Dark Places

by Reavis Z. Wortham

  “Oh, that’s all right. It was a long time ago and I reckon it was for the best. It didn’t have a chance to grow up to sin, and run off.”

  Aunt Belle’s mouth was a thin line. “There’s no reason to talk like that. We came ’cause of Leland.”

  “They’re both dead and buried, and ain’t no one on this Earth can do nothing about it, so we need to go on. In a hunnerd years, it won’t make no difference anyways.”

  I kept staring at the baby in the photo, and didn’t like that she’d called that little thing an It. “Didn’t you name him?”

  “Hush, Top.” Miss Becky’s expression flashed me a warning.

  Marty came through in boots that sounded a size too big. They were squared off at the toes with a chain going across the top. “Jerry. His name was Jerry.” He didn’t stop, letting the screen door slam behind him.

  “It cried all the time.” Melva shook her head as a tiny giggle rose in her throat. “Never saw a baby cry so much.”

  I couldn’t sit there anymore with that crazy woman. “I’m going outside.”

  Miss Becky nodded. “There was a lot of folks at Leland’s funeral, Melva. It was good to see so many.”

  I knew better than to let the door slam when I went out. Marty was on the porch, smoking and watching the rain drip off the edge of the roof. “Why were you staring at us so much up at the store?”

  I couldn’t meet his eye. “I wasn’t staring.”

  “I guess you heard what we were talking about?”

  “It was probably about money or girls—Grandpa says that’s what trouble’s usually about.”

  Marty took a long drag and let the smoke out through his nose. “Your grandpa talk about me?”

  “What for?”

  “Does he?”

  “No. Why would he?”

  “Where is he?”

  “Gone.” I didn’t want to tell him anything. I didn’t trust the guy any farther than I could throw him, and I didn’t like him one little bit. Even for a kid, I knew he was trying to lead the conversation somewhere, and I didn’t know why. I wished Uncle Cody would drive up and take him to jail, for anything. For some reason though, the way he kept staring at me, I felt like I needed to explain what I’d seen up at the store. “You guys were sitting out there, and I couldn’t help but wonder what you were doing.”

  He smirked. “Yeah, I know about doing things you can’t help.” He took a deep drag and let the smoke out through his nose in a long cloud. “Want a drag?”

  “Nossir.”

  He snorted again. “I was smoking half a pack a day by the time I was your age.”

  “I have asthma.”

  He finished the cigarette and flicked the butt into the wet dirt beside Norma Faye’s car. “I’m going for a ride. You want to go?”

  I sure didn’t, but I was afraid I’d look like a baby. “I’ll have to ask.”

  “Go ahead on.”

  I went back inside and stood beside Norma Faye’s chair for a long second. They glanced up at me, but no one said anything. Acting bored, I went back outside.

  “In or out,” Miss Becky said.

  I stepped around a rotting board and faked a sigh. “They won’t let me.”

  He nodded and patted his hair greasy with HA hair lotion. “Didn’t think so. Your cousin’s still gone, huh?”

  “Yep.”

  “She left in a hurry, I hear.”

  “She left. That’s all.”

  He studied me for another second before getting into his truck and backing onto the dirt road. Shifting into gear, he pulled out in a spray of muddy water.

  I stayed on the porch, wishing we would go, too. After I’d cranked the washing machine ringer a couple of times and poked through a wooden box of wrenches, I laid on my back to see what the yard looked like upside down. It seemed like an hour before they made their goodbyes, and we hurried through a heavy shower.

  Me and Miss Becky climbed into the backseat. She folded her hands in her lap. “Norma Faye, drive us to town. I want to talk to O.C.”

  Both her and Aunt Ida Belle flicked their eyes to the rearview mirror at us back there. Aunt Ida Belle twisted halfway around. “What good will that do?”

  “None at all, but at least we’ll be doing something.”

  While Norma Faye drove, I closed my eyes and listened to them gossip about how odd Miss Melva was, until the conversation drifted back to Pepper. I dozed on the way to town and dreamed she was back with me and we were laughing like we used to.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Miss Becky opened the door to Judge O.C. Rains’ office without knocking. He glanced up and pitched his pen onto a stack of papers. “Have any of you Parkers ever learned how to knock?” His eyes told me he wasn’t really aggravated.

  She stopped, wondering if it was a serious question. “Why, it had your name on the door and I figured you’d be in here.”

  He sighed and waved at the only empty chair in the office that smelled like old books and damp paper. Miss Becky sat down. Norma Faye and Ida Belle stayed by the door. I perched myself on a stack of law books beside his desk, drinking a Mountain Dew. It didn’t taste near as good as it would have if Pepper’d been with me. She always liked those bottles because they said “It’ll Tickle Yore Innards!” and had a picture of a cork going through Willy the Hillbilly’s old slouch hat.

  I suddenly realized I missed her so bad it hurt. My stomach knotted up, and for a second I thought I’d cry, but I wouldn’t do it in front of all those adults.

  “Did you bring me a Coke?” The judge’s white eyebrows met in the middle, but I knew he wasn’t mad.

  “I’ll go get you one. What kind do you want?”

  Folks who aren’t from around out part of the world sometimes have trouble with how we talk. If I went up to the store and asked for Coke, Uncle Neal would ask me what kind. Coke’s a general word for soda pop. I’d seen the judge drink Dr Peppers, oranges, grapes, and root beers, but there were others in the machine downstairs like RC Colas, Double Colas, Big Reds, and cream sodas.

  “Aw, I reckon I don’t need one right now, but I might take a sup of yours after while.”

  Ida Belle was dabbing at her eyes with a lace handkerchief. “O.C., can’t you put out one of those all calls to tell everyone to look for my baby?”

  “Hon, we’ve done done it.” I could tell it about broke his heart to see them in his office, desperate for information. I wasn’t sure why we were in there in the first place. Uncle Cody was sheriff, and I knew for a fact that he was doing everything he could to find Pepper. I guess they were reaching out for whatever they could find. “There’s men watching for them all across Texas. I’ve seen half a dozen reports about little gals they’ve picked up that fit Pepper’s description. None of ’em was her. Have you heard from Ned or James?”

  Miss Becky nodded. “They split up for a while, but they haven’t found her. Have you heard from Cale’s mama’n daddy?”

  “Yep.” Mr. O.C. rocked back in his chair. “Talked to them several times, and he’s asked the same questions as y’all. We’re doing what we can.” He pooched his lips out to think. That’s when the phone rang.

  “This is Judge Rains.”

  Judge O.C. didn’t hold a receiver tight against his head like some folks. He kinda rested it on his shoulder and angled the whole thing away from his face while he rocked back and forth in his creaky old desk chair. I was sitting close enough I could hear snatches of the man’s odd way of talking. It was as if he were reading and stumbling over a written speech.

  “Hear what I am telling you—”

  “Who is this?”

  “—don’t matter. Them two men you’re looking for are burried by the dam and equipment at the new lake.”

  O.C. frowned. “How do you know that? You don’t sound right.”

  “Ne
ar to the heavy equipment.”

  “That’s a pretty big lake bottom. Can you give me a little more to go on?”

  Aunt Ida Belle had heard enough to scare her. “Oh my God! They’ve found my baby in the bottoms!”

  They all three set up to start wailin’, but Judge O.C. covered the mouthpiece. “Y’all hush and settle down. This is about something else.” He went back to the caller. “All right. Them two men are buried by the heavy equipment close to the dam. Who is this?”

  “You need to hurry…ah…due to the water coming up.”

  “Wait.” Mr. O.C. stopped rocking. “Why’d you call me?”

  “Ned Parker ain’t here and them men need to be burried right.”

  Something about that voice was familiar.

  “How do you know about them?”

  Silence.

  “Did you call the sheriff’s office?”

  “No, I’m talking to you, ain’t I?”

  “Who killed ’em? Was it you?”

  There was a long silence before the line went dead.

  Judge Rains pushed the disconnect button with his finger. The caller hadn’t given him much information, but I was sure of one thing, he was from Center Springs. No one else would know Grandpa was out of town and I didn’t think it came from town, because it wasn’t raining hard right that minute.

  Judge O.C. dialed four numbers real quick. Someone answered on the other end. “Who’s this?”

  “Cody.” His voice was as clear as the man’s had been.

  “Good. I got a call, said them businessmen you’ve been trailin’ are buried in Center Springs.”

  “Where?”

  “Said somewhere in sight of the dam. You better get to rolling. With all this rain, the creek’ll be out of its banks by now and I’d imagine it’s gettin’ close to where he said they’re buried. Get John Washington to go out there with you.”

  “Wonder why they called you and not me?”

  “Can’t say. I asked him, but he didn’t give me no answer.”

  “All right. I’ll get Anna, too. We need to move fast.”

  Mr. O.C. hung up without saying goodbye and scowled. “Becky, I hate to run y’all off, but that was an important call I gotta get on right now.”

  She gathered her purse and stood. “Dead men buried in the lake. Daddy said that lake would claim folks pretty quick, but I doubt he figured it’d be this soon.”

  “It wasn’t the lake that took ’em.”

  Norma Faye shoved a strand of red hair behind her ear. “Was Cody in his office?”

  “Yep.”

  “We were going by to say howdy, but I guess we’ll need to go on home.”

  “That’d be best. He’s gonna be pretty busy for the next little while.”

  Instead of going to see Uncle Cody, we went downstairs, our footsteps echoing on the black and white tile floor. All that time, I kept playing Mr. O.C.’s conversation over in my head.

  I’d heard that voice before, but I couldn’t place it.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Cody hurried out of the courthouse, taking the back steps two at a time. He jogged across the parking lot to his sheriff’s car and picked up the microphone. “John.”

  He was on the wet road by the time Deputy Washington came back. “Go ahead, Cody.”

  “I’m on the way to Center Springs. We got a call saying those missing businessmen are buried in the lake bottom.”

  “Anything else? It’ll be hard to find them out there.”

  “Not much. The caller said they were somewhere in sight of the dam, where the heavy equipment’s been working to finish up. I’ve called some other folks, but you probably need to meet me.”

  “I’ll be there directly.”

  Cody keyed the microphone again, thinking hard. “Anna.”

  She came on immediately. “Go ahead. I heard what you told John.”

  “Good. I need to talk to you about what you’ve found out.”

  “Quite a bit. See you there.”

  It was raining hard by the time he was north of town. The bar ditches ran with water, a clear indicator that the new lake would soon cover the Sanders Creek bottoms. He drove over the dam twenty minutes later. From that high vantage point, the empty bowl of the future lake emphasized the clouds hanging low overhead.

  The lake bed was easier to access on the far side of the dam, opposite the overlook. There was another way into the bottoms, but it was farther west and wound through some rough country before opening to where they were going. Cody drove past the old house place where his grandfather once lived, then down the sandy incline rutted with deep tracks from heavy vehicles.

  He stopped the car beside a cluster of pickups, afraid of getting stuck if he went any further. The wipers slapped a beat to the radio tuned low and buzzing with static. Two bulldozers chained to a dragline poured black smoke into the rain and towed the dragline free of the mud toward higher ground.

  John and Anna arrived and more trucks parked behind them. Cody opened the trunk and pulled on a long yellow rain slicker. His shirt was already wet, but it would at least turn water for the rest of the time they were out there.

  In her own raincoat and Stetson, Anna gave him a grin when she noticed him eyeing the hat. “I needed a little more brim for all this water.”

  “I can see that. It probably makes more sense for you to wear that anyway.”

  Isaac Reader, Dub Hinkley, and Mike Parsons closed in to hear. Buck Johnson parked close and joined them. With nothing else to do in town on such a rainy day, he dropped by to offer his services if they were needed.

  Cody waved a hand. “Y’all, all I know is that someone called and said the bodies of those businessmen are buried somewhere out there.”

  John whistled, appearing twice as large in his own loose slicker. “That’s a lot of blowed up country.”

  “Listen, listen, this is a big lake.” Ike Reader stated the obvious, as if the rest of the people around him hadn’t noticed. “Do we spread out and start kicking the ground?”

  “I don’t believe that’d work, Ike.”

  “Well, they might not be buried deep and we might see some clothes, or an arm or something.”

  “We might, but I doubt that, too.”

  Anna shoved both hands in her pockets. “Then why are we here?”

  “Well, I guess we had to come out. I wanted to see how high the water’s getting, and second, I had an idea.” He pointed at a battered farm truck rattling down the hill toward them with Ty Cobb Wilson behind the wheel. “They may have our answer.”

  The Wilson boys stopped and detrucked. Not minding the rain, Jimmy Foxx tromped through the mud and lowered the tailgate while Ty Cobb walked down to meet them. Both wore thigh-high waders, folded down at the knee and flapping like bell-bottom jeans around their calves. “You must have something special going on to be out here in this weather.”

  Cody watched Jimmy Foxx open the door to one of the dog boxes. “Yep.” He explained about the call and why he’d contacted them. “So I heard you had this dog that can smell dead people.”

  Jimmy Foxx led a soaked Brittany spaniel on a leash. “Sure do. Cracker here, we call him that ’cause it’s short for Cracker Jack, well, we can’t hunt quail anywhere near a cemetery because he’ll run to a fresh grave and start digging.”

  John’s eyes widened in horror at the thought of digging in a grave, fresh or otherwise. “Lordy mercy, what’s wrong with that dog?”

  “Nothing that we can figure out.” Ty Cobb rubbed Cracker’s ears. “He’s got the best nose I ever saw for a retriever. He ain’t much at pointing birds, but by God, once we get one on the ground, he’ll find it. We’ve used him to track all kinds of wounded game, but if he gets a whiff of something dead, you cain’t hardly drag him away.” He looked sheepish. “Brother Hill at the Methodis
t church said we couldn’t hunt anywhere near the cemetery anymore, though that’s where two or three big coveys hang out. Said it wasn’t right to see a dog nose-deep in a fresh grave. He’s done it twice.”

  Ike stepped back from the dog, as if it might sniff at him. His fears ran deep, and often involved clowns. He’d never thought to worry on a dog that pointed dead people, though. “Listen, you don’t think he can point at folks who might be sick or dying?”

  Cody bit his lip to hide a grin. “You feeling all right, Ike?”

  “I’m fine now, but I’d die right here and now if that dog was to lock up on me. Listen, listen, you know, Mr. Messer out in Ragtown can smell cancer and he can tell when folks are ready to die. They bring him out to some people’s houses ever now and then who’re in bad shape to see if they’ll make it.”

  Anna raised an eyebrow at the thought. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “If I’m lyin’, I’m dyin’…” Ike trailed off when he realized how the words sounded. “Listen, I heard tell they took him to the cancer ward in Dallas and he ’bout had a seizure pickin’ up on all them old folks that didn’t have much longer in this old world…” he stopped again, thinking about what he’d said.

  The guys would have left him dangling, but Anna felt sorry for the sun-baked little farmer, so she tried to get Ike off the hook. “So you called them to find the bodies, Cody?”

  “That was my thought.”

  John shook his head. “I don’t rightly know if he’ll be able to smell in all this rain. It’s been coming down for so long.”

  Cracker sat in the mud and scratched an ear with one hind foot.

  “I understand, but we’re talking about two bodies, and I doubt they were buried that deep, if they’re here at all.”

  Ty Cobb waved an arm in the rain. “I hope you have a starting point. There’s a lot of country out there.”

  “Not much of one.” Cody jerked a thumb. “Get down toward the creek, because the water’s rising and I think it’d be best if we covered the ground there first, then y’all can work out this way.”

  Jimmy Foxx released the dog and whistled. He waved an arm and called to Cracker in a singsong voice. “Look fooor it.” The Brit put his nose to the ground and sniffed his way toward the creek that had already slipped its banks. The dam was finished and the Corps of Engineers had closed the gates. For the first time, all the water that should have eventually emptied into the Red River two miles away was creeping toward what would soon be the permanent shores of Lake Lamar.