Tin City Tinder (A Boone Childress Mystery)

by David Macinnis Gill

  “Mrs. Yarbrough?” I closed the last book, collected my notes, and ventured toward the front door. “I’m ready to go.”

  She opened the front door. “Hope you found everything you were looking for.”

  “Sort of,” I said. “I was hoping for some more, though. The farmhouses that burned down in Tin City and Nagswood, for example."

  “Oh?” Her ears perked up. “Were those houses built for the homestead programs?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “’They look a lot like this house, except they were two stories.”

  She clicked her tongue. “Why, that would be just terrible.”

  “Why?”

  “Because if they were homestead houses, they would be historical landmarks. Destroying them is not only illegal, it is immoral, as well. I hope they catch whoever did it.”

  “Did what?”

  “Burned them to the ground, of course, along with that poor woman, may she rest in peace. Don’t look so shocked, Boone, this is a small town. Word travels fast among the blue haired set.” Her eyes twinkled. “Good luck with whatever direction your journey leads you.”

  7

  I was reviewing my Atamasco notes when I reached the Atamasco Volunteer Fire Department. The firefighters were washing down the pumper and doing an equipment check.

  “Hey, it’s the possum,” one of them yelled. “Save any more wild critters, Possum?”

  I waved, playing along with the joke. If I objected, I would never hear the end of it. Like sailors, firefighters busted one another’s chops pretty hard. It came with the territory.

  The Atamasco station was a brand new building, with six bays downstairs, sleeping quarters on the second floor, and the captain’s office to the side.

  It was there that I found Lamar.

  I took a seat in the bench outside the captain’s office. The door was half open, and since the building was all steel and concrete, the sound of their voices carried.

  “What a firefighter does on his own time is his own business,” the captain said. “Especially a vollie. I ain’t saying that I approve, mind you. It’s just that he’s got some old fashioned notions.”

  “Old fashioned?” Lamar said. “You’re saying that these notions don’t keeping him from doing his job.”

  “I believe that’s what I just said.”

  “That woman who died in Nagswood might argue with you.”

  “We settled this problem on the site, Lamar.”

  “That was before the body was found. My stepson heard her screaming. I’m wondering why Loach didn’t.”

  “What exactly are you hinting at?” The captain raised his voice. “That my vollies had something to do with it?”

  “I ain’t hinting—I’m saying it.” Lamar’s chair scrapped across the floor. “In this envelope is a formal complaint against your company for dereliction of duty, refusal to render aide, and endangering the safety of a fellow volunteer.”

  The other captain’s chair scraped on the concrete, too. “Lamar, you want to think about this good and hard before you go after Eugene. He’s got friends, and this is a small town. Remember that.”

  “Nobody knows that better than me,” Lamar said. “I hope other folks remember that, too.”

  A couple of seconds later, Lamar came out of the office and walked right past me. His cap was pulled down over his eyes. He was staring at the ground, hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket.

  His truck was parked across the street underneath a row of oak trees. Lamar trotted out to the yellow line, waited for a car to pass and then crossed to the parking slot. The meter showed red, indicating that he had been in the fire station almost thirty minutes.

  I paused to let several trucks pass. A Landis Logging Company semi sped by close to the side of the road, blowing dust and pine bark chips in its wake. Landis’ truckers were infamous speeders, but the deputies always looked the other way because of the name on the side.

  The instant a break opened, I made a dash for it. Halfway across the highway, my cellphone started ringing.

  “Terrific timing, Doc.” I answered. “A logging truck’s about to obliterate me.”

  “I’ve got news.”

  “Hang on.” I ducked behind an appliance delivery truck. “Did you read about the Nagswood victim? It said the medical examiner identified her.”

  “Don’t believe everything you read,” Abner scoffed. “The finger you sent? The hyphenated lady ran some tests and found some interesting chemical compounds.”

  “Like what?”

  I peeked around the delivery truck. Lamar was kicked back in the cab of the truck, hat covering his face, the radio cranked. The sound of Molly Hatchet drifted down the street.

  “She found alkali metal,” Doc said. “Sodium, to be exact.”

  “Sodium?” I said. “Really.”

  “A significant quantity was also found on the body of the Nagswood victim.”

  “You won’t believe this.” I told him about the theft from the college lab. “Some coincidence, huh?”

  “Good to know,” Abner said, “We can get together later to compare notes. Listen, Boone, I’ve got a job for you.”

  “What kind of job?”

  “Investigative work. You up to it?”

  “What do you need me to do? Collect more physical evidence?”

  “I want you to interview a man named Troy Blevins. He teaches band at your old high school.”

  “Thought you’d want dirt on Eugene Loach.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “He let Mrs. Vega die. Lamar filed a formal complaint against him for dereliction of duty. Loach has to be involved somehow.”

  “Maybe he is. I still need you to ask this band teacher some questions.”

  “Text me a list.”

  “Already did. Check your phone.”

  A patrol car rolled past me and hit its lights. It swung into the parking place a few slots ahead of Lamar. Deputy Mercer climbed out. He wore the same mirrored sunglasses and carried a ticket book tucked under his arm.

  “Got to go, Doc,” I said. “There’s a situation here. Anything else?”

  “Just one more thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I need you to draw five hundred dollars out of my bank account and bring it down to Galax tomorrow morning.”

  “Five hundred bucks? What for?”

  “Bail money,” he said, sounding very pleased with himself. “I’m in the Allegheny County jail.”

  8

  Before I had hung up, Abner admitted he was locked up for interfering with a police investigation. He wouldn’t go into details, except that there was no need to hurry because the arraignment wouldn’t happen until morning. I agreed to wait, even though I hated the idea of leaving him in a cell overnight.

  When I got back to the truck, Mercer was finishing a parking ticket and a noise ordinance violation.

  “Wait just a cotton picking minute,” Lamar told him. “You’re a county deputy. You can’t write me up for a city ordinance.”

  “Tell it to the judge.”

  “We’re both in public service,” Lamar said, his voice rising. “How about a little professional courtesy?”

  “Professional courtesy is for professionals.” Mercer clicked his ink pen. “You volunteers ain’t real firemen. Just overgrown boys playing with your hoses.”

  Mercer sauntered back to the prowler and pulled right in front of a logging truck, which had to lay on its brakes to keep from pancaking him.

  “Almost wish that truck had kept going,” Lamar said when I got in and he pulled out behind the logging truck. “I’ve got to talk with Hoyt about that boy. Power’s gone to his head.”

  “Mercer knows how to spread the love around,” I said.

  Lamar clicked the radio on. A commercial was playing for a new development, Autumn Hills, the same one that I had seen in Landis’s office.

  Lamar shook his head. “Building in the flood plain. Hope they know how to
swim.”

  “Isn’t that illegal? How did they get the permits?”

  “Autumn Hills Development Company has Trey Landis on the board. That’s the only permit they needed.”

  “I thought Mom was the family cynic.”

  “When you’re born and bred in Allegheny County, it ain’t cynicism. It’s called the Way Things Work.”

  I leaned forward to turn the volume lower when an Emergency Broadcast System message came in.

  “Authorities in Allegheny County,” the computer-generated voice said, “have issued a Silver Alert for Henry James Meeks. Last seen in Galax North Carolina wearing overalls and a light blue shirt. Anyone knowing his whereabouts, contact the Allegheny County Sheriff’s Office.”

  Lamar shook his head in disbelief. “There’s a stretch if I ever heard one. That’s not a Silver Alert. It’s a statewide APB. Hoyt’s using the system to catch Stumpy for him.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “So he can arrest him, of course.”

  “Hoyt thinks Stumpy’s involved with with the fires?”

  “That’s what I’m guessing. A man reports one fire, so they assume he started the second one. As if Stumpy could stay sober long enough to plan his next meal.”

  “I thought Stumpy gave up drinking.”

  “Stumpy’s given up drinking more times than I can remember.”

  “So what’s next?”

  “Next is your Mama’s protest at the County Council.” Lamar hit the accelerator. The speedometer climbed. “We better not be late, if we know what’s good for us.”

  9

  Lamar and I arrived just in time for the meeting. In the parking lot across from the courthouse, I spotted Cedar and Luigi.

  “Catch you later,” I told Lamar and jogged over to met them. “Fancy meeting y’all here.”

  Cedar gave me a peck on the cheek. “When I heard about your mom’s protest, and I had to come watch the fireworks.”

  “You made poor Luigi come along?”

  “I volunteered,” he said. “ I want to see American democracy in action."

  “Probably, you won’t see much democracy,” I warned him. “Not much action, either. These County Council meetings are pretty much a sham. All the decisions were made during backdoor deals.”

  “Is that not illegal?” Luigi asked.

  “To paraphrase the county historian, welcome to North Carolina.”

  We followed a group of protestors with homemade signs into the courthouse. The Council’s planning commission met on the second floor in one of the rooms adjacent to the courtroom. When we entered, the room was standing room only.

  I counted fourteen rows of seats, twenty chairs per row. Every one of them was filled with a person holding a placard. Behind the chairs and alongside the rows, dozens more people stood. They had placards, too, stapled to yardsticks to make protest signs.

  We found a place to stand on the back wall.

  In front of the room, separated from the gallery by velvet rope were two tables. The one facing the audience seated the seven members of the Allegheny County Planning Commission, all of whom shared the same deer-in-the-headlights look.

  Mom sat at the table facing the Commissioners, with her back to the crowd. Mom’s attorney sat at her right elbow. I recognized him by his rumpled suit.

  A third person sat the other end at the table. He had slicked backed hair and wore a pinstriped dark suit with a crimson square tucked into the breast pocket of the jacket.

  Even from the back, I knew it was Trey Landis.

  He leaned over to speak a silver-haired man sleeping in a wheelchair. The man raised his head, nodded twice, and fell back asleep.

  “Who’s that?” Cedar whispered.

  “George Deems Landis himself,” I said. “I’m surprised they brought him out tonight. His health is pretty fragile.”

  The gavel came down, and the meeting came to order. The first and only item on the agenda was the discussion of a planned community in the western area of town, a mixed-use neighborhood that would feature homes, shopping, nature trails, and a championship golf course called Autumn Hills.

  Mom’s attorney leaned over to whisper something in her ear.

  Landis waved at several people in the crowd, and their placards vanished. One look from the man, and the signs went down. It wasn’t even a threatening look. It was a smile, wide, with gleaming teeth that could be only gotten from a dentist’s chair.

  On the surface, it was a friendly gesture, but the smile was a threat.

  The chair of the commission was a portly man in a pink dress shirt. “I believe this proposal is pro forma. We discussed this in closed session, as you know. The county engineer’s read over the plans and—“

  “Point of order,” Mom interrupted. “I believe you skipped a step on the agenda. You’re required to begin the meeting with public input.”

  “Sorry, didn’t see you.” The portly man covered his eyes to shield the bright lights. “Is there anybody, ah, here who’d like to comment?”

  The crowd burst out in laughter.

  “I take that as a yes.”

  More laughter.

  Even Trey Landis smiled.

  “I’ll go first,” Mom said, “since I’m already sitting at the table.”

  The chair pulled at his collar. “State your name for the record, ma’am.”

  “You know my name, Charlie. I treated your dog for mange last week.”

  The crowd hooted.

  “Let’s stick to the subject, Dr. Rivenbark,” Charlie the chair said. “We don’t need an unruly puppet show here.”

  Ouch, I thought. Charlie had obviously read Mom’s comments in the newspaper.

  “Have it your way, then. Dr. Mary Harriet Rivenbark, DVM. For the record, I represent the mob behind me. We are here to protest the illegal removal of bodies from graves in Tin City.”

  The chair covered the microphone with a meaty paw. He and the other six commissioners whispered for almost a minute.

  “After conferring with my colleagues,” the chair said, “we think you should take this up with the sheriff. It’s out of our purview.”

  The crowd booed. They raised their placards and chanted. The commissioners looked decidedly more nervous, but I noticed Landis never stopped smiling.

  “That’s not true,” Mom said. “The sheriff referred the case to you, since you approved the development plan for Autumn Hills development without asking the Allegheny County Historical Society to research the property. If you were anything other than a rubber stamp for developers, you would’ve known there’s a cemetery on the property.”

  “I expected better from a doctor,” Charlie said. “Where do you get off calling us a rubber stamp?”

  “Like my granny always said,” Mom said, “if you lie with dogs, you’re going to get fleas.”

  The crowd broke into applause. Half of them stood and waved their placards like a football crowd cheering a touchdown.

  “Order! Order!” Charlie pounded the gavel. “Get hold of yourselves before I have a deputy throw you all out. And Mary Harriet—“

  “Dr. Rivenbark to you.”

  “—I think you’ve wasted enough time tonight.”

  Mom covered the mic and asked her attorney a question.

  “May I have a word, please?” Landis unhooked the microphone from the stand so that he could walk closer to the crowd. “This is all a misunderstanding, and I think I can clear it up to everybody’s satisfaction. I can see why you good people are upset. What Dr. Rivenbark describes is indeed a disturbing scenario. Let me assure that the truth is a different matter. The development of the so-called Tin City property is one hundred percent legal. We have complied with every federal regulation, every state law, every local statute. You see, state law requires that when human remains are moved, the next of kin must be located. If the next of kin cannot be relocated, then the County Commission must approve of a move. However, that is unnecessary, because we purchased the property from
the next of kin. Before we acquired it, we agreed to the interment of a small, family cemetery with the owner, Mr. Troy Blevins, whom I believe is a local music teacher. Mr. Blevins is in attendance tonight, along with his sister, Athena.”

  The crowd murmured, and Blevins stood up. His hands shook. Mr. Blevins had conducted the band through dozens of concerts, marching shows, and festivals, but this was the first time I had ever seen him nervous.

  “It’s, um, true what, um, Mr. Landis told you,” Blevins said. The graveyard is, um, our family cemetery. Our grandparents are buried there, along with our aunts and uncles. Athena and I, we’re the last of the Blevins family and so, well, y’all know how it is these days with the government taxing everything.”

  The sister stood up. I got my first clear look at her face.

  It was Dr. K.

  “They’re brother and sister?” I whispered to Cedar.

  “Looks like it.”

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Dr. K began, “what my brother is trying to say is, as embarrassing as this is, we had no choice but to sell the property. The inheritance taxes on our parents’ home were more than we could afford on our teachers’ salaries. We were facing a tax auction until Mr. Landis heard about our problem. He gave us a fair price. More than a fair price, to be honest.”

  “What’s that got to do with moving your kin?” one of the protesters called out. “You two are as bad as Landis.”

  “The cemetery would have been moved no matter what!” Mr. Blevins snapped. “Except it would’ve been the government doing it! Our kin would’ve been buried in unmarked paupers’ graves!”

  That doesn’t sound right, I thought. There were at least a hundred graves on the property, so it had to be more than the small family cemetery. North Carolina law was funky sometimes, but I didn’t think the government could move graves without the family’s permission.

  The crowd deflated.

  A collective shrug swept over the room, as if they had all simultaneously murmured, huh? Some wondered aloud how Mr. Blevins could allow his own family to be hauled out of the ground just so he could make a buck, but Landis had definitely turned the tide.