A Tough Nut to Kill (Nut House Mystery Series) (17 page)

The twins were barely out of the Nut House when my phone
rang. It was Sheriff Higsby.

“Need to see you over here, Lindy,” he half growled into the phone on his end.

“You at the police station?” I asked, stalling for time; so many things were boiling through my brain.

“Yup.”

“What’s it about, Sheriff? Do I need Ben with me? You charging me with murder, too?”

It didn’t seem to matter much if I was uncooperative. Being cooperative hadn’t gotten us very far.

“Don’t need to be hostile, Lindy. It’s about Martin. Heard maybe it was Justin called him, sent him out to where somebody tried to kill him. Justin’s not saying a word. I think one of you better start saying something. Doesn’t make it any better for him, you know.”

Chastened, and a little frightened, and wondering if Hunter had betrayed us, I agreed I’d be right over. “I wanted to see Justin this morning anyway. He’s got to be all broken up about Martin.”

I hung up and turned to Meemaw. “That was Sheriff Higsby. Wants to see me. He heard Justin was the one sent Martin to the barns, looking for something.”

“Think Hunter will be there?”

“I hope so.”

“Then give him this copy of the letter.” She pulled the “Virginia” letter out of her pocket and handed it to me. “And I think you better call that rehab place soon as you can. Could be where Amos went—drying out. And if that Virginia was with him, maybe we can find her, too.”

I was on my way out of the store when Miss Amelia stopped me. “You know what, Lindy? I think it’s time we got over to that Barking Coyote. We’ve got to talk to that lady Amos was having the affair with. I been thinking about that jilted boyfriend of hers. That kind of thing can simmer on for years. Seems like the place where Martin and Amos locked horns was over Jessie. If the boyfriend knew about Martin and how he hated Amos, he might’ve used it, like trying to make Martin look like the killer.”

I winced. The Barking Coyote Saloon wasn’t the kind of place I was used to going. And worse than me, I just couldn’t see Miss Amelia in there with the “good ole boys” and the cheap women, all doin’ their line dancing and slugging back Garrison Brothers Bourbon.

“Sure, Meemaw, we’ll get over to the Barking Coyote as soon I get back from the jail. Right after I call this rehab place. Right after I get over to see Jessie and tell her how sorry we are about all of this. And right after I help Bethany with those damned doves and Mama with her private detective . . .”

“Don’t be a whiner, Lindy Blanchard,” she told me, hands on her hips. “You remember who you are. Suck it up. Now, you get your lazy behind outta here.”

Told off and knowing I deserved it, I was out the door, almost swooning in heat that hit me like a feather tick, and not a cloud in the sky.

• • •

I walked over to the police station from the Nut House, as
much to buy a little more time before facing the sheriff, as to get some needed exercise. At the corner, where Alamo runs into Carya Street, I turned and looked over at the Dairy Burst. It was past noon, school lunch hour, and the kids who hung out there were already slouched along the outdoor benches, licking ice cream cones melting as fast as they could lick. It seemed so ordinary, kids laughing and falling over one another. I felt a sharp pang, as if I were an outsider in my own town, somebody who didn’t have the right to a normal life. But Miss Amelia’s words—“Suck it up!”—ran through my head, and I got over it fast and ran up the steps to the police station.

Deputy Sam Cranston, new to the force, only twenty-eight and good looking enough to seem to be always posing in his short-sleeved blue shirt, stood behind the front desk.

“Hunter’s back out at yer ranch this morning,” Sam said. “If that’s who you’re looking for. More tech guys with ’im.”

“They bring my trees in yet?”

“Saw ’em out back. Hunter was watering them, last I seen.”

“Good,” I said, and meant it. “The sheriff wanted to see me. And I want to see my brother.” I gave him my best haughty voice. Sam had been behind me at Riverville High School, maybe three years. I knew he’d had a crush on me from afar—way afar since he never spoke to me, only gave me the mooneye when we passed in the halls.

“Sheriff’s in his office. I’ll clear seein’ Justin with him.” He blushed, a spreading red that started somewhere around his Adam’s apple and climbed slowly to his hairline. “Tell you up front, Lindy, Ben Fordyce is back with Justin now.”

“Good,” I said, keeping my peremptory voice. “Hope he gets Justin out of this place today.”

He gave me a shy, but skeptical, look as I flounced away from him and toward the hall leading back to Sheriff Higsby.

The sheriff stood when I walked in, and tipped his brown cowboy hat my way. He offered a seat and launched right into hearing that Justin was the one who’d asked Martin to go and search those barns.

“I don’t know a thing about it, Sheriff,” I answered, dropping my officious voice for a sweeter one—a voice I hoped would melt the tin badge right off the sheriff’s chest.

“One of my men heard him on the phone Saturday morning. That’s what he did with his one phone call.”

I sat back, anger boiling up inside. “That’s illegal, isn’t it? Listening in on a man’s one phone call?”

He shrugged. “Mistake. My deputy just happened to be standing there . . .”

“Think I’m telling Ben, soon as he comes outta seeing Justin. Let him file some charges or something.” I was really into high dudgeon now, mad as a wet hen.

“Lindy.” He put his hands in the air. “Calm down. Maybe you think I’m not on your side in this, but I am. I want to turn Justin loose as bad as you want him outta here. But I can’t. Not yet. And after what happened to Martin yesterday, well, I’m thinking Justin’s at the middle of this somehow. Maybe not that he did anything. Maybe he’s not the one who killed Amos. And sure not the one who attacked Martin. Still, he’s a part of all of this. And to tell you the truth, I’m not sure but what he’s the next target.”

I took in a breath.

He leaned forward, hands together on the desk. “I put Hunter in charge of the case, Lindy. I got a lot of other things to do. I can’t really spare Hunter right now, but I think he’s the best man to look at everything that’s happened and figure it all out.”

I slouched back in my chair and nodded.

“So I told Hunter to work with you and Miss Amelia.” He patted the air with both big hands when I leaped forward to deny that we were doing anything. Last thing we needed was to have the sheriff horning in, scaring away people who could help us. “You know Riverville. People notice things and people talk. So what I wanted you to know is that Hunter’s there to help. Whatever you two ladies find out, take it to him. You wouldn’t want to get in the way of justice, would you?”

The tone was patronizing. The smile a grimace. I wanted to growl back at him, but the man was being up front with me—in his own way. I dug down and pulled out my best good girl smile, maybe even batted my eyelashes a few times, and left the office, stopping only to be reassured I could see Justin.

“Soon as Ben leaves,” the sheriff said.

Ben walked out forty minutes later, when I was just about to give up and go out to call that rehab center in Houston.

He was his usual self, bent forward a little, bulging briefcase knocking against his leg. His seersucker jacket hung open over his white shirt, and his graying hair stuck up at the back from taking off his white cowboy hat. He saw me. His face took on a somber look.

“Lindy, I was coming out to see you and your mother. You going home from here?”

I shook my head. “Not until this evening, Ben. So much to do.”

He nodded. “I understand. Heard about you and Miss Amelia looking into things yourself. As your attorney, I’ve got to warn you—”

I put a hand up, stopping him. “Don’t waste your breath, Ben. Nothing’s going to stop Miss Amelia on a tear. We’ll be fine.”

“Just that—well, now with Martin. I’m a little worried. Could be some madman out there.”

“I know. If only Martin’d come out of that coma. I’ll bet anything he could tell us who attacked him and put an end to this whole mess.”

Ben bent forward, lowering his voice. “There’s something I need to talk to you and Emma about. And Miss Amelia. Something I should’ve brought up before . . .”

There were dark circles under his eyes. Whatever Ben had to say, it was going to be serious. “I’ll call before I come out. Make sure y’all are home.”

We left it at that, his seriousness doing nothing to raise my spirits.

“I can’t believe it, Lindy.” Justin leaped from his cot when
he saw me. “I did this to Martin. All because I had a hunch . . .”

There was nothing I could say. I let him talk, pour out his guilt at sending Martin out to the barns because he’d figured whoever did that to Amos was after all of us. What I wanted to do was close my eyes and not see him in his orange jumpsuit with
RIVERVILLE CITY JAIL
written across his back. I wanted none of what was happening to us to be real.

“If I woulda thought it was dangerous, I’d never have sent Martin out there looking for those trees. I just thought maybe whoever did that to Amos might want to make us look guilty. Make it seem all the Blanchards were in on the killing.” He shut his eyes and shook his head. “Sounds dumb but . . . Look, I was right. The trees were there in the shed. Somebody put them there for the sheriff to find. And Martin,” he moaned. “Poor Martin . . . I sent him out there.”

I put my arm around him, led him back to the cot, then sat down beside him.

“Martin will be fine.”

“He outta the coma?” His eyes lit up.

I shook my head. “Medically induced. Until the swelling goes down.”

He looked away, staring at the wall.

“Who hates us this bad?” I asked him after a while.

“I would’ve said Uncle Amos, but he’s dead.” He took a long deep breath. “I’ve had nothing to do but think since I got here. At first I was thinking some pecan rancher from Georgia or someplace, mad about what you were doing and wanting to steal your work, make a killing off it. I was thinking maybe shoving that plant stake through Uncle Amos happened because the man got caught. That it wasn’t something planned. Then I was thinking hiding the trees on our ranch would make it look like we were behind the whole thing. You know, frame me for Amos. Frame the family.”

“Or maybe it wasn’t somebody out to destroy my work, after all,” I said. “Maybe whoever did it followed Amos out there. He was trying to see Mama earlier in the day. Amos could’ve noticed my greenhouse; it wasn’t finished when he left town. Maybe he wandered over to take a look, thinking Mama’s office was in there. If that was the case, whoever killed Uncle Amos was after him all along. Maybe what happened to my trees was just the killer going wild when he realized Uncle Amos was dead. You know, went on a rampage, destroying everything right up to my office, then setting the fire, cutting down the trees. An awful rage.”

“Or a cold calculation,” Justin said. “Cut down the trees to make it look like Amos did it and was stopped. Took five trees . . .” He shook his head. “Why would he do that? Had to load them into a car. No tire tracks.”

“No rain. Ground too hard for prints.”

“Why didn’t Martin see him? He was out mowing all around that area.”

“If he came the back way in, from over on the river road instead of the main entrance, he was parked behind the greenhouse. That way’s all brush and scrub. I come that way myself when I’m coming in from La Grange.”

Justin worked his two rough hands together. When he turned his head to me, I looked into eyes that didn’t belong to my brother. Or not the brother I knew. It was the first time I’d ever seen Justin scared, and all that did was make me madder and more determined to get whoever was doing this to us.

“You know how much I held against Amos,” he said. “Never kept it a secret. Didn’t step away from saying I thought he had something to do with Daddy’s accident. And I’ll tell you something else, Lindy. Somebody’s going to remember what Amos did to Jessie, jilting her the way he did. When they do, the sheriff’s going to think me and Martin were in this together.”

“But I saw him mowing near the greenhouse.”

“Yeah. Near the greenhouse. Think about it. And on top of that, Martin’s my only alibi. Saw me take off to go after those hogs. And Higsby’s saying they found something in Amos’s hand. Something that proves I did it. I don’t know what he’s talking—”

“I do. Hunter told me.”

“What?”

“Your belt buckle. The one Daddy gave you. I asked you about it last week.”

“Yeah, and I told you that belt broke out in the grove. I took the buckle back to the barn and put it in a drawer until I could get a new belt.”

“Anybody see you do that?”

He rubbed his forehead. “I’m always in the barns. Who knows who was there one day or the other? People drop by. Lord, how many people on any given day! The co-op people were out a while ago. Neighbors come by all the time. You know how it is yourself, Lindy. When isn’t there a visitor or friend or even, once in a while, tourists Miss Amelia sends out from the store to have a look? Then there’s all the men who work for me.”

“Anyway, that’s what the sheriff found. Your belt buckle.”

“How’d it get there if—”

I gave him a look.

“Who’d do that?”

“A killer.”

“They had to plan ahead. Steal the buckle. Can’t be any of my men. No reason. Most of them didn’t even know Amos.”

“Only Martin.”

He gave me a hard look. “The last thing Martin would do is hurt me. And if he killed Amos, how’d he attack himself down there at the shed?”

“Then we’re right back to
who
and
why
.”

He thought awhile. “About the belt buckle, Hunter told you?”

I nodded.

“You mean Hunter’s helping you? I was afraid he’d turned on me.”

“And we’re helping him. Me and Meemaw.”

Justin turned his first smile on me. “Can’t quite see Meemaw as some kind of Miss Marple.”

“She’s good at it. Smart with people, Justin. Just like we always said—that sixth sense of hers when she knew we were up to no good. Maybe it’s a thing with grandmothers. People talk to her. They like her. Some, like the Chauncey girls, who would never come to the police, are chipping right in with anything they know.”

“Then I guess I’m in good hands. And you, too, Lindy. I don’t think any man could ask for a better sister . . .”

I got up to leave before my big brother had me crying.

“Be careful, Lindy,” he said from behind me. “And keep your eye on Meemaw. You know she has a tendency to get hardheaded, especially where her grandchildren are concerned. I wouldn’t want to be the man crossing her. There could be trouble.”

“There already is.” I smiled back at my brother. “Remember what Daddy taught us.”

“‘Remember who you are.’” He nodded.

“That’s all we need, Justin. Like Granddaddy used to say, ‘Jist git ’er done. Jist git ’er done.’”

Sam was back, pushing the cell door button.

At least I left my brother smiling.

• • •

I ran down the high concrete steps to my truck. Laughter
came from the kids over at the Dairy Burst. I glanced at them, almost jealous, then got pulled back from my deep self-pity by my ringing cell phone.

Hunter Austen.

“Gotta see you, Lindy. We need to talk. Something you should know. You have dinner yet? How about The Squirrel? I’m buying. Say forty minutes?”

I agreed.