“Well, he probably is.”
“And? What’d you find out?”
“Well, he was at the shelter last night, like you guessed—but only for supper, they said. He ate, then said he was going to Bud’s Pool Hall.”
“Bud’s?”
“I asked if it was because he wanted to drink, and they said no. Said he’d given up drinkin’. Said he was supposed to meet somebody there.”
“Who?”
“Don’t know.”
Interesting, she thought. Who would the man have known in Notchey Creek? Was it an old friend, an acquaintance, or someone he was meeting for the first time? And had the person been responsible for his inebriated state that morning? Or perhaps, she thought, they could at least tell them who he was and why he was in Notchey Creek.
Before she could ask any more questions, Jed’s cell phone rang and he answered it. “Sheriff Turner.” As he headed for the door, he continued speaking. “Uh huh. Yeah, Alveda, I spoke with her. No, Alveda, she and that pig aren’t gonna terrorize the community anymore. What? No, they’re not gonna ruin the festival either. Okay. Okay. Bye.”
The shop door slammed shut behind him.
13
Aunt Wilma Reports
The distillery was quiet when Harley arrived later that afternoon. She was happy to see Uncle Tater had risen from bed and was seated in the barnyard, assembling a moonshine still. When he heard her truck rumble into the drive, he lowered the wrench to his side and saluted her with his beer bottle.
Uncle Tater always looked amused, like he just heard a good joke. He wore his typical uniform of flannel shirt and overalls, with his white hair tucked in a John Deere hat.
As she stepped outside her truck, he said, “Well, if it ain’t my favorite truck and my favorite gal both come to see me.”
Harley smiled, heading across the barnyard in his direction. “What’s the still for?”
“Pioneer Days.” He tightened a copper coil with his wrench. “Patrick Middleton asked me to make it. Like the ones they would’ve used back in the 1800s. Figured I’d set it up outside the store downtown yonder.”
“Ah, that’s great,” Harley said, wanting to promote any worthy endeavor. “I bet it’ll be a big hit at the festival.”
“Well, we’ll see, I reckon.” He rested his wrench in the grass and took a sip of his beer. “Hey, what’re you doin’ out here at this time of the day? I figured you’d be down at the store.”
“I had to bring Matilda back from the vet and pick up a bottle of single barrel for a customer.”
“She doin’ all right?”
“Just another upset stomach.”
Tater shook his head. “I’m surprised that old pig’s still alive the way she carries on.” He thought on this a moment and chuckled. “But I reckon folks say that about me too, and I’m as fit as a fiddle.” He took a sip of his beer. “Well, why don’t you join me for a beer in The Shed after you’re done with your business.”
Harley agreed, then headed toward the distillery.
Inside, she found Aunt Wilma at her desk, reading The Notchey Creek Telephone, a gossip magazine that posed as the town’s newspaper. A wig worthy of an Oompa Loompa peeked above the newspaper’s pages, and Harley feared what lay beneath that wig. Wilma was sensitive about her hair, and she would be undoubtedly cranky about the failed permanent. But to Harley’s surprise, Wilma lowered the newspaper and grinned.
“Ain’t it marvelous, Harley?” she said. “I tell you what. I done myself a favor with that old failed permanent. If my hair hadn’t fallen out, I wouldn’t have got this here wig. And if I hadn’t got this here wig, I wouldn’t have known how beautiful and low-maintenance it is. You see, all I gotta do is put it on when I wake up, and I’m done. Purdy as punch.”
“I’m glad you’re enjoying it,” Harley said. And what a relief.
“That pig all right?”
“She’s okay.” Harley scanned the shelves of whiskey behind Wilma, then grabbed a bottle of single barrel.
“I know you’re awful proud of that new batch yonder,” she said. “Though you won’t never brag on nothin’ you do. Who’s wantin’ it so soon?”
“Just somebody who came in the store.”
Harley tucked the bottle under her arm and headed back toward the front door. Before she could make her escape, Wilma said, “You hear the big news?”
Harley paused in the doorway.
“There’s a big rock star in town. Can you believe it? There’s a story about him here in the paper. Front page. The Telephone says he and his quote ‘entourage’ is stayin’ up yonder at the Muscadine Farms while he looks at properties in the area. And he’s rentin’ out the entire place, can you believe it? Lordy, that must be costin’ him a whole lotta money.” She rustled the paper and continued reading. “‘Left the lights of L.A.,’ it says, ‘for the quiet refuge of the Smokies.’ Wants to do some kind of work on a solo album—‘in private,’ it says.”
Harley doubted he would get that.
Wilma pulled a magnifying glass from her desk drawer and angled it over the newspaper, squinting at the accompanying photo. “Now, that ain’t bad.” She ran her tongue along her bottom lip. “No, sister, that ain’t bad at all. Of course, he’d be even better lookin’ if he’d cut that old long hair and shave that scruff off his face. I swear I don’t see why a man like that’s got to ruin his looks by havin’ hair and clothes like that.”
Harley opened the door to leave, and Wilma added, “His name’s Beau Arson or somethin’ or another. Awful name if you ask me, but apparently, he’s the lead guitarist and singer for some hard rock band or another called Assault. Real famous, apparently.” She shrugged. “Of course, I ain’t never heard of no Assault or no Beau Arson neither. As you know, I don’t listen to much but Mr. J. Bazzel Mull and the Sunday Mornin’ Gospel circuit. But all the young people around here’s heard of him, and there’s quite a write-up about him in today’s paper.”
When Harley showed no reaction, surprised, thrilled, or otherwise, Wilma added, “Well, I guess you ain’t never heard of him neither then.”
No, but I’ve met him, she thought. “See you later, Wilma.”
14
The Shed
Harley ventured out into the morning sun, smiling as the distillery’s door slammed shut behind her. The air felt a bit warmer now, and she hoped for temperatures in the low sixties. After resting the bottle inside her truck, she decided it was time to pay a visit to The Shed, the red tin outbuilding where Uncle Tater held court. She didn’t usually visit The Shed at this time of day, but wanted to ask Tater something.
She found him inside, lounging in a green plastic lawn chair beside a small cooler, his boots propped up on a giant spool of copper cable. He held a remote control in one hand and a longneck beer in the other, his eyes dancing with the flickering light of a flat-screen TV. A collage of license plates lined the wall behind him, and a long-abandoned hornet nest peeked from the corner of the ceiling.
“Come on in, honey,” he said. “Have yourself a seat on the couch yonder.”
The couch was a long vinyl car seat Tater had disemboweled from an old minivan. Like most things in The Shed, he’d acquired it from Floyd’s Junkyard.
“Wanna beer?” he asked, patting the cooler beside his lawn chair.
“Not yet, but thanks.”
“Well,” he said, picking up his remote, “you’re lucky. You arrived just in time for The Golden Girls.” Tater grinned as the opening credits for The Golden Girls appeared on the screen. He turned up the volume.
“Thank you for bein’ a friend,” he sang along. “Travel down the road and back again. Your heart is true, you’re a pal and a confidant.”
“Tater,” Harley said over the music, “can I ask you something?”
“What’s that, honey?”
“Have you seen anybody new in Bud’s recently?”
“What kind of individual you talkin’ about?”
“A man, probably midd
le-aged or older—dark hair, ratty clothes.”
“That sounds like half the county.”
“But this man had scars on his face—several—like he’d been in an accident or something terrible.”
“Scars, scars,” Tater said, scratching his chin. He took a sip of beer and burped. “Hmm. Seems like I did see a feller like that last night.”
“Did you talk to him?”
“Nope, but—”
The Shed’s door flew open and Tater’s best friend, Floyd Robinson, stepped inside, a Hardee’s bag in one hand and a six-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon in the other.
“Well, there’s ol’ Winnie Cooper, ain’t it?” he said, smiling at Harley.
“Floyd,” Harley said in return, pleasantly.
Floyd Robinson, proprietor of Floyd’s Junkyard, was a large, burly man in Dickies and loafers. With his bulbous red nose and happy demeanor, he reminded Harley of Mr. Hamburger from Popeye, but with a shock of white hair. He thumped down into the beanbag beside her, and she wondered how he was ever going to get up from it again.
“Did I miss The Golden Girls?” he asked.
“Naw, you ain’t missed ‘em. And it’s one of your favorite episodes. ‘The Men of Blanche’s Boudoir,’” Tater said with panache.
Floyd unwrapped his cheeseburger and took a bite, smacking his lips. “Yep, I reckon that’s one of my favorites.”
“Uncle Tater,” Harley said, “you were telling me about the man you saw in Bud’s.”
Both men looked over at Harley, seemingly surprised that not only was she talking, but that she was asking questions.
“Oh, yeah, that.” He took a sip of beer. “Well, he was goin’ around the bar yonder askin’ questions of folks.”
“What kind of questions?”
“About folks in town mostly,” Floyd said, his mouth full of cheeseburger.
“Sure was,” Tater said. “But who he really wanted to know about was Patrick Middleton. Why I don’t know, but he wanted to know where he could find him.”
“Said he was supposed to meet him there,” Floyd said.
“And?”
“Well, I reckon somebody give him Patrick’s address because the next thing anybody knew, he was gone. Just like that.”
“What time was this?”
“Aw, about eight, I reckon.”
“And you haven’t seen him since?”
“Nope.”
Harley was about to ask another question when Floyd pointed at the TV screen. “Oh, look yonder! We’re comin’ up to my favorite part!”
Blanche was on screen, presenting a calendar to Sophia, Dorothy, and Rose. “The Men of Blanche’s Boudoir,” she said. “I’m surprised you were able to walk in October,” Sophia added.
Floyd’s laughter burst through The Shed, rattling the tin walls and inflating the beanbag. Patting his belly and catching his breath he said, “That Blanche. She’s a good ‘un.”
“Naw, not for me,” Tater said. “I’m more of a Dorothy fan. Takes charge. Knows what she wants.”
“Well, you’d have to get you one of them step ladders for your dates.”
“What do you know about dates, Floyd? I bet you ain’t had one in thirty years.”
Floyd laughed, this time only rattling the beanbag. “Well, I have me a right mind to ask old Hazel Moses out. She’s about the only person in town I know who’s been single about as long I have.”
“That’s because she’s been pinin’ for Patrick Middleton for thirty years. It seems like everybody’s interested in him lately.”
“Aw, Tater, you know Patrick ain’t gonna get with her.”
“She don’t know that.”
“Well, she ought to know it. Heck, he would’ve made a move by now if he was interested.”
“I heard he likes ’em young,” Tater said. “And blond. Hazel’s right purdy, I reckon, but she ain’t young.”
“And she definitely ain’t no blonde,” Floyd added.
Harley glanced at her watch and rose from the minivan seat, satisfied with her visit to The Shed. If anything, Tater and Floyd were a wealth of information.
“Where you headed off to?” Tater asked.
“An errand.”
“Yeah?”
“And then to the historical society meeting.”
“You mean the ‘full of horse poop meeting’?”
Harley couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, that one.”
“Well, you better take a shovel with you, you hear?”
“Will do,” Harley said, forcing back another laugh.
After leaving The Shed, she walked back to her truck, pondering the homeless man’s behavior in Bud’s Pool Hall. Why had he been searching for Patrick Middleton? She stopped when she spotted Wilma standing beside the truck’s passenger side door.
“I need you to take that pig in and get her weighed,” Wilma said, motioning to Matilda in the truck bed. “For Pioneer Days. I think we ought to enter her in that Prize Pig contest. I think she’s got a good chance of winnin’. And that prize money’s twenty-thousand dollars, Harley. You know what we could do with twenty-thousand dollars? We could make repairs to the distillery, buy us some more barrels. Heck, we could even build Matilda her own little house at your place. With heat and air and a refrigerator.”
Harley considered. While their whiskey business was no longer in bankruptcy, they were still a long way away from being successful. The money would certainly come in handy. And though Matilda was precocious, she was objectively a large and beautiful pig.
Harley nodded in consent, and Wilma clapped her hands together in excitement. “Alrighty! You’re to drop her off at six o’clock tomorrow mornin’ at the festival grounds, you hear? And I figure she can stay with you tonight, bein’ as you live in town.”
The last time Matilda had stayed at Harley’s house, the pig had chewed through the laundry room wall and eaten her hardback copy of The Fall of the Roman Empire. Nonetheless, they did need the money.
Harley got inside her truck. “6 a.m., it is.”
“You won’t regret it, Harley. I promise you won’t.”
Harley was about to make her escape when Uncle Tater ran out of The Shed, flagging her down with his beer bottle. “Hold up there, Harley honey. I need you to haul somethin’ for me if you don’t mind.”
He pointed to an antique toilet in the back of his orange 1976 Ford pickup truck. Harley was not a historian, but she knew the toilet must date back to at least the 1860s.
Wilma huffed. “You mean that old toilet?”
“Opha Mae Shaw wants it,” Tater said. “Says it’s got hysterical value. Says she wants to plant some flares in it for Pioneer Days.”
“I don’t care if it’s got historical value or not,” Wilma said. “That ain’t no flower pot.”
“Opha Mae’s the creative type, Wilmer. And I reckon it ain’t no worse than that cupcake Harley’s got perched on her roof yonder.” He moved his gaze from Rosie, the cupcake, then back to The Shed. “Floyd, get your butt out here!”
Seconds later, Floyd emerged from The Shed, his cinder block legs wobbling in his Dickies. Before Harley knew it, the two old men were loading the antique toilet in the back of her truck, stationing it alongside Matilda.
Tater took in the scene and grinned. “Well, Harley, I reckon that old Mr. Dickens of yours would be right proud. You got your own Olde Curiosity Shop.”
“And it’s mobile,” Floyd said with glee.
15
Boonie
The last rays of autumn sun peeked through the canopy of trees as Harley’s truck climbed the winding road to Muscadine Farms. On more than thirty acres of rolling farmland and surrounded by the Smoky Mountain foothills, Muscadine Farms was a famous, yet hidden, gem.
Featured in numerous travel and food magazines, the resort was a private refuge for affluent guests who spent more than a thousand dollars per night fishing, hiking, and hunting in the Smokies while enjoying the best wine and cuisine in the Southeast. But there was
nothing pretentious about the place. The owners, Laura and Max Abner, were locals who had become a successful businesswoman and chef, respectively.
As the Chevy climbed the hill and entered the clearing, Harley spotted the resort’s signature red barn and its two adjoining white farmhouses, serving as a dining hall and inn, respectively. A cornucopia of pumpkins, gourds, and hay stalks lined the buildings’ perimeters and the paths connecting them with the inn.
The parking lot, usually open to the public, had been cordoned off with a makeshift fence, and behind the fence stood an enormous bald man in leather chaps and a matching vest, gold rings hanging from each of his pierced ears.
His gaze moved from Rosie, the giant cupcake, to Matilda, the giant pig, then to the toilet, which compared to modern toilets, was also a giant. Harley stopped her truck beside him and rolled down the window. Even more displeased with her looks, it seemed, he crossed his arms at the chest and gave a smug look.
“What?” he said.
“Hello, sir. I’m here to see Mr. Arson.”
“No fangirls allowed.”
She held up the bottle of single barrel whiskey for him to see.
“Oh no, not this again. Listen, Olive Oyl. Girls have tried to bribe me with a whole lot more than that to see Beau. I’ve been tested more than Jesus in the desert.”
Harley tried again. “He came by my shop this morning and asked me to deliver it to him.” She showed him the note Beau had left and the one-hundred-dollar bills.
As the man stared at the note and money in disbelief, she added, “Look, I really have no interest in seeing him. I just want to drop this off. If you could just make sure he gets it, I’ll be on my way.”
He considered this for a moment, leering at her with skepticism, then grabbed his walkie-talkie. “Yeah, I’ve got some teenager out here, says Beau asked her to deliver a bottle of whiskey to him.”
He stopped speaking and examined Harley. “What do you mean what does she look like? Um, well, let’s see. She’s got these big Sally Jessy Raphael glasses from the ’90s, dark brown Pippi Longstocking braids, and a camouflage hat. Looks like she could’ve been on Heehaw. Yeah. But not one of the hot ones in the short dresses that hung out in the cornfield. No, more like, ‘I caught me a possum in the woods yonder, and after I skin it, I’m gonna fry it up for my supper.’”
Murder Comes to Notchey Creek Page 5