Sheriff Hawkins paced his small office, alternately looking at photos of himself and local dignitaries, or studying a small bronze replica of the Texas state capitol on his desk. “Should we notify the local paper? They may want to cover it.”
Understanding dawned on Cody. The man had ambition, but not the sense or bottom to make it work. “We’ll call them as soon as we have Owen in custody. This may be nothing more than knocking on the door and he gives up. That wouldn’t make a very good story, would it, getting them excited about something and then just have the guy hold out his wrists.”
The attention-hungry Sheriff Hawkins thought for a moment as he straightened a photo on the wall. “I guess not. Maybe we can take a picture afterwards.”
Anna rolled her eyes.
Chapter Seventy-three
Tom Bell was in the shower when Ned turned down the sound on the color television and picked up the phone. He hated showers and was aggravated because the room didn’t have a tub. “Long distance to Center Springs, Texas. I’m calling Miss Becky Parker. This here’s Ned Parker.”
He studied the oily sheen on two pump shotguns lying on the bed as the call went through. He thought the operator had cut him off, but the phone in Center Springs finally rang through a storm of static. The receiver clacked and a voice spoke through a low buzz. “Hello?”
The operator came through loud and clear. “I have a person-to-person call to Miss Becky Parker.”
“This is Pepper.”
“Is Miss Becky Parker there?”
“Yeah, but who’s calling?”
“Ned Parker.”
“Well put him on.”
“Are you Miss Becky Parker?”
There was a brief silence. “Sure.”
“You said you were Pepper.”
“That’s my nickname. If you’d asked for Pepper you’d have known right off.”
“Pepper!” Ned had no idea she couldn’t hear him. “Operator. Pepper’ll be all right.”
“Fine, then. Here’s your party. I’m connecting you now.”
The line clicked. “Pepper. Can you hear me?”
“Grandpa! Where are you?”
“A long way off, honey. Who’s there with you?”
“Miss Becky. We just got home from the hospital. Uncle James and Aunt Ida Belle are staying with Top tonight.”
Ned started to ask her about his grandson, but was afraid of what he’d hear. He needed to get either the good news or the bad from an adult. “Good. Put your grandmother on the line.”
“I just went through all that so I can talk to you. She won’t tell you, but Tucker’s out there in his car asleep again.”
“Why does that bother you?”
“Cause he oughta have sense enough to come inside. It’s colder than a well-digger’s butt out there and he’s asleep with the motor running to stay warm. If he’s trying to earn extra money, why’s he wasting it on gas? He’s liable to kill himself breathing that exhaust.”
“I’ll talk to him when I get back. Now let me talk to your grandma.”
“But I wanted to talk to you. Mark has an idea that Tucker’s up to something else.”
Ned rubbed his bald head in frustration. “Now why would he say that?”
“I don’t know.”
“Put Mark on.”
“He’s over at Uncle Cody’s, stacking wood on the porch. He wanted to make a little spending money.”
“All right. Have him tell Cody what he’s thinking.”
“I don’t know when Uncle Cody’ll be back. He’s gone to Collin County.”
“Good goddlemighty, girl, where’s Miss Becky?”
“She’s in the kitchen. But Grandpa, I want to talk to you about something else. There was a guy who come up to the house yesterday and wanted me to sell him that gold piece of Daddy’s. He had that big-titted gal from the store with him and I got nervous.”
“You should have been, and I’m thinking about blistering your butt when I get home over it. Tell that to Cody, too. Now, put your grandmama on the line.”
“Fine then.” He heard the receiver click against the wooden telephone table, then Pepper’s faint voice. “It’s Grandpa. He wants to talk to you, not me. You can tell him about the stole still, too. He wouldn’t let me.”
Miss Becky rattled the phone some more and Ned closed his eyes when she spoke. “Ned?”
“Hi, honey.” The tight muscles in his neck eased and he settled down at the round table beside the window, nearly bumping his head on the swag lamp suspended directly over the ashtray positioned in the exact center. “What about the stolen still?”
“More whiskey is already showing up and they’re thinking it’s from that one.”
“I told them not to set it up on the square. Now somebody’s already fired it up again.”
“That don’t matter much right now. Where are you?”
“We’re in the Holiday Inn just outside of Washington. Maryland, I believe. We’re still trying to find the man who started all this. How’s Top?” He held his breath.
“He’s better. The doctor says he’s out of danger and his lungs are clearing up every day.”
“So they got a good handle on it? He’s gonna be fine?”
“I didn’t say that. Dr. Heinz says he’s getting stronger. If the medicine keeps working and he don’t backslide tonight, they’ll send him home tomorrow. I’m worried about you, too. When are you coming home?”
“As soon as I find that man.”
“Ned, you don’t have to do this. Top’s gonna be all right. Come home.”
“You’d want me to keep on after him if somebody shot Top. It’s the same thing.”
“We need you here.”
“You have Cody and John and James. I need to find this feller before he hurts somebody else.”
“We need you.”
“It won’t be much longer.”
“Ned, let the Lord handle this. Vengeance is…”
“…Mine. It’s mine. You’ve told me that before. I believe the Lord is using me to find the man responsible. You know, others died besides Top getting’ sick. That’s how He works, in mysterious ways.”
She was silent with nothing but static on the long distance line. “Y’all had any trouble?”
“Not so’s you’d notice.”
She was silent on the other end of the line. “What are you gonna do when you finally root him out?”
“I don’t know yet.” He absently watched a commercial featuring a knight on a white horse, aiming a lance at people and whitening their clothes. “You tell Cody to keep an eye out. I believe these people know who I am, and I wouldn’t put it past them to try something.”
“What do you mean?”
He heard the shower shut off. “I mean keep an eye out.” He glanced out the window at the snow-covered parking lot. A car with smoke pouring from the tailpipe and bad shocks on the rear made him think of Tucker asleep in the cold yard and he grinned. “Hey, tell Cody to pick Tucker up next time he sees him.”
“Well, my stars, Ned. How come?”
“He’s running whiskey in the back of that car. That’s why it’s sittin’ low in the rear.”
“How do you know that?”
“I don’t for sure, but I have a good idea. He’ll know who took the still and it’ll lead back to Doak who I ’magine has it fired up already.”
“I never had no idea.”
“That’s because Tucker’s kinfolk.”
“What if you’re wrong?”
“Tell him I’m sorry, and to go get a real job so I won’t be suspicioning him, but I’m not.”
“All right. I’ll let you go. Ned, you be careful.”
“It seems like we have this conversation a little too often.”
“I was thinkin’ the same thin
g. I’ll keep prayin’ for you.”
Ned thought about the men and one woman they’d left dead. “We’re gonna need it.”
Chapter Seventy-four
Tom Bell flicked a speck off his black hat in the Holiday Inn and rested it upside down on top of the metal television cabinet. “You think this is a good idea?”
Ned stuck his index finger in the dial and spun it. “I do.”
“They can trace the call if you stay on long enough.”
“That’s what I’m hopin’ for.”
Tom glanced out the window at the nearly empty, snow-covered lot. Only one car was parked in front of the coffee shop less than fifty yards away. “Go ahead on, then.” He settled in the chair, lacing his fingers across his flat belly.
“I intend to.” He dialed the phone. “Yes, hello? This is Constable Ned Parker. I need to speak to a Mr. Gray who had a…whatta ya call it?…assignment in Center Springs Texas.”
He listened for a moment. “I know you don’t know who that is, or where Center Springs is, either. I intend to talk to your Mr. Gray right now, or I’m gonna drive over there and go through you to do it.”
Ned waited and nodded at Tom. He put one hand over the mouthpiece. “She’s seeing if anybody knows anything…hello?” He listened. “She’s transferring me.”
Ned tilted the phone and Tom Bell leaned in to listen. “To who?”
“Didn’t say.”
A male voice came through the earpiece. “Hello?”
“This is Constable Ned Parker.”
“That’s what my secretary said. How can I help you Mr. Parker?”
“So she already knew who I was calling, huh? Is your name Mr. Gray?”
“How can I help you, Constable?”
“That’s good enough for me. You were in Chisum and Center Springs a couple of weeks ago.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Yes you were, and some of your friends too. That crap you had Curtis Gaines spray from his airplane killed some folks, and made a bunch of others sick, some of my people.”
“Mr. Parker. I’m sure you don’t know much about the CIA or clandestine operations, but even if an operative went to Texas and did the things you say, they wouldn’t be talking with you on an open line. You never know who’s listening.”
“I’m listening. I want to know who you work for and what operative ordered you to do what you did.”
The man on the other end of the line laughed and Ned knew for a fact that the guy had been toying with him from the minute he picked up the receiver. “I don’t know what world you live in, but no one here is named Mr. Gray, and no one here will talk to you about your accusations or about who they work for, or with. Are you getting my message Mr. Parker?”
“I’m gettin’ pretty tired of your guff. I believe you’re responsible for those deaths or that little gal a minute ago wouldn’t have put you on the line. I intend to take you in. I’m coming to your office before the end of the day and putting you under arrest.”
“You can’t arrest me!” The voice laughed again. “This is ridiculous. You won’t even get through the gate. I don’t know why I’m even talking to you. I’m going to hang up now.”
“One of your men died in Austin.”
The line was silent. Ned met Tom Bell’s eyes.
“Four more were killed in a house yesterday. One was a woman.”
“I heard about four murders on the news. They say another was taken hostage. Do you know anything about that, Mr. Parker?”
Ned turned it back on him. “I heard something about it.”
“Did you do it?”
“I want to talk to you face-to-face.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“Then I’m coming through your front door, like I said.”
“You do that, and you’ll be arrested, badge or no badge.”
Ned figured they’d had enough time to trace the call. “I’ll be there in an hour.”
“Wait a minute.”
Ned paused.
“It’s snowing hard out there and the roads will be clogged. I don’t know how you got this number, because it isn’t published. You say you know where I am? Drive on in and give your name to the guard at the gate. I’ll make sure he lets you in. You’ve obviously gathered a lot of information, all of it incorrect. Let’s clear all this up. I have a previous appointment. Be here in three hours.”
“Fine. I’ll see you there.”
The call disconnected and the two lawmen studied each other across the motel room.
Tom Bell’s eyes were battle-bright. “They’ll be here before you know it.”
“I’m countin’ on it.”
Chapter Seventy-five
Joe Hill punched another line. “Did you get it?”
The voice on the other end was clipped, all business. “Just a minute. We’re working on it.”
Hill waited, knocking the dollop from his pipe into a glass ashtray and scraping the inside with a metal pick.
“Got it. Room Twelve at the Holiday Inn just across the line in Maryland.”
“Good.” He hung up and addressed the agent across the desk. “I want a team there in thirty minutes.”
The Italian-looking agent nodded. “Orders?”
“He killed our agents and kidnapped another. Neutralize him and anyone else. Do it personally.”
“Just exactly how do we recognize this guy?”
Hill’s desk phone rang. “Sixties, pot belly, cowboy hat. He’ll stand out. Leave the bodies there.”
“Yes sir. Then locate and eliminate Agent Carl Hanson. He’s going by the code name Mr. Brown. You know him by sight?”
Matt simply nodded.
“He’s become a threat and we can no longer trust him.”
“You’re talking about wet work. You know I’ve never personally done that kind of thing.”
“We all have to start somewhere, and I’ve been watching you. You’ll do fine.”
Chapter Seventy-six
Mr. Brown tracked through the snow in the Holiday Inn parking lot and pushed through the door into the coffee shop. He took a seat at a booth overlooking the two-story motel and Ned Parker’s red Plymouth Fury. He was confident that his time with the Company was over.
Guilty over what he’d done in Center Springs, he felt even worse after setting up the old men. Mr. Brown had hoped Mr. Gray would come out to the roadhouse with his team to settle with the Texans. He drove down the road and parked on a turnout, watching the agents when they arrived. Disappointed that Mr. Gray wasn’t with them, Mr. Brown drove back to the Gulf station and called the sheriff’s department to tell them that trouble was about to break out.
What followed was a shock. A man in a fedora arrived in an unmarked car and went inside. Twenty minutes later the parking lot was crawling with local police who hauled the four agents away in handcuffs.
He was surprised to see Parker and the other Texan emerge not long after, speak with a drunk woman in the parking lot, and take her home. Confused, Mr. Brown followed them to a row house in Alexandria and after what sounded like an intensive firefight, emerged with a wounded man.
He followed at a distance as they drove aimlessly through the streets before pulling into the Holiday Inn and renting a room. He almost laughed aloud when they dragged the apparently dead hostage from the backseat and put him in the trunk like luggage. Mr. Brown spent the night in the chilly car, running the engine only when the cold became unbearable.
He trailed them back to the row house the next morning, this time chuckling when they propped the body behind the wheel. Those two old men kept him in stitches. Torn between simply walking away to disappear forever or watching to see what came next, he waited to see this final act of the drama that had been playing out for days.
Ordering coffee in the warm café, he lit
a cigarette and watched the snow fall, thinking about where he’d come from and the jobs he’d been assigned since joining the Company. He didn’t mind the overseas work, but the truth was that he wanted to see this thing done, so he could walk away and divest himself of the guilt he carried after performing experimental warfare on American soil that took the lives of his fellow citizens.
He liked the idea of vanishing forever, thinking of the skimmed money he’d squirreled away in his offshore bank account, and the twenty thousand dollars in cash stowed in the trunk that would support him and his family on a warm Mexican beach for the rest of his life.
Chapter Seventy-seven
Agent Matt Matteo killed the engine of the 1965 Galaxie 500 after backing into a snowy parking slot at the edge of the two-story, L-shaped Holiday Inn. There were only a dozen snow-covered cars scattered in front of the rooms. Tire tracks crisscrossed the buried blacktop.
It was Matteo’s first “wet” assignment and he intended to do things right. He’d learned from the first team that got shot up in Alexandria not to take the two old men for granted.
Heavy snow fell as he studied the motel. Drapes darkened more than half of the rooms, while the occupants of several others had theirs opened to spill bright yellow light onto the exterior walkways on both the ground and second floors.
Agent Sammy Fontaine cracked the window, lit a cigarette, and studied the snow-covered cars. He was the only redhead in the department and often sported a sunburn in the summer months. Freckles spotted his nose, prompting the nickname Opie that he hated. “There’s Room Twelve.”
Matteo squinted. “Yep.” Room Twelve was on the little end of the L-shaped motel.
They studied the motel with rooms opening onto the parking lot. The metal balcony rails were thick with fallen snow. The heated swimming pool steamed in the cold air, but still looked slushy. The interior of the coffee shop on the corner glowed with warm, yellow light.
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