by Shannon Hill
I thanked him, retrieved Boris, and strolled down the street to my shiny new cruiser. I saw Davis Collier standing outside his café, fussing with the placement of the two tiny round glass tables and their matching chairs. I waved. He didn’t wave back.
***^***
I got back to Crazy in time for the picnic. Let me tell you, a picnic is no fun for a vegetarian in our town. It was all barbecue and ribs and hamburgers, and those cloying potato and pasta salads that even the bugs avoid. I shared a tiny bag of chips with Boris, who drowsed under a table where it was a few degrees cooler but no less humid.
Travis Murray had provided a couple of kegs to counteract the lemonade and iced tea the church ladies had brought. I took some iced tea and regretted it. I may be Virginia born and bred, but I never have learned to like my iced tea with roughly two tablespoons of sugar per glass. I dumped it on a bush hoping I wasn’t committing herbicide, and started patrolling the perimeter. Boris stayed in the shade. Smart kitty.
I’d expected to see Eddie Brady but Tom tipped me that Eddie and his buddies were drinking at home. That was one less problem. Then I saw Heather Shifflett with her backpack. If she didn’t end up in jail, she’d make a hell of a mural artist, but not today. I confiscated the cans of spray paint, reminded her that she needed to ask permission before she beautified property, and shooed her back to her dad and little brother. She went, sulking, until Darren Mitchell popped over to talk to her. I let her dad handle that.
The turnout was pretty good for such a miserably steamy day. Spottswood Park isn’t much—a few acres of wooded land with a rough grassy clearing, squished up between Spottswood Lane and Main where it turns into Madison Pike—but Elk Creek runs through it, and plenty of people were wading to take the edge off the heat. Across the road, the fire department was setting up for the fireworks. Hugh Rush, the VFD chief, only used the kind of fireworks you could buy at a roadside stand, but that man could do things with colored lights and a smoke machine that made the display seem a lot bigger than it was. Not too far from him I saw Tom and Kim manning the coolers of water and sports drinks. I saw Jack Littlepage, too, conversing awkwardly with Aunt Marge and Roger, as they stood in line at the condiments table. No sign of any Ellers unless you counted me. At a guess, I’d say two-thirds of the town was there.
That meant I had better cruise the streets to be sure the other third wasn’t up to something.
I tucked Boris carefully into his cat-seat once the air conditioning had kicked in, and eased on down Main Street. All quiet. I waved to a few people who were sitting on porches, but it looked like everyone not at the picnic had taken refuge indoors. I couldn’t blame them. We get heat, sure, but this was record-breaking. You could hear the asphalt melting.
I’d settled into my cruising mentality when I realized it was getting very dark. I checked my watch. Definitely not sunset. I checked the sky. Black and gray clouds, piling up fast. I hate those kinds of storms. They build up their strength, then jump the mountains. One minute, the thunder’s a distant rumble; the next, you’re running for it. I just hoped there wouldn’t be any hail until everyone got home. Pea-sized stings, but when it gets to about hickory-nut-sized, you’ll see some bruises.
It probably sounds foolish, but I sped back to the park. Elk Creek flash floods frequently, and turns parts of the park into a swamp, but that never stops people from being idiots. When I got there, I saw Hugh Rush and Tom were already sending people home. I reinforced the message by parking my cruiser by the little bridge and keeping my lights flashing. When I stepped out, careful to leave Boris safely in the car, I could hear a lot of angry mutters even over the distant thunder. Tom looked placid, but I could see he was irritated by his stance, and Hugh was plainly impatient.
“Anyone think to check the weather?” I asked Tom when I joined him.
“Mr. Love came over.” Thomas Love lived on Spottswood Lane. He was one of our favorite people. He never broke the law. “Radar looks pretty scary.”
I scowled. “They said only thirty-forty percent chance this morning.”
Tom’s smile slid sideways. “Things change. I guess that front’s coming through early.”
I had to physically drag Jack Shiflet out of the creek. He reeked of beer. Little Dylan Spivey decided to pitch a tantrum up a tree, so I had to climb up and get him for his mother, who was nearly crying from aggravation, and I pretended not to see when he got a swat on the behind for slapping her. Tom got into a shouting match with Joe Brady, who insisted he knew better than any old radar what kind of weather we’d get, and wouldn’t get up from the picnic table. Bobbi and Raj ambled off hand-in-hand, so sickly-syrupy in love that I was tempted to ask Hugh to give them a shot from the fire hose. Josie Shifflett fell three times on her way to her car, and I sent her home on foot, her husband Ron apologizing to me in between her curses.
All in all, business as usual.
The storm popped over the mountain maybe five minutes later. I drove carefully along Main, keeping my lights flashing and my spotlight on to help people see through the sudden downpour. Lightning danced all along the mountaintops. Thunder boomed so close that Boris scrambled into my lap and then under my seat. I slowed the cruiser even more, wincing as a tree branch whipped past my windshield. At Bare Road, I turned around and slipped back down Main at a crawl. I finally made it to the office, and sat in the parking lot watching pea-sized hail bounce off the hood. Boris emerged from hiding, huddling on my lap like a kitten. I yawned and settled in for a quick nap. If I knew Crazy, everyone would flock back to the park for fireworks the moment the sky cleared. I’d better rest while I could.
A hard thump on the car woke me. I blinked and stretched, gave myself a good shake. The rain had subsided to a drizzle, and mist was curling up from the pavement, along the treetops. It reminded me of stories Aunt Marge would tell me when I was small, about storm-wraiths and rain-fairies. But what really held my attention was the shotgun in Jeff Collier’s hands.
12.
You want a wake-up call, seeing the wrong end of a shotgun will do it. It’s also a good incentive to move to a state with gun ownership laws a hell of a lot stricter than Virginia’s. Maybe another country, even.
In the movies and on TV, someone shows up to save the day. Or the hero of the story pulls some improbable trick. Too bad real life isn’t like TV and the movies. I just sat there. My fingers were frozen in Boris’s fur. I had one good clear thought: If this guy killed my cat, I’d haunt his ass till the end of time.
Then Jeff Collier peered closer, and his shoulders relaxed, and he put the shotgun on the hood of my car, turning it so the barrel faced him.
I still don’t remember getting out of the car, or how I got him in handcuffs. I just know one minute, I’m in the car, and the next, he’s facedown in a mud puddle. Spitting out dirty water and tiny gravel. “I thought you were county!” he said wetly.
For that insult, I let my knee stay in the small of his back a couple seconds longer. “Wrong,” I snarled, and hauled him up. Adrenaline’s fabulous at times like that. I felt like Superman as I marched him into the office and read him his rights. When Tom walked in a few moments later, and saw Jeff Collier in a cell, his jaw dropped. “Where’d he come from?”
I kept scrubbing myself dry with paper towels. “I’m gonna find out. The park flooded?”
“Yeah, but Hugh says they can do the fireworks over at the elementary school parking lot.” Tom fidgeted, eyes going from Jeff to me to the shotgun on my desk. “You okay? You got all mud on you.”
“I’m fine,” I said, and hid my shaking by grabbing the phone. “I’ll let Aunt Marge know about the fireworks, she’ll see everyone hears.”
“What about him?” asked Tom.
I took a deep breath. I had a lot of questions for Jeff Collier, but I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to ask them. “He can wait. Give him some scrubs. I’ll tell Kim’s mom to bring over some food for him.”
I turned my back to make the phone c
all to Aunt Marge. I was thinking a lot of things, but mostly I was trying to figure out why Jeff Collier looked so happy to be in my jail.
***^***
The fireworks went off without a hitch, and finished up about ten minutes before another storm rolled through. The rain was a blessing. It kept the drunks inside, so I could go home. I dragged myself to bed and slept so hard that even Boris demanding breakfast couldn’t wake me up. It took Aunt Marge spritzing me with water from her plant mister. Even then, I was moving at about the speed of snail. Lucky for me it was Sunday. Nobody would be up to see that I wasn’t.
Tom was waiting when I finally got to the office around eight. He’d spent the night, and looked more rumpled than Jeff Collier. They were finishing up the hard-boiled eggs and biscuits Kim’s mother had dropped off, and talking about fishing.
Normally we interviewed people in the lunchroom, but I wasn’t feeling all that motivated. I pulled a chair over and sat down with my notepad on my knee. Boris finished his morning butt-wash and jumped onto the chair Tom meant for himself. Resigned, Tom got a third chair and straddled it.
“Jeff,” I said, “I gotta tell you, I am worn out. So let’s start simple. Why’d you run?”
Jeff looked relieved I hadn’t started with something harder. “Got scared. I was taking out the trash, and all I see is Colliers in handcuffs.” He shrugged, and turned red. “I freaked out. Took off up the mountain.”
Tom raised his eyebrows. “You been up on the mountains this whole time?”
I shifted so I could see Boris’s tail. It stayed curved along his body.
“Pretty much,” said Jeff. “I got back in the house to get some food, but I’ve been roughing it. Then yesterday, I mean day before yesterday, I snuck on home, and I saw all my brothers and all back home again like nothing was wrong.” His hands moved strangely in mid-air. “I figured by now you’d know which one killed Mama.”
I flushed. I knew I was being silly, not that it stopped me.
“Sorry,” Jeff muttered. “I just meant.. I mean…”
Tom intervened. “All right, you’re home, you see everyone, and…”
“I asked Davis what was going on. He said he doesn’t know, nobody’s talking to him. He even tried talking to Honey, that’s how bad it is. Even Laura hung up on him.” Jeff shrugged, half-smiling. “I figured my chances weren’t any better, but I tried talking to Rob. We usually get along okay. He slammed the door on me.” Jeff scowled. “He had that look he used to get when Mama was on him about something. Like he wasn’t happy doing it but he wasn’t going to do anything else.”
That was interesting but not terribly relevant to my purposes. I went for the direct approach. “How’d you come to point a shotgun at me?”
It was Jeff’s turn to go red. He suddenly couldn’t look in my direction. “I got nervous. Davis said he was worried they were going to blame this all on him or me or both. Well, I was getting the same idea. So I thought maybe I should turn myself in. Only when I tried, down in Gilfoyle…” His gesture this time was easily understood. “They tried to kill me. Shot at me!”
Tom swelled up with outrage even faster than I did. “The county boys shot at you? In town? With civilians around?”
Jeff Collier nodded. “I was walking down the street, and I was maybe half a block away from the police station, and all of a sudden I hear someone hollering, ‘Hey, he’s wanted for murder!’, and I see this fat guy…”
I didn’t quite groan. Chief Rucker strikes again.
“And then someone’s shooting at me.”
Boris’s tail lay quiet. He was washing a paw, utterly unconcerned. Either he trusted Jeff Collier, or Aunt Marge was right, and his tail wasn’t worth a damn as a lie detector.
“I ran like hell and I figured you wouldn’t shoot first and ask questions later.” He scratched nervously at his stubble. “I didn’t know the car, I thought it was a county cop waiting for me, I am really, really sorry about that.”
Boris looked up, tongue protruding, then went back to his toilette.
Tom cleared his throat and tried to look intimidating. “Where’d you get the shotgun?”
“It’s mine,” replied Jeff. If he was lying, I couldn’t tell, and if he was nervous or guilty, he was hiding it better than most. “I didn’t think I should be going around…Well, hell, I didn’t think. I just didn’t want the county cops…I just thought…” More anxious scratching. Finally he looked incredibly hangdog and said, “I’m a Collier. Someone shoots at me, I guess I gotta shoot back. Y’know?”
We did know. I looked at Tom. We nodded slightly. I turned back to Jeff Collier. “What about Buck and Marilee?”
“What about them?” he immediately responded, then hastily amended, “I mean, they’re not even here. They didn’t even come to the funeral.” He tried to smile, and failed spectacularly. “Look, I know this is bad, and I’ve been stupid, but I didn’t kill Mama. I didn’t even hate Mama. I just…” He turned pinkish again. “I avoided her. It was easier.”
I looked at Tom, and he smiled a little. “Jeff, I got to ask. The name ‘Grenville’ ring any bells?”
“Who?”
“It’s a what,” I said gently. “Worth about a million dollars.”
He looked from me to Tom, and back again. “What?”
“Grenville is land,” said Tom. “Your mother owned it.”
Jeff Collier shook his head, half-laughing. “Mama didn’t own anything but the house and all that crap in it.”
“And Grenville,” I reminded him. “And whatever money she buried in the yard.”
“I don’t know about any land,” said Jeff Collier. He got up and stretched. I heard his spine crackle. “But I know Mama’s gotta have hundreds of dollars buried around the place. I figured that yard would look like a bunch of moles been at it by now. Everybody in the hollow knows she buried pickle jars full of dollar bills. She’s done it since we were kids. Hell, could be thousands.”
I made a note to tell Harry to tell whoever had the bad luck to be named executor of Vera’s estate.
In the cell, Jeff Collier walked in tight circles, hand scrubbing at his face, his scalp. “You sure Mama got killed for land?”
I could not tell a lie. At least, not that minute. “Could be.”
He barked a hard laugh. “Doesn’t that figure. Not get killed for being mean but for… money.” He said the word like it tasted sour. He stared at us. “You know who burned the house?”
I didn’t let him know the state police had that case. “Not yet.”
He sat back down, hands dangling limp. If you ever wanted a picture of a guy who wished he’d been born an orphan, this was it. I have to say, time around the Colliers was more and more convincing me I was lucky to be an only child.
I gave Boris a good scritch under the chin so he’d let me have my pen back. “Who’d know about your mother’s affairs?”
“Mama.”
I didn’t tell him not to be a smartass, mostly because I suspected he had no idea he’d come off sounding like one. “Ken?”
“I dunno!” he exploded. “We don’t talk about that kinda thing!”
“What have you talked about?” I asked sharply. “Sports?”
“Yeah,” he snapped. “And what to do about Mama, sometimes.”
He looked suddenly stricken and sick. We waited.
I leaned forward. Boris slunk down, irked. “What did you want to do about Mama?”
He slumped. “The whole thing—with her heart and all—we started thinking maybe we should see about getting her in a nursing home. Or maybe hire in someone to sit with her. We didn’t talk about it every day,” he went on miserably, “but it came up. Y’know. Christmas. Ken’s big Fourth of July picnic.” He considered, added, “Probably more, but that’s the only times I’m around them more than a minute or two.”
“Who had these discussions?”
“I dunno. All of us. Mostly it was about who’d pay for it, that kind of thing.” H
e took a deep breath, choked on it. “We weren’t really serious, I don’t think we were serious. We mostly just didn’t want to have to take care of her ourselves.” He had the character to look ashamed. “You must think we’re…”
“Your mother had a reputation for being difficult,” I soothed. “Jeff, I have to ask you. Who’d know where your mother kept things? Important papers and all that?”
“I don’t know. May and Eileen and Laura mostly went in to box up all that crap. They’d know, I guess. But I don’t know. The way Mama hid her money, she wouldn’t let anyone see something big like her papers.”
“Did you know Ken claims she had stock.”
His head lifted. His eyes were wide, pained. “What?”
“He told me he saw stock certificates when he went looking for your father’s squirrel rifle.”
“He never told me,” said Jeff bitterly. “He got that gun to teach me to shoot back when I was about eleven years old, so he’s had time.”
“Mr. Collier,” I said formally, “you’re still a person of interest. I’ll see if Harry Rucker plans on filing any charges, but if he doesn’t, you’ll be free to go as far as I’m concerned.”
I dragged my chair back to my desk, and dumped Boris off Tom’s just as Kim breezed in. She didn’t spare Jeff Collier a glance. “Guess who asked me out to dinner?”
“No idea,” I said, wishing Tom wasn’t in earshot. The poor guy looked like he’d lost his teddy bear.
“Len McDonough.”
I tried, for Tom’s sake. “Isn’t he a little too artsy for you?”
“Well, dating rednecks ain’t working,” said Kim saucily. She flipped her hair, newly streaked by Bobbi, like a superstar model working the runway, and vanished into the lunchroom.
I turned to tell Tom it was okay to go home, but he was already going. I sighed. Then I planted my hat on my head, picked up Boris, and headed out before my day got any worse.
13.
To most people, Memorial Day is a day off. For me, it’s just another day. I woke early and got in a long walk while Boris slept in, then went to work like always. I even parked in my speed trap by the garden center, although most of Crazy was still in bed. It was peaceful, watching the leaves rippling in the breeze. I’d drifted into a state somewhere between a meditative trance and sleep when the crunch of tires on gravel startled me. I looked over to find Maury, or more accurately, the big trash truck with Morse Sanitation & Disposal painted bright yellow on its dark green sides. Trash is like crime. It doesn’t take vacation days.