CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Well, that was a close one! He wouldn’t be sleeping on the library porch again, but it had been so dark, and he had been so tired, he just couldn’t go another step farther. Jasper Totherow groaned as he rose from his rumpled bed of tow sacks and rubbed his aching back. That blasted bench at the library had been as hard as granite, but at least he would’ve been out of the rain. He was going to have to find a better place to sleep than this drafty old shed. It had rained some during the night and enough water had blown through the cracks to dampen his clothes and his spirits. He was getting too old to live like this. If he got chilled by a little rain in August, what would it be like in the colder months ahead?
Jasper rubbed his arms and shivered. He knew the shed where he’d spent the night was used as a temporary storage place for cotton before it went to the gin, and in a few short weeks, the fields around him would be dotted with pickers—mostly women and older children now that most of the men were in the armed services. A lot of the county schools let out for that purpose. If he could just get by until then, Jasper was sure they would take him on to help, maybe even give him a place to stay, at least until the crop had been picked.
And then what? He stretched and relieved himself behind the shed. He would worry about that when the time came. Right now, he was hungry. Last night, he’d eaten tomatoes and cantaloupe he’d taken from a garden down the road, and he needed something to hold him, something solid. Jasper thought of his grandma’s biscuits, fluffy white inside and crusty gold on top. He’d give anything for one right now—steaming hot, with butter and honey—but Grandma was long gone and laid to rest in an overgrown churchyard. Jasper wiped a couple of tears away with a grimy hand, unaware himself if he shed them for the biscuits or for his grandmother.
If he couldn’t have biscuits, loaf bread would have to do, and there was a little store about a mile or so down the road. The fact that he didn’t have any money didn’t concern him.
Jasper waited until a couple of customers had the attention of the store clerk. One, an older woman in a skirt down to her ankles, wanted a can of Garrett sweet snuff, which the clerk had to stoop and look for underneath the counter. At that moment, Jasper took the opportunity to help himself to a loaf of bread, and if he had stopped there, he might’ve gotten away with it, but a couple of cans of Vienna sausage would taste mighty good with that bread, Jasper thought, and he might as well treat himself to a Nehi orange to wash it all down.
It was the drink that got him into trouble, as one of the cans of sausage slid from beneath his shirt as he lifted the bottle of orange drink from its ice-water bath, and it startled him so that he grabbed up the other items and bolted, not even taking time to pry the cap from the bottle of Nehi with the opener on the ice chest.
“Hey! Come back here! You haven’t paid for that!” the clerk yelled after him, and a tall bearded man standing on the front porch of the store, who happened to be the husband of the woman buying the snuff, reached out a giant hand, grabbed Jasper by his shirttail, and swung him around, pinning him against the wall. And there is where he stayed while the clerk telephoned the sheriff, and Deputy Peewee Cochran came out to collect him in his 1931 Model A Ford truck.
* * *
The deputy’s wife told Jesse Dean Greeson about it when she went to Cooper’s Store to get some pinto beans for supper, and Jesse Dean told Emma Elrod, who told Emmaline Brumlow, who told everybody at that afternoon’s meeting of the Elderberry Woman’s Club.
“Well, I’m not surprised,” Miss Dimple said to her friend Virginia after the meeting, and neither was Virginia, who had been told earlier about Jasper’s recent nap on the library porch. “At least he’ll be given something to eat and a place to stay for a while,” Dimple said.
“I don’t understand why he disappeared so suddenly,” Virginia said. “Not that I didn’t appreciate his absence.” The two had put the folding chairs away after the meeting, and now Virginia swept crumbs from the floor. How could grown women make such a mess with a few cookies and a handful of peanuts? she wondered.
“I believe he was frightened,” Dimple said. “Jasper saw something or someone around the time Leola Parker died and that suspicious fire was set.”
“I’d like to know what it was. Maybe Sheriff Holland can get to the bottom of it,” Virginia said.
Miss Dimple didn’t answer, but she was thinking it might not hurt to have a little visit with Jasper herself.
* * *
There’s no time like the present, Dimple thought, and leaving Virginia, she set out to walk the mile or so to the county jail on the outskirts of town. The August afternoon was sultry, and for a few minutes she wondered if perhaps she should have waited until morning, but if a visit with Jasper would help clear up who was behind the dreadful things that had been going on, she didn’t want to wait another minute.
The owner of the store where Jasper had attempted to take the food had declined to press charges, saying if Jasper had merely asked, he would have given him something to eat, Peewee told her. But at Jasper’s request, he preferred to remain a guest of the county, at least for a few days.
“I don’t know why he wants to stay here,” the deputy told her, “but Sheriff Holland says it’s okay. I reckon he’s just glad to have a place to sleep and three meals a day.”
Miss Dimple agreed, but she also thought Jasper wanted to be safe. If anyone planned to harm him, it would be unlikely for them to invade the county jail to do it.
She found him asleep on his bunk, his mouth wide open and a scattering of bread crumbs in his beard, but at least he wore a clean jumpsuit of worn blue denim. He sat reluctantly and rubbed his eyes when Peewee opened the door of his cell to tell him he had a visitor. It was obvious he wasn’t at all happy to see her.
Miss Dimple accepted the only chair and got right to the point. Using her usual method of dealing with first graders, she faced him directly, forcing him to meet her eyes. “Jasper,” she began, “I want you to tell me what you saw the day Leola Parker died that frightened you into running away.”
“Didn’t see nothin’.” Jasper hung his head and looked away.
“Someone set that fire—set it deliberately,” she continued. “Did you see who it was?”
He shrugged. “I told you I didn’t see nothin’! Wasn’t even there.”
“Then you have a short memory,” Dimple said. “You must have forgotten that not too long ago you told my friend and me that you saw somebody that day and you knew what they did.” Dimple rose and looked down at him. “Three people have died because of what happened that day, Jasper Totherow, and an innocent person has been arrested for it. Now, tell me what you saw!”
“It ain’t got nothin’ to do with me.” He shifted on his bunk and looked around as if he hoped to find some way for a quick escape, but Jasper was in a jail cell and he wasn’t going anywhere.
“Then why did you run away?” Miss Dimple persisted. When he didn’t answer, she took a deep breath and sat again. “You were afraid you’d said too much.” She spoke softly. “Isn’t that right?”
He looked up, his eyes wide with fear. “I don’t want nobody comin’ after me.”
“No one’s going to come after you here, Jasper. Don’t you want to put the person who did this away? Just think of it—you wouldn’t have to run anymore. You wouldn’t have to worry.”
He thought about that for a minute. Sighing, he finally spoke. “See … the thing is, I really don’t know who it was.”
Miss Dimple frowned. “Were you too far away to recognize the face?”
He shook his head. “Couldn’t see his face, or much of the rest of him either ’cause he was covered by a sheet. Could’ve been a woman, for all I know. Had on some kind of white pointy thing. Looked kinda like a ghost.”
“You mean he had on a hood like people wear in the Ku Klux Klan?”
“Yeah, I reckon. I ran when I saw him set that fire. No tellin’ what he might do if he saw me watchin’.”<
br />
He could’ve helped Leola, might’ve even saved her life! “Did you see what happened to Leola that day? Did he attack her, too?”
Jasper shook his head violently. “No! I saw her run out of the house—I reckon she must’ve seen that smoke; then all of a sudden like, she stopped and ran back toward the house. I don’t know if that man in the hood scared her or if she meant to get inside to the telephone, but she tripped on that step and fell. Right soon after that, that little gal showed up, come runnin’ from them woods behind the house.
“Heck, at first I didn’t even know the old woman was home. She keeps—kept—her car, that old Plymouth she drove, in the garage out back.”
“Then what were you doing there?” Miss Dimple asked.
“I come to get me some tomaters—she told me to help myself—and radishes, too. Them was the best radishes!” Jasper smacked his lips, remembering.
Dimple thought of the garden Leola kept behind her garage, and knowing Leola, she didn’t doubt that this time Jasper spoke the truth. Leola Parker was always glad to share what she had. Clearing her throat of a lump that threatened tears, she asked if Jasper had seen a car.
This time, she was rewarded. He nodded eagerly. “Sure did, but I don’t know what kind and didn’t stick around to find out.”
Miss Dimple frowned. “Do you remember what color it was?”
“Uh-huh. It was black.” Jasper stretched and yawned, obviously eager to get back to his nap. Dimple thanked him and left.
* * *
“You had a telephone call while you were out,” Phoebe told her when she got home. “It was a long-distance call and I wrote down the number. Leola’s daughter, Mary Joy, asked if you would call her back.”
“Well, Miss Dimple, you were right,” Mary Joy told her when they were finally connected. “Some man came out here yesterday and asked if I was interested in selling Mama’s place.”
“What man?” Dimple asked.
“Never saw him before. He didn’t give his name and I didn’t ask. I told him I wasn’t selling, but he gave me a card with some company name on it—in case I changed my mind, he said. Luther wasn’t here and I didn’t let him in.”
“Good for you! Do you still have the card?”
“Just a minute and I’ll get it,” Mary Joy said.
“Here it is,” she said when she came back to the phone. “It’s something called Bold Victory, Incorporated.”
“Hmm … does it say what it is?”
“No, and there’s nobody’s name on it, either. Only a phone number and some kind of fancy initials.”
“What kind of initials?” Miss Dimple asked.
“Looks like a B on top of a V,” Mary Joy said.
“And that’s all?”
“Yes, ma’am, except for Bold Victory and the phone number, and it’s not a local number, so it must not be anybody from around here.”
Miss Dimple wrote down the number Mary Joy gave her, but she didn’t recognize the exchange. “I’ll ask Florence McCrary,” she said. “She should be able to tell us where it’s located.” Of course Florence would also be curious about why she wanted to know, but that couldn’t be helped.
“Is Luther’s mother still with you?” she asked.
Mary Joy’s sigh was barely audible, but it was a sigh all the same. “Yessum, but she’s rarin’ to go home.”
Dimple hated being the bearer of discouraging news, but she advised Mary Joy to play hostess to Maisie a little longer and not to unlock her door for anyone she didn’t know. “I don’t want to frighten you, but this person might come back and try again.” And this time, he could be more persuasive.
* * *
“Why, that’s an exchange way down in Florida,” Florence said when Dimple spoke with her the next day. “You planning a vacation?”
Miss Dimple told her she was trying to get in touch with her brother, Henry, who had called and left a message, but she wasn’t sure if whoever answered the phone had written the number down correctly. It surprised her that she was getting so good at lying, and it shocked her even more that her Victorian conscience didn’t even raise an eyebrow.
“You want me to connect you, then?” Florence asked.
“Yes, please.” She might as well dive in headfirst, Dimple thought.
“It might take a few minutes. I’ll ring you when I get an answer.”
“Dimple, I don’t think that’s your brother,” Florence told her when she called back. “Some woman answered and she talked so fast, I couldn’t understand a word she said. Must’ve been a Yankee. I asked if Henry Kilpatrick was there, and she got all huffy—just plain rude—so I didn’t think you’d want any dealings with her. It’s someplace in Jacksonville. I’ll call her back if you want, but it’s gonna be expensive.”
Long-distance calls cost dearly and few people could afford them. Dimple wasn’t one of the few, so she thanked Florence and replaced the receiver. Bold Victory, whatever it was, was located in Jacksonville, Florida. Perhaps someone else had heard of the company. Dimple sat down to one of her Victory Muffins and a cup of ginger mint tea. The morning was half-spent and she had visits to make.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Opening her umbrella to ward off the blazing August sun, Miss Dimple started out for a visit with the Jarretts. The umbrella, once a vibrant shade of violet, was now streaked and faded, she noticed. When this war was over, Dimple decided, a new umbrella would be one of the first things she’d purchase.
Attempting to stay on the shadier side of the street, Dimple walked a little faster. She was eager to give Clay’s family an update on the latest developments with Mary Joy, and also to boost their hopes after her recent conversation (if you could call it that) with Jasper Totherow.
She found Chloe Jarrett and her daughter, Loretta, tightening the lids on glistening jars of green beans that lined the kitchen table and countertops.
“This should be the last of the batch,” Chloe said, welcoming her. “This makes seventeen more quarts to add to the thirty-something I put up earlier. I usually detest canning,” she confided, “but at least it’s kept me busy—not too busy to worry, but it helps a little.” With a damp dishrag, she carefully wiped off the bright green rows of jars. “Please take some of these home with you, Miss Dimple. We’ve plenty to spare and they’re a lot better than the canned ones from the store.”
Miss Dimple accepted gratefully and hoped she would be invited to sit somewhere other than in the steaming kitchen.
Loretta, thank goodness, was of the same mind. “For heaven’s sake, Mama, it’s hot as Hades in here!” She untied her apron and tossed it over the back of a chair. “Let’s sit out on the porch, where it’s cooler.”
Chloe rinsed out the dishrag and draped it over the sink. “Of course! What was I thinking? And how about a glass of iced tea? I could use one myself.”
“That would be most welcome,” Miss Dimple admitted. After the long, hot walk from town, the cold drink was appealing. The three took their glasses to the shady end of the front porch, where a slight breeze ruffled the leaves on the pecan tree at the corner of the house. Already the tight green hulls had formed around the shells inside which nuts would soon mature. Amos, the old Collie, slept nearby under the overhanging branches of a drooping spirea bush.
“I’m afraid we don’t have any encouraging news from our Clay,” Chloe began, setting her glass aside. “I’ve told Bobby Tinsley over and over that he was out picking peaches when Prentice was killed. Came in a little after noontime to get cleaned up so he could make deliveries for Harris Cooper. I don’t know how they think he could be in two places at once!”
“Well, I believe I might have a bit of good news, or at least it’s worth looking into.” After drinking most of her tea, Dimple continued to hold the frosty glass, relishing its coolness. “I spoke with Jasper Totherow yesterday and he said something I found intriguing.”
Loretta frowned. “But, Miss Dimple, you can’t believe a thing that crazy old man says
!”
Her mother, eager for any word of encouragement, quieted her daughter with a wave of her hand and leaned forward. “What was that, Miss Dimple?”
“He said he saw someone light that fire at Leola Parker’s the day she was found dead.” Miss Dimple told her how, according to Jasper, Leola had tripped and hit her head.
“Did he know who it was?” Chloe asked.
“He didn’t get a good look because whoever did it was wearing a Klan hood that hid his face, but Jasper said he was driving a black car.”
“A lot of cars are black,” Loretta said.
“True, but someone in a black car attempted to follow us when several of us went to see Leola’s daughter, Mary Joy, down near Griffin. We managed to evade whoever it was, or so we thought, but now Mary Joy tells me a man has approached her about buying her mother’s property.” She explained how Leola had been badgered by someone with the same goal in mind.
Chloe gripped the arms of her chair. “Do you think this same person might have been responsible for setting that fire?”
“Perhaps not the same person, but one of his associates,” Dimple replied.
“I wonder why he wants that particular piece of land,” Loretta said.
“I wish I could answer that, but perhaps it will eventually come to light.” Miss Dimple drank the rest of her tea and set the glass aside. “But it does seem there’s a definite connection to Leola’s death, and possibly Prentice Blair’s.”
“I don’t suppose Mary Joy recognized the man who approached her,” Chloe said. “Did he leave a name?”
“No, but he did leave a card with the name of a company, or I assume it’s a company. It’s called Bold Victory, and Florence tells me that according to the phone number, it’s located in Jacksonville, Florida.”
“And there was no other name on the card?” Loretta asked.
Miss Dimple shook her head. “Just the name, Bold Victory, a phone number, and the initials in large black print. Mary Joy says it looks like the B is superimposed on top of the V.”
Miss Dimple Picks a Peck of Trouble: A Mystery (Miss Dimple Mysteries) Page 20