Eyeshot (11 page)

Smallwood put his sunglasses on. “Everything's under control, Mama. You go ahead and do the nasty down-there, and I'll take the dogs and the kid to the park.”

Sonora hugged Heather, told her again to be good, and headed back the way she had come. She turned back once, as she hit the tree line, and looked over her shoulder. Heather was skipping along beside Smallwood, asking him about Tubby, Clampett at her heels, tail wagging.

Sonora frowned. She was very cautious about allowing men into her children's lives. She barely knew this man and she'd broken relationship rules already. Not that she was planning to have a relationship.

She brushed the hair out of her eyes and headed back through the trees to the water that had hidden Julia Winchell for the last couple of weeks.

17

When Sonora came through the trees to the muddy edge of the river she heard the hum of insects, and the low, easy laugh of men just beginning to feel comfortable with one another. Sizemore and Cheatham had known each other for years, and Sam could always be counted on to work that good ole boy magic that is the special province of Southern men.

They were sitting on an old yellow rowboat that had been turned over to expose flaking paint and a hull that had been scraped raw.

Sam was eyeing a white plastic bucket with a John Deere symbol on the side, flies thick at the edges. “How long'd you keep it in there?” He got up and peered inside. Grimaced.

“Keep what in there?” Sonora asked.

George Cheatham looked up. “The, um—”

“The plastic bag,” Sheriff Sizemore said, at the same time Sam said, “Make a guess, girl.”

Sonora looked inside the bucket, which held about three inches of dirty brown river water, two tiny silver fish with meaty white bellies, and something that seemed to have the teeth and tail of a fish, and the hands and feet of a 'gator. Dead flies skimmed the top of the water.

“What
is
that?” Sonora asked, pointing to the 'gator thing.

“Water dog,” George said.

“Gar,” Sizemore told her.

Sam looked at Sonora. “You really never saw one before? They bark when they're onshore.”

“They do not,” Sonora said, frowning at him, but Sizemore was nodding his head. “Was it, that gar thing, was it in the bag with the … was it in the bag?”

Cheatham nodded. “Smell of blood attracted it, then it tore on in there. I kilt it with a baseball bat I keep in the bottom of the boat.”

Sonora looked at the boat, mud banked against the edges where it had dripped water. She looked back in the bucket. A sliver of brown plastic floated next to the gar, whose damaged head swelled and bloated in the heat. More flies arrived, circling the top of the bucket. Sonora felt the sun on her head, the sweat running down her back. Her shoes were caked with mud.

They could take that gar back, and analyze the stomach contents.

Sam clicked his recorder on. “Mr. Cheatham was just getting started on his story.”

Sonora settled next to Sam on the overturned boat. Cheatham turned another five gallon bucket—this one said
PAPA JOHN
'
S MILD GOLDEN PEPPERONCINI
on the side—and sat on the edge. He scratched his chin.

“I run the trotline out last night around dusk.”

Sonora looked at Sam and he whispered in her ear. “Fishing line. Baited all the way across, goes across the river, sits on the bottom, maybe, and snags fish.” He looked up at Cheatham. “What'd you bait it with, Mr. Cheatham?”

“Cookie dough and night crawlers.”

Sam looked interested. Nodded his head.

“Went down real early this morning, 'bout six-thirty when the sun come up, and brought up the line. Found this bag hanging off the middle. So I pull it up and dump it on the bottom of the boat there.” He rubbed rough palms together, making raspy noises, like cricket legs at dusk. His left shoulder twitched at regular intervals.

“Never seen nuthin' like it before and never hope to again. That water dog up and crawls across my foot and I bash it good with my bat there.” He nodded toward the stained aluminum bat. “And I head on home, shaking like nobody's business, I don't mind telling you.”

“Did you check the rest of the line?” Sonora asked.

Cheatham nodded. The shoulder twitched.

“Anything on any of the other hooks?”

Cheatham shook his head. “Nuthin' of a unusual nature. Turtles. Got a good-sized wide mouth bass. Good eating for tonight, anyhow.”

Sonora watched for the shoulder twitch. “Then what happened?”

“I come close to heaving the whole mess on back in the water, then I start to wondering where's the rest of her? So I poke around a little where the line was, but didn't find much. I didn't look too hard, it was giving me a funny feeling, sitting out on that boat with … you know, in the bottom.”

Sonora glanced out across the river. “Right about where were you, Mr. Cheatham?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. Pointed to the right, away from the ballpark. “Right down there just a piece—see where that tree's laying sideways like? Had one end of the trot line tied around it, but I hid it on the other side. Didn't want nobody messing with it.”

Sam nodded.

Sonora looked out over the water, picturing the old yellow boat bobbing in the ripples, the park quiet, sun just up, accordions of reflected light skimming the water's surface. Fish jumping, making ripples. Cheatham emptied his last cigarette out of a crumpled pack of Camel Lights, struck a wooden match on his black-rimmed thumbnail. The acrid smell of burning tobacco drifted around their heads. Cheatham inhaled deeply, dragging a good way into his last cigarette like a man starved.

Sam took pictures. Jack Cheatham sat on the upturned bucket, cigarette loose on the left side of his mouth, a hesitant smile on his face, like a man who's been trained to smile for the camera, no matter what.

18

Sonora watched them from a distance—Heather going up and down in the big swing, Smallwood pushing her higher and higher.

There was no parking this far back in the park, so Sam edged the Blazer off the road into the grass. He put the car in park, tapped the steering wheel. Looked at Sonora and grinned.

“So that's the famous Smallwood. He still calling you every couple of weeks?”

Sonora nodded. Watched Clampett, on his feet, circling the swing set, growling at any child or adult who came within fifteen feet of Heather.

He seemed to tolerate a smaller dog, who sat and watched Smallwood and panted in the heat. The dog was packed tight as a sausage casing, with short blue-gray fur and black ears. He watched the playground with a look of intelligence that was unnerving.

“Where'd the little dog come from?” Sam asked.

“Smallwood's. Weird-looking mix.”

Sam shook his head at her. “That's a blue heeler. Cattle dog. I haven't seen one since I was a kid.”

“I'm glad Clampett didn't hurt it.”

Sam laughed. “You been worrying about the wrong dog, Sonora.”

She shrugged and got out of the car. Heather was smiling, swinging higher and higher, hair blowing, and Sonora felt sad.

It was the daddy thing. Zack was an absentee father when he was alive, and Sonora knew that if he had lived, their marriage would have ended around the time she had buried him. But Heather and Tim were missing out on the strong male influence thing.

On the bright side, there had been insurance money.

19

Sonora let out a sigh when she saw the McDonald's across the street from the Winchells' small blue house.

“What?” Sam asked.

“McDonald's,” Sonora told him.

“You hungry?”

She looked pointedly at her daughter. Sam nodded, and pulled into the parking lot. Sonora turned around and looked at Heather.

“Can Clampett have a cheeseburger?” she asked.

They left Heather locked in the Blazer with the windows down, Clampett gulping a cheeseburger, Heather working on a chocolate sundae. The first chocolate smear was already drying on the passenger's side headrest, and the windshield was fogging with Clampett's warm breath. Sonora had left the radio playing, and shown Heather the house, catty-corner to the McDonald's and across the street, which Heather was under no circumstances to cross.

Sam and Sonora headed down the sloping asphalt parking lot toward Main Street, which was torn up and clogged with trucks, men in hard hats, a steam roller, and a huge lighted arrow mounted on a trailer that kept traffic herded into one slow-moving lane.

Mounds of dirt were piled on the side of the road. Broken concrete and asphalt were liberally mixed in the reddish brown soil like raisins in a muffin.

Sonora glanced down at her Reeboks. These were her oldest pair. Probably be easier to throw them away than clean them up. It was 6
P.M.,
but the sun was still high. It felt like the middle of the afternoon.

The Winchells' house was fifty, sixty years old, red brick that had been whitewashed, the paint peeling. Mounds of dirt were humped at the end of a gravel drive. The yard was sparse, weedy, but trimmed. There were flower boxes in the front window, thick with pink and white begonias.

A rusty red wagon sat by the edge of the driveway. It had been packed with stuffed animals. A tiny bicycle, no more than two feet tall, lay across the front porch.

Sam picked the bicycle up, set it gently on the sidewalk beside the front steps. He looked at Sonora.

“I should have stayed with football.”

Sonora knew what he meant. Times like this she wished she was a secretary. “Football gave
you
up, remember?”

“If I forget I have you to remind me.”

Sonora took a breath. Tried to relax. Her back felt rigid and achy. She rang the doorbell, heard thumps—small feet on hardwood—an angry screech. The door stuck, then opened. Winchell held the baby in the crook of his left arm. His sleeves were rolled up and the front of his shirt and top of his pants were wet. Sonora recognized the child from the pictures that still sat on her desk in Cincinnati.

Butch Winchell pushed his glasses back on his nose. “Hi.”

The baby was wrapped in a yellow terry-cloth towel that was draped and hooded over the top of her damp, drippy head. She grinned at Sam and Sonora, showing a spread of tiny milk teeth.

“
Move,
” she said.

Winchell glanced down at the little girl. “This is Chrissie. Her first word was
move,
the second was
mine.
”

Possible future in police work, Sonora thought.

“Mr. Winchell,” Sam said.

Winchell held up a hand. “Come in, and we'll talk.”

He was oddly relaxed and matter-of-fact. He led them into a living room with polished hardwood floors. A cheap but colorful oriental rug, rose and black, warmed the room. There were wood shutters on the window, and the walls had recently been painted a soft yellow. The furniture was old, salvation army era, but there were mahogany bookshelves built into the walls, a stone fireplace, and a television tucked into an antique oak pie safe.

With the ease of experienced parents, Sonora and Sam negotiated the coloring books, crayons, and Duplos that littered the floor. Sonora settled on the edge of an old green couch. She avoided the armrest, which had a mysterious yellow stain. Sam took a recliner, maroon vinyl, that looked as if it had survived—barely—the kittenhood of a series of bad cats. Foam spilled from a tear in the cushion. Sam tucked it back in absently, realized what he was doing, and quit.

“Let me put Chrissie in her sleeper,” Winchell said. “Be right back.”

Sonora waited till she heard his footsteps on the staircase. “You called him, right?”

Sam looked at her. “You were standing right there when I did it.”

“I mean, you told him why we were coming out here, right?”

Sam nodded. “Told him it would be a good idea to have someone with him. Maybe to look after the kids.”

Something was pressing into her back. Sonora fished behind her and pulled out a worn blue book with a cracked spine and tooth marks on the corner.

Dr. Seuss.
Green Eggs and Ham.
She handed it to Sam, looked at her watch. They had a four-hour drive back.

Sonora drummed her fingers on the armrest, away from the yellow stain. Noticed a little girl, the three-year-old, staring at them from the hallway. She stood in the shadows and her features were hard to make out. She was small, tummy swelling over her shorts and pouching out from under a chocolate-smeared T-shirt that was getting too small.

“Come on in,” Sam said.

She took three steps forward. She wore pink flip-flops and held a half-eaten cookie high up over her head. She had tucked a purple weed into her hair, snug behind her ear.

“Why you got that cookie over top your head?” Sam said.

“Got it at the Mortons' next door. Didn't want Bernie to get it.”

“Bernie that hungry?” Sam asked.

“Bernie's always hungry. He's a dog.”

She took a bite of cookie. “My name is Terry. Are you here about Mama? Daddy says we're having a bad year.”

Footsteps again, on the staircase. Slow. Winchell came down the stairs with the baby in one arm and a folded playpen in the other. Sam was on his feet in an instant, reaching for the playpen.

“My little girl had one just like this,” Sam said, unfolding the yellow-meshed square and setting it in the center of the room.

The baby screamed, leaned toward Terry and the cookie. Terry shoved the cookie toward her sister.

The baby's mouth popped open, soft lips pursed. She nipped off the end of the cookie, chewing hugely, exposing pink gums. Chocolate-tinged drool spilled down her chin into the folds of her neck, and soaked the collar of the rose-pink sleeper.

“Terry, I just got her cleaned up.”

The little girl put the cookie behind her back. “I'm sorry, Daddy. Want me to get a wash rag?”