Husband and Wives (7 page)

I shrugged. ‘Could be. You notice anything missing?’

He shook his head. ‘We don’t have the kind of things people would want to steal. No high-end electronics, no jewelry, nothing like that. I mean, we have three TVs, but the newest one is ten years old!’

‘Well, with you saying that, and the fact that The Branches seems pretty well sealed—’

‘The rock walls are not electrified, Sheriff. Anyone could climb over.’

I nodded. ‘OK. Good point. I’ll do some more talking with the security chief,’ I said. Then added, ‘You know, one of these days, we’re gonna have to have a long talk about how you manage this lifestyle – both financially and, well, you know, just handle it.’

Jerry turned red. ‘Maybe one of these days,’ he said, his head down again.

My deputy Nita came back in the living room. ‘Think we found out what the murder weapon was,’ she said, perking me up and bringing Jerry’s head back up.

‘What’s that?’ I asked.

‘You ever heard of a meat tenderizer?’ she asked.

‘I suspect you’re not talking about the powered kind,’ I said.

She said, ‘Huh?’ and I just shook my head for her to go on. ‘No, it’s a metal object—’

‘Sorry, Deputy, I know what it is. So one’s missing?’

‘Yes, sir, and Carol–– Mrs Hudson said it was a large one . . .’

Jerry spoke up. ‘Yes, I remember it! I’ve seen Mary use it often! The handle was about a foot long and the head was a large square, maybe four by four. I used to laugh about her being able to use it – it was so heavy. Our oldest son had a hard time picking it up.’ The light that had come to his eyes when he spoke of this reminder of a whole and happy family, died. He looked down at his hands again.

I stood up. ‘That’s great, Nita. Let’s get the Boy Scouts out here tomorrow to search the cul-de-sac and the whole damn neighborhood if need be.’ My eyes landed on the huge cross on top of the mantel. I turned to Jerry. ‘Ah, sorry about the cussing.’

Milt Kovak – Tuesday

I got home close to seven, and Jean already had supper on the stove. Me and Jean have different views on food, which is why we switch off nights cooking. Tonight was supposed to be my night and I’d been soaking red beans since yesterday and had some collards and pork chops waiting in the fridge. When I said Jean already had supper on the stove, I meant that figuratively. There was a big salad on the table with arugula greens (you ever tasted them? Bitter and they got stems! I hate stems), hearts of palm (which are tasteless hunks of something, I’m not sure what), a few things not so bad, like tomatoes and radishes and celery, and some chicken that looked like it had been boiled. Which it mighta been. All dressed with totally tasteless oil and vinegar. Jean was taking homemade bread (and by that I mean her bread-machine bread) out of the oven and I thanked God for that. At least I’d have one thing solid to eat.

I greeted my family and sat down to the big old salad and we all pretended to have a grand old time eating it. Well, maybe just me.

I was real glad that Jean was officially on this case. I always discussed cases with her, but felt guilty. With her officially on this one, I didn’t have to feel guilty when I discussed it with her.

‘So they’re not Mormons, not officially anyway,’ I told her, explaining what Jerry Hudson had told me about his church. ‘So wherever they were raised, in Oregon it was an off-shoot, too, I suppose, since Carol Anne and Rene told me their families were plural. But there is a church here, which means we got more plural families in Prophesy County than I ever thought.’ I stopped for a moment, then added, ‘Course, I never thought about having even one plural family here. I thought all that happened in Utah and Texas.’

‘How many do you think there are?’ Jean asked me.

I shrugged. ‘The guy from the church that I met, that Andrew Schmidt, Mr Paranoid, said it was a “small congregation,”’ I told her. ‘What constitutes a small congregation, I don’t know.’

‘What’s the name of the church?’ Jean asked.

‘New Saints Tabernacle,’ I said.

‘I’ll check into it tomorrow,’ she said.

‘Think it’ll be on the Internet?’ I asked, because that’s what Jean meant when she said she’d ‘check into it.’

She nodded. ‘If not, I’ll find another way,’ she said, and by the look on her face, I think she meant it.

Jean McDonnell – Wednesday

I checked the Internet the next day, Googling my brains out – nothing at all on a New Saints Tabernacle anywhere in Oklahoma. There was one in Utah, so I looked that up. There were no names associated with the website, since polygamy is against the law, but there was some information. New Saints Tabernacle was started in the late 1950s in a valley in Utah where there was no electricity and the only water was a creek that ran through the valley. Wells were dug and homes sprang up and a small church house was built for the nine families (forty-two men, women, and children) that now lived in the small village they named New Saints. New Saints, Utah was never recorded with the post office, it being a plural community, so whoever made this website had to be a citizen or former citizen of the small town.

By 2007, the date of the last entry on this website, the community now had seventy-five families, totaling almost 900 people, including children. According to the website, New Saints was still ‘off the grid,’ with the only electricity supplied by generators that were used sparingly, the water by wells. The children were taught in a communal school with various parents teaching them, mostly lessons they would need to live in their own community, such as sewing, cooking, making and using cleaning agents, how to plant a house garden, and child-rearing for the girls, and carpentry, mechanics, animal husbandry, and soil retention and farming for the boys. According to the author of the website, some children did go off to college, but the ‘majority’ came back to New Saints afterwards to offer what they learned to the community and to raise their own families.

I couldn’t help but wonder what any of these people would say if someone were to mention to them how close their community was to the original idea of communism? It tickled me to think of it.

All of this Googled information was fine, but it still didn’t answer the question of how many families in Prophesy County were plural. So I got off the computer and picked up the telephone off my desk. My next client wasn’t due for another half hour, and this was official business, even if I was enjoying myself. Research has always been my secret love.

There was no listing in any of the small towns in our area code for New Saints Tabernacle, and the only listing I got from directory assistance for Andrew Schmidt, the man from the church Milt had met the night before, was unlisted. Milt did mention he was a little paranoid. I wondered about the straight-ahead approach, looked at my notes and called Rene Hudson. She seemed to be the one most likely to blab.

‘Hello?’ she said in a sing-song voice when she picked up the phone.

‘Rene? Hi, it’s Jean McDonnell,’ I said.

‘Who?’ she asked.

‘Dr McDonnell? The sheriff’s wife?’ I tried.

‘Oh, yeah! Hey, how you doing?’ she asked.

‘I’m just fine, Rene, how are you?’ I asked.

‘Oh, OK, I guess. Me and Carol Anne have to get everything ready for the funeral and it’s a real bummer,’ she said.

‘Have they released the body yet?’ I asked, surprised.

‘No, I don’t think so,’ she said. ‘Carol Anne just said we need to be ready when they do.’

‘That makes sense,’ I said. ‘The reason I’m calling, Rene, is about your church.’

‘The New Saints Tabernacle?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ I answered. ‘How many people go to your church?’

‘I dunno. I never counted,’ she said.

‘Approximately,’ I encouraged.

‘Well, there’s like maybe ten on the men’s side – bunch more on the women’s side, of course.’

‘So men and women are separated during the service?’ I asked.

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘How else would the men be able to concentrate?’

‘Right,’ I said. ‘So maybe about ten families all together?’

‘I guess,’ she answered, ‘although some of the men might not come to service all the time. So there might be more than that.’

‘Can you give me some of the names of the families? I need to talk to them,’ I told her.

Taking my request quite casually, Rene said, ‘Well, there’s the Schmidts, Andrew and his wives . . .’

‘Someone other than Andrew,’ I suggested.

‘Ah, David Bollinger and his wives. You need their address?’ she asked.

I said, ‘Yes,’ and she read it out to me.

‘Oh, and here’s another. Sarie Whitman. She’s the second wife of Thomas Whitman. She’s got two little girls. Here’s their address.’

And she read that one off, along with three others. Altogether, including the Schmidts and the Hudsons, that was seven out of maybe ten plural families in Prophesy and Tejas Counties.

‘Well, thanks so much, Rene,’ I said to her, and really meant it.

‘Hey, you’re welcome! You should come see the burial dress we’re making for Mary. It’s gorgeous!’

‘Thanks. Maybe I’ll come by,’ I said and hung up.

FOUR

Dalton Pettigrew – Wednesday

‘
M
ilt?’ Dalton said timidly, not wanting to disturb the sheriff right now, since he already seemed disturbed enough.

Milt slammed some papers down on his desk and said, real testy-like, ‘What is it, Dalton?’

‘Ah, you wanted me to tell you about that dead body?’

‘What about it?’ Milt said, looking back at his desk.

‘Ah, I don’t have a cause of death yet—’

‘Then why are you bothering me with it?’ Milt demanded.

‘Well, he sorta looked like he’d been strangled . . .’

Milt’s shoulders drooped and he hung his head for a minute, then looked up and sighed. ‘Sorry, Dalton. I’m worrying about this other case and being ornery. The ME’ll let us know if you’re right. You ID him?’

‘No sir, nothing on him but some change and a Swiss army knife.’

‘Get his prints from the ME’s office and have Holly help you get on the right stuff with the computer.’ Milt waved him away. ‘Just talk to Holly. She knows all about that shit.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Dalton said and headed slowly for the bullpen. Before disturbing Holly, however, he needed to get the prints. He called the ME’s office and Terry answered the phone. ‘Hey, Terry, it’s Dalton Pettigrew from the sheriff’s office?’

‘Hey, Dalton. How are you?’

‘I’m just fine, Terry. Thanks for asking. Ah, I need to get the fingerprints on that dead body you picked up yesterday?’

‘Sure, we already took ’em. Want me to fax ’em over or would you rather we email ’em?’

Dalton thought about it. ‘Ah, hold on.’ He put Terry on hold and got up slowly, checking out Holly as he did. He’d noticed this morning that she had on something new – at least, new to him. It was a dress, like a sundress, mostly pink but with big yellow flowers on it, with those skinny shoulder straps and all, but with it being late fall she had a long-sleeved yellow T-shirt underneath it. The dress was real short, but she had on black tights without feet, the ones that look like really tight stretch pants – he didn’t know what they called them – and yellow shoes with lots of straps. He thought she looked really pretty, especially since her hair was down. He walked to her desk and waited until she was off the phone.

‘Hey, Holly?’ he said quietly behind her.

Holly jumped and turned around. She laughed nervously. ‘Oh, Dalton! I didn’t hear you come up. Can I help you?’

‘Ah, yeah. I need to check out some fingerprints and Milt said you knew how to do that.’

‘Sure! Let me see the prints,’ Holly said, smiling at him.

‘Ah, I’ve got Terry from the ME’s office on the phone and he’s got the prints. He wants to know if we want them faxed over here or emailed?’ he said, letting out a breath. He’d rehearsed that speech all the way over to her desk, and he was glad it was over with.

‘Have him email them to me, OK? Then come over here and I’ll show you how it’s done!’ she said, all smiles.

Dalton tried to smile back but was afraid it came out as more of a sneer. He went back to his desk to talk to Terry, but he’d hung up. So Dalton called the ME’s office again, got Terry and asked him to email the prints. ‘What’s the addy?’ Terry asked.

Dalton hung his head. This was getting way too complicated. What in the world was an addy? He took a chance and called out to Holly, ‘Terry wants to know the addy!’

‘I’ll take it! Which line?’ Holly asked. Dalton gratefully told her then sat back and tried to breathe calmly. If he didn’t watch it, his asthma was going to come back, that’s what his mama was always telling him.

Holly hung up the phone and called out to Dalton. ‘Come on over and I’ll show you what to do,’ she said.

Dalton levered himself to an upright position – he still worked out enough that his linebacker’s body hadn’t turned to fat, but he’d strained his back last weekend helping his mama move furniture – and moved to Holly’s desk.

She pulled up a nearby chair next to hers. ‘Have a seat,’ she said.

Dalton sat down, fully aware of how close he was to Holly. He could smell her, and it was nice. Kind of fruity, a little flowery, but mostly just real nice. He was aware of her voice, telling him this or that as she hit keys on the key pad of her computer, changing the screen from this to that. He saw the fingerprints up on the screen and then something else happened, but he wasn’t really listening to the words. He didn’t really like computers, afraid they were smarter than him. He just liked listening to Holly’s voice. It was a pretty voice, almost musical.

‘Sorry,’ Holly said. ‘He’s not in any of the databases.’

Finally realizing she was speaking directly to him, Dalton said, ‘Huh?’

‘Your guy’s not in any of the regular databases,’ she repeated. ‘I’ll keep looking in the not so regular ones, but it doesn’t look hopeful.’

‘OK then, thanks,’ Dalton said, reluctantly standing up.

‘You’re welcome,’ Holly said, again smiling at him. ‘Any time.’

He nodded his head and moved on. He sorta wondered if his dead body had anything to do with the sheriff’s dead body, but he figured Milt would know more about that than him. It wasn’t like they had a whole lot of dead bodies in the county, but they’d been known to have a few. As close as Vern’s shop was to the highway, it could have been just a dump job, as far as Dalton knew.