by Bill Crider
They did.
Rolingson found out the hard way that driving on the narrow county road wasn’t quite the same as sailing along Houston’s Gulf Freeway.
Rhodes didn’t see it happen, didn’t even hear the crash, but he saw the results when the county car topped a little rise in the road.
There was a sharp curve at the bottom of the rise, and Rolingson clearly hadn’t been prepared for it. He’d almost made it anyway, but at the last minute the rear tires hadn’t taken hold in the loose gravel and the truck had slewed off the road and into the weed-choked drainage ditch.
That in itself might not have stopped Rolingson; with a little driving skill he could have gotten out of the ditch if that had been the only trouble.
But the ditch was still muddy from the Easter spell rains. Rolingson had never been stuck in the mud before, and he had no idea of what to do about it. The one thing he shouldn’t have done was to press down on the accelerator as hard as he could and hope that the pickup would pull itself free, but that was what he did.
When Rhodes arrived on the scene, he could hear the high-pitched whine of an engine being revved. He could see the pickup’s rear wheels spinning, and they could see the mud that was being flung up behind them.
Rolingson was never going to get the pickup out of the ditch that way, as any hick could have told him.
Rhodes stopped his car and got out. Only then did he realize that he didn’t have his pistol. He had no idea where it was, though he thought it was most likely on the couch or on the floor in the front room of Graham’s house. He’d had it out of the holster when Marty Wallace crashed into him, and he hadn’t thought of it since. He’d been too addled when he left the house to think of it then.
He was still addled, and he was hearing a terrible thrashing noise in his head. He started toward Rolingson, hoping that because of his minor accident Rolingson might be just the least bit confused, too.
If Rolingson was confused, however, he didn’t show it. When he saw Rhodes coming, he got out of the pickup and took off down the road in an easy jog.
Rhodes headed after him. Every step he took made him feel as if someone were sitting astride his shoulders and hitting him in the head with a wooden mallet. Marty Wallace’s head had been hard.
As he followed Rolingson, the thrashing noise seemed to get louder and louder. When Rhodes rounded a curve, Rolingson still well ahead of him and gaining, he saw that the noise wasn’t in his head after all.
The tree whacker was hard at work, and it was coming along the road toward them.
The whacker was built a little like a tractor with a power lawnmower on an arm that could be extended either in front or to the sides. The mower part could be angled as much as ninety degrees to whack off the tree limbs, or it could be lowered to the ground for the brushy cover.
It was making so much noise tearing and breaking the limbs that the county employee driving it had not heard the slamming of car doors when Rhodes and Rolingson got out of their respective vehicles, and he was paying no attention to the two men running along the road in his direction.
It looked to Rhodes as if the man were wearing a Walkman or a cheap imitation, no doubt with the volume turned up to ten, listening to whatever kind of music he preferred to drown out the noise of the whacking.
Rolingson saw at once the advantages of being in the driver’s seat of such a machine if you were being pursued by the county sheriff. He ran alongside the chopper, put his foot on some step that Rhodes could not see, and dragged the surprised driver from the open cab, heaving him roughly out into the middle of the road, where he landed on his back and skidded for a good five feet. Rhodes knew the man’s back would be skinned and sore for days.
Rolingson might have been a city boy, but he wasn’t without intelligence. He sat in the cab for a few seconds, working the various levers until he found out how to maneuver the mower arm. The next thing Rhodes knew, the chopper was bearing down on him, the mower blade turned toward him and whirling so fast that Rhodes couldn’t see it.
Not being able to see it wasn’t much comfort however, considering that Rhodes knew it was there. And knew what it could do to a tree.
He could only imagine what it could do to a man, but what he imagined wasn’t pretty. It involved arms and legs flying through the air and drops of blood as fine as mist.
He suddenly remembered a neighbor’s cat that had a bad habit of getting under cars and climbing up into their engine compartments to sleep. He remembered the day the neighbor had started the car and the cat had been too near the fan blade. It hadn’t been a pretty sight.
Rhodes knew that the macho thing to do would be to stand there unmoving, bravely facing certain death by mangling. He also that he would be a complete idiot to let Rolingson mow him down. Literally.
He turned and ran.
He was tempted to put a hand on top of his head to keep it from flying off, but he told himself that wasn’t really necessary, no matter how imperative it might appear to be. He did it anyway. It seemed to help.
There was another problem. Even had he been a devoted exerciser and spent an hour or so daily on his Huffy Sunspirit stationary bike, he would have had trouble outrunning the chopper.
As it was, he didn’t have a chance.
Not in the road, at any rate. But he didn’t think that Rolingson could hit him if he went in the ditch.
Rhodes veered to the right and ran down the side of the ditch, weeds slapping at his pants. When he stepped into the water at the bottom, his left foot sank into mud that covered his shoe almost to the ankle. No wonder Rolingson had gotten the pickup stuck.
Rhodes pulled out his foot, but the shoe stayed in the mud. He didn’t have time to feel around for it. Rolingson had angled into the ditch, and the mower blade was spinning crazily not ten feet from Rhodes’ unprotected body, which had never felt quite so soft and vulnerable.
There was a hardy-looking elm with low-hanging limbs to Rhodes’ right. When he’d been a kid, he’d spent a lot of time climbing trees like that one, but now he couldn’t begin to recall the last time he’d climbed one. Thirty-five or forty years?
Not that it mattered. He grabbed a limb, put his foot—the one with the sock—onto another, and started up.
He could have run into the field, but the barbed-wire fence that surrounded it was rusty and sagging, and the fence posts were rotten. Rolingson would plow right through it and catch him in less than a minute. At least in the tree he might be able to climb higher than the spinning blade could reach.
The whole tree shook when the whacker ripped the lower limbs apart only seconds after Rhodes left them for the upper branches. Bark, leaves, and shredded wood flew around him as he put his arms around the trunk and held on. The noise was awful, and it didn’t do a thing to improve Rhodes’ headache.
The tree was too thick for Rolingson to destroy with the whacker. He would have needed a chainsaw for that. However, he didn’t give up. He began raising the arm.
Rhodes didn’t think he could go any higher than he already was. The branches wouldn’t support him, and falling would be almost as bad as getting whacked.
He went higher anyway.
The mower arm continued to climb.
Tree parts continued to fly.
As a consequence of raising the arm, the vehicle behind it had to come closer and closer to the tree.
Well, Rhodes thought, looking down from his insecure perch, why not?
He jumped from the tree and landed on top of the cab with a hollow thud. His shoed foot went out from under him, but the sock stuck tight, with the result that he fell hard on his right buttock.
The top of his head sailed off into the ditch, or it felt that way. Rhodes put up a hand to check. His head was all in one piece as far as he could tell.
He turned over on his stomach and lowered his head over the side. Rolingson stared back at him with undisguised hatred and swung a boulder-sized fist at his face.
Rhodes jerked back just i
n time, and Rolingson’s fist connected with the edge of the cab top.
The impact bounced Rhodes an inch into the air, and it didn’t do his head any good, either.
It did a lot less good to Rolingson’s fist, and Rhodes could hear his howl over the furious chopping of the mower blade.
Rhodes looked down again and saw that Rolingson was preoccupied with his hand. Blood was welling out of the skin over the knuckles.
Rhodes didn’t have any sympathy to waste on Rolingson. He reached around, grabbed a handful of the t-shirt, and started dragging Rolingson out of the cab.
Rhodes would probably not have been successful if Rolingson had not been both hurt and surprised. As it was, he managed to pull Rolingson off the driver’s seat and dump him in the mud and weeds of the ditch.
It would have been nice if he could have trusted Rolingson to remain there, but somehow he knew he couldn’t. He launched himself off the top of the cab.
Rolingson was lying on his back, and Rhodes landed on top of him, getting a knee into Rolingson’s sternum.
Rolingson’s face turned completely red as he struggled for breath, and Rhodes thought the fight was over almost as soon as it had begun. He was glad of that.
But he was wrong. Rolingson swung his good left hand up and clouted Rhodes in the face. Rhodes fell off into the muddy water at the bottom of the ditch. He was sure that the top of his head had parted company with him this time.
He didn’t have time to investigate. Rolingson was getting to his knees and winding up for another swing.
Rhodes’ fingers closed over something in the mud. It was his shoe. It came out of the mud with a sucking sound, water and mud-drops flying off it as Rhodes swung it as hard as he could at Rolingson’s face.
The sole of the shoe hit Rolingson squarely in the nose. Rhodes felt the nose give way, and there was a gratifying crunching sound.
Rolingson yowled, and his fist went harmlessly by Rhodes’ ear. Blood spurted from Rolingson’s nose.
Rhodes got up, ready to hit Rolingson again, but he didn’t have to. All the fight had gone out of the bigger man, as sometimes happened when it was proved to people that, unlike the way things had happened in the past, their superior size was not going to be the deciding factor in a fight. Rolingson was all right when it came to choking little old ladies or smaller men like Brame, even hanging men the size of Graham. Getting hurt by someone like Rhodes was a different thing.
Rhodes was dripping with muck and muddy water. Rolingson, who was bleeding, looked even worse.
Over the sound of the tree whacker, which was still working on the tree, Rhodes heard someone talking to him. It was the county employee, who now had his earphones hanging around his neck.
“You need any help?” the man said.
“Not now,” Rhodes said.
“If I’d known there was gonna be mud wrestlin’—”
“Yeah, I know,” Rhodes said. “You would have gotten here sooner.”
“Right,” the man said. “How’d you know that?”
“Never mind,” Rhodes said. He nodded toward the whacker. “Can you get that thing shut off? It’s giving me a headache.”
“Sure.” The man walked past Rolingson and climbed into the cab. He turned the key and the engine stopped.
“Thanks,” Rhodes said.
He shook water and mud out of his shoe and slipped it on his foot. He felt on his belt, and to his surprise he found that he still had his handcuffs. He walked over to Rolingson and cuffed him. Rolingson’s thick wrists were almost too big for the cuffs. Rhodes was very thankful Rolingson hadn’t hit him.
Rhodes looked up at the county employee. “You don’t see the top of a head anywhere around here, do you?”
“Huh?” The man looked at Rhodes as if he were afraid the sheriff had suddenly gone crazy.
Rhodes put up a hand and touched his hair gently. “Never mind,” he said. “There it is.”
“Uh, yeah,” the man said. “Whatever you say.”
Rhodes jerked on the cuffs. “Let’s go, Mr. Rolingson,” he said. He was glad the county car was already a muddy mess, but it was about to get worse.
“By nodse,” Rolingson said. “You brogue by nodse.”
“I’m sorry,” Rhodes said.
But he wasn’t.
Ruth Grady met him as he was going past Appleby’s house, and she turned around to follow him back to the college. The EMS vehicle was still at Graham’s house when they got there.
“She’ll be OK, I think,” the young EMT told Rhodes. “Concussion is all. Hell, Sheriff, you look a lot worse than she does.”
Rhodes was pretty sure he felt worse, too. “I’ll be all right,” he said.
“Maybe you better come by the hospital,” the young man said. “Let somebody check you out.”
“Maybe,” Rhodes said.
He told Ruth to follow the ambulance into town and keep a watch on Marty Wallace. “Consider her your prisoner. She’s involved in all this up to her neck.” Then he asked about fingerprints in the Volvo.
“It had been wiped down, but not very well,” she said. “I found a couple.”
Rhodes hoped they were Rolingson’s, but they wouldn’t convict him. Maybe Marty would talk.
“We can search Rolingson’s clothes for rope fibers,” Ruth said. “If we can find some and get a match with the rope that was used to hang Graham, that might help.”
“Good,” Rhodes said.
Fiber evidence, fingerprints, a solid motive, and maybe even a witness. Things weren’t looking good for Rolingson. Marty Wallace would probably get a light sentence, Rhodes thought, since she probably hadn’t actually killed anyone. And besides, she was a good-looking woman. No matter what anyone said, justice wasn’t entirely blind, especially if there were a number of sympathetic men on the jury. But Rolingson was going away for a good long time.
Rhodes felt the top of his head again. He didn’t feel sorry for Rolingson at all.
Chapter 19
“Are you sure you feel like going on a picnic?” Ivy said.
“Yep,” Rhodes said. He didn’t nod for fear that his head might fall off into his lap.
“You don’t look like it,” Ivy said.
Rhodes had gone home, had a hot shower, washed his muddy clothes, and put on clean ones. He thought he looked pretty good, except for the lump on his forehead, which felt as if it were about the size of a basketball. Then he had gone by the hospital, but not to get checked out. He had talked to Marty Wallace.
“You should have seen the other guy,” he told Ivy.
Ivy didn’t laugh. “Is it all right for us to go on a picnic in the county car?”
“This isn’t just a picnic,” Rhodes said. “This is official county business, too.”
He had taken the car by the station that the county used and had it cleaned out, though the seat was still a little damp on his side. Ivy’s side was fine, since no one had been sitting there. The back seat didn’t matter. Any prisoners would have to tough it out.
“Where are we going?” Ivy said.
“Obert,” Rhodes said.
When they got to the college, Rhodes parked in front of the main building. They got out, and Rhodes got the food out of the back seat. It was in a white plastic cooler that had a picture of big blue bass on the side. Rhodes had made roast beef sandwiches and put them in the cooler along with two Dr Peppers.
“This is a lot better than waiting for you to come home late,” Ivy said. “I did sort of want to see The Searchers, though.”
“We can tape it,” Rhodes said. “That’s better than staying up. Come on.”
“Where are we going?”
“Over there.” Rhodes pointed to the rock pile.
“Those things are as big as dinosaurs,” Ivy said.
Rhodes thought she was very perceptive. “What are those yellow flowers called?” he said.
“False daisies,” Ivy said.
Rhodes wondered if that could be right. When they cam
e to one, he leaned down and looked at it. It looked a lot like a daisy, all right, but he supposed it wasn’t one.
Ivy picked one and held it up. “They’re smaller than real daisies,” she said. She was wearing jeans and an old shirt. Rhodes had called her at work and warned her to change. “What happened to the beautiful woman who was involved in your investigation?”
Rhodes had told her about Marty’s being taken to the hospital. “The doctor says that she’s going to be fine. Did you go by to see the Appleby women on your way home?”
“Yes. They’re both ready to move back to Obert now that it looks certain that Mr. Appleby won’t be coming home anytime soon.”
“How will they support themselves?” Rhodes said.
“Twyla Faye says she can get a job as a checker in a supermarket. She’s done it before. Her mother will sell the cattle that Appleby got legitimately, or the ones that no one has said are stolen, and then she’ll try to get a job herself. With her and Twyla Faye both working, they’ll do all right. She wants the twins to go back to school, if they get out of jail.”
“I think they’re going to have to face a few charges,” Rhodes said as they reached the rocks.
He had talked to Claude and Clyde earlier, and they still remained silent about what they did or did not know about Simon Graham. Cy Appleby was no longer quite so self-assured, but he still had enough control over the twins to keep them from talking. Rhodes didn’t mind. He thought he knew everything Claude and Clyde could have told him.
It was only about four-thirty, and the sun was still in the sky. The rocks had been soaking up the sunlight all day, and they were warm to the touch. Somewhere in the field a quail made its bob-white call.
“Come on in the shade,” Rhodes said, walking into the shelter created by the rocks.
Ivy followed him in. There was no longer any litter there, Rhodes having carried it away. The ground was smooth, almost as if it had been swept clean.
“Someone’s been here before us,” Ivy said. “Is this one of your old romantic rendezvous spots?”