You can’t charge me with anything, Burns. Collins will vouch for my whereabouts as soon as he’s up to it. You’ve got nothing.”

  “Is that so? You spent several years enjoying the hospitality of the State of Kansas, didn’t you, Hanlon?”

  “You know damn well I did.”

  “I believe that whenever a con checks into Leavenworth, he gets to leave his fingerprints on a card, which the prison keeps forever. I expect you’ve had that honor, so you’re familiar with the idea of fingerprinting. Really helps with identifying repeat offenders, I hear.”

  Hanlon reddened, but had nothing to say to this. He glanced over at Hume, who was still standing silently in the corner. Burns reached into his pocket, withdrew a tobacco pouch and papers, and proceeded to roll a cigarette. He offered it to Hanlon, who took it.

  Burns struck a match on his leg and leaned forward to light Hanlon’s smoke before he continued. “So, you know that whenever a person touches anything, he leaves behind the marks of his fingers, and those marks are like nobody else’s. In fact, it seems that some eggheads think that you can prove without a shadow of a doubt which exact man out of all the men in the world touched any particular article you care to study. And did you know, too, that the forward-looking and progressive city of Enid, Oklahoma, has just come into possession of a fingerprint kit?”

  Hanlon exhaled a long plume of smoke. “My heartiest congratulati
ons.”

  Burns’ mouth twitched. “And did you further know, smart ass, that we are in the process of testing several items taken from the scenes of all three break-ins, including an empty nitro can, and we have discovered some very nice fingerprints that we are going to photograph? Our plan was to send those pictures to the penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas, where the Feds have agreed to compare them with their collection. In fact, we’ve requested that they start their comparison with one particular set of prints that we think highly likely to match up with some of ours.”

  Hanlon looked unimpressed.

  “But you know what?” Burns continued. “Since you decided to violate parole and get yourself arrested, I don’t think it’s going to be necessary to send those photos all the way to Kansas. We now have those very fingers of interest right here in our custody.”

  Hanlon shifted in his chair, irritated at Burns’ chipper tone of voice.

  But the chief wasn’t done yet. “Seems there are another couple of fellows who weren’t interested in hanging around to help us with our investigation, either, Hanlon. The man that Mike Ed Burns hired to be watchman at Yeager Transfer and Storage tried to take a powder not two hours after I questioned him. Bull Heath, the old boy who was supposed to be watching Crawford’s well the night it was broke into, he did give us the slip. He was a booger to track down, but the sheriff’s men finally caught up with him yesterday. Both of them have provided us with their prints.”

  “Be interesting to hear what them two have to say.” Sheriff Hume spoke for the first time.

  The lawmen eyed Hanlon expectantly. He took a final drag on the cigarette, tossed it to the floor, and ground it under his heel.

  Burns looked at Hume. “Collins has made a bunch of fellows do a bunch of things to a bunch of folks, you know, Sheriff.”

  “So I hear,” Hume said. “But damn if we’ve ever been able to catch him at it. I’d be willing to do a lot for the man who helped us nail that slippery scoundrel.”