by W L Ripley
“I’m heavy. Maybe I wouldn’t toss.”
“Sound pretty sure of yourself. You tough, Storme?”
“Purposeful. You own a dog? Doberman with a bad attitude?”
His cheek twitched as if a fly had landed there. “I’m not very happy about that,” he said. “I understand a man has to protect himself, but don’t throw it in my face. Very dangerous.”
“Somebody popped Sheriff Kennedy. I’m not happy about that. What do you know about it? Why was your dog guarding a field of marijuana?”
“I notice you haven’t shown a badge.”
“That’s because you’re a good noticer.”
“You a private detective?”
I shook my head. Drank some chicory. “Just a good citizen like yourself.”
He threw back his head and laughed his raucous, booming laugh. “You’ve got cojones, podna. I’ll give you that. You come in, ask me about a murder I know little of, then you sit here sipping my chicory. You’re in the wrong place, boy. You have no official capacity and no idea who you’re fucking around with.”
“And who would that be?”
“Ask around.”
“I have.”
He cocked his head to one side and eyed me like a cobra would eye a mongoose. “And what do they say?”
“That you run whores out at your truck stop. That you’re a ruthless businessman and you pretty much have your way around Paradise. That everybody is afraid of you but they’re not sure exactly why.”
He elevated his chin two inches, pointed it at me. “And what do you say?”
“That you’re the bull goose in a mud puddle. You run drugs, bully the locals, and you got reason and ability to whack the sheriff. That, and you’ve got this cheap carny act working with the Deep South, coon-ass routine.”
His lips thinned to a straight line, and I saw a tightening at his temples where a blood vessel rose like a worm against the skin. Though his facial expression changed little, the force of his anger was palpable. Sentient, yet crackling in the air between us. “Well, Storme. We know how it lays, now. You’re an interesting man. Interesting, if not smart. I don’t like your conversation. Be nice to talk with you some more, but,” he said, slipping in the Cajun accent, “ol’ Willie Boy don’t tole you all things, him. So get lost, cowboy.”
I stood up. Met his eyes with mine. Two gunfighters backing away from the table. Each wary of the other.
A door opened at the back of the office and two men—a blond surfer type and a darker, hairy guy—stepped in. They had weight-machine muscles and steroid-soaked eyes. “This is Vance and Breck,” said Roberts. “Boys, this is Mr. Storme. He’s leaving now.” They crossed their large forearms in front of their forty-eight-inch chests simultaneously. Synchronized bulging. Maybe it was a new Olympic event. They certainly looked big enough to toss me out, and I was wearing new threads, but I wondered if they realized I possessed the secret knowledge of how to cloud men’s minds. Probably didn’t care. Their minds looked clouded enough already.
“They do any tricks?” I asked Roberts, keeping my eye on the beef. “Roll over? Speak? Play dead?”
“Shut up, wiseass,” said Vance, the darker man.
“Is ‘speak’ the only command you respond to?”
“Just come along with us, Mr. Storme,” said Breck, the blond guy. “Please. No trouble.” A polite bone breaker.
I was thinking of another snappy rejoinder when the sky darkened and a man only half the size of a station wagon stepped into the office. He was bald as Mr. Clean and had a wicked red Fu Manchu. He looked like a pirate. A really big pirate. I tried to remember if I’d thought to bring an antitank mine. Darn. Changed clothes. “You need something, Willie?” asked the giant. He was six nine and had to weigh close to three hundred pounds.
Roberts looked at me. He smiled. Smug. In control. “Do I need Mr. Cugat for anything, Storme?” he asked. With a little luck I might have been able to handle the salt-and-pepper twins. However, the mountainoid was another matter.
“No,” I said. “Not yet, anyway.”
“Y’all come back,” said Roberts.
“Love to,” I said. I left. And did so with as much dignity as the situation would allow. At least I didn’t let them kick sand in my face. I didn’t let them tweak my nose, either. What a man. Tempestt said good-bye as I was leaving.
“How did it go?” she asked.
“Swimmingly,” I said. “I should make vice president by Christmas.”
“Call me for coffee.”
“Looking forward to it.”
“So am I.”
She was standing at the picture window when I pulled out of the parking lot.
So, I’d made one friend. Out of five. Not bad for me.
ELEVEN
So, I’d met Willie Boy Roberts. Hadn’t accomplished much by it. He’d played me like a catfish in shallow water. Controlled the interview. Called the shots. I was small change to him.
No doubt about it. Willie Boy Roberts was a dangerous man.
I knew he was involved in something the local Kiwanis Club wouldn’t approve of. Unless there was more to the caster-and-conveyor-belt business than I knew, there was no reason to keep that much hired beef around.
Chick Easton was back at the Silver Spur, knocking back Carta Blanca when I came in.
“I thought you were Canadian,” I said, sitting on the chair he’d kicked out from the table for me.
“No habla englisa,” he said, then added, “gringo.”
The waitress brought coffee without being asked. It was fresh. Willie Boy’s chicory had been bitter. Fresh coffee in the late afternoon in a blue-collar bar could only mean Chick had clued the waitress in. I thanked him.
“No problem. You owe the waitress an autograph.”
Though not an autograph person, I said, “Okay.”
“Wait ’til you hear where she wants it. Ah, sweet bird of youth ever thou were’t. Or is it thou never were’t? These are hard questions for us Mexican-Canadians. How’d you make out with Roberts?”
“Pretty good. They didn’t fold me up in a packing crate and mail me back to Colorado.” I related my meeting with Roberts and the hired help. Chick nodded occasionally, didn’t interrupt. I told him about Tempestt.
“Maybe she can give us some inside information,” I said.
He raised an eyebrow. When he did, I noticed part of the left one was missing. Hadn’t noticed before because his dark, weathered skin had obscured it. Now I could see the dull blush of scar tissue. The eyebrow looked like an apostrophe. “No other interest?”
I ignored him. “What about the lawyer? Winston.”
“You didn’t answer my question. What about the girl?”
“What about her?”
“Dark hair with gold highlights, long legs, muscular? Sounds like we should go back and lean on her a little. Or at least you should. I’ll hold your coat.”
“The lawyer.”
He smiled, sipped the Carta Blanca. Leaned back in his chair. “He’s quite the boy, our Alan. Brooks Brothers suit. Rep tie. Capped teeth. Got a salon tan. Has that dull green cast to it. Five ten, 165 pounds. Smokes imported cigarettes. Works out some, but he’s not athletic. Left-handed. Been to an eastern university. Maybe even Ivy League. Smart. Cool. Can look you straight in the face and lie his ass off, but has a nervous habit of straightening his tie when he does.” He stopped and drank more beer. Smiled at me. Proud of himself.
“That all you could get?”
“It’s the Mex beer. Messes up my head. He also likes to fast dance and drinks vodka.”
I sipped my coffee, smiling into it when I did. Easton was pretty sharp. “Okay,” I said, “how do you know all that?”
“I lied about the dancing. He was a little tipsy in court, but not worried about breathing in anybody’s face. Vodka drinkers can get away with that. Got a little New England accent that slips in with the midwest drawl. Lays off his r’s some. But it isn’t often and seems practiced. Held
the cigarette in his left hand. It had a gold circle above the filter and is thinner than domestic. He’s slim-waisted, but he dropped a pen and the bailiff tossed it to him and he slapped at it with two hands. Not athletic.”
“Anything else?”
“Thinks he’s cute. Girl reporter may be right. He may swing both ways. Likes being in the center ring. Primps and preens. Mugs. Bullies. He worked the female judge. Gave her the eye, cocked his head at her. Pouted a little. At first she didn’t like it, probably seen it before, but by the end of the session he was making points with it. Lawyers. Living proof that snakes fuck cockroaches. He patted the male bailiff’s hand, rubbed his shoulder. Subtle androgyny is an advantage for him in court. He tries to seduce the entire room. And loves it.”
He lit up a cigarette. Continued. “Another thing. He ain’t above fixing it so he wins. You can see it’s all that matters. Winning. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear he breaks down in tears when he loses. He’s got something on the prosecutor. Either that or the PA is superdumb. He let Winston get away with murder. Several times he didn’t object when he should have, let Winston introduce testimony that was full of holes. Even the judge got annoyed with the prosecutor’s performance. This is a good county to get arrested in. Just hire Winston. Something else. More than once Winston looked at me without looking at me. It was funny. Like he didn’t think I noticed it.”
“Maybe he thought you were cute.”
“I am.”
“You think he’s involved in any of this? The drugs? The sheriff?”
“I think he’s capable of anything,” Chick said. “There’s probably little happens around Paradise he’s not at least aware of. Highly intelligent. Brilliant even. Well thought of around town. He’s involved in a campaign to save the downtown area. A unique guy. Knows a lot of people, but probably has few close friends, though there are people who would like to have him in their corner.”
“There’s Horton,” I said, reminding him of the lifestyle editor with the bad manners.
“You find Horton attractive?”
“Mesmerizing,” I said.
“Probably not a lot to choose from in a community like this. Being gay is dangerous work in this part of the country. They may march in the streets and hold political office in San Francisco, but around here they get the crap beat out of ’em, and that’s when the locals are feeling generous. Still, I’m having trouble buying Horton and Winston. Winston has money and mobility. He can go other places for it.”
“Maybe Horton provides information for Winston. He does work for a newspaper. Besides, between the two of them it doubles the contacts they have.”
“Pimp for each other? We’re guessing. But I’ll bet my Josh Logan fan club button he’s involved in this, either directly or peripherally. He likes this stuff. He’s attracted to the wild side. When he left the courtroom he finally looked at me. At first he just glanced, then he looked again and there was something else in it.”
“Recognition?”
Chick shook his head. “Anger. Even hatred.”
“So, what have we got so far? We kicked over some rocks and found a couple of snakes. I didn’t really get anything from Roberts except a bad feeling about my longevity and a warning to keep out of his business. He didn’t seem particularly worried about me.” A door slammed and I heard the sound of a stool flushing.
“This is a nasty place,” said Chick. “I know. I’ve been in nasty places before, and this is one of them. Something ain’t right. The whole feel is wrong. Community betterment signs and a businessman with head-knockers on the payroll. Then, you got this honest sheriff in the middle of all this corruption and everybody says he was honest and he gets bumped. Now you got a moron in his place and all the little snakes don’t have to crawl under rocks anymore. They can come right out and play in the sunshine like they were real people. Oh, here’s something interesting. Guess who Winston was defending in court? Our buddy Luke. The little weasel with the Shit Happens hat.”
“Small world.”
“Tiny.”
I paid Chick’s tab. He was good at this work. In fact, he was good at many things. Unusual things. Talents one didn’t acquire at the Acme Bounty Hunter’s School. Where had he learned them, then? As for Winston and Roberts, I was sure they were involved in most of the dirty doings around the county, but would they kill the sheriff? Winston had his own reasons to hate Kennedy. But kill him? Winston had the big family name. Money. Position. Still, he was a strange one. Roberts was a better candidate. Willie Boy would benefit from having a bonehead like Baxter as sheriff. But killing the sheriff brought in the heat—state bulls and out-of-town suits with names to make. Killing the sheriff was stupid, something Roberts wasn’t.
Unless there was no other choice.
Chick bought a six-pack of Carta Blanca and a pint of Mezcal. “Never know when Villa might ride by,” he said.
We walked outside into the cool, fading light of Ozark autumn. As we neared the Bronco, a county car pulled up and Baxter got out. Deputy Simmons, whom I remembered from my first visit to the sheriff’s office, got out on the passenger side.
“Charles Easton?” Baxter said, trying for official.
“Too many cop shows,” said Chick, to me.
Baxter said, “You’re under arrest.”
TWELVE
“What’s the charge?” I asked.
“Shut up,” Baxter said. “Or I’ll run you in with him. I’d like that. You might even resist arrest.” He smiled. “I’d like that even more. A night in the jug might cool that mouth of yours.”
Chick looked cool and unworried. He had an amused look on his face, as if the sheriff’s fly were unzipped. “What’d I do this time?” he asked.
“I’ll think of something. Just get in the car.”
“Nah,” said Chick. “You know how it works. Play fair. Just tell me what heinous crime I committed. You know, like aggravated assault, public drunkenness. Using polysyllables in front of a known imbecile.”
Baxter reached into the police unit and pulled out a nightstick, one of those black clubs with a T-handle. A nasty weapon. “I’m taking you in for questioning in the murder of Sheriff Kennedy.”
“Waste of time,” said Chick. “I know less about it than you know about fifth-grade math. If I knew who killed the sheriff they’d already be in jail.” He paused for a moment, stuck his cigarette in the corner of his mouth. “Or worse.”
Baxter placed the barrel of the stick in his free hand. “I’ve been trained with this, Easton.”
“That mean you won’t mess your diapers when I take it from you?” Chick said. Baxter’s face reddened. The light at the intersection turned amber then crimson behind him. Deputy Simmons was nervous. Baxter wanted to use the stick.
“You dealt it, boy,” Baxter said.
Chick handed me the booze and calmly said, “We don’t need this silliness. I’ll go with you. Quietly, even.”
Baxter relaxed his grip on the nightstick. “Cuff him, Simmons,” he said. Chick held his arms out and allowed him to place the bracelets on his wrists.
“You got anything in a yellow gold?” asked Chick.
“No more smart shit,” said Baxter.
“Mind if I chuckle to myself if I think of something funny?” Chick said. “Like your ACT scores?”
“Get in the car, asshole.”
“I love it when you talk dirty.”
The deputy escorted Chick to the unit. Held the top of Chick’s head as he helped him into the back of the unit. There was a screen between the backseat and the front.
The sheriff moved closer to me, leaned into my face. “You watching this, hotshot?” His breath was hot on my face. “Learn something from it. This is my county now, and you’re stinking it up.”
“You’re so lyrical,” I said.
“Don’t fuck with me, Storme.”
“That cuts both ways, Leslie.”
We stared at each other for a long moment, like two high school kids in a school
yard. His eyes were bloodshot and mean, the bad eye, malevolent and dark. Finally, he backed away.
“I’ll follow you down, Chick,” I said.
“Do what you like,” said Baxter. “But nobody talks to or sees him ’til tomorrow afternoon.”
“That’s crap.”
He smiled at my rising anger, spat tobacco on my shoes, and got in his car. They drove away, leaving me on the sidewalk with a bottle of Mezcal and some Mexican beer I wasn’t going to drink. Tobacco spit on my shoes. I felt impotent and stupid.
I put the beverages in the Bronco and walked to an open-air pay phone. The street was quiet and deserted. I thought of the old joke about pulling the streets up after dark, but didn’t laugh. Downtown Paradise was almost gone. Drained of its life by shopping malls, corporate discount chain stores, dual-lane highways, and recession. No jobs and few businesses. The American Dream. Gone without even leaving a high-water mark on the buildings. Mortgaged tomorrows for today. Then tomorrow came.
There was a sadness to it and no joy in its realization.
If Alan Winston could restore the downtown, then more power to him.
I called information and got Jill Maxwell’s number. Called it. Her recorder answered and I hung up. A few blocks away I heard a horn honk and echo. I called information again and got the number of the newspaper. I dialed that number and asked for her.
“I’m sorry,” said a female voice. “Jill’s on vacation.”
I asked when she would return and the voice said two weeks. That made no sense. I hung up and dialed the Days Inn and asked for Sam Browne. Finally, something went right. He answered.
“What’s up, Storme?”
“Chick’s been arrested,” I said.
“Who?”
“Friend of mine. Chick Easton. Baxter cuffed him, said he wanted to question him about the sheriff’s murder. What do you know about it?”
“Nothing. The name never came up. I got a message you called earlier. What did you need?”
I told him about the vanished marijuana. Being shot at. He said they hadn’t had time to get out to the field yet. He asked why I hadn’t reported it.