“Enough!” I held up both hands. “Please. I feel like a pot roast at a table of starving people.”
“Sarah Booth is right.” Millie patted Scott’s arm and winked at Harold. “I know it’s hard to wait, but pushing a woman into a relationship never works.” She looked around to be sure my partner wasn’t in the room. “It’s Tinkie I’m really worried about.”
“Dah-link, I’m thinking the same thing.” Cece faced me. “You have a problem on your hands.”
I couldn’t even pretend I didn’t know what she was talking about. “I don’t know what to do. That baby, overnight, is her and Oscar’s world.”
All merriment fled Cece’s face. “When you find that baby mama, there’s going to be hell to pay.”
“I know.”
“I’ll give Coleman a call,” Cece offered. “Maybe it would be best if he took the infant to Child Services sooner rather than later.”
“No!” I didn’t mean to sound so emphatic. “Tinkie has her because that’s what’s best for the baby. Pulling her away now won’t keep Tinkie and Oscar from getting hurt, but putting Libby into the system might be damaging. We’re in this. We’ll just have to keep on course to the bitter end.”
8
I wasn’t the type to suffer prophetic dreams, but the conversation with Cece must have lodged deep in my subconscious because I spent the night chasing after little Libby, who had suddenly grown into a baby with Olympic track abilities. She crawled faster than I could run. I chased her over the river and through the woods, while she scooted about like a nymph from Greek mythology.
In the background of the dream, Tinkie searched for the baby, calling to her in a plaintive voice. She sounded like a lost soul.
I woke up at daybreak, exhausted. I had to find Pleasant Smith—for Libby’s sake and for my partner. And I had to find out who’d stabbed Rudy Uxall. He was my best lead.
First on my agenda was Rudy. I called DeWayne, who filled me in on his investigation into the young man’s death. Uxall had been stabbed in the thigh. The blade had nicked the femoral artery, and medical care could have saved his life.
“An inch to the left and it would have been a muscle injury and Uxall would be alive,” DeWayne said. “If he’d gone to the hospital, he’d be alive. I found out something else, too. Rudy got into a fight with a muscular blond man about a month ago at the Waystation Bar on the Bolivar County line. The fight was about a pregnant woman who’d been playing and singing in the bar.”
“How’d you find this out?”
“I tracked down Rudy’s family. Hoss Kincaid had to break the bad news to them about Rudy’s death. He said one of the Uxall brothers told him Rudy had been in a fight with an ex-con.”
“Name?”
“He didn’t know. But the brother, Alfred Uxall, said the fight was about a pregnant singer. It has to be Pleasant. Alfred denied knowing anything about Pleasant or how Rudy was involved with her.”
“Thanks, DeWayne.”
“How’s Coleman’s case going?” I missed Coleman. I’d become spoiled by having him as a sounding board.
“He hopped a private plane to Memphis this morning at six. Should be back by two. He’s with the three bodies, waiting for the autopsy. He’s worried, Sarah Booth. This kind of element in Sunflower County is more than we can manage. Even with help from the state investigators and the highway patrol, we can’t cover the land area we need to patrol.”
“Watch Coleman’s back,” I requested.
“Will do.”
DeWayne gave me Rudy’s address, which turned out to be not too far from the road where Charity Smith lived. Although it was in Bolivar County, I went anyway. Hoss Kincaid would just have to get over himself.
When I pulled up in the yard, I knew I’d made a mistake. Rudy’s kin had gathered to wake his death. They were a burly group of four large men and the fiercely unhappy glare they sent my way should have warned me off. I couldn’t let it.
A big man, at least six-foot-six, came toward the car. “We’re not interested in talking with anyone,” he said. “You can leave the same way you came in.”
I introduced myself and got a long glare for my troubles.
“Maybe you didn’t hear me,” he said. “Get back in your car and leave.”
“I’ve been hired to find a young woman who recently gave birth to a child. Rudy has been linked to the baby. You can either talk to me or talk to the sheriff in Rosedale.” I hated to be blunt to a grieving family, but sometimes kindness wasn’t the ticket. I was working against a ticking clock, in more ways than one. “What’s your name?”
“It’s none of your business, but my name is Alfred. Rudy didn’t have nothin’ to do with a baby, and even if he did, he’s dead now and can’t pay child support.”
I inhaled slowly to keep my temper in check. “I didn’t say he was the father.”
“You said linked. What else could that mean?”
“I don’t know what his relationship with the mother of the child might be, but I need to find her. Now. It’s urgent.”
Maybe he realized I wasn’t going away and it would be simpler to answer my questions than to fight about it. “What is it you want?” He waved the other men to the front porch of the house where they gathered in a clump to watch me as if I might turn into a dragon.
“Do you know this woman?” I showed him the photo of Pleasant on my phone.
“She lives around here, but she disappeared, like four weeks ago.”
At least he didn’t deny knowing her. “Have you seen her?”
“Last I saw her she was broke down on the side of the road on Highway 12. I was headed to the tire shop over near Clarksdale.”
“She was alone on the side of the road?” I wanted to add, and you just drove by, but I didn’t. Once upon a time a man would never leave a woman—especially a pregnant woman—stranded on the roadside. He’d stop and fix the car or see to it that she was driven to safety.
“She was sittin’ on the hood of her car. I would’ve stopped, but I had to get a tire for my boss and have it ready. If the tire shop closed before I got there, I’d have lost my job.”
“How well did Rudy know this young woman?”
He considered. “They were friends. I’ve seen ’em talkin’. Not sweethearts. Nothin’ like that. Rudy said she was nice to him.” He shrugged. “End of story.”
“Not quite. Rudy had Pleasant’s newborn infant daughter.”
The big man tilted his head back. “Rudy had her baby? What for?”
I wanted to knock his brain into gear with the flat of my hand. “That’s what I need to find out. Why would Rudy have Pleasant’s newborn daughter? Why would he drop her off at someone’s house, and then drive to an abandoned farm instead of going to the hospital? He was wounded and he knew it.”
“You’re asking me to explain Rudy. No one here can do that. I told that deputy who came asking that Rudy got into a fight over a month ago with some character. All I know is Rudy tied up with the guy and it was over Pleasant. I don’t know the particulars.” He pointed to a woman who came out the screen door of the house and stood staring at us. She wore a navy dress with white dots in a fashion that made me think of another era. “That’s Rudy’s ma, and she couldn’t’ tell you why he did half the things he did.”
“Pleasant Smith may be in trouble. Serious trouble. Her life could very well be in danger.” More likely she was dead, but I didn’t say that. “Rudy may have been the last person to see her alive. Do you know where he was Tuesday night?”
“Rudy don’t live here most of the time, but you can ask Ma if you’re bold enough to do it.”
I only rolled my eyes and walked past him to where Mrs. Uxall stood at the edge of the porch. She was a tall, stout woman dressed in her Sunday best to attend to the funeral details of her son. I wasn’t oblivious to the situation.
“Mrs. Uxall, I’m sorry for your loss.” I started to introduce myself.
“Get off our land,” she said. “You g
ot no call snoopin’ here. Rudy was a good boy, and today I got to make arrangements to put him in the ground. I don’t need nothin’ you’re wantin’ to say unless it’s to tell me who murdered my boy.”
“I don’t know who stabbed Rudy, but I’m looking into it. He’s very much a part of my case, which involves a young woman whose life hangs in the balance.” I explained the situation to her.
She shook her head. “Rudy wasn’t always smart, but he was never mean. He couldn’t hurt anything. He couldn’t chop off a chicken’s head if he was starvin’ to death, so don’t go tryin’ to say he hurt a girl and took her baby.”
Mrs. Uxall wouldn’t be the first mother who had blind spots for the criminal inclinations of her son. “I’m not saying anything about Rudy. Don’t forget your son was stabbed, and maybe by the same people who took Pleasant. I’d think you’d want justice.”
“You think that missing girl was the reason someone killed my boy?”
“It’s possible. He may have been trying to help her. Look, I need to find Pleasant. If she just had the baby, she may need medical attention. Time is critical. Don’t you think she should be reunited with her child?”
She thought a minute, and her face softened. “If Rudy took that baby, he had a good reason to do it. He didn’t confide in me, but he set a store by that girl. He was a friend to Pleasant, and he told me she could sing like an angel. He said she was gonna be famous, and when she was, she’d hire him to be her security. If he was fighting about Pleasant, it was because he thought someone meant her harm.”
“Back when she disappeared, do you remember anything Rudy might have said? Maybe he was trying to help her. Maybe he said something that would help us locate her.”
The others had slowly drawn closer to us as we talked. They were big people—tall and broad shouldered. If Rudy took after them, he would have been a good bodyguard for Pleasant. If he had been trying to help her, then he had been stabbed for his efforts.
“I didn’t see Rudy much after Pleasant disappeared.” Mrs. Uxall pondered that statement for a moment. “He said he was movin’ in with friends, but he didn’t give no details.”
“Your other son,” I indicated the man I’d talked with, “saw her broken down on the road.”
She whirled on Alfred with a speed that astounded me. The next thing I knew she was beating him on the head with her purse. “You passed a pregnant girl on the road and didn’t help her. What did I teach you?”
He ran through his excuses about picking up a tire, but she was having none of that. “I’ll deal with you when we get back from the funeral home.” She faced me again. “That’s all I know. If I think of anything, I’ll call. Rudy wouldn’t hurt Pleasant or her baby. If he had the infant, it was because she gave her to him. That much you can take to the bank. Now I gotta go.” She brushed past me and went to the car, her other sons following.
While I was in the area, I decided to stop by Cotton Gin High School. I wanted to talk to the band director and some of Pleasant’s friends. If she’d run away, surely a classmate would know. If she hadn’t gone of her own free will, maybe some of her friends could tell me who had shown an interest in her in the last few months.
* * *
Built in the 1960s, the high school followed the architectural design of a chicken hatchery—a long, low, flat building with windows that could be pushed out at an angle. The school had been built in the days before central air, and window units hung off the building like ticks on a dog. Everything reeked of poverty. Cotton Gin High School had been erected and then left to slowly decay from lack of funding. It was a sad place, with an open field parking lot for the students and a faculty lot, with one visitor parking spot, near the front door.
When I stepped inside, the deteriorating conditions were forgotten as the sounds and smell of high school assaulted me. Young girls clustered at lockers to giggle and stare after the boys who paraded down the hall like peacocks.
The different cliques, almost identical to the ones in existence during my high school years, were easily distinguished. The cool girls—those without acne and with glossy hair and slender thighs—giggled and practiced cheers halfway down the hall. The geek kids were buried in lockers, sorting through a mountain of books. The jocks squeaked down the hallway in athletic shoes. Twenty years had passed, but nothing had really changed. Except I felt terribly old. The fresh-faced students, many self-conscious and the rare few who exuded security and determination, were my past. How had so much time slipped by me?
“You lost?” a very tall young man asked.
“I need to speak with the principal.”
“Down the hall, to the right.” He rearranged his backpack and continued to his next class.
I followed him, stopping at the door of a large glass office where several women worked at desks. The principal’s office. Oh, I’d been here before, and always because I was in trouble. Funny how guilt oozed from me just because of the proximity. I pushed the past away and stepped into the reception area.
“Can I help you?” a pretty brunette asked.
“I need to see Mr. Bryant.” I gave my name but didn’t show my PI badge. A minute later I was seated across the desk from the principal.
R. B. Bryant had twenty years heading one of the poorest schools in the nation under his belt. He wasn’t a man who wielded his authority with a swagger. He was soft spoken and friendly. When I explained what I wanted, he offered his full cooperation.
“Pleasant Smith was an extraordinary young lady,” he said. He leaned back in his chair, the springs squeaking. “The whole school was buzzing about her music, and I have to say she seemed to write songs with a great maturity. She had a shot to escape the poverty here, and I had hopes she’d bring resources back to Bolivar County.”
“She was a good student?”
“Exceptional. We have some very bright students here at Cotton Gin High, but sometimes brains aren’t enough to escape the quicksand of environment.”
His words struck a chord with me. “Pleasant could have made it, couldn’t she?”
“She could have. It was almost a done deal, from what I know. Scholarships for the plucking, interest from an agent in Nashville. Someone with Pleasant’s talents, getting a degree from Delta State University right here in Cleveland, and then rocketing to fame—it would put us on the map. And it would give the kids here an example, show them it could be done. Unless you’ve seen success firsthand, it’s hard to conceive. So many of my students come from generations of dire poverty. They can’t imagine a different life.”
“What do you think happened to Pleasant?”
He leaned back in his chair and stared out the window. “I’ve thought about this every day since she disappeared. She took the pregnancy in stride, and to my knowledge, she never revealed the name of the baby’s father. That takes a lot of grit for a young girl to pick up a burden like that and carry through by herself. She had responsibilities taking care of children at home, but other than those days, she didn’t miss school, until she disappeared. Someone had to take her. I just hope she’s still alive. That baby should be due any day.”
It was clear Principal Bryant cared about the students in his charge. Law and order took a second place to compassion. “Did Pleasant ever talk about the future?”
“She planned to make it in Nashville and come back here to open a music studio. She wanted to record the next generation of Mississippi blues players. She said she wanted to talk to that new club owner over in Zinnia when he got his club going.”
Scott. She had meant to talk to Scott. It didn’t sound as if Pleasant had abandoned all of her dreams voluntarily. “Pleasant had an appointment with a music agent, do you happen to know who it was?”
“Tally McNair, the band director, could probably answer that. She and Pleasant were close.”
“I realize Pleasant never said, but do you have any idea who the father of her child might be?”
Bryant leaned forward, the chair squeaking again.
“It’s a puzzle. She never showed any interest in the boys at school. As far as I know, she never had a date. She was totally focused on her music and getting a scholarship to DSU. Of course, she’s a young woman, and no number of rules and restrictions can counteract youthful impulse. But Pleasant thought things through.” He frowned and looked down at his hands for a moment. “I wondered if she’d been raped. Her family situation isn’t the best. That trailer park has some rough customers.”
“I’ll check that possibility out.” If Pleasant had carried her rapist’s child, it wasn’t inconceivable that the man had decided to shut her up before she could sue him for support, or worse, send him to jail. The bad thing about this case was that almost anything was possible, based on the evidence I’d gathered to date. Which wasn’t much. And time was running out. Coleman couldn’t wait much longer to take official action. He had to uphold the law, and he’d already cut me as wide a margin as possible.
The principal telephoned the secretary in the outer office, instructing band director Tally McNair to come to the main office. “There’s a teacher’s lounge next door. You can talk in there.”
“Thank you.”
“I hope you find Pleasant and her baby and they’re both okay. She worked hard to make some opportunities for herself. My gut tells me something terrible has happened to her, but I hope I’m wrong.”
“Me, too,” I said before I shut the door and waited in the hallway for the band director to arrive. When she turned the corner and came toward me, I was surprised to see a young woman who might have passed for one of the high school students. Tall and slender, Tally wore her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail that swung with her animated walk.
I introduced myself and we stepped into the empty teacher’s lounge. “I can’t be away from my class for long,” she said. “What can I do for you?”
I explained who I was and what I wanted, and her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, god, can you find her?” She gripped my hand. “You have to find her.”
Rock-a-Bye Bones Page 8