A Killing at Cotton Hill

by Terry Shames

  Patsy assures me that Dora Lee is with the Lord, using a lot more words than seem necessary. Her husband and kids slip in the occasional “amen.” After Patsy winds down, I tell Leslie Parjeter that I appreciate his sending his stepson to get me out from under the burden of dealing with Dora Lee’s affairs. “Dora Lee was a long-time friend to me, but it seemed right that family should be there.”

  “It wasn’t me that had that idea. It was Wayne, here.”

  “Now Daddy, you’re the one who called me,” Jackson says.

  “And I’m sure it was your idea.”

  Patsy makes her mouth into a smile, but her eyes are uncharitable. I’m wondering if she thinks these two are going to get their hands on something they aren’t entitled to. None of these folks stand to inherit a dime, but families are peculiar about guarding rights they don’t even have.

  “Your folks couldn’t come?” I say to Patsy.

  “Poor things,” Patsy says. “They wanted to come so bad, but they’re just too old. It would like to have killed them.”

  “It’s nice that you made the trip,” I say to Parjeter.

  “Cost me a good bit in gasoline,” he says, “But I thought I ought to spare that for Dora Lee.”

  “Have you met Dora Lee’s grandson, Greg?” I say to Parjeter.

  He says he has. At the mention of Greg, Patsy purses her lips in that way religious people have of showing disapproval.

  “Patsy, you all ought to go out to Dora Lee’s after this and get him to show you some of his paintings,” I say. “He’s got some talent. Have you seen them?” I ask Jackson and Parjeter.

  “No, I can’t say as I have,” the old man says. “I’m sure doing them paintings is fine for them that has rich relatives, but with Dora Lee gone, that boy’s going to have to get them ideas out of his head and find some kind of work. His making pictures ain’t going to put bread on the table.”

  “It’s true, most artists never make much of a living,” I say. “But I know a little about art, and he might be one of those who does all right.”

  When I say I know something about art, all of them look at me like I had just admitted I keep goats in my living room. A wondrous thing to behold, but of a different order of human.

  Jackson says, “How do you come to know anything about art?” Me being a hick small-town old boy.

  I tell him that my wife taught me an appreciation for it. “That’s why I took note of Greg. You know anything about art yourself?” I say.

  He shakes his head. “Not a thing.”

  Patsy can’t keep her judgment to herself any longer. “The Ten Commandments tell us not to have any graven image,” she says. “And that means it’s an idle pastime to be painting pictures. An abomination to the Lord.”

  That’s the first I’ve heard of such an interpretation and I don’t quite know what to say. More than ever, I’m glad Greg didn’t go and live with his daddy’s sister. “Was your brother as religious as you are?” I ask.

  “No, it’s only since Ken and I married that we’ve seen the light,” she says. “I’m afraid my brother was lost to me even before the Lord took him. I wish my nephew had lived with us instead of Dora Lee. We could have set him on the path to righteousness.”

  After that, as quick as I can I excuse myself and step away from them. I feel a release in my neck muscles. Across the room Rodell is making some middle-aged women giggle. I go over and stand by until he runs out of steam, and then tell him I need to talk to him. The shit-eating grin he’s been using on the ladies vanishes. We walk off a little ways, and he squares up facing me with his hands on his hips and his legs planted wide.

  “What is it I can do for you?” he says.

  I ask him if he’s had time to find out if any of his men had word of a strange car out by Dora Lee’s.

  “I don’t understand why this information would concern you,” he says.

  “It concerns me because I want to see whoever killed Dora Lee brought to justice, and I don’t perceive a lot of activity in that direction.” I put a little steel in my voice.

  “Well, Chief, just because you don’t perceive what’s going on don’t mean nothing is. Since you was Chief, we’ve got more technical ways of looking into things.”

  “I’ve yet to see any technical thing that takes the place of good, solid footwork.”

  He looks around the room and from the flush of his face, I believe if we were alone, he might haul off and punch me. “I don’t need any so-called footwork to tell me that grandson of hers is guilty as sin. If you hadn’t interfered, I’d have him off in Bobtail right now and everybody would be satisfied.”

  “What evidence do you have against him?”

  “That would be in the category of none of your goddamn business,” he says.

  Rodell’s drinking buddy, Carl White, sidles up and tells Rodell it’s time they left, and Rodell is more than ready to get away from me. He claps his hat on his head and walks away without another word to me. I’m satisfied that I gave him fair warning. If he’s not going to put muscle into investigating Dora Lee’s death, then I am.

  I go over to where Caroline and Maddie Hicks seem to have run out of things to say to each other. Maddie is trying to hush a toddler in her arms who’s about had enough of the proceedings. As soon as I walk up, Maddie excuses herself and hauls the child off to find its mother.

  “Have you had a chance to say hello to your Uncle Leslie and Aunt Patsy?” I say.

  “Get me out of here,” Caroline says. There’s a sheen of perspiration on her top lip.

  “You’ve got it,” I say. “Put a smile on your face.”

  As I propel her toward the door, I’m saying nonsense to her to make it look like we are having a conversation. I wouldn’t say the set of her lips would be called a smile, exactly, but it tends in that direction anyway.

  Outside, I tuck her into my truck. “We’ll come back later and get your vehicle,” I say. She nods and stares out the front window. “I’ll be right back.”

  I go back inside and thank the Baptist ladies for a fine reception and put some bills into their kitty to help defray expenses. I also press a check into the Reverend Duckworth’s hand, pretty sure no one else would have thought of it. And to tell the truth, I didn’t either; it was Ernest Landau, the funeral director, who reminded me.

  Then I tell Ida Ruth and Loretta that Caroline has had enough and I’m taking her to my place to rest, but that Caroline especially wanted to thank them for all they did.

  “That’s real friendly of her,” Ida Ruth says, with a tinge of sarcasm in her voice that tells me she doesn’t believe Caroline said any such thing. Loretta tells me that she’ll see me later, one of those proprietary comments she’s given to.

  As I’m leaving, I notice that Wayne Jackson is talking to Frances Underwood and a man I take to be her husband, Clyde. Clyde is doing the talking, gesturing with his hands wide, and Jackson is nodding. What comes to my mind is the words, “flim flam man.” Not something you hear these days, but it seems about right.

  It’s about 115 degrees inside the truck. Caroline is looking pale. I tell her to keep the windows rolled down because the air-conditioning has long since given up.

  Back at my place, I tell Caroline she should go to her room and get rested up, that I’ve got some sun tea brewing on the back porch and I’ll bring her a glass. “You want sweet tea, or not?”

  She unbuttons her jacket and slips out of it. Under it, her sheer blouse is tight against her breasts, leaving not too much to the imagination. Her glance at me lingers longer than seems necessary. “I’ll have whatever you’re having,” she says.

  I take my time, giving myself a chance to pull my thoughts together and her a few minutes to get settled in. I bring the big jar of sun tea in and take the teabags out, and I set it on the table. I see there’s a message on my machine, so I listen to it.

  “Samuel, I got a little information for you,” DeWitt says. “I’m not sure what good it will do you. An old boy I
know over in Bobtail says he’s pretty sure they’ve tested most everything around there and they’ve found no new natural gas deposits. He says since the Barnett find up north, everybody’s been praying to find a big area like that down in central Texas, but nothing has come of it. I’ve still got some feelers out, but that’s all I know so far.”

  That figures. Jarrett County, along with its neighbors, has missed out by thirty miles in every direction on oil. And it looks like we’ve dodged natural gas as well. This has always been a poor area; just a few steps shy of depression. It’s land like this—hard to farm, unyielding, tending to drought—that has made men like Leslie Parjeter miserly, begrudging every dollar they spend. They know that they’re only one dry season away from ruin. They hold on year after year, but it takes all the joy out of them. I may not particularly like Parjeter, but I understand him.

  The only thing that keeps us a little more prosperous in Jarrett Creek is the big lake that the state of Texas engineered about thirty years ago to the west of town. The lake is the reason there is no more creek in Jarrett Creek. Since it was put in, we get lots of boaters and campers and fishermen from all over, and business is pretty good. Before the lake was dredged, the area where it sits was all swampland, good for nothing but snakes, possums, bugs, and quicksand.

  With DeWitt’s news, I’m back to square one wondering what Clyde Underwood is up to. I’ve half a mind to get down to the bank right now and ask Gary Dellmore what makes Dora Lee’s property suddenly so interesting. But I’m kidding myself. Dellmore is a banker through and through. If he knows something, he’s not only keeping it to himself, but he’s working as hard as he can to get the bank in on it, along with a tidy little portion for himself.

  After ten minutes, I take a glass of iced tea in for Caroline, along with some lemon cookies I keep around, being partial to them.

  She has put on a sleeveless blouse and slacks and has fluffed her hair different from the way it was this morning, so it looks softer. It’s a lighter brown than Dora Lee’s was, almost blonde. She’s sitting in the one chair in the room, an uncomfortable old wingback chair I have put there for people to sit in while they put on their shoes. Her hands clutch the arms of the chair as if she’s afraid it might lift off and get airborne.

  “Thought you might want to lie down,” I say.

  “Would you like that?” she says.

  It’s a strange question that embarrasses me in a way I’m not quite ready for. “I don’t have any opinion one way or the other. You suit yourself.”

  I start to sit down on the bed, but instead I go into the dining room and bring back one of the chairs from there. “We need to talk,” I say. “You’re going to have to decide what to do with your mamma’s land and her things. You and Greg.”

  She’s watching me. “I haven’t quite figured out what you are getting out of being involved in Mother’s business,” she says. She hasn’t touched the tea.

  “Your mamma and I knew each other for a lot of years. She helped me out when Jeanne was dying, and afterwards. The least I can do is see to it that her death doesn’t lead to conclusions she wouldn’t have wanted.”

  “I suppose you think I ought to apologize for leaving here and cutting off ties with my mother,” she says.

  “I didn’t have that in mind.” The person I think Caroline ought to apologize to can’t hear her anymore. It wouldn’t be right for me to tell her I don’t give a damn what she does, but right now that’s what comes to me. She seems all snarled up in her own self. I don’t know what that’s about, but she’s had thirty years to work it out. If she hasn’t done it yet, twenty minutes with me isn’t going to change anything.

  I take a cookie and offer her one, which she declines. “The business I’m concerned with is your nephew, Greg. He’s been dependent on Dora Lee and I know she would want someone to help him sort out the financial end of things.”

  Caroline reaches over for the tea and sips it. “That tastes good,” she says, and smiles a lazy smile.

  “About Greg?” I say.

  She shrugs. “He’s over twenty, isn’t he? He can make his own choices.”

  “You think that way because you were prepared to go out into the world when you were that age. But he’s a different person. The boy could be taken advantage of. For starters, Leslie Parjeter wants him as a hired hand without pay. I wouldn’t be surprised if Wayne Jackson went along with it.”

  “You’ve got that right. That whole Parjeter family . . .” Her voice trails off. I haven’t been looking straight at her, and when I do, I’m shocked by the expression of loathing on her face.

  As soon as she knows I’m looking at her, she passes a hand over her face and like some magician, puts her expression back into neutral.

  “When you were talking last night, I noticed you didn’t think too highly of Jackson. What have you got against him?”

  She runs a finger over her lower lip. I’m coming to the realization that she has an unconscious way of making all her gestures seem sexual. “Nothing really. Kid stuff. We didn’t see them often, but when we did, it had to be us going over to their farm in Dimebox. Mother said Leslie Parjeter was too cheap to ever come to our place. Since I was in Wayne’s territory, he always had the upper hand. He tricked me into all kinds of things.”

  She shudders and wrinkles her nose like she smells something awful. “I guess you know a farm has a lot of booby traps. I remember once Wayne told me their chickens laid eggs in odd places, and he told me if I put my hand down into a box out in the barn, I’d find some eggs. I believed him, and what I got was a handful of chicken shit. Leslie saved it for fertilizer. God, I hated Wayne!” She suddenly laughs, and I see the pretty woman she could be. “He’s probably a perfectly nice man, but I guess I know how to hold a grudge.”

  “Sounds like you’ve got a reason.”

  She gets up and glides over to the window. “I take it from what you’ve said that Mother didn’t leave a will.”

  “I didn’t find one, and if Wayne Jackson did, he didn’t share that information with me.”

  Caroline keeps her back to me, looking out the window as she says, “I don’t know anything about Texas inheritance law. Do Greg and I inherit equally? Or is it just me?”

  “If I’m not mistaken,” I say, “kids inherit equally, and if one has died, like your sister Julie, then her half goes to her son. But I hate to tell you, there’s not much of anything to inherit anyway.”

  She turns around. “Really? The farm isn’t worth anything?”

  “The problem is, before your daddy died, there were big medical expenses and the farm went into a lot of debt. Your mamma paid back some of it, but it’s still got a heavy mortgage to pay off.”

  She sneers, and her voice is hoarse. “Why am I not surprised? They say you can’t take it with you, but if anybody could it would be Teague Parjeter.”

  “I guess he couldn’t help that he was sick.”

  She’s moving her hands restlessly up and down her bare arms. “I guess not.”

  I lean forward with my hands on my knees. “There is one thing about Dora Lee’s land, though. It might be worth more than I think.” I tell her about Clyde Underwood’s low-ball offer and my curiosity about why the land might be more attractive than it would appear. “Could be that Underwood knows something about it that will push up the price. Then you and Greg might get something more out of it.”

  “I appreciate your looking into it,” she says. “I have to tell you, all I really want to do is to sell that land and never look back.”

  “Why do you hate it so much?” I feel like by asking the question, I’m walking toward a wild animal, hand outstretched to help gentle it. And I may get my hand bitten off for my trouble.

  She walks back and picks up her tea and takes it to the window. She sips it and looks out. I wait, sensing that she’s almost lured into telling me. But I can also sense when she backs away and slips back into the brush. “One of the reasons I didn’t want to come back here is
I didn’t want to answer any questions about the past.”

  “That’s all right. I thought maybe it would ease your mind to talk about it.”

  “I don’t think so. But about the land, I suppose you’re right, I ought to get everything I can from it. God knows, I’ve made a mess of everything else.” She stares down into her glass.

  “You got married not too long ago,” I say. “I notice you don’t wear a ring. What happened?”

  “You could say the marriage just didn’t take.” She sits down on the edge of the bed. “You could also say that most men are out for what they can get. He took me for what little I had. I waited all those years to get married, and thought I had some sense. But it turns out I’m not any smarter than my mother was.”

  I sit up. “I don’t like hearing you talk about your mamma that way, or yourself either. Everybody makes mistakes.”

  She sits back down and slips off her shoes and runs a hand from her foot, up her shin and back down. “Yes, everybody makes mistakes. Some are bigger than others.”

  “Just don’t throw away an opportunity to make what you can out of the land. For Greg’s sake, too.”

  “You’re a sweet man, Samuel. I hope Greg is worth your trouble.”

  I tell her that I hope so too, and that I think he’s a boy with talent.

  “I noticed your paintings. I’ve never been much for art myself. But I remember your wife liked it. This stuff you have is real?”

  I’m not sure why I hedge my answer. “It’s things Jeanne and I both liked that we bought.”

  She gestures to a print on the wall above the dresser. “You think Greg could make a living doing paintings like that?”

  It’s the continual bane of the serious artist, this question. Can you make a living at it?

  “Yes, I do. I could be wrong. Plenty of good artists never manage to make a name for themselves, or they go wrong somewhere. But he should at least have the chance.”

  She sighs. “I’ll go out to the farm and see what Wayne is up to. I think that whole swarm of relatives had planned to stop by before they go home.” She turns liquid eyes to me. “I don’t suppose you can come with me?”