Joan Hess - Arly Hanks 13 (23 page)

He was thinking about fixing another sandwich when he heard the kitchen door open. He used the clicker to turn off the TV, flung himself off the sofa, and wiggled into the space between it and the wall.

"Tonya? Sonya? You gals here?" called Jim Bob as he came into the living room. "I could smell your perfume all the way out in the kitchen." After a moment of silence, he plopped down on the sofa. "They could have waited," he added to himself in a churlish voice, "or at least told me they was coming over. Aw, hell, maybe I'm smelling whatever they had on last night."

The TV came on.

Hammer realized he was clutching his sandwich, but he'd left the glass of milk on the coffee table. It didn't seem likely that Jim Bob would think the two women had stopped by for milk and cookies. He crawled around the end of the sofa and peeked at Jim Bob, who was drinking a beer and watching the cars go in circles. If the sumbitch had noticed the glass, he hadn't said anything.

He stayed where he was as Jim Bob switched channels, pausing here and there to take a chug of beer. Basketball gave way to cartoons, shiny-toothed women selling diamond jewelry, and for a brief moment, some hairy-chested singer strutting around in clown makeup and black leather shorts.

Afore too long, Jim Bob belched and went back into the kitchen. Hammet grabbed the glass of milk and crept back behind the sofa. He 'sposed he could have made it to the closet, but in there it was dark and stinky.

Jim Bob came back and fell on the sofa. "Damn those prancy bitches," he said as he popped open another beer. "I might just ought to call Cherry Lucinda and see what all she's doing. Ain't no reason I should sit here like some pimply girl hoping some asshole's gonna call and ask her to the dance. Screw 'em!"

Hammet hoped he wouldn't, at least not on the sofa anyways.

When I got back to the PD, I went to make sure Duluth had been fed. The cell was empty. This trend, if indeed that's what it was, was beginning to irritate me. Colleen did not seem a likely conspirator, but there were no traces of chicken bones and biscuit crumbs on the floor. There were three possible scenarios: Duluth had been gone when she arrived; he'd waited until she left and then taken his meal away for a picnic by the lake; or he'd kidnapped her (and good luck to him; her kin were more likely to show up with shotguns than ransom money).

But Duluth was once again at large, with Camp Pearly Gates as his playground. There was no point in driving out to Crank Nickle's place; Duluth was a Buchanon, but he wasn't brain dead. He was most likely hiding somewhere in town, waiting for a chance to call Leroy to come rescue him. Putting out an APB on Leroy would be difficult, since his name was pretty much all I knew and I doubted Harve would agree to a roadblock until we had a big-time bloodbath, with Beamers being splattered every which way and upstanding citizens like Willetta, Mrs. Panknine, and Doc Schmidt being seriously inconvenienced.

But, dammit, Duluth wasn't wily enough to keep escaping on his own. Earlier, when Willetta came into the PD, I'd been trying to think why one of the Beamers would have helped him. One of their own, no matter how unlikely a candidate for Miss Congeniality, had been murdered, and he was a suspect. Judith and Naomi had been at their campsite. Sarah had been preparing meals on four wheels, and Rachael had been at the café. Ruth was at the morgue.

Which left Deborah, who wasn't anywhere.

I realized it had been the better part of two hours since I'd dumped Bonita at the motel. I taped a note on the front door of the PD telling Les where I'd gone, then drove down the road and pulled up in front of the unit. The curtains were still drawn, a good omen. I subsequently found the door unlocked and the room empty, a distinctly bad one. If there were some way, I told myself, that I could just make everybody stay in place for even a fleeting moment or two, I might get somewhere. But, no, the aliens were clearly collecting them with the same exuberance Marjorie exhibited when confronted with a thick scattering of acorns.

Bonita was on foot, which helped. I went back outside and looked around, then drove slowly down the road, hoping she was not so addled by the pain pills that she had broken into Buttons and Bows to try on hats or into the body shop to, well, look for a body.

As I drove past the junkyard, I spotted Sarah walking alongside the road. I pulled over. "Want a ride?"

"Sure, thanks," she said as she got into the station wagon. "Far as I know, all forty meals were delivered. Those damn boys are so friggin' irresponsible that at times I want to grab them and shake them until their pitiful brains dribble out their ears."

"They're not volunteers?"

"Hell no, they're slave labor, same as me. Petrie and Eustace were arrested for vandalizing a cemetery, and Byron burned down a church a few miles from here. Chief Panknine persuaded the judge to give 'em community service. I'd rather see them doing time at the prison farm."

I glanced at her. "Slave labor? Didn't you tell me that you knew what you were getting into?"

"Community service was part of the deal. I took over from Ester, and the next Beamer will take over from me."

"What happened to Ester?"

"Nothing, far as I know. She didn't whine all the time like Ruth, but she admitted herself she wasn't cut out to live like that. She trained the both of us to fix the meals, then started cleaning the Robarts's house. She didn't like it, but at least she was making minimum wage. Of course most of it went to the Daughters of the Moon, same as everybody else's. After she managed to save a little money, Anthony gave her a ride to the bus station in Starley City."

"Wouldn't she have looked ... conspicuous?" I asked.

Sarah snickered. "She was so worried about that she bought herself a scarf at Buttons and Bows. Folks that noticed probably thought she'd been sick or something. And don't bother asking me where she went. Ruth was the only person she ever talked to. They used to sit out on the picnic table and whisper until Judith shooed them inside."

"What about Ester's children?"

"She said she'd send for them when she could. Before she left, she was acting like she expected to win the lottery and come back for them in a big white limousine. Now they're moping around and causing trouble."

I let it drop. "You want to stop at the café and have something to eat, or at least a glass of tea?"

"So you can keep trying to weasel information out of me?"

I parked in front of the Welcome Y'all Café. "Are you afraid Deborah might find out?"

Sarah's hand moved toward her forehead, as though she intended to push a lock of hair out of her eyes. Realizing the incongruity of the gesture, she managed a smile. "Old habits die hard, I guess. I'm not afraid of Deborah or anyone else. As long as I make my contribution, I'm free to do whatever I want. I'd probably go dancing over in Azure if I didn't look like something out of a cheap comic book. The good ol' boys might get the wrong ideas."

I put my hand on her arm. "Aren't you at all upset that Ruth was murdered yesterday?"

"Yeah, sure I am," she said. "She wasn't much help in the kitchen, but she was better than nothing. I hope you're paying, because I don't have a dime to my name."

We went inside. Most of the booths and half the tables were occupied; the buzz of voices faltered, then resumed. I reminded myself that Sarah was no more peculiar-looking than Rachael behind the counter. Several stools were uninhabited, one of which was conveniently situated next to Bonita, who was working on a cheeseburger that oozed mustard and catsup.

I let Sarah drift away and sat down. "I thought you were going to stay at the motel," I said in a low voice.

"The vending machine was out of peanut butter crackers."

"What if I'd needed you?"

Bonita wiped her chin with a paper napkin. "Then I guess you would have found me. It wasn't as if I was spending the afternoon at the library doing research. This is the only place open in the whole damn town, and believe me, I checked. No cars in front of the PD, no hustle and bustle at Buttons and Bows. I did learn something of interest while I walked down here, though. If you're ready to climb off of your high horse, I'll tell you."

I was tempted to pull rank and remind her that I was in charge of the investigation, courtesy of the Stump County sheriff, also known as her boss. However, I sighed and said, "My heels are on the ground. What?"

"Well, I was thinking that these women and their rotten children must have gotten here somehow."

"In a Honda Accord," I murmured, pointing discreetly at Sarah, who was whispering to Rachael at the end of the counter. "Norella had a car, too."

Bonita made me wait while she ate another bite. "Did you notice the body shop next to the church?"

"Yes," I said. I had noticed, after all; I just hadn't noticed anything much about it.

"If you want to hide stolen cattle, you add them to a herd. If you want to hide a car, you leave it parked with a bunch of other cars." She took a scrap of paper out of her shirt pocket. "I wrote down the license plate numbers of four cars that weren't obvious candidates for body work. Two have Arkansas tags, one Oklahoma, one Missouri. One of them's a Honda Accord."

"Very good, Bonita," I said.

"I should have thought of it sooner, but the pain pills dulled my thought process."

Fried chicken and creamed peas were having the same effect on mine. "Stay here and keep an eye on Sarah and Rachael," I said. "I need to call these in, but I can't see doing it from the pay phone by the restrooms."

"I already did."

"Oh."

"It may take time, it being Sunday, but we should know something in an hour or two. Did you learn anything from the prisoner at the PD?"

"He was convinced his ex-wife had brought his boys here, but he claimed not to have gone to the campgrounds. Until we have an identification -- "

"Les called me at the motel, since nobody was answering at the PD. Brother Verber wasn't the most coherent witness, but he was fairly sure the body at the lab was Norella Buchanon."

"Fairly sure?"

"That's what Les said." Bonita finished off her cheeseburger, licked mustard off her fingers, and looked at me. "Now what?"

13

"It seems pretty straightforward," I said. "She brought the boys here, so he came after her and killed her. Odds are good that he was drunk at the time and doesn't even remember doing it."

"Why kill her?"

I shrugged. "He has a temper. I've seen it in action."

"How did he know she'd be in the woods yesterday afternoon? What if another Beamer followed her?"

"None of them has anything resembling a motive. Ruth, or maybe I should say Norella, wasn't popular, but she told her mother she was leaving. I'd imagine the other Beamers would have cheerfully carried her suitcase and her boys to the road and left them to walk to her car. They may have been irritated with her, but I can't see them doing more than short-sheeting her bed and cutting off her nightly quota of herbal tea. Crushing someone's head requires blind rage."

"Divide and conquer?" suggested Bonita. "You take one of them and I'll take the other."

"Not just yet. These two are safe here, and Corporal Robarts is at their campsite, watching over the rest of them."

"Boy, that'd make me feel safer than a heifer in a barn with a coyote scratching at the door."

"Mrs. Robarts is in the market for a daughter-in-law with breeding potential. If I send you to her house for questioning, you're likely to end up on the sofa looking at Anthony's class photos and report cards."

"Okay, then what? I can't bear to just sit here when some poor woman's been killed like that."

"Did you bring your dental records? I'm sure Mrs. Robarts would like to examine them. Win any medals in highschool field and track? Swim team? Certificate from the health department that you're free of communicable diseases?"

Bonita floundered, then settled on self-righteous indignation. "Does Sheriff Dorfer know you carry on like this when you're in charge of a murder investigation?"

I stood up. "Beats me. I'm going to the PD to make a fresh pot of coffee, rock back in Chief Panknine's chair, and try to figure out how to proceed. You may come with me if you promise to keep your mouth closed. Your other options are to stay here and have a piece of pie, spend quality time with Willetta Robarts and amateur videos of Anthony starknaked in a wading pool, or go back to the motel and watch pay-for-view porn movies on the TV."

"I could interrogate the witness."

"Not exactly."

"Surely he's sobered up by now."

I told Sarah to stay at the café until I returned, then beckoned Bonita to follow me. While we drove to the PD, I described Duluth's disinclination to remain in jail for any length of time, even under what I had to admit was my watch. She was not impressed.

Les's car was parked by the door. Brother Verber was splayed in a chair, mopping his neck with his handkerchief. Les was likely to be in the back, gawking at the empty cell. I could hardly wait to tell him the whole story.

"So finally you show up," Brother Verber said with his customary eye for technicalities. "I must say I was mightily surprised you weren't here to offer support when I got back from this terrible ordeal. The very minute I went into that cold room and they pulled out the metal drawer, the only thing that kept me from keeling over was my unflagging faith in the Good Lord. I put my hands together to pray like I'd never prayed before."