Husband and Wives

by Susan Rogers Cooper

  Jean Mcdonnell – Friday

  I went up to the ICU to check on Rachael and Melissa. Melissa was sitting up in bed, her head newly shaved, talking a mile a minute. When she saw me, her smile broadened and she pointed to her head.

  ‘Look!’ she said. ‘I asked the nurse to fix my hair and she made it look just like Mama’s!’

  ‘Wow!’ I said. ‘You both look great! We can put some lotion on your heads and make them both shine!’

  ‘Ooo, Mama, let’s do that!’ Melissa said, bouncing in her bed. ‘You’d look real pretty with a shiny head!’

  Rachael laughed. ‘What a grand idea,’ she said.

  I pulled up a chair between the two beds so we could talk for a while. I’d only been there for fifteen minutes or less when I saw the strangest thing: a giant man walking toward Rachael’s room. Melissa saw him about the same time as I did, and for the first time since my arrival, stopped talking. Rachael turned to where both Melissa and I were looking, and her smile faded.

  ‘Excuse me, ma’am,’ the giant said in a deep, gravelly voice, as befitting a giant, ‘my name’s Roy Donley. Sheriff Milt said I should come over here and sit. Something about your husband getting out on bail.’

  Rachael and I looked at each other and both sighed our relief. He wasn’t a giant hit man; Milt had sent him.

  ‘Mr McKinsey’s out of jail?’ Melissa said in a whisper.

  ‘Now, don’t you worry, little darlin’,’ the giant – excuse me, Roy Donley – said, moving closer to Melissa’s bed. ‘I’m not a mean man, I’m just big. But guys like Mr McKinsey don’t know that. They take one look at me and run like the cowards they are.’

  Melissa held out her hand. Roy took it and placed it on his palm. ‘Boy, you’re big,’ she said, her little hand in the center of his palm, with lots of room left over.

  ‘Yeah, little darlin’, I am big, that’s just a fact of nature. Like a skunk’s got a white stripe, and a porcupine’s got quills. And you’ve gotta a pretty bald head.’

  Melissa giggled. ‘That’s not nature! The nurse shaved it so I’d look like Mama.’

  Roy Donley looked over at Rachael and smiled. ‘Two of the prettiest bald-headed women I’ve ever seen,’ he said.

  Rachael smiled back.

  Milt Kovak – Friday

  I got Holly to do the paperwork we needed and by the time Tatum Barclay slithered through the door we had the prisoners out of their county-blue jumpsuits and into street clothes, and the paperwork sealed in a manila envelope. It took less than five minutes to get them out of there and I was grateful for that. I hadn’t seen Tatum Barclay in a while. Ten years ago I woulda sworn it was impossible, but the man was even uglier than he used to be. Short to begin with, he was even shorter now, his back hunched up with osteoporosis, his head poking up like a turtle’s, his long, thin nose sticking out of his face like an antenna. He looked like a caricature of himself. Even Emily McKinsey shied away from him, and that woman liked to inflict ugly.

  But they were gone, and that was some sort of good news. I called Charlie to tell him they were on their way, and he said, ‘We’re gonna have to keep ’em the night. Judge is out of town till morning. Got any recommendations on how to treat ’em?’

  ‘Don’t let ’em get wet and don’t feed ’em after midnight,’ I said as I hung up, not caring really if Charlie got my movie reference or not. It was an old movie, after all.

  I called Roy Donley next. When he answered the phone, I said, ‘Roy, Milt Kovak.’

  ‘Hey, Sheriff,’ he said.

  ‘You at the hospital?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Everything’s copasetic here.’

  ‘Well, the prisoners have been transferred to the city jail, but they won’t even go before a judge to set bail until morning. So you can go on home,’ I said.

  ‘Oh,’ he said, sounding dejected. ‘OK, then.’

  ‘You gonna be OK to come back tomorrow?’ I asked.

  ‘You got me twenty-four/seven, Sheriff Milt,’ he said.

  I thanked him and hung up, thinking, bald or not, Rachael McKinsey was still a pretty woman and that maybe Roy Donley had picked up on that.

  Which still left me with trying to prove that Michael McKinsey, or possibly Emily McKinsey, had killed Mary Hudson. Somebody sure had, and if it wasn’t the McKinseys, which I was kind of afraid it wasn’t, then I was right back where I started. Which was nowhere.

  I sat back and contemplated the situation as I knew it. The city police forensics guy found no fingerprints in Mary’s kitchen other than hers, her children’s, her husband’s, and the two sister-wives’ and their children’s. In other words, so many damn prints he probably lost track. The only footprints in the blood were those of Lynnie Hudson, Mary’s daughter who discovered her. Basically, no forensics evidence to point at anyone, much less specifically at the McKinseys. Michael McKinsey’s alibi (being at work) could be fudged; he didn’t clock in, being a supervisor, but this or that employee saw him most of the day. Emily, on the other hand, didn’t have much of an alibi. She was at home abusing Rachael and her kids, and since none of them were allowed to see a clock, they certainly couldn’t vouch for her whereabouts at any given time. Since she took breaks from her torture of the family, she would have had the opportunity.

  The only motive I could come up with for either McKinsey having done the deed was the obvious one: Mary had found out about the abuse or the theft of funds or the death of Nalene McKinsey, or any of the other nefarious stunts pulled by the couple, and was going to turn them in. As more and more information about the torture of Rachael and her children came out, suspicion fell more heavily on Emily than on Michael. Michael was a beast who beat his wife; Emily tortured the wife and the children and stole money from them, as well as from Michael, and may be responsible for Nalene’s death. Emily was not a very nice young lady.

  Any other suspects, I asked myself? Just church people. Like their preacher, or whatever he called himself, Earl Mayhew, or his boy Earl Jr, or Thomas Whitman, who Jean said probably had nothing to do with it. He didn’t talk to women unless he was married to them, she’d said, which was the same thing Michael McKinsey had said. ‘I don’t talk to the wives of other men.’ Then there were the Bollingers. They were more modern – wore street clothes, had normal haircuts, etc. So maybe David Bollinger didn’t have a problem with talking to other men’s wives. Have to look into that. And Bollinger brought it back full circle to Earl Mayhew, as one of Bollinger’s three wives was Earl Mayhew’s daughter, Naomi Ruth. Who was also Earl Jr’s sister.

  Interesting, I thought. Interesting enough to take another look at the Earls. Earl Sr knew something was wrong at the McKinsey house and never said anything. If he wasn’t directly involved in Mary Hudson’s death, he was surely guilty of not reporting child abuse. Earl Jr had been spying on or stalking Mary Hudson. And then he up and lied to me about it. I’d like to talk to him alone.

  And then, of course, there was Brother Bob Nathanson, pastor of the United Brethren of the Holy Church of Jesus Christ in His Almighty Goodness, or just the Brethren as they were known locally. Brother Bob was the one who burst in my office demanding I arrest somebody for the killing of that ‘wanton woman.’ That being Mary Hudson. I never did find out what he and his congregation were up to that Monday.

  I thought about the whole thing for way too long. After about an hour, Holly called me to tell me there’d been a wreck right in front of the station and I was the only one here. I sighed and headed outside to deal with it.

  It was a two-car wreck, and I knew both participants. Kyle Davies was seventeen and he and his family went to the Catholic church where me and Jean go every other Sunday; the kid was a straight arrow. The other vehicle belonged to Jessica Anderson, who was twenty-two, a party girl, spent most of her nights at the Dew-Drop Inn and her days nursing a hangover while checking out groceries at the Stop-N-Shop. I only knew her because she’d been the cause of several bouts of fisticuffs at the Dew-Drop over the past couple of years
. Longer than she’s been of drinking age, that’s for sure. As it was her quitting time at the grocery store, I figured she might be in a hurry to get to the Dew-Drop.

  ‘Hey, y’all,’ I said, as I looked both ways while crossing the highway to get to where they’d pulled their vehicles off to the side. Kyle drove an antique 1980s Ford F150 pick-up truck; Jessica drove an antique 1980s Datsun (before they were called Nissans). Kyle’s truck didn’t have a dent; Jessica’s Datsun looked totaled. ‘What happened?’

  I shoulda known better. They both started talking at once, pointing at each other, their voices getting louder and louder. I did a two-fingered whistle and they stopped. ‘Ladies first,’ I said.

  ‘He pulled out in front of me and slammed on his brakes!’ Jessica said.

  ‘I did not!’ Kyle all but shouted. ‘I pulled in front of her back by the courthouse, and then we get here, and a car’s turning in front of me, so I put on my brakes and she slams into my rear!’

  I thought, He should be so lucky, but didn’t let my garbage mind spill out of my mouth. ‘That’s the way it happened, Jessica?’ I asked.

  ‘No! Well, not exactly!’ Hands on hips, she blustered a bit.

  ‘You speeding, Jessica?’ I asked, since she’d been stopped for that a couple of times.

  ‘No! Not really,’ she said.

  ‘What does not really mean?’ I asked.

  ‘I was just going maybe a mile or two over the limit,’ she said, looking behind her at nothing. ‘The limit changes right up there.’

  ‘Yeah, right up there,’ I said, pointing at the fifty-five-mile-an-hour sign a hundred or so yards up the highway. Here in front of the sheriff’s office, although out of the city limits, the speed was still forty.

  ‘Sheriff, pleeeeez don’t give me a ticket! Pleeeeeeez! I’m gonna lose my insurance.’

  ‘Seems like you don’t have much of a car to insure, honey,’ I said, looking at the Datsun.

  Jessica turned around and looked at it and burst into tears.

  Kyle was rubbing the toe of his Tony Lama in the dust of the highway shoulder. ‘Don’t cry, Jessica,’ he said, which just made her cry harder as she turned around and threw herself against Kyle’s scrawny chest. He patted her back and looked at me. ‘Maybe we can say it was my fault?’ he asked. ‘So my insurance can pay to fix her car?’

  ‘Kyle, that’s called insurance fraud,’ I said.

  ‘Oh,’ he said.

  ‘What am I gonna do?’ she wailed.

  ‘Both of y’all call your insurance companies,’ I said. ‘I’ll call a wrecker for your car, Jessica.’

  ‘How am I gonna get home?’ she wailed, while I was thinking ‘home’ might be a euphemism for the Dew-Drop Inn.

  ‘I’ll take you,’ Kyle offered.

  ‘That’s OK, Kyle,’ I said. ‘We’ll make sure she gets home OK. Since your truck’s fine to drive, why don’t you get on your way after you give me your insurance information.’

  He did while Jessica lit up a menthol cigarette, getting pissed now, arms crossed under her already ample bosom, making them look even larger. ‘Kyle, call your agent,’ I said, ‘then go on about your business.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ he said, looking longingly back at Jessica.

  I walked Jessica back across the highway to the station, had her put out her cigarette in the ashtray in front of the building, then took her inside and sat her down on the bench. Holly was the only one in the big room and she was filing and pretending not to pay attention.

  ‘Jessica, you’ve been stopped three times for speeding. Nobody ever gave you a ticket but you’ve been warned. This time, I’m afraid, you’re getting two tickets, one for speeding and one for rear-ending Kyle.’

  She welled up again. ‘Honey, I’m married to a psychiatrist,’ I said. ‘I’ve learned not to let female tears affect me. So here’s the deal. Since I personally did not see you speeding, I’m just gonna give you a ticket for causing a wreck. You got anything other than liability insurance?’

  The tears began again as she shook her head. ‘Now I’m without a car, huh?’ she said, looking into my eyes. ‘What am I gonna do?’ and she began to wail righteously and loud.

  ‘What you’re gonna do is this,’ I said. ‘While you’re sitting here waiting for Holly to take you home, you’re gonna call your insurance agent. Got that?’

  She sniffled but nodded.

  ‘Meanwhile, I’m calling a wrecker to come get your car.’

  Again, she sniffled but nodded.

  I walked back to the bullpen and spoke softly to Holly. ‘Get her address off her ID and take her to that address, not to the Dew-Drop Inn, which is where she’ll wanna direct you, got it?’

  ‘Yes, sir, Sheriff,’ Holly said.

  I used Holly’s phone to call for a wrecker, watching while Jessica made a call, hopefully to her agent and not to her hunk-of-the-month to drive her to the Dew-Drop. But it was really none of my business. The girl was over twenty-one.

  I told Holly, ‘You go on home. Go get your purse and take off.’

  ‘But, Sheriff, I’m not through—’

  ‘It’ll be here in the morning. I’ll switch the radio and the phone over to the duty officer.’ She looked at her computer longingly and I said, ‘Now, get, girl.’

  ‘See you in the morning,’ she said, as she picked up her purse that rested on a shelf under the counter, and headed out to the waiting room to get Jessica. I figured by morning I’d hear from Jessica’s mother, a city councilwoman who expected favors.

  I called Emmett, tonight’s duty officer, to let him know I was switching over early, did the deed, then went back to my office to listen to the silence. That didn’t last long. My stomach rumbled and I remembered a new Mexican restaurant just opened the other side of downtown. I called my wife and suggested she and Johnny Mac stop by here and we’d drive there together. My wife thought that was a wonderful idea.

  NINE

  Milt Kovak – Saturday

  The next morning I got Nita Skitteridge to ride with me back to Tejas County and the New Saints Tabernacle. I called Bill Williams to let him know I’d be going into his jurisdiction.

  ‘Well, hell, Milt. I got my own stuff to worry about right now,’ he said when I told him I was on my way.

  ‘Truthfully, Bill, it’s closer if I just go to the church than come all the way to your shop. And I don’t see that we need more than you saying it’s OK.’

  ‘You gonna arrest the preacher for anything?’ Bill asked.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘Just need to ask some more questions.’

  ‘You gonna arrest his wives or his children?’

  ‘I have no plans to arrest anybody,’ I said. ‘Except maybe you for running up my cell phone minutes.’

  ‘OK then, go ahead. But call me when you’re through.’

  ‘You got AT&T stock, dontcha, Bill?’

  ‘I wish,’ he said and hung up.

  There were several cars in the parking lot of the church when we got there. Earl Mayhew himself opened the door to the double-wide.

  ‘Well, hey, Sheriff Kovak,’ he said, still chewing from, I suppose, the sandwich he held in his hand. ‘What can I do you for?’

  ‘Wondered if we could have a word, Brother Earl,’ I said.

  ‘Well, now, I’d invite you in, but . . .’ He shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘But what, Brother Earl?’

  ‘Well, now, I know it ain’t politically correct,’ he said, ‘but it’s in the scriptures that we, and by we I mean God’s chosen, don’t consort with mud people.’

  ‘Here we go again with this mud people shit!’ Nita said, hands on hips, a couple of fingers I noticed caressing the butt of her .45.

  ‘Now, I don’t mean to offend, Deputy, you got ever’ right in the world to do just about anything you want . . . Except come inside my home.’ He looked at me. ‘You understand that, Sheriff?’

  ‘Not a bit,’ I said. ‘But I don’t figure I have time to get a warrant, s
o get your ass out of the trailer on your own, or I’ll slap cuffs on you and take you in. ’Course, Deputy Skitteridge’ll have to sit in the back with you.’

  Nita smiled. ‘And I like to rub legs with my felons,’ she said.

  He handed his sandwich to someone behind him and walked down the steps. He was wearing pleated front trousers with cuffs and one of those sleeveless T-shirts I’ve heard called wife-beater, his graying hair too long and not yet blown-dry and sprayed stiff. It bounced around his face as he came down the steps.

  ‘I think I done answered all the questions you had, Sheriff. And I tried to help you with the whole problem with the McKinseys.’

  ‘If I were you I wouldn’t speak of the McKinseys,’ Nita said. ‘The sheriff is not happy about that whole thing and how you could have prevented most of it by saying something months ago. So, shush,’ she said, holding her finger up to her lips. ‘Be very careful what you say,’ she whispered.

  ‘This woman is harassing me, Sheriff,’ Brother Earl said. ‘I am formally asking you to make her stop.’

  I slapped my arm over Brother Earl’s shoulders, and told him in a right friendly manner, ‘Naw, Brother Earl, she’s just giving you facts. What you do with ’em is your business.’

  ‘I wanna call Sheriff Williams . . .’

  ‘He told me to tell you how sorry he was that he couldn’t make it today,’ I said, arm still around his thin shoulders, ‘but to tell you hidy.’

  We’d made our way inside the metal building that served as the sanctuary. I pointed to a metal chair sitting by the front door, and Deputy Nita influenced Brother Earl to sit in it.

  ‘I got questions, Earl, and you will have answers, understand?’ I said.

  ‘How can I have answers if I don’t know any, Sheriff? That’s just plain dumb—’

  Nita kicked the bar on the chair between his legs, shoving the chair back a foot or two and getting a nice shade of pale on Brother Earl’s face. ‘Are you calling the duly elected sheriff of Prophesy County dumb?’ she shouted at him.

  ‘No, of cour—’