The Blight Way

  Tully smiled. “I appreciate Deedee’s generosity, but you can put all our meals on the county tab.”

  “Good,” Dave said. “I planned to, anyway.”

  Pap and Buck were digging into their chicken-frieds with all the gusto of persons on the brink of starvation. Tully studied them silently for a few moments. When he looked up, Dave was watching him and smiling.

  “You should feed these boys more often, Bo.”

  “I suppose,” Tully said, “but I’d kind of like to lean them down a bit.”

  “Ha!” Pap said. “I weigh exactly the same as I did in high school—one sixty-five.”

  They looked at Buck. He shook his head in refusal to comment on his weight.

  Pap wiped his mouth with a napkin. “You ever hear anything from Paul Cooper at Central Electric, Bo? Besides fishing?”

  “Yeah, I got some interesting information. Back during one of the country’s fuel shortages—I think it was back in the seventies—Congress passed a law that said the electric utility companies had to buy any power produced by private dams, solar panels, windmill farms and whatever. When Vern and his dad heard that, they went out and dammed up Last Hope Creek, one of half a dozen streams that run down out of the Hoodoos and through their property. He hooked up a generator—don’t ask me how, but Vern can do practically anything mechanical—and started selling electricity.”

  “I guess it didn’t pan out for him,” Dave said.

  “Oh, he has had some good years,” Bo said. “In a normal year, with the usual amount of rain and snow, he could make a hundred thousand off the dam.”

  Buck almost choked on his last mouthful of chicken-fried steak. “A hundred thousand!”

  “Sounds like a lot to us poor working stiffs, doesn’t it, Buck? But to Vern it was little more than a hobby.”

  “Yeah,” Pap said, “I expect any year he didn’t take in at least half a million on the ranch, he was slipping farther down the drain.”

  “Well, maybe he’ll do better on his grapes and winery,” Buck said. “At least grapes don’t eat.”

  “Or jump fences,” Tully added.

  Chapter 31

  As they were leaving the restaurant, Tully pulled Dave aside. “I need your services again.”

  “Same rate of pay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I may have to open that casino after all.”

  “See, Dave, I’ve got this theory that the three dead guys were set up by someone riding in the right rear seat. When the car came up to the berm, one shooter opened up on the front seat. The second shooter hesitated a couple of seconds to let the person in the right rear seat jump out. That hesitation gave Holt, the fellow who made it to Batim’s fence, time enough to get out the left rear door. He had his gun out and was shooting wildly. That pool of blood we found back in the woods could mean he may have hit somebody standing back there, maybe not another shooter but an observer. I’ve got a bad feeling that person was Vern Littlefield. He supposedly went off to his elk camp that night, but I suspect he didn’t.”

  Dave peeled the foil off a stick of Doublemint gum, wadded it up, poked it into his mouth and began to chew. “Cindy had me go up to Vern’s hunting camp and look for him, but all I found was his pickup truck. No Vern. There weren’t any signs he had even been there. I did have a problem figuring out how Holt could have got out of the car alive with all those bullets ripping through it. But you’re saying the rear seat wasn’t shot up until Holt was out of the car?”

  “That’s what I’m saying. We didn’t find any shell casings from Holt’s gun. So maybe he was using a revolver. Or maybe one of the shooters picked up the casings afterwards. I suspect it was just a matter of chance his random shooting connected with the person in the woods. But what I want you to do is go out to the scene and see if you can find any trees he might have hit. Maybe we can retrieve some of the slugs. If we do, that will help prove my theory.”

  “Phew!” Dave said. “This is a tough one. A bullet in a tree!”

  “Do what you can.”

  “So where do you want to meet? You could have supper back at the restaurant?”

  “No, I’ve brought some steaks and potatoes and stuff, and we’re going to camp out up along the river. You’re welcome to join us. I suspect there will be some sipping of whiskey around the campfire.”

  “Sounds good. But I don’t think my old back is up to sleeping on the ground. What do Pap and Buck think of your little plan?”

  “I haven’t told them.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  Chapter 32

  “We’re gonna do what?” Pap shouted.

  They were sitting around in chairs back at Ed’s gas station. Ed was out front servicing a car.

  “I knew you’d like it,” Tully said.

  “Nights get down to freezing,” Buck said. “I’ve got some big tarps, three good sleeping bags and a bunch of food in the back of my rig,” Tully said. “Plus a fifth of Bushmills to keep us warm. Of course, we could always go stay at the hotel.”

  “I ain’t never going back to that hotel,” Buck said. “I don’t care what nobody says, the place is haunted.”

  Pap started rolling himself a cigarette. “You ever figure out who you jumped in the hotel, Bo?”

  “Not for sure. I think it was Lem Scragg, though.”

  Pap paused in the act of licking his cigarette paper. “Lem Scragg! What would he be up there for? Figuring on killing us?”

  “I don’t think so. He seemed startled to find anybody else in the hotel.”

  “How about all the ghosts I saw coming down from the cemetery?” Buck said. “How about them?”

  “There weren’t any ghosts!” Tully said. “You dreamed them!”

  “They looked real enough to me. Gives me the creeps just thinking about ’em.”

  Ed came in wiping his hands on a rag. “What secrets you boys passing behind my back?”

  “No secrets,” Bo said. “I was just telling Pap and Buck my plan for us to camp out up along the river.”

  “Getting mighty cold these nights for camping out,” Ed said.

  “You hear that, Bo?” Buck said. “Even Ed thinks it’s too cold to be camping out.”

  “You ever see such a bunch of pantywaists in your life, Ed? No, we’re going to camp out, and that’s the end of it.”

  “You change your mind, Sheriff, I think me and my wife could manage to put you up at the house.”

  “Appreciate the offer, Ed, but the fellas and I are going to camp out. I don’t want to drag you any further into this investigation than is necessary.”

  “May already be too late, Bo. This station used to be the main communication center for Famine. Now all the gossip has suddenly all dried up. I haven’t picked up a single juicy rumor all week. Maybe it’s just my imagination, but it seems like the whole town is afraid something real bad is about to happen.”

  “Something real bad has already happened,” Tully said. “We’ve got three men shot to death.”

  Pap lit his cigarette. “You know, that was my impression, too, while Buck and me was out canvassing the town.” He picked a speck of tobacco off his tongue. “It seemed as if these people were scared to death of something, afraid anything they might say could get them involved in whatever this is. We didn’t find a single person who claimed to know anything, did we, Buck?”

  “Nope. They seemed real nervous, too. But, anyway, I think we should reconsider Ed’s offer to put us up for the night.”

  “Forget it!” Tully said. “You’re camping out!”

  Chapter 33

  Tully drove out onto a wooded bluff half a mile from the highway. The bluff overlooked the river. Buck pulled in behind him. Down below, the Blight River made a broad turn, cottonwoods lining a steep bank on the far side, a sandy beach protruding into the river on the near side. Tully had camped on the bluff as a teenager, and it wasn’t one of his fonder memories. It didn’t look as if anyone had camped there since.

  �
��Here’s the program,” he told Pap and Buck as they climbed out of the other Explorer. “Pap, you build us a fire pit with some rocks. Buck, you get us a night’s supply of firewood, and I’ll unload the camp gear.”

  Pap and Buck went to work with a distinct lack of enthusiasm, but soon they had the camp set up and the fire crackling away. Tully and Buck moved a couple of log sections over to the fire for seats.

  “So what’s for supper?” Buck asked. “It better be good.”

  “It is good,” Tully said. “Nothing better. Rib steak grilled over an open fire. Also, I’m slicing up potatoes, alternating the potato slices with onion slices, putting a dollop of butter on each and wrapping each up in foil to roast.”

  “Reminds me of Boy Scouts,” Buck said.

  “You sure those sleeping bags are warm enough for out here?” Pap said, hunching down into his mackinaw.

  “Supposed to be good all the way down to twenty below.”

  “Might serve. Where’d you get them, anyway?”

  “County bought them. Supposed to be part of the search-and-rescue operation I started.”

  “Rescued anybody yet?”

  “One crabby old fellow who claimed he wasn’t lost, just spending the night out in the snow. We hauled him in, and he groused every inch of the way. Turned out the old nut often spent nights out there in the snow, but it was good practice for us anyway.”

  “I hear it’s better to stay lost than to have Blight County Search and Rescue find you,” Pap said.

  “Some of the boys are a little wild,” Tully said. “But all in all I think it’s better for folks to be found.”

  Buck spread out the tarps on three sides of the fire and started unrolling a sleeping bag on each. “These the same bags we used last night?” Pap said.

  “Yeah, first time they were used. My crew of search-and-rescuers aren’t dedicated enough to spend a night out when they’re looking for someone.”

  Pap laughed. “You ever have to search for somebody, it’ll probably be for Buck.”

  “That’s all you know, Pap,” Buck said. “I’ve been running around these mountains my whole life and ain’t never been lost once.”

  Darkness had slipped up out of the valley below. Tully was cooking the steak on a hand-held grill, using one of his leather gloves for a pot holder. He could no longer see the color of the steak, so he had Buck grab him a flashlight out of the Explorer. He shined the light on the grill and realized the flashlight had arrived just in time. He put on his other glove, grabbed the foil packages one by one and dropped them on the aluminum plates being held out to him by Buck and Pap.

  “Smells pretty good,” Pap said, opening his package. “Didn’t know you could cook so good, Bo.”

  “Only over an open fire.”

  “So what’s for dessert?” Buck asked, forking a chunk of steak into his mouth.

  “Bushmills.”

  After supper they sat around poking the fire with sticks and sipping whiskey. It was times like this Tully wished he had taken up pipe smoking, maybe a nice corncob. Ginger had always been dead set against his smoking anything, even the occasional cigar. “You’ll live a whole lot longer, Bo,” she had said. So far he had outlived Ginger by nearly ten years.

  Bit by bit the fire died down. Tully threw on a couple more logs, and it blazed up again. Several cars full of high school kids pulled in next to the beach down below. They howled and yelled and played their music at deafening levels until almost midnight. Tully was about ready to drive down and send them all home, when he heard someone scrambling up through the brush from below. Two teenage girls stumbled out on top of the bluff. They walked over and looked down at Pap in his sleeping bag.

  “We’re cold,” one of them said.

  “Freezing,” said the other.

  “Unzip that sleeping bag, old man, and let us slip in beside you and get warm.”

  “Yeah, mister, let us get warmed up a bit.”

  Tully had had enough. “You girls get away from that old man and leave him alone. Scat out of here before I arrest the whole bunch of you.”

  The girls looked over and saw the light bars on the Explorers. They ran off down the bluff screaming and giggling. Suddenly, down below, the music stopped and car engines roared to life. Silence at long last settled back over the valley.

  Then out of the darkness Pap growled, “Won’t you ever learn to mind your own business, Bo?”

  Chapter 34

  By early morning, it was snowing. Buck awoke Pap and Tully by yelling one of his ten-letter obscenities.

  Tully peeked out from under his blue plastic tarp, half of which, like Buck and Pap, he had folded over his sleeping bag. He shuddered. “At least you were warm and cozy all night in your twenty-below sleeping bag, Buck.”

  Pap groaned. “I’m too old for this. I need something between me and the hard, cold ground. Like a couple floors of a nice hotel.”

  Tully thought he should respond to the comment with a laugh, but wasn’t up to it. He ached all over. Too bad Pap and Buck hadn’t had enough sense between them to talk him out of this stupid idea.

  “Okay, okay, stop complaining,” Tully told them. “I’ll take you to the House of Fry for breakfast.”

  “You call that a bribe?” Pap said. “The House of Fry is killing me.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Buck said.

  Already the snow was turning to rain. It would be piling up in the mountains, though. Tully thought of the Cliff kid. If the snow didn’t bring him down, he would have to go get him. If Vern Littlefield was up there chasing elk, it would bring him down, too.

  They rolled up the sleeping bags and tossed them in the back of Tully’s Explorer. Then they shook as much rain off the blue tarps as they could and folded them up and stashed them away. The cooler still contained half a bottle of Bushmills, several cans of soda and most of the ice. He could have forgotten the ice.

  There was always something particularly miserable about breaking camp in the rain. Perhaps for the first time in his life, Tully looked forward to the warmth and roar of talk and laughter at the House of Fry. And the smell of hot grease.

  Pap rode with him back to the restaurant, working most of the time on rolling himself a cigarette. “Hands are so dang cold from camping out I can’t make my fingers work right.”

  “Stop complaining,” Tully said.

  “My birthday was several days ago. Are we still celebrating?”

  “Sure, doesn’t it feel like it? I sometimes forget that you’ve turned into a senior citizen.”

  “I hate being called that. Besides, I’m as good as I ever was. Better than you by far.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You want me to give you a for-instance? How about women? If you knew as much about women as I do, you wouldn’t be forever having so many problems with them.”

  “Let me see if I remember this correctly. I seem to recall a fellow a number of years ago who ran naked out the back door of a house and climbed over a board fence while the lady of the house stood in the doorway and shot at him with his own thirty-eight revolver.”

  “I seem to recall a situation vaguely similar,” Pap said, smiling. “I think the lady’s name was Mo. For Maureen. She was one terrific gal, as I recall, and a wonderful shot, too. She grazed me across the ribs with one round. Stung like heck. If she hadn’t been such a good shot, she might have killed me.”

  “Maybe Mo was a bad shot,” Tully said. “Did you ever think of that?”

  “Nope, I never did.”

  All the trees around Dave’s House of Fry dripped with melting snow as Tully pulled into the parking lot. Oddly, the parking lot was nearly empty.

  Chapter 35

  They slid into a booth at the House of Fry.

  “Uh-oh,” said Tully. “No Deedee today. Not here to fuss over old codgers.”

  “You must think I’m as woman-starved as you,” Pap said. “Fact is, I can take them or leave them alone.”

  “Is that your sec
ret?” Buck said.

  “Mind your own business,” Pap said. “Besides, I can’t be giving pointers to a young fella like you. Bo would probably arrest me.”

  “I probably would,” Tully said.

  They ordered the pancakes, with sides of eggs, bacon and hash browns.

  “One or two pancakes?” the waitress said.

  “Two, of course,” Pap said. “How come you always ask?”

  “Dave makes us ask, because the pancakes are so big. He doesn’t like to waste food, even if the customer is paying for it.”

  “It won’t be wasted,” Buck said. “The boss here has had us camping out for a week and we’re starving.”

  “Camping out? In this weather? The sheriff must be a lot meaner than I’ve heard.” She gave Tully a big smile.

  He checked her out more thoroughly. Not bad. A bit plumper than Deedee, but not bad. Probably already in love with him. He gave her his warm look and was thinking of something to say when Dave walked over and slid into the booth.

  “You okay, Bo?” he said.

  “Yes, I’m okay!”

  “Don’t get sore. You just looked a little odd there for a moment.”

  “Did you do what I asked you to do?” Tully said.

  “Don’t I always?”

  “I guess. Find anything?”

  “As a matter of fact, I did. All right to share it with these two galoots?”

  “Yeah, they’re a couple of blabbermouths, but go ahead.”

  “I checked every tree that might have been hit and found one bullet hole. I dug it out with my knife. Don’t worry, I was careful not to scratch it.” He handed Tully the bullet, wrapped up in a handkerchief. “It looks to me like a forty-five caliber.”

  “You find any shell casings?”

  “Not a one. The ambushers must have picked them up, but you’d think they would have missed at least one.”

  Tully unwrapped the handkerchief and looked at the slug. “Could be a forty-five, all right,” he said. “My theory gets better all the time.”

  “At least it would if we had Holt’s gun,” Pap said.