Murder Grins and Bears It (2 page)

“
I have about thirty pounds
of day-old bakery in the car,” Carl told him. “Bear bait. You can
eat some of that.”

Little Donny perked right up, plopped
Barney’s old orange baseball cap with Budweiser printed across the
front on his head, and followed Carl and his coffee can of chicken
grease out the door.

“
Stay away from Carl’s can
of chicken grease,” I called out to Little Donny. I didn’t want my
favorite grandson smelling like a chicken and getting mauled by a
ravenous bear that weighed three times what he did.

About time, I thought when they pulled out
of the driveway in Carl’s station wagon. I rushed through the
house, grabbing my Blublocker sunglasses and oversized purse from
the dresser. After rummaging through Little Donny’s suitcase and
clothes, I pulled his car keys out of his jacket, which lay in a
heap the floor next to his bed. I let out a loud sigh of relief. If
the keys had been in the pants he was wearing, I’d have been dead
in the water.

At seven-thirty I tried to start Little
Donny’s car. I worked on it for fifteen minutes before phoning Cora
Mae, who lives down the road.

“
If I remember right,” I
said to her, “one of your husbands used to drive a stick shift
car.”

“
That was Earl,” Cora Mae
said, eating something crunchy into the phone.

“
By any chance, did you pay
attention to how he did it?”

“
Did what?” Cora Mae is a
mite slow in the morning but by noon she’s be sharp as a cracked
bullwhip.

“
Did you pay attention to
how he made the car go?”

“
Oh sure. He tried to teach
me, but I couldn’t get the hang of it. Your feet and hands have to
work at the same time. It’s complicated.”

“
But do you remember how he
did it?”

“
Sort of.”

“
I need your help,” I said.
“Come right over.”

I waited outside impatiently until she
eventually strolled up the driveway in her black, sleeveless knit
top, black stretch pants, and high-heeled black sandals. Cora Mae
just turned sixty-three but she doesn’t look or act her age. The
knit top was low cut and as tight as a sausage casing. Cora Mae
discovered Wonderbras last year and hasn’t been out of them since.
Her boobs stand right up and lead the way.

“
Cora Mae, can you speed it
up a little?” I said. “I’m going to miss the auction.”

She sashayed into the passenger seat and
studied the stick shift. “That’s a clutch,” she said, pointing at
the extra foot pedal. “You have to synchronize it with the gas.”
She used her hands to demonstrate. “Give it a try.”

She remembered most of it. The only part she
got wrong was the shifting order. After I tried to start out in
fourth gear a few times and did the jackrabbit hop, she remembered
it right, and we took off down the drive.

We blasted out onto the road in the stolen
Ford Escort at the same time as we heard the bang.

“
What was that?” Cora Mae
wanted to know.

“
This piece of junk is
backfiring,” I said, grinding through the gears. “And Little Donny
needs a new muffler.”

****

The County auction is held annually at the
Escanaba fairgrounds, forty miles down the road from Stonely. All
the surrounding municipalities get together and sell stuff they
don’t need anymore. Last year when I still had Barney’s truck, I
drove over and paid only thirty dollars for a perfectly good power
saw the forestry department was auctioning off.

“
Where are you getting the
money from to bid on a truck?” Cora Mae asked on the way over. “I
thought you were trying to live on your Social
Security.”

“
I’ve got resources,” I
hedged.

“
You dug up your money box,
didn’t you?”

“
It’s for a good
cause.”

After Barney died, I went to the bank and
withdrew every last penny of our money and buried it in a
waterproof steel box under the apple tree. It’s my insurance
against failing banks and an untrustworthy government.

I had to put it all back in the bank to beat
Blaze in court, but that was only a temporary arrangement.

My purse was stuffed with wadded greenbacks,
but I intended to hang on to as many as possible.

I dropped Cora Mae and her high heels at the
main gate and parked Little Donny’s Escort on the side of the road
about three blocks from the fairgrounds, hoping nobody would park
close by. If I had to use reverse, I was in real trouble.

We were just in time for the automotive part
of the auction, and Blaze’s old sheriff’s truck was the first
vehicle on the block.

“
Now, I know this truck
don’t look like much,” the auctioneer hollered while the crowd
hooted and roared with laughter, “but it sure can run. Only a
hundred thousand miles on it, and a hundred left to go.”

You could hardly hear him over the howling
going on.

“
What happened to it?”
yelled a fat heckler with a skull and crossbones tattooed on his
arm. “Looks like some clown spray-painted it yellow. Look, they
even spray-painted the door handle and all the trim.”

The crowd roared. I was beginning to get
annoyed, especially after the clown remark. I took it personally
since I was the one who’d tried to snazzy up Blaze’s rust bucket
with a little new paint. I did it to help him out and never got a
thank you for it.

In hindsight, I do have to admit spray paint
isn’t the best way to touch up a paint job. The paint ran in
streaks in some spots and it was real hard to keep off the windows.
That’s why I went ahead and sprayed the trim. Paint was on the
chrome already anyway.

“
Better haul this one off
to the junk yard,” some other wit in the crowd shouted.

I kept my eyes on the truck. It still had
the lights and siren on the roof and I was going to need that.
Someone had peeled off the Sheriff’s Department lettering but I
could still read what it had said since it was a different shade of
yellow from the rest of the truck.

“
Five hundred dollars,” I
called out.

The auctioneer’s head swung in my direction.
“We’re starting the bidding out at eight hundred. That’s rock
bottom.”

“
Then I’m bidding rock
bottom,” I said.

Rock bottom went once, twice, three times.
Sold to the little red-haired lady in the orange suspender
pants.

That was me, although my hair is more a
light copper shade than actual red.

I grinned to beat the band.

****

“
How are we going to get
both your new truck and Little Donny’s car home?” Cora Mae wanted
to know.

“
That’s why I brought you
along,” I said. “The truck is an automatic. You’ll be able to drive
it. I’ll drive Little Donny’s car with the stick shift and you can
follow me in the truck.”

“
But I never renewed my
driver’s license. I don’t have one.”

“
Neither do I, but in case
you haven’t noticed, I drive just fine.” Which was sort of a lie.
I’ve had a few scary moments and I’ve done a little damage, mostly
to my own property. My first attempt at driving was in Barney’s old
truck, and I only drove it for a week before I rolled it into a
ditch. “There’s no other way to do it, Cora Mae. You have
to.”

I paid up, filled out the required forms,
and motioned Cora Mae to hop into the passenger seat of my new
truck. I drove it out the side gate of the fairgrounds, around the
block, and parked next to Little Donny’s car. I pulled a
screwdriver from the back seat of the Escort and screwed Barney’s
old truck plates onto my bright yellow truck.

After taking all this in without lifting a
manicured finger to help, Cora Mae slid into the driver’s seat of
my new business vehicle and waited to follow me in the Ford Escort.
My grandson’s car jumped and lurched onto the road. I ground the
gears, the engine roared, I popped the clutch, and the car tore
off.

I was going to have whiplash before I got
this piece of junk back to Little Donny.

Before leaving Escanaba I turned into the
parking lot at the hardware store, with Cora Mae trailing in the
yellow truck.

“
I’ll be right back,” I
yelled to her and hitched my heavy purse up on my
shoulder.

The purse hung as heavy as a bucketful of
well water, but it was a critical part of my summer wardrobe. It’s
a lot easier to stash concealed weapons in the wintertime than in
the summer. In the winter, I wear a fishing vest under my hunting
jacket and fill all those little pockets with everything I need. I
didn’t have that choice when the hot weather rolls around.

Moments later I came out of the hardware
store carrying a lettering kit with sheets of black letters in
different sizes.

“
Let’s hit it,” I called to
Cora Mae.

****

I saw the commotion as soon as I turned down
Old Peterson Road. Cora Mae, following behind, almost hit me when I
slowed suddenly. Sheriff and fire vehicles jammed the road, all
trying to one-up each other by running every strobe light they had.
An ambulance, off to the side of the road, was surrounded by
deputies. One lane was sectioned off and guarded by a group of men
I recognized as assistant deputy volunteers. Blaze had recruited
them when he was reelected last year.

Word in the U.P. travels faster than a
skunked dog races for home. About thirty spectators had gathered,
not much of a crowd yet, which meant this was fresh-breaking
news.

I pulled over, careful to leave room between
Little Donny’s Ford Escort and the next vehicle so I could get out.
Cora Mae parked behind me. I ran back to my new truck, opened the
driver’s door and reached past Cora Mae to flip the lights and
siren switches. Might as well join the action. If I looked official
I might be able to drive right into the middle of the
commotion.

Nothing happened. I flipped the switches
three more times before I gave up. “Dang,” I muttered. “Nothing
ever works when you need it.”

Cora Mae teetered behind me in her spiked
heels as I elbowed my way to the front of the group.

“
Gertie Johnson,” I said,
identifying myself to the volunteer deputy facing me. “I have
clearance to move through.”

“
I’m sorry, but I have
orders from Blaze and he says everyone stays on that side of the
line.” He stretched his arms out along the rope.

“
I’m the sheriff’s mother,
do you know that?” He didn’t flinch when I tried to intimidate him
with my most threatening expression.

“
Yes, ma’am, I know, but
Blaze said nobody can pass. He didn’t leave special instructions
for you.”

Time to switch tactics. “What happened
here?” I asked him sweetly. I scanned the crowd of officials,
looking for Blaze. The volunteer, busy holding his line, didn’t
respond, so I turned back to the crowd. “Does anybody know what’s
going on?”

“
Don’t know,” a man next to
me said. He pointed off in the direction of the woods. “They
carried someone out on a stretcher a little while ago. I’m guessing
it was a dead body considerin’ the way it was covered up head to
toe with a blanket, eh.”

“
Dead hunter, for sure,”
someone said.

“
Car accident,” a woman
offered.

“
No crashed car around
here,” someone else said. “It’s a dead hunter.”

Something inside of me wanted to scream. I
grabbed Cora Mae by the arm and squeezed. “Little Donny and Carl
were hunting back in there,” I croaked, not bothering to hide the
panic in my voice. “Where’s my grandson?”

“
Don’t even think it,
Gertie. They’re okay.”

“
Little Donny was hunting
back there,” I repeated, feeling flushed and dizzy.

chapter 2

Recovering slightly, I ducked under the rope
and broke into a lope in my brand-new running shoes. I wasn’t
thinking too clearly. Fear wound a knot in my stomach and I felt a
surge of adrenaline. I planned to run as long as it took to find my
grandson.

A firm grip on the back of my suspenders
snapped me back.

“
Where you going, Ma?” a
familiar voice said.

“
Let go of me,” I cried
before I realized it was my son, Blaze.

He released his hold, and I grabbed his arm
and clenched it. “Where is he?” I demanded.

“
Where’s who?” Blaze’s face
was pale.

“
I heard someone’s dead,” I
said, squeezing his arm tighter. “Little Donny was in the woods
with Carl. Where’s Little Donny? Where’s Carl?”

Time seemed to crawl. Blaze opened his mouth
and very slowly the words traveled through the air. I was about to
smack him I was so desperate to hear reassuring words.

“
Carl’s over by my truck,”
Blaze said, pointing in the direction of the ambulance, “and Little
Donny seems to be missing at the moment.”

“
Little Donny’s not in the
ambulance, is he? Please tell me he isn’t in the
ambulance.”

“
No, Ma. He’s
not.”

I released my grip on Blaze’s arm and
clutched at my pounding heart. “That’s a relief. For a minute
there, I had a very bad feeling. I need to sit down.”

Blaze motioned and a folding camp chair
appeared out of nowhere. I dropped into it and steadied my
nerves.

“
Who’s in the
ambulance?”

“
A guy named Robert
Hendricks.”