Kent Conwell - Tony Boudreaux 04 - Vicksburg (23 page)

If the killer wasn’t Stewart or WR, it had to be Annebelle,
but she was not a southpaw. I had seen the DVD with her hitting practice balls to the players, right-handed.

Or maybe she was ambidextrous. Maybe WR was.

I shook my head in frustration and inserted the Monroe
and Beaumont fast-pitch softball game in the DVD, hoping
that Annebelle Edney would be nowhere in sight. That could
mean she slipped away at 1:30, raced home, killed the old
man, then returned in time for the 5:30 game.

What I saw dashed cold water on my little theory. In the
first inning as the lead-off hitter came to the plate, the camera panned the spectators, and there was Annebelle as big as
life. I replayed the scene several times just to be sure.

Fast forwarding through the remainder of the game, I
paused each time the spectators were panned. I failed to see
Annebelle again, but I had to reluctantly concede that the
camera had panned different segments of the spectators. The
game ended with the Marauders winners, six to four. In
the last pan at the end of the game, I spotted her once again.

I replayed the video.

The bleachers on which the spectators sat were aluminum, permitting a view of the parking lot behind. At the
beginning of the last inning, a blue pickup drove behind the
bleachers. I replayed the clip several times. I couldn’t tell
the make, but I remembered the blue Ford F150 pickup
parked in front of the old man’s house when Jack and I drove
in on Monday.

I wondered if the pickup on the tape could be Annebelle’s.
Sure, she was sitting in the stands at the end of the game, but
still, I hadn’t seen her from about 1:40 until after 5. Maybe
my theory wasn’t so far off base after all.

The time of JW Edney’s death was 2:40. I did some fast
calculating. There was still time. She could have left Jackson
at 1:40, committed the murder at 2:40, and got back to
Jackson by 5. I just needed proof she wasn’t at the game the
entire time.

And she could have been the one to order the naphtha, not
Stewart. Their voices were similar.

A wild idea hit me. It was a long shot, but sometimes long
shots pay off. I called Tom Garrett.

His temperament had mellowed somewhat, having all the
vitriol of a rattlesnake. “Yeah?”

“Garrett, it’s me, Boudreaux. Do you have any connections with the state highway patrol?”

“What’s on your mind now?”

I held my tongue. “Just tell me”

“Some. Why?”

“Check for a ticket issued to Annebelle Edney on the
twenty-sixth between the times of one-thirty P.M. and fivethirty.”

He muttered a curse. “Look, I’m getting tired of this non-
sense, Boudreaux. You’re just wasting everybody’s time.
Why don’t you do like the rest of us and accept the medical
examiner’s findings, that JW Edney died by a fire he
caused?”

Suppressing the peals of anger ringing in my ears, I held
my temper. Obviously, Garrett had paid no attention to the
death, nor, I reminded myself, should he. The ME declared
it accidental. “Listen carefully, Detective. The body lay on
its right side at the base of the table. Now, if the fracture to
the skull was caused by the fall, the injury would be on the
right side. Correct?”

He snorted. “Yeah”

“Edney’s skull was fractured on the left, indicating that a
left-handed person stood behind him and struck him on the
left temple. A blow on the left temple would have knocked
the old man to the floor, on his right side. You agree?”

Garrett did not speak for several seconds.

“Garrett? You still there?”

He snarled. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m here. Go on. So what did the
medical examiner say? You did ask him about that, didn’t
you?”

“He surmised that when the sparks exploded, JW Edney
spun from the table, stumbled and fell to his left, and then
while he was unconscious and suffocating, he rolled over to
face the table. But,” I added, trying to sound much more
authoritative than I felt, “anyone with experience in smoke
inhalation deaths will tell you that it is impossible for an
unconscious person who is asphyxiating to roll over.” I
paused. “That’s why I say this was murder and not an accident.”

Garrett remained silent for several seconds, but I could
hear the seasoned lawman’s brain working. I hoped he was
seasoned enough to not let personalities influence him.
Finally, he said, “All right. Tell me again what you need”

I repeated my request.

“You’re playing a long shot here, Boudreaux. Besides, a
search like that could take days.”

“If they inputted it in the database, it won’t.”

He hesitated, then, “All right. Anything to get you back to
Podunk Holler.”

Before he hung up, I said, “Hey, thanks for the phone records. We couldn’t have done it any faster back in Podunk
Holler.”

Garrett was still cursing when I hung up.

After hanging up, I inserted the corrected DVD in the
player. I kept my fingers crossed. And there she was,
Annebelle Edney, right in front of my eyes, hitting balls to
the team, and, to my stunned surprise, left-handed.

Excited, I hit the pause button and fumbled with the phone,
placing a call to Matt Barnes in Jackson. When he answered,
I blurted out, “You gave me a corrected copy of the
Vicksburg game. What was wrong with the initial editing?”

“I thought I told you”

“No, no. What was it? You didn’t tell me.” My words tumbled over one another.

“No big deal. We accidentally reversed the images.”

For a moment, I was speechless. I had not even thought of
such a possibility. Then I remembered the number of southpaws on the team in the first DVD. That should have told me
something, but the idea never occurred to me. “You mean,
you reversed the images?” I knew I sounded like a dummy,
but I was too stunned to ask an intelligent question. I repeated myself. “You reversed the images?”

He laughed. “Yeah. Reversed. You know, flip-flopped,
backwards. They’re straight on the new one though”

I clung to my newest theory, hoping to prove it when I
talked to Annebelle. To do that, I had to be sure I asked the
right questions.

Spreading the telephone records and note cards on the
desk, I jotted several questions beginning with the signing of
the will on July 24. I hesitated. For some reason, the date
leaped out at me. I studied the card, then those on either side,
one of which indicated that on July 17 JW Edney purportedly called his attorney to instruct a new will; the other had
the assertion from Doc Raines down at Vicksburg Auto Parts
that two days before JW’s death, they had attended an
antique car show in Lafayette, Louisiana.

Then, like a sixteen-pound sledgehammer, it hit me
between the eyes. The nagging thought that had kept worrying at me all week, telling me I had missed something. There
it was, plain as the proverbial nose on my face.

I muttered a soft curse. “The missing piece” How could I
have been so thick-witted. “Why didn’t I see that?” I muttered. The day he attended a car show with Doc Raines two
hundred and fifteen miles to the south in Lafayette is the day
he was purportedly signing the new will in lawyer Goggins’
office!

I opened my copy of the new will and checked the date.
Sure enough, July 24. My fingers fumbled from the excitement coursing through my veins as I picked up the card
dated the twenty-fourth and reread it. According to
Annebelle on Monday evening after the heirs met with
Goggins, she told WR that her father had called her on the
twenty-fourth just after lunch to tell he signed the new will.
Impossible!

“Slow down, Tony,” I muttered. “Think. Surely, Annebelle
and Goggins aren’t so stupid as to claim her father signed
the new will on a day he was out of town. What if they
hadn’t known he was out of town?”

Hastily, I called Doc Raines at the Vicksburg Auto Parts.
“Are you certain that you and JW were in Lafayette on the
twenty-fourth and fifth?”

“Absolutely,” he replied. “I was just going by myself, but
at the last moment, I called JW. He’d planned to stay home
and work on his cars, but he just said, `What the heck,’ and
came along.”

“Spur of the moment, huh?”

Doc laughed. “Yep. Didn’t tell anyone. In fact, on the
drive down, he mentioned that he needed to call his housekeeper when we reached Lafayette so she wouldn’t worry.”

I grinned with satisfaction, thanked him, and hung up. On
impulse, I headed for the kitchen where I found Alice.

“Yes, sir. Can I get something for you?”

“One question, Alice. Last Friday, the twenty-fourth.
Did Mr. Edney happen to get a phone call from his daughter?”

She frowned, then nodded. “Annebelle. Yes, sir. I told her
he was out, but likely he would soon be back. A few hours
later, just before I left for the day, he called telling me he
was in Lafayette. I tried to call Miss Annebelle back, but
there was no answer.” She hesitated. “Is everything all
right?”

.,Is everything all right?” I laughed and picked her up
and swung her around. “Everything is perfect, Alice, just
perfect”

Back in my bedroom, I stared at the cards on my desk.
Now all I had to do was confirm the evidence, and I had my
killer.

At that moment, the phone rang. It was Garrett. “You got
lucky, Boudreaux,” he said, the hostile edge gone from his
voice. “A warning ticket was given to Annebelle Edney at
four-fifty P.M. between mile markers thirty-four and thirtyfive on 1-20 on July 26”

I shouted into the receiver. “Fantastic!”

“Hey! What the-”

I hastily apologized. “Sorry, Garrett. I didn’t mean to yell
in your ear. That little tidbit just about nails the lid on her.”

He hesitated. “What are you talking about?”

“Annebelle Edney.”

“She killed her old man? I don’t believe it.”

Quickly, I detailed what I had discovered.

Garrett wasn’t impressed. “A good lawyer could tear it to
pieces.”

“Maybe. But, what if I can get either Goggins or
Annebelle to admit it?”

“You’ll never get a lawyer to admit it, and she would just
turn around later and deny saying it.”

“Not if you were there”

For a moment, a pregnant silence greeted my ears. “What
do you have in mind?”

“What if I met Annebelle someplace where you could
hear her admission?”

“Like where?”

I pondered the question a moment. Then, I thought of the
perfect spot. “Out at the military park. There’s a site with a
cave. Thayer’s Approach. Site number six, I think. You could
get there ahead of time. From what I read, the cave’s at the
bottom of the stairs. You hide inside. I’ll meet her just in
front of the cave”

“How are you going to get her out there?”

“I’ve been thinking about that. She might need a little
nudge. I think I can give it to her.”

He hesitated. Finally, “Sounds just dumb enough to work.
If that’ll help get you back to Podunk Holler, I’ll jump right
in. What time?”

“I’ll let you know. I’ll contact her. Try to set it up for
around four.”

Hastily slipping the cards into my shirt pocket, I hurried
downstairs, anxious to pay William Goggins a visit.

Goggins greeted me as he would any prospective client,
solicitous of my well-being, considerate of my intentions,
and concerned about my progress. He studied me intently. “I
heard through the grapevine about the accident in your pickup. I hope you weren’t injured.” The worried look in his eyes
did not reflect his concerned words.

I relaxed. Jack had stayed with our cover story. “News
travels fast around here”

His expression remained unchanged as he chuckled and
gestured to the red leather chair. “You know how small
towns are. Nothing exciting ever happens. WR told me about
the damage to your pickup. If I’m not mistaken, he learned
of it from Jack. Please. Have a seat. Tell me, how is the
investigation going? Well, I hope”

I nodded. “As well as can be expected”

“So, what do you need from me?”

Behind his smooth facade, I sensed a tense wariness, like
an animal bunched and waiting to leap. “Not much,” I
replied casually. “Just want to verify the date on the new
will. I had made a note of it, but-” I shrugged. “You know
how it goes. I misplaced it”

The wariness faded. “No problem,” he replied with a
voice as smooth as honey. He picked up his phone and
requested his secretary to bring him the Edney file.

She remained standing by his desk as he flipped the portfolio open and retrieved the will. “Here, Mr. Boudreaux,” he
said, opening the document and handing it to me. “See for
yourself. At the bottom. By his signature.”

“I see. July 24. One-forty-three P.M. That’s odd.” I looked
up at him. “Are you sure that was the correct date?”

He bristled. “Certainly. For the sake of our clients and
their welfare, we cannot afford mistakes.”

I apologized profusely. “I didn’t mean to offend you, Mr.
Goggins. I probably misunderstood another witness who
claimed JW was out of town on that day. I’ll doublecheck
my information.”