The Homecoming

by Carsten Stroud

  Endicott couldn’t see the driver, just a pair of large-veined brown hands on the steering wheel, big strong hands, cowboy hands. Faded jeans. Another big guy, and no fat on him either. A tooled-leather belt with a big cowboy buckle. A white shirt. Some kind of thick gold ring on his right hand, looked like a Marine Corps crest.

  The butt of a large steel revolver was sticking out of a hideaway holster tucked into the driver’s waist. Okay. There you go.

  These are the guys running Edgar.

  The leathery cowboy with the silver hair was still looking at the cell screen. Endicott knew what it said because he’d had the message ready to go as soon as he saw anyone showing the slightest interest in Edgar’s Windstar.

  86 MEET. MAIDS DOING ROUNDS. WILL CLEAN SCENE AND RESET MEET.

  The man with the silver hair put the cell away and looked up at the second-floor gallery of the Motel 6. In the double lens the guy’s face was like something chipped out of a gravestone and his eyes were as yellow as a wolf’s. They seemed to be boring straight up through Endicott’s Zeiss glasses and drilling into his brain.

  He knows I’m here, came the irrational thought, unbidden but piercing. He knows. Endicott’s groin got tight and he stepped back away from the window.

  The Ford suddenly accelerated away from Edgar’s van, turned the corner, and was gone. But Endicott had the plate number memorized. He was good at that sort of thing, even when he was scared brainless.

  Endicott watched through the slit for a while, expecting the Ford to pull into the Motel 6 parking lot any moment. But it didn’t.

  After a long, tense time, Endicott drew the slit closed, feeling deeply rattled, which was highly unusual for Endicott.

  He pulled himself together and started to work on the room, and the unholy mess it contained. Drill enough holes in people and all sorts of stuff comes running out. As he went at the job, which was unpleasant, and likely to get more so as he worked his way through the scenario he was going to create, most of his mind was on the work in front of him.

  But a small screen at the back of his skull was running a text loop over and over:

  GOING TO NEED SOME HELP WITH THOSE GUYS

  GOING TO NEED SOME HELP WITH THOSE GUYS

  “You know what the fuck happened back there?” said Coker, as they worked their way north.

  “I do. Edgar’s dead and we just got burned.”

  “He’ll have your license plate.”

  “Yep.”

  “I figure Crowder’s dead too.”

  “I certainly hope so.”

  “Edgar must have talked, Charlie.”

  “Not necessarily. Maybe he was alive when you asked him how his wife was. Maybe not. Maybe Endicott already knew Francis was dead. I have no idea how, but did he tell the guy everything? I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because Endicott still had to go to the trouble of reeling us in for a visual. If Edgar had talked, told him who he was working for, Endicott wouldn’t have run that risk. He would have known about us already. Why take a chance on us coming right at him, once we figured out we’d been burned? Edgar had to know he was a dead man either way. Edgar had a lot of fuck you in him. He wouldn’t want to go out crawling.”

  A pause.

  “Good point,” said Coker. “Neither would I.”

  “Did Edgar have people?”

  “He had an Aunt Vi. Loved whiskey and macaroons. You think we should send her a bit of money?”

  “Yes. I’ll take care of it.”

  Another pause, while both men worked it out.

  “We’re gonna have to kill this pesky fucker,” said Coker, with an edge. “We should have gone in and taken him out right there.”

  Danziger shook his head.

  “Edgar said Endicott had a big Sig Sauer and lots of ammunition. Holed up in there, only one way in. It would have been a gunfight. Hard to explain why we were there when Niceville PD showed up. We’re gonna have to lay back in the tall grass and work this out.”

  “We know anything about this guy?”

  “Only what Edgar sent us. Resident of Miami. Single. Calls himself a collector. Probably working for those guys in Leavenworth. Or at least he was.”

  “You think he’s gone freelance?”

  “Two million buys a lot of loyalty, Coker.”

  They were out of the suburbs now and pulling onto North Ring Road.

  “You gonna go to work?”

  “No. I called in before I called you. Jimmy’s okay with it. I can’t be buggering around in a black-and-tan with this Endicott guy running loose. He has your plate. I figure he’ll come for you tonight. We’ll be ready.”

  Danziger pulled up beside Coker’s car, a green Crown Vic, shut the engine, put out a hand to stop Coker before he got out.

  “He’s not coming for anybody tonight, Coker. He’s gonna want to bring in help.”

  Coker considered this.

  “Got a point.”

  Danziger gave him a sideways grin.

  “He’s read the file. You smoked four cops with a Barrett. He’s gotten a look at you already. Even I think you’re a scary-looking guy. From the way he’s handled himself, he’s no fool. He’ll check out of the Marriott, hole up somewhere secure, and call for backup. Give him a day for his shooters to get here, get ready. Then he’ll come.”

  Coker grinned at Danziger.

  “You’d love that, wouldn’t you, Charlie? Be just like the big fight at the end of The Wild Bunch.”

  “Except in my version they die and we don’t.”

  A Beryl Is a Jewel

  It was after three o’clock Friday afternoon when Reed pulled into the main square of Sallytown, parked his shiny black Mustang under a spreading willow, and climbed out of the car, stretching his back muscles. He was still sore in all kinds of places—he’d been bounced around pretty good in that crash at the Super Gee and his safety harness had left welts across his chest and shoulders. It felt good just to stand in the sunlight and take in Sallytown.

  He knew the town pretty well, since he’d spent a year patrolling it for State before he got reassigned to pursuit. It was a sleepy Main Street kind of town, population around three thousand, just like thousands of others scattered across the South, and the main square had what most main squares in the South had, a redbrick town hall with a Confederate flag flying on the pole outside, a flowered central garden with a statue of a Rebel cavalryman in the middle, and live oaks all over the place, every one trailing wisps of Spanish moss.

  On the far side of the square was the Episcopalian Church of Christ the Redeemer, built in 1856, rebuilt in 1923 after the lightning strike and the fire. It was a white wooden structure with a needle-sharp spire painted silver. The spire could be seen for miles around, sticking up out of the trees and glittering like a spear tip.

  A historical plaque beside the town hall said that it had been built in 1836 and during the war it had been the headquarters for Robert E. Lee and his staff for three months in 1864. A soft fall light lay over the square and the buildings and the people walking up and down the main street, going in and out of the shops.

  The vehicles were mainly pickups and older Detroit steel. The pickups had bumper stickers with sayings on them like THIS TRUCK INSURED BY SMITH AND WESSON or OUT OF WORK? HUNGRY? EAT YOUR IMPORT! Reed, a man of the South himself, had no problem with that Confederate flag either.

  Although a bunch of pig-eyed redneck dimwits had defiled it back in the sixties—and were still doing it—to him the flag of the Confederacy would forever stand for Chickamauga and Shiloh and Manassas and Vicksburg and the thousands of wildwood boys who had died at those places.

  Not that he’d try explaining that to anyone north of the Ohio River.

  He stretched again, worked out a kink in his neck, and headed across the square to the town hall, which was where the Archives and Records Office was located, on the second floor facing the parking lot out back. He was in plain clothes, jeans and cowboy boots, a
white tee and a navy blue blazer, but he had his service Beretta in a holster at his waist and his badge was in his coat pocket. He wasn’t on official business, but nobody had to know that.

  As he climbed the stairs to the old carved doors he remembered the call he had taken from Nick earlier in the day, telling him about the theft of the Shagreen brothers’ corpses from the State HQ lock yard. He had no thoughts on it other than to be thoroughly amazed that the Shagreen brothers had friends who cared enough about them to steal their corpses. Nick had suggested that those friends might be out looking for Reed Walker.

  Reed had no position on that other than to hope it was true because he would truly enjoy shooting them.

  Archives was open until five on a Friday. When he stepped into the dim, shadowy space with the slowly turning ceiling fan and the tall sash windows, he was greeted by the slender shape of Miss Beryl Eaton, who had been expecting him for over an hour now.

  Miss Beryl was in her seventies at least, but still a beauty, with soft pale skin and vivid blue eyes. Her long white hair was swept up in a spiral arc and pinned by a silver bar. She had been the archivist for Sallytown since the fifties, a widow now, and kind of a living monument herself.

  “Reed, how lovely. You look well.”

  “I am, thank you, Miss Beryl. You are, as always, stunning.”

  “And you are, as always, a charming liar.”

  She asked after the family and she required details, not just a few vague pieties. She said how sorry she was about Dillon’s disappearance and asked him if any progress had been made in finding out the circumstances of his “passing.”

  Reed was forced into a series of evasions that he hoped Miss Beryl did not notice while she walked him back into the records area, where there was a long trestle table, shiny with age, on which she had laid out a silver pot that smelled of strong black coffee, a tall china cup, and several ancient green ledgers. Each one was as thick as the King James Bible. She pulled out a chair for him and watched while he got himself squared away.

  “I took the liberty of bringing the parish records over from Christ the Redeemer for the time frames you mentioned. That would be the newer-looking book on the left. These others are property records and tax rolls and of course the various census books we have for the period you requested. Do you wish any help at all?”

  While Reed had told her that he was here to look into a birth certificate matter dating from around 2000, he hadn’t been more specific than that, and Miss Beryl was too tactful to pry, apparently feeling that his visit was an official one, and therefore something not to be poked at by a clerk.

  “I think I’m good, thank you, Miss Beryl.”

  She nodded and slipped silently from the room, leaving a faint scent of mimosa. He pulled the parish ledger over, flipped it open, and went to work. And the work was grim. Page after page of chicken-scratch handwriting or faded type, and the smell of must rising up from every open book. None of the relevant documents had been scanned into a searchable database, although there was talk of doing it when the economy got better. Kate had told him that Sylvia had done all her searching through Ancestry and had come up with zip, so maybe a database wouldn’t have helped anyway.

  Reed drank his coffee and dug in and went at it and he was still at it an hour later, when Miss Beryl ghosted back into the room and stood looking down at him. He was slumped over a pile of ledgers and records books, looking rumpled and frustrated.

  “Dear boy. You look quite terrible.”

  Reed, who had never liked clerical work, looked up at her and smiled.

  “I’m getting bogged down here, Miss Beryl.”

  “Perhaps I can be of some help?”

  Reed looked down at the heap of open books. He was getting nowhere. And time was running. Miss Beryl sat down on the far side of the table, folded her long-fingered hands, and smiled at him.

  “This isn’t an official investigation, is it?”

  Reed gave her a wry smile.

  “Yes. No. And it might become one. How’s that for an answer?”

  “Perfectly sensible. Let me help you. I infer from the specific pages you have open that you’re trying to determine a birth. Am I correct?”

  “You are.”

  She sat back and considered him.

  “I’ve always liked you, Reed. Many of the young policemen with whom I come into contact are dismissive of the doddering old bat who runs Archives. You have never been that sort. I think you’re worried and unhappy. The tenor of your unhappiness leads me to conclude that this is a family matter.”

  “In a way.”

  “And that would be …?”

  “The Teague family.”

  Miss Beryl’s expression altered slightly. It became both cooler and more guarded.

  “I know the Teague clan quite well. Which branch?”

  “Miles Teague. And his wife, Sylvia.”

  Miss Beryl paused. When she spoke her tone was reserved and careful.

  “Miles Teague. He’s dead now, is he not?”

  “Yes. He is.”

  “By his own hand.”

  “Yes. And Sylvia’s gone too.”

  “Yes. I know. May I venture a guess?”

  “Please.”

  “You’re looking into an adoption that Miles arranged. A young boy named Rainey. Rainey is now in your sister Kate’s care, and she has questions?”

  “Yes. Several. Many.”

  “Rainey was the boy who was at the center of that tragedy last year, was he not? His abduction and his odd return, found in a sealed grave. Sylvia’s disappearance, Miles’ suicide?”

  Reed nodded, waiting.

  Miss Beryl was silent for a long time. She was obviously torn between tact and truth.

  “I am going to make a leap of faith here, Reed. I hope I won’t be sorry that I have done so.”

  “Whatever you have to say stays between us.”

  “That may not be possible. Do you recall a Leah Searle, Reed?”

  “I know the name. She was the lawyer Miles hired to do the adoption paperwork for Rainey.”

  “I knew her. We met during the early days of her work for Miles. I was impressed by her. She was an able young woman. Initially, our relationship was purely professional. I helped her with the Archives, and the parish books. The issues were complex and the records utterly chaotic. We persisted. And we failed. Over time it became clear to both of us that there was no reliable record of Rainey’s birth in any available archive or database.”

  She made a sweeping gesture over all the books on the table.

  “You can ruin your young eyes going over these materials, Reed, and you will go away as puzzled as you were when you arrived. You’re aware that Leah Searle is dead?”

  “I understand she drowned.”

  Miss Beryl raised an eyebrow and smiled.

  “In her bathtub. An accident, we are told.”

  Reed looked at her.

  She held his look.

  “We come to the heart of the matter. She was in Gracie at the time of her death, following her researches. I believe by this point she was no longer working for Miles. I believe she was following her own line of inquiry.”

  “Into Rainey?”

  Miss Beryl shrugged.

  “Not only him. It had become a more wide-ranging investigation. You know the Teagues have a reputation, here in Sallytown, and elsewhere?”

  “I know about London Teague. I know that he probably had his third wife killed, back in Louisiana, before the Civil War, and that her godfather called him out over it.”

  “That was Anora.”

  “Yes. She was—”

  “A Mercer, as are you, on your mother’s side. Anora’s godfather was John Gwinnett Mercer. After her death, he and London Teague came to a stand at John Mullryne’s home in Savannah. The fight was inconclusive.”

  Reed was wondering why Miss Beryl had taken such an interest in the history of his family. She knew it better than he did. But he said nothing, a
nd she went on.

  “London Teague had two wives before Anora. The first one, whose name is not known, died of malaria in the West Indies, where London ran a slave market catering to ships bound for the Carolinas. The second wife, Cathleen, had two sons, Jubal and Tyree. She died by her own hand after discovering that London Teague was a philanderer and a brute. Tyree was killed at Front Royal, during the War of Secession. Jubal, a cavalryman, survived the war and, very late in his life, had a son named Abel Teague. Anora had two girls, Cora and Eleanor. After her death, London sent them to live with John Gwinnett Mercer in Savannah. Cora died of influenza in the last years of the war. Eleanor went on to establish the Mercer line from which you derive, Reed. But Abel was born too, of Jubal, and in him the sins of London Teague came back into the living world. Abel Teague was a scoundrel, a rake, and a coward. Many men wished him dead, men of your line, or men married to women of your line. In the year before the First World War, Abel defiled a young woman named Clara Mercer. And then he refused to marry her. Clara had an older sister named Glynis. She was married to a fine man named John Ruelle. They owned a large plantation on the eastern slope of the Belfair Range. They took Clara in. She had suffered a nervous collapse. She may have been pregnant. John, and later his brother, Ethan, called Abel out for his offenses, but Abel would not come to a stand. That is to say, he refused to fight a duel. Refused many times. He was immune to shame, and cared nothing for anyone’s honor. Not even his own. I doubt he had any honor to protect.”

  Reed reached into the inside pocket of his blazer and pulled out a sheet of paper folded in three. He held it out to Beryl, who took it.

  “What is this, Reed?”

  “It’s a memo I found in my father’s printer the day he disappeared. It was one of the last things he wrote. I gave it to Kate and Nick. This memo is why I’m here. To see for myself if it’s accurate.”

  Miss Beryl unfolded the sheet.

  Rainey Teague DOB questions:

  memo for Kate.

  Searched Cullen County census for period surrounding R’s DOB with Gwinnetts found no entry. No entry in surrounding parishes no entry in Belfair, no State or County Records show any certificate of R’s birth or baptism. No record in adjoining states, counties, or parishes. No sign R was born or baptized anywhere in US, Canada, or Mexico in any date range corresponding to his stated age. Foster parents Zorah and Martin Palgrave: found entry Cullen County Registry of Birth Martin Palgrave born Sallytown November 7th 1873 married Zorah Palgrave Sallytown Methodist March 15 1893. Palgraves received credit letter signed G. Ruelle April 12 1913 “for care and confinement Clara Mercer and delivery of healthy male child March 2nd 1913.”