Past Dying (The Alan Graham Mysteries)

by Malcolm Shuman

  It wasn’t somebody with a case of road rage.

  I reached into the glove box for my cellular phone.

  The headlights behind me blinked from low to high beam and back. He wanted me to stop.

  The hell I would.

  I was fumbling to turn on the phone, so I could punch in *LSP, the emergency number of the State Police, when the lights behind me blazed into blue and red and a siren wail caused me to swerve across the center line.

  A cop had seen us, was calling for him to pull over …

  No. He was the cop …

  If I stopped, who knew what might happen? And if I kept going I’d get slammed for trying to escape.

  Digger was growling nonstop now, and I had a vision of Chaney Reilly explaining how he’d been confronted by a vicious dog, and how he’d had to shoot to protect himself.

  I eased off the accelerator.

  “It’s okay, boy. I can handle it.”

  Digger didn’t look like he believed it and I didn’t, either.

  I glided onto the shoulder, shifted into neutral, and waited.

  A shadow passed over my outside mirror and I tensed. Whoever it was had gotten out of the car.

  Headlights whipped by on the highway and I wished someone would pull over, anybody who might be a witness, but they kept going, giving us a wide berth.

  I slowly rolled down my window and then placed my hands on the steering wheel, in sight.

  “Steady, Digger.”

  Footsteps crunched on the shoulder and I turned my head. He was standing just left of the driver’s side, but I couldn’t make out his face.

  Now he was coming forward again.

  If he was from Lordsport he was outside his parish. I could tell him he had no jurisdiction.

  Sure.

  He stopped beside my open window and bent down.

  “Alan, you’re a hard man to catch.”

  I looked up, saw Jeff Scully’s face, and slumped back against the seat.

  ELEVEN

  “You son-of-a-bitch,” I said.

  “Yeah, I know. They told me you called and I saw you as you were leaving town just now. But I didn’t want to stop you in the parish because somebody would see it.”

  “And tell Chaney Reilly.”

  “He’s got eyes everywhere.”

  “So what’s going on at your cabin?”

  He looked surprised. “Nothing. The man’s full of crap. I hope you don’t believe him.”

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  “Is there anything else?” I asked. “Or am I just supposed to sit here like a criminal the rest of the night?”

  “I was hoping there was some word on the coin.”

  I told him what Pepper had said. “We’re going to talk to a dealer in Port Gibson. He may have a line on collectors in this area. Or if anybody bought some silver pieces lately. Collectors tend to network. In the meantime, why don’t you go back over all the bulletins you’ve gotten in the last year or two for burglaries in other parishes? It may be listed as part of some haul. You might not have paid any attention to it at the time.”

  Jeff nodded. “True. And the chief deputy usually checks those, anyway. I’ll go over them myself this time.”

  I reached for the hand brake. “I’ll let you know what we find out. If you want the piece back …”

  He shook his head. “No. Keep it for now. I don’t trust it not to get lost from the property room.”

  “Things that bad?”

  He nodded. “Chaney wouldn’t think twice about getting something out of the evidence room if it suited him.”

  “Don’t you keep the room locked?”

  “Alan, I’ve got fifteen deputies. It’s not hard to get a key.”

  “Okay. We’ll hold it a little while longer.”

  “Thanks.”

  I released the hand brake and put my hand on the gear shift.

  “Alan, there’s one more thing.”

  I groaned under my breath. “What?”

  He was shoving an envelope in my direction. “Keep this,” he said. “Use it if you have to.”

  “What is it?”

  “Look inside.”

  I did.

  “No way,” I told him. “I don’t even know if this is legal.”

  “It’s legal,” he said.

  “Jeff, I’m an archaeologist …”

  “And you know how to dig things up. Including historic facts. You can check court records, do interviews, put things together.”

  “That’s different.” I thrust the envelope back at him but he held up his hands, palms outstretched.

  “You have to,” he said. “Please.”

  I shook my head. “This is the damndest thing I ever saw.” I dropped the envelope on the seat beside me.

  “I need you,” he said.

  “Good night, Jeff.” I eased out onto the highway, leaving him standing there in the glare of his own lights.

  When I reached the Sandbar her white Integra was already in the lot. The restaurant was located a block off the four-lane, in sight of the bridge, and I found a quiet place to leash Digger. I opened a can of dog food for him and dumped it into a small plastic dish I carried.

  “Guard the vehicle,” I said.

  I went up the steps into the wooden building. The smell of fish frying hit me like a club and I felt my salivary glands go into overload. I told the receptionist I was there to meet somebody and she showed me through the mostly empty dining room to a second room on the left.

  Pepper was smiling at me from a booth, a plate of fried onions in front of her.

  “Draft beer, seafood platter,” I told the receptionist, who smiled and hurried off to get a waitress.

  “Don’t I get a hello?” Pepper asked as I slid into the place opposite her.

  I reached over and took her hand. “You get whatever you want,” I said. “Now or later.”

  “I’ll settle for doing what’s on your mind later,” she said. “If you’re over your mad.”

  “You’re a hard woman,” I said.

  She reached under the table. “And you’re a hard man.”

  “I’m a hungry man,” I said, grabbing an onion ring. My beer came and I took a deep swallow, savoring the taste.

  “Well, the place hasn’t changed,” I said, stretching. “Even down to the placemats. Is that why you wanted to meet here?”

  The restaurant was named after the Vidalia Sandbar, an island on the Mississippi side of the river where duels had been held in the last century. The most notable had been in 1827, between two Louisiana factions from Rapides Parish, and in the melee a knife fighter named Jim Bowie had made a name for himself by stabbing a man called Norris Wright to death. Now you could dine in elegance and read about the famous brawl on the placemats.

  “Seemed appropriate,” Pepper admitted. “By the way, what’s the situation with the librarian?”

  “Still missing,” I said and told her about Jeff’s stopping me on the highway. “I have a funny feeling about the guy.”

  “Stress,” Pepper said. “Plus, you’re special to him. He probably really doesn’t know how to deal with you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You know how you are with Sam? You’re friends but he’s also your mentor. You joke with him but you really look at him more as a father. I imagine Jeff feels that way about you.”

  “Father?” I snorted. “I’m not that much older than he is.”

  “It’s enough,” she said. “He probably feels he has to please you and at the same time he needs your help, because you’re the guy who can do anything, fix anything.”

  “That scares hell out of me,” I said, grabbing another onion. “By the way, how’s Sam?”

  Pepper hesitated.

  “What is it?” I demanded.

  “Libby put him in the hospital,” she said.

  “She what?”

  Her hand came over to hold my own. “They’re doing some tests. She thought he needed to r
est anyway. I’m sure it’s all right.”

  “I ought to be there.”

  “What could you do?”

  “Just be there,” I said. “In case.”

  “What about Jeff?”

  “Jeff can handle himself. I got taken in at first by the good old boy act, but he’s not nearly as helpless as he’s tried to make me believe. Sometimes I think he’s really pulling all the strings himself. Now, Sam …”

  “Sam’s being taken care of. I’ll check on him tomorrow. Besides, he’d want you to see this through.”

  Our plates came and I grabbed a hush puppy.

  “Jeff asked about the silver piece,” I told her between bites. “Do you have it in your car?”

  She shook her head. “No. It’s right here.”

  She glanced around the room to see if anyone else was looking our way and opened her handbag.

  “So who’s our expert?” I asked.

  “His name is Hightower. He runs an antique gun, knife, and coin store in Port Gibson. I e-mailed him a scan of the thing and he said he’d look at it if we could come up and see him. I thought we could drive up tomorrow morning.”

  We took a room at the Natchez Ramada, on a high bluff overlooking the river. I closed Digger in the bathroom and then turned toward the bed.

  “You don’t want to go down to the riverboat and play poker?” Pepper asked coyly, standing in the half light, hands on her hips. “I thought we could take a tour.”

  “Around the world,” I said, reaching for her.

  “You’re ambitious.” She came into my arms. “But, like they say in poker, put up or shut up.”

  “Enough about poker,” I declared.

  “Then will you settle for poking?”

  I did.

  The next morning, after a breakfast of waffles and eggs, we made arrangements to leave Pepper’s car in the motel lot, checked out, and, with Digger in the backseat, drove up to Port Gibson. A quiet, shady little town with almost as many historical plaques as people, Port Gibson didn’t seem to have changed much since Grant had shelled it in the Civil War. The streets had been paved, there were electric lines and cars, but gentility still suffused the place like an after-bath lotion.

  The shop was one street back from the highway, a pecan tree-shaded house in the Greek Revival style with a hanging wooden sign that said ANTIQUES. We left Digger in the Blazer and went up the walk to the front door, which had a sign that said OPEN.

  The interior had been turned into a series of showrooms, with one holding antique pistols, rifles, and lead balls; another holding knives and swords; and one containing ancient coins, all in polished wooden cases with clear glass. On the walls were oil paintings of men in martial regalia and several old flags from different periods in the short history of the Confederacy. As I took it all in I half expected Jefferson Davis to step out of the hallway, but instead the man who came out was slight, beardless, and completely bald. He wore a maroon vest and a dark red tie with a ruby stickpin. He smelled heavily of cologne and had lively brown eyes that seemed to be assessing us.

  Pepper told him her name and he smiled.

  “So good to meet you both,” he said, offering me a soft hand with three rings on the fingers. “I’m Clovis Hightower. May I offer you some tea or coffee?”

  Pepper smiled. “That would be nice.”

  Clovis Hightower showed us down the hallway into what had once been a parlor but was now clearly a room for entertaining his clients. He gestured to a sofa that I guessed was Queen Anne.

  “So what will it be?” he asked.

  We gave him our orders and he returned a few minutes later with a silver service and let us each sweeten our coffee and add cream. Then he set the tray down and took a seat opposite us, carefully hiking up his pants legs.

  “I was very interested in your coin,” he said. “Weapons are my special hobby but I also collect coins from the colonial and antebellum eras. I’ve been in this business twenty-one years. It started as a hobby, metal detecting for Civil War relics and then trading at shows and on the Internet.” He handed us his card. “Do you have the artifact with you?”

  Pepper nodded, delved into her bag, and placed a small tissue-wrapped object on the table. Hightower leaned over, and I thought of a spider about to spring on its prey. He whipped on a pair of latex gloves, and then his thin fingers shot to the tissue. He unwrapped and lifted the tiny wedge.

  “Ahhh,” he sighed, turning it over in his hands. “You found it in an archaeological excavation?”

  “In a river, actually,” I said.

  “Really. A pillar peso, no doubt about it. Mexico City mint. Too bad it was cut up. It might have been worth something.”

  “You’ve never seen this particular piece before?” I asked.

  The dealer frowned. “Not in this condition. There’s no market for quartered silver pesos.”

  “Are there any people in Cane River Parish, Louisiana, that you’ve dealt with?” I asked.

  “Cane River Parish? You mean over near Simmsburg?” He shook his head. “No. Now, I bought a Confederate sword from a man in Alexandria a few months ago. And I sold a Schively Bowie to a man in Winnsboro—no, I take that back, it was Winnfield.”

  “A Schively Bowie?” Pepper asked.

  “Yes. Henry Schively was a cutler in Philadelphia during the antebellum period. Jim’s brother, Rezin, had Schively make several fancy Bowie knives to his own specifications and gave them to his friends.”

  “But no coins. Nobody came in and bought, say, a handful of silver coins.”

  “I don’t sell coins by the handful. And I can’t say that I would sell to someone who approached me in that manner.” He sniffed. “Can you be more specific about what you’re trying to find out? I could help you better if you explained.”

  “This was found at a murder scene,” Pepper said. “It may have been part of a fake treasure trove. We thought you might know where a person could buy a bunch of these if he wanted to run a scam.”

  “Ahhh. Now I see.” Hightower scratched an ear. “Well, I don’t know of anyone in that geographic area. But you know, there is another possibility.”

  “Yes?” I said.

  “People do find treasures. This could be a part of a genuine treasure trove.”

  I nodded. “Well, thank you for your time, Mr. Hightower.”

  He gave a quick little smile and followed us toward the door.

  “I’d give you twenty dollars for it,” he said. “If you’re inclined to sell.”

  “I think we’ll hold on to it,” I told him, shaking his hand.

  “Fifty,” he said. “But that’s as high as I can go.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Hightower.”

  We left him tisking and walked back to the Blazer.

  “Do you think he’s telling the truth?” Pepper asked.

  “About what?”

  “Anything. He seemed pretty eager to get his hands on something he said was worthless. Do you think he could be lying?”

  “That’s stretching it,” I said.

  “I agree.” She got in and I slid behind the wheel. “But I was watching his eyes when he saw it. There was something there, almost like, well, lust …”

  “Sure he wasn’t looking at you?”

  She jabbed me with an elbow. “You know what I mean.”

  “Sure,” I said, releasing the hand brake and starting the engine. “The man’s a collector. It’s called enthusiasm.”

  “I’m not so sure.”

  She had the coin fragment out now and was turning it over in her hands as if an answer might emerge if she turned it just the right way.

  “Well, take it on back to Baton Rouge with you and lock it up,” I said.

  “I’m surprised you trust me to take it back by myself.” She laughed.

  “You aren’t going to be by yourself,” I said. “I’m sending along a guard.”

  “What?”

  “Digger,” I said. “He’s better than Brinks Armored.”
/>   “And more personable than some archaeologists I know,” she said.

  I couldn’t argue with that one.

  TWELVE

  We had lunch in Natchez and then parted, she taking Highway 61 back down to Baton Rouge, and I heading back west over the river into Louisiana again. The sky had cleared somewhat, showing patches of blue, but the air outside was still as sharp as a knife blade.

  I wasn’t sure I wanted to return to Lordsport. I was out of my depth, trying to wend my way through small-town politics. And something told me that things could get worse.

  As I approached the parish line, just south of Carter Crossing, I saw a sheriff’s cruiser parked under a pecan tree. Five seconds after I passed he slid out onto the road and came up behind me with his flashers on.

  Now what?

  I didn’t know the deputy but he greeted me by name.

  “Dr. Graham, sorry to have to stop you, sir, but Judge Galt asked if you could come talk to him.”

  “Judge Galt?”

  “Yes, sir. He lives just right up here in Carter Crossing.” I shrugged. “What the hell?”

  Carter Crossing is a dome of rock from the last ice age that thrusts out of the surrounding lowlands. In its forests, in 1731, the Natchez fought a last, losing battle against the French. Since then, the forests had been felled and the area used for cotton and cattle. The owners now were old aristocracy. Men like Judge Galt.

  The deputy led me right at the caution signal in the center of the tiny settlement and up Highway 15, toward Winnsboro, but five miles on, at a crossroads that wasn’t much more than a convenience store and a cotton gin, we turned left, onto Highway 621, and headed southwest. Ahead were the green hills of the game preserve and I realized that if I kept going, I’d pass the place where Luther and I had turned off into the hills; the road connected with Highway 20, the main route between Lordsport and Carter Crossing, and Luther and I had approached it from the other end.

  We hadn’t quite reached the hills, though, when the deputy turned left onto a dirt road that led back through pasture land. After half a mile a white board fence appeared on either side of the road. In the distance a house loomed against the fields, its classical columns and elliptical arches hinting at a bygone way of life. On one side someone had added a tower that stuck up like a phallus.